Greetings to the Church at Corinth

February 13, 2022

Speaker: Gil Rugh

Topic: 1 Corinthians Series

Scripture: 1 Corinthians 1:2-3

We’ve started a study of the book of 1 Corinthians and let me recommend a book to you. It’s an older work, 50 years or so, by Earl Radmacher on the church, “The Nature of the Church”, but we have it in Sound Words in hardback and softcover. And it is a good foundational work on the doctrine of the church. Earl Radmacher was president of Western Conservative Baptist Seminary for a number of years. So I recommend that to you. I was reminded of it because in my notes I have a number of references from it and reminded of it being a good foundational work. We just did the opening three verses of Paul’s letter of 1 Corinthians so let me read those to you. “Paul, called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother, to the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, saints by calling, with all who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” Paul writes this letter as an apostle. Now let me just review the three basic qualifications of an apostle with you, a reminder that they were a unique group of men selected and appointed by Christ and then the Apostle Paul joined that select group. They became key in the writing of our New Testament. So first qualification for an apostle was that he was an eye witness of the resurrection. Basic simple truth, he had to have seen Jesus Christ after His resurrection from the dead. You can back up to Acts 1:22. Verse 21, they are looking for a replacement for Judas to keep the number 12, and Paul will be the 13th apostle. But verse 21 for the sentence, “Therefore it is necessary that of the men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us – beginning with the baptism of John until the day that He was taken up from us – one of these must become a witness of His resurrection.” So they follow through and Matthias is added to the 11 to make 12 again, and Paul will be the 13th apostle. So he had to be an eye witness of the resurrection. The Apostle Paul says that he was an eye witness. Come back to 1 Corinthians 9. Remember Paul is saved in Acts 9 and he does have a confrontation with the resurrected Christ, and in 1 Corinthians 9:1 Paul says, “Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord?” So have I not seen Jesus our Lord? In 1 Corinthians 15:8, again Paul is defending his apostleship and he talks about the appearances of Christ. Verse 3, “I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scripture, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and then He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. After that He appeared to more than 500 brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep” (died). “Last of all, as one untimely born, He appeared to me also.” So the last of the appearances of Christ is to the Apostle Paul. Now He appeared to 500 brethren at once. Not everyone who saw Christ after His resurrection was an apostle, but a requirement for an apostle was you had to be one of those who saw Christ after His resurrection from the dead. And Paul marks himself off here as a unique and special case. So first qualification of an apostle. These are important because there are certain groups today, particularly in the charismatic movement, who think apostleship is still a gift for today. And that creates all kinds of problems. So the first qualification is you had to be an eyewitness of the resurrection, and Paul says last of all He appeared to me, so I’m sort of one untimely born, as he put it. I am unique in that He appeared to me in a special way on the Damascus Road in Acts 9. Secondly, the ministry of an apostle was validated by miracles, his ministry was validated by miracles. Over in 2 Corinthians, Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 12:12, “The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with all perseverance by signs and wonders and miracles.” And that is Paul arguing again that he is a genuine apostle. Verse 11, “I have become foolish; you yourselves compelled me. Actually I should have been commended by you, for in no respect was I inferior to the most eminent apostles, even though I am a nobody. The signs of a true apostle were performed among you… by signs and wonders and miracles.” The Apostle Paul did those, they demonstrated that he was a true apostle. And thirdly, he was the recipient of revelation from God, he received direct revelation from God. That’s the third qualification there. Back up to Galatians 1:12, “the gospel,” verse 11, “which was preached by me is not according to man. For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.” So Paul claims again his apostleship, I received direct revelation from God. I didn’t learn the gospel from men, I learned it from a special revelation from God. Turn over to Ephesians 3, Paul again developing his apostleship, and he says in verse , “that by revelation there was made known to me the mystery.” Mystery was something you could not understand, it took direct revelation from God. There is new revelation given through the Apostle Paul. This is where we want to be careful that we put all these together because those who claim to be apostles today have the gift of apostleship, I have books written in my library by those who claim the gift of apostleship is present. Then they claim that God speaks to them, and so it is consistent with the Word of God but it is new revelation from God. It’s not. The Apostle Paul in Ephesians 3 is arguing, by “revelation there was made known to me the mystery as I wrote before in brief. By referring to this, when you read you can understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which in other generations was not made known to the sons of men.” So the gift of apostle involved receiving of direct revelation from God. You can read the rest of Ephesians 3, there are other passages, but those passages at least establish. When Paul starts out his letter, coming back to the first letter of Paul to the Corinthians, because “Paul, called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother.” God had directly intervened in Paul’s life and set him apart, called him not only to salvation, but to be an apostle, one sent with the special message from God to carry on a special ministry from God. That establishes somewhat again, just a reminder that the gift of apostleship is not present today, it’s not present after the Apostle Paul. Now there is revelation given after the Apostle Paul, the Apostle John wrote the gospel of John but he also wrote the book of Revelation, and Paul has been dead for 30 years. But he is an apostle. There may be non-apostles who received direct revelation, but they have to also fit into the rest of the deeds of an apostle or the eyewitness of the resurrection. Luke might be an exception, but by and large the apostleship gift is unique to the New Testament times, closing with the Apostle Paul. Let’s look on a little further. He’s writing to the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, saints by calling. All these refer to the same group but he identifies them in several ways. It’s the church of God which is at Corinth, it’s to those who have been sanctified, that are saints. They are joined with those who call upon the name of the Lord. So the church is a unique group. And let me just review with you a little bit about the church in the New Testament, these are just foundational truths that we want to be sure that we refresh our minds with regularly. Several things noted about the church. #1. It is a translation of a word, you may have it in the margin of your Bible, ‘ekklesia’, don’t have it here in 1 Corinthians in the New American Standard. ‘Ekklesia’, it’s ‘ek’ which is the Greek preposition for ‘out’, and ‘kaleo’ which is the verb ‘to call’, it’s a called out group. But be careful what you do with that. It was originally used in secular Greek of the citizens, the Greek citizens of a Greek city. It could be used of any kind of assembly, even a disorderly group. It’s used that way in the New Testament. Come over to Acts 19, and we’re just looking at the word translated church in the New Testament. It does describe a unique group but it’s not based on just the word that is used, ‘ekklesia’, a called out group because it is used in Acts 19. And I just pulled this out as an example. Look at verse 32, “So then, some were shouting one thing and some another, for the assembly,” and you have, if you are using a New American Standard Bible a little #1 in front of ‘assembly’ and if you go to 32 in the margin, it is ‘ekklesia’. Well, that’s the word for church, so we could have translated this for the church was in confusion. We say, wait a minute, that’s not about the church because these are unbelievers in a mixed multitude who are claiming their allegiance and worship of a Greek goddess. But it’s called the church, they are a called out group. It just came to mean an assembly in Greek. Look at verse 39, “But if you want anything beyond this, it shall be settled in the lawful assembly,” the lawful assembly, the assembly that met the rules, the regular assembly, the regular church. But again we wouldn’t use the word ‘church’ and the Greek word, just the called out group. Then it is used again in verse 41, “After saying this he dismissed the assembly,” the church. I just want to use Acts 19 as an example that the word ‘church’ could be used of any special group of people. Here he is referring to the citizens of this city, the Greek citizens and their conduct. So the word translated ‘church’, but it is ‘ekklesia’, it’s just a group called together, an assembly, citizens. #2. It was used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament and here is where some confusion comes in. It was used in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, the Septuagint, we abbreviate it LXX, the 70, but refer to the Septuagint which referred to Israel at times. However this does not mean the church as we talk about it in Paul’s letters for example, because it didn’t exist in the Old Testament. But just so you note it is used for the Hebrew word, you don’t need it, it’s ‘qahal’, transliterated over ‘q-a-h-a-l’, but it sometimes translates that word in the Old Testament because it just meant an assembly. So when you read the Greek translation of the Old Testament you would read about the church, it wouldn’t be necessarily translated ‘church’ but it is the same word. It is the ‘called out assembly’, it is the group. So it’s used in the Septuagint that way. #3. It was used before even Israel came into existence, it’s used in the book of Job. Job 30:28, Job says, “I stand up in the assembly and cry out for help.” Well, even if you’re going to say it referred to the Jews, Job is usually identified maybe in the time of Abraham but the development of Abraham’s descendants into the nation Israel, that doesn’t even happen until the captivity in Egypt. But even in the line of Abraham, no indication the Job was part of that. David wrote in Psalm 26:5, “I hate the assembly of evildoers.” That’s the translation into Greek of the Greek word ‘church’. I hate the church of evildoers, I will not sit with the wicked. Wait, that doesn’t fit. I’m belaboring this because some who want to just blend the church an