And such were some of you. But you were washed, you ere sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God -1 Cor. 6:11

Reading through the New Testament epistles for my New Testament Survey class I'm taking as part of my Crusade training has been cuasing me to "chew the cud," so to speak. Especially reading the words of Paul to the Corinthian church, for example has been revolutionary. I feel like I'm rediscovering these books for the first time again-through new eyes.

It's funny how some of us have read these books all our loves, yet a lot of the surrounding details of the letter, like occasion, place, reason, date and context, escapes us. I always knew the Corinthian church was a messed up church, but I didn't realize it was that messed up. Like MONDO problems!

The reason why we have all this practical church advice about how to deal with heretics, sexual immorality, idol worship, and how to use our gifts accordingly, is because the Corinthian church got these all wrong! There were sexually immoral people in their congregation, publicly having sexual affairs that they even boasted about to others! Talk about messed up! And here I am, at times getting frustrated with things I see in the body that aren't even CLOSE to what they were in the New Testament times.

Speaking with a brother the other week, we came upon this subject and he commented to me, "yeah...I'm not so sure I would want our church to be like the New Testament church. They were pretty messed up!"

I think we often elevate the New Testament church to "having it right" because they had the super-apostles and these amazing men of God. But we often forget about the kind of congregations they had to deal with!!! I think because they were the most anointed and set apart for this apostolic ministry, perhaps God gave them the most difficult situations to deal with so that we would have the knowledge that we have now to deal with our own church conflicts and problems.

What patience they had! This amazes me most about them and convicts me to the core. I have dealt so impatiently with people in the past...it has been a major charcter flaw of mine...if James and John were the sons of Thunder, I could very well be nicknamed a son of Zeus or Fury. O Lord...mercy. Forgive me...those who have felt the end of my impatience.

But herein lies the lesson I've been learning and how God has been opening my eyes. I should never lose patience with a believer, no matter how messed up, no matter how far gone I may think they are.

To start off his letter in 1 Corinthians, Paul reminds them of their calling, gives them a blessing and tells them how thankful he is for each one of them. He is thankful to God for the grace given to them and reminds them of His sustaining power until "the day of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Cor. 1:8). Paul sets up for us the precedent of how to deal with sin. And how to deal with brothers and sisters who are caught in sin.

We should first encourage, affirm the believer, and remind them of who they are in Christ. We should not ostracize, criticize, or seek to point out that particular area while ignoring the rest. Too often we're so focused on the negative, we scarcely see the Jesus in that person, and we cut them down at the roots.

Perhaps because Paul knew how much he had been forgiven of his offenses against Jesus, and murderous crimes, it stopped him from lashing out at others. He could not condemn because he knew he was not condemned for his crimes ofr persecuting Christ. May the grace of Jesus upon our lives stop us from having such fury against others. Let us be reminded of God's grace everday, everytime we look in the mirror.

This entry was posted by Christopher Wu, on Thursday, May 05, 2005. You can leave your response.