Well, we have had many messages—a lot of food—and we are all filled up. I seem to lose my appetite when I am all full. And here we are again with another message.
But the deal is this: if we mention the name of Jesus, and if His fragrance fills this place, there is that magic that happens where we become hungry again. There is nothing like the aroma of Christ to make us hunger and thirst after Him. So let us pray that the Spirit would fill this place with His fragrance tonight as we speak one more time on this matter of Who Am I in Christ?
Father, we are so thankful that You sent this last Adam to the earth, that we might discover things we never would have otherwise known. All of us here who march in the triumph and fragrance of Christ realize what a blessed life and destiny we have.
Now, Lord, we have received so much. As Laodicea, we could get rich and lazy and lose our appetite for You, Lord, unless the Holy Spirit speaks to our hearts and causes Your hunger to come forth in our lives again.
So we pray that You might give us, by the Holy Spirit, that spiritual hunger we need to pursue after Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. To that end, we give You this time, in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.
I would like us to read some verses in these Corinthian letters tonight, because I want to talk about the church in Corinth. Let us begin in 1 Corinthians 1:1-10.
Paul, called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother,
unto the church of God which is at Corinth,
even them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in every place, their Lord and ours:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I thank my God always concerning you, for the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus;
that in everything ye were enriched in Him, in all utterance and all knowledge;
even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you:
so that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ;
Who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye be unreproveable in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
God is faithful, through Whom ye were called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Now I beseech you, brethren, through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfected together in the same mind and in the same judgment.
Now let us turn to 2 Corinthians 5. Verse 17 is one of our theme verses, but let us begin in 2 Corinthians 5:9.
Wherefore also we make it our aim, whether at home or absent, to be well-pleasing unto Him.
For we must all be made manifest before the judgment-seat of Christ; that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he hath done, whether it be good or bad.
Knowing therefore the fear of the Lord, we persuade men, but we are made manifest unto God; and I hope that we are made manifest also in your consciences.
We are not again commending ourselves unto you, but speak as giving you occasion of glorying on our behalf, that ye may have wherewith to answer them that glory in appearance, and not in heart.
For whether we are beside ourselves, it is unto God; or whether we are of sober mind, it is unto you.
For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that One died for all, therefore all died;
and He died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto Him Who for their sakes died and rose again.
Wherefore we henceforth know no man after the flesh: even though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now we know Him so no more.
Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature: the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new.
But all things are of God, Who reconciled us to Himself through Christ, and gave unto us the ministry of reconciliation;
to wit, that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not reckoning unto them their trespasses, and having committed unto us the word of reconciliation.
We are ambassadors therefore on behalf of Christ, as though God were entreating by us: we beseech you on behalf of Christ, be ye reconciled to God.
Last night, we tried to touch on this matter of who am I in Christ. We began by talking about the Adam that we are: lost, broken, alienated from God, our spirit dead because of sin.
Then, upon this earth, in the fullness of time, came Jesus Christ, the last Adam—the end of this realm and reign of Adam, his transgression, sin, and death—to bring us into a whole new realm called in Christ. Those who believe become new creatures in Christ.
Most of us came to the Lord convicted that we were sinners and going to hell, or sensing that we desperately needed something in our lives. We reached out to Jesus, hoping that through finding Jesus and His help, we would lead a better life on earth.
We had little idea of who we really are in Christ, or of the destiny that awaits us. But as Christians, as we began to pursue and know the Lord, we began to think, “Wow, this whole matter of being in the new creation and being in Christ is bigger than I thought.” It involves a higher level of life than we have known.
We find ourselves progressively and gloriously being transformed—ever so slowly and often unconsciously—more and more into the image of Christ. Then, in the end, as our brother has been intimating each morning, we come before Him: the overcomers, the bride, whatever it is. He looks at us and says, “Now, you look just like Me—bone of My bone. I am marrying you.”
Then we join Him in this wonderful millennial reign. What an amazing fact: we look like Him. There is no one like Jesus, but we have been transported and transformed from that old Adam who always had, as my old brother Ernie used to say, “stinking thinking”—always thinking negatively, always being a loner, always criticizing others.
Now we have been brought into the last Adam, in Christ. There is a whole new atmosphere, a whole new life. Inside of us is a spirit alive to God, and the Holy Spirit begins to lead. Oh, this whole new-creation thing is marvelous.
As I made the point last night, the more I know Christ, the more I know who I am. The more you know of Him, the more you understand your calling and your place in Christ.
Tonight I want to talk about what I call knowing who we are by seeing the most beautiful Christ. Have you ever seen the most beautiful Christ? I speak as a fool, but you will understand as I go along in this testimony.
Tonight we want to look at Corinth and see that, as we come into Christ, we come into Christ corporately. Who am I? As you are baptized into Christ corporately, you discover reflexively who you are.
Last night we considered the personal Christ; tonight, the corporate Christ.
Corinth was pretty much like New York City: a city of sin. It was a seaport town, bustling with business. In the Roman Empire, it was one of the leading cities because of its commerce and shipping port.
There was a lot of sin and a lot of religion, because there were many temples there: prostitution, heavy drinking, and corruption. There was an expression in the Roman Empire: “That guy is a Corinthian.” It basically meant something as bad as saying, “That guy is a New Yorker.” You did not want to be around that kind of fellow.
Corinth was a beautiful city on the outside—garish, painted, full of temples, art, museums, plays, and circuses—but underneath it was rotten and corrupting. It was a testimony to the world that is passing away with all its lust. Corinth was slowly dying from the inside out.
Then something hidden happened. Something was born in the midst of Corinth somewhere: a new creation.
Second Corinthians 5:17 can be interpreted personally: “If any man is in Christ, he is a new creature.” But it can just as truly be interpreted from the Greek, in its context: “If any man is in Christ, he is in a new creation.” This is speaking about the corporate Christ—the church.
In the midst of the darkness of Corinth, a new creation was born. It was born through the travail of a year and a half of the apostle Paul, who came to town on his own while his fellow apostles were trailing behind in the villages of Macedonia.
Having briefly gone through Athens, he came to Corinth and began to preach the gospel in the synagogues. Then he met two key companions: Priscilla and Aquila. From what we see in the Scriptures, it looks like Priscilla was the preacher and Aquila was just a tentmaker. He made the money, kept his mouth shut, and his wife did all the preaching—that is kind of the idea.
But the most wonderful thing about them was that they opened their home. Paul preached to the Jews for a period of time until there was such opposition that he was thrown out. Yet there were now new believers in Jesus the Messiah.
What did they do? No problem. They met in Priscilla and Aquila’s house every night. They probably had pulled pork every night. People came over, and most Corinthians had no idea where this new creation was. It did not have a big temple or a large building.
In the daytime, you were likely to find them at the house next door to the synagogue, owned by Titus Justus, who opened his home to Paul. Paul—and eventually Timothy and Silas—began preaching there, discipling new believers, praying, and who knows what else.
The ruler of the synagogue got saved, and that was part of the problem, but that is another story. At night they met at Priscilla and Aquila’s house, and something happened: these sinful, New Yorker Corinthians got saved.
Paul called them saints—set apart, full of grace, full of love. What? Yes: sinners saved by grace. A new creation was formed, and this new creation was centered in Jesus Christ.
He was the beginning. He was the end. He was the foundation. He was the building. He was the Head. As Paul later put it, this was the new man: Christ in the church together, where Christ is all and in all.
Corinth may have been a desperate place, but if you walked among the saints, it was a whole other kind of atmosphere, filled with the fragrance of Christ. Here were newly saved Corinthians, excited about this new life they had discovered.
For a year and a half, despite trouble, Paul laid the foundation as a wise master builder: Jesus Christ. To make that new creation solid with Christ, he preached Christ and preached Christ and preached Christ. Those people knew they were saved by Jesus Christ.
These sinners who used to be the old man, who used to be in Adam, suddenly became one new man, created in the image of the One Who created them. All these messy sinners—one new man, created in the image of the One Who created them.
This was amazing. Who would have thought that a Corinthian would be known for showing holiness, love, fervor for God, and good works? This was indeed a new creation.
The rest of the city may have ignored this church, though it became harder and harder as the saints went around spreading the gospel in every quarter of that sinful city. Yet in that great dark city, the most important thing happening was this little new creation of a couple hundred believers.
This was the most important thing going on. This was marked for eternity and destiny: the new creation.
The letters to the Corinthians give us a window into that new creation. These sinners got saved, and I will give them one thing I wish we all had: they were enthusiastic, running after the Lord and wanting to know Him.
Perhaps one night Paul spoke about the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and those people jumped right in. They started prophesying, praying for healing, and doing things before they even knew what they were doing.
Paul said, “You are so alive. You come behind in no gift.” They were already teachers and preachers. In simple faith, they came to God and received whatever God had for them. Paul said, “Through Jesus Christ, you receive the power of the Holy Spirit,” and they said, “Give it to me, Lord.”
They were babes—enthusiastic babes—but so in love with the Lord and so pursuing. What a life: a life of light, a life of love after all that sinful living. They were in it hook, line, and sinker. This was a new creation. Things were really happening.
Paul says, “I thank my God always concerning you, for the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus.” They were saved by His grace, enriched in everything—in utterance and knowledge. The testimony of Christ was confirmed among them, they came behind in no gift, and they eagerly awaited the return of the Lord Jesus.
Is that not a wonderful group? Would you not like to be part of something like that? That is the new creation as we see it through the window of Corinthians.
Now, I know they had imperfections, and we will have to deal with that. But before we get to the imperfections, let us think about what they had for a moment, because it was something quite marvelous.
There was so much life there that, a couple of years later, when Apollos came to Ephesus, Aquila and Priscilla happened to be there. Apollos was a preacher in the synagogue, preaching to the Jews about the Messiah.
Aquila and Priscilla took him aside. Aquila said, “Apollos, you look a little skinny. Let me give you a good meal.” Aquila paid for the meal; meanwhile, Priscilla started to preach. They explained to Apollos the more excellent way.
Apollos knew that Jesus was the Messiah, but what he did not know was that Christ was the church: a corporate, living organism with members functioning in the life of Christ.
So Aquila and Priscilla sent him away to Corinth, saying, “You have to see what is going on.” At that time in Ephesus, there was no church; they were still meeting in the synagogue. But in Corinth there was that unique expression of Christ, from top to bottom—Christ all and in all.
Apollos went to Corinth and said, “Whoa. I see Jesus in that guy. Here is a brand-new Christian, and I see Jesus evangelizing through that person. This person has a healing ministry. This person is speaking about the Lord.” He was blown away.
Apollos got his own anointing, preached, and greatly helped the saints in Corinth. He preached Jesus the Messiah, and many more Jews and others were saved. Aquila and Priscilla could recommend the church of Corinth: “Check it out. There is something vital and alive going on there.”
Sure, they were babes. But like the believers in Acts 2:42, they did not know what else to do except continue steadfastly in the apostles’ teaching, fellowship, breaking of bread, and prayers. The grace of God was upon them.
If you had given them a formula or a pattern for what a church should be, it might have stunted their growth. But they were growing with a life that was from God. They could not wait to get together to see what else would happen.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14:26:
What is it then, brethren?
When ye come together, each one hath a psalm, hath a teaching, hath a revelation, hath a tongue, hath an interpretation.
Let all things be done unto edifying.
I call it the “hath-a” passage. When you assemble, each one has something: a psalm, a teaching, a revelation, a tongue, an interpretation. Can you imagine showing up at your assembly and saying, “Dear Lord, we know You are with us. Now lead us by Your Spirit”—and then, like popcorn, boom, boom, boom: teaching, revelation, prayer, healing, prophecy.
Everybody hath a. Do you have a hath-a? That is the King James: everyone hath a. I like hath-a. In our group, we say, “We are going to have an open time of fellowship,” and people start looking in their pockets: “Let us see, hath I got anything? No, I will just sit back and wait for somebody else.”
Everybody hath a. This is a church that is alive. This is a church that is a new creation. There is something bubbling in that church which comes from the life of Jesus Christ.
Not everybody spoke in every meeting, but Paul basically said, “We have a problem, saints: you are all so lively. Now it is time for some order.” We often have the opposite problem: “Brethren, you are all dead. Now we need some life.”
Usually, the people who want to share life share their own life, not the Lord’s life. That is a whole other situation.
The church in Corinth was like an oil rig that had hit oil. They were drilling down, and suddenly it came up out of the ground: “We struck it!” There was so much life pouring out of that Corinthian new creation, springing up everywhere.
But Paul was a wise master builder. He looked at that life springing up from the oil well, and he could see the oil, but he could also see the water, the stones, and the junk. He could see the flesh, carnality, natural wisdom, and all these things.
He knew that unless the cross of Christ could work upon this gusher, they would lose the vitality of the testimony of Christ that was presently so real in their midst.
Paul was jealous for every church in which he ministered, and so he had words of correction regarding these things. But before we go further, I want us to see the point I am trying to make.
Who we are is discovered in a phrase Paul uses that is almost completely out of our parlance today: the Christ.
Many times in the New Testament, you see the word Christ. Sometimes it has the article with it, and sometimes it does not. Sometimes there is a reason Paul puts the Christ there. When you read the context, you can see that in some places Paul means more than simply Jesus Christ, and more than merely the body of Christ.
He means Jesus Christ and the body of Christ as one living organism: the Christ.
In 1 Corinthians 1:6, literally, Paul says:
Even as the testimony of the Christ was confirmed among you.
Paul is saying that in the church at Corinth you not only see the body of Christ, as we often call the church, but you see Christ attached to the body of Christ. This is one organic unit called the church.
Further on, in 1 Corinthians 12:12, Paul gives the analogy of the members of the body functioning by various gifts:
For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body; so also is the Christ.
The first time my brother Stephen Kaung pointed this out to me, I said, “Wait a minute. What are you talking about?” Many people think Paul made a mistake and meant to say, “So also is the church.” But he did not say the church.
Perhaps if you asked the Corinthians, “What is this new creation?” they would not say, “The church,” as we conventionally think of it. They would say, “We are part of the Christ.”
The body of Christ is not merely a metaphor meaning that we are connected to Christ. The body of Christ means nothing unless Christ is literally attached to that body in a living relationship.
Paul understood the church as an organic union of Christ and His people. This came from the vision he saw on the road to Damascus. When he understood that, in persecuting Christians, he was not merely hurting the body of Christ—he was hurting Christ.
Jesus said, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?” You are touching the body; you are touching Me. You are not merely touching people; you are touching Me, because I am one with those people in an organic union.
Paul saw that. For the rest of his days, he did not try to build a church like a synagogue or an organization with a top-down structure of apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, and teacher. He tried to build Christ—living Christ.
He wanted Christ in Corinth, Christ in Ephesus, Christ in Derbe, Christ in Lystra—not merely a church.
When we think of church now, we often think of a building—the place where we leave our umbrella. No, no, no. Paul saw Christ, and he spent his life as an apostle building the living Christ by the work of the Spirit.
Who is adequate for such a thing? Building a living organism is beyond human ability. No CEO can devise such an organization. There is no organization on earth like the church, because it is an organism with heaven attached to earth.
In 1 Corinthians 12:13, Paul says that when you and I were saved, we were taken by the Holy Spirit and baptized into that one body. Now you are part of something. You are no longer merely yourself.
If you ask, “Who am I?” while thinking only in terms of yourself, you are already off. You are now part of the new creation. You have to start thinking on different ground.
This is such a simple revelation, but I was personally so dumb as a Christian. I was saved in 1964, and I did not know that the church was Christ until 1974—ten years later. For five of those years, I was a pastor.
Many pastors have no idea what we are talking about right now. A pastor is trained to be like the Lone Ranger. You come into a group, build it up, organize it, and if you are good, you get promoted and move on to the next organization.
You are the Lone Ranger. You shoot, leave a silver bullet, get up on your horse—“Hi-ho, Silver!”—and ride off to the next place. What, be attached to these people? “No, I am not attached to them. I am their leader. I tell them what to do.”
“I feed the sheep and beat the goats.” Well, there I was. That is what I thought for a long time.
For a while, I was involved in the charismatic movement, but I saw a great tragedy. Like the Corinthians, there were many gifts and many expressions, but in the end it was all self, self, self. It divided and split, divided and split.
There was no governance. There was no Head. You cannot have the body of Christ flailing around with gifts if there is no Head saying, “No. Yes. No. Stop. Flesh. Spirit.”
Without the Head, the body does not work right. That was the charismaniacs I was part of. It was a ride, but it was a tragedy when I saw the lives of people who had bought in and gone through so much.
How did I get to this place? I came to the most beautiful Christ I had ever seen.
Praise God for a gospel preacher who came to a Baptist church in 1964 and preached all week long. Nobody got saved except me. I knew it was a disastrous week for him, but on Thursday night I walked up because I had seen Jesus.
I saw Jesus in that man. I saw Jesus in my wife, and I saw Jesus in my in-laws. I saw enough of Jesus that I decided, “I want to get in on that creation there.” And I got saved.
The Lord made me a pursuer. I do not know why; I am just curious and interested. Much of Christianity struck me as funny, though it was also a learning experience.
When I was three months old as a Christian, I had my first opportunity to witness to someone and see her come to Christ. I went with a partner who had known the Lord for more than three months and actually knew how to pray with someone and lead them to the Lord.
I began sharing that I had grown up in a home where my mother was a Christian Scientist. The woman said, “Stop. Wait a minute. I was a Christian Scientist.” I thought, “Whoa. This was designed by God.”
Needless to say, that young woman got saved. I could tell her from experience what was wrong and what was right concerning Jesus. When I left, I realized: God directs your steps. Man, this is some kind of God.
They got excited, I got carried away, and long story short, I went to the cemetery—I became a pastor.
Now we jump nine years, to 1973. I was helping with a team of witnesses and evangelists at the Billy Graham Crusade in Seoul, Korea. On our way back, we stopped near Taipei, Taiwan, and held a revival at an American military base.
One day, someone asked whether I knew Watchman Nee. I said, “I do not know him personally, but I have read every book I can get my hands on.” He said, “I know a bookstore in the middle of Taipei with a whole lot of books by Watchman Nee.” I said, “Let us go.”
At the book room, I bought ten or twelve books. As we came out, some brothers came down from upstairs saying, “Praise the Lord. Hallelujah. It is wonderful.”
I asked, “What is going on here? Did you have a prayer meeting? Did you have a Bible study? What did you do up there?” One of them said, “We met Christ.”
I had never heard anyone say that. Usually, we had fellowship time in the fellowship hall of a Baptist church, which meant you ate cake and drank Kool-Aid downstairs. But I had never heard anyone say, “We met Christ.”
That piqued my interest. In 1974, I heard “Crazy Man Stephen Kaung,” and would you not know it? He was speaking on 1 Corinthians 12:12. He said, “The revelation Paul is trying to minister is that the church is the Christ.”
That was the first time I had heard it expressed like that. I started debating in my heart: “No, no, no. The church is the body of Christ.” But he answered the question of why it meant more than that, and the more I debated, the more he answered every question.
By the time it was over, I knew I was on the edge of something I did not quite understand.
Then, in 1975, I came to my first Richmond conference. I walked in that place, and I saw Christ.
I had been to many meetings—Spirit-filled meetings. I had sensed the presence of God, the blessing of God, people being saved, and all kinds of things. But to sense Christ Himself—that was different.
I sensed Him there. I did not know how to interpret it, because I lived in Raleigh, North Carolina, and I was pastoring another church—a bunch of people.
In God’s timing, I was invited to go with a witnessing team to Halford House in England, where Lance Lambert was. We held evangelistic meetings from Wednesday through Sunday, and people got saved. It was a wonderful time.
But Sunday morning, I stood up to testify at Halford House. Brother Lance and others were there, and I started to cry. I said, “I found home. This is home. This is home.”
I could not explain it. The way these simple people prayed was different. The way they worshiped was different because they were not making a show. They did not have professionals at the front leading with guitars. It was just Christ.
It seemed they caught onto a theme. Somebody read a Scripture, somebody prayed, and for five days I was exposed to Christ. In their prayer meeting, they all knelt down and prayed; afterwards they got up and had tea.
They were blue-collar people. It was not sophisticated at all. It was just Christ. The pianist played Christ. He did not show off, though he had been a famous concert pianist before he was saved. He played Christ.
I said, “I found home.” When I got back to North Carolina, I resigned from the church and tore up my ordination papers. But let me tell you something: I saw the most beautiful Christ I had ever seen.
I had seen Him as my Savior, my Baptizer, a powerful Savior, a Lover, and a Forgiver. I had seen Him as many things. But when I saw the corporate Christ as a living reality, it spoiled me for the rest of my life.
Honestly, I could never live or fellowship in anything other than Christ. I had a new hunger: to find Christ—the Christ, the corporate Christ.
As I go from place to place and minister in many assemblies, I am always looking: Is Christ here? I know that sounds mystical, and it is. It is very mystical.
But let me pose a few simple questions. Where you meet, is it a church, or is it the Christ? To me, that makes all the difference in the world.
Remember, Corinth was the Christ. We are not talking about perfection. It is possible to have an assembly where everything is squeaky orthodox and clean—everything neat, predictable, scheduled, and dead. That is not necessarily the Christ.
You can have a crazy megachurch, a charismaniac group doing all kinds of things and seeing all kinds of miracles. That does not mean it is the Christ.
You are precious believers. I know that is why you are here. Nobody in their right mind would be here after six ministries and still be willing to take this up on Sunday night—except that you love the Lord.
Do not look down on Corinth. I wish I could go from a Corinth to a Corinth and show them the more perfect way. Yes, they were fleshly and carnal, and all of that is true enough. But they had life. They had Jesus.
When you walked into their midst, you touched Christ. If people do not touch Christ when they come into your midst, what is the point? You may have an organization that has existed for forty years. Congratulations.
But if it is not the Christ, then we repent until it is the Christ. That is what the Lord is looking for: not an organization, not personal perfection, but a bride—the Christ.
Now we must address this matter because Paul, being a master builder, had to address this marvelous congregation. His words had to be strong.
After he complimented them on having life and gifts, waiting for Jesus, and having the testimony of the Christ confirmed in their midst, he had to say:
For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.
They knew Christ, but they needed to meet Christ dealing with Adam—Christ crucified in them—or they would spoil the testimony with human flesh.
Paul said, “You are babes. Yes, you think like babes. You act like babes. ‘Gimme, gimme. I want.’ Ambition. Using your mind.” He said, “I have a wisdom for you, but I cannot share it with you: wisdom for the mature. But you are babes because you are fighting: ‘I am of Paul. I am of Apollos. I am of Peter.’”
What is the matter with you? Paul had to bring correction. In the excitement of being in the new creation, had they forgotten that when God called them, He did not call many mighty, noble, or wise?
Do you know who you are without Christ? You are Adam. When you act independently, Adam leaks out all over the testimony. It despoils it, covers it, and hinders it.
They needed to learn that Christ crucified is their Master and Head. He says no to human wisdom. Stop using your human wisdom, because it causes you to prefer one person over another: “I like Paul. I like Peter. I like Apollos.”
Forget it. Christ says, “I love all those men, and I sent them to you. I want you to have a varied diet. I want diversity in there. Why are you narrowing down and getting smaller?”
Human plans will end up despoiling the Christ. The Corinthians did not realize that by human flesh they were hindering their highest calling.
What was their highest calling? First Corinthians 1:9:
God is faithful, through Whom ye were called into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Your main calling is to share Christ’s fellowship: fellowship between you and Jesus, and fellowship between you and your brothers and sisters.
The church is to share Christ, not share me. Share Christ. Have you received something from Christ? Great—share it. And when it edifies, especially, share it. But stop sharing yourself.
A young Christian does not realize this. Young Christians think everything they share is wonderful. Sometimes we need to stick them in a cell for a little while, especially when they are young and zealous and running around preaching to everybody. A lot of times they are doing more damage than good.
Sometimes it is the Lord, and sometimes it is them. The Lord uses it, but there is a time when the Lord says, “Enough. Out to the desert.” That is what He said to Paul: “I like your witnessing so much, Paul, I am sending you into the desert to witness to the sheep for three years.”
Paul needed correction. We need correction. The cross has to work in our lives, or we lose this testimony of the Christ.
What is our life in Christ about? The fellowship of the Christ. Do not merely preach a sermon; fellowship the Christ. Do not merely go to a prayer meeting; fellowship the Christ. He is praying and interceding—let us enter in.
There is a living side when Christ is the pulse, when the Christ is all and in all. This is what the Lord is looking for. It is so beautiful. But if our flesh gets in the way, it can ruin the testimony of the new creation.
Notice what Paul says as he begins his correction in 1 Corinthians 1:10:
Now I beseech you, brethren, through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you;
but that ye be perfected together in the same mind and in the same judgment.
That is how you know a church is under Christ: there is corporate thinking from the Head that keeps the saints in one accord.
You and I were loners. I was the Lone Ranger; you were Tonto. Now we are saved, but we are still individual parts. The Lord says, “I want you to start thinking corporately.” We ask, “What does that mean?” He says, “I want you to think My thoughts.”
One group wants blue carpet in the meeting place and another wants green carpet. The Lord says, “Come to Me about it. It is not that I like blue or green better, but let us be of one mind. Let us not pick Paul, Apollos, or Peter. Let us be of one mind.”
It is not easy. Those who are married understand. I was happily independent until I got married. Then I got the sneaking feeling that there was somebody always bothering me, and every decision I made affected her.
I could not just stay out all night with the boys, because I had to meet her at the door when I got home. Just about the time I got used to her, the kids came along. I thought I had a life to live, and then there were kids.
Thinking corporately, having the same mind—this is a discipline that takes time.
You want to know your destiny? I have bad news first, and then good news. I say, “Who am I, Lord?” I keep looking for Dana in the Bible. There is no Dana in the Bible. I am going to write a new translation and turn Daniel into Dana—something. I am just not in there.
So if I want to know who I am, I guess I cannot use the Bible. But wait a minute: in the Bible I suddenly look and see myself—not exactly myself, but myself with you, together in the new creation.
I see the bride, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, one new man, a testimony lampstand, one olive tree, the household of God, the New Jerusalem, glorious sons. There I am—but it is not singular.
My identity is not about me. It is about us.
Suppose you reached the spiritual condition where you could become absolutely perfect and take the next train to glory. Would you leave the rest of us behind? That is why our dear brother is 103 years old and still here. The Lord wants him to take out the whole lot.
We are in it together, brothers and sisters. You have a destiny, but you have a destiny with the people right next to you. It is not enough to say, “I am going to go my way. I do not care what they do.” Oh yes, you do. It will come back to haunt you if you think you do not care what they do.
You and I are bundled up together with the saints. How do we discover Christ? We discover Christ in one another.
There I was, pastor of the Poobah Baptist Church, always getting after my wife because she was not spiritual like me. My Bible was dented and marked up, while her Bible always looked brand new. I had many charges against her, despite the fact that we had three boys.
I was the spiritual giant. I was always looking at my wife and saying, “Well, Lord, it is my cross I have to bear.”
Then one night, my wife was on the phone—one of those old phones with a cord. The phone was in the kitchen, but she was out in the hall. I was sitting there, of course, reading some spiritual document—or maybe watching television; I am not sure.
I overheard my wife ministering simple, godly wisdom to a sister in the church. The Lord said to me, “Dana, I am leading her in a spiritual way. Do you see Christ in your wife?”
And I saw Christ in my wife. How are you going to see Christ? How are you going to know who you are if you cannot see Christ in one another?
Start with your wife. But the Lord has a great sense of humor when He sends you out two by two, or when there are three responsible brothers. The three that the Lord picks do not make any sense. It is oil, water, and gas.
The Lord says, “I want you brothers one together.” If you hang in there long enough and go through your cross, you will see Christ in your brothers. You should see Christ in those responsible brothers.
Paul says that Christ died for us, therefore we all died. Those who live no longer live for themselves, but for Him. Therefore, we no longer regard one another according to the flesh.
That means we see Christ in one another. Do you see Christ in your brothers and sisters? What about the brother who stands up to speak, gets lost, reshuffles his notes, and takes too long? We do not have many brothers who take too short, but I suppose it is possible.
Do you see Christ in them? Sometimes their portion is very different from your own natural appetite.
I used to tell young people, “If you do not get meat and potatoes, my ice cream is not going to do you much good.” I might give young people a little ice cream that they enjoy, but they need meat and potatoes.
We even have brothers and sisters who minister rice, but we need it. Do you see Christ in that bowl of rice? Maybe not the stir-fry last night—that is another subject. Leave that alone.
Paul says, “I would love to come to you and encourage you, but right now I have to tell you: there are so many things you are doing out of yourselves. Until you stop being babes, you are going to have problems.”
In 1 Corinthians 1-4, human wisdom is the problem. Somebody builds this way; somebody builds that way; somebody prefers this person. It is all human wisdom and human preference.
Paul says, “Here is one foundation, and that is Jesus Christ. You are one temple together in the Holy Spirit, and that is holy.” He applies the cross to human wisdom.
Human wisdom leaks into the Christ so frequently, and it hinders the testimony. Some good idea runs amok. That is why we need to check and be sure that it is all right with the Lord before we do things.
In 1 Corinthians 5-7, Paul deals with sexual sin and the shame brought upon the body of Christ by tolerating sin. There were all kinds of problems, and Paul had to remind them of the feast they had.
We have the feast of the Passover Lamb, but it includes unleavened bread. Purge out the leaven of the flesh so that our feast might be Christ, the Lamb of God, and no flesh.
In 1 Corinthians 8-9, people had gotten smart and found a new freedom. They said they could eat and drink anything they wanted because they belonged to Christ and did not believe in things offered to demons.
But their knowledge puffed them up rather than love edifying the saints, and they were splitting the church. Paul says, “Your goal is not freedom. Your goal is to be mastered by Christ.”
“I put my body under discipline. I do not want anything to make me subject to it except Christ—not food, not drink, not anything. I will be subject to nothing except Christ.”
Your goal is not to say, “I have a right to drink, and I do not care what you think because you are an old, stodgy, legalistic Christian.” Better not to drink around such a person. Your goal is not freedom to drink; your goal is to be mastered by Christ.
Then, in 1 Corinthians 10-14, there was disorder all over the place. Can you believe it? They were getting drunk at the Lord’s table. The Lord’s table itself was causing division.
Some were so unaware of their brothers and sisters—so undiscerning of the body of Christ—that they were drinking themselves into trouble when they took the Lord’s table.
There is order, holiness, and unity involved that they were not seeing. Paul says there is order: God is the Head of Christ, Christ is the Head of man, and man is the head of woman. If you want life, it has to be ordered, not disordered.
Spiritual gifts are beautiful gifts from the Holy Spirit, but if exercised disorderly, they become a cacophony of sound. They turn people off instead of edifying them.
God is a God of order. Do everything decently and in order. Do not jump around, show off, and become an exhibitionist. Paul wants all those things under the restraint of the love of Christ.
That is why he places 1 Corinthians 13 right in the middle. The love of Christ should control spiritual gifts and their exercise.
First Corinthians 15 was a doctrinal mess. People were baptizing on behalf of the dead. Some thought the resurrection had already come. Paul had to set them straight by speaking about Christ and the coming resurrection in one of the most beautiful passages we have.
All of that was necessary to correct the saints. Paul wanted to see the Christ.
Do you want to know who you are? May you see the Christ.
There is no assembly on earth that is perfect, because our Head is in heaven. Because of our flesh and sinfulness, we all fall short. But those who desire to hold fast to that Head, even in these last days, can still bear the testimony of the Christ.
Is that your heart’s desire? The Lord is looking to return, but He is looking for those lampstands—not perfect assemblies, but assemblies that have this desire for the Christ.
There are assemblies that began as oil springing forth in life. Then, by the working of the cross and the Holy Spirit, they found order and had a testimony.
But over the years, that testimony can become covered over by customs, tradition, self-confidence, and knowledge. A place where people once came and said, “I see the Christ,” can become a place where people say, “I do not know. It is just another religious group.”
Do you want to be just another religious group? Or do you have a higher and holier desire? Have you seen the Christ—that corporate Christ, Christ assembled in the midst?
We know one thing absolutely: you cannot have the most beautiful Christ unless Christ is practically and really the Head of the church.
That means in the prayer meeting, the Lord has the final say. In the brothers’ meeting, the Lord has the final say. When you gather together in worship, the Lord is the Spirit Who gives both liberty and restraint.
When we assemble, we need liberty in Christ to share, testify, and glorify our Lord. But we also need correction in our midst, which is a sure sign that Jesus is Head.
I am not talking about legalism, but we need discipline. There are those who speak far too much, those who always speak up, but it is not always of the Spirit. They need to learn the discipline of the Lord.
There are also those who never speak, despite the Spirit prompting and prompting and prompting them. We need to learn the discipline of the Lord in the body of Christ.
It needs to be a reality in our midst. If anybody can get away with anything in our assembly and then break bread with us, we do not have a testimony that can last very long.
There must be a real sense that the Lord is present. Paul says, “Knowing therefore the fear of the Lord, we persuade men.” Do you fear the Lord?
Do you see the most beautiful Christ in such a way that you always want to remain in that new creation? You do not want that old creation coming in. You want it to be a new creation.
There is always repentance, always adjustment, and always discipline necessary in the body to maintain that life.
Some people are mystical and say, “I used to go to that church, but Christ is not there anymore, so now I go over to this church. Christ seems to be failing here, so soon I will go to that place because I heard Christ is over there.”
We are not talking about some mystical aura over a congregation. Sometimes, where Christ is, He is sitting on everybody until we learn His discipline. Sometimes, in a church where Christ is Head, He is saying no to the plans we are trying to make.
The new creation does not necessarily look like wonderful geysers of oil coming out of the ground. But I will tell you what the new creation looks like: it looks like Christ.
It has the order of Christ, the love of Christ, the generosity of Christ, and the patience of Christ. In every letter of Paul, he begins by speaking about life, and then he speaks about how to govern that life through practical exhortation.
Oh, brothers and sisters, I hope you have a vision of the Christ. It spoils you for the things that used to be called church when those things are merely conventional understandings.
The Lord wants us to be the new creation. You will discover who you are in the new creation in a way you never could in any other environment.
There is discipline involved, and there is life—resurrection life. We have to deal with Christ crucified. He stands at the door of the assembly and says no to the things coming in extraneously, and yes to that which comes by His Spirit and life.
May we learn how to live in the new creation and never be satisfied with merely existing.
The new creation: I saw the most beautiful Christ, and I have always been pursuing ever since to see it reproduced among the saints as I go from place to place.
It is such a rejoicing to go to an assembly where you sense the Christ. You immediately relax and join the worship because He is there.
In a very wonderful way, I must say, for these thirty years the Lord has been here at Harvesters. Our dear brother Hosea Thornton Stearns and the brothers here in South Jersey had this idea years ago, spoke with Brother Stephen, and thirty years ago Harvesters started.
For many years, I have touched the Christ. It has been precious. When we broke bread together this morning, Julie and I were sitting in the back, leaning against the wall because our backs are giving us trouble. There were all these children running around, but I sensed the Christ.
People worshiped, led by the Spirit. There were songs, precious breaking of bread together. That is the new creation. That is the Christ.
I have spoken to the brothers in Manhattan, and now they want all of you to come and live with us. But I fear this is a wonderful time we have in these meetings, yet it is temporary.
Back home is where the Lord wants the new creation and the testimony of the Christ. You and I have such a hunger because in that we discover who we are.
Oh, Lord, we realize that our souls must ask this question: “Who am I? Who am I?” Yet we never find a good resolution to that question until we lose ourselves in Christ.
May all the saints here find a new revelation of the Lord Jesus, running in front of them and leading them on to pursue Him. May everyone here see the beauty of the Christ and touch this Lord in the midst of His body, in organic union.
Oh, Lord, although we are not perfect, we want to be perfected. We pray that the cross will do its work in our lives. We want to see the value of Christ maintained in our midst.
For these things, we thank You. Thank You, Lord, for showing us such grace and mercy. Thank You, Lord, in Jesus’ name.