Family Matters

1 Corinthians  •  Sermon  •  Submitted   •  Presented   •  33:49
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Our Scripture lesson today comes from 1 Corinthians 6:1-11:
1 Corinthians 6:1–11 ESV
When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints? Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life! So if you have such cases, why do you lay them before those who have no standing in the church? I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to settle a dispute between the brothers, but brother goes to law against brother, and that before unbelievers? To have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather suffer wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? But you yourselves wrong and defraud—even your own brothers! Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
May God bless this reading of His holy and infallible Word.
At first glance, this portion of Scripture appears to have limited application. Thankfully, most of us will go through life without ever feeling the need to take someone to court over a personal injury, much less a Christian brother or sister. However, upon closer examination, this text has a much broader application; it speaks to the Christian’s relationship to Christ, His Church and to the world. This is something we deal with every day.
If you recall, two weeks ago, Paul when teaching on the subject of church discipline reminds the Corinthians that there is a sharp distinction between the church and the world. He writes:
1 Corinthians 5:9–12 ESV
I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge?
One of the unfortunate consequences of the success of Christianity in the West is that this distinction has been blurred or even lost in the minds of many Christians. Almost everyone was a Christian or at least claimed to be a Christian. For hundreds of years the West was call “Christendom” and most Americans considered the United States to be a “Christian Nation”. Sadly, those days are now long gone, for decades Western Europe has been essentially a pagan society and it appears that America has now joined them. The only bright side of this sad turn of events is that it should be easier to see the distinction between the world and the church.
I say “should be” because even in first century Corinth, the church seems to have forgotten who their true family was. Some in the church were taking their fellow brothers and sisters in Christ before the civil law courts in an effort to defraud them. The Greek and Roman law courts were notoriously corrupt; judges and juries would rule in favor of the highest bidders. As we will learn in 1 Corinthians 11, the wealthy were excluding the poor from their fellowship meals, and most likely, the rich members of the Corinthian church were taking the poor members of the church to court in order to defraud them.
Paul is shocked by this behavior, this can be seen in three places in our text by the way Paul composes his letter. In Greek literature, the most important idea is placed first in a sentence and the very first word we find in our passage is the word “dare”. The KJV and the NKJV get it correct when they translate this verse:
1 Corinthians 6:1 NKJV
Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unrighteous, and not before the saints?
In some editions of the King James Bible, the publishers have printed this word “dare” in bold print. Paul is literally shouting, “How dare you, go to the civil courts rather than before the church!”
Paul is shocked because they are displaying a total ignorance of who they are, who the church is and most importantly, who Christ is.

A Shocking Ignorance of Who Your Family Is

The biblical worldview is a worldview dominated by covenant. We are created by God to be in relationship with God and with each other. The modern, secular worldview is all about the individual. Today in the West, each person defines their own identity, their own morals, even their own truth. I just learned a new word this week, “metrue”. Apparently, this is one of the new buzzwords created by the Woke Left. It expresses the idea that what is true for me is all that matters.
This is not the biblical worldview. God is the only one who has the right to define truth. Jesus is the truth. The Apostle John writes that Jesus is “full of grace and truth” (Jn 1:14) and in that same Gospel, Jesus says he is “the way, the truth and the life” (Jn 14:6). What God has revealed to us is that no one is an island, everyone belongs to a family, you are either in the family of God or you are in the family of the Devil (Jn 8:44).
In 1 Corinthians 1:1-4, Paul is telling us that because we are related to Christ, we share in His authority, consequently it is unnecessary for Christians to go outside of the church. He does this by using what is called a greater to lesser argument. If the greater is true, then the lesser is true also. We find this argument in vs. 2-3:
1 Corinthians 6:2–3 ESV
Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life!
If the saints will one-day rule with Christ over both heaven and earth, how much more are they capable to rule over trivial matters such as personal injury lawsuits! On the inverse, why should we trust those who as Paul said have, “no standing in the church”, especially in light of the notorious corruption of the Greek and Roman legal system?
This issue of identity has application far beyond personal lawsuits; the question “who am I” is one of the most basic and fundamental questions every person asks. If we answer that question in any way other than how God has revealed in His Word, we are opening ourselves up to a life of confusion, pain and ultimately eternal separation from God. We are created in God’s image to be in a relationship with Him and with each other. Christ came and died to restore that relationship.
God is our Father, Christ is our Lord and Savior, the church is our mother, and our fellow Christians are our brothers and sisters! These relationships are so precious and vital that we should be willing to guard them with our very lives, with brings us to Paul’s second point:

A Shameful Disregard for the Honor of Your Family

This is found in vs. 5-7. Once again, the very first word in the Greek text is the word shame; “To your shame, I say this”!
In 1 Cor 4:14, Paul was careful not to shame the Corinthians, but now he holds back nothing, the act of dragging another brother or sister before a secular law court is so out of character to who a Christian should be that they deserve nothing but shame!
What is so shameful about this? It all comes down to honor. Our secular society has become so individualistic that it has forgotten all about honor. There was once a time when relationships mattered. People would die to preserve the honor of their family, their nation and their God. Today, people only care about themselves.
This is not how it should be. In the biblical worldview, relationships are governed by covenants: mutual agreements in which people bind themselves to each other and to God in love and fidelity. Ever since the so-called Enlightenment, the biblical worldview has been under attack and what is now seen as “normal” by the broader society we live in is not normal at all. God calls us to be in covenant with Him and with each other, to care about each other and to guard each other’s reputations. In their selfish pursuit of personal gain, the Corinthians were forgetting the value of their relationships.
To not trust in the wisdom and righteousness of other fellow Christians to come to a just and equitable verdict is to bring dishonor to the both Christ and to the church. This is such a serious matter, that Paul says in vs. 7 that they should be willing to suffer loss rather than bring their dispute to secular law courts. To gain victory in a secular law court is to suffer defeat in the things that really matter—our relationship with Christ and His church!
How much do you love Christ and His church? I told you this passage was practical. Its application goes far beyond personal lawsuits; it comes down to who or what you really value. For example, when you came to worship today, was your main concern to be rightly relating to God and your fellow believers, or was to have a “worshipful experience” or “to be blessed” or to “be fed”? Do you see how individualistic our worship has become? Today, worship is about pleasing people, not pleasing God.
This ugly individualism is what is behind the mass shootings, broken families, sexual immorality and financial fraud that plague both our nation and sadly, the church today. This brings us to Paul’s final point:

A Scandalous Sin Revealing What Family You Really Belong To

Once again, Paul uses a literary marker to show us what is important; he says in vs. 9, “do you not know that”. We use phrases like this to signal to the other person what we are about to say is very important.
What is so important that Paul feels it necessary to use this technique?
He tells us, “the wrongdoer will not inherit the kingdom of God.” There is a connection between vs. 8 and vs. 9, that is hard is seen in the ESV. The latest edition of the NIV clearly shows it:
1 Corinthians 6:8–9 NIV11
Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers and sisters. Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men
The wealthy members of the Corinthian church were dragging the poorer members of the church into the corrupt civil courts where “justice” went to the highest bidder. Now the cat is out of the bag! These wealthy members of the Corinthian church were dragging their fellow Christians into the civil courts for the purpose of defrauding them! Paul is warning them that if they persist in doing this, they are going to reveal precisely which family that belong to—the family of the Devil!
However, when we sin, there is also the opportunity to demonstrate that we are really a part of the family of God. Paul however, reminds us of this in vs. 11:
1 Corinthians 6:11 ESV
And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
You see, sin no longer serves as the bases of a Christian’s identity. Christians sin, but they are not dominated by sin.
Let me use some biblical examples of what I mean. Just like King David, a Christian can commit adultery, but adultery did not characterize David’s live, nor should it yours. Just like Noah, a Christian can get drunk, but just like Noah, drunkenness should not characterize your life.
When a person unites themselves to Christ in faith, this new relationship changes everything. Notice the three things Paul now says are true of a believer:
1) You are washed—Our sins are washed away by the blood of Jesus.
2) You are sanctified—We are set apart as holy. We are no longer in the family of the Devil, we are in the household of God.
3) You are justified—We are declared just on the bases of Christ’s righteousness.
This is who you are in Christ! So start living like it!
When you find yourself in sin, repent of it, turn away from it, and put it to death by the power of the Holy Spirit!
I know at times, it seems as though all you are doing is repenting and the day when you will no longer have to fight against a particular sin seems like an impossibility, but remember this, it is Christ that will complete the work of sanctification, not you. Paul encourages us with these words:
Philippians 1:6 ESV
And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
I hope you see that not only have I been preaching about matters that should concern the family of God, but also I have been reminding you that family really does matter. Being a child of God through faith in Jesus Christ is all that matters. Everything thing else that truly matter flows from our relationship with Jesus.
Are you a member of the family of God through faith in Christ Jesus? If you are not, or if you are not sure, then today I urge you, receive Jesus as your Lord and Savior and believe in the power of His name. If you do, this is what will happen:
John 1:12 ESV
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,
Receive and believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, because Family Matters!
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