1 Corinthians 10, we'll begin
in verse 14, where Paul writes, wherefore, my dearly beloved,
flee from idolatry. Now he says, wherefore, because
of the things that we studied last week in these previous verses.
Because Israel, who thought they stood so strong, were so blessed
of God, they still fell into idolatry. They fell into God's
judgment for it. Paul says, because that's true,
you flee from idolatry. So the same fate doesn't happen
to you. Wherefore, because our God has
saved us with such a great salvation, because he's given us everything
in Christ Jesus, flee from idolatry. Don't even give the appearance
of worshipping someone else or something else other than Christ.
Wherefore, because the Lord Jesus Christ became our substitute,
because he was made sin for because he suffered the wrath of God
for our sins, because in his blood he's brought us to God. Flee idolatry. Don't even give
the appearance of worshipping something or someone other than
the Lord Jesus Christ. And wherefore, because our God
is the one who will not suffer us to bear a burden greater than
we can bear, and because our God will make a way to escape
the trial eventually in his time, because that's true, flee from
idolatry. Don't even flee from it. Don't
even give the appearance of putting your stamp of approval on idolatry. And you know, in our day, we
need to remember this, that idolatry, an idol, is not just a hunk of
stone or not some ceramic work somebody bows down to. It's a
perverted gospel, a false gospel, a false Christ. Flee from it. Flee from it like the plague.
Don't even give the appearance of worshiping that way. And that's
the theme that runs through the verses in our lesson this morning.
Don't even give the appearance of putting your stamp of approval
on that idolatry. And he goes on in verse 15, he
says, Now I speak as to wise men. You judge what I say. I'm
speaking to wise men and women who've got plenty enough wisdom
to judge what I'm saying, to understand what I'm saying about
associating yourself with idols, with false worship. And Paul
gives three arguments against associating ourselves. We're
not just talking about idolatry, it's even associating yourself
with idolatry, associating yourselves with false worship. And the first
one, in verse 16, is the Lord's Table. The cup of blessing which
we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread
which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?
Now, Paul calls the Lord's Table the cup of blessing. The elements
of that table picture the source of every blessing that a believer
has. The elements of that table picture the shed blood and the
broken body of our Lord Jesus Christ. And every blessing that
we will ever partake of comes from that sacrifice, the sacrifice
of Christ for the sin of God's elect. Every spiritual blessing
that we enjoy was purchased with that sacrifice, with the blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we partake of that table
and we bless him for that sacrifice. It's the cup of blessing. And
when we take the Lord's table, what we're showing is communion
with Christ, union with him. That word communion actually
means a union with him. What we're saying when we partake
of that table is his body was broken for me. His body must
be broken because he became guilty of my sin. I know he died for
multitude no man can number, but when I take to that table,
what I'm saying is he died for me. It was for my sin. I heard someone say one time
if I was the only sinner he died for, he would have had to suffer
just exactly what he suffered. He suffered for me. I take that
bread and I drink that wine, I'm saying he died for me. Look over at page chapter 11.
This is when our Lord has instituted the Lord's table. This is Paul's
instruction here. In chapter 11, verse 24. And
when he had given thanks, he'd break it. And he said, take,
eat. This is my body which is broken
for you. For you, this do in remembrance
of me, because this is my body, which is broken for you, for
you. This is a personal thing showing
my union with him. When we drink that wine, what
we're saying is the precious blood of Christ was shed to pay
for my sin. It was mine. When we partake
of the Lord's table, it's showing union with him. I eat that bread. I drink that wine. And those
elements become part of my body. In a very short time, those elements
are inseparable from my body. You can't distinguish those elements
from my body where they become part of me. And that's a picture
of the believer's union with Christ. That union is so complete
that we are inseparable from him. You can't tell the difference.
That's what that word communion means is that we're inseparable
from him, joined to him. And that's why the Lord's table
is so precious to the believer at such a special time of worship.
It's showing forth the Lord's death till he come, and it's
showing our union with him. Now, a feast in the idol's temple
shows the same relationship. They're showing communion and
union with that idol. Now, you may be invited to go.
We looked at this a few weeks ago. You may be invited to go
and eat at that feast, and that might be just a free meal to
you. In your mind, in your heart, that's just a free meal. But
other people see you partaking of union with that idol. They
see you joining in with people who are blessing that idol. Now,
you're not doing that in your heart. You're not blessing that
idol in your heart. You're not joining in union with
that idol. You know that idol's nothing.
But people watching you don't know that. They don't see your
heart. All they see you doing is participating in that feast. So Paul says, flee from that.
And the Lord Jesus Christ. Is so important to the believer
that we would never even want to give the appearance that anything
rivals him. We would never want anybody to
be mistaken. into thinking that something
else is as important to me as my Lord. You know, I was at a
Catholic wedding one time. And, you know, that's a very
active ceremony, you know, stand up, sit down, fight, fight, fight.
That's what I thought. You know, they stand up. I'm making fun
of them. But they stand and they kneel
and they stand and they sit. And I just sat there. You know,
before I went, my dad told me what was going to happen. He
said, you just sit there. So I did what he told me to. I sat there.
And a friend of mine looked over me and she said, you know, it
wouldn't hurt you to stand up and sit down and kneel. It wouldn't
hurt you to go up and take the communion, you know, when the
priest has the communion. Well, that's true. It wouldn't have
hurt me. My body, it would not have hurt
me to stand up and sit down and kneel and go up there and take
that from the priest. It wouldn't have hurt me. It's
the exact same element we partake of. It's just bread and wine.
That's all it is. It wouldn't hurt my body. But
we never, ever do it because that's participating in idolatry. We never want to give the impression
that someone would think, I think that's okay. I think that's the
same thing as we worship here because it's not. We never do
that. So the first argument is the
Lord's table. argument against associating
ourselves with these idolaters is our union with each other.
Look at verse 17. For we, being many, are one bread
and one body. If we are all partakers of that
one bread, then every believer is part of the same body, the
body of Christ. We're part of the same bread,
the bread that represents the body of Christ. And no matter
who you are, no matter where you're from or what your background
is, God in His grace has put you in the body of Christ. Now,
a loaf of bread is made up of a lot of different grains of
wheat. It could come from different fields and different places,
and they bring it all together, and they mix it all together,
and it goes through the process from harvest to baking. And after
that process happens, you don't see individual grains of wheat
anymore. You see one lump, one loaf of bread. And that's the
way believers are. You're not an individual. We
don't stand alone. We're all one body, part of one
body, the body of Christ. And God forbid that we take that
body to worship an idol. God forbid. Because when we worship
together around the Lord's table, what we're saying is this one
body has one Lord. one Savior, one hope, one hope
of forgiveness of our sins, one hope of eternal life. And that
hope is found in what that table represents, the sacrifice of
our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, when we would go to partake
of a feast of an idol in that idol's house, it looks like we're
saying the same thing, that we're partaking in one body with all
those people that are worshiping that idol. And we never want
to give the impression that we're joined to that body of idolaters. And remember now, an idol is
not just that hunk of wood. It's a false gospel, a perverted
gospel. And we won't partake in it. Now,
we just won't do it by God's grace. If someone says, well,
you know, you're being awful fanatical. You know, other people don't
make that big a deal out of this. How important is Christ to you?
How important? If He is your life, It's that
important. That's how important he is to
me. And not only is he that to my heart, I want to show that
to others. Now, there's a line that we're
going to draw. We won't participate in this idolatry. And I can compromise
on a lot of things. I mean, I probably should compromise
on more things than maybe I do. But never the Lord Jesus Christ. Never, ever. We can't do it.
We're one body. And the third argument that Paul
gives against associating with this idolatry is the picture
of the Old Testament priests eating the sacrifices that were
offered to God. Look at verse 18, "'Tis behold,
Israel after the flesh, are not they which eat of the sacrifices
partakers of the altar?' Now the priests in the Old Testament,
they ate the meat that was offered as burnt offerings to God. And
when they ate that meat, they showed I believe the God of that
altar. I worship the God of that altar.
I worship the God to whom this sacrifice was made. They showed
that this sacrifice is the only way to God. This sacrifice is
the only way to worship God. Now, if you go and eat meat in
the idol's temple that was offered to that idol, people think you're
saying the exact same thing. That you approve of the God to
whom this sacrifice was offered to. And I know in your mind,
in your heart, that's not what you'd be doing, but we need to
remember. Unbelievers don't have the same discernment you do.
They're still blind. The only reason you have this
discernment is God's given you life. God's given you sight.
They don't have that. They don't understand that that
idol's nothing. You do, but they don't. They
think that that idol and the God of heaven and earth are on
the same plane. They're both to be worshipped.
And we don't want to give them a mistaken impression that we
agree with them. There's a difference between
these idols and the true and living God. And we show that
by refusing to partake in the worship of that idol. You know,
over the course of my work career, I've come in contact with a lot
of women in the workplace, worked with a lot of women. And I've
always made sure that nothing I ever do could be confused with
flirting. Never. Why? Because I love Janet
Sue. That's why. I love her. I mean,
I love her. She's so important to me. Not only do I not want to actually
cheat on her, I don't want anybody to be confused and think that
some other woman could rival her place in my heart. That's
what Paul's saying right here. And that's your attitude. If
the Lord Jesus Christ is everything, if he's everything to you, then
you just don't even associate yourself with this idolatry.
Now, verse 19, Paul says, Now what say I then? That the idol
is anything? Or that which is offered in sacrifice
to idols is anything? But I say that the things which
the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils. and not
to God. And I would not that you should
have fellowship with devils. Now, what's Paul saying? Is he
saying don't partake in this idolatry because that idol is
really something, that that idol really has some existence? Well,
of course not. We know better than that. We
know Paul's not saying that that meat that's been offered to an
idol, it's not been changed. It's not been defiled so that
it will affect your soul. But those offerings have been
offered to devils. That's what he says. They've
been offered to devils. That idol, he says, has been
offered to devils as part of devil worship. That's what idolatry
is. That's what a false gospel is.
It's not another gospel. It's not just a different form
of the gospel. It's devil worship. That's what Scripture said. You
can say, Frank, you're being too hard. That's what the Bible
says. It's devil worship. Don't have
anything to do with it. I mean, don't even trifle with
I mean, do you let your children play with rat poison? What if
they wouldn't need it? You can let them play with it?
Absolutely not. Don't even trifle with this.
Don't have communion with these idolaters in their place of worship.
Now, I know you've got to work with them. They're your co-workers.
You've got to live next to them. They're your neighbors. And you
be friendly to them in those places. By all means, we're not
called to be ugly with these people. But don't have fellowship
with them in their place of idolatry. That's what he's saying. Because
if you do, you'd seem to put your approval on their idolatry.
And you know, people say, well, you know, we're all going to
the same place. We're just taking a different route to get there.
We're all worshiping the same God. We're just worshiping in
a different way. No, sir. May I work with said that one
time, you know, we have a lot of customers who are Arabic and
so forth. And he told, he was telling me,
You know how accepting he is to these people. I told this
fellow, you know, you know who I'm talking about. We're all worshipping the same
God. I'm going to shock you. We're all worshipping the same God.
And I told him, no, we don't. No, sir. And he was just flabbergasted
that I would say that. If we really believe that, that
we are not worshipping the same God, then do not participate
in their idol worship. Look over at Joshua, chapter
24. Joshua 24. In verse 14, Joshua is warning the
people of Israel against this now. He says, Now, therefore,
you fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in truth. And
if you're going to serve him in sincerity and truth, look
what you do. Put away the gods, put away those idols which your
father served on the other side of the flood in Egypt and serve
ye the Lord. And if it seem evil unto you,
if it seem hard unto you to serve the Lord, you choose this day
whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served
that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the
Amorites in whose lands you dwell. There's lots of different ones.
There's lots of different idols. But as for me and my house, we'll
serve the Lord. And that's our attitude. If you're
going to serve the Lord, you're going to put away those idols.
You're going to put away any association with them. You're going to put
away any idea that you're putting your stamp of approval on. Because
I'm telling you this right now, you've got to get on one side
of the fence or the other. There's no in between. Look at
verse 21 in our text. You cannot drink the cup of the
Lord and the cup of devils. You cannot be partakers of the
Lord's table and of the table of devils. Can't do it. It's
impossible to worship God and worship these idols. It's impossible
to sit at the table of the Lord and to sit at the table of idols.
Can't be done because they're diametrically opposed. One is
light, the other is dark. One is light, the other is darkness.
Can't be done. Either your trust is in Christ
or it's in an idol. It's in a false Christ. It's
one or the other. There's no in-between. Now, verse
22, Paul says, Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we
stronger than he? Look over in Exodus chapter 20. The reason for the second commandment
is God is a jealous God. He's jealous of his glory. He's
jealous of the worship that's due unto him. In Exodus chapter
20, verse three, here's the giving of the law, the Ten Commandments.
Second Commandment, verse 3, thou shalt have no other gods
before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee
any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven
above, or that is in earth beneath, or that is in the water under
the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself
to them, nor serve them. Why? For I, the Lord thy God,
am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon
the children under the third and fourth generation of them
that hate me. Isn't that interesting? Bowing
yourself down to these idols shows God says you hate me. See, there's no in between. It's
one or the other. Now, are we foolish enough to
think we should provoke God? You only provoke somebody if
you think you're as strong as he is or stronger than he is.
You only poke your finger in the eye of somebody you think
you can take. If you think he can whip you,
you don't poke your finger in his eye. Are we going to provoke
God? Do we think we can stand before
Him? God is God. We're just dust. And we're gone, just dust. But
besides that, besides the thought of provoking God's anger, the
belief God's child has absolutely no desire to provoke the Lord. We love Him. Our desire is to
serve Him and please Him. And we're jealous of His glory
too, aren't we? Aren't we jealous of His glory?
We are if we know Him. If we've seen any of His glory,
of who He is, we're jealous of His glory. Now verse 23. All things are lawful for me,
but all things are not expedient. All things are lawful for me,
but all things edify not. Let no man seek his own, but
every man another's will. Now, there are all kinds of things
I can do, that I'm free to do, that are not sin. But it's not
always smart to do it. Henry said in his outline, what
is permissible is not always advisable. Now, most of you know
my daughter, Savannah, just turned 16. So we're doing what you do
with 16-year-olds. We're teaching her to drive.
And we're going down the road and she's concerned about going
fast enough so that cars behind her don't build up and be mad
at her and so forth. And we might be going down the
road and the speed limit's 45 or we got up on the highway and
the speed limit's 55 or 65. I tell her, now you know you're
not required to go 45. We pull out on the interstate,
you're not required to go 65 miles an hour. There can be times
that you should go slower. You can go slower. Many times
you should go slower. You know, you don't feel safe
or the circumstances dictate you go slower. It's permissible
to go 65. Now, you don't have to. You just
don't have to do that. Unlike her daddy's example, you
don't have to. You can go less than a speed
limit. And that's what Paul's saying
here. There are things you're permitted to do, but you should
give them up many times. for the good of others, so that
you don't cause your brethren to stumble. And don't we do that
following the example of our Lord? What did He give up for
you? Oh, the glory that He dwelt in,
the riches of His glory, the wealth. He gave it up. What did Paul say in 2 Corinthians
8? You know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though
He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor. As for your sakes,
that ye through his poverty might be made rich. Now we follow his
example. If you truly love the Lord and
you love his people, you give up those things for them, for
their welfare, because true love, we'll see this in here in a couple
of chapters, seeketh not her own. Our welfare and our comfort
is not as important as the welfare of our brethren. If you truly
love them, that's the way you feel. Now verse 25, Paul goes
on, he says, Now whatsoever sold in the shambles, that eat, asking
no question, for conscience's sake. For the earth is the Lord's,
and the fullness thereof. If any of them that believe not
bid you to a feast, and you be disposed to go, go. And whatsoever
said before you, eat, asking no question, for conscience's
sake. But if any man say unto you, This is offered in sacrifice
unto idols, eat not, for his sake that showed it. And for
conscience sake, for the earth is the Lord's and the fullness
thereof." Now, when you go to the shambles, you go to the market,
you buy and eat the meat that's sold there, and don't ask whether
or not it was offered to idols. Just don't ask. You know, you
don't have to go around and act like a religious nut. Just don't ask. You won't
be defiled if that meat was offered to an idol. Just don't ask, because
you know it doesn't matter if it was offered to an idol or
not. It's not going to affect you in any way. And remember
this, no matter where that came from before it went to the market,
no matter where it came from, it was the Lord's. It came from
God. The earth is His and the fullness
thereof. So eat it and be thankful. But
if someone tells you, hey, I got this meat here at a reduced price
because it was offered to an idol. Well, then don't eat it. Saving a little bit of money
in that case is not important. Don't do it for conscience sake
and not just for your conscience. For the conscience of a weaker
brother that's down the aisle watching you. Or for the conscience
of that unbeliever that's watching you buy it and think, well, he
doesn't think there's any difference. No, you show him that there is
a difference. Same thing applies if an unbeliever invites you
over to dinner. You want to go? Go. Go and enjoy
whatever's set before you. Eat it and enjoy it. Give thanks.
Don't ask if it was an offer to an idol. It doesn't matter.
But, if they tell you, here's this nice roast God's been offered
to an idol. Well, then don't eat it for conscience
sake. And again, not for yours, for
his. So he'll see that you do not put your stamp of approval
on that. And listen, you're not going
to go hungry. You're just not going to go hungry.
There's plenty of other food to eat and enjoy and be thankful
for because the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof,
the fullness of this earth. belongs to your father. Is he
going to let you go hungry? No. You know, the best example
I can think of of this is, you see this happen at my house.
Somebody comes and knocks on the door. And they got that box
of those chocolate candy bars they sell as fundraisers. Janet
loves those things. I mean, she loves them. And buddy,
she'll buy two or three. She just buys all she likes.
And she'll buy them and hide them from the girls because she
wants to have them, you know, And they come to the door, and
she used to say, well, who are you selling those for? And they'd
say, well, it's for this church group. Well, she'd say, no, I'm
sorry. I'm not going to buy any. And then for the next hour, she'd
sit there just in misery, thinking, oh, I could have had those. I
can't. She'd feel so deprived, you know?
So now, she operates under the don't ask, don't tell policy,
which is what Paul's saying here. Don't ask, don't tell. If they
come and want to sell a list, she says, yeah, I'll buy some.
And she hurries and buys it before they tell her. You know, she
just don't want to know. But if they tell her, I'm selling
these candy bars to raise money for my church, well, I'm sorry.
But if she don't know, she'll buy them and eat them and enjoy
them. That's exactly what Paul's saying right here. That's exactly
what he's saying. You're not going to support and
fund or put your stamp of approval on this idolatry because that's
what it is. It's idolatry. Now verse 29,
Paul says, conscience I say, not thine own, but of the other. For why is my liberty judged
of another man's conscience? For if I by grace be a partaker,
why am I evil spoken of for that for which I give thanks? Whether
therefore ye eat or drink or whatsoever you do, do all to
the glory of God. That's why I said a minute ago,
the conscience he's talking about here is the conscience of your
weaker brother. or the conscience of the unbeliever that's watching
you. And someone says, boy, that's tough. Why should my conduct
be dictated by another man's conscience when he doesn't have
as much light and understanding and discernment as I do? Why
should I have to give up my liberty because of someone else's weakness? If someone asks that question,
I've got a better question for you. Why shouldn't it be that
way? Now to the believer, I'm not
saying that to someone who's not been born again. I'm talking
about to the believer. Why shouldn't it be that way? It's that way
in our civil life. Every one of us is guaranteed
liberties in our constitution, but you're never free to use
that liberty to harm someone else. You know, we have freedom
of speech. That's a pet peeve of mine. Freedom
of speech in the constitution. It's guaranteed a speech against
the government that you disagree with. You have a guaranteed freedom
to speak against the government that you disagree with. And that's
degenerating our day to freedom of speech. I can say whatever
I want, whenever I want, because I have freedom of speech. Well,
that's true. But you're not free to run into
a crowd of theater and shout fire when there's not one and
cause a stampede and get somebody hurt. You're not free to say
whatever you want and slander somebody and harm their reputation. You don't have the freedom to
use those liberties to harm someone else. So when someone says, well,
you know, why should my conduct be dictated by another man's
conscience? The better question for the believer to ask is why
would I expose myself to have my liberty in Christ be evil
spoken of? There are so many other things
I can do and enjoy. There are so many other blessings
of God that I can enjoy and be thankful for. Why would I expose
the liberty that I have in Christ to be evil spoken of? Our conduct
is guided by the glory of our God. Not my own pleasure, not
my own ease, but His glory and the good of His people. We're
always better off to deny ourselves than risk bringing reproach on
the gospel. Look back at Romans chapter 14. Romans 14 verse 16. Well, look at verse 15. It says,
But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, with thy conduct,
with whatever it is that you're doing, now walkest thou not charitably. You're not walking in love. Destroy
not him with thy meat, or with thy liberty to eat that meat
for whom Christ died. Let not then your good be evil
spoken of. For listen, the kingdom of God
is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy
Ghost." Those things are a whole lot more important than what
you eat or what you drink. Now verse 32, give not offense,
neither to the Jews nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of
God, even as I please all men and all things, not seeking my
own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved. If the glory of God is our chief
concern, I'll be very careful not to offend my brethren with
my liberty, because our first goal is the eternal good of others,
of those believers here and unbelievers out there. That's what is our
goal, that they might come hear the gospel, that the Lord might
save them. That's a whole lot more fulfilling
and pleasure than my own fleshly enjoyment. That's what our Lord
did following his example. Someone did that for you. Someone
gave up their time. A pastor, a preacher gave up
his time, gave up so many things to be able to preach the gospel
to you for your eternal good. Wouldn't you like to do the same?
We're not all going to be preachers and things, but we can do those
things with this goal in mind, the glory of God and the eternal
good of others. A big part of growing in grace,
this is true, is to quit thinking about myself and think about
somebody else. I got behind a car this morning,
had a I'd almost have to draw it out for him. Weird looking
bumper sticker. Look at that bumper sticker. What in the world
does that mean? And underneath it, it explained what it meant.
And I thought, this is good. He must increase. And this fella must decrease.
That's what he's saying. Alright, Lord bless you.