to know you and understand you,
that you are the Lord who exercises loving kindness
and justice in the earth.
And we worship you this morning.
Amen.
Would you open your Bibles with me please
to 1 Corinthians chapter three
as we look into God's word together.
In our recent trip we went to an area of Greece
that is called Matera.
The word Matera means hovering in the air.
It's where we get our word meteor.
It seems to hover in the air.
And this area is called Matera,
hovering in the air because of the kinds of formations
that you see on the screen before you.
Amazing rock formations there.
Monks in the 11th century began to live in these rocks
in the caves as a way to express their spirituality.
Later they built structures on top of the rocks.
We visited one of them, saw several of them.
Until very recently actually, relatively recently,
these monasteries were accessible only by ladders
and by ropes and baskets, believe it or not.
Now back in the days when the baskets were the only way
in which to get to the monasteries,
the story is told of a nervous pilgrim
who asked his host, Monk,
do you ever replace these ropes?
To which the monk replied, well of course we do.
Whenever they break.
Now if renunciation of companionship and vows of poverty
brought spirituality,
then we should follow that pathway.
But the fact is they don't.
We're not called by God to go up on that pathway,
but we're called by God to be wise stewards
of our earthly possessions and to use what he has given us
in this life for the advance of God's kingdom.
Whether those be relationships or possessions
or spheres of influence,
whatever we have we're to use for God.
What matters is what possessions we base our lives upon.
Those that we will one day leave behind
or those that we are given by God that will last forever.
And that's what I wanna talk about today.
Now the Corinthian believers,
like many believers today were deceived
because they had their eyes on possessions and people
and they used these to advance their own agendas.
They even boasted in their spiritual leaders
in ways that were divisive and carnal.
You see they had divided themselves up into groups.
They belonged to various factions.
They were what we might call preacher groupies.
And frankly Paul had had enough of it.
He writes to them beginning in verse 18 of chapter three.
Do not deceive yourselves.
If any one of you thinks he is wise by the standards
of this age, he should become a fool
so that he may become wise.
For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight.
As it is written, he catches the wise in their craftiness.
And again, the Lord knows what the thoughts of the wise
that the thoughts of the wise are futile.
That is the thoughts of the worldly wise are futile.
So then, no more boasting about men.
All things are yours.
Whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world
or life or death or the present or the future,
all are yours.
And you are of Christ and Christ is of God.
Other translations put it perhaps a little better
than the NIV and they say, all things belong to you.
And you belong to Christ and Christ belongs to God.
What I wanna say to you today
and what I think God wants to write in our hearts is this.
That what you possess and who possesses you
are two of life's most important questions.
What you possess and who possesses you.
How you answer these questions of possession
determine your outlook on life.
They determine the way you choose to conduct yourself.
They choose how you view your essential identity,
who you are.
And so I'd like for us to think about these possessions
that will last forever.
Paul makes three statements of possession.
I invite you to look at them with me
in reverse order for our purposes today.
The last statement in Paul's list,
but the first we'll look at is this one.
It says Christ belongs to God.
Christ belongs to God.
It's an amazing statement.
It's difficult to plumb the meaning of that statement.
But it's a reflection of the inexplicable unity
that is present in the triune God.
We are touching here in this statement of possession
upon the very nature of God himself.
Christ belongs to God.
And what we begin to understand here is that God
eternally exists as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Three distinct persons in absolute oneness.
Now that is a statement, that is a truth
that is very difficult, indeed impossible
to fully understand.
If you try to understand it, you'll lose your mind.
But if you deny it, you lose your soul.
Because it is a revelation of the mystery
of God's own person.
The titles that are given help us distinguish
the uniqueness and the specific roles
of each person of the Trinity
in carrying out the eternal purposes of God.
God is one, but he eternally exists
as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
It's important to understand
that God never disagrees with himself.
God is never in division about anything.
He always acts in absolute unity and constancy.
He says, I am that I am.
That is his name.
I am that I am.
And it reveals to us not only God's eternity,
but his unchangeableness.
It says, Christ belongs to God.
Now there's no verb in the way that Paul wrote this.
It really says Christ, God's.
And so different translations vary
the word they put in there,
but belongs seems to be a very good interpretation of it.
Christ belongs to God.
How are we to understand that?
Well, let me give you an illustration
that is on a human level.
And it's really in no way a parallel
to Christ belonging to God.
But I can say, my son belongs to me.
My son belongs to me.
Now, how can I say that?
Because his mother and I generated him.
We gave him birth.
And as such, my son shares my DNA.
He shares my nature for the good or the ill.
My son belongs to me.
Now, please understand that the father
did not generate the son.
He did not begin the son.
The son has existed eternally with the father.
But I think what we're touching on here
is the fact that the son, Christ,
fully shares the nature of God the father
that they are in absolute unity.
Christ belongs to God.
Now, out of that truth,
we're going to have two other truths
that will telescope as we work backward.
The second statement of possession is this.
You belong to Christ.
Christ belongs to God.
You belong to Christ.
Think about that.
Say it with me.
I belong to Christ.
Let that sink down into your mind.
I belong to Christ.
Paul says in Romans chapter 14,
if we live, we live for the Lord, if we die, we die
for the Lord, therefore whether we live or we die,
we are the Lord's.
We belong to Him.
In what ways, I might ask?
Well, in the first place, we belong to Him by creation.
Just as a potter forms a vessel,
an artist paints a picture, a writer crafts a story,
a programmer designs software,
a musician composes a song,
they own what they make.
Jesus Christ is our maker.
And so by creation, we belong to Him.
We are His offspring, Paul says in Acts chapter 17.
In Colossians one, he says, all things, including us,
were made by Him.
We belong to Him by creation.
But secondly, by redemption, we belong to Christ,
by redemption.
The word redemption relates to the Roman slave market,
in which someone would go to the slave market
and purchase, pay the purchase price for a slave,
and take Him out of the market to belong to Himself.
The Bible says that we are redeemed by Jesus Christ.
He has paid a price for us, so that we might belong to Him.
Paul says in Titus chapter two,
our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ,
gave Himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness,
and to purify for Himself a people
that are His very own.
We belong to Christ by redemption.
He paid for us.
I happen to be thinking about this some more
after I did the outline, and I realized there was
yet a third way in which we belong to Christ,
and I would title it this way by presentation.
We belong to Christ by presentation.
Jesus said, all that the Father gives me will come to me,
and the one who comes to me I will in no wise cast out.
All that the Father gives me, five times
in His high priestly prayer in John chapter 17,
Jesus prays to the Father for those
whom Thou hast given me, he says.
Do you realize that the Father loves the Son so much
that He has given Him a special gift?
And that gift is you who are followers of Jesus.
You belong to Jesus because the Father
has presented you to Him as a love gift.
And so we don't belong to Jesus like a slave
belongs to his master as though we were some piece
of property or chattel.
This belonging I'm talking about is in the context
of relationship, relationship.
It's the same sense in which I can say
that my wife belongs to me.
Out of all of this world, she is the one who belongs to me.
And vice versa, she can also say that I belong to her
for the good or the ill, I belong to her too.
We belong to each other based upon relationship.
And so we belong to Jesus Christ based upon relationship.
That's the kind of belonging it is.
We belong to Him and it can be said He belongs to us.
There's a beloved Him that captures the sense
of this romantic belonging, this mutual belonging.
It says loved with everlasting love,
led by grace that love to know.
Gracious spirit from above, Thou has taught me it is so.
Oh this full and perfect peace, oh this transport,
all divine in the love which cannot cease, what?
I am His and He is mine.
Another verse says His forever, only His.
Who the Lord in me shall part?
Oh with what a rest of bliss Christ can fill,
the loving heart, heaven and earth may fade
and flee earth born light in gloom decline.
But while God and I shall be, I am His and He is mine.
Friend, before salvation we belonged elsewhere.
We could say that we belonged to the world.
John chapter 15, Jesus says,
don't be surprised if the world hates you,
it hated me first.
He says it hates you because you no longer belong to it.
But I've chosen you out of the world.
You see before we came to Christ,
we belonged to the world that is passing away.
Now we belong to Him.
Every person listening to me right now
belongs either to the world or to Jesus Christ.
All of your eternity hangs in the balance of this question.
Who possesses you?
Who do you belong to?
If you don't belong to Jesus yet,
you can belong to Him today by coming to Him in faith
and trusting Him as your Lord and Savior.
Christ belongs to God, says Paul.
You belong to Christ.
Thirdly, he says, because these two are true,
all things, all things belong to you.
Notice that twice Paul says this in our text,
all things are yours, all things.
Paul aligns with this in Romans chapter eight
when he says, he who did not spare his own son
but gave him up for us all.
How will he not also, along with his son,
freely give us all things?
All things.
Now Jesus is the rightful heir of all things,
but because you and I are coheirs with Jesus,
all things belong to us as well in Him.
Now what Paul is saying here is the antithesis
of that partisan spirit that was in Corinth,
that sought to draw lines to divide up the body of Christ.
Paul is saying to them and to us,
you are an heir of everything that God has made.
You don't have to be jealous for one leader or another.
You don't have to be territorial.
All things belong to you.
Therefore you can't embrace others
and be gracious and generous in your attitudes.
Now Paul doesn't leave it to our imagination
what belongs to us.
He begins to form a list.
It's not all inclusive by any means,
but he says all things belong to you,
including your spiritual leaders.
He names himself an Apollos and Cephas or Peter.
Do you know that your spiritual leaders belong to you?
You don't have to divide up sides around them.
Warren Wearsby writes,
each one of God's servants belongs to each believer.
No member of the church should say,
I belong to Paul or I like Peter
because each servant belongs to each member equally.
Perhaps we cannot help but have our personal preferences
when it comes to the way different men minister the word,
but we must not permit our personal preferences
to become divisive prejudices.
In fact, the preacher I may enjoy the least
may be the one I need the most.
Think about that.
You see the Corinthians needed to focus on what
they were being taught rather than who was teaching them.
They needed to build their lives on God's wisdom
and not follow after the foolishness of the world's wisdom.
So you and I can thank God for all of those
who are leading and teaching,
for all of those serving gifts in the body of Christ.
No one needs to be jealous about anyone else,
but rather we can respect and appreciate all
the gifts that God has given his body.
Your spiritual leaders belong to you,
whether you want them or not.
There is a chain letter that was going around
some time ago, perhaps you heard about it.
It was addressed to the board of deacons.
It says this is a chain letter.
The result of a computerized survey indicates
that the perfect preacher preaches 15 minutes.
Condemns sin but never offends anyone.
Works from eight till midnight,
including custodial work at the church.
He makes $60 per week, wears good clothes, buys good books,
drives a good car and gives $50 a week to the poor.
He's 28 years old and he's been preaching for 30 years.
He's wonderfully handsome.
He has a burning desire to work with teenagers
but spends all of his time with the older folks
in the church.
He smiles with a straight face.
Because his sense of humor keeps him seriously dedicated
to his work.
He makes 15 calls per day on the church family,
on shut-ins and hospitalized,
while at the same time evangelizing the lost.
He's always in his office when he's needed.
If your preacher does not measure up to this chain letter,
send this letter to six other churches
who are tired of their preacher too.
Bundle up your preacher and send him
to the church at the top of the list.
In one year, you will receive 1,643 preachers
and one of them should be perfect.
But warning, keep this letter going.
One church broke the chain and got their old preacher back
in six months.
Your spiritual leaders belong to you,
whether you want them or not.
Paul says also the world belongs to you.
What an amazing thought.
The world belongs to you.
John MacArthur quotes a preacher of another generation
by the name of Joseph Parker who said,
and writing about his first pastorate.
He said, I began my ministry in Branbury in England
and my upper window looked over the vast estate
of a wealthy man.
It was I really who inherited that estate.
Oh, I did not own a foot of it, but it was all mine.
You see, the owner came down to see it once a year,
but I walked its miles day after day.
You and I may not own very much in this world
and the bank may own most of what we have.
Really, but the fact is that it's all ours,
the whole world, the sea coast up and down it.
You would like some beachfront property.
It's all yours.
Now don't go build a house on it because I said that,
but it's all yours to enjoy.
You enjoy the mountains, you enjoy the desert,
you enjoy the sky, the birds,
you enjoy flowers in the springtime.
Aren't the flowers beautiful this time of year?
The beautiful California poppies up along the street here
as you come into the church property.
They're all yours, all yours.
Another preacher of the name of Maltby Babcock.
If I had a name like Maltby, I would probably change it,
but he had enough self-confidence to keep it.
Maltby Babcock died at 42 years of age in 1901
while on a trip to the Holy Land, if you can believe that.
But he's the one who penned the words that we love to sing.
This is my father's world.
And to my listening ears, all nature sings
and round me rings the music of the spheres.
This is my father's world.
I rest me in the thought of rocks and trees,
of skies and seas, his hand, the wonders wrought.
This is my father's world.
The birds their carols raise.
The morning light, the lilies white,
declare their maker's praise.
This is my father's world.
He shines in all that's fair.
In the rustling grass, I hear him pass.
He speaks to me everywhere.
This is my father's world.
Oh, let me never forget that those who are in the world
though the wrong seems off so strong,
God is the ruler yet.
This is my father's world.
The battle is not done.
Jesus who died shall be satisfied
and earth and heaven be won.
Friend, it's all yours.
It's all yours to enjoy
because your father is this maker.
Paul says all things belong to you.
He also includes life itself.
Life, he says, belongs to you.
All that it entails, the ups and the downs of life,
its opportunities, its privileges,
Christ's followers, my friend,
have an entitlement to the delights of life
that no one else has.
We can live with a passion for life.
We can use life for its God intended purposes.
We can enter into every season of life with pleasure.
We can enjoy the experiences of life to the full
because life belongs to us.
It's ours.
God gives it to us
and we know why he's given it to us.
And not only this life, but eternal life belongs to us.
He who has the Son has what?
Has the life.
If you have the Son, you've got it all.
Paul includes also in this list death.
Death, you say, well, there are some things
I might not want.
Listen, either death has you
or you have death.
It's one or the other.
And for the follower of Christ, we own death.
Paul is thinking here about the process of dying
and leaving behind this world.
We possess it because the great enemy
has been broken and defeated by Jesus Christ.
Its sting has been removed by the one
who lives again, our savior.
So that death for us who are in Christ
is relegated to the position of gatekeeper only.
So that when our time comes, he can only serve
the purpose of God by opening the gate
and allowing us to leave this world
to go into the presence of the Lord.
We possess death in Jesus Christ.
We also possess the present, the present.
Whatever today holds for you belongs to you.
It is already sanctified by God for your good.
All of the contingencies of today,
all of the possibilities will fall out
to your eventual advantage.
I'm not saying to you that everything today
will be pleasant, it may not be.
Nor am I saying it will be easy
because all of life is not easy.
But whatever the present has belongs to you
because God has shaped that present for your good
and nothing can keep God's purpose
from being achieved in your life in the present.
But not only the present,
he says furthermore the future belongs to you.
That is whatever tomorrow holds
and beyond tomorrow, the future of Christ coming,
that's yours.
The ultimate culmination of all things
with the new heaven and the new earth, it's yours.
He who overcomes will inherit all things, the Bible says.
Now Paul's point here is this.
God's children already possess all things in Christ.
Just as Christ belongs to God, is that forever?
Of course, the eternity of God.
Just as you belong to Christ, is that forever?
We're absolutely secure in Jesus Christ.
So all things are forever yours.
So don't sweat the small stuff.
That's what the Corinthians were doing.
Paul wants them to get their eyes off the small stuff.
He says everything is yours, live like it.
When everything belongs to you,
you don't have to stake a claim for part of it.
You don't have to mark out your territory
because it's all yours.
You can forget about yourself.
You don't need to worry about being overlooked or offended.
You're not going to be shortchanged.
So you don't have to live a graspy, greedy life.
God's freely given you all things in Christ,
everything you'll ever need.
You don't need to develop a competitive spirit
to try to get ahead.
Don't divide yourself into teams promoting one leader
over another or be jealous for your leader or your group.
You don't need to because it all belongs to you.
You don't need to live like a victim in this world
because all of life's experiences belong to you.
And God will use even the most adverse
things in your life for good.
So do the Corinthians need to think
in terms of rivalry with others?
No, nor do we.
We should not think of ourselves as rivals of other churches
as though if they win, we lose.
Or if they lose, we win.
That's not the kingdom of God.
We should not be resentful over a church
which gets more publicity or more acclaimed than our own.
We should never compare pastors and pick favorites.
We should not choose whether to attend church
based upon who's speaking this weekend.
We should never create celebrities out of ministry leaders
and develop personality cults.
To all of that Paul says, no more boasting about men.
Be done with that because all ministry leaders
belong to you and you possess all things in Christ.
If one is honored, then everyone benefits.
If one church advances, God's kingdom grows.
Praise God.
If another group is in the spotlight,
rejoice with them away with the competition
in the kingdom of God, all things belong to you.
We belong to Christ who in turn belongs to God.
Therefore we don't need to be anxious.
We should not squabble over anything as God's children.
We can be perfectly content
because we possess all things in the shepherd
we shall not want.
And we cannot be robbed by anyone else.
But we can rob ourselves.
By our own attitudes we can rob ourselves
of that inner contentment, of that joy, of that peace.
We can have the spirit of harmony disrupted
by following the pathway of the Corinthians
and being immature and carnal in our attitudes.
If we ignore the riches of Jesus Christ,
we will live in poverty by our own choice
and rob ourselves of our inheritance.
How sad that any of us should do that.
To be close today, I want us to think about
what God may be saying to me.
And maybe we can each ask that question
and jot down on your notes what I hear God saying
to me.
Take a moment to think about that.
Is there something I need to let go?
Do I need to take down the fences in my life?
Do I need to forgive another person?
Like the Corinthians, have I deceived myself
into thinking that I'm better than others?
Is my attitude contributing to the building up
of God's temple?
Am I living as the heir of all things
or as a pauper in the kingdom of God?
My friend, these are things that you can never lose,
but you can lose the benefit of them.
Will you determine in your own heart today
to listen to God's voice,
to do whatever it takes to live in the light
of the fullness that you have in Jesus Christ,
and don't miss out on anything that God wants you
to enjoy in this world?
Let's pray together.
Father,
I thank you today for the truths of belonging,
that we belong to Jesus Christ, your Son,
by your grace.
We certainly have not done anything to contribute
to that or to earn it,
but it is your gift when we have trusted Him.
And I want to pray, Father, if there's some friend
who's here who's never yet trusted Christ
and who still belongs to the world,
that even in the quietness of this moment,
that one would trust the Savior,
believing that he died on the cross for Him,
and rose again from the dead,
inviting Jesus to come into His life as Lord and Savior.
Oh, Father, in belonging to you,
may we then understand that all things belong to us.
Lord, help us to live in the relationship
that you have brought to us in Christ.
Thank you that we are yours,
that you are ours forever.
Amen.