Tag: 1 Corinthians 9

How Important is the Gospel to Us?

Matt Erickson2 Comments

Rembrandt Paul

Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible….I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings. (1 Corinthians 9:19, 22b-23)

How important is the gospel to us? Does it save us only or does it shape every aspect of our lives. The Apostle Paul is motivated to sacrifice his freedom and autonomy for the sake of his gospel ministry. His goal is that more might be saved by all means available.

We do not see in Paul a half-hearted love for God and the gospel, but a wholehearted dedication. He surrenders all he is and has to God that God might use all of Paul for His purposes. Every aspect of Paul’s life is surrendered to God for His purposes: His freedom, his cultural frameworks, his preferences, his will, his strength, his comfort—everything.

What about us? Are we the sort of people who are completely surrendered to God for His purposes? Have we given every aspect of our lives into the hands of God or is there something that we have held back? Our response to these questions may reveal how important the gospel really is to us. May God give us strength to surrender everything to Him.

Self-Control, anyone?

Matt EricksonLeave a comment
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My crazy notes for last week’s message.

With all the hullabaloo in the news these days about failures on the right and on the left, abuse of power, and the angst over unacknowledged sexual abuse, it was ironic that last Thursday I spent time with young adults at Kaleo talking about self-control. I hate to say it’s not surprising to me that not only are these painfully abusive things present in people’s lives, but that we do not know either what to do with it or how to apparently prevent it. It should not surprise us when we have heavily criticized any standards of character in hopes of finding ourselves through vain self-fulfillment fantasies. These two things go hand in hand.

Jesus was not being ‘spiritual’ in an esoteric way when he said, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” (Matthew 16:24). He was revealing the practical truth that the way we truly become ‘ourselves’ is not through rampant, visceral, unbounded self-centered desire but through turning from ourselves to a source of greater guidance; in this instance, Jesus as our Master Teacher and Lord.

When we read in 2 Peter 1 that God has given us “everything we need for a godly life” (2 Peter 1:3) it comes to us only “through our knowledge of him” – that is, Jesus – and God’s “great and precious promises,” not through our self-will. Such a move toward God and from ourselves is what saves us from “the corruption in the world caused by evil desires” (1:4). On the one hand as humans we tend to get worried about prudish morality here, but on the other hand we are disgusted by the abusive immorality so prevalent. Peter reminds us there is no happy medium here, there are only those equipped with God’s power to live a different sort of life and those that are left to live from their own power, which struggles gasp air above the sinking waters of sin’s corruption. Read More »