Good morning. Let's open this
morning's service with number 186. Number 186 in the big hymn
book, the church is one foundation. Let's all stand together. Thank you. Thank you. The church's one foundation is
Jesus Christ her Lord. She is his new creation by water
and the Word. From heaven he came and sought
her. to be his holy bride. With his own blood he bought
her and for her life he died. ? Elect from every nation ? Yet
one o'er all the earth ? Her charter of salvation ? One Lord,
one faith, one birth ? One holy name she blesses ? Partakes one
holy food and to one hope she presses with every grace endued. Mid toil and tribulation and
tumult of her war. She waits the consummation of
peace forevermore. Till with a vision glorious,
her longing eyes are blessed. and the great church victorious
shall be the church at rest. ? Yet she on earth hath union
? ? With God the three in one ? ? And mystic sweet communion
? ? With those whose rest is won ? ? O happy ones and holy
? ? Lord give us grace that we ? Like them the meek and lowly
on high may dwell with Thee. Please be seated. I'm just overwhelmed right now
that you chose that hymn, Tom. How appropriate. That is to what
I wanted to try to speak to you about this first hour. The unity
of the church, the unity of believers, that's what our text in 1 Corinthians
chapter 1 is about. And that hymn said it all. said it all. One Lord, one faith,
one baptism, one God and Father of us all. What sweet communion
believers have together in the gospel of God's free grace and
the glorious person of the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm so thankful
for it. I'm thankful that we can sing
that hymn with some understanding. Good morning. Joy, thank you
for playing this morning. It's good to have Joy and Delphus
with us this morning. Let's bow together and ask the
Lord's blessings on his word. Our Heavenly Father, how thankful
we are for the union that you have given to us in thy dear
son, We thank you for our sanctification, for our holiness. By virtue of
our union with him, we have perfect acceptance before thee. We thank
you, Lord, for the hope of salvation. We thank you for the communion
of the saints and the fellowship that you've given to believers
as they are able to rejoice together in the one faith, one Lord, one
baptism, one God and father of us all. How we pray that you'd
be pleased to strengthen that bond of unity that you put into
our hearts. For Christ's sake, we ask it.
Amen. well we've been in first corinthians
two sundays and we have covered i say covered we haven't covered
anything uh... but we have gotten as far as
the first two verses of chapter one so my hope this morning is
to move a little bit quicker and uh... see the whole idea
of chapter one as it speaks to the unity of believers. The unity of believers. How sweet
that unity is. The Scriptures ask this question,
how can two walk together unless they be in agreement? And they can't. And yet, what
sweet unity there is when the Lord causes us to be in agreement. And when He gives us ears to
hear, we are in agreement. We're in lockstep conformity
to the revelation of truth that He has made of Himself in His
Word. We don't experience what we had
experienced in religion when there was such disunity such
a variety of opinions and conflicts that came about as a result of
that. We understand a little bit about
what the Lord meant in Galatians chapter 6 when He says, when
He said, bear ye with one another and so fulfill the law of Christ. So fulfill the law of Christ.
put up with each other. You've got some other areas that
rub one another the wrong way, but this common bond that we
have in the gospel is what enables us to bear with one another in
those other areas and to love one another and to maintain that
sweet communion with each other. So that's really how Paul, that's
how the Lord begins 1 Corinthians because there's not going to
be an ear to hear anything else that the Lord has to say to us
unless there's agreement about the gospel. Unless there's some
unity with one another's understanding of who Christ is and what it
is He's accomplished for us. And so that's That passage that
I just quoted in Galatians chapter 6, the next verse says, If a
man think that he be something when he is nothing, he deceives
himself. The worst kind of deceit is when
you have deceived yourself. And we deceive ourselves when
we think we're something, when we're nothing. What is it that
disrupts the unity of man? When he thinks he's something,
and he hadn't gotten what he deserves. Vain glory always precedes
strife, doesn't it? And so, if a man thinks he's
something, when he's nothing, he has deceived himself. Oh Lord, don't let us deceive
ourselves. And if we're not deceived about
ourselves being nothing, we will esteem one another more highly
than ourselves and we'll put up with one another for the gospel's
sake. and the unity that we have together
in Christ will grow us in God's grace and in the knowledge of
the Lord Jesus Christ. That's my prayer. That's my hope
for our fellowship. I'm so thankful for what we have
and I just want it to get better. Don't you? She wants the bonds
of love and care for one another just to strengthen. If it is
to happen, the Lord's going to use His Word to accomplish that. And that's what this whole chapter
is about. And so I'm praying this morning that the Lord will
give us ears to hear what He has said to us, and that that
will be the result. That He'll strengthen our bonds
of unity, first with Christ, and then with one another. Alright,
we saw that this was from Paul to the church, the called out
ones who lived in Corinth. Now I just want to repeat something
that I shared Wednesday night. I made this point when we talked
about Corinth, as evil as a city as that was, we don't live in
any more evil day than the believers lived in Corinth. It was worse
then. And those who would lean on the
nostalgia of the past, thinking that, oh, the good old days were
better than today, they weren't. They weren't. I just Googled
this past week the per capita murder rate in the United States.
Just look it up. In the 50s, it was 4.5 per 100,000
in the United States. And then in the 80s and the 90s,
it went up to 10.5. Right now, the last six years,
it's back to where it was in the 50s. That's just an interesting
bit of information to say to us that, you know, the things
of society, you know, they just ebb and flow. Don't think that
we live in a worse society. I mentioned Wednesday night that
we checked Laura Grayson to UCF, and the sense of order and respect
just struck me comparing what I remember of the chaos and anarchy
on college campuses back in the 60s. I didn't see any of that. And so, you know, don't believe
it when preachers say, well, you know, we just we live in
a worse time. The world has always been the
way it is. It's always been the way it is.
And, you know, we're in the world. But we're not of the world. We're
not of the world. We're the called out ones. That's
the church. Called out of the world. And
called saints. You see that in verse 2? We're sanctified. We're perfect. Perfect. That's what a saint
is. A saint is one who is without
sin. In the person of my substitute,
by virtue of my union with Christ, I stand before God perfect. Never have I violated the law
of God. Never have I sinned. And it's not as if I didn't sin. I haven't sinned. God sees me
in Christ. Say, well, someone says, well,
that's the way God sees you. The way God sees you is the way
it is. That's just the way it is. And that's our hope, isn't
it? So we're called out of this world,
we're sanctified, we're saints. Who else can say this? Look what he says in verse 3. Grace be unto you and peace from
God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Here's where unity
begins. It begins with grace. As I said,
how can two walk together unless they agree, and David said in
Psalm 133, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together
in unity. How good and how pleasant it
is for brethren to dwell together in unity. And we have unity when
it comes to grace. comes to the grace of God, we
know. There's no debate about it. There's no discussion. There's
no controversy. We know that had God not of His
own sovereign will and purpose before time ever began, in His
all-wise, divine omniscience, chosen a people, We wouldn't
come. We wouldn't believe. God had
to choose us. It's called grace. It's all of
grace. We didn't have anything to do
with it. Grace is free. Grace is a gift. Grace is unmerited
favor. And there's no doubt about it,
is there? Our election is all of grace. It's all of grace. Our redemption is all of grace.
We didn't have anything to do with what the Lord Jesus Christ
accomplished on Calvary's cross when he shed his precious blood
and paid for our sins and satisfied the demands of God's holy justice.
We didn't have anything to do with that. It's a gift. It's all of grace. Regeneration
is a work of grace, isn't it? We know that we didn't just wake
up one day and say, well, I decide that I'm going to follow Jesus.
I'm going to give my heart to Christ. I'm going to allow Jesus
into my heart. We know that's not true. We don't
talk like that. We've got unity when it comes
to our understanding of the grace of God in our regeneration. Nicodemus, you've got to be born
from above. It's not of him that willeth,
nor of him that God makes you willing in the day of his power.
We know that the Lord, in the day of love, put his hand on
us, opened up the eyes of our understanding, and what he opens
no man can shut. And he gave us hope in Christ. He gave us faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ. And our regeneration was all
of grace. Our sanctification is all of grace. We've got to
be perfect and holy before God and the only way that's going
to happen is if God puts us in Christ and sees us in Christ
and we have acceptance before God in the Lord Jesus Christ. Being kept, you know that's of
grace, don't you? How many times a day do you wander? Horrible things of unbelief have
you thought and said and done, and yet the Lord won't let you
remain there, will He? You would if you could. You'd
leave. It's of grace. He's got you on
a leash, doesn't He? If you're a child of God, He
does. You know what I'm talking about. He won't let you go so
far. Then He'll use that to cause
you to see, once again, your need for Christ. You know that
the hope of eternal glory, being presented before the throne of
God without fault, is all of grace. He's going to have to
do that for you, isn't He? You're not going to be able to
present yourself before God and say, well, Lord, I didn't...
No! You're not going to say, I anything, are you? No, this
unity is all of grace. So Paul talks about the called
out ones from the world and he says, it's all of grace. And we're in agreement, aren't
we? Yes. We're not going to mix works
with grace. We're not going to mix law with
grace. We dare not do it. It will destroy
our unity. It'll destroy our unity with
Christ, and it'll destroy our unity with one another. Grace be unto you. Let me read this verse from John
chapter 17. When the Lord said, when He was
praying that high priestly prayer for us to the Father, and He
said, neither pray I for these alone, but also for them which
shall believe because of their word. He's talking about us. The Lord was praying for the
disciples, but he says, Father, I'm not just praying for them,
I'm praying for all those that are going to believe because
of their testimony. And then the next verse he says,
that they may be one. even as I am one with thee father
thou art in me and I in thee that they may be one in us what
what sweet communion is it possible for the Lord Jesus Christ to
offer up a prayer to God that he doesn't answer is that possible
So when there is disagreement and conflict over the truths
of the gospel, and I'm not saying we don't have disagreements and
conflicts in other areas of life. We do. You know that. But it's
the unity that we have in the gospel that enables us to forgive
and to remain together. That's true in marriages. It's
true in churches. It's our unity in Christ that
enables us to forgive one another. And is it possible for the Lord
to pray a prayer for his children that the Father doesn't answer?
Father, I pray that even as I am in you and you are in me, and
we're one together, that you'll make them one together in us. So what does that say about all
the disunity that goes on amongst religious people? Well, you can draw your own conclusions,
can't you? You can draw your own conclusions when it comes
to the disunity over gospel truths among religious people. They're not being taught of God. getting their direction from
this Word or from the Spirit of God. God teaches all of His
children the same thing. You don't teach one of your children
one thing and another one of your children something different.
You teach them the same truths, don't you? And so it is with
the Father. Grace be unto you and peace. peace. Without grace there can
be no peace. Without grace there can be no
peace with God. The only way we can be accepted
is to be found in Christ and that's all of grace. There can
be no peace with God without grace and there can be no peace
of God in our hearts keeping our minds in Christ Jesus without
grace. Grace always leads to peace.
You say, well, how do I know? Here's a gospel truth. We're
going to be dealing with assurance of salvation in the next hour.
How can I know that I'm saved? Do you have peace with God? Has
He spoken peace to your heart? Do you know anything about the
peace of God that keeps your heart and your mind in Christ
Jesus? That's the evidence of grace. Grace and peace. Not a false
peace. Not a peace that's based on a
covenant that you made. But a peace that's based on grace. Grace be unto you and peace from
God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, that's what
I want. I want the peace of God. I want
peace with God. I want you to have peace with
God. I want to have peace with God and I want to. I want to
experience the peace of God. In our lives together. Look at verse 4. I thank my God always. For you. always on your behalf
for the grace which is given you by Christ Jesus. Unbelievers can experience the
emotion of gratitude. They can. They can be grateful.
Unbelievers can be grateful. They can be grateful for an act
of kindness that someone shows them. They can be grateful for
their circumstances in life. Just experiencing gratitude is
not any evidence of being a child of God. But what does he say
here? I thank my God. I thank my God. My gratitude
is not directed simply towards you. The unbelievers might show
gratitude towards another man for something that they do for
them, but our gratitude first and foremost is to God for the
grace that he's given to you and how grateful we are to God. And notice he says to my God.
You ever talk to somebody about the gospel and you tell them
that you worship different gods? And if they're religious, the
first thing out of their mouth is, oh no, no, no, no, no, no. No, there's only one God. We
worship the same God. And they're desperate for you
to get on board with their God. But we're not, we don't need
to to be in agreement with them. They need to be in agreement
with us, but we don't need to be in agreement with them because
we know that our God is the one and only true God. and that the
God that they're worshiping is a figment of their imagination. He's an idol that they've fashioned
in their own minds, and when we say to them, we worship a
different God, we know that's true. And Paul said, I thank
my God. I know who He is. I know whom
I have believed, and I'm persuaded that He is able. And my thanksgiving
and my gratitude is to Him for you. And not just for the good
things that you do for me, but for the grace that He has put
in your heart, because that's where the connection of unity
is between us. How thankful we are for the miracle
of grace. And it is a miracle, isn't it?
You know it's a miracle. You know it's a miracle in your
own life. That the Lord would cause us to believe the gospel?
When the whole world stands in opposition to our God? That we would believe the same
thing? I thank my God always. This is a constant attitude. You know, someone says that the
attitude of gratitude. It really is, isn't it? And you say, well, you know,
I'm in a situation where it's hard to be thankful. You know, that's where grace
comes in. Again. It's the grace of God that would
cause you to believe. I mean, to really believe. Not
just to succumb to it, not just to resign yourself to it, but
to really believe that however difficult the circumstances are
that you're in, that God sent them to you. They're of the Lord. and therefore you're good, and
therefore His glory. And when God says to you, not
when I say to you or when another believer comes to try to comfort
you and tells you that it's of the Lord, but when God speaks
peace to your heart, He will say to you, you know these things
are working together for good, for them that love me and those
that are the called according to my purpose. Be ye thankful
in all things. Not for all things, but in all
things. There's a difference. We're grateful
to God in the midst of our trials, for these trials are the will
of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. That takes grace, doesn't it?
It takes an abundance of grace. Oh, but how sweet that grace
is when it becomes effectual to our hearts. Grace be unto
you and peace from God. I thank my God always on your
behalf for the grace of God which is given you. That's the only
way you're going to get grace. The only way you're going to
get it is God gives it to you. And the reality of that causes
all of us to be mercy beggars. Oh Lord, give me grace. We never
stop begging for it, do we? Never stop asking. Lord, give
me grace. I need more grace. Increase my
faith that in everything That in everything you are enriched
by Him in all utterance and in all knowledge. We speak the same
thing and we know the same thing. We believe the same thing. Here's
the grace of God that works in our hearts and continues to enrich
us in utterance and in all knowledge. Now look at verse 6. Even as
the testimony of Christ Now some of you, some of our young people
haven't had the experience of having been in religion where
people love to tell their testimonies. And generally, they are nothing
more than a recount of their own experiences in life. You know, this is what I was
doing and this is where I was. Testimony, when the Scripture
speaks of testimony, it's the same word for witness. It's the
word marteo. It's the same word from which
we get our word martyr. And the Scripture speaks of the
testimony of Christ here in 1 Corinthians 2. Look over in chapter 2, verse
1. And I, brethren, when I came
to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring
unto you the testimony of God. So in chapter 1 he calls it the
testimony of Christ, and in chapter 2 he calls it the testimony of
God, and in 2 Timothy chapter 1 verse 8, be not ashamed of
the testimony of the Lord. So it's not your testimony. He's
the one who became the martyr. He's the one who laid down his
life for the sheep. If you're going to share your
testimony, don't tell men about your experiences. Tell them about
Christ. He's the testimony. He's the
witness. What has he taught you about
himself? Who is it that you believe? Should
we witness? Should we share testimony with
the world? Certainly I hope that the Lord
would make us able to do that. I hope he'd give us opportunity
to do that. I hope that we would be ready
always to give an answer to them that ask us for the hope that's
within us and that we would do it in a spirit of meekness and
in fear. Don't recount your experiences. Those are, at best, subjective. And at worst, they're completely
boring. Who cares what your experiences
are? I don't get Facebook. I don't
get it. I don't get, you know, putting
out there for the whole world to read what you're doing and
what your experiences are and where, you know, last place you've
been and all. I don't figure that's of any interest to anybody.
My life is for me and, you know, it's a bore to everybody else.
And if you think that everybody in the world is interested in
what you're doing, you're deceived. Because the truth is that your
life and your experiences are a bore to everybody else. All
they're doing when they do show an interest in it are competing
your experiences with their own. Isn't that the truth? I'm speaking
the truth. I know I'm offending somebody
right now. You just don't understand. Maybe
I don't. Maybe I don't. But I'm trying
to make a point. And my point is that when you
witness, don't tell them about your experiences. Nobody cares
what your experiences are. Tell them about Christ. He's
the one they need to know about. It's the testimony of Christ. It's the testimony of the Lord.
It's the testimony of God. He's the martyr. He's the one
that laid down His life. If you've got something to tell
somebody about Him, tell them about Him. Don't tell them about
what, you know, where you've been and what you went through
and what your experiences are as if you missed that. You know,
I hear people talk about their conversion experiences as if
they're missing the sins that they've been, you know, that
they left behind. You've heard people talk like
that. When I used to do this and used to do that and now they're
reminiscing. It's the testimony of God. In Revelation chapter 15, the
tabernacle of the testimony was opened in heaven. That box which
is a picture of Christ with the mercy seat where the blood was
put. And God said, here I'll meet with you. And it was a box
that was made of wood that wouldn't rot, speaking of the humanity
of Christ, and overlaid with gold, speaking of the deity of
Christ. And within that box was the rod
of Aaron, speaking of his priestly function as our intercessor.
the Ophir of Manna, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ as the
prophet of God who came with the bread of life, and the tablets
of the law, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ as our King who
not only set the law, but fulfilled the law. Tell men about Him.
He's the testimony that's opened up in heaven. And if He's opened
up that testimony to you, and that's our unity, isn't it? You
see, if we focus on our experiences, they're all different. And I
can't understand your experiences, and you can't understand my experiences.
We come from different experiences. And all we're going to do, to
go back to the whole Facebook thing, all we're going to do
is find ourselves competing with one another to see who's had
better experiences. and that's going to disrupt our
unity. But if our testimony is about
Christ, then we're going to be in agreement, we're going to
be of the same knowledge and of the same utterance. We're
going to be saying the same thing and believing the same thing. Alright, let's take a break.
Sorry about the whole Facebook thing, folks. I'm going to need that robin
for a brief.