No Compromise

No Compromise 1 Corinthians 9:16-23 New King James Version (NKJV) 16 For if I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for necessity is laid upon me; yes, woe is me if I do not preach the gospel! 17 For if I do this willingly, I have a reward; but if against my will, I have been entrusted with a stewardship. 18 What is my reward then? That when I preach the gospel, I may present the gospel of Christ without charge, that I may not abuse my authority in the gospel.19 For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win the more; 20 and to the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might win Jews; to those who are under the law, as under the law, that I might win those who are under the law; 21 to those who are without law, as without law (not being without law toward God, but under law toward Christ), that I might win those who are without law; 22 to the weak I became as weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. 23 Now this I do for the gospels sake, that I may be partaker of it with you. This is the Word of God, for us the people of God, thanks be to God! Let us pray Heavenly Father, our Rock and our Fortress. We come to you to give our praise, our worship, and all glory. You bless us so much and we ask that you would bless us once more with the message you would have us hear. Make us your vessels to carry your message out into the world. We ask these things in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ....Amen. I realize that I'm coming to you again from the book of 1 Corinthians for the third time in four weeks. It's not my intent to take us through the entire epistle, the scriptures have come up in the Lectionary and have just felt like the message that needed to be preached on those weeks. So, let us dig into the scriptures. The apostle Paul is writing to the church of Corinth about his choice to preach the gospel without charge. You see, throughout his ministry, Paul continued in his trade as a tentmaker in order to provide for his own livelihood. He did not accept payment for preaching the gospel as other ministers of his time were doing, but he was not speaking ill of this practice either. In fact we need to go back to the verses that preceed our scripture reading this morning. Earlier verses from this chapter of 1 Corinthians tell us: 1 Corinthians 9:1-15 New King James Version (NKJV) 1 Am I not an apostle? Am I not free? Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord? 2 If I am not an apostle to others, yet doubtless I am to you. For you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord. 3 My defense to those who examine me is this: 4 Do we have no right to eat and drink? 5 Do we have no right to take along a believing wife, as do also the other apostles, the brothers of the Lord, and Cephas? 6 Or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working? 7 Who ever goes to war at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat of its fruit? Or who tends a flock and does not drink of the milk of the flock? 8 Do I say these things as a mere man? Or does not the law say the same also? 9 For it is written in the law of Moses, You shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain. Is it oxen God is concerned about? 10 Or does He say it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written, that he who plows should plow in hope, and he who threshes in hope should be partaker of his hope. 11 If we have sown spiritual things for you, is it a great thing if we reap your material things? 12 If others are partakers of this right over you, are we not even more? Nevertheless we have not used this right, but endure all things lest we hinder the gospel of Christ. 13 Do you not know that those who minister the holy things eat of the things of the temple, and those who serve at the altar partake of the offerings of the altar? 14 Even so the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should live from the gospel. 15 But I have used none of these things, nor have I written these things that it should be done so to me; for it would be better for me to die than that anyone should make my boasting void. So, we see that as far back as the Levitical preisthood that ministers received support for ministering God's Word. The Levites lived off of the animals given as sacrifices. So, intern for their service in the tent of the tabernacle, they were provided for. The scriptures tells us that Cephas, the apostle Peter and others received support for their ministering. We're also told that Paul's often time traveling companion Barnabas denied himself the right to payment as well as a wife as part of his commitment to God. Even though it was right for them to be provided for and to have families, they practiced a form of self-denial as a part of offering themselves as a living sacrifice to our Lord. This was their way of giving more of themselves to God's service. Even though they would go as far as to live by the customs of those they were witnessing to instead of the Jewish customs they had known all their lives in order to witness to different peoples, they wouldn't let strange customs, money, or material wealth, not even a wife or family distract them from serving God the way they were meant to. Paul does not boast or brag of this though. Paul tells us that he knows if he preaches the gospel free of charge and joyfully he will receive his reward in other ways. He also tells us that he feels he has inherited a stewardship. Indeed, as a minister, you do have a stewardship. As a minister, your stewardship is much akin to that that Jesus laid upon Peter's shoulders in John 21:17 New King James Version (NKJV) 17 He said to him the third time, Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me? Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, Do you love Me? And he said to Him, Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You. Jesus said to him, Feed My sheep. Jesus is telling Peter as His minister that he is to feed the Lord's sheep with the Word of God. That's also what it means when we prayer the Lord's Prayer and we ask the Lord to 'Give us our daily bread'. We're asking the Lord to feed our souls with His Word. We also see this when Satan is tempting our Lord and Jesus tells him that 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. What could be a more important stewardship to be entrusted with? You see, that's why this scripture grabbed me when I saw it this week. It's a subject very close to my heart. I have very strong feelings about the payment ministers receive for preaching the gospel. I can be very critical of ministers who seem to get into the ministry for a career instead of being called to serve God. I'm especially critical of the ministers we see on television and of pastors of these mega-churches we see today. You see, thus far, I have never accepted payment for preaching the gospel of Christ, even when traveling to do so. It doesn't make me any more holy or righteous or a better minister, but like Paul, I feel like it's my way of giving back to God for all that He has done for me. There's no better reward for me when preaching the Word of God than when someone comes up to me afterward and tells me thank you. I don't know that I will always be able to say this though. One day I may go into full-time ministry and stop working my regular job so that I can serve a church and congregation as I would need to. I'm still not sure of how I would feel about being payed to preach then. But, that also brings me to another subject. As a part of that stewardship, I must be careful when I preach that I don't put too much of 'me' into what I am writing or speaking. When it comes to writing a sermon there's always the urge to want to write from our favorite scriptures or from verses that have had special meaning to us throughout our lives. Though this may be something easy to share or to build a sermon on, is it really serving the right purpose? This came to mind when I ran into my pastor from my home church the other night. We got into a conversation about my serving at Baileys Chapel and then about writing sermons. We talked about how we choose scriptures and he said that he always tries to make sure that he's not making the message about himself. He doesn't like for the services or the sermons to be too much about himself, which is how it should be. The sermon and the service should be about God! If we write from our favorite scriptures or ones that have special meaning to us, they most likely will not have that same meaning to others. If they don't strike a chord with those we're preaching to, then we have done neither them or God any service at all. We have been a bad steward over what God has entrusted us with. Another part of that stewardship that is very important and that I take extremely seriously is how we must present the gospel. We must allow God's love and grace to show through while we are ministering. We have to show kindness to our fellow Christians as well as non-believers. We must be repsectful to those we are witnessing to and not attack them with our beliefs. There's no way of forcing Christianity onto someone. We can say that you have to believe or else. That's something that pagan religions do, not believers in Christ. We can do this by simply presenting to truth of the holy scriptures to those we are witnessing to. We can offer them the scriptures in an intelligent, respectful manner without 'hitting them over the head with the bible'. While doing this though, we must not give into their beliefs or unbelief and deem them acceptable. Some ministers in our day and time would have us be more accepting of those of other beliefs and some even knowingly or unknowingly start using some of these pagan practices in their own ministry. An example would be if someone were to tell you that we all 'pray to the same God', but just have different ways of doing it. I can tell you most assuredly that this is not true. The beliefs and practices of other religions make it clear that they are not praying to the same God. This is called Universalism and it is most certainly contradictory to scripture. The bible tells us in John 14:6 6 Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. Can the message be any clearer? We can make no compromise when it comes to preaching the gospel. We can also make no compromise when it comes to accountablility. Today many people have the tendency to say 'I'm saved' or 'I'm covered by God's grace', so now I can live or do as I want. God's grace and salvation through Christ are beautiful things, but we must be careful how we preach them if we are to be good stewards over His flock. While we preach of grace and salvation, we must also remind people that they are to be born again as it is written in John 3:3 Jesus answered and said to him, Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Jesus is telling us here that there MUST be a change within us if we are to see God's heavenly kingdom. Paul reminds us of this in Ephesians 4:21-23 21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: 22 that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, 23 and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, We do everyone we share the gospel with if we don't tell them these things. Going back to the earlier subject, we must not allow profit to influence how we preach the gospel. Paul did not accept payment for his ministry as a way of giving back to God, but I also believe that was also that he could not be swayed one way or the other in he way of presenting the gospel by the gain of material wealth. In a way, you could say that Paul preached the truth because he had nothing to lose by doing so. Paul made no compromise in his ministering the gospel and he would eventually pay the ultimate price for doing so. Paul would be martyred for his ministering without compromise, as well as Peter, Jesus' brother James, the disciple Stephen, and many other of the first disciples of Christ. They took the stewardship that God a put upon them very seriously. It meant more to them than their lives. It was everything to them and it must be everything to us as well. I'm preaching this to myself more than I am to anyone else. Paul set an excellent example for us and we should never lose sight of it. He denied himself many luxuries, even a family so that he serve God without distraction. He did not let anything hinder him from witnessing the truth of the gospel. When it came to his faith in the Lord, his ministry for the Lord, and the way he presented the Word of God, there was no compromise. When we preach the Word of God to the people of today, we must also present the gospel with no compromise. In the name of The Father, and of The Son, and of The Holy Spirit.....Amen. God bless you my friends, Pete.