Tag: New Testament

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The Job Description – 2 Corinthians 6:1-13

Paul is writing to a church that he loves and that loves him, but with some detractors. He had written an earlier letter (1 Corinthians) to the church taking them to task for assorted problems. That letter was generally well received, but not universally. The early church didn’t necessarily meet in a single large group, but many smaller ones, and some leaders within those groups had destructive views of both the gospel and of Paul.

Paul has just been going over how the Corinthians are called to be ambassadors of Christ, working for the ministry of reconciliation. He then goes on, in chapter six, to lay out the job description that comes with that title.

He opens this passage with a prophetic text from Isaiah about the coming of Christ, about a unique moment in history. He is calling out the Corinthians passionately, much like he called out Peter in the past. Paul’s passion is most aroused when the gospel of Christ is being twisted to oppress others.

When he says that he “put no stumbling block” in front of anyone, he doesn’t mean to entirely avoid offense. Even a cursory reading of Paul’s epistles makes that clear. Instead, he means that there is a need to clear out whatever cultural baggage may make it difficult for people to come up God. In the case of Peter, that meant not commanding circumcision. In the case of Timothy, elsewhere, that meant getting circumcised.

In verses 4-5, he gets deeper into the job description, and starts with suffering. Suffering is not punishment – it is a necessary part of our role as Christians. Paul doesn’t just speak of suffering generally, but suffering specifically in the form of beatings received in punishment for sharing the gospel.

How is this possible? In verse 7, we see how – the power of God and the weapons he provides. Paul uses battle terms, to make it clear that the Christian life is like a war.

The job description goes on, running through a list of contradictions. Glory and dishonor, known and unknown, sorrow yet rejoicing. The Corinthians should expect hard times, but should also expect peace to come through that suffering.

Even when we share the Gospel and love people, they may not respond the way they should. The Corinthians had pelted Paul with many non-essential complaints – he wasn’t an original apostle, he didn’t have a proper letter of recommendation, and so on. But Paul still seeks to be opened wide to the Corinthians, even as they dispute around the margins.

We here at Seed Church are also called to be ambassadors of Christ, for the ministry of reconciliation. We’ve been charged, trusted, empowered with a valuable mission, one that is ultimately more meaningful than anything else we could do. We have meaning and purpose in a world that alternates between seeking it desperately and dismissing it sardonically.

Many of us have been hurt by people in the church, and so accepting the notion that we are on this mission with the church. Jeremiah gives us something of a model. He was called specifically to warn the Jewish people about their impending destruction, and was ignored, imprisoned and eventually killed without ever making a visible impact.

We are given an impossible task that is only made possible by the work of Christ and person of the Holy Spirit. We are not restrained by who or what or where we are, because we are enabled by God. We will fail and be taken advantage of, but we will be known by God.

Do we want this job? Do we need to take up this role as co-worker with Christ? Do we need to realign our priorities with the description of this job? The right time to act is now.

– Sermon Notes, Aaron James, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, April 8, 2018

2 Corinthians 6:1-13

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Jesus Versus the Empires – John 12:12-19

The atmosphere in Jerusalem was electric. Flooded with tourists and pilgrims, the city hummed with rumors about the itinerant rabbi who had raised a man from the dead, and was now headed their way. The people were excited and intrigued, while the Pharisees were more and more concerned about this destabilizing force.

The anticipation reached a crescendo as Jesus neared the eastern gate, riding on a borrowed donkey. Crowds rushed from the gate, shaking palm branches pulled off the trees lining the road to the Mount of Olives, a symbol of Israel’s righteousness and joy.

The people were attracted to the power of Jesus, to raise the dead and, presumably, overthrow the Romans and reestablish the Kingdom of David. Their cry “hosanna” means “save now,” a call for immediate action and salvation. The people believed that the coming messiah was a political creature, leveraging physical power to ring in the new physical kingdom.

Jesus rode a donkey, in fulfillment of prophecy, rather than a warhorse, but the donkey was still a common mount for royalty in the Near East. Note also that Jesus never rejects the praise and worship of the crowd.

Meanwhile, the Pharisees were already plotting to deal with this troublemaker. Any destabilization of the tenuous political situation threatened their power and the little empire they had carved out.

Jesus’ entire life was a threat to the Empires of the world, beginning with his birth and the paranoia of Herod. He threatened not just political empires, but religious and cultural empires, as well as the personal empires within every human heart.

Today, we live in the midst of a mighty empire, politically, militarily, culturally – and of course, personal. That homeless rabbi is coming for our empires. In Jerusalem, he went from the Triumphal Entry directly to kicking over tables in the Temple. As he marches towards your soul, what is at the heart of your personal empire that Jesus needs you kick over? Racism, greed, anger?

We build walls of justification around these personal empires, much of it bolstered by lies and assumptions from the cultural empires we live in the midst of. As in Jerusalem, Jesus is coming to upend things we have believed our entire lives. How will you welcome him?

– Sermon Notes, Dave Lester, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, March 25, 2018

John 12:12-19

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Ambassadors for Christ – 2 Corinthians 5:11-21

Paul begins by explaining that his ministry is driven by his understanding of the awesome responsibility he has to Christ. This is partly in response to his opponents who questioned his motives, capabilities and even sanity.

But Paul asserts that he is neither self-seeking nor insane. Instead, he is driven by a new way of living. He owes a life-debt to Christ, one that gives him both the privilege and responsibility to know, serve and spread the news of God.

It changes his entire worldview, not just of Christ but also of humanity as a whole. He had seen Jesus as a false messiah, but now sees him as the savior of humanity. That understanding changes his view of humanity as a whole – and of himself in particular.

That change is an understanding of the gospel, an understanding of our creation, fall, redemption and restoration. We ourselves are a part of this plan, even though we ourselves are the offenders.

The gospel means that God is not out there tallying up good things and bad things and weighing them together. Instead, he simply removes the bad things and sends us off as ambassadors to tell others about the opportunity. There is an intensity to this, a desire to see others redeemed and restored as we have been.

There should also be an intensity within our own life to live for Christ. Often, we see Christ like an expansion for the video game of life, where we can choose to play the base game when we don’t feel like tacking on the Jesus DLC.

The death of Christ opens a way for us to see others differently. No one, however horrible they have been to us, however awful they may be, however broken, is irredeemable. And we, with Paul, are called to communicate this to them. Are we motivated to participate in this mission of reconciliation?

This message has changed our lives, and we should be honored to share it with others. If we do not feel the same urgency that Paul does, the first step is to ask God to give us that desire and those opportunities.

– Sermon Notes, Jeff Krabach, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, March 11

2 Corinthians 5:11-21

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Jars of Clay and the Weight of Glory – 2 Corinthians 4:7-18

Paul just finished talking about the light and glory of God, and here contrasts that with the vessels that he stoops to place it in – namely, is. Clay pots, cheap, abundant, easily broken.

Speaking of easily broken, if it were not for the all-surpassing power of God, Paul makes it clear that he himself would be broken. The story of Paul’s life after his conversion has not been one of comfort and luxury – he goes into more depth in capture 11, but to sum up, he is hard pressed, perplexed, persecuted, struck down. Christians as a whole were surrounded by threats of death and violence at all times – but by life as well. Bad news was all around, but the Good News was at work. The life of Jesus was at work in Paul’s life, and in the lives of the Corinthians.

The ultimate consummation of that work is in eternity, and in the midst of difficulties, that is what he looked to in order to not lose heart. The grace of God that brings Paul into this eternal relationship with Him drives thanksgiving for the mercy shown.

And the grace goes beyond simply the withholding of punishment. In the essay that takes its name from this passage, CS Lewis notes that the most important thing in the world is “What God thinks of is.” The answer is stunning. We are celebrated by God. The weight of this glorious truth makes the suffering Paul mentions seem insubstantial in comparison.

So we may feel like we live ordinary lives – at best. In reality, death and decay are all around us. Outwardly, we are wasting away. As people, as a society, as families, as churches. What can we do about it? Do we feel the weight of glory? Sometimes we are even shamed by the gospel itself, for failing to live up to or spread its message.

But we are not, in the end, ordinary. As Lewis writes, “you have never talked with a mere mortal.” We are all on a trajectory to either eternal glory or dark horror, and God has given us an opportunity to be a piece of bringing people to that glory. As grace extends through us to others, it moves us to the proper position of thankfulness.

– Sermon Notes, Dave Lester, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, February 25, 2018

2 Corinthians 4:7-18

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Transformed by the Glory of God – 2 Corinthians 4:1-6

Here, Paul shares four ways the glory of God transforms our lives.

First, the glory of God transforms our lives so that there is an absence of cowardice and an increase in resilience. If anyone has a reason to be a coward and may motivation, it was Paul, given all that he had endured. But as the dangers and depredations of life increased, they drove him to mediation on Christ, which then bolstered his confidence in Christ and to serve Christ. The more the glory of Christ becomes preeminent in our lives, the less fear we will have about speaking about him.

Second, we renounce behavior that dishonors the Gospel and we refuse to mishandle the message of Jesus. Paul is being accused of both of these things, by opponents who were themselves using the gospel for personal gain and twisting its message. The gospel they were trying to impart was missing the cost of discipleship, while piling on the rules and regulations of the Mosaic Law, all while disconnected from the Apostles designated by Christ.

Third, the glory of God transforms our lives so that our proclamation and practice of the Gospel impact how people think about the Gospel.
It changes us so that others see Christ in our behavior and actions. Not all will see this – “the god of this world” blocks the those who need God the most from understanding His glory.

Fourth, the glory of God that transforms our lives becomes the motivation by which we proclaim the Gospel that saves our lives. As we get closer to seeing to seeing Jesus, God makes us look more like Jesus.

– Sermon Notes, Brian Bailey, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, February 18

2 Corinthians 4:1-6

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Unveiled Glory, Transformed Hearts – 2 Corinthians 3:1-18

Paul here is using the story of Moses on Mount Sinai to go after false teachers, peddling the word of God for money, and seeking to undermine Paul’s ministry. One thing these false teachers were doing was to claim that Paul’s ministry there was illegitimate because he never presented a letter of recommendation.

This is a bit silly because a) he did, in fact had a letter from the Council of Jerusalem, and b) he founded the church to begin with! His letter was the hearts of the congregation there in Corinth. He then pivots to an even more important contrast between words written physically and words written on hearts.

The Law of the Old Covenant was a glorious thing that made Moses’ face shine, but Paul’s ministry is greater because it is written with the ink of the Spirit on the hearts of believers. The Law was transitory, but the Gospel is permanent. There are three things we can take from this. There is a difference between the dead letter of the Law and the living Spirit. It is easy to throw Bible verses at people, whether in an argument or an attempt to teach or comfort, but if we are not doing this in a way that gives life to the listener and the speaker, it will end up being a dead letter and quite possibly thing more harm than good. Second, the way we live our lives matters as a testimony of the work of Christ. That does not mean our moral uprightness, which the World as a whole does really care about. Rather, our freedom in Christ and the joy in that freedom should stand out boldly against the backdrop of the world. Third, we are being transformed. The veil is off, and when we turn to the Lord we both behold and reflect God’s glory. This is not actually natural. We prefer to have clear rules and then do penance when we fail, to “sit in the sin” and feel its weight. Paul, though, says that the penance has already been done. There is no more veil, no more separation between us and God’s presence. “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” So, all we need to do is turn to the Lord. There is no more condemnation – we are free. -Sermon Notes, Seth MacGillivray, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, February 11, 2017

2 Corinthians 3:1-18

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The Worthiness of Jesus – 2 Corinthians 2:1-17

In these six verses, Paul shows us four important realities about Jesus. Paul is writing to the church in Corinth, a city that is morally autonomous and morally unmoored. The notion of the exclusivity of Christ was difficult for the culture to swallow, much as it is today. And there was a great deal of Corinth still in the Corinthian church. (Much as it is today.)

If Jesus is worthy, risk in relationships is unavoidable. Paul took a risk in his relationship with the Corinthians, and that relationship broke. They rejected his teaching and the wisdom of God in him.

In the American church, Jesus has become very ordinary, developing apathy, demanding nothing and enabling assimilation. We do not look much like the New Testament church, but rather look like the culture around us.

If Jesus is worthy, then life will be a paradox. Jesus is continually leading Paul as a captive to his death. Paul is providing a high definition picture of this paradox of life and death. Paul’s opponents would have called out how feeble, weak and pathetic Paul is – and Paul himself would boast in it, because it is in his weakness that Jesus is glorified and His strength is demonstrated.

If Jesus is worthy, then our words have weight in the world. God the Father delights in the worthiness and sacrifice of Christ, and does the same when Paul imitates Christ by giving up his life. But be because that fragrance is the fragrance of death, of giving up our lives as Christ did, those words frightens many off – those who are perishing. But for those who are being saved, those words are a path to salvation.

If Jesus is worthy, then we will be gripped by the gravity of the Gospel. Paul here calls out the false teachers who are gaining wealth by peddling the word of God in order to earn money. They did not feel the weight of the gospel.

Likewise, we must ask if the wealth and comfort that we live in is making the gospel seem less weighty. Jesus says that it is very difficult for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God, which means the vast majority of us in America are at a severe disadvantage.

God finds supreme satisfaction in His Son, and invites us to do the same.

– Sermon Notes, Brian Bailey, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, February 4, 2017

2 Corinthians 2:1-17

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Your Wrath is Not Righteous – 2 Corinthians 2:1-11

To start, again, some background.
Paul founded the church of Corinth, then spent 18 months there. Sometime later, Paul writes to the church, warning about their need to deal with the sin in their midst (this is part of 1 Corinthians), specially, a man’s affair with his step-mother.

Paul subsequently visits Corinth and the disciplinary process begins, apparently not well. He then writes the “Severe Letter” which has been lost (probably for the best), and plans to visit Corinth again, but is prevented. Finally, he writes 2 Corinthians, trying to ratchet some some of what has happened in response to his letters and visit.

That second visit was distressing, even traumatic. As it is for many pastors, Paul is fatigued by being the one people call only when they are in crisis, particularly when dealing with sin against them or by them. In many ways it is a privilege to be in these situations, but when they are the primary way you interact with people, it takes a toll.

This is something all pastors deal with, and Paul in particular has been dealing with this in regards to the Corinthians. This is why he wants them to deal with their issues internally. This is one reason he is glad not to be able to visit them as he had planned. When he comes to them, he wants it to be a joyful experience.

He then explains the background of his initial confrontation of the sin in the church, explaining that the motive was his concern for them, not just his personal desire to be “the hammer.” It is a legitimate concern, but Paul wants to dispel it.

The tone here is very different from Paul’s initial condemnation, where he called on them to hand the man over to Satan. Now, he calls them to forgive him, to avoid themselves falling under the influence of Satan.

We see here in the Corinthians the human tendency to jump from one extreme to the other. Just as it is important to be clear on the need to confront sin, it is important to offer forgiveness. This is why the gospel has two parts – we are worse than we think we are, but more loved than we can possibly imagine. Humans constantly struggle between justice and mercy.

This time around, Paul is addressing the abuse of justice. One of the most successful strategies of Satan is to take our healthy zeal for justice and produce in us a heart of hate. God’s wrath is justified and righteous – ours, on the other hand, is not so much. The scriptures never justify human wrath. Instead, it is condemned categorically by Christ in Matthew 5, by Paul in Galatians, Ephesians & 1 Timothy, by James. We are called to “get rid of” our wrath, categorized right alongside idolatry and witchcraft. The only text in all the New Testament that gives permission for wrath pretty clearly calls us to keep it limited to 24 hours (“do not let the sun go down on your anger.”). God’s perfect wrath is not permission for us to be imperfectly wrathful.

As we seek justice in our communities, we must guard our hearts. We live in an age where wrath and self-righteousness is endemic in social media. We have all created zones of justification where we see our wrath as justified. There are horrific, monstrous things that people do, but we are not called to wrath and vengeance. True justice only comes from God.

We must confront sin, advocate for the oppressed and guard the weak. But we must also guard our hearts. We all have the same depravity within us. We should seek to not feel wrath, but rather pity, in those cases where we are confronted by people who do evil. We should aspire to be like Rachael Denhollander, the gymnast who confronted her abuser and that of hundreds of girls, in her clear, unflinching condemnation of evil, and the bright beacon of Christ’s mercy that she points to.

That evil and that hope exists within each of us. May we each seek to confront that evil, in our life and our world, without giving into it though self-righteousness and wrath.

– Sermon Notes, Brent Rood, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, January 28, 2017

2 Corinthians 2:11-21

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When Plans Change – 2 Corinthians 1:12-24

Paul here is defending himself from attacks around his change of travel plans to Corinth. The real story, though, is that his teaching is being undermined and criticised by Judaizers who want to require gentile Christians to follow the ceremonial law, become circumcised and so forth.

In 1 Corinthians, Paul notes that he plans to visit Corinth around his visit to Macedonia. In the end, though, that did not come together for reasons outside his control. Paul’s enemies in the church used this as leverage to attack not just Paul, but his teachings in general.

Paul, in turn, uses the story of his human inability to accomplish what he had planned to illustrate God’s supernatural ability and faithfulness to fulfill all his promises. In fact, it is often through the disruption of our plans that God accomplishes his.

There are many things in life that we do not have control over. This can be difficult to accept, especially living in a wealthy society where we are free from many of the things that have historically upset people’s plans (war, plague, etc.). But even today, our control of our lives is much more limited than we often realize.

However, if we recognize that much of this lack of control is actually the hand of Providence, that can change our perspective. Many of us can point to things in our own lives where we have seen Providence work in the past. But we may also be able to point to situations where Providence did not work in a way that we might have hoped.

How do you respond when things spin out of your control? Job losses, disease, injury and much more can upend our plans and send us into a spiral of worry and anxiety. It takes our joy and peace, and sends us away from seeking and serving God as we are called to.

In those seasons, the challenge is to let go of the things of the world, let go of our control, and instead cling to the promises of God. We are, at Paul writes, sealed as God’s, with the Holy Spirit as a deposit of even greater things to come.

– Sermon Notes, Dave Lester, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, January 21, 2017

2 Corinthians 1:12-24

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Suffering and Comfort – 2 Corinthians 1:1-11

Paul wrote four letters to the Corinthians, two of which survive. Paul planted the Corinthian church and stayed with them for 18 months before moving on to more ministry. Shortly after this, all hell broke loose, and, after writing his first two letters, Paul has to head back to Corinth to deal with them.

They rebuff him and he leaves for Ephesus, writing what is called the “Severe Letter”. This letter shakes them into some form of response, including church discipline on the most egregious offenders.

Paul begins writing Second Corinthians, and midway through gets news from Titus about more bad news – a group has infiltrated the church and is undermining Paul’s teaching and very position as an apostle.

So the letter here is largely Paul validating his apostleship by way of his sufferings. The two key words as he opens his letter are “suffering” and “comfort.”

In that instruction, Paul takes a very Old Testament, monotheistic tack, with God as the source of all mercy and compassion. This is in contrast to the popular religion of the day (and ours) where the power of a god is seen in the material successes of its followers.

God divinely encourages Paul who suffers on behalf of the Son, so that he can be a conduit of comfort for others who suffer on behalf of the Son. There’s a whole lot of comforting going on. God meets Paul with sufficient sustainment to meet his level of suffering. The greater the suffering, the greater the comfort – and the greater comfort he can then provide to others.

What does all this mean for the Corinthians, though? As a result of what is happening in Paul, the Corinthians can take encouragement from it as they also suffer in their own way, and be built up and sharpened more and more into the image of God.

Most of us (probably none of us) will not suffer in the specific ways Paul did (shipwrecks, 30 lashes, imprisonment), but if Jesus is as worthy as God says He is, then we must suffer on His behalf.

Paul then shifts from the general to the specific, recounting what he had Jay endured. God undermined Paul’s confidence in himself in order to build up his confidence in Christ. Just as Christ was led to the cross in order that he might be raised from the dead, so good led Paul to within inches of his life so that his self reliance might be left in the grave and he be raised in himself from the dead.

A key word in this passage is “rely” which has its roots in “persuade” – Paul is no longer persuaded of his own abilities. Meanwhile, the Corinthians saw persuasion as a key value, and the infiltrators sought to persuade them of his unfitness, but the persuasion Paul relied upon was that of Christ, not his own abilities.

Like Paul, we are called to make much of Christ in our American-Corinthian culture, to suffer and be comforted by Christ as we seek to live out the Great Commission. The world does not value the sufferings of Christ, but as we follow and suffer with Him, His sufficiency is revealed in our lives, revealing Him to that world.

– Sermon Notes, Brian Bailey, Seed Church, Lynnwood, WA, January 14, 2017

2 Corinthians 1:1-11

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