Alright brethren, let's turn
to 1 Corinthians chapter 3. 1 Corinthians 3. The church at Corinth was so divided,
and that's such a shame when that happens, but Paul gives
three reasons here why every believer should strive to keep
the unity of the Spirit. to not be a divider, not glory
in our flesh and divide, but to endeavor to keep the unity
of the Spirit. Here's three things. Now look
here at verse 9. First of all, he says at the end of the verse
there, you're God's building. Now that's a good motive, isn't
it? My brother, my sister is indwelt by the Holy Spirit of
God and this church collectively brought together is the building
of God, is the temple of God. And then look, everything we
have, we have by the grace of God. Number two, he says there
in verse 10, according to the grace of God which is given unto
me. As a wise master builder, I've
laid the foundation, another buildeth their own. But it was
all by God's grace. Everything we have, by God's
grace. Isn't that a good motive to try to endeavor to keep unity? Your God's building, everything
you have, you have by God's grace. And then look here, there's only
one foundation, and that's Christ. Let every man take heed how he
builds their own, for other foundation can no man lay than that is laid,
which is Jesus Christ. Those are three good reasons
for you and I, who are believers, to be builders united. Builders united. Now, let me
make a few comments before we get to these three points. Whenever
believers begin to divide, take sides, that's glorying in flesh. That's carnal. That's not of
God. God's... He's creating unity.
He's making His people one. He's not dividing. That's of
us. That's of us. And God hates the
divider of brethren. Look at Proverbs 6. Proverbs
6. And look at verse 16. Proverbs 6, 16. These six things
doth the Lord hate. Now that interests me. I want
to know what God hates. Because I hope I hate what God
hates. These six things doth the Lord
hate, yea seven are an abomination unto him. Number one, a proud
look. A lying tongue. Hands that shed
innocent blood. A heart that diviseth wicked
imaginations. Feet that be swift in running
to mischief. A false witness that speaketh
lies. And here's number seven. He that
soweth discord among brethren. God says, I hate these things.
It's abomination to me. Now you see, when I read that,
this is what I always need to be reminded of. That's me in
my flesh. I don't want to read that and
think about a brother or sister or somebody else and say, I wish
they could get that. No, what I need to do is read
that and think, that's all my flesh is. I'm the forward man
in my flesh. A forward man sows strife. A
whisperer separates chief friends. That's all I am in my flesh.
But by Christ's Word, by the Spirit of God working in us,
believers are made one in Christ. You know, when Paul dealt with
this whole thing back in the first chapter, he asked, here's
the question again, he said, you divided. And he said this,
this is how he answered it, is Christ divided? We're supposed
to be one body in Christ, and we got Christ as our head, we're
one body in Christ. Is Christ's body divided? No. Can one be divided against one? We're
one in Christ. That's what He's saying. So whenever
we start taking sides, you've got to create division to do
that. If you exalt one brother, you've got to put another one
down. If you're exalting one over another, you know what I'm saying? You've got to endeavor to keep
unity. Listen to this word. Where no
wood is, there the fire goeth out. Don't you love the simplicity
of God's Word? Where there's not any wood, the
fire goes out. Well, so where there is no tail bearer, the
strife ceases. You know, somebody that's a gossip,
wants to come around, talk to you, and carry on, and, you know,
talk about somebody. If you don't talk with them about
it, they don't like it. They stop talking because it's
not fun. The fire goes out. Cast out the
scorner and contention shall go out. Strife and reproach shall
cease. Now when you read that, you think
of, well then, that person needs to be cast out. No. Lord, teach
me this man, this old, sinful, forward, tail-bearing, striving,
fleshly man that's in me. Lord, give me grace to cast him
out. And then the strife will cease.
You see, the strife, if I got strife in my heart, you know
where it's coming from? my flesh. That needs to be cast out. Alright,
now I pray God will use this. I don't want strife and reproach
in my heart. I pray God will use this to make
me by His grace put off the old man and look to Christ. Follow Christ. Walk after Christ.
And if there is anybody here or anywhere that hears it, I
pray God will do it for them. Here's my point. There's no point
for you and me to glory in our flesh, and that's all divisive
talk is, is glorying in our flesh. There's no point for us to do
that, but rather to endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit,
and here's the three reasons. Number one, you're God's building.
Number two, everything you have has been given to you through
this gospel by the grace of God. And number three, you are one
foundation as Christ. All right, let's look at these
three things. First of all, we ought never glory in our flesh
by dividing one another, but rather endeavor to keep the unity
of the Spirit because you're God's building. You're God's
building. He says there in verse 9, you're
God's building. Now, what does that mean? Well,
number one, God the Father built the building. His people are
the building, the living stones united together, and God the
Father is the builder. It's his building. It's his structure.
He built it. Listen to Amos 9, 11. In that
day, God said, I will raise up the tabernacle of David that
is fallen. The tabernacle of David pictured the church of
God. And he said, now that's gone. That's demolished. But
in that day, when Christ comes, God said, I will build up the
tabernacle of David. And he said, and I'll close up
the breaches thereof, and I will raise up the ruins, and I will
build it as of the days of old, that they may possess it. And
that all the heathen that are called by my name may be brought
in. Saith the Lord that doeth this. This is the Lord God. He's the
builder. That's number one thing. It's God's build. My brother,
my sister is God's building. That's God's property, that's
God's building, that's God's work. And then number two, God
the Son's building, Christ built this building. Listen to Zechariah
6, 12. Speaking to them, saying, thus
speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold, the man whose name is
the branch, that's Christ, the branch, Son of God, he shall
grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of
the Lord. Even He shall build the temple
of the Lord, and He shall bear the glory, and He shall sit and
rule upon His throne, and He shall be a priest upon His throne,
and the counsel of peace shall be between them both." Christ
is the builder. He came and laid down His life
to make these stones alive, your brethren, and to make them righteous
and holy, and He's built them up. He's gathered them out of
this earth, and He's assembled us together. This is Christ building. And then here's another thing.
Look at 1 Corinthians 3.16. God the Holy Spirit dwells in
you. It's how you and God built this
building. That's what I'm saying. Look
here. The Spirit of God dwells in you. 1 Corinthians 3.16. Know ye not that ye are the temple
of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? Watch this. If any man defile
the temple of God, him shall God destroy, because the temple
of God is holy, which temple you are." He's talking to believers
in whom the Spirit of God dwells, who God has assembled in His
church, which is His temple, His holy building, and He's saying
to us, now, any division that we would create between one another,
anything we would do to strive and divide with one another,
That, my brethren, is to defile God's building. You know, if
you had a building, and you knew in this earth, and somebody said,
that's God's building right there. He built that building. God built
that building. It's His building. He keeps it. It's holy. It's
not to be transgressed in any way. Would you take out a spray
can, paint spray can, and spray graffiti on that building? Well,
what he's saying here is, that brother and that sister, in whom
Christ dwells, that church that he's assembled in whom Christ
dwells. If we speak a word negative against
one another, you might as well be taking to spray paint and
just defiling it. That's what he's talking about.
This is God's building. This is God's building. You know,
and he says there, he takes the wise in their own craftiness.
See, I wish we could get this. God does that. We don't do that.
You see, you need to stop trying to think that we can be wise
enough to determine when a man's being crafty and trying to pull
the wool over somebody's eyes and trying to... God does... God'll handle that. God'll handle
that. We don't fool God. You know,
we get rebelling and we're always going to find some way to support
it in the Scripture. We have a terrible tendency of
making up our mind what we want to do and then looking for Scripture
to support it. And that's backwards. Go to God's
word bow But God no, he's not mocked by that if a man's doing
that if he's a false Believer a false pre preacher anything
like it. God's gonna deal with him guts Sovereign that's comfort
to us to just trust the Lord to deal with Ain't that good? We just trust God. He just says
all you got to do is just be help one another comfort one
another Don't don't divide don't foul So what then should a believer
be doing? Listen to what Peter said. You
as lively stones have built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood. You know, the priests in the
Old Testament had a service to do. You're now the house, he
said. You don't need that Old Testament
tabernacle anymore. You're the house. And you don't
need that Old Testament priesthood anymore. Of all God's people,
a holy priest. And it's for this purpose, to
offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. What is that? Pray for your brethren. Every time you think about something,
something's going to pop out of your mouth that just might
be just a little slight negative about them. Lord, bless them. Bless me, bless them. Keep us
united. Those are spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Alright, so let's move on now.
Here's the second thing. We're God's building, number
one. Secondly, never to start glorying in our flesh by dividing,
but endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit, number two, because
everything you have as a believer, you received it by the grace
of God. Everything. Paul says here, verse
10, according to the grace of God which is given unto me. As
a wise master builder, I laid the foundation and other builders
thereon. Paul refers to himself here as
a skilled master builder because he was the first one God used. Christ called him and sent him
to Corinth to preach the gospel. He was the first one Christ used
to preach the gospel there. And then Apollos came along after
him and preached the gospel there. He built on the foundation Paul
was used to lay. So he says here, he calls himself
a skilled master builder. The true skilled master builder
is God our Father and His Son Christ Jesus. He's the master
builder. You know, you think about what a master builder does.
The master builder draws up all the plan for the architecture
and knows the building inside and out from the foundation to
the top cornerstone. He knows it all before yet a
piece of ground been broken. Well, God determined before the
world began the whole scheme of salvation and how he'd save
his people. He determined the whole thing.
Everything was predetermined beforehand. Just like an architect
draws out all the plans and knows where everything's going in that
building. God did that. He's the master builder. And
God chose the foundation. He chose for his son to be the
foundation. of this building, to come and
do everything necessary to make this building stand on the rock. And he chose what kind of stones
he was going to put in this building. You build a house, you choose
what you're going to build it out of, you choose the stone
you're going to use, you choose granite if you're going to make
granite countertops or whatever, you choose the stones you're
going to use for that house. God chose every one of his people.
Chose them in Christ, chose them right where they'd go, right
where He'd put them, right where they needed to be in His house
to make His house what it needs to be. And then God chose who
He'd use to build the house. Yes, He did as the master builder.
He chose who He'd use to build the house. Every worker that would be working
on this house, and every preacher, and every witness that he'd used
to bless their word, to call out his people and build up these
towns, he chose who they'd be. And then, when it all came into
time, God has given grace, non-stop given grace, in all provision,
in all things, so that those that he's using build this house.
So Paul says, there's no point in being divided. There's no
point in exalting Paul over Apollos, this preacher over that preacher,
or this brother over this brother, or what have you. There's no
point doing that. According to the grace given to me. According
to God's grace. The master builder gave this
to me. If I'm a skilled craftsman, if I'm used in this work to do
something of any skill whatsoever, it's not because it came of me,
it's because I got it from him. He gave it. Listen to Paul. Paul said this, I labored more
abundantly than they all did. Now if he'd have stopped there,
he would have said, Paul, that's pretty arrogant. But he said,
yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me. He said, I
was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God
given unto me by the effectual working of his power. And he
said, I labor striving according to his working, which works in
me mightily. So you see what he's saying here?
What should I speak? If there's a problem and it's
affecting me or it affects somebody else, and we don't, I don't,
as far as I know, we don't have this kind of problem here. It's
been a unity as far as I can tell, but what does the preacher
know? But it's good to talk about this
before it ever happens, though. If you ever think about having
a divisive thought or, you know, nip it, cut it out, what should
I do? Listen to this. Peter said, if
any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God. In other
words, if I'm going to say anything at all, get it from right here. And if any man minister, I'm
going to serve somebody, I'm going to minister, let him do
as the ability that God gives, not in my own strength, my own
wisdom, the ability God gives, that God in all things may be
glorified through Jesus Christ to be praise and dominion forever
and ever. You see, everything's of grace.
We can't boast. We don't have any reason to boast
in anything. It's all God's grace. So number
one, that brother, that sister, this whole church, you're God's
building. And number two, everything we have, everything we are, is
by God's grace, given, freely given. Here's the third thing. We ought never glory in our flesh
by dividing being divisive, but we ought to endeavor to keep
the unity of the Spirit because every believer has one foundation,
that's Christ. And there's no other foundation
that can be laid. And I want us to get this point right here.
Look at verse 10. Let every man take heed how he
builds thereupon. For other foundation can no man
lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Here's what
we need to remember. The church is not built by us.
And a church is not built on us. You know, we can get to the
point of thinking, if I'm not there, that thing's going to
fall apart. Try it and see. It won't fall apart, I guarantee
you. Because I'm not holding it together, God is. He's the foundation. Christ is
the foundation. And He said there, you're built
on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. That doesn't
mean the apostles and the prophets are the foundation. That means
you're built on the same foundation as they're built on. Who is it?
Jesus Christ Himself, being the chief cornerstone. Jesus Christ
Himself. And in Him, all the building
is fitly framed together, and it grows as He adds one of his
children to it. It grows in a holy temple in
the Lord. And you're also a habitation
of God through the Spirit, he said. This is Christ's building. Christ is our only righteousness.
He's our only holiness. He's our master builder. He's
the foundation of this building. He's everything. He's all in
all. And each believer is on this same foundation. So he says,
take heed how you build on this foundation. Now, he's primarily
here talking to ministers. He's talking to preachers here.
So this is a warning to every preacher. Did you start with
Christ? Did you begin telling about how
God chose Christ and chose the people in Christ? Did you begin
with telling folks how God did all this to give Christ all the
preeminence? Did you show sinners that we're
falling into sin because He's the last Adam, patterned after
the first Adam, and He might come and represent all His people
like the first Adam represented His people? and that we might
be made righteous in Christ just as we were made sinners in Adam.
If you start with Christ, he says, keep building with Christ.
Don't stop building with Christ. Here's where we miss it though.
That's okay as long as that's advice for the preacher. Everything
we do and say, we're building on this foundation somehow. People
are hearing us. They're watching us. They're
listening to us. Our children are. Our brethren are. And everything
we do and say, we build on this foundation somehow. We don't
live in a world alone. Everything affects the people
around us. So be careful, he says, you're all witnesses of
Christ. Be careful how you're building
on this foundation. These things that they were doing
at Corinth, that wasn't building with the same materials that
they started building with. They're starting to divide now.
And that's not going to be good. He's saying, get back to building
with Christ. What does that mean? That means
nothing but the truth of God's Word. Build with that. That means nothing but truth
which glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ. That means nothing but
truth which abases all our wisdom and all our works. That means
nothing else will God use to build His child and His church,
but His Word, His truth. It glorifies Christ and abases
us. The moment we start mixing our wisdom and our will and our
strength and our desires and our pleasure and this is how
I think it ought to be, what have you, we stop building with
Christ and we're building with flesh now. Now listen to this. This is from Ecclesiastes 12,
9. And I want you to hear what this says. Because the preacher
was wise, that caught my attention. What does God say makes a wise
preacher? I want to know that. Because the preacher was wise,
he still taught the people knowledge. I want to know what that is.
How do you teach the people knowledge? Alright, he gives three things.
Yay! He gave good heed. He gave good
heed. Heed to what? Heed to God and
His Word. That's where you start. Right
there. Here's number two. And he sought out What'd he seek
out? He sought out God's Word. And he set in order many proverbs. Where'd he get them? He got them
from God. In other words, he sought what does God say, and
he took heed to it. He sought out the Word, the needed
Word, and he ministered that Word. He said, as a wise preacher
that gave knowledge, gave the people knowledge. We have a tendency,
like I said to you, we'll think on something, this is what I
want to do, this is how I'm going to do it, and it's harsh deceitful,
so deceitful. And then we go to the Word and
we say, now let me see here, I'm going to find a place, oh
yeah, that's backing me up right there. Well, that's backwards. He said, go to the Word first.
Seek out what God says, heed it. And if you want to minister,
minister what God says. And all the while endeavoring
to keep unity. I was with a mother and a daughter
one time. And they were religious, but
I don't know if they knew anything just religious, but they got
in an argument. And the mother started quoting scripture to
the daughter. She wasn't ministering love to
the daughter. She was trying to chop the daughter's head off
with the Scripture. That's what Christ said, take
heed that the light that is in you is really light and not darkness. In other words, when you start
wanting to quote Scripture to somebody, make certain that your
motive is the glory of Christ and the good of your brethren.
The unity of your brethren. Even abasing yourself. Because
when we're doing it to make our point and exalt our position
and what have you, that's darkness. Paul's told Timothy, take heed
unto thyself. Remember what you are. Don't
forget. And take heed unto the doctrine.
And he says, and continue in the doctrine. Isn't that good
advice? Take heed to yourself. and to
the doctrine and continue in the doctrine and he says so for
in doctrine or for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself
and them that hear thee alright let me end this I want to give
you a few simple things to remember from Matthew I want you to go
to Matthew 7 I'm going to give you these things and then we're
going to read just a little bit of scripture and we'll be done I've been sick
the past couple of weeks and I know the messages are short.
Will told me the other day I'm preaching some of the best messages
he's ever heard me preach. One was 27 minutes, one was 28,
one was 29. They were wonderful. How do we strive to keep the
unity? How do we strive to make sure we're not being divisive?
Here's number one. Let us each rest entirely in
God our builder, look for His grace, ask for His grace, and
just lay down flat on Christ our foundation. Get as close
to Christ as you can. That's number one. Number two,
speak to one another the good news of Christ. Talk about the solid rock. That's
the word that's going to encourage and save and help. That's the word. And as we do
that, do it forgiving constantly. Forgiving constantly. Because
you have to. You have to. We're sinners. We just do things
and say things and act ways. We just have to forgive one another.
But point each other to Christ, forgiving constantly. Number
three, encourage one another in Christ to keep oneness all
the time. Encourage each other to keep
oneness all the time. As Paul said, endeavoring to
keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. And then
number four, know this, anything else and everything else is of
our flesh and is divisive. It's not of God. That's right. Anything but those three simple
things. Anything other than faith in
my Redeemer. Anything other than speaking
of Christ, the good news of Christ, and forgiving constantly. Anything
other than encouraging one another to unity and the bond of the
Spirit. It's not my flesh. And it's divisive. And it's not any good. That's
what Christ teaches all through the Sermon on the Mount. And
He gets to the end of it. And he says this, now look at
Matthew 7, 24. Therefore, whosoever heareth
these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a
wise man which built his house upon a rock. Who's that foundation? Christ is. And the rain descended,
and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that
house, He never ever anywhere in the scripture said that we're
not going to have storms and violent storms. They're going
to come. That's why I said build on this
rock. Christ the rock. Because those storms come and
look what happened. And it fell not. Why? Because it was founded on a rock.
Because it was founded on Christ. Look at verse 26. And everyone
that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall
be likened unto a foolish man which built his house on the
sand. On the sand. And the rain descended, and the
floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house, and
it fell. And great was the fall of it.
Do you want to be founded on sand or on a rock? I want it
all to be in Christ. All on Christ. All resting on
Christ alone. That's where we want to be. You
know, I may get my feelings hurt. I may be up for losing a lot
and it be very painful and sorrowful to me. But God give me grace
to remember there's something more important than me. It's
His glory. It's the good of His people.
And make me always be a vessel in the Master's hand used to
minister grace and comfort in Christ. because that's more important
than anything else. And anything else is just going
to divide. I want to be on the rock. Let's build on the rock. Father, we thank You for this
Word. We pray, Lord, that You would feed us with it, truly
make us to eat it, make us digest it. It's just sometimes these
things can be too too much and we just need you to feed us,
Lord. Pray that you would give the
milk to the babes and give the meat to the strong and apply
it as only you can apply it and make us willing, Lord, to bow
and to heed you, heed your word. For Christ's sake, for Christ's
honor, we ask in Christ's name, amen.