Sermon Tone Analysis

Several months ago I set out to do a pull up.

We started working out 3 days a week last July but I could not do a pull up.

I decided to get some help and ordered these bands.

Green assist: 50-125 lb

Purple assist: 35-85 lb

Black assist: 25-65 lb

Red assist: 15-35 lb

No band assist: 0 lb

I watch as sometimes people join me in working out and I have been working out since last July and they decide they want to start working out.

When they start, they want to start where I am.

They want to stack the 45’s on the bar and get after it, but they are not there yet.

Paul says to the Corinthians you are not there yet.

You are still infants in Christ.

I have to feed you milk to drink spiritually and not solid food.

You are still not ready.

The words you are still not ready imply that Paul believes they should be further along than they are.

I get the opportunity to coach our baseball and softball kids.

As a coach, it is difficult when you work on something in practice and then you go to the game and the kids should be further along than they show they are.

Paul says you are still not ready.

You should be on solid food but you are not.

How does he know they are not ready for solid food?

v.3 and 4

1 Corinthians

1 Corinthians 3

You are living in the flesh.

The evidence of this fleshly living is ENVY and STRIFE

Envy: Jealousy or eager rivalry

feeling or showing competition of someone or their achievements and advantages.

They are on the same team and yet they are competing.

Obvious Paul is writing to this group fo adults who are jealous of each other and competing with each other when they are on the same team.

James 3:

When you think of Jealousy, I remember growing up and experiencing this at a young age with other kids and what they wear, what their parents drove, what kind of house they had, what talents they have.

Now being a parent and seeing kids today this same thing exist in children today.

You see evidence of jealousy.

Young men “fight” with each other because they are jealous.

Kids on the same team pick on each other because they are jealous.

Girls can be so mean to each other because they are jealous.

This is easy to spot in children but if we are honest many times it is easy to spot in adults as well.

Dads may be jealous of other dads and their relationship with children.

Ladies are jealous of other ladies and the peace they have in their lives.

Some married couples are jealous of the peace they see in other couples.

This same word that Paul uses in 1 Corinthians is also used in James.

James writes very sternly about this.

I believe the Bible speaks so sternly against envy because God wants us to want him and not others.

Essentially that is what envy is.

You want what others have or can do.

All the while Jesus went to the cross and died the cruelest of deaths by public crucifixion.

He hung naked on a cross, nails drove through His hands and His feet, and His side was pierced because he desired that we should have relationship with him.

When we envy others we essentially are saying we want them instead of Jesus.

Jesus died for us.

May we want God.

May we desire God.

May we find contentment in God.

Strife: quarrel, to speak discord, argue

quarrel, to speak discord, argue

Swanson, J. (1997).

Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament) (electronic ed.).

Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

Romans 1:28-

Romans

Galatians 5:19-21

1 Timothy 6:3-

Paul says I can tell you are still on milk because there is STRIFE among you.

Think about children for a minute.

Do children quarrel or argue?

I will never forget that my cousin growing up was known for always disagreeing with anything that someone would say

His response was always na huh.

I don’t know about you but in our home kids like to argue.

If we are not careful a simple instruction to clean a room becomes a long conversation about cleaning a room because kids like to quarrel or argue.

Scripture is very stern about not having strife among us because again an attitude of strife is very prideful.

Strife causes us to focus on our opinion rather than on Jesus.

In strife, we want to be right.

We want to make sure our opinion matters.

Jesus came in human flesh, Jesus was nailed to a cross, Jesus had thorns placed on his head, Jesus bled and died, Jesus was beaten, Jesus was mocked not so that we could make sure all or our arguments are right, but Jesus did all of this to make us right in him.

Is it not amazing that Jesus’s death on the cross sets us free from envy and strife.

The act of Jesus dying and shedding His blood on the cross releases us from being people who are full of Envy and Strife.

Motocycle wreck

If I was to tell you this morning that I was riding down 65 Hwy on a motorcycle and a gust of wind caught and through me off doing 70 mph

You would see the effects of being in a wreck.

So it is when you encounter the Gospel of Jesus.

You can’t encounter the Gospel of Jesus and not be changed.

You can’t stay on milk.

You have to seek solid food.

Now if the indicators of immaturity are envy and strife in the church.

I am concerned that many Christians are still on the Green band (show the green band).

The finished work of Christ on the cross calls us as believers to be set free from envy and strife.

The finished work of Jesus on the cross allows our immaturity to move to maturity.

The death of Jesus sets us free from desiring others and making sure we are right.

The finish work of Jesus on the cross sets us free to want God and God alone.