Common to Everyone

Sunday, March 11th, 2007
Third Sunday of Lent
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Text: 1 Corinthians 10:12-17

12So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall. 13No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it. 14Therefore, my dear friends, flee from the worship of idols.
15I speak as to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. 16The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ? 17Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.

Over the last few Wednesday evenings, we’ve been studying what it is that sets Baptists apart, and in doing that we’ve been more or less following the book “The Baptist Identity; Four Fragile Freedoms”. What we’ve been seeing through the study is that, overarching everything else … or perhaps underlying everything else, is a single concept that is reflected in the four chapter titles – and indeed in the subtitle itself – FREEDOM.

We’ve seen that the foundational concept that drove John Smyth and Thomas Helwys to establish that first small group of believers and constitute themselves into a church in Holland in 1609 was a desire to be able to FREELY practice their faith as they understood it, as they studied it, and as they lived it.

Over the last nearly four centuries, our Baptist predecessors proclaimed, defended, fought and died because of this understanding of what it meant to be a people of faith – freely choosing to become followers of Christ, freely choosing to read and interpret scripture for themselves, being guided by the Holy Spirit, freely choosing to associate as an individual with a body of believers and freely choosing as a body of believers to in turn associate with OTHER bodies of believers in their local area or across the world. At the heart of the Baptist understanding of what it means to be a Christ follower is the idea that Christ offers us a freedom that goes so deep and is so strong and so permeates our being that it suffuses – it spreads into – every aspect of our lives, and while it is a wonderful, liberating thing to experience this freedom we HAVE in Christ, it can make for some pretty unruly experiences … of which Baptist History is full.

So when we come to the letter Paul writes to his brothers and sisters in the church at Corinth, it is especially important for us to understand the fundamental issue that was at the root of the situations that Paul was asked to address by the folks there.

The Corinthians lost sight of what that freedom they found in Christ meant for them.

They were surrounded by every conceivable iteration of religious, social and physical practice that their first century society could come up with, and when Paul stepped into that mix and said “Christ sets you free FROM ALL THIS” they stopped listening at the word “free” and from there, took off on their individual wild goose chases, largely depending on what experience they were coming out of.

Paul’s stay in Corinth is estimated by scholars to have lasted about a year and a half … which would seem to be plenty of time to get some grounding established within the church, especially considering he wasn’t working by himself – Timothy and Silvanus and Priscilla and Aquila were with him, and Phoebe came from nearby Cenchreae; and after he left, Apollos, a Missionary from Alexandria in Egypt came to continue the instruction of the newly formed church.

Even with all that, the folks in the Corinthian church still ended up having to ask Paul about a number of issues:

1. What to do about some concepts that had been held onto by some people who were formerly devoted to the mystery religions, what later came to be known as Gnosticism in the early church;

2. How to deal with the sexual immorality of a particular couple in the congregation;

3. How to handle disputes and disagreements within the membership;

4. How their faith in Christ translated into how they lived together in marriage;

5. What their faith in Christ meant in the face of being offered food to eat that had first been sacrificed to idols in one of the multiple temples that filled the city and surrounded them;

6. How they were to practice their spiritual gifts;

7. How they were to observe the celebration of the Lord’s Supper;

8. Questions about the resurrection of the dead;

9. And finally, questions about a special offering that Paul was gathering to send back to the followers of Christ who were gathering in Jerusalem.

Paul had his work cut out for him when he began to dictate the reply from Ephesus to send back to them.

The passage this morning comes from that part of his reply that is dealing with the problems surrounding the questions about eating food sacrificed to idols, which is actually a pretty lengthy section, beginning in chapter 8 and going through the first verse in chapter eleven.

The situation is this: the idea that idols are no more than the material they are made of – bronze, gold, wood, stone, whatever – and don’t pose any sort of threat by way of supernatural or divine retribution if one does not appease or obey these supposed (lower case g) ‘gods’ is a concept that those who first received the gospel of Jesus Christ from Paul ‘GOT’. They understood that, whatever following may have developed over the centuries around Aphrodite or Hermes or Zeus or whatever other gods might be around, when it came to ultimate significance – what mattered in the end – none of THEM made a difference – only Christ did. So there was no real issue when it came to dealing with the ‘apparent’ spiritual significance of dealing with them. Since they were not real, there were no consequences to, for example, eating the meat of an animal that had been sacrificed to one of the pagan gods just down the street, and the priest or priestess turned around and sold it to make some money to support the temple staff. I imagine the sign at the stand said “Fresh roasted bull; 100% organic, purified in the fires of the great and mighty Zeus; provides 100% of the daily recommended dose of ‘Zeus Juice’ for those who worship him! It keeps you going when you have to ride herd on all those other, lesser gods!”

The problem arose when people who still BELIEVED to some degree in the strength OF those other gods, who had begun to express interest in the new Jesus faith and began to come around to their meetings and were attracted by what they saw … then saw one of their new friends stop at that stall and buy a quarter pound Hermesburger with extra onions. Although they were moving away from what they had taken for granted as being fact all their lives, there was still a part of them that had yet to overcome all that baggage, and in fact, was still so entrenched in the belief that eating that meat infused the person with the essence of the god to whom it was sacrificed that it didn’t make sense … it seemed that these Christ followers who were eating this food were wanting it both ways – covering all their bases, as it were.

It’s hard for us to really get into their skin, I think, because of the specifics involved. I looked through the phone book, and nowhere in the Northern Neck is there a listing for a temple to Zeus, and I haven’t seen any ads in the Northern Neck News for fresh-sacrificed Zeusburgers, on buy one get one free special at Food Lion.

So let’s see if we can put these same temptations into our context:

What I HAVE seen are ads on Television for “chat lines”, where you are invited to talk with local singles and really have “fun” – usually by beautiful young women who are breathing the commercial at you more than speaking it. I’ve seen movies on the top shelf at the movie rental store that are MOSTLY covered, but there is just enough of the title showing to give you an idea of what might be on that video tape or DVD … I’ve seen magazine covers that present the physically beautiful body in situations that turn it into so much meat on the sacrificial altar of lust and base desires, with total disregard for the worth of the individuals pictured. I’ve heard talk shows on the radio as well as on television that celebrate the depravity of the human mind – that give equal standing and weight to voices that espouse hatred and bloodlust and encourage the dehumanization of our fellow human beings so as to make it easier to allow atrocities to become more and more and more acceptable. I’ve heard interviews with proponents of ideas that center on a man being the ultimate determinant of his fate. I’ve seen shelves and shelves of bestsellers that propose to their readers that we are, in a word, divine in our own right. I’ve seen books that claim to explain all the mysteries of the Bible – which would, of course, provide the person who reads them with the ultimate knowledge – what’s going to happen when, and where, so having that answer, that special knowledge, that BIG SECRET will give you the POWER to be in the KNOW, and ready when the time comes.

Most references to this passage focus on the words of verse 13:

13No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.

It's a nice thought. You may have heard it rephrased as the saying "if God led you to it, God will lead you through it."

I would invite us to read the two statements that straddle these two sentences … for just this time skipping over the two sentences of verse 13.

12So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall. … 14Therefore, my dear friends, flee from the worship of idols.

So what does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?

Let’s read on:

15I speak as to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say.

Paul is saying “THINK FOR YOURSELVES!” In this context, he’s saying “Don’t be taken in by the prevailing … MOOD … the accepted NORM …” THAT accepted norm tends to be WAY off base, when it comes to discerning what is TRULY meaningful and what TRULY matters in this life!”

He goes on:

16The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a sharing in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a sharing in the body of Christ? 17Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.

Paul began the argument against eating food sacrificed to idols in chapter 8, way back, by saying that in fact, yes, as Christ followers, freed from the lies of idolatry, we are free to confront and ignore and in so ignoring tear down the presuppositions that surround the acceptance of those idols. We are free to basically say out loud that the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes. We can call a spade a spade.

What his argument comes around to, though, is the reality that we each are at a different place in our pilgrimage … in our faith walk with Christ. Some are sprinting ahead, taking in and assimilating what it means to be a Christ-follower as fast as we can run. Others of us are coming along at a steady pace, taking in and digesting each bite, realizing the full implications only after careful deliberation and much study and prayer. Others of us are straggling along behind, sometimes gaining momentum and coming even with the rest of those who are walking along the way and sometimes stumbling and falling back … seemingly struggling with what sometimes seems like insignificant issues that nevertheless occupy the lion’s share of our devotional time.

Paul highlights the fact that – no matter where we are on the road – that we eat the same bread – that we share the same cup, that we share the same Christ. We who are many are one body.

That means that we cannot expect all of us to be at the same place in our spiritual journeys. That we are to bear with each other, encourage each other, help each other along, hold each other accountable, live alongside each other in this freedom that Christ gives – the freedom to BE so much more than the world expects us to be. To surprise our neighbor with an unexpected – and maybe even undeserved word or act of friendship and kindness, to confound the person who has just had a horrible day with a totally random act of selfless giving that will renew their faith and show them that there truly ARE people who SAY they are Christ followers and LIVE like it as well. And give that honor to Christ’s presence in their life – in other words – that will unpretentiously give the credit where credit is due – humbly acknowledging that were it not for the transformative power of Jesus being Lord that that … whatever… would most likely not have taken place. Claiming Christ as Lord carries not only enormous freedom, but enormous responsibility as well.

Let’s pray.