Grace for the Broken - 1 Corinthians 1:1-9

you watch something on TV, or you watch a movie, and you begin to think for a minute that it might be really cool to live there. I remember when I was young, Little House on the Prairie was a f a pretty popular TV show. And people would watch " Little House on the Prairie, and they would say something like, Oh, it would be so cool to live back then." And then I'd say, "W it, though? You're gonna probably die at 60, you're probably gonna lose one out of four of your kids in childbirth. You're gonna have a really pretty miserable existence. People go to, like, the Renaissance Fair. And they say, "Oh, it'd be so cool to live by. No, not it. all. Not me. I don't want to live anywhere but right now. Give me flushing toilets and air conditioning and drive through windows at restaurants and food from all over the world at the Hy V three minutes from my house. Give me right now. I don't I want to visit for a minute places like that, but I'm want to live there. And we have a tendency to do the same thing with our understanding of what the early church must have looked like. We read things like the last part of the book of the end of the second chapter of the Book of Acts. And we read about how they had all things in common and how they were just taking their meals, house to house, and they were like in the temple every day under Solomon's portico, learning the Word of God And we say, "Oh, the early church would have been just perfect." And people will say things like this.We need to be like the early church. You hear pastors say, or church leaders or church members say, "I wish we could just get back to being like the first century church." I don't think we understand what we're saying when we say that. If you read the New Testament, what you discover is the first century church was pretty screwed up. They had a lot of problems. Have you read the New Testament? A lot of the letters of the New Testament, the New Testament is made up of letters written to churches, and most of the letters are addressing problems that those churches were having. This was not a perfect situation. And we do that a lot. when someone says, "I want to be like the early church. What I'll have to say is, which early church would you like to be like And to make my point, I'll say, "How about the Church of Corinth? Would you like to be the church in Corinth?" That was a messed up place, and we're going to discover that over the next few months together, because today, we're starting our series in the Book of 1 Corinthians. And we're going to get a little glimpse into just one of those first century churches, and we're going to see that they weren't perfect places They were full of messed up people that just like our churches today. People that came out of brokenness and sin, and were saved by the grace of Jesus Christ and gathered together and brought with them all kinds of issues that they continue to struggle with. We're going to see that between now. We're going to take a short break at Christmas, but outside of that, we're going to be in 1 Corinthians now through Easter Sunday. And we're going to see what God has to say to us through this level written to the church in Corinth. What was in front of us here is a letter. It's a letter, if we start, we just open it up, 1 Coians chapter 1 verse 1. We're going to start here, and you discover the very first word is the word Paul. It's a letter from a man named Paul. Paul wrote 13 letters that made their way into the scripture. One of them is 1 Corinthians, he began every single one of them the same way. Paul starts with his day. Why? That's how you started a letter in the first century. And for most of our history, when we have written letters and our more modern history, we will write a letter, and then we will sign our name at the end of the letter In the first century, when you wrote a letter, you put your name right at the beginning of the letter. And I would say that today, we function more like the first centuryury in the way we correspond with people, don't we? When you send a text to someone, you don't write a text and then say, "Hey, it's Matt, I'll say, if you might not know who I am, I'll say, "Hey, Josh, it's Pastor Matt from Northland And then I'll go on and say what I want to say. When you sent a text message, that's the exact same way they wrote a letter in the first century. You said right up front who it's from, who it's to, and then you go on with what you want to say. And so so Paul begins the letter with his name, Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus. Who was Paul? Paul was a missionary of the early church. If you have been with us, Phil, the last few months, we just recently spent a great deal of time going through the Book of Acts. The Book of Acts tells us the story of the early church from the Ascension of Jesus for the first 30 years of church history And Paul was one of the central figures in that book, a common name that we came across as we worked a way through that. He made three missionary journeys across the Roman Empire, preaching the good news of Jesus Christ Christ, and starting new churches, one of those was the church in the city of Cont. And so he says, it's by Paul, called by God, by the will of God, to be an apostle. What is an apostle? You'll see that word of the Bibleible a lot. The word apostle meant means one who is sent, one who is sent out on a mission. We might use our word ambassador in a similar way today. Our country will send an ambassassador to another country to represent us. An apostle was one sent by God to represent him to other people. Paul is saying, I have been sent by God to minister to you, sent by God to send this letter to you by the will of God. He points out that he's doing this according to God's will in God's plan, in God's authority. That's going to be important because he's going to address some very difficult issues. I'll say more about that in a moment. So he says, right up front, I'm writing you as one sent by God, by God's will, to minister to you. Verse 1, he says he's with our brothers Sohenes, who is Sohenes. He's most likely the same guy mentioned in Acts chapter 18. If you want to go later today and read chapter 18, Acts chapter 18. you can hear the story of the founding of the church in Corinth, this group of people are receiving this letter. And you'll see mention there a man named Sosthenes. Sosthenes was a leader of the Jewish synagogue. Paul was went first to the Jewish synagogue, being to preach that Jesus is the Messiah they were waiting for. Some of those Jewish people believed the message and followed Jesus, some rejected him And then Paul, after being rejected by the Jew Jewish people, he went right next door to the house next door to the synagogue, kept preaching the gospel, and many non Jewish people became followers of Jesus. One of those Jewish leaders who became a follower of Jesus was this man named Shenes. In fact, he's even persecuted for his faith. You're going to read Acts 18, you'll see the story of his persecution that he experienced. He's with Paul as he's writing this letter. Some suggest that he could be Paul's secretary. Now, if you if you spend most summer on Bible scholars or read many Bible scholar works, they like to make up more difficult words for the very simple words we already have. And so if you ever come across the word aanuensis, aanuensis, that's that's just a fancy word for secretary. What that meant is that Paul is dictating this letter to Sosthenes, and he's writing it as Paul dictates it. That may be why he mentions him right here. We're not 100% sure, but he wants to let us know that he's with Sosthenes. Then he tells us that this letter is to the Church of God that is in Corinth. So let's say a few things about Corinth. Corinth was started, the church that was started in A.D 50. During Paul's second missionary journey. He went to the city of Corinth. He stayed there a year and a half, preaching the good news about Jesus, and many began to follow Jesus, and a church was established there. He left there, and some time later, probably either 80, 50, between 80, 53, and 8055, Paul is now on his third missionary journey. He's spending some time three years in the city of Ephesus, and while he's at Ephesus, some circumstances arise that motivate him to write a letter to Cont. So started on his second journey 8050, letter sent during his third journey, AD 53 or 5 55, from Ephesus to the city of Corinth. It's one of two letters that find their way into the Bible. 13 letters were written by Paul. Again, Bible scholars call those epistles. If you ever heard the word epistle, say, what's an epistle? Just a fancy word for letter. And so it's a letter written by Paul. It may be one of four letters that he wrote. There's a letter mentioned in 1rit, Corinthians 5,9, that may be the first letter he wrote them that we don't have. It's not included in scripture. He writes then, the book that we call 1 Corinthians. He may write a third letter that's's mentioned in 2 Corinthians chapter 2 and then he writes a fourth letter that finds its way into the scriptures, which is 2nd Corinthians. So he's writing these letters to this church in Corinth. Now, where is Coth? Cont is located in southern Greece. At this time, it has a population of 80 to 100,000 people, and the main thing you need to know about Corinnt is it's on a major trade route, had ports on each side of it and so it's a major trade route between Greece, North Africa, Italy, and Asia Minor. So tons of goods are passing through this, tons of people are passing through here, and for that reason, it becomes a very wealthy city, and it becomes a very culturally diverse city. And that leads to two things that become a problem for people living in Corinth, who are now followers of Jesus. Number one, because of its cultural diversity, people from so many different parts of the world, it's become a center of paganism. All kinds of religions are a practice there. There are 12 temples in the city of Corinth during this time, the largest of which is the temple of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love and there are upwards of a thousand temple prostitutes working in this temple every single day.s also lead to our second problem in Corinth, it was a city of open and unbridled immorality. Great immorality took place in the city of Corinnt so much so that scholars tell us that the word Corinth became synonymous with immoral practices. To Corinthize, it's hard to say, to corinthonize was to engage in immorality and drunkenness. Somebody's carrying on. He said, they're Corinthonizing. And a loose woman would be called a Corinthian girl So you don't want to be known as a Corinthian gal back in that day. All right? That was a bad thing to be known as that. city of paganism and immorality, and idolatry, and out of that culture and against that background, people are becoming followers of Jesus And while they're moving from their life of paganism and idolatry and morality to become followers of Jesus, some of those struggles have crept into the church. And now now we have a church full of immature believers who seem unwilling to fully divorce themselves from the culture around them and from their past. And so Paul writes this letter to address the struggles that broken church was facing How does he know about these? Two ways he finds out. One, we learn later in chapter 1 that someone he refers to as Chloe's people, have told him some reports about the church. So Paul's in Ephesus, someone from the city of Corinth, from Chloe's people, whoever Chloe's people are, they show up in Ephesus, and Paul said, "Hey, how's the church in Corinth going? And They said, oh, Paul, it's a mess And Chloe's people begin to spill the tea about all the stuff going on in Corinth. Now, there's the second thing that happens. Paul gets a letter from some of the people at the church of Corinth asking some questions about the struggles they're having. So Paul's heard this report from Chloe's people. He's received this letter with all kinds of questions, and he says, there's a lot of trouble going on in Corinth. And so he writes this letter to address the problems this broken church is facing. What are those problems? We're going to see so many of them as we move through here. One, there's a lot of division and factions and competing allegiances. People have split, and half the churches said, I'm following Paul." And the other half said, "I'm following Apollus." And the people who liked Paul were not getting along with the people who followed Apollus. They had disputes within the church, so much to the point where they were taking each other to court. Imagine a bunch of you all just suing each other all the time. I got to deal with all these lawsuits. Everybody keeps suing each other. They were arrogant in the use of their gifts and they're bragging about the gifts that they had. There was a lot of sexual immorality still happening, and the church was looking the other way. Paul's going to talk about one situation where there was immorality to the point that not even a pagan would be tolerate, and he said, "You all aren't even dealing with it. You're looking the other way and ignoring this." They had a failure to break with the idolatry of their past, and it led to a lot of theological confusion and disagreement. How do I I live out my new faith in Christ in a context of paganism and idol worship? He's going to talk about that later in the letter. There's a lot of disorder and chaos in their worship services and he has to write and tell them how to conduct their worship services in an orderly way. There's class discrimination, so much to the point, because of the economic diversity, so much the point where people were being discriminated against, even at the point of the Lord's Supper. Some people were not getting to participate fully in the Lord's Supper because of the class distinctions between them. And then there's an overall spiritual immaturity. Paul says, you guys should be on solid food by now, but you still needed the milk of an infant because you're spiritual immaturity. So to this church of immorality and immaturity and division and confionusion and factions, he writes this letter. Now, I want you to notice this morning, how he begins the letter. He's going to hit him pretty hard with a lot of these issues, but he does doesn't come out of the gate swinging on their sin. He comes out of the gate, reminding them of their holiness of their identity in Jesus. He's not going to come and say, right out of the gate, hey, guys, it's. I got a lot of problems with you people. He's gonna have a lot of problems. He's gonna bring those up. What he's going to see out of the gate is, I want to remind you of your identity in Jesus. He's going to remind them right out of the gate that God saved them and sanctified them and gifted them to serve and to live for his glory. He's going to remind them that they've been set apart from the paganism and idolatry of their past. He's going to remind them that by grace, they've been forgiven and made holy, and because God has made them holy, and God has saved them, and God has gifted them, they don't have to walk in the brokenness of their past. God is faithful and those who once walked in brokenness and sin now can stand before God guiltless. So he doesn't start by telling them they're terrible sinners. He starts by reminding them that they hold holy saints. So what does this mean for us today? We need to find ourselves in the story every week as we move through here. I heard recently a guy in a podcast say,Most of the Bible, when you think about the context of the Bible, it wasn't written to you, but it was written for you. What he meant by that was a prophet spoke to a particular situation in the Old Testament. And he was addressing these people, but it benefited all of us Send with these letters. This letter was written not to Northland church, but written to the church at Corinth. While it was not written to us, it was written for us. What I mean by that is these letters, this letter to Co, is the inerant, authoritative word of God for us today. It's not just an ancient letter to an ancient church. It is the living and abiding word of God set before us today. In fact, Paul said said this in verse 2. He says, to the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ, Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who at every place called upon the name of the Lord, Jesus Christ. It's not just for Corinth, but it's for all those in every place who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus. It's for us If you're a follower of Jesus, this book is for you, this letter is for you. So if God can rescue the Corinthians out of idolatry and change them, he can change us. If he can gift them and give them a new purpose, he can do the same for us. If God can fix this, can redeem this broken church in Corinth, he can do the same for you and I in our lives today. So God's not starting with our shortcomings and our failures, but rather reminding us of our identity in Christ. The other, there's a lot of sin to be confronted in the days ahead as we read through this letter. But today, the message is God has given you a new identity a new identity in Jesus. Are you walking to according to the new identity you have in Jesus? Here's the main point I want you to get. We're going to unpack this as we go through this. But the main point to see from the beginning is this is the message of these opening nine verses. God gives grace and gifts to sinful and broken people. God gives grace and gifts to people in Corinth who come out of idolatry and immorality and paganism, God gave his grace to those sinners and gifts to those sinners, to walk in newness in their new identity, and so he does for us. God gives us today his grace. And God gives us, he enriches us with gifts, sinful and broken people, so we might be redeemed, made holy, and used for his glory. Let's unpack this. First thing I want you to notice is that His grace sanctifies us. His grace sanctifies us. What does that mean? Well, look at verse two with me. verse two. He says to the Church of God that is incorrent to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints. I once you notice those two two words, sanctified and saints. These words, in the original Greek language, are very closely related. The word "sanctified" is a verb, and it means to make holy." To those who have been made holy The word "saint often here, functions as an adjective, meaningholy, but here, this adjective functions like a noun, meaning holy people. So what he's saying here is to those who have been made holy in Jesus, and are now holy people. So what does it mean to be holy, to be a saint? The word holy, or to be a saint, simply means to set apart. A saint is a holy one, and something holy is something that's been set apart. It's any simple way that you take one thing, and you set it apart for one purpose and one purpose only. Now, you probably heard me, if you've been around here a while, you've probably heard me use this reference before, but when I think of holiness, I think of my toothbrush Why? The most holy thing I'll use today, the most holy thing I have used today, is my toothbrush, not this particular toothbrush. I got this one free from Zononarosa Dental. You have a free commercial there. I have an appointment tomorrow at 8:00 a.m. I'll get a new toothbrush. Why is a toothbrush holy? Hopefully, hopefully, you use your toothbrush for one thing and one thing only. I hope that you have set apart your toothbrush to only brush your teeth, right? Josh, if you have a toothbrush sitting there, and Mel decides her jewelry needs to be cleaned, and your toothbrush makes a handy tool to clean her jewelry, she's defiled your toothbrush, right? You don't want to brush your teeth with something she just used to clean her jewelry with. Worse yet, if she decides to clean the toilet And your toothbrush makes a handy tool for cleaning the toilet. It's no longer set apart. Like, I gotta get. I go back to Z Rosa dental, get a new toothbrush, because she's ruined it, right? Set apart, you say, "I'm gonna use this for one thing only, and that is to brush my teeth." When the Bible says we're holy, what it means is our lives have been set apart. We've been set apart from our past, we've been set apart with a new purpose, and our new purpose in life is to bring God glory, to live for Him as His child And now because you've been called made holyy, the Bible in 1st Cothians chapter 1, calls you a saint. You're a saint, if you're a f of Jesus. How do we use the word saint? We use the word saint a lot of ways. The Catholic Church uses the word for someone who has died that has done some particular special things during their life, that church leadership will now make them a saint now that they're dead And so we think of a saint that this person who died hundreds of years ago, we now call them a saint. We use the word sometimes as someone who lives a very virtuous and devout life, someone who's a very religious person. We saw that person such a saint by the way they live their life. Sometimes we use the word saint for the way that someone who's done something very special for us. Someone does me a favor, and I say, Scott Parmman helps me out with something, you borrow his truck to help me move something." And I say, "Scott, man, you're a saint. Thank you for that." It's a way we say, you've done something very special for me." Sometimes we use it as a way of someone who's very patient in a difficult situation. You might say, to date Matt wholesale, Emily is a saint." I mean, it would take a you got to be a saint to date Matt, we use it that way, right? Now, how does the Bible use it? The Bible doesn't talk about dead people or people who do you a favor, or someone who who chose great patience. The B is a saint for anyone who's a follower of Jesus. If you're here today, you're a saint It's Saint. Timothy. It' Saint. Brad. Yeah. It was a room full of saints. Saint. Sandy. You've probably been called a saint more than Timothy gets called a saint. But the Bible calls you saints. anyone who's a follow Jesus Christ. And's so what's gonna say is y'all need to start acting like the saints that God has made you to be. He has set you apart. You need to live in that identity. And this happens through the greatace of Jesus Christ. First four, I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus You are saints because of God's grace. God's showed his unmerited favor toward you. You didn't deserve it. You can't earn it. You would be hopeless if it weren't for the grace of God in sending Jesus Christ to die on the cross for your sins. When I was in high school, someone taught me this, Acrostic grace is God's riches at Christ's expense how you a way, you can define grace. We get the riches of God, His mercy, his love, his forgiveness. We get all of that at the expense of Jesus Christ's death on the cross. Christ died on the cross, and because of his death on the cross, I go to experience the grace of God, grace that sanctifies us. Not only does he sanctified us, he goes on to say that he has gifted us. His gifts enrich us. His grace has sanctified us and made us holy. His gifts have enriched us. that in every waivers 5 says that in every way, you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge. Even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you, so that you are not lacking any gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. You have been enriched by the gifts of God. God has gifted you and you are not lacking any gift to serve him. And what's he saying to this immature, struggling church? You folks have been given a new identity, and you have been gifted. And you need to begin to function like people who have been set apart and forgiven and made holy, and have also been enriched by the gifts of God to serve him as we wait for him to return. Now, we're going to say a lot more about this in a few months or a few weeks, whenever we get to 1 Corinthians chapter 12. But let's take just a peak there. 1 Corinthians chapter 12 says, now there are over varieties of gifts but the same spirit. There are varieties of service, but the same Lord. There are varieties of activities, but it's the same God who empowers them all in every one. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common goods. He's going to go on and define all that in the rest of that chapter. But what he's saying is, you have been gifted Peter wrote this in another letter of the New Testament.As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. Whoever speaks as one who speaks the oracles of God, whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies, in order that in everything, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Was he saying, you have been gifted, and as you received a gift, there's an expectation that you use that gift for God's glory." And verse 7, he said, "We do this as we wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ until Jesus returns, God leaves us here with the gifts He's given us to serve him. What he's saying is God gives broken, sinful, immature people, because he wants to use broken sins, sinful, immature people for his glory and his purposes. Unt until the day he comes back. Jesus, Donald the cross wrote that ascended into heaven, said, I'm coming back, but between now and the time I come back, you are the plan I'm gifting you and going to use you for my glory with the gifts I have given you. And then finally says, "Until that day comes, I will sustain you. I will sustain you. His faithfulness, will sustain us. Verse 8, Who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus. God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. Those in Christ will be found guiltless, they'll be found blameless on the day Jesus returns. He's writing to assure them that he who began this work in their lives is going to fully complete it and be faithful to it until the end when they stand guiltless before him. No matter how much you struggle, God will sustain you. God will find you guiltless in the end he's writing to this church, reminding him of this identity and this promise before he hits the hard conversations about their sin. He finishes first Thessonian, or he writes later 1 Thessonians chapter 5, He writes in the church in Thessalonica. Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful. He will surely do it. He's reminding them. You can trust him. The God who saved you will you' stand before him guiltless at the end of it all. Now, what do we do with this? What is What is the word that God has for us? Three questions I want to ask you this morning, that correspond these three prison principles we pulled out of this. Number one, am I walking in holiness? Consider today this question in your own life. Am I walking in holiness? verse 2 tells us that we are made holy through Jesus Christ. Verse 4 tells us we were made holy by the grace of God that was given to us. We are not holy by our own efforts. We cannot do things to become holy. We're only made holy by the grace of God, through our faith in Jesus Christ. There are many scriptures in the Bible that speak to our holy standing before God. So if you went out today and you did a study, I'm going to look up holiness, sanctified, set apart consecrated. I'm going to do a study of all that in the Bible. You're going to find references in the scripture that says that you are making holy, you have a holy standing before God through faith in Jesus Christ alone. Nothing you earn. What you will also discover, though, are many scriptures that call us to live holy lives to be holy.y. For example, 1 Peter chapter 1 1 Peter chapter 1, verse 14. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. Since it is written, you shall be holy, for I am holy. So what do we have here? We have scriptures that tell us we have been made holy, and we have scriptures that tell us to go and be holy. So we understand here is there's two sides to this. There's a positional holiness. I am right before God because of faith in Jesus Christ Christ alone, but now that I have been made positionally holy, I am called to live out my holiness in Christ in practical ways What it looked like now to walk in this new identity? He has both made us holy and called us to live holy lives. Those who have been sanctified by God, set apart as his holy people, are now called to reflect that holy relationship in the way they live their lives. He's reminding them of their position and their calling. Why is all this important? Because he's going to say, "You got to quit acting the way you used to act. You got to quit struggling things you struggle. You're different now. You have a new identity. You to walk in that new identity. I hope that when you came to faith in Christ, your life began to look differently than it did before. Jesus changes us. If you said following Jesus, but my life looks exactly like it did before I was following Jesus, we're missing something. I talked to a young lady, she was baptized in the early service, the 8:00 a.m. service I told her this week. She's been following Christ, and how she's coming here in January, began to hear the gospel, she gave her life to Jesus. She's baptized today. And she said, "Yeah, the first Sunday I came here, I saw everybody writing stuff down while you were talking. And she said, that was weird. Like,W are they they're taking notes in church. And she says, "That was really weird to me. And she was a few weeks after coming here, I started writing stuff down that you were saying during the sermon. She said, "Oh, my gosh, I've become one of them." And then she wanted to talk about other things in her life and how her life has changed over the last few months. And she began following Jesus, and she's sharing about just things that her life that are dradically different than they were a few months ago. Why? Because Because God set her apart when she gave her life to him, and now she begins to live differently with her new identity in Jesus Christ. Is your life reflecting your new identity in Jesus? Paul would write to the Ephesians chapter 4, verse 1, "Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called. Are you walking in a manner that reflects the calling you have now as a follower of Jesus Christ? You know, I think the thing is, we ought to start seeing ourselves more like saints and less like sinners and I want to explain that because I think we want to have the sort of humble, I'm just a sinner. There's nothing special about me." Well, maybe we need to say, "No, I'm a saint. I've been set apart by God, but life is has been changed by God. Inst instead of, "I'm just gonna keep doing these same old things, so that's just what I am. I'm just a sinner. What if we say No, I'm wake up tomorrow morning and say, "I'm not a sinner, I'm a saint. I was a sinner saved by the grace of. God, and he's called me now to walk out this day as a saint. What would that look like to see,How would a saint live out their life today? What would that look like in your life? A year ago, I read a book called Atomic Habits. Anybody read the book Atomic Habits. It's not a Christian book, but it's a really good book. And it's a book about just the power of habits in our life. one of the things he said that I remember the most, as he said, that every action we take is a vote for the kind of person we want to become. Every action you take is a vote for the kind of person you want to become. And so, for example, if I want to be healthier, I need to say, what would a healthy person do? When I go to a restaurant today, I need to say, what would a healthy person order on this menu When I go to the grocery store, I'll say, "What would a healthy person put in the shopping cart at the grocery store?" When I get up at 5:30 in the morning, I ask myself, "W would a healthy person do at 5:30 in the morning to start their day?" And you start doing the things a healthy person would do, and you will become a healthy person. Now, I want to make a connection between that to this principle here It's the same and yet at the same time, radically different. What we ask ourselves as saints is, what would a saint do? What would a saint do? Not what would I do to become a saint, but having been made a saint, what would I do? What would a holy person do? And what if we begin to ask that question throughout the day? What would a holy person do in this situation? How would a holy person respond in this circumstance? How should a holy person talk and a holy person act? And faced with this decision in front of me, how would a holy person make that? What would a holy person do in that situation? Am I living my life in a way that represents the identity, the new identity I have in Christ, no longer a sinner, but a saint made holy because of faith in Jesus. What is the one area of your life today, where you might be failing to reflect the holy standing you have before God, where your conduct might be inconsistent with the state standing you have because of the grace of Jesus. I think he's telling him this from the beginning to set the stage for the conduct he's going to address throughout the letter. Second question, I want to challenge you to consider is, am I using my gifts? If I have indeed been enriched by God, as verse 5 says, and if it's true, that I no longer lack spiritual gifts from him how am I living my life in light of this? Am I living like a person whose life has been enriched by gifts from God? Our mission statement at Northland, part of it, we have four parts of our mission statement. You see them on the back wall, you hear it in the video at the start of each service Hopefully, it's something that's sinking in. But part of that is we want people to experience fulfilling service opportunities. Why? Not because we have a lot of things that need to be done around here, and we need to recruit people to do some of these jobs, but because we want to see people using the gifts that God gave them for God's glory, because that's what God's wants. wired them to do. Are you using your gifts? You say, "How do I learn more about that? There's a lot of things you can do, books on spiritual gifts and classes and spiritual gifts. You could go out this afternoon, you could just Google " spiritual gift inventory and you'll find these things online, these tests you can take, or you answer some questions and it tells you what your gift is. Let me tell you, the easiest way to know what your gift is, just start serving the Lord and see how he's wired you to serve Him. Grab the bulletin and just prayerfully read it. God, there's a lot of stuff, opportunities for ministry in this. Have you gifted me in some way to be a part of one of these ministries? It's even asking a pastor or a leader in our church, "Hey, what do you see in me Do you see in me some gifting from the Lord that you think he could use? Does you see, like a place as you've gotten to know me, that you see a place that God might have wired me uniquely for this ministry that he might have for me. It's just living it out saying, I know God is gifted. I had to find how he wants me to use those gifts. And opportunities all the time. Maybe it's parents's night out next week. You say, God's gifted me in a way that I could serve that ministry. ESL's gonna kick back off here very soon. You say God's gifted me in some ways. I think my gifts, could be useful in that ministry. It's children's ministry. The Tegan was baptized at age, she goes, "Can you introduce me to the Children's ministry director? I want to get involved in children's ministry." She's like, "God is a gift to me, I want to serve him. I want him to use me. We're a church plant we're going to launch in March. maybe God is brought you here to be part of that missionary group that we send out. God's your unique gift set. It's part of what we need there. How has God gifted you and are you using your gifts? Are you living like a holy and gifted person would live? And then finally, am I confident that I'll be found blameless in the end? Verse 8, we noted that those who are in Christ will be found guiltless when they stand before him. You'll stand before Him, all the sins you've committed, washed away because of the death of Jesus Christ on the cross. And part of this idea of holiness is the idea that God puts His holiness on us as an exchange that takes place at the cross. Jesus took my sin and gave me his righteousness. So when God looks at you, he doesn't see your sin. You're not standing from guiltless because between now and then, you're gonna become a perfect person who's never gonna sin again. You're gonna keep struggling just like those in Corinth kept struggling. But when you stand before him, God's not going to see your guilt, but Christ's righteousness on you. Are you confident of that? Have you put your faith in Jesus Christ? The Bible tells us that Christ alone saves us. Christ alone can forgive our sins. I was at a restaurant this week with two church planters. We talking to the waitress, and she asked what we were doing, and we were talking about what we were talking about. And she goes, "You guys are starting news churches." And one of the guys said, "Yeah." She goes, "I have some advice for you." I said, "This is great, I'd love to hear it." I said, "What advice do you have?" And she said, "Don't limit yourself to just the Bible." I said, "That's interesting. What do you mean?" She said, "There's a ton of great religious writings out there. She'd be talked to me about all these religious books and writings she had read. She goes, "The Bible's great." She said, "I love Jesus. That guy was a hippie and a radical. I love him.. But he's not the only one that teaches us good things. You see, she had that mindset that " I'll take Jesus, but I'll take him alongside all these other." We tried to. The conversation kind of died. She was open to understanding the verse that Jesus is, the way, the truth, the life. He's the one way. This isn't a book about how can I. a helpful book among many other spiritual books? This is a book that points us to the one way we can be made right with God. That's through faith in Jesus Christ. Our only hope, when we stand before God at the end of it all, our only hope is Jesus. I want to ask you, David, do you have the confidence that you've given your life to Jesus If you' not, I want to encourage you to do two things. One, you can just take your connect card. There's a box on there. The card in front and the back of the chair there. There's a box that says, "Follow Jesus." You say, "I want to talk to someone more about what it means to follow Jesus. You check that box and we will reach out to you and set up a time to talk to you more about what it means to follow Jesus. Or, you may say today, God's made it clear what I need to do. I've heard the message of the gospel, I see my need for Jesus, and I'm ready to give my life to him. You can do that right now. Would you pray with me? Right where you're sitting. You can be given the confidence that you'll stand guiltless before him by calling out to Jesus Christ and committing your life to him as your Lord and Savior. You say something like this. Pray this in your own way, but as we're praying together, your prayer could sound something like this. God, I know that I'm a sinner, and my only hope is Jesus. And I'm turning from my sin and committing my life to him. God, sanctify me, set me apart from the sin of my life I'm in now, to the forgiveness and the graces and the mercy that you have for me in Jesus. That could be your prayer right now. Maybe you are a fellow of Jesus, and maybe your prayer is a prayer of confession and repentance, because you would say, my life isn't really reflecting a life of holiness. I know that I've given my life to Jesus, but I've been living more like a sinner and less like a saint, and I just need God to help me. and maybe your prayers, God forgive me. That lately, I have not been walking in my true identity as your child. God, I confess that, and I ask for your help, let me walk in home. holiness tomorrow, walk according to the calling with which I've been called. Maybe your prayers, God show me where you've gifted me. God used me between now and the day you were returned Jesus. I want to be used by you. Show me how you gifted me. God, I pray for the one who is not a follower, that today their heart would be open, that they would be drawn to you, and by your grace and mercy, they'll be set apart from their life of sin to walk with you and follow you. God, remind us tomorrow and every day that we have been made holy, and convict us when we failed to live in that identity. Thank you for our gifts. Let us use those for your glory. Thank you, that your grace and your gifts are given to sinful and broken people, that we can be used by you. in Jesus' name, Amen.