Using Rights & Liberty

Transcript

GR 1325
05-21-06
Using Rights and Liberty
1 Corinthians 9:1-7
Gil Rugh

What a great God we serve, and it's amazing to think that He has spoken to us and directed in the recording and writing down of His very words so that we could come back to them again and again and again and have them as the nourishment for our souls, that we continue to grow and know Him better and love Him more as we are nourished by the truth of His Word.

We're studying the book of 1 Corinthians together, and we're in 1 Corinthians 9 so turn there in your Bibles. Paul began this letter to the church at Corinth by emphasizing very strongly and clearly that the ministry of the church is about Jesus Christ. The message we are entrusted with is a message concerning Jesus Christ. It's not a message about being religious, it's not a message about being good, this is a message about Jesus Christ and the work that He has accomplished on the cross. Turn back, if you would, to 1 Corinthians 1:2, where he began this letter by addressing it to the church of God, the church that belongs to God. It's His possession. In the book of Acts we are told that He purchased it with His own blood, the blood of His Son. The church of God which is at Corinth, and it is comprised of those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, they are saints by the calling of God. He goes on to emphasize as you come down then to verse 17, Paul states concerning his ministry when he came to Corinth, which was the ministry he had wherever he went. Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel. Not in cleverness of speech, not in wisdom of word, so that the cross of Christ would not be made void. You cannot add anything to the message of the cross, you cannot take anything away from the message of the cross, because when you do, you nullify its effectiveness, you render it empty of its power.

For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. That's why some people attempt to add the wisdom of men to the message of the cross, so that it won't seem so stupid, so foolish, so unattractive. But you remember Isaiah, the great writing prophet, hundreds of years before the letter to the Corinthians said He has no comely form or appearance that we should be attracted to Him. His beauty is who He is, His beauty is in the work He does. How sad that we should think that we have to make Him attractive. He is the beautiful Savior, He has given His life for us. But this message is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. We can testify to the miraculous power of the message of the cross of Christ. For when we believed it, our lives were changed. We know what it is to be clean, to be forgiven, to be made new. We know that the gospel is the power of God to salvation to everyone who believes. The end of verse 21, God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. Jews and non-Jews alike are on a search for something that's attractive and pleasing to them. So verse 23 says, we preach Christ crucified.

You come down to chapter 2, Paul says, when I came to you at Corinth some five years earlier, verse 1, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. I didn't come with eloquence. I didn't come with superior wisdom. I came with the message that God had given, and I determined to know nothing among you, except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. When you come to chapter 3 verse 11, Paul says, no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. And this salvation which is found in Christ and found in Christ alone, which turned loose the power of God in a life, that totally changed that life, can make it new, to cause a person to be born again, sets a person free from slavery to sin.

Turn back to John 8. Jesus was speaking to the religious people of His day. Some of them professed to believe in Him. And in verse 31, Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed in Him, if you continue in my Word, then you are truly disciples of mine. You claim to believe in Me, the evidence of that will be, you will continue to trust in Me, to live your life in obedience to Me. Later John would write his first epistle and he would say concerning some who had abandoned, believers who had abandoned Jesus Christ, they went out from us because they were really not part of us. Because if they had been part of us, they would have remained with us. But they went out from us because they were really not of us. That's what Jesus is saying here. If you continue in my Word, then you are truly disciples of mine. People claim to have trusted Christ, but they don't continue to walk in His Word, they are not genuine disciples. And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. The sad thing is, so many people in the world today do not know they are not free, they don't know the awful, horrible condition of their slavery. They were born in sin, they live in sin, they know no other life, they don't know the awful condition of their slavery.

So they answered Him, we are Abraham's descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say you will become free? Jesus answered them, truly, truly I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. You know that the Bible also says, all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. That would mean all are enslaved to their sin. But verse 36 says, so if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed. You're not free until you come to life in Christ, you come to believe in Him and He sets you free and you are no longer enslaved to your sin. You're no longer controlled and dominated by your sin. People call struggle, we call it addictions today. That's just a dressed up word for slavery, and the root problem is not this or that, the root problem is always the same. It is sin, and you cannot be set free by a pill, you cannot be set free by a certain procedure. You can only be truly set free by Jesus Christ.

Now that freedom that you enter into when you come to believe in Christ has become the experience of the Corinthian church. But it's important that we as God's children know how to use our freedom in Christ. The Apostle Peter who would have been one who was privileged to hear Jesus Christ speak these words wrote in I Peter 2:16, act as free men, only do not use your freedom as a covering for sin, but use it as bondslaves of God. Isn't that an interesting connection of words? You're free, use your freedom, but not as an excuse for sin. Use your freedom as one who is a slave of God, because true freedom is now to live in a relationship with the living God as His slave, to do His will. That's true freedom because you are free when you can function as God created you to function. And so we are free when we can now function in a relationship with Him and serve Him.

Turn to Galatians 5. We are coming to 1 Corinthians. Verse 1, it was for freedom that Christ set up free. You ought to have that highlighted, underlined. It was for freedom that Christ set us free. Come down to verse 13, for you were called to freedom, brethren, only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh. The way Peter put it was do not use your freedom as a covering for sin. Don't use your freedom as an excuse to sin, but through love serve one another. You see I was set free in Christ not to do as I please, but to do as He pleases. I was set free, not for serving myself, but for serving others. In love serve one another.

Come back to 1 Corinthians 9. This is Paul's subject in chapter 8-10. How do we use the freedom, the rights that we have in Jesus Christ. He has set us free, but now how do we use this freedom. In chapters 8-10 the basic issue being dealt with is idol worship and the eating of food sacrificed to idols. Paul will bear down on that subject when we get to chapter 10. But first he wants to deal more broadly with the issue so that they don't think this is a one-issue subject. There is a foundational principle here that governs all of our activity, including eating of certain foods. And that is using our freedom or our rights as God intends us to use them as His children, to use them as true slaves of the living God, to use them in the context of serving others because of our love for them.

Paul began chapter 8 by telling them that all of us as believers can claim knowledge, but knowledge as an end in itself only leads to arrogance. What a sad curse in the church it's been to have people parade around with heads filled with knowledge and not the faintest idea how to use it. That was happening in the church at Corinth, they were trying to beat people into submission with their superior knowledge as they saw it. Paul says, knowledge puffs you up, love builds you up. You have true knowledge, you truly know the living God, you truly know what He has said, then the passion of your life will be to express your love for Him and your love for His people by a willingness to sacrifice your rights, to forego your liberty so that another weaker Christian can grow to greater maturity in Christ, so that others who don't know the Savior might come to know Him.

You know in our liberty we can be accurate in our knowledge and wrong in our action. Paul says in chapter 8 verse 8. Food will not commend us to God. We are neither the worse if we do not eat nor the better if we eat. So those who claim that food offered to idols, in the context of what he has been talking about, is nothing, they're right. Food is nothing. If you eat it you're not more spiritual, if you don't eat it you're not more spiritual. So that is not the issue.

But verse 9 of chapter 8, here is the issue, take care that this liberty, word that means right. This liberty, this right of yours, does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak. There is the concern. I don't parade around, talking about the freedom I have in Christ and the rights that are mine in Christ, and the using of this liberty and right, because that's my freedom, that's my right, in such a way that it makes the development and growth for a weaker Christian more difficult. They stumble over my freedom, and it's disastrous for their Christian life and Paul says under the direction of the Holy Spirit, that is a sin against Jesus Christ. We sometimes like to write off these kinds of things and say, that's their problem, they need to get more mature. But it's my problem, is it not, if I sin against Christ?

And that's what He says in verse 12 of chapter 8, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food causes my brother to stumble, I will never eat meat again so that I will not cause my brother to stumble. If food is a problem for you as a fellow believer, you know I have the liberty and right to eat it, but you know what? I also have the right and liberty not to eat of it. So if it's a problem for you, I just won't do it. That solves it. Now you'll note, all this is addressed as we mentioned, to the knowledgeable Christian, to the strong Christian, we would say. Doesn't mean the weak Christian can run around telling everybody what to do. It does mean that those who understand the truth are using their understanding of the truth—God's grace, the freedom He has given us to build up other believers.

So now when you come to chapter 9 Paul is going to pick up on what he has said in verse 13, I am willing to give up my rights. I won't eat food if it causes my brother to stumble. All of chapter 9 talks about how Paul gave up rights that were his, freedom that he had, but he didn't use, for the benefit of others, of the lost who had to hear the gospel, of believers who needed to grow to greater maturity. So chapter 9 Paul will use himself as an example. Then in chapter 10 he'll be ready to bring the discussion back to the whole issue of food sacrificed to idols and the issue of idol worship. And now we can talk about it in the context of exercising Christian love in whatever we do, but understanding some of the real issues in idols and their connection to demons.

Paul begins chapter 9 with four rhetorical questions, questions that grammatically are structured in the Greek text in which this was originally written, to imply a negative answer. In other words we have am I not free, am I not an apostle, have I not seen Jesus our Lord, are you not my work in the Lord. All these questions are phrased in such a way that they imply a yes answer. Am I not free? Yes, of course I am. We talk this way and use questions this way in our conversation, sometimes with the inflection of our voice. We'll say to someone, didn't you think I already knew that? We're not asking them, we're in effect saying I already knew that, but we put it in the form of a question. So Paul begins, am I not free? Grammatically the way this is structured the Corinthians know the only answer is yes, of course he is free. I mean, he's free in Christ like any believer is free in Christ. He has liberty, he has rights. Am I not free? Yes.

Then he goes to a second question, am I not an apostle? You'll note these first two questions become matters that will be developed in some detail and he'll take them in the reverse order. Am I not free? Come down to verse 19, for though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all. So when you get to verse 19 and down through verse 23 he's going to talk about the matter of his freedom, talk about his apostleship and his freedom as an apostle and his rights as an apostle and the whole apostolic ministry in the first 18 verses of this chapter. All about this subject, how do you use your rights. In fact knowing the rights and the liberty I have in Christ is just the first step. Knowing when not to use those rights and liberties is an even greater question, because if they are misused and do damage to others, that is a very serious matter. Am I not free? Of course he's free, and we'll talk about that whole issue of freedom later in the chapter.

Second question, am I not an apostle? Of course he is an apostle, one sent by God. He began this letter in 1 Corinthians 1:1 identifying himself as Paul, a called apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God. And in that unique special position of an apostle, and I have that unique ministry and you have experienced that ministry. Paul is not primarily concerned to defend his apostleship against those who might attack his apostleship at Corinth. That will come in a later letter, 2 Corinthians. Here he declares the fact of his apostleship and the evidence of it in the case of assumed reality. Because obviously if he's going to talk about the freedom and rights he has as an apostle, if they didn't recognize he was an apostle, this whole argument would collapse. So he begins with what ought to be a common assumption, “am I not an apostle?” Of course I am, that's irrefutable.

The third question supports that, have I not seen Jesus our Lord? One of the requirements of an apostle, a foundational requirement beyond believing in Him, was to have seen Jesus Christ after His resurrection from the dead, so that he could be an eyewitness of the resurrection. We have a lot of goofy stuff going on these days about Jesus Christ. People sit down and write a work of fiction and they can't talk enough about it. All made up. I was watching some of this recently on television as some of you have, and I was watching on one channel, I believe the history channel, and they were going through to show how all of this and the Da Vinci Code was fiction. They interviewed a man who came up with some of the foundational matter, they had the record of an interview from him and before he died he said, I made this all up. Then I turn to the channel next to it, National Geographic channel, and they were using that very evidence to raise the question, what if this is true? I mean it would be like me talking about the millions of people living on Mars. Then I say, you know, I made that all up. And you go out of here to talk to people, what if that is true. Well you know if Alice in Wonderland isn't true . . . If there is a Brer Rabbit, wow, what would that mean. Where are we going to go with that? I mean, we've just dumped our whole line of thinking into the realm of fiction.

Well you know what? The resurrection of Jesus Christ is not fiction. And one of the requirements was there had to be men who had seen him with their physical eyes after his resurrection from the dead. Paul was one of those, in Acts 9 he saw Jesus on the Damascus Road. We get to chapter 15 Paul will unfold the major post resurrection appearances of Jesus Christ to numerous witnesses, last of all to him. And we'll note that when we get to 1 Corinthians 15, there are no apostles today. There is a movement in some charismatic circles to talk about the revival of the five-fold ministry from the book of Ephesians 4, where He gave some as apostles, some as prophets, some as evangelists, some as pastors, some as teachers, saying that all five gifts have now been revived in the latter days of the church. That's another fiction made up by the imagination of men. There are no apostles today, there are no prophets today, there is no new revelation being given by God. It is all contained here. But Paul was an apostle.

Are you not my work in the Lord? He established the current church at Corinth. He told them in his second letter that he was the first person to bring the gospel as far as Corinth. Remember he crossed over into Europe with the gospel, into Greece, made his way down to Corinth. Paul says I was the first one to bring the gospel that far. Then he says, I hope to even go farther in carrying the gospel. So Acts 18 records his bringing the gospel to the city of Corinth and people being saved. So you are my work in the Lord.

So he can say in verse 2, if to others I am not an apostle, at least I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord. I mean if people in other places who haven't sat under my ministry would question my apostleship, you at Corinth wouldn't. Because the very fact you claim to be believers in Jesus Christ is a testimony that I came and proclaimed the gospel to you. And God worked through me as His apostle to bring about your conversion. So if I'm not an apostle to others, I am to you. You are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord, verse 2. A seal was a stamp that guaranteed the security or the reality of something, it authenticated it, guaranteed it. Paul said, you Corinthians are the guarantee, the evidence, the seal of my apostleship.

So that being settled, my defense to those who would examine me is this. Now they're not examining his apostleship, but what he is going to do is present the arguments from his own life of the proper use of liberty and freedom as an apostle, reminding them of his apostleship and some of the evidence of it. Now he's going to tell them, as an apostle I have rights we will all agree to. Now let me walk through this with you and you'll see how I chose not to use those rights, not to use that freedom, so that you could hear of the message of Christ without any barriers, so that you could be taught the Word and grow and mature in your walk with Christ. That gives you some idea what it means to have knowledge of the freedom of Christ and that knowledge also brings you the understanding of how to use your freedom in Christ, not to be a stumbling block to someone, but to build them up.

My defense to those who would examine me is this. And now a series of questions, again that imply the answer. Do we not have a right to eat and drink? Or if you were going to put it the way the grammar here would give you the emphasis, we are not without the right, are we, to eat and drink. Of course not, you have the right to eat and drink. In the context, of course, of chapter 8, food offered to idols and since food is nothing in verse 8 of chapter 8, of course Paul has the right to eat and drink. In fact as he is going on to develop, he has the right to have food provided to him by those he ministers to. So whatever kind of food you're talking about, Paul has the rights, unlimited rights, as a believer in Jesus Christ and as an apostle of Christ, to all kinds of food and drink.

Now I want you to note something here. The word right, verse 4, do we not have a right; verse 5, do we not have a right; verse 6, or do only Barnabas and I not have a right. That's the same word that was translated liberty in chapter 8 verse 9, take care that this liberty, and in my Bible there is a marginal note. Right, exucia is the Greek word, it's the same Greek word in chapter 8 verse 9 translated “liberty” that is translated right down in chapter 9. I wish they had translated it the same way, I realize sometimes translating into English they use a variety of words, but it would be helpful in the same context if we could have the same word. What I want you to note, it's the same word. So do we not have a right? Now remember we're talking in the context of chapter 8 verse 9, take care that this right of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block. Now do we not have a right to eat and drink? Of course we do, he's already talked about the fact that he will forego that right in verse 13 of chapter 8. He'll elaborate on his freedom in Christ when we get to verse 19. So of course you have that right, Paul. So you are not arguing against it, you're not abstaining from the food as you say you would in verse 13, because you are weak and don't understand that you have a right to eat of it. So I have the same right that you do, we're agreed on that.

Do we not have a right, verse 5, to take along a believing wife, even as the rest of the apostles and the brothers in the Lord and Cephas? Now he continues this emphasis on his rights because that's where the Corinthians are hung up. The knowledge party at Corinth packed in more facts into their mind than they had assimilated, and so they didn't have genuine knowledge with any understanding. Paul is saying, do we not have a right to take along a believing wife. Well, that would be a right. Literally, take along a sister as a wife, a sister referring to a woman who is a believer. We have a right to have a wife who is a believer. Now I don't have a right to marry someone who is a nonbeliever. Now he dealt with, if salvation occurs after marriage in chapter 7; but the principle of scripture is, and we saw that in chapter 7, marriage is fine, it's ordained of God. You have the right to marry whomever you want. You do have a right to marry a believer. So don't we have a right to take along a believing wife, a sister as a wife?

Note what he says, even as the rest of the apostles. Paul evidently was unique in this matter. The other twelve apostles had wives and I assume they had kids. They are not talked about in the scripture, but Paul says here they do, and it was their practice. And you'll note the word, take along. It's not just the verb to have a wife, it's a verb that means to take someone along with you, to be accompanied by someone. So here having a wife as a part of their life and ministry would mean they would travel all the time with them, they evidently had kids. Who took care of the kids? The wife, evidently some of the wives were free at times to travel with their husbands, others weren't, but they were always part of their life and ministry. The other apostles have wives. Can't I have a wife? Isn't that a right for me? Is Paul the only one who wouldn't have a right? Now what he is doing here is preparing the way for talking about why he chose not to use that right. Wasn't wrong for the other apostles to do it, because it is a liberty. But Paul chose not to exercise this right, to use his liberty. The rest of the apostles had wives, and the brothers of the Lord. That's an interesting addition, the brothers of the Lord. These are the half-brothers of Christ, born to Mary after the birth of Christ. Before Mary and Joseph were formally married she conceived Christ by an act of the Holy Spirit. The scripture tells us that she and Joseph did not have sexual relations until after Christ was born. There is no question on Jesus' parentage. But the indication of scripture is Mary and Joseph then had a normal marriage relationship after the birth of Christ, and they produced other children. And the scripture indicates that.

A number of scriptures refer to that, but we'll just go to Matthew 12:46, while He was still speaking to the crowds, behold His mother and brothers were standing outside seeking to speak to Him. Someone said to Him, behold your mother and your brothers are outside seeking to speak to you. There they are identified as His brothers. Turn over to chapter 13. Jesus was back and revisiting His hometown of Nazareth. And He began to teach them in their synagogue, and in chapter 13 the end of verse 54, they are astonished and they ask the question, where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers? Note verse 55, is not this the carpenter's son, Joseph. Is not His mother called Mary and his brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us? I don't get it. This Man was part of the carpenter's family. Evidently Joseph is dead by now because they refer to the fact that Mary and the brothers and sisters are still present, the implication being Joseph is not, having passed away, been deceased. Interesting, what we would say a major event in the family life of Jesus, and it's not even recorded. He does have four brothers—James, Joseph, Simon and Judas. And at least two sisters, because “sisters” is in the plural, but since they are not named we don't know whether it was two, three, four, how many, but there are at least two. Because his sisters (plural) are with us. How many more than two we don't know since they are not named. We know there are four brothers because they are named. We also know from other scriptures that these brothers were not believers in Him until after His crucifixion and resurrection. Evidently through special appearances to them after His resurrection, and His brother, James, is the most well-known, the only one we really know anything about, and he wrote the letter of James that we have in our New Testament. We are told that the Lord appeared to him, and Paul will list this in 1 Corinthians 15. In fact in Galatians 1:19 Paul says that he went to Jerusalem and he had a meeting with James, the brother of the Lord. So evidently the four brothers of Christ have been saved and are actively involved in a ministry of proclaiming the truth concerning their half-brother, Jesus Christ. They are well enough known that Paul can refer to them in his letter to the Corinthian church as having wives that accompany them, and they are well familiar with that ministry of the brothers of Christ. And you could understand they would have well-known ministries because of their family relationship with Christ and now their conversion. So they are well known as having wives.

So having a wife is not a detriment to the ministry. All the other apostles but Paul had wives. The brothers of the Lord had wives. Perhaps I should say, Roman Catholicism, in order to perpetuate the myth of the perpetual virginity of Mary taught that she never had sexual relations with her husband, Joseph, and she never had any other children. And these called brothers and sisters were just close relatives. Well you know there is another word for a cousin, in fact it's used in the Bible. Paul uses it in the book of Colossians and refers to Mark as the cousin of Barnabas. Josephus refers to the brothers of the Lord, he knew the right word for a cousin. I was reading in my Roman Catholic catechism before I came to the service this morning, I try to keep fresh on that, and I was reading on the perpetual virginity of Mary, and they acknowledge there is no absolute support for such a doctrine in the New Testament. But it is a teaching of the church, and that makes it absolute, because Roman Catholicism has two authorities—the church and the scripture. But it really only has one authority, because the only authoritative interpreter of the scripture is the church. I just mention that in case you wonder what the Roman Catholics do with the passages that talk about His brothers in connection with the perpetual virginity of Mary. We say these are cousins or other relatives, but they are brothers. The emphasis is not on Mary, as honored as she is, it is on Christ.

All right, we have one other person, Cephas, mentioned in 1 Corinthians 9 who took along a wife. It's good to know the first pope was married. He had a wife. Cephas is Peter, you know. Peter took along a wife. Now we know from the gospels Peter was married. Turn to Matthew 8. During Christ's earthly ministry, verse 14, when Jesus came into Peter's home, he saw his mother-in-law lying sick in bed with a fever. Now you know what a mother-in-law is? That's the mother of your wife. My mother-in-law lives with us. She is my wife's mother. And since I have a mother-in-law I have a wife. So Peter was married, had a wife. You know I've often wondered as I read about the traveling of the disciples and the apostles with Christ, what were their wives thinking? You know you would think, Peter shows up at home here and his wife would say, it's about time you got home. I've been cooped up with these kids for the last seven weeks, where have you been? We don't get into any of that. I mean, Peter is home, they go in . . . I don't want to give the wrong impression, I think Peter had a lovely wife, a supportive wife, a godly wife. It's just not things . . . We think everything ought to be about the family. I don't want to minimize the importance of the family, but it's not where the scriptural focus is. Peter doesn't even refer to his wife or kids in the letters he writes. I mean, you'd think he would at least bring them in. He doesn't, why? Because it's not about my physical family. I have responsibilities with my physical family, but there is something more important, that's my spiritual family. We dealt with that in chapter 7. That can be misunderstood and misused, but the truth is still the truth. It needs to be properly applied.

All right, come back to 1 Corinthians 9. Cephas was evidently well known to the church at Corinth, Paul has already referred to him a couple of times in this letter. In chapter 1 one of the divisions in the church was around Cephas, chapter 1 verse 12, chapter 3 verse 22. Whether Peter had ever been to Corinth we don't know, he wasn't there before Paul because as I mentioned, Paul says that he was the first to carry the gospel that far. Whether he visited there on a later occasion we don't know, but it's not surprising a leading man like Peter would be well known in the church at Corinth, and his ministry well known. But he had a wife. Paul's point here is that I don't have a wife, but I have the right to have a wife, just like the other apostles do, just like the brothers of the Lord do, just like Peter, perhaps the most well-known among the apostles. I could have a wife.

All right, what about money, or do only Barnabas and I not have a right to refrain from working? Now he brings in Barnabas here. So he's using himself as an example and that's where he'll narrow down to talk about himself, but he wants them to know, have the illustration to establish his rights here—the other apostles, the brothers of the Lord, Cephas, Barnabas. What about support in your ministry? Well, do only Barnabas and I not have a right to refrain from working? When you read Acts 18, the opening three verses when Paul arrived at Corinth to bring them the gospel, he took up residence with a couple named Aquila and Priscilla because they were of the same profession. They were tentmakers, leather workers. And what Paul did while he ministered at Corinth, he worked at what we call his secular profession. We still use the terminology, a tentmaker ministry. Meaning what? A person supports himself with a secular job while he, on the side as we would say, preaches the Word and does what we would call a ministry. That's what Paul did at Corinth. He was a tentmaker. He had a tentmaker ministry. That put a lot of extra pressure on him. Here he is in the city of Corinth with all of its paganism, with all of its opposition, and he has to work in a secular job and try to evangelize the city with the time that he has after he does what is necessary to pay his bills. Evidently Barnabas had the same kind of ministry. Interesting he mentions Barnabas here, because Barnabas wasn't with Paul when he came to Corinth. Barnabas and Paul had parted ways at the end of Acts 15, and Paul took Silas as his traveling companion. Barnabas went off on a separate trip. But evidently the ministry of Barnabas was well known to the church at Corinth, and Paul has great respect for Barnabas and his ministry.

So he uses him as an example, and evidently Barnabas followed the same practices as Paul did. When he went into an area to preach, he didn't take money from those people because he didn't want any confusion. He didn't want to put a barrier up. What would happen if Paul or Barnabas came to the city of Corinth, Paul coming to Corinth, wherever Barnabas would go, and they would say, I came to tell you about Christ and we're going to take an offering? Oh, he is here for the money, one of these traveling teachers who is primarily concerned about the money. They could never say that about Paul because he wouldn't take anything from them. What would they think if I went down on the university campus outside the Student Union and I said, I want to preach to you about Jesus Christ and tell you He's the Savior who died on the cross? Please drop your offerings in the box in front of me here. They'd go away saying, he's a huckster, he's just down there to get money. Well they may accuse me of other things, but if I don't take any of their money, they can't accuse me of being after their money, can they. So Paul, as we'll see when it unfolds, he didn't want to put any barriers up there that would keep people from the gospel. Barnabas did the same thing.

But it was a right of theirs, established broadly in other areas and established by Christ Himself, established by Old Testament scriptures, that those who minister the Word of God have the right to be supported by those who benefitted that ministry. But it was a right Paul chose not to use on certain occasions, like his ministry at Corinth. He took money on other occasions, we'll talk about that as we get later in 1 Corinthians 9. What is the point? I have rights, I have liberty, I could exercise them, but I choose not to. Why? If I'm thinking about me, it would be a lot easier, a lot more pleasant, a lot more helpful if you supported me. But I didn't think about me, I thought about you. And it would clear away some potential barriers to your being willing to listen to the gospel if I didn't use that right. That's the point. So I'm always aware of the rights and liberty I have in Christ, but I don't stop there. I'm always thinking, what is the best way to use or not use my right in this area? What is the best way to use or not use the freedom I have in this area? Verse 7 elaborates, do only Barnabas and Paul not have the right to refrain from working? Not that he doesn't consider the ministry work, he just means having another job to support himself.

Then the three questions, who at any time serves as a soldier on his own expense? I mean, a solder goes to become a soldier. Well he doesn't have to provide his own clothes, get his own food, get his own weapon, make his own lodging. That's all a part of the provision for him as a soldier. Who plants a vineyard and doesn't eat the fruit of it? I mean, a farmer is laboring, cultivating a vineyard. Doesn't he have the right to eat the grapes that he has produced? Of course. Or a shepherd with a flock. He tends the flock and cares for it. Doesn't he benefit from the milk from the flock? Of course, he does. It's just an ingrained principle in life that you get to benefit from your work. This will be more fully elaborated as Paul picks up in verse 8 and establishes this with scriptural support.

The principle, though, is clear, is it not? We have certain freedoms, certain rights. You can establish them biblically. You can establish them broader than just biblically. But that does not mean you always have to use those rights or always have to use that freedom. And Paul is an example of one who chose to forego his rights or freedoms.

Turn back to John, as we conclude, John 1. This will take us back to where we started. John 1, the uniqueness of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the creator of all who became a man. Not proved, but declared, Almighty God has said it is true. In John 1:12, verse 10 says, He was in the world, the world was made through Him and the world did not know Him. He came to His own and those who were His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right, there's the same word we've been talking about in Corinthians. Do I not have the right, do I not have the right? To those who received Him, He gave the right, the authority to become children of God to those who believe in His name. We have . . . the right to be the children of God, we belong to Him through faith in Christ. With that right and authority now to declare ourselves sons of God come other rights, other authority, but now I must be careful to use those rights, that authority not selfishly, but as scripture says, through love serve one another. We must use our freedom as bondslaves of God. I am a child of God, He gave them the right to become children of God. What does that mean? Children of God, we belong to His family. I have not been set free to be my own person and to do my own thing, I have been set free to become a child of God, His child, His slave, to do His will, to honor Him with my life, my thoughts, my actions, all of my being. We must consider now that I know I'm a child of God, now that I know that as His child I have certain rights, freedoms, but I must be careful that I don't think that means that now I can do as I please. It means now at last I can do as He pleases. I can be pleasing to Him, the one who loved me and gave His Son to die for me.

So two questions. Have you been given the right to become the child of God by faith in Christ? Have you believed in Him? Not have you attended this church, not have you been baptized here? Not, do you give your money here? Not, do you teach Sunday School? Not even, have you been a board member or a Sunday School teacher? Remember Paul says, God didn't send me to baptize, He sent me to preach Christ. That's the bottom issue. You can sit here all you like and die and go to hell because you have no authority, no right to become a child of God until you place your faith in Him. And then if you have believed in Him, you have become a child of God, that is your right. With that has come other rights and other authorities. Are you using your new liberty in Christ properly as a child of God, as a slave of God so you might through love serve others, that He might be honored?

Let's pray together. Thank you, Lord, for the majesty of your Word because it is the manifestation and revelation of your very person. Thank you that your Son is the Savior and by believing in Him we have been given the authority and the right to become children of God, to belong to you, to be members of your family, your household, to be obedient to you, to live our lives pleasing to you, to love you and to love others and be willing to serve them. May that be the testimony of our lives and may that be the testimony of our church. We pray in Christ's name, amen.