Transcription
[Music] Well, the Lord be with you. If you have a Bible, and I hope that you do, would you turn with me? We are going to be looking at the book of First Corinthians this morning, and we're going to be in chapter 3, starting in verse 5. And we're actually going to work through the entirety of the rest of this chapter. So, 1 Corinthians chapter 3, verses 5 to the end of the chapter.
And this morning, I want to encourage us to hear the words of Paul and to live a lasting life, to live a life that matters, that counts, and that has lasting significance. Through this letter, Paul is writing to a church, a church in the city of Corinth. And now, this is a church that Paul has already founded. He is the one that established this church. And in the beginning, they started out really well. They, they heard the gospel of Christ, they received him as Lord and Savior.
And now, as Paul is on another missionary journey, he's been hearing reports about what's going on in the church and he's been receiving letters, questions about some concerns going on within this church family. Because what we see in the text is that the culture of the city is infiltrating the church, where there is all of this emphasis on social status, on affluence, on these rogue philosophies and wisdoms that are being promoted within this culture. With all of the different people traveling and trading and it being multicultural, we see that this is starting to infiltrate the church, where the church is starting to prioritize other things apart from Christ and his gospel message.
There are these individuals who are, who are promoting themselves and saying, "I am of this group." And we see that there are actually factions forming within the church. You see some that are saying, "I'm of Paul, the one who founded the church. That's my guy. That's who I follow. That's who maybe baptized me." You have others who are saying, "Well, I'm of Apollos, the most eloquent Christian speaker, maybe at the time, someone who everyone wanted to have come, come preach at our church. Apollos, you're awesome." We have people saying, "I'm of Apollos. He baptized me."
Then we have others who are claiming, "I'm of Cephas, that is of Peter." You know, he's one of the main apostles. He's the one that was called "The Rock." And he's the one that we see doing all of this amazing, miraculous signs in the book of Acts. And so, we have all of these different Christians within this church family looking to these different human leaders. And what it's doing is it's actually dividing the church. They're starting to see, "How can I elevate myself in the church? How, how can I find more importance based on who I associate myself with?"
And so, what they're doing is they're living like the world, where they're competing and they're comparing themselves, rather than recognizing their identity in Christ. And so, what Paul does at the very beginning of this book is he calls them out of the culture and back into their identity in Christ. They need to understand that they are fundamentally equals. That they are one, because we are all equal at the, at the foot of the cross. And so, he's been calling them regularly back to the gospel message. He keeps pointing them back to the gospel. He says, "The gospel is what will unite you. The reason you're divided is because you've lost sight of the gospel."
"What I have come to preach to you is no other message but Christ crucified." And this message, though it may seem foolish to the world, the Jews would look at a suffering Messiah and they'd say, "That, that's just radical. That's foolishness." The Greeks would think that this is, this is just insane to think that deity would lower himself and become material and then suffer and die by crucifixion, which once again, Romans wouldn't even use the term crucifixion because it was too profane to come out of their lips. It was not something you would use in polite conversation. But now, this is the message that is proclaimed in the church. This is the, the sign that we see in our churches when we see a cross or a crucifix, that we are literally proclaiming a suffering, dying Savior, a God who would come and lower himself to be a servant. That is the message. And though it will seem foolish to the world, we know, for those who are saved, it is the power and the wisdom of God.
And so, he keeps pointing them back to this gospel message. And now, as he's writing in the beginning of chapter 3, if you remember last time, he then starts to call them out on not growing in their understanding of Christ and the gospel. Because the gospel is good, the gospel is wise, the gospel is powerful, but that's just the beginning of our faith journey. And the problem was is that he wanted to give them deeper truths, let them see and understand the deeper things of God. But because they have not grown, they just continue to be stagnant. They're coasting in their spiritual life. They are not able to receive the deeper things of God.
And so, he says, "I have to give you milk again. I cannot give you the solid things, the deeper things of God, because you have not been growing. You have not been maturing." And so, he's giving them this pretty harsh rebuke here. And sometimes, I kind of emphasized this last time, we miss out on really what he's saying here when he calls them carnal. He says that you are fleshly, you are of the world, you look and live like you are lost. And likewise, when he says that you are spiritual babes, he's basically saying, "You are a bunch of babies. You are disturbing Christians because you still need milk." And I talked about this, you know, a baby that nurses is cute. A 30-year-old is disturbing. That's what he's calling them out on. He's making it very blunt for them to understand their spiritual situation.
Well, now he's going to just continue to press his foot on the gas as we look in verses 5 moving forward, because he wants them to really consider their life and ministry. When they claim Christ, him crucified, when they say that they believe the gospel, they are a church family, they are the Church of God. How are they really living their lives? What are they valuing? What are they prioritizing? And so, he then begins to explain who we are, once again, in Christ. Who, what is our identity?
And I think what we see in the first few verses of this section, verses 5 to 9, we see Paul emphasizing that every saint is a servant. He's already explained early in the letter that they are all called to be saints. That every single one in the church has been sanctified. They've already been set apart. So, we are already, our identity is a saint. You, if you are a true follower of Christ, if you have received the gospel message, you are a saint right now. But the problem is, they weren't living up to their sainthood. They were not living up to their identity. And so, he's been unpacking what it means to be a saint.
And I think what he shows us here is that if you really want to live out saintly lives, a saint fundamentally is a servant. Just notice how Paul describes himself and Apollos, just in the very beginning here. He says, "Who then is Paul and who is Apollos? But ministers through whom you believed." Now, some translations, translations will say "servants" because it's using a word that could be basically be interchangeable there. He's saying, "Who am I? Who is this eloquent speaker, Apollos? Who is, who is Cephas? Who is Peter? We are all servants. Why are you looking to us for your identity? Why are you looking to the pastor for your identity? Why are you looking to a political figure for your identity, or some social media influencer, some celebrity? Why are you trying to identify with them?" You're identifying with something that is lesser than.
And that's why he even goes on in verse 7. He says, "So then, neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters." He says, "We are nothing. We are just humble servants." He's kind of dehumanizing himself for the, the purpose of of making his point. He's showing us that if you want to be a saint, stop focusing on your social status and focus on the Savior. And in fact, we know that when we look at the words of Christ, true greatness is found in serving. Matthew 20:26-28 says, "Whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave. Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many."
See, Jesus wants us as Christians to be truly great. That should be encouraging. He wants us to be great. You know that. But it's not how the world defines greatness. It's what the kingdom defines greatness. We are to strive after greatness, and that is found by being a humble servant of the King. And by the way, that should be really exciting to think about. That when we get up every morning, it's not that we're just any servant. You are a servant of the King. Not a king, the King of the universe, the Lord of Glory. That is who you directly serve. And know that is your identity. You are His saint. You are His servant. And so, we cannot think of any higher calling. Nothing will be greater than being His servant, His representative, His ambassador.
And so, what we see here is that Paul starts to explain that we, as saints who are called to serve, will serve in different ways. And so, he explains that, you know, there's some who will plant like Paul. There will some will be some who will water like Apollos. But then there's others. There's some that will till the soil, and there will be some who will reap the harvest. His point is, stop competing with one another. And he's going to get in this book later, he's going to talk about how we are a body who comes with different gifts, ultimately to, um, encourage and build up the body. That these gifts have meant to encourage and edify one another.
And so, what he's saying is, you're not better because you plant or water or or till the soil or or maybe the one that actually reaps the harvest. Maybe you're the one that gets to hear someone come to Christ and profess Christ. Maybe you're the one that baptizes them in the water. But you have to remember that there's this ongoing work that's happening where some have already been planting the seed, some have been watering, maybe for years, decades. There's some that have been working on the soil. But we are to compete. Rather, we are to just value the fact that we are all working together in this process of advancing the kingdom and bringing other people to know Jesus as Lord and Savior.
And Paul even says on this, not only does he explain that we have different functions, but then he says that we are all one in purpose here. He says, "Now he who plants and he who waters are one." See, the goal for all of us is to make Christ known to the world. And so, if someone is good at planting or watering or doing different things, we praise God for it because we're not competing. If a church is growing and booming in another town or or in the same town as us, that's not competition for us. That's, we give God glory for that because what we see is that God is bringing the increase.
And so, every single servant is necessary. Every single one of us as saints are important for the kingdom to advance. But then he goes to the point here is that, but ultimately, true growth is always God-given. See, if someone never plants, there's never going to be growth. If someone never waters, you might have good planting, but if there's no water coming to give nutrients to the seed, then it's not going to grow. But you know, there's something where someone may have all of the conditions right, where you plant, you water, you've been taking care of the, the soil, and there's still no growth. Why is that? Because ultimately, all these little steps along the way is not what brings the growth. These are just part of the process. But ultimately, all growth comes from God.
Now, that comes from when we're talking about numerical growth within a, a local congregation, as well as spiritual growth within your own personal life. All growth comes from God. It says in the text, "God gives the increase." In John 3:27-30, John the Baptist says this, "A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven. You yourselves bear me witness that I said, 'I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him. He who has the bride is the bridegroom. But the friend of the bridegroom who stands and hears him rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice. This joy of mine is fulfilled. He must increase, but I must decrease.'"
See, John the Baptist is is hearing what his disciples are saying. And the fact is, there's many of these disciples who were leaving John the Baptist and his ministry to follow Jesus. And some of them were saying, "Like, this might be a problem. We're not, we're not getting the same numbers that we used to be getting, John." Like, "What's going on here?" And he explains, ultimately, no matter how big or small someone's ministry is, guess what? It's not because of how amazing the speaker is, how gifted the speaker is. It's what God is doing in His sovereign will.
Because we understand this, right? We've seen churches that have, they don't have all the spectacle, but all of a sudden, one day, there's a revival that takes place and the church just blows up. And you go from like 20 to a thousand. And then we have other churches where they have all the stuff, and for some reason, they just die out. Why is that? It's because God is the one ultimately that gives the increase. And I love John's spirit here and his posture. And I think that we, in ministry, especially, can learn and humble ourselves to be more like John is to recognize, it's not about us. "He must increase." And I love this part. It's not just "him increasing." Because we like that part usually. Christians are good with the "him increasing." But the other part is "decreasing." That we actually decrease. Not "he increases and we increase." "He increases, we decrease." That's the humble posture that we should have before our Lord.
Let us get as low before Him. You know, there's this thing in martial arts that, you know, whenever you're bowing for your, your teacher, that you, you, you stay lower, um, with when you're bowing to the teacher, and you wait for him to get up. And the more respect you give to them, the lower you get. We should all be flat on the floor when we think about what we are doing, when we are giving reverence and worship to our God, when we are thinking about about who Jesus is.
So, true growth comes from God. Now, that does not mean that servants are unimportant. Of course, servants are the means, not the cause of growth. God has selected us to be the ones He uses as instruments for growth. And I think it's so important that we just kind of use this, maybe as an example to, to, to visualize. Imagine if you have not had water in days, and that, you know, it's not long before you will die of thirst, literally. Maybe you've been on a deserted island. There is no access to clean drinking water. Now, if I came to you and I had fresh drinking water, and I came to you and I was about to offer it to you, and then I was like, "Oh, wait, this is in my kid's Bluey cup." You probably don't want this water. Let me go take it back. You probably need it in in this bottle, this glass bottle. No, you wouldn't care if it was in the Bluey cup, would you? You'd probably drink it out of the river if it was clean and it would, if it would sustain you.
The purpose is, it's not the vessel. It's not the vessel. It's what's in the vessel. It's what's coming from the vessel. It's what's going to give you life and sustain you. It's the living water. That's the purpose. It doesn't matter who we are, what we look like, where we come from. It's ultimately, are we offering the world living water? Are we offering them the thing that will nourish and satisfy their souls? And so, that's what we need to understand is that we are just the cup. We are just the bottle. We are just the vessels. We are saints. We are servants. But we will never be the Savior. That's when we get it all mixed up. That's what was going on with the Corinthians. They were starting to try, try to elevate themselves and think of themselves as self-important. Whereas he's saying, "You're not the Savior."
Men, fathers, husbands, we need to hear this. You are not the savior of your home. You're not the savior of your kids. You're not the savior of your community. Likewise, women, moms, wives, you're not the savior. You're not supposed to be. You're supposed to trust God, serve Him faithfully, and He gives the increase. He provides life and growth. And then we then just serve and rejoice.
Now, that doesn't mean that how we serve does not matter. Of course. And he's going to start to unpack for us in this text how what we do and how we serve does matter. But what, but the point is, is that what matters is not men's view of our ministry, but God's. As we serve, we don't see how the world sees and say, "Well, it doesn't look like, you know, you're doing very much for God." No. God ultimately knows what's in our hearts, what's in our intentions, what we are doing in the secret place. We don't need to be concerned about what men think about us. We need to be concerned about what God thinks about us and how we are serving Him.
Because in the text, it then says that "God will reward each one according to their work." God will reward His faithful servants. I think of Matthew 25:21, where it says, "His lord said to him, 'Well done, good and faithful servant. You were faithful over a few things. I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your Lord.'" Those are the words that we want to hear when we breathe our last breath. And when we open our eyes in glory, we want to see Jesus. We want to see Him glorified. And we want to hear those words, "Well done, good and faithful servant." And then He will give us reward. Rewards. Sometimes we get a little weird about talking about rewards. But if you read the Bible, you'll see rewards are all over the place. Jesus promises us rewards. Now, of course, we don't let the rewards overshadow our relationship with Christ. Christ is King. But we can also be excited about the other things that come with Christ in His kingdom, the rewards that He offers us.
And now, it doesn't explain all of the details, what all of these rewards are going to exactly look like and how that will play out in eternity. But we can be encouraged and excited from the fact that there will be rewards given for faithful servants. But we see that within this, there's also a warning in verses 10 to 15. And what we see is that Paul actually kind of moves from an agricultural metaphor into an architectural metaphor. Where he was talking about these servants planting in a field or a garden, well, now he kind of moves from the garden and he goes into a building. And he wants you to start to think about, not only how you plant, but how are you building the kingdom? How are you building the church? How are you building people's lives? How are you building up spiritually?
And what he shows us in this text is that every work will be tested. God is so much more concerned about the quality of your work than He is the quantity. God is not going to be looking and saying, "Give me all your stats. Tell me how many times, how many people, how many baptisms." He's not going to be asking about that. He's going to say, "What quality work have you done with what I have given you?" Because once again, He gives the increase. But when He gives you something, do you squander it, or do you take advantage of it and honor Christ with it?
And what Paul goes on to explain is, as he gives this image now as of a building, he explains that he, Paul, was like a skilled master builder as he's building up the church. And he, he says, "He has laid the foundation, not *a* foundation, *the* foundation." And that foundation is Jesus Christ. So, every church ultimately must be laid on that foundation, which is Jesus Christ. And I think it's important that we see this, because there are so many so-called churches today who are building not on Christ. They're building on personalities, programs, politics, emotions, social agendas, or maybe just niche theologies. That is, things that are actually biblically true, but you make it your entire ministry. It's like, "I love, I saw this one really awesome thing. I, I got, gained revelation on this one passage." And now the entire church is all about this one passage, this one theme, whereas we need the whole counsel of God's word.
See, what we see here is that there are so many that are building on a foundation that is not really a foundation. I said this before, that if we have people coming up here preaching in our pulpits and Christ is not mentioned, you need to leave our church. There's a quote by Charles Spurgeon, and I, and I, I enjoy many of his quotes, but I think sometimes he gets a little extreme with the way that he will phrase things. But he makes a comment, something along the lines of, "If a man preaches a sermon without ever uttering the name of Jesus, that should be his last." And now, I think that if there's young men and that are trying to work in ministry, maybe you coach them up a little, disciple them before just getting, you know, casting them to the side immediately. But I do think that the spirit of it is true. When we have Christian people coming to hear Christian sermons, the sermons need to be Christian. I don't care if you're preaching from the Old Testament, because we know Jesus has said, "Moses wrote about me." He showed them how the law and the prophets were all fulfilled in Him. So, if you were preaching from the Old Testament and you don't see Jesus in it, you're not seeing the same scripture. Because all of scripture ultimately points to the one true foundation, which is Jesus Christ.
I've also shared this story before. Whenever I lived in the Outer Banks for a period of time, there was a church I visited. And I noticed that they didn't have communion during the service. Which I understand that there's different denominations and how frequent they, they partake of communion together. But I just was wanting to know, like, how often they partook of communion. And the first person that spoke to, which was like the, the hospitality person, they didn't know. And so they asked one of their ministers to come forward. And when I asked them that, they said, "I believe it's once a month, but really, we only do it whenever it's relevant to the service." Do you see the mistake there? If communion is not always relevant, what are you preaching? Because communion is proclaiming the sacrifice of Christ and reminding us that He is returning. So, so if you're not seeing the person, the work of Christ, and it's not relevant, I don't know what you are proclaiming in this church. Christ crucified should always be relevant if it is a church.
And the thing is, now he says that with that foundation, we have to establish that must be our foundation. Then how we build upon it is going to be judged. He goes on to explain that we all will stand before the Judgment Seat of Christ. In 2 Corinthians 5:10, it says, "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad." Now, some of you are reading this and like, "Well, wait a second. I thought we were saved by grace through faith. Why is it saying that we are going to stand before the Judgment Seat of Christ and be judged about what we do, whether it's good or bad?"
Well, it's important that we recognize that this is not the Great White Throne Judgment that is being described here in 2 Corinthians or in this passage that we're reading in chapter 3. Rather, this judgment is not concerning our salvation. This judgment is concerning our service. And now Paul starts to unpack this for us here, as he explains that the way that we serve the Lord, the works that we do in this life, they are either going to be in one category where they're listed as the gold, the silver, the costly stone. And what this is meant to do is is refer to enduring quality work. He says, but there are going to be others who, they're going to be building on this foundation, they're going to be doing things in life, doing things in their ministry, and they're going to be compared to wood, to hay, and the straw.
And he says that one day, all of these works are going to be tested. Every single thing that you have ever done for Christ will be tested. And the question is, will they stand the test? Because it says that they will be tested by fire. This is a judgment every single Christian is going to experience. And we understand when fire comes on wood and hay, what does it do? It burns up. It disintegrates. But we know with gold, it actually purifies. It makes it more precious, more costly. So, the question is, when God comes, when Christ tests our works, our lives, how we've meant to serve Christ in this life, will it be purified? Will you receive a reward, or will it all be lost? Will every single thing that you have done in this life be lost?
Once again, he says here that "anyone's work that is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he still will be saved." This is not saying you're going to go to hell. This, this is not a salvation question. This is a question of, "Will you suffer loss? Will you be saved by Jesus, but then squander your life on these temporary things?" You can go find wood and hay outside right now. But I'm sure many of us don't expect to just go outside and find gold and silver anywhere we look, because one passes away. It doesn't matter. You can burn it up quickly. And the others, you have to search for. You have to work for. You have to value them.
And I think this is also just a humble reminder for us. And sometimes we hear this preached in churches where we say that not all, um, or that all sins are equal. Maybe you've heard that before. And though it's true that all sin deserves punishment, the wages of sin is, is death, I don't think it's biblical to say that all sins are equal. In fact, we know that Jesus says that there are weightier matters of the law. We know that Jesus says that it'll be more tolerable in the day of Sodom for other cities. Why is that? It's because there are some who do more grievous, um, grievous things that, that will go against God's will. Likewise, not all servants are as faithful. Yes, we all get Christ as our reward, but not everyone standing here or sitting here this morning is going to receive the same reward. It's because there's going to be some who've been faithful. They've been doing everything they can to, you know, what does Jesus say? He says, "To store up treasures in heaven. To set your mind on the things above." There's going to be many faithful servants who've done just that, and they're going to be honored for it.
But there's going to be many others who, they got their ticket to heaven. They've experienced grace. But then they did what some of these Corinthians did. They stayed as spiritual babies for life. They never moved into the deeper things of God, and they never experienced these rewards that are available, offered to them. And so, what that means is, we need to examine our lives. Think about the doctrines, the actions, and the motives that you have. What do you believe, and why do you believe it? Some of you, once again, your spiritual life is like a preschool level right now. You probably couldn't explain to me the fundamentals of the faith without going into heresy or saying something that would go against very common, basic teachings. What do you believe? Why do you believe it? Are you studying to show yourself approved? Are you growing in your knowledge of the Lord, and are you living it out? Are your actions, when, when Christ will evaluate what you did with what you learned?
So many of us come to, to church on Sundays, and we go to church on maybe Wednesdays, or we have small groups, or we have other things that we are involved in. You have all of this revelation that has been given to you. You will be judged, judged more strictly with what the revelation you've been given. Especially, we know teachers will definitely be judged more strictly with what they've been given. You have all this revelation week in and week out. Are you applying it? Does your life show that you are living for the Lord?
And then finally, your motivations. Now, this one's even harder. Because here's the thing, you might have the good doctrine, and you might even be doing the right things. You might be coming to the services, you might be, you know, feeding the poor, you might be sharing the gospel. What's in your heart? Are your motivations, and are your intentions to glorify God? Or is it like these individuals here who were once again trying to self-serve, to exalt themselves? Because our ultimate motivation, every single morning, the very first thing that we should be thinking about is, "How can I glorify God?" Some of you probably never thought about that when you woke up. That should be the thought that goes through our mind every single day.
I just want to read this verse for you, and maybe you highlight this if you don't already, or memorize this. In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 31: "Whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." Now, what does that mean? When you wake up, do it to the glory of God. When you shower, do it to the glory of God. When you brush your teeth, do it to the glory of God. When you greet your spouse or your children, when you go to work, when you relate to your neighbors, your family, do it to the glory of God. Because Paul, in that context, actually is talking about food and drink. He's not even talking about all these other things about prayer and worship. He says, "All aspects of our lives should be done to the glory of God."
And that is how we can know that our life will matter. When you have Christ, who is a lasting foundation, and whenever you live your life to the glory of God, everything you do, you're trying to build with precious stones, precious metals. You want to do your very best for God. And so, that means that you are wanting to advance the gospel to the world. You are wanting to help the hurting, the broken in this world. You are serving in your church. You are studying the word of God. You are spending time with the Father in the secret place. All of these things are lasting. All of these things are eternal, and there will be rewards for you.
But if you decide to choose the, the wood, the hay, and the straw, if you choose all of these things that the world is prioritizing, I mean, once again, you can enjoy them, but they're passing. They're fleeting. They will be gone. And you're going to be that person who are still overjoyed because Jesus has saved you, but you're going to be that person that says, "I don't have anything else." And once again, in, in, in heaven, we're not going to be, you know, we're not going to be comparing ourselves in one sense, but it does say in the text that you will suffer loss. It's not a positive thing here. I think that we need to wrestle with this and have a little bit more mature theology as we think about our salvation and our sanctification here, that we really want to take this passage seriously when he says that our works will be tested by fire, our doctrines, our actions, and our motives. They will be evaluated.
And finally, the, in closing verses 16 to 23, we need to understand that why our building is so important. As he went from the garden to the building, he now zeros in on what type of building. And he shows us that the church is God's temple. In verse 16, it says, "Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are."
See, Paul explains now, as we've been talking about building on the foundation that is Christ, he talks about how the church, the local church, is described as a temple in which God's Spirit lives. How powerful is that? Think about the Old Testament imagery in the passages where they had the, the, um, the Tabernacle, and you see that you have the presence of God through the cloud and the pillar of fire there. And you think that's God's presence with the Tabernacle. And then we see that at one point, the, the Shekinah glory comes into the temple when they, they built and established the temple, and God's presence comes in. He is saying that that Spirit, God's presence, is now with the church.
In fact, we see in Romans 8:11, it says, "But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you." He says, "You have the same Spirit that was with the Ark, that was with the temple, but also the Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead." So, that supernatural resurrection power lives within you as a believer. Not only that, but also within the local church, right now, with us gathered as believers, we all have the Spirit within us, and we have the Spirit around us. We have to remember that we are not materialists. There is a spiritual realm, and we have our God with us. We have the Spirit with us. We are to view this holy assembly, who we are as saints and servants, we are a holy temple.
Are there some things that you do in the church, or rather, are there certain things that you don't do in the church because you're in a church? Probably, right? And on the flip side, there are probably things that you will do more properly because, because you're in the church. Why is that? This is just the building. These are just walls. We are the church. But there are certain things that we aren't keeping holy in our temple. There are certain things that we're allowing to take place within our temple.
Once again, he gives this warning here and says that those who will defile the temple, who defile the church, and that can be through false teaching, that can be through being divisive, like we see these Corinthians being, he says, "There are people that you defile God's holy temple, they will be destroyed." We need to make sure that we keep the temple holy, keep the church holy and blameless. And that we see this stern warning. And I think to myself, Mark 11:15-17, what does Jesus do when he goes to the temple and it has been defiled? Jesus went to the temple and began to drive out those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. And he would not allow anyone to carry wares through the temple. Then he taught saying to them, "Is it not written, 'My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations'? But you have made it a den of thieves."
Are there maybe some things in our lives right now, in our churches right now, where we are looking a lot more like these individuals who have been making God's temple defiled, a, a den of thieves, like the world culture infiltrating? Because here's the thing, when Jesus shows up, He loves us. He offers us grace, and He, He, He offers us mercy. But He also takes His temple very seriously. And there's going to be some tables He will flip in your life. And in fact, we know in John's account, He gets a whip. It takes time to fashion a whip. He was meticulous with getting that whip right. And then He chased people out of the temple. We need to make sure that we start flipping things in our own lives for God's glory. We need to take it seriously here. We need to live a life that has lasting significance.
So, once again, how do we do that? We recognize our identity. We are saints called to serve. We recognize that there will be a test of our works. It will be tested by fire. We must build with gold, silver, and precious stones. Ultimately, because we understand that we are God's temple. The Holy Spirit lives within you. He is in our midst right now. God is with us wherever we go. And so, that we need to make sure that we keep this temple holy and that we avoid and eliminate anything that would seek to defile it.