Connecting to the Body of Christ

1 Corinthians 12:12-27.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on February 12, 2017.

Here at Abundant Life Christian Fellowship in Everett, WA, we have summed up the mission that God has for our church in these words: Connect people to the Abundant Life found in Jesus.  Last week we talked about how the starting point is for people to connect to Jesus Christ by putting their trust or faith in his teachings and in his work.  Today, we are going to deal with the reality that those who connect to Jesus will be moved to connect to his body, The Church. 

Of course many people scoff at organizational churches and some of them are Christians.  Let’s recognize up front that this has some justification behind it.  We don’t have time to walk through all of those issues.  But it is important to recognize that the Bible reveals that Jesus is creating a group of followers that can be thought of in macro terms, The Church (at all times and all places), and in the micro (a small, local gathering of some of these believers).  We are all part of the universal, macro Church when we are spiritually born again.  But not all are convinced that micro-gatherings are necessary.  Thus they are content to “believe” in Jesus, and yet never face the issue that Jesus is wanting to connect them to other believers.  Suffice it to say, if we are connecting to Jesus then we have no choice of whether or not we are going to connect to his body because this is what his Spirit is trying to accomplish.  If you have put your faith in Jesus, he is working by His Spirit to connect you to his people in some local expression of his greater body.  Let’s look at the passage before us.

Believers all belong to the Body of Christ

In this passage Paul is explaining to the Corinthians why their worldly thinking in the area of spiritual gifts (and many other areas for that matter) was woefully lacking.  They had developed a very fractured and divisive group of believers in Corinth.  Paul explains that there is only one body, and yet many members.  Here he brings up the analogy of a human body.  Jesus, who was no longer here in the flesh, still has an earthly body, and that is His Church.  Thus each believer represents a diversity of gifts and functioning through which the Holy Spirit fits us together in order to operate as Christ’s body.  Now, Paul’s focus is on the individual members.  Even though they are very different, they are still part of one body, just as the individual parts of the body are vastly different and yet all work together for the one body.  Though he doesn’t state this here, in Ephesians 4:11-16 Paul explains that Jesus himself is the head of this body.  Just as the brain sends signals to very different aspects of the body to do very different things, it is all for the singular good of the whole body.  The Corinthians understood the diversity, but not that each part is supposed to be directed by the Spirit for the unified good of the whole.  Ephesians 4 makes it even clearer that we who are connected to Jesus by the Spirit, are also supposed to connect to his earthly body through other believers.

Thus all those earthly divisions that divide this world and are used to gain power for certain ones, is not embraced by the Spirit of Christ.  In verse 13 Paul lists 2 of these divisions: race and economic status.  Whether Jew or Gentile, Free or Slave, those who come to Christ are members regardless of what people may say.  You are a member because Jesus says so, and because the Holy Spirit is working to connect you to it.  We who are believers need to be quick to embrace and welcome new believers.  Of course this is easier said than done.  Do you remember how the believers responded to Saul of Tarsus when he repented of persecuting Christians and became one of them?  They were afraid to associate with him at first.

In verses 15-20 Paul points out that our differences are not meant to divide us.  Now he is not talking about doctrinal differences here.  When it comes to the teaching of the Bible and our interpretations, we need to recognize that certain things have always been recognized as essentials to the faith.  You must repent of sin; that is essential.  Another essential is the deity of Jesus Christ, and His coming Day of the Restoration of all things.  I could go on.  But I hope you get the point.  Some “beliefs” are heretical.  They should never be embraced even for the sake of unity.  Why?  Remember we are to unify with other believers of the faith, not those who believe just anything.  A good statement that has been around for several centuries is this: In Essentials Unity, in Non-Essentials Liberty, and in All Things Charity.  Historically we have often divided over non-essentials and generally without much charity.  Paul on the other hand is talking about our spiritual giftedness and our natural background.  Though they may be very diverse, it is not in order to keep us segregated.  The diversity is on purpose and is meant to strengthen the body and better equip it.  So the differences are meant to strengthen our unity, not weaken it.

Notice in verse 15 that Paul gives some examples.  These first examples all involve a member excluding themselves.  In this case, Paul mentions that they may exclude themselves because they aren’t like another member (perhaps a more visible or “distinguished” member).  The Corinthians saw spiritual gifts as a sort of heavenly commendation.  They all wanted to speak in other languages because in their social context that represented the highest gift.  Of course Paul tells them that they are wrong.  In their mentality, speaking in tongues was a sign that you were extremely close to God.  The more unintelligible something was, the closer to God it must be.  Paul explains to them that this is completely backwards.  The whole reason why the Spirit of God draws believers together is so that they can encourage one another.  Thus Paul, who had nothing against speaking in tongues, counseled them to at least have their “tongues” interpreted so that it could help the other believers.  The Corinthians had it backwards.  The gifts of God (both natural and spiritual) are not given to an individual for their own good, but to enable them to help others.  We need to learn to embrace the natural differences that we have with others, and to also embrace the spiritually diverse ways that God works through us.  When you exclude yourself, the rest of the body goes without the function that God has gifted you with.  No we can’t all be an eye or the lips.  It is not about what I want, but about how God is fitting me into the body.  Don’t exclude yourself because you take away from what God has for others, and you lose out on what God wants to give you through those others.

In verse 21 the example switches.  Notice that here the parts are excluding others.  The proud members can exclude the “weaker” members.  Of course this was being interpreted by worldly thinking and not the mind of Christ.  All new Christians are “weak” in the faith because their faith hasn’t weathered the storms of doubts, fears, and persecution that older Christians have.  Thus those who are strong should not exclude the weak, but quite the opposite.  Your strength is not for you, it is for the sake of the weak.  Help them and strengthen them.  Pride has the tendency to exclude others, whereas shame has the tendency to exclude self.  But in Christ, both pride and shame are supposed to be dealt with at the cross.  The cross speaks to our pride and says, “Only Jesus is worthy of our boasting.”  The cross speaks to our shame and says, “This is how greatly and by whom you are loved!”  Thus the proud come away humbled and the shameful come away healed.  On one hand none of us are anything, and yet, on the other hand, we are everything to God.  This great tension is meant to take vastly different people and help them to be welded into a unit called the body of Christ.  However, it is only possible if we are listening to the Spirit and being led by Him.

Do not look to leadership or being a pastor as something great.  These are not the greatest positions within the Church.  These are actually positions of servitude.  True leaders who are lead by the Holy Spirit will realize that He is asking them to lay down their lives in order to serve the rest.  Why are they being served?  They are served so that they can do the work of sharing Jesus with the world around them.  There won’t be any pastors in the eternal state.  We will all stand side by side as the adult children of God and enjoy His presence forever.

Connecting to the Body audio

Connecting to the Source of Life

John 15:1-8.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on February 5, 2017.

Our mission statement, here at Abundant Life Christian Fellowship, is: Connecting people to the Abundant Life found in Jesus.  This is a brief and succinct way of saying what our Lord has told us to do.  Connections are a big part of what God is trying to do in this world.  Yet, these connections must be more than just a natural thing.  This all starts with making a spiritual connection to the ultimate, spiritual source of life that is found in Jesus.

In our passage today, Jesus uses a picture of a vine and its branches to help us understand the reality of both an outward connection and a inward connection.  It is not enough to just look like you are connected.  A branch can be physically connected to the tree and yet not be drawing life from it.  So it is imperative that we hear the Spirit of God calling us to a living connection.  Calling us with the words, “Come!   Let him who thirsts come.  Whoever desires let him take the water of life freely.”

Jesus is the true vine

Let’s look at verses 1-3 first.  Jesus describes the metaphor and identifies what each part signifies.  Jesus is the true vine.  His disciples are the branches that are connected to him.  The Father is the gardener who is tending to the branches of the vine in order that it might bear more fruit.  Jesus doesn’t explain how they became branches connected to him.  So let’s flesh that out a bit.

How does one get to be a branch connected to Jesus?  John 3:16 becomes a good starting point.  “For God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son that whoever believes on Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.”  Thus the connection begins with belief in Jesus (Faith, Trust).  Do you trust that the work of Jesus on the cross covers your sin?  And, do you trust that following him as your master will lead to eternal life?  If you do then the Spirit of God connects you to Christ by taking up residence within you.  John 1:12-13 also says, “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”  Thus when the reality of who Jesus is comes to us, we must receive Him as He is, God’s Son.  Still, our spiritual birth is a spiritual thing, not a natural thing.  No one becomes connected to Jesus because they were born in a particular family or of a particular race.  We must individually believe in Him.  Lastly Romans 11 tells us that God grafts us into the olive tree, which is Jesus, so that we can partake in the life of the tree and its roots.  So we have a part in receiving the Truth that God gives us about Jesus and believing Him enough to follow Him.  God does the spiritual part of connecting us spiritually to Jesus.

Notice that Jesus calls himself the “true” vine.  He doesn’t say anything more about that in the rest of the passage, and so we might miss its significance.  If there is a true vine then it implies that there has been a false vine or many false vines.  The presence of a false vine had been promising life, but had actually delivered spiritual death to the religious leaders of Israel.  They had been tempted to connect to something other than the One, True God.  Of course, on the surface it looked like they were.  But that was only a superficial connection.  Their true spiritual connection was to the ways of the world, to the devil himself.  This is our human predicament.  We tend to connect to all manner of things that we hope will bring us life, but they never satisfy.  Jesus is the true vine that will actually deliver on the life that it promises.  He is not a pretender.

In verse 2 we are told that the Father prunes the branches because He wants them to be fruitful.  So what is this fruit that God desires?  Just as Jesus is a life giving vine, so God wants us to be life giving branches.  The fruit represents that which gives life.  Galatians 5 tells us that the fruit of the Spirit of God in our life is Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness, and Self-Control.  But it also says that the fruit of my own flesh and connection with this world is: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like.  Then Paul says, “I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.”  So there is a certain amount of cutting that happens in the life of a follower of Jesus who is spiritually connected to Him.  They will be pruned so that they can be more fruitful.  Pruning always starts with cutting off the dead stuff.  It stresses the tree and robs it of strength to grow more fruit.  Pruning also cuts off perfectly good twigs.  This is done because sunlight and oxygen have trouble hitting all parts of the tree.  We can complain with things that God removes from our life, but He does so for our own good; that we might be a fruitful branch.

A Connection to Him gives Life

Verses 4-8 give us a better picture of what it means to draw life from Jesus and it begins with a command.  It is not enough to connect to Jesus for a moment or temporarily.  We must abide in Him.  That word is also translated as “remain,” or “dwell.”  Jesus needs to become the source that we are hoping to draw life from.  And, in those times when we are tempted to find another source, we must resist the urge to move.  It doesn’t work to “try” Jesus for a week, a month, a year, or decade.  We must remain in Him and keep drawing into ourselves the life that He is supplying.  So the temptation comes from our flesh and the world around us to disconnect from Jesus and to connect to the so-called life of this world.  But in the end it only leads to death.  This is what Adam and Eve faced.  They were living in connection to God.  It wasn’t just superficial.  He was their very life.  But one day the devil comes as the serpent and tempts them to connect to something else.  You can’t have both.  To connect with the wisdom of the devil is to automatically disconnect from the wisdom of God.  And thus, death entered the world.

In verse 5 Jesus makes it clear that producing any real fruit is impossible without Him.  Some people’s lives look very fruitful because they are making money and living the high life.  But, that is not good fruit that gives life.  You can accomplish all manner of things without Jesus, but none of them will satisfy your soul and give you a life that is so powerful that it is eternal.  Fruitfulness that is recognized by God is only accomplished by following Jesus and nothing else.

In verses 6 and 7 we are reminded again that the connection must be a living connection.  There must be life flowing from Jesus to us.  Now this part of the passage can be seen as each branch being an individual person.  From time to time God cuts off those who have remained in His Church but are only pretending a connection to Him.  They refuse to draw life from Him by trusting the way of Jesus.  However, it is also true that God goes through our life from time to time and asks us to surrender particular areas of growth that may not be bad in and of themselves.  But, they must be removed if we are to be fruitful.  So Jesus points to His Word remaining in us as a further description of Him living in us.  When we hear the Word of God it is speaking to us about what should be cut off and what should be encouraged to grow.  The Holy Spirit also convicts us in our hearts to surrender in trust to the words of Jesus.  In these moments we either draw life from Christ or we harden our heart towards his life.  The enemy of our souls seeks to make us question God’s Word and quit trusting, believing it.  This is what he did with Adam and Eve.  “Did God really say…”  Always, he seeks to break that living connection that we have with the Spirit of God.

Lastly in verses 7-8 Jesus speaks to the area of prayer.  He points out that our prayers are affected by this connection.  The disciples were often amazed at the power of Jesus’ prayers.  For our prayers to be answered we must have a living connection with God.  That living connection is maintained by hearing and putting our trust in it.  Yes, it is important to obey God’s word, but we must do more than that.  We must obey out of a trust in God himself and all that He says.  Now some people try to take this passage to mean that you can have anything you want if you are connected to Jesus.  But, don’t forget that a living connection to Jesus will change what your heart desires.  At least it will cause the things of God to rise to the top.  When you are trusting in Jesus you aren’t praying from the desires of your flesh.  Instead you are praying from a heart and life that has learned the wisdom of God’s pruning.  Even in our prayer life, God is trying to teach us how to prune our own prayers.  Do you want your prayers to be fruitful?  Then learn to pray in accordance with the Spirit of God, rather than the lusts of your flesh.  Our lives can bring glory to God when we trust Him and prayerfully ask His help in this life.

I pray that you have made that connection to Jesus.  But if you haven’t don’t let another day go by without letting go of the false vine of this world and the false life that it promises.  Take hold of eternal life today by putting your faith in Jesus.  Then start drawing life from Him immediately by entering into a trusting relationship with Him.

Connecting audio

The Heart of a Righteous Person 4

Psalm 51:10-19.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on January 29, 2017.

Today we will finish up our look at David’s repentance in Psalm 51.  By way of reminder, David wrote this psalm after he was confronted by the prophet Nathan about his sin with Bathsheba and the murder of her husband.  If we learn anything in this psalm, I pray that we learn this: the heart of a righteous person will be broken by God’s conviction of their sin.  They will repent of it and seek to restore relationship with Him. 

This is an extremely important point because it is becoming common to act like sin is not a problem for Christians, due to the fact that they are covered by Jesus.  However, the Bible tells us to not be deceived.  God will not be mocked.  If Christians sow to the flesh they are going to reap destruction from the flesh.  Sin negatively affects our relationship with God and with other people.  Yes, God can cover it with His grace.  But, we should never use that as a license for sin, and apathy towards the damage it does.  Some worry that warning against sin will create a mentality in which a person thinks they have lost their salvation each time they sin.  Of course, poor leadership could teach this or give this impression.  The truth is that sin detrimentally affects our spiritual relationship with God.  If we do not deal with it by repenting in our heart and doing the actions of repentance then it can eventually shipwreck our faith.

Desires its relationship with God to be fixed

We left off dealing with how God fixes our heart and mind.  David declares that God gives His wisdom to our minds, cleanses the heart stained by sin, and deals with the guilt of our sin.  In verse 10 he adds another thing that only God can do and that is to renew a steadfast spirit within us.  David knew that something had gone wrong in his own spirit.  He used to resist all manner of temptations and steadfastly long for the Lord’s way.  But the seduction of this sin broke through all of that.  Thus he asks God to repair it in such a way that it would be firmly established as it should be, AKA “a right spirit.”  This is a lesson to us about our hearts.  Just because your heart desires something doesn’t mean you should give in to it.  You can want the Lord and His ways more than the desires of your flesh.  In fact it is impossible to please all of the sinful desires that flit through your heart.  There are so many of them that you quickly get into a conflict of interest, which forces you to choose one over another.  David was not some kind of unfeeling, super-spiritual boy growing up.  He had a heart filled with sinful desires just like you and me.  He had done a good job of rejecting them and choosing the Lord’s way, but not at this point in his life.  When he gave in to the desires of his flesh, he found himself in bondage to sin from which only the Lord could free him.

I am going to skip verse 11 for now and look at verse 12 because it gives us two more areas where the Lord fixes our heart and mind.  First, sin had robbed David of his joy.  No matter how good it felt to give into temptation, it left him miserable in the end.  He lived in fear of discovery and hatred of his own weakness.  He had ceased to walk faithfully in the way of salvation and had taken an exit ramp to Pleasure Island.  The Bible tells us in Hebrews 11:25 that the pleasures of sin are passing, or temporary.  No matter how good they are in the moment, they cannot replace the eternal joy and peace we have when we walk in right relationship with God.  David tried to walk the fence of looking righteous, and hiding his wickedness.  This will never bring joy and neither will going all out after sin.

The second item in verse 12 is the need for God to uphold us.  Literally we need something to lean on and only God can be that thing.  David knew that his life was falling apart.  His spirit alone was not enough to hold everything up.  In fact, David was in danger of becoming exactly like Saul who had persecuted him for so long.  This concern is not just for holding his external life together, but also for holding his internal mind and spirit together.  Our spirit was not meant to walk life without the upholding strength of the Spirit of God.  We will find that things eventually fall apart without Him.

In verse 11 David’s greatest fear is that God will abandon Him and no longer speak to his heart by the Holy Spirit.  This sense of the presence of God was in jeopardy.  Saul’s sin and lack of repentance led God to reject him as king and to refuse to speak to him.  David recognized that he was in that same dangerous place.  His only hope was to repent with a broken heart and plead with God for mercy.  Saul’s wickedness was not that he lacked faith in God.  His wickedness is that when he was confronted with it, he refused to soften his heart and repent.  David is showing us proper repentance.   There is nothing more precious than the reassuring presence of the Spirit of God in our life.  Even when the Spirit is rebuking and correcting us, we can still take joy in the fact that God does so because He loves us.  Hebrews 12:5-6 says, “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when He rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one He loves, and He chastens everyone He accepts as His son.”  A parent who does not discipline their child does not care about them and only has a superficial love.  David knew he had stepped over the line.  For him this was not a debate with other scholars about whether it was possible to lose one’s salvation.  For him it was a desperate sense that, no matter what, he didn’t want to go forward without sensing that the Spirit of God was with him.

Desires to help others

From verse 13 on, we see a change.  David is still pleading with the Lord, but he is also declaring what he wants to do for others.  His sin has done a lot of damage in the hearts of people throughout the nation.  His sin against the people could not be undone.  But, if God would forgive him, David would lift up the Lord before them.  There are some things that failure in sin teaches us.

In verse 14 David recognized that his past righteousness wasn’t enough.  He would teach people God’s ways.  God’s ways are righteous.  My ways are only righteous as much as I walk in His ways.  It is easy to promote self before others, especially when we are successful and our station in life is elevated.  People love to look up to successful people.  David’s “right” choices had led him into horrible actions and possible destruction.  However, the ways of the Lord lead to life.  The Bible says in Proverbs 14:12, “There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.”  I would have to agree with David.  No pastor, evangelist, or missionary can point people to God’s ways because of how great they are.  Rather, we have all personally learned that following the desires of the flesh led to death, both physically and spiritually.  But God’s way leads to eternal life.

In verse 15 David says, “My mouth will show forth Your praise.”  He promises to publicly praise God’s righteousness.  Think of it.  David sees that his time is up and the “bridge is out” up ahead.  When God delivers him from his own sin, he will be filled with joy and the desire to praise God.  We praise God as an exalted form of acknowledgment.  But, we also praise God by way of encouraging each other.  It is important to rejoice in what God has done in your life and share that with others.  As we do this we lift God up and encourage others not to harden their heart, but instead break down in repentance before God and our fellow man.

In verses 16-17 David tells us one of the lessons he had learned.  This is an important part of repentance.  When we receive the forgiveness of God, we want to share with others the lessons we have learned.  Recognize that you don’t have to learn everything the hard way.  God has surrounded you with brothers and sisters who can share with you what they have learned, on top of the vast amount of lessons shared with us in the Bible.  David learned that God is not interested in our sacrifices at His temple.  He is interested in the sacrifices that are happening in our heart.  God wants a broken and contrite heart.  Self-righteous sin tells us to sacrifice everything but our own flesh.  Many people approach this same place as David and they harden their hearts.  Saul had continued to offer sacrifices, but he refused to let his heart be broken before God.  He hardened it all the more.  Yes, we should gather together and sing, hear the Word, read the Bible, and pray.  But all of these things are meaningless if our hearts are hardened towards God.  At the end of the day, all God wants from you is a heart that stops hardening itself and softens towards Him.  The heavenly Father loves you more than you can even imagine.  Don’t harden your heart towards Him.

In the last two verses, we may miss what David is really doing.  In a sense God hasn’t answered in the psalm, yet.  David knows that his sin has affected the nation.  Saul’s sin had caused the nation to descend into 40 years of chaos.  In a sense David is saying, “Whatever you do with me, God, have mercy on the people of Zion and Jerusalem.  Sin has consequences, and many of them affect the people around us.  Part of repentance is recognition of what we have done to others.  David had messed things up and the nation would pay a price.  We all have to own up to our own part of the problem without saying, “Yeah, but they did such and such.”  No matter what, I do not want to put the work of God in other people’s lives in danger.  My sin could snuff out the flame of God’s work in the life of another.  This is a horrible thought.  May God help us to deal with our sin and take the passion that David pours into this psalm as a template for our own act of breaking down in full repentance before God.

Heart of a Righteous Person 4 audio