1.21 blog

This past Sunday I preached from Philippians 2.5-11, where we read that Jesus the God-man, humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

As I studied and reflected, I realized that we aren’t horrified by the cross anymore. And in large part that’s because we aren’t horrified by death anymore. We remove it far from us and avoid it. Within minutes after death, corpses are removed to the freezer of hospitals. Rare is the funeral where we are confronted with an actual dead body. In fact, rare is the funeral anymore. We have “celebrations of life” nowadays.We use euphemisms like, “passed away,” or “went home,” and only expose ourselves to death through the safety of entertainment. We like to pretend that death is not a curse, or even better that it doesn’t exist. But it is a curse. It does exist.

It even claimed Jesus.

God, grant us a fresh horror at the specter of death. Let us not be sensitized to it. Help us to know what our salvation cost Jesus. We so take this for granted. We balk at the calls to obedience. We bristle at the “intolerance” or “judgmentalism” of Christianity. But Jesus Christ has died for us. The wonder of that should wash away any objections or reservations that we have about him, or the way he has ordained that things should be.

The crux of history is the cross of Jesus Christ. According to the Scriptures and the Christian faith, it is here, as a Jewish Carpenter was lynched by the civil and religious authorities of his day, that humanity reached its darkest hour, and God displayed his greatest mercy.

This Friday, April 2, we will gather at 903 North Cherry Street at 6.30pm to observe Good Friday together.

May all who join us experience the horror and the wonder of the cross.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

Yesterday while preaching, I mentioned that we are now beginning Holy Week, and that this is the most important week in the life of the Christian Church. It is in Holy Week that we observe/recognize/celebrate the central act of God in history: the death and resurrection of the Son of God. Because most of our regular attenders, covenant partners, and blog readers (three distinct groups) have not been reared in liturgical traditions, I wanted to take a few moments and get us acquainted with the ins and outs of Holy Week (at least in broad strokes).

Yesterday was Palm Sunday/Passion Sunday. On this day we celebrate the Triumphal Entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. Many churches will distribute palm fronds and enact this event, when Jesus was greeted as the long expected Messianic King. However, the day’s liturgy ends with an account of Jesus’ passion, showing how quickly the crowds, and we ourselves defect from and betray the one to whom we claim loyalty.

Thursday is Maundy Thursday or Holy Thursday. On this day we look back to the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper. Many churches will also reenact the washing of the disciples’ feet by Jesus. This is the beginning of the Paschal Triduum (Triduum means “three days”) of Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday. After the service of Maundy Thursday, church bells are silenced, the sanctuary is darkened, crosses are removed and/or veiled, and it is customary to begin a fast.

Friday is Good Friday. On this day Jesus was crucified. The Son of God, Creator of the Universe was abused and murdered by his rebellious creatures so that they could be saved. Churches gather on this day to recount the Passion of Christ, which is often read by the whole congregation. This is a somber day of fasting, reflection upon our sin and upon the immeasurable grace of God shown in the sacrifice of his Son on our behalf. The Eucharist is not celebrated on this day because it marks the death of Jesus, and a celebration of his Presence would be out of place.

Saturday is Holy Saturday. On this day Jesus’ body lay in the tomb. Rarely are there formal services during the day, and often the fast from Holy Thursday continues, but not always. After sundown, many churches celebrate the Great Vigil of Easter, a celebration of Christ’s resurrection. During this service lights are brought back into the sanctuary, the bells are rung, Alleluia is sung (for the first time since before Lent), new Christians are baptized, and the fast begun on Holy Thursday is concluded with a celebration of the Eucharist.

Sunday is Easter, the Day of Resurrection. On this day Jesus rose from the dead, triumphant, vindicated, and able to bestow life upon his people. Easter is the most joyful feast of the Christian Year, celebrating our Savior’s victory, new life in him, and a brave new world.

At 1.21 this year we will be holding services on Good Friday and Easter Sunday (more information to follow). Hopefully the foregoing information will help you to better prepare and make the most of this highpoint in the Christian year.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

Concluding our thoughts from the last two posts, which have argued that participation in the visible institutional church is an indispensable part of following and belonging to Jesus, we look at a couple of potential objections and tie up some loose ends.

But wait a minute, some might say, I can see that the church is quite important in the New Testament, but aren’t we all the church? Isn’t the church the people? Can’t I “be the church” on my own, or at home, or with my Christian friends? The problem with these statements is not that they are false, but rather that they’re incomplete. The church is the people, that’s true; and a recovery of that reality is important. But we must also recognize that the church is a place.[1] By place we don’t mean a geographic location, but rather a context, or institution. We as the people make up the church, but the church is greater than the sum of the parts.

To understand this, it might be helpful to look at 1 Timothy 3.15, where Paul explains that the church is “the household of God…the pillar and buttress of truth.” The church upholds, supports, and bears the truth of the gospel for the world. But its relationship with the gospel is asymmetrical. If the church were to disappear, the gospel would still be true because it is based on the work of Jesus, not on the church. Through the gospel, God calls out and creates the church. Apart from the gospel there is no church.[2] And yet once the church is created, it is the pillar and buttress of the gospel’s truth. In a similar way, we have an asymmetrical relationship with the church. We are the church. But if we were to all die, or apostatize (God forbid), the church would still be there. Hence, the church is more than just the people. That’s what we mean when we say that the church is a place.

In this sense, the church is the place where God meets us clothed in the gospel, through Word and Sacrament. It is the place where we are given and nourished in our faith.[3] We receive ourselves through the church, as God works to bless us where and when he’s promised to. Becoming a Christian means signing up for the church, which has existed throughout the ages in various cultures and locales. It means learning from and being formed by the community of faith that has gone before us.[4]

This is a far cry from the statements in our first post’s opening paragraph. And it’s a far cry from the outlook of North American neo-liberal democratic culture. It’s not all about me, or my choices, or my finding my own way. Instead, following Jesus means (among other things) submitting myself to his church. This means that rather than approaching Jesus or the Christian life as an independent individual, I am a part of a community that has a claim on me. Belonging to Jesus implicates me in an inescapable network of relationships that I must take into account, and just generally complicates my life. But it’s worth it.

Yes, this is a far cry from the cultural air we breathe. And the fact that it’s so countercultural probably indicates that it’s exactly what we need in our current cultural context. God has a way of doing that. He saves us in the most countercultural way imaginable, and calls upon us to believe a completely counterintuitive message (1 Corinthians 1.18-2.16). The gospel of Jesus’ life death and resurrection in our place already radically undercuts the individualism and independence of our culture. We cannot save ourselves; we are completely dependant on the work of another. It should come as no surprise that the community formed by that message should exhibit the same tendencies.

The church is a flawed, yet beautiful reality. And it is precious to Jesus. If we would love him, it would be precious to us as well. “Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen” (Ephesians 3.20-21)

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[1] This way of conceptualizing the church comes from Michael S. Horton, People and Place: A Covenant Ecclesiology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2008).

[2] The Protestant Reformers taught that the marks of a true church were the right preaching of the word of God, the right administration of the sacraments, and redemptive discipline. All of these features are bound up in the gospel. Preaching and sacraments deliver Christ and his gospel, while discipline guards and protects believers in the gospel.

[3] As the Heidelberg Catechism explains, the Holy Spirit creates faith in us by the preaching of the gospel, and strengthens it through the sacraments (Question 65).

[4] I alluded to this approach in note 11 of the first post. At this point, I think I’ve sufficiently demonstrated the point, and we can revisit my thoughts there. Given what the Bible says about the church, we find that we do indeed need to take what the church has always believed very seriously.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

Continuing our thoughts from Monday about whether or not the church is a helpful but optional supplement to a “personal relationship with Jesus”:

The first reference to the church in the New Testament[1] comes in Matthew 16.13-20. Jesus asks his disciples what the word on the street is concerning his identity. The disciples give the various answers floating around. Then Jesus asks them one of the most pertinent questions we can be asked, “And who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter answers, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God,” leading Jesus to proclaim, “I say to you that you are Peter [Petros], and upon this rock [petra] I shall build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.” Going on, Jesus promises to give the church the keys of the Kingdom of heaven for binding and loosing sins and eternal destinies.[2] So we see Jesus speaking of the church as an institution which he will found and build, and against which hell itself will be no match.

In, essentially, his last set of instructions before returning to heaven, Jesus instructs his disciples saying, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…” By connecting baptism to discipleship (in fact, one of the ways disciples are made), Jesus coordinates following him with belonging to the church. This is because the sacraments are the specific provenance of the church and that baptism in particular initiates us into the life of the church (1 Corinthians 12.13). Clearly, in Jesus’ estimation, the church is an important reality.

Moving on to the Book of Acts, we see the way the church understood itself in the earliest days after the resurrection of Christ. In several places, Luke uses the phrase ἐπὶ τὸ αὐτὸ (epi to auto: in the same place) to describe the church assembling together (Acts 1.15; 2.1; 2.44, 47; 4.26). The first Christians apparently believed that it was quite important for them to not only relate to Jesus, but also to other Christians, as many other Christians as was possible. The fact that the pattern throughout the narrative is that when people are converted they are baptized and added to the number of the church (Acts 2.41, 47; 4.4, 32; 6.2, 7; 8.12-16, 36-38; 9.18; 10.48; 16.15, 33; 19.5) shows that not only did they relate to other Christians, but that they specifically related to the church. Hence, in the church’s own self-understanding, far from being an optional supplement to a privatized relationship with Jesus, the church was a vital expression and indispensible aspect of what belonging to Jesus looked like.

In the Book of Ephesians, Paul gives us some of the highest ecclesiology to be found in the New Testament. He defines the church as the Body and fullness of Christ (1.15-23); the place where believers most fundamentally belong, transcending even ethnic and familial ties, indeed the dwelling place of God (2.11-22); the place where God is most glorified and his love most fully known, as well as a central aspect of his plan throughout the ages and a motivation for the creation of the world (3.7-21). He explains the importance of the church’s unity: “There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all” (4.4-6).[3] It is in and through the church that we are to reach Christian maturity “so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ” (4.12-15). In Paul’s estimation, there is no way to be faithful to God, and reach his purposes for us (and history) apart from the church.[4]

There are two primary images Paul uses to describe the church. She is the Body of Christ (e.g., Colossians 1.18), and his Bride (e.g., Ephesians 5.22-32). Both of these metaphors highlight the significance of the church. Jesus is the head of his body, the church. For those who want to bypass the church and simply deal with Jesus, this presents a problem. We do not worship a decapitated Savior, but a crucified one. You cannot have the head without the body. Furthermore, no good husband (and who would dare say Jesus is not?) is going to be especially fond of people who hate and mistreat his wife. If you can say to your friend, “Hey, I’d love it if you could come over and hang out, but you’re going to leave that hag behind, I can’t stand her,” and have him say, “Okay,” that friend is well on his way to divorce. You cannot have the bridegroom without his bride.

In our final post, we’ll tie up a few loose ends.

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[1] There’s an ongoing theological debate about when the church originated. Some, especially Covenant Theologians, would say that the church began with the protoevangelium in Genesis 3.15. Others, especially Dispensationalists, would say that it began with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2. As a private theologian I have my own opinions. But 1.21 Church does not have an official position on this issue, so I’ll leave that to the side. Everyone agrees that the New Testament is pertinent to our understanding of the church, so we’ll begin there.

[2] Our Roman Catholic friends see Jesus as giving these keys exclusively to Peter as the first Pope here. However, we believe it’s invalid to limit the ministry of the keys to Peter (or his successor) alone, since in Matthew 18.19, he describes the entire church as exercising this ministry. Incidentally, that passage also highlights the importance of the church in Jesus’ conception. In the case of unrepentant sinners (who profess Christ), the church has the authority (and duty) to declare that they are not believers in Christ and exclude them from the company of God’s people (using the keys to bind, and shut up the Kingdom of Heaven).

[3] This is the only explicit mention of baptism in Ephesians, but the fact that it’s included in this list shows that Paul regarded it as monumentally important. And once again, that shows the importance of the church (see above).

[4] Again, here is where the language of the Westminster Confession (Chapter 25) that outside the church “there is no ordinary possibility of salvation” is so important. God can and probably does work and save people outside of the visible institutional church. However, these passages of Scripture show us that the ordinary way he works is so intimately bound up with the church as to make it indispensible. We can rejoice at a merciful God who saves people where there is no visible church, or helps people grow who foolishly and obstinately refuse to be joined to a church. But that should not lead us to presume that we can do away with the church or that it is dispensable.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

This past Sunday, Pastor Stephen preached a great message on Christian Community. It reminded me a lot of something I’d written recently. So I’m breaking it up into several blog posts and making it available here. Enjoy.

“Don’t get me wrong; I love Jesus, I just can’t stand the church… Jesus, please save me from your followers…We don’t need ‘churchianity,’ what really matters is having a ‘personal relationship with Jesus’… Christianity is not a religion,[1] it’s a relationship.” These statements may come from diverse perspectives, but they all share a common theme: a distrust of and distaste for the church.[2] The church in America has fallen on hard times. In a lot of cases, it’s brought this upon itself.[3] I personally know a good number of people who have been “burned” by a church, leading them to be turned off to ecclesial[4] involvement, at least for a time. And even for those Christians who generally view the church in a positive light, it’s often viewed as a sort of optional supplement for the Christian life of a “personal relationship with Jesus.”[5]

This is quite a departure from the view of Christians throughout history, who could make statements as strong as, “Outside the church there is no salvation,” or “You cannot have God for your Father unless you have the church for your Mother.”[6] And just in case we might think that these are simply “Catholic”[7] notions, we find the exact same sentiments articulated by the Protestant Reformers, who if anything else, were not Roman Catholic.

For example, Martin Luther said, ““Therefore he who would find Christ must first find the Church. How should we know where Christ and his faith were, if we did not know where his believers are? And he who would know anything of Christ must not trust himself nor build a bridge to heaven by his own reason; but he must go to the Church, attend and ask her. Now the Church is not wood and stone, but the company of believing people; one must hold to them, and see how they believe, live and teach; they surely have Christ in their midst. For outside of the Christian church there is no truth, no Christ, no salvation.”[8]

Or you could listen to John Calvin, “I shall start, then, with the church, into whose bosom God is pleased to gather his sons, not only that they may be nourished by her help and ministry as long as they are infants and children, but also that they may be guided by her motherly care until they mature and at last reach the goal of the faith…so that for those to whom he is the Father, the church may also be the Mother…There is no other way to enter into life unless this mother conceive us in her womb, give us birth, nourish us at her breast, and lastly, unless she keep us under her care and guidance until, putting off mortal flesh, we become like the angels. Our weakness does not allow us to be dismissed from her school until we have been pupils all our lives. Furthermore, away from her bosom one cannot hope for any forgiveness of sins or any salvation.”[9]

Or in a more In a more moderated style (which hits the point Calvin and Luther were making, the Westminster Confession of Faith reads that outside the visible church “there is no ordinary possibility of salvation” (Chapter 25, emphasis added)[10]

Simply put, this is something that Christians have always believed, at least until recently. In our North American context of rugged individualism, where the political philosophy of liberalism (the idea that individuals and their liberty are the most important thing) is the air we breathe, such concepts are utterly foreign. So who is right? What role should the church play in the Christian life? To what extent is it necessary for us? In our next posts, we’ll turn to Scripture in order to determine some answers to these questions.[11]

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[1] A lot of times at 1.21, we use the term “religion” in a pejorative sense, meaning humanities attempts to curry God’s favor through obedience or ritual performance. In that sense, “religion” is always a bad thing. However, that’s not the way we’re using it here.

[2] In some cases, it’s explicit. In others, it is an implied premise.

[3] The increasing frequency of sex scandals among clergy (both Roman Catholic and “Evangelical”), and the prominence of money-grubbing televangelists spring immediately to mind.

[4] The Greek word ekklesia (assembly), is word for “church” in our English New Testaments. Ecclesiology is the study of the church. Ecclesial means having to do with the church. Introducing these words to you will help us to be a bit less repetitive in our writing, as now there are more words at our disposal for talking about the same thing.

[5] Of course, I’m not arguing against a personal relationship with Christ. There are features of the phrase that commend it: it shows the importance of a personal appropriation of the faith, it indicates that Christians aren’t called to principles and propositions, but to a person: Jesus. But it also has problems. For one thing, by virtue of being created in the image of God, all human beings have a personal relationship with Jesus, it’s just that most of them have the relationship of “enemy;” so the phrase doesn’t tell us too terribly much. Second, people tend to understand “personal” to mean “individualized,” undoing one of the positive aspects of it, and leading to problems unique to our cultural context (neo-liberalism). The phrase isn’t found in the Bible. And while that doesn’t mean it should never be used, it does seem better to describe the Christian life in the terms the Bible actually employs, rather than making up our own.

[6] Cyprian of Carthage, “Letter to Jubaianas Concerning the Baptism of Heretics,” in Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 5, Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, ed. (Buffalo: Christian Literature Publishing Co.,  1886). Revised and edited by Kevin Knight. Available online at <http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/050672.htm>. Accessed February 20, 2010; and idem. On the Unity of the Catholic Church vi (CSEL 3.i.214; tr LCC V. 127 f.), cited in John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, John T. McNeill ed. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1960), 4.1.1 n.2.

[7] Unfortunately, we tend to associate the word “catholic” with Roman Catholicism. However, the word by itself should have no such association. Instead, it refers to the church throughout the world and throughout time.

[8] Martin Luther, Sermon for the Early Christmas Service; Luke 2:15-20 (1521-1522). Luther’s Works, American Ed., Hans J. Hillerbrand, Helmut T. Lehmann ed., Philadelphia, Concordia Publishing House/Fortress Press, 1974, (Sermons II), vol. 52:39-40

[9] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, John T. McNeill ed. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1960), 4.1.1, 4.

[10] My thanks to Wikipedia for putting all of these references in one handy location.

[11] This is putting the cart before the horse a little, by assuming something that I intend to prove later on, but we should give a strong weight to the testimony of Christians throughout the ages. If the church has more or less always believed a certain thing to be true, we should always be very hesitant to depart from their company, and only do so with clear and strong biblical reasons.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

In our last post, I made the point that all Christians ought to be under church discipline in the sense of being formed by the church and its practices. Because the church is a God ordained authority, it’s dangerous for us to not be in submission to it. We’re going to talk a little bit more about that today.

Most of the time, we’re able to go about our lives under the general discipline of the church, being formed by it to think, speak, and live properly. But every now and again something goes wrong. This should never surprise us. We are sinners. Christianity is a religion for sinners, founded by a savior for sinners (1 Timothy 1.15). Therefore, we should not be surprised when (sure enough) we sin. And ordinarily when we sin, we are led by the Holy Spirit to repentance. When we repent, we are restored to an unhindered relationship with our heavenly Father.

But sometimes we need a little help. We may not see our sin. And in those cases Jesus instructs our brothers and sisters in the church to confront us about it (Matthew 18.15; Galatians 6.1-2). And usually, with that sin pointed out to us, we repent and are restored.

But sometimes that doesn’t “work” either. Maybe our sin has captivated us. When that happens, more people confront us (Matthew 18.16). And if we repent, we are restored. But if even having multiple brothers and sisters plead with us in love to repent of our sin doesn’t “work,” our sin is brought to the whole church (Matthew 18.17). And if even the whole church’s pleading leaves us unrepentant, then the church has no option but to declare that, in their judgment, we are not true believers. This is because Jesus’ sheep hear his voice and follow him (John 10.27), and if we aren’t doing so, we’re probably not his sheep. And because the church loves us too much to let us think we are Christians when we are not, they will excommunicate us when we get to this point and are still unrepentant.

But in all of this, the goal is never to punish, instead, we desire to see repentance and restoration. This is a pursuit of love: for Jesus and for those caught up in sin.

And one of the main reasons we should join a church is so they can do this for us.

I know that in our individualized culture this rankles us. How dare they interfere with me? Who are they to tell me I’m not a real Christian? They are the people authorized by Jesus to do so. I may have an opinion about whether or not someone’s a believer, but my opinion doesn’t matter. I don’t have the authority to make this declaration. The church, though, does. And while excommunication doesn’t mean that a person is absolutely not a saved (only God knows that), it is a real and serious declaration, that should be taken absolutely seriously.

But don’t you see the wonderful thing about it? By having a church that loves you enough to discipline you in this way, you can know that you aren’t going to be allowed to go utterly off course in your spiritual life and make a shipwreck of your faith. The church is there to look out for you, and protect you, and finally take away your dangerous delusions if need be. Praise God for church discipline!

If your church doesn’t practice corrective discipline, beg your pastors to consider adopting it, for your own good. And if you are a pastor, please study this important topic, and come up with a game plan to wisely and sensitively introduce this to your congregation. Jesus is worth it. His people are precious to him, don’t take risks with their spiritual health.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

If you’ve been journeying with us through the last several weeks, you know that 1.21 Church is currently exploring what it is that makes us a church rather than just another religious or civic organization. A consistent refrain in my preaching during this time has been that as a church in the Reformed tradition we answer this by saying that the marks of a true church are: the word of God rightly preached, the sacraments rightly administered, and discipline carried out. In our preaching we’ve been able to cover preaching and the sacraments, but not discipline. So for the next couple of posts we’re going to take a quick look at church discipline, the third mark of the church.

The first thing we ought to address is the fact that when we hear “church discipline” (or discipline in general) our primary thought is of punishment. Someone has messed up, and now we’re going to do something to them in order to show them that this was a bad thing to do. That’s not discipline. That’s retribution. And churches aren’t called to retribution. (God will take care of that when and if it’s appropriate) Now, sometimes discipline does involve correction after sin has occurred , but even that isn’t punishment (we’ll talk about that in the next post). Before we talk about that, though, we need to talk about discipline in general.

As Christians we are all called upon to be disciples of Jesus. And you’ll note discipline and disciple share a common etymology. That’s because the one is necessary for the other. Being a disciple isn’t something that comes to us naturally, in order for us to be disciples, we need to experience discipline. And that’s the primary reference when we talk about church discipline (or at least it should be). Through the church’s practices of prayer, preaching, and sacraments, we are formed into the kind of people we should be, but would not be on our own.

Through this sort of discipline we are trained, we learn what to do, what not to do, how to speak, how to think. As Stanley Hauerwas observes, we don’t have minds worth making up until they’ve been formed by the Bible, and the practices of the church. And so in that sense, everyone who belongs to a church is under that church’s discipline. We place ourselves under its authority, and basically say, “Okay, I’m asking you to look out for me and tell me what my life should look like.” I know that in our Liberal North American context we hate and distrust authority. But God says that we need it in our lives, and that one of the forms in which it should come to us is the church.

We need to be under the church’s authority, under its discipline because we need to be under Jesus’ authority. Apart from God ordained authority, we’re in a dangerous place spiritually (but we’ll talk more about that next time).

Are you under church discipline?

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

A week ago today, the Christian Church entered into the Season of Lent. We, at 1.21 Church are using this season specifically to cultivate a greater sense of dependence upon and satisfaction in God, and a greater sense of the utter worthiness of his Son, Jesus Christ. Having been raised Roman Catholic, I’m generally familiar with the liturgical rhythms of the Christian year. However, most folks at our church do not share this background. With that in mind, I wanted to share this brief video that I came across to help explain the Season’s history, its practices, and its purposes.

The man speaking is Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury (currently one of the hardest jobs in the world). I don’t always agree with him, but I greatly respect him, and there is much that the Church can gain from listening closely to him.

…Continuing our thoughts from yesterday on why mediocre preaching can be a good thing (from 1 Corinthians 2.1-5). We’ve seen that Paul refused to use his rhetorical know-how to woo the Corinthians over, but instead sought to know nothing among them except for Christ and him crucified, because often “good” preaching can detract from Jesus.

Paul has explained how he wasn’t among the Corinthians, now he explains how he was among them. With weakness, fear, and much trembling. This is not the guy your church would want to hire to do its preaching. This is not the picture of a guy we’d want to follow. But he’s not getting us to follow him, he wants us to follow Christ. He explains once more, he wasn’t using persuasive words of wisdom. Instead, his preaching was in demonstration of the Spirit and of power. With the advent of the Pentecostal and Charismatic movements, we tend to hear “Spirit” and “power” and think of the extraordinary: miracles, healings, tongues, etc. But those phenomena don’t really fit with what Paul has been saying about the way he preached. Here’s what I think he’s getting at, as he preached (poorly it might seem), and people were converted, that this demonstrated the Spirit’s power. The fact that people came to believe this stupid sounding message, preached by this unpersuasive, ugly, trembling man demonstrated that the power belonged to God.

Through preaching, God speaks, judges, converts, and saves. It’s because of this that Paul is able to preach without feeling the need to pull out his rhetorical guns. It’s because of this that mediocre preachers like Pastor Stephen and myself can get up in front of people and preach in all our mediocrity, because ultimately the things preaching aims at can’t be done by us anyway, even if we were good preachers. No matter how good we are at it, God’s the one who has to accomplish anything worthwhile. That’s because preaching is more than instruction. Preaching is an address from God through the preacher. Preaching gives life. Preaching delivers Christ. This requires a strong doctrine of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit can and does work in a variety of ways. But he has specifically tied himself to the preaching of the gospel. He may work by other means. He will work by this means.

In verse 5, Paul explains a final reason for his weak preaching of Christ crucified: so that the Corinthians’ faith would not rest on human wisdom, but on the power of God. At the end of the day this is what we want. We don’t want to win people over, and have their faith be based on us. We want them to be entrusting themselves to God. We want to preach in a way that’s compatible with the message we’re to proclaim. There are some people who are good at preaching. There’s nothing wrong with that as such. God calls us with various skills, talents, etc. However, each set of preachers has their own struggle and temptation. Good preachers have to struggle against relying on themselves, or preaching in such a way as to draw attention to themselves. If after a sermon we’re thinking, “Oh that [insert name of your favorite preacher], he’s sure witty,” Or, “It was hilarious when he said this,” then there might be a problem. We mediocre preachers have to be careful not to rely on ourselves too, but we also have to fight against the desire to be good preachers. It’s not wrong to want to improve. It’s not wrong to want to offer Jesus your best. But it is wrong to assume that if we were better speakers God would be better able to use our preaching or be more glorified by it. God uses crappy preaching all the time, and he’s not limited to our skills. And when God saves people or sanctifies them through crappy preaching, he gets all the credit. So he wouldn’t get more glory if we were better: we would. Instead, God uses the particular skills of particular preachers to accomplish his particular purposes in the lives of his people. So rejoice in mediocre preaching as long as it’s preaching of the cross.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger

Yesterday Pastor Stephen preached a sermon on preaching from 1 Corinthians 2.1-5. In it we saw what is preached (Christ crucified), who should preach (Pastors especially, but also all Christians), and why we preach (because Jesus is utterly worthy to be proclaimed). One thing that the Apostle Paul highlighted in this passage of Scripture is the way that preaching can sometimes undermine preaching.

Here’s what I mean. We’re often told that style is neutral. That’s not quite right. The way a message is delivered does affect the message. So we want to be careful that the methods we use don’t obscure or change the message we bring. During this time period, there were traveling speech makers, who, for a fee would train you to use rhetoric to win arguments. They’d role into town, make some really persuasive, eloquent speech, collect tuition, and then equip their students to be just as persuasive themselves. They were the heirs of the sophists, a philosophical school in ancient Greece. The sophists were experts in rhetoric and persuasion. They would demonstrate their prowess by successfully arguing both sides of a debate. They’d do clever stuff like use logic to prove that we don’t move. They didn’t care for truth, only persuasion.  So when Paul comes into town, people would have expected a similar show from him. They expect him to argue persuasively and manipulatively about Jesus. But he doesn’t deliver. He’s not counting on his rhetorical skill to win people over. Paul was trained in Rabbinic argumentation, classical drama, and rhetoric. It’s not that he couldn’t have come in and used his verbal skills. It’s that he chose not to for specific purposes.

And Paul’s purpose was to know nothing except for Christ and him crucified. This determination is the reason behind his refusal to come with lofty, wise words. It would contradict his message for him to preach in those ways. If he comes preaching: our salvation rests entirely on Christ, and it’s solely at God’s initiative, and we’re utterly dependent upon him, and Christ is all our wisdom, righteousness, etc., and yet does so in a way that highlights himself and his skill, he undermines the message. Pastors who say, “Jesus is our only hope and salvation,” but then preach sermons where they’re the hero of every illustration undermine their message. Pastors who preach the salvation of sinners by grace alone, and then complain about how the “queers” and Democrats (or fundamentalists and Republicans) and other bad folk are ruining our country undermine the message. If God is truly the author and finisher of salvation. If we really are foolish, weak, and dependent on him, then it makes no sense for us to preach in such a way as to highlight ourselves.

So…at this point I’ve said about half of what I want to. So rather than writing an overlong blog post, I’ll stop here for now. Tomorrow I’ll finish things up.

Posted by: Gene Schlesinger