Grace, Peace, and Freedom
Tom Shrader opens a study of 1 Corinthians with background on the city of Corinth and the problems facing its church, including divisions over personalities, unaddressed sin, and failure to use available spiritual resources. Paul's greeting establishes his apostolic authority and reminds the Corinthians that they are sanctified saints called to visible holiness. Shrader then extends Paul's teaching on grace to practical Christian living, arguing that a genuine grasp of grace produces gratitude, freedom from judgment of others, and liberty to pursue the unique calling God has placed on each believer's life.
“To show grace is to extend favor or kindness to one who doesn't deserve it, and can never earn it. We're saved by grace — unmerited favor that's extended to us.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: 1 Corinthians
Recorded: 2000 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 41 min
Themes: grace, freedom, peace, holiness, gratitude, calling, unity, judgment, new believer, struggling with division, feeling unworthy, young adult, navigating conflict, church member, questioning your calling, struggling with judgment of others
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 1:1-3, 1 Corinthians 1:4-7, 1 Corinthians 1:10-12, 1 Corinthians 5:1-2, 1 Corinthians 5:9-10, 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, 2 Corinthians 1:1, Philippians 1:1, Colossians 1:1, 1 Thessalonians 1:1, 2 Thessalonians 1:1, Philemon 1:1, Acts 18
Theological Themes: sanctification, becoming holy, apostolic authority, grace theology, ecclesiology, spiritual gifts, biblical calling, justification
Full Transcript
Background and Setting
We begin our study of 1 Corinthians this morning as part of our ongoing study of the book of Acts. As we work our way through Acts and Paul stops to write back to the cities he has visited or where he has established a church, we stop and study that letter. Today we look at the letter of 1 Corinthians.
The author is Paul. By way of background, this letter is written not to an individual — not like Timothy, Philemon, or Titus — but to the church, to the body of believers at Corinth. We date this writing to 55 AD, probably the early part of that year. Paul writes it during his three years in Ephesus.
The City of Corinth
The city itself has not a single history but histories. Corinth was part of the flourishing golden age of Greece — the same era we associate with Athens — and during that time Corinth was flourishing as well. The Corinthian games were exploding in terms of athletic competition. It was a magnificent city, but in 146 BC it was literally leveled and destroyed by Rome, and it lay dormant for about a hundred years.
In 44 BC the city was rebuilt under the leadership of Julius Caesar, probably for two reasons. First, as Rome's slave population grew, they would release slaves to become freemen and frequently use them to populate colonies, so Corinth became a haven for freedmen from Rome. Second, it was a strategically important city.
The strategic location of Corinth is critical to understand. Northern and southern Greece are connected by a stretch of land just four miles wide, and that is where Corinth sits. All sea trade moving from Rome to Asia or from Asia to Rome inevitably passed through Corinth. Sailing around the southern part of Greece covered roughly 250 miles of treacherous water. It was said, and I quote, "A sailor never takes a journey around the Cape to the south unless he first writes his will." Most captains preferred to haul their goods on skids across that four-mile stretch of land rather than navigate those waters. It was far safer and far easier to do it overland.
A Cosmopolitan and Corrupt City
That four-mile corridor made Corinth a strategic and cosmopolitan setting. Sailors, financiers, and entrepreneurs flooded the city. A great many wealthy people made their living from this trade, and wherever there were wealthy people there was always a large number of slaves. Corinth was therefore both a business center and a political center — it served as the capital of that particular territory of Greece.
It was also a place where pagan gods were worshipped. Like many cities in Greece, Corinth had a great hill rising about 2,000 feet above the city, and on top of it stood a temple built to the goddess Aphrodite. The setting was so magnificent that on a clear day you could see Athens, about 45 miles away. Thousands of temple prostitutes conducted their worship services in Corinth, and it was a wicked, wicked place.
Someone once said that if you took New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Las Vegas and put them all together, you would have Corinth — the vanity fair of that day and age. It was a place where people were notoriously wicked. In ancient Greek plays, whenever a character was from Corinth, if it was a man he was depicted as a drunkard, and if it was a woman she was depicted as a prostitute.
The Church Emerges from That World
What makes perfect sense, then, is that the church in Corinth was comprised of men and women who had exited exactly that life. In this very letter, in 1 Corinthians 6:9–11, Paul writes: "Do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminates, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers shall inherit the kingdom of God." Then Paul says in verse 11, "And such were some of you."
When Paul wanted to address these issues and speak to this lifestyle, these people knew exactly what he was talking about. But he does not stop at their past. He continues in verse 11: "But you were washed, you were sanctified." That becomes a recurring theme throughout this letter. Paul continually reminds them not only that they have been justified — declared righteous — but that they have been sanctified, set apart for a specific purpose. You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and now you are sanctified.
Sin in the Church
It only makes sense that a city so wicked would send some of its baggage into the church with its new converts. What alarms Paul, however, is not only that the past is drifting in, but that in the present tense there are active problems with sin inside the church. In chapter 5, verse 1, Paul says: "It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not even exist among the Gentiles, that someone has his father's wife." There is incest in the church — behavior not even seen out in the surrounding community. This is what Paul is dealing with as he writes to this congregation.
The Problems in the Corinthian Church
Paul is going to address three general areas of problems in the course of this letter. The first problem came as a result of a split among the people in the church over personalities. Chapter 1, verses 10, 11, and 12: "I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you. But you were made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment. For I have been informed concerning you, my brethren, by Chloe's people, that there are quarrels among you." What type of quarrels? Verse 12: "Now I mean this, that each one of you is saying, I'm of Paul, or I'm of Apollos, or I'm of Cephas, or I'm of Christ."
In this church, people were following people. There were some who said, "I follow the Apostle Paul. Paul's my leader." Others said, "No, it's Apollos for me." Others said, "No, it's Cephas" — that's Peter. And then there's always a group that plays what they think is the trump card: "Not me. I don't follow him. I follow Jesus."
Loyalty to People Versus Loyalty to Christ
It is human nature to follow people, and there is nothing wrong with that. Sheep follow shepherds. It is the most natural thing in the world to connect with somebody — with someone's teaching, to simply feel a connection. That is good and healthy. But what happened in Corinth was that the connection went beyond what was healthy and became something causing division in the church.
There is nothing wrong with following a person until it collides with a greater purpose — the purpose of the church. There is nothing wrong with being loyal to someone until that loyalty is directed toward a person rather than toward Christ and the church He has ordained. What happened is that people were saying, "I follow Paul," implying that made them more spiritual than others, while others countered, "I follow Apollos," claiming that was more orthodox, and so on. Paul is going to address this throughout the letter.
Sin and the Lack of Repentance
The second problem is that this church was infected with sin. Chapter 5, verses 1 and 2: "It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, immorality of such a kind as does not even exist among the Gentiles, that someone has his father's wife." Someone was sleeping with his mother — most likely a stepmother — and this was something even the Gentiles would not tolerate. But here is the real problem, in verse 2: "And you have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, in order that the one who has done this deed might be removed from your midst."
The problem is not simply that there is sin in the church. There will always be sin in the church. There will always be people in the church who are not Christians and who will sin. There will always be Christians who sin. What Paul is saying is that the deeper problem is the absence of repentance in the hearts of the people. The church will not deal with it. They have become arrogant, puffed up, refusing even to look at it — and the evidence of that is that they have not removed or disciplined the person involved.
Paul also reminds them in chapter 5, verse 9: "I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people." The letter we call 1 Corinthians is technically the second letter Paul wrote to Corinth, and what we call 2 Corinthians is technically the third. There is a lost epistle — a letter Paul wrote to this church that we do not have a record of. Paul had already addressed this issue once before.
He clarifies his meaning in verse 10: "I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world, or with the covetous and swindlers, or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world." When he said not to associate with immoral people, he did not mean the immoral people of the world, because they are everywhere — you would have to leave the world entirely to avoid them. He continues: "But actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is an immoral person."
Failing to Use What They Had Been Given
Paul is concerned not only about the personalities splitting the church and the sin infecting it, but also about this church's failure to use the resources — especially the spiritual resources — available to them. Chapter 1, verses 4 through 7: "I thank my God always concerning you for the grace of God which was given to you in Christ Jesus, that in everything you were enriched in Him, in all speech and all knowledge, even as the testimony concerning Christ was confirmed in you, so that you are not lacking in any gift."
Paul is going to confront these people about the problems in the church while also pointing out the sad reality that they already have everything they need to address them. They have the Word of God, they have the apostles' teaching, and they have the gifts — and yet they have failed to deal with these issues.
A Brief Outline of the Letter
Paul, the apostle, writes this letter of instruction to these believers, and here is a brief outline of what he covers. First, he addresses their calling — pointing out that they are saints, called and set apart by God, called to be holy and pure. From there, he begins to work through the specific problems in the church, addressing unity and the divisions that have formed among them.
Paul's Co-Workers and the Pattern of Mentorship
Paul writes this letter with a great many concerns to this body of believers. He talks about servanthood and morality, marriage and liberty, and the role of men and women in the church. Even the Lord's Supper has become a problematic area for them. He addresses spiritual gifts, the resurrection, stewardship, and ultimately closes the letter with all of these issues weighing on him. With that context in mind, let us look at the first three verses of 1 Corinthians 1.
The letter opens: "Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Sosthenes, our brother." Sosthenes is a character we have met before. Back in Acts 18, Paul arrives from Athens in Corinth, traveling alone at that point. He joins forces with Priscilla and Aquila in their tent-making business, and what they share goes far deeper than a trade — they share a love for Christ. Together they begin to evangelize the city, God raises up those He will save, and Paul establishes a church and begins to teach in it.
The Jews listen for a while, but then they come and attack Paul. Paul leaves the synagogue and begins to teach in a home. One of the leaders of the synagogue, a man named Crispus, joins them. The impact Paul and the church are having on the Jewish community is so significant that they drag Paul into secular court. Gallio, the proconsul from Rome, hears the charges brought by the Jews and throws the case out entirely — Paul does not even have to make a defense.
After that, the Jews take Sosthenes outside — he had been the leader, the one acting as the prosecuting attorney, the one who had been attacking Paul — and they beat him right there. Apparently, God used that beating to open his eyes, his heart, and his mind. Sosthenes does not merely become a follower of Christ; he becomes a co-worker of Paul's.
There is a striking pattern worth noting here. When the scripture references are laid out in a row, it becomes plain that Paul continually had someone alongside him, especially Timothy. Consider these openings: 2 Corinthians 1:1, "Paul and Timothy, our brother." Philippians 1:1, "Paul and Timothy, bond servants." Colossians 1:1, "Paul an apostle, Timothy, our brother." 1 Thessalonians 1:1, "Paul, Silas, and Timothy." 2 Thessalonians 1:1, "Paul, Silas, and Timothy." Philemon 1:1, "Paul, a prisoner of Christ, and Timothy, our brother." And here, Paul and Sosthenes. Paul always had someone around him — someone he was grooming, someone he was helping grow in their understanding of Christ, of Scripture, of how to lead and cause people to grow.
The Call to Mentorship
This is a great role model for your own life. You should always have someone who is a co-laborer with you, someone you are mentoring and bringing along. They may not replace you, and they may not even be involved in the same ministry you are involved in, but you are preparing them for whatever ministry God has in their life. Do you have that?
If you are leading a small group, do you have an apprentice in there that you are training and preparing? If you are involved in student ministries, do you have a leader or a staff person you are bringing along? If you are leading a discipleship group, are there students in whom you can see God clearly at work — and are you grabbing hold of those students and incorporating them into your life and activity? That seems to be the pattern here. Paul says, I have Sosthenes with me.
Paul's Apostolic Authority
The major emphasis of verse 1, however, is what Paul says as he describes himself. He says, "I am an apostle. I have been called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God." Paul is asserting his apostolic authority. John MacArthur suggests there are probably at least five reasons Paul does this. First, he was not part of the original twelve. Second, he is continually challenged. He is emphasizing that he is not the same Paul who persecuted the church. He is emphasizing his spiritual relationship with the church, and he is demonstrating that he is on a special mission from God.
Paul establishes this up front rather than opening with "Paul the bondservant," as he does elsewhere, because he is about to come after these people. There are eleven problems in this church that Paul is going to address, and of the eleven, ten of them are behavioral. Paul is going to confront these people forcefully. And their natural tendency — their flinch position — is going to be the same as anyone's when someone comes at them: "Who made you king? Who do you think you are to talk to me that way?" Paul says, let us start here. Let me tell you who I am.
He is not using the word "apostle" in the generic sense. The word apostle means "sent one," and in that sense we are all apostles with a small "a" — we are all sent, and we are all missionaries. That is not what he is talking about. He is talking about the office of apostle. That is why he says he has been called as an apostle — it is God who put that call on his life, it is God who brought him to this point. He is an apostle of Jesus Christ, and God is the One who placed him in that position.
So Paul writes the letter, in verse 2, to the church of God which is at Corinth.
The Church as a Mirror
Gordon Fee, in his preface and introduction to his commentary on 1 Corinthians, writes this: "Perhaps the single greatest theological contribution of our letter to the Christian faith is Paul's understanding of the nature of the church, especially in its local expression. If the gospel itself is at stake in the Corinthians' theology and behavior, so also is its visible expression in the local community of redeemed people." In other words, Paul is talking about the reality that redeemed people have a perception in the local marketplace. The philosopher Kierkegaard was once approached and challenged by a Christian to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Kierkegaard had a great response. He said, "If you want me to believe in your Redeemer, you must look a little more redeemed." In other words, he was not seeing the faith flesh itself out — and that is exactly what Fee is talking about.
Fee notes that the net result is more teaching on the church in 1 Corinthians than in any of Paul's letters. After pages and pages of analysis, he summarizes it this way: "A final word needs to be said about the considerable importance of this letter in today's church. The cosmopolitan character of the city and the church, the strident individualism that emerges in so many of their behavioral aberrations, the arrogance that attends their understanding of spirituality, the accommodation of the gospel to the surrounding culture in so many ways — these and many other features of the Corinthian church are but a mirror held up before the church today." When you read about this church in Corinth and you are sitting in Gilbert, or anywhere in the Valley of the Sun, in the culture we find ourselves in, this letter ought to function like a mirror. The issues they were struggling with are the very same issues we see in our culture. The practical application of this letter is enormous for us.
Sanctification and the Call to Be Saints
Paul says he is writing to the church — it is the church of God, God owns it, He possesses it — though it is geographically located in Corinth. Paul addresses those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, the saints by calling. We need to understand what Paul is doing here, because frequently he speaks of justification, and it is important that we distinguish the two. When we talk about justification, we are talking about a judicial term: when Christ died on the cross, He died for the sins of His people. His death, His blood, covered the sins of His people, and we were justified — declared righteous before a holy God. Justification is this divine act by which a holy God declares a sinful, lost, unholy person righteous. It is what Christ accomplished on the cross.
Notice, however, that Paul does not speak here of our justification — he speaks of our sanctification. Because we have been justified, now we ought to look a little more redeemed. Paul says we are to be saints, ones who are set apart, holy ones. Growing up in the Catholic church, the word "saint" brought to mind someone with a halo, someone who had been canonized, someone very special — someone in whose name miracles were performed, or to whom one might pray. But that is not at all how the Bible uses the word. When the Bible speaks of a saint, it is speaking of you, if you know Christ. If you know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you are a saint. That means you are set apart. You are to be holy. There ought to be a distinctiveness about the way you live, and the goal of your life is to be pure.
It seems that almost in a cavalier fashion we speak about sin in our lives and say, "Well, everybody sins, and even as a Christian I'm still sinning — every day, every hour." I am not sure that is supposed to be the norm. You and I are to be pure, and you and I are to be holy. That is your calling, and it is supposed to be visible. There should be something visibly detectable in your life that would tell me you are a saint.
Grace: Undeserved Favor
All of this flows into verse three: "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ." Grace is favor. Chuck Swindoll writes that to show grace is to extend favor or kindness to one who does not deserve it and can never earn it. Receiving God's acceptance by grace always stands in sharp contrast to earning it on the basis of works. Every time the thought of grace appears, there is an idea of being undeserved — in no way is the recipient getting what he or she deserves. Favor is being extended simply out of the goodness of the heart of the giver. We are saved by grace, unmerited favor extended to us.
I was speaking about Jeffrey Dahmer not long ago. Jeffrey Dahmer did not simply take victims and assault them — he raped them, killed them, and dismembered them. Some he placed in a freezer; others he boiled and ate. He was ultimately caught and went to prison. The reports are that just months before his execution, he gave his life to Christ in repentance and faith, as a defining moment — much like the moment many of you experienced. If that is true, then Jeffrey Dahmer is in heaven. I always couple that with the truth that Mahatma Gandhi is probably, by his own testimony, the nicest man in hell.
That tends to cause people to line up afterward with an objection: "You mean someone can do what Jeffrey Dahmer did — cut people up, eat them, do all of that — and still go to heaven? You mean I can do whatever I want and still go to heaven?" And the answer is yes, if Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior.
there's the Christian school, somewhere in the middle. And all three groups are passionate. And all three groups tend to look at the other two groups as if they're wrong. That's a freedom issue. That is not an issue that's right or wrong. That is an issue of freedom. That is a place where you get to choose as a parent, as a family, how you're going to raise your children. And when I understand grace, I give you freedom to make that choice, whatever it is, without judgment.
Here's the third thing Swindoll says you can expect when you grasp grace. You can expect to become more appreciative and less critical. When I start to understand what God has done for me, when I understand that I was totally undeserving, when I understand that I brought nothing to the table and He gave me everything, it changes the way I look at people. When I'm critical and judgmental, it usually means I've forgotten grace. It means I've sort of lost sight of where I was and what He did.
The fourth thing you can expect is that you will give and receive grace more freely. Grace becomes a way of life. The people around you begin to experience the grace of God through you. That's when grace moves from being a doctrine you believe to a life you live.
Living in Grace
Now let's talk about what it means to live in grace, because that's really where we are. And this is where it gets very practical. I want to look at Galatians. We've been in Galatians for several weeks now. And the book of Galatians is really, I think, one of the most powerful books in all of the New Testament as it relates to this topic of grace and freedom. Because what Paul is dealing with is people who understood saving grace, but who had then moved back under a system of law and rules and religion. And Paul is trying to pull them back.
Let's look at chapter five, verse one. "It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery." Now here's the thing that's amazing to me. He says it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Now that seems redundant, doesn't it? But it's not. He's making a specific point. The point is this: the purpose of your freedom is freedom. It's not so that you will then construct a new system of rules and regulations and go back under that. The purpose of the freedom that Christ won for you is that you would actually live free.
And that's the issue. Because what these Galatians were doing, and what we so often do, is we get saved by grace, and then we think, okay, now I've got to perform. Now I've got to keep up my end of the bargain. Now I've got to maintain this thing. And before long, you're not living in grace anymore. You're living under law. And Paul says, don't do that. Stand firm. Don't go back to that yoke of slavery.
The Tension Between Law and Grace
Look at verse two. "Mark my words! I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all." Now you've got to understand the context here. The issue was circumcision, but circumcision was representative of the whole law. What the Judaizers were saying was, yes, you believe in Jesus, but you also have to be circumcised and keep the law of Moses. And Paul is saying, if you go that route, you've just walked away from grace entirely. It's not grace plus anything. The moment you add something to grace, you've left grace.
Verse three: "Again I declare to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey the whole law." See, that's the point. You can't pick and choose. If you're going to go the law route, then you've got to keep the whole thing. Every jot and tittle. And nobody can do that. That's the whole point. That's why we need grace.
Verse four: "You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace." Now I want to be careful here, because a lot of people read that and they think this is talking about losing your salvation. That's not what Paul is talking about. He's talking about a sphere of existence. When you go back to trying to earn your standing before God, you've stepped out of the sphere of grace. You've alienated yourself from the way Christ operates. You've fallen out of grace as a way of living.
Waiting in Hope
Verse five: "But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope." There's a waiting. There's a patience. There's a faith dimension here. We don't have it all yet. We're not fully righteous yet in our experience, though we are positionally. And we live in that tension, waiting for the full realization of what God has promised, and we do it by faith through the Spirit.
Verse six: "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love." And here Paul pulls the rug out from under the whole argument. It doesn't matter if you're circumcised or not. It doesn't matter what your religious pedigree is. The only thing that matters is faith that works itself out in love. That's the whole ball game. Faith expressing itself through love.
This is so important, because what we tend to do is we tend to make all of our religious activity the measure of our spirituality. How often are you in church? How much do you give? What ministries are you involved in? And all of those things can be good things. But if they become the measure, if they become the way I maintain my standing before God, I've left grace. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
The Source of Legalism
Verse seven: "You were running a good race. Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth?" I love this. Paul uses a running metaphor. You were doing great. Somebody got in your lane. Somebody tripped you up. Who was it? And the implication is, it wasn't God. This legalism, this going back under the law, this didn't come from God. God didn't call you back to that.
Verse eight: "That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you." There it is. God didn't tell you to go back under the law. God didn't tell you that you have to perform to maintain your standing. That's coming from somewhere else. That's coming from the Judaizers, that's coming from religion, that's coming from our own insecurity, that's coming from the enemy. But it's not coming from God.
Verse nine: "A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough." This is a warning. Once you let a little bit of legalism in, it spreads. It doesn't stay contained. You let one rule in, and pretty soon there are two rules, and then ten rules, and before long the whole thing is leavened with legalism and you can't find the grace anymore.
Paul's Confidence and the Offense of the Cross
Verse ten: "I am confident in the Lord that you will take no other view. The one who is throwing you into confusion will pay the penalty, whoever he may be." Paul has confidence. Not in the Galatians' track record, but in the Lord. He believes that God, who began this work, is going to see it through. The people causing this confusion are going to answer for it, but Paul's confidence is in God.
Verse eleven: "Brothers, if I am still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case the offense of the cross has been abolished." This is interesting. There were apparently rumors going around that Paul himself was still preaching circumcision. And Paul says, look at the evidence. If I were preaching circumcision, nobody would be persecuting me. The reason I'm being persecuted is because the cross is offensive. Grace is offensive. The message that you can't earn it, that it's free, that there's nothing you can bring to the table, that is deeply offensive to human pride. And that's why it gets Paul in trouble.
Verse twelve: "As for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves." Now that's a pretty strong statement. Paul is frustrated. He's being sarcastic. He's saying, if circumcision is so great, if a little cutting is the path to God, why don't they just go all the way? It's not a polite verse. But it shows you how seriously Paul takes this issue of grace. This is not a secondary issue to him. This is the gospel.
Freedom and Its Proper Use
Verse thirteen: "You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love." And here's the balance. Here's where Paul lands. Yes, you are free. Absolutely free. But freedom is not license. Freedom is not an excuse to do whatever you feel like doing. The freedom you have in Christ is freedom to love, freedom to serve. You've been freed from sin so that you can actually love people the way God designed you to love them.
This is so critical, because there are two ditches here. There's the ditch of legalism on one side, where you're trying to earn everything, you're performing, you're under a system of rules, and there's no joy and no freedom in it. And then on the other side, there's the ditch of license, where you say, well, grace means I can do whatever I want, and you use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. And Paul says, don't go in either ditch. Stay on the road. You are free. Use that freedom to serve one another in love.
Verse fourteen: "The entire law is summed up in a single command: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" Paul takes the whole massive system of Mosaic law, with all of its hundreds of commandments, and he boils it down. He doesn't say, here are the top ten. He says, here's the one. Love your neighbor as yourself. When you do that, you've fulfilled the law. You don't need a list of rules if you genuinely love the people around you.
The Danger of Devouring One Another
Verse fifteen: "If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other." And this is where it gets very practical and very personal. Because what happens in a community that's under legalism, in a community that's lost grace, is that people start turning on each other. The judgment and the criticism and the comparison that comes with a performance-based system ends up destroying community. People start biting and devouring each other. And Paul says, watch out. That road leads to destruction.
This is why grace matters in a local church. This is why it's not just a theological category. When we lose grace in a church community, when we become performance-based and judgmental and critical, we start destroying each other. And the watching world sees that, and they want nothing to do with it. But when a community genuinely lives in grace, when people are free, when there's no judgment for where you've been or what you've done, when people are loved as they are, that is profoundly attractive. That is what the world is hungry for.
So the question isn't just, do you believe in grace? The question is, are you living in it? Are the people around you experiencing it from you? That's the call. Not just grace as a doctrine you affirm, but grace as a life you live.
Freedom Without Condemnation
There is a group in the middle that says it is a balance for them, and God placed it on their heart to go to a Christian school. There is nothing wrong with any of those positions. We do not have a position at this church on schools.
Here is my position on the matter. If you are in the homeschool camp and you think you have it all figured out and there is something wrong with everyone else, then we condemn homeschooling. If you are in the Christian school camp and you say you do not know how anyone could put a child in a public school, and that homeschoolers are too isolated, then we condemn the Christian school. If you are in the public school camp and you are saying that you are the truly spiritual ones because you are out in the world, small and alive, doing what Jesus would do — that if Jesus had a child He would put him in public school — then we condemn public school.
Do you understand what you have here? You have freedom. Here is the call, parents: you pick what is right for you, and when you pick it, that is your choice. But do not put down somebody who chooses homeschool, do not put down somebody who chooses public school, and do not slam the people who choose Christian school. You have rights here. You have freedom here. Pick whatever course you want.
It does not have to be about schooling — you can make your own illustrations out of this. Whatever becomes most important to us has a way of becoming the singular way we think God would do it. We see this in the pro-life movement. We are very pro-life, but sometimes a person can be so immersed in pro-life that they are looking down their nose at anyone who is not involved in it the same way.
Maybe God called someone to the prayer ministry, or to small groups. When you truly grasp grace, you have a great deal of freedom. You have the freedom to be the person God has called you to be, and you do not have to judge everyone around you.
The Danger of Making Everything a Position
We get asked constantly: what is the position on Halloween? What is the position on Santa Claus? What is the position, what is the position, what is the position? We can get doctrine drawn so tight that it becomes very, very dangerous. There is usually joy in this life of faith, and I understand that, but it troubles me when people get all tied up trying to figure out every position and then write a white paper on it.
Grace Not Yet Fully Received
To become a Christian minister, much of my involvement and exposure has been in the realm of church and Christian organizations. It has been my observation that even most sincere believers are not free. They have not learned to accept and enjoy the grace that has come to us in Jesus Christ. It saddens me to say that grace is still, for many people, a somewhat wild concept.