“Blameless when the Lord Comes”
I Corinthians 1:3-9
12/3/08 Sermon
It is the season for the giving and receiving of
gifts. Here in the epistle text for this evening the Apostle Paul
gives thanks to God for the gifts He’s given to the Corinthian
congregation. They aren’t the kind of gifts you can get at
Macy’s or Target, however. The gifts God gives are the
gifts of forgiveness, life, and salvation, Himself, His grace, mercy,
and peace, His Son, His Word, Baptism, and His Supper. With these
gifts the Corinthian congregation had been enriched, showered with
treasures from God, treasures that would never grow old, gather dust,
get stolen, or decay. And yet, these people certainly
didn’t deserve such gifts. The Christians in Corinth were
some of the most dysfunctional Christians the Apostle Paul had ever
worked with. He had been working among them for a year and a
half, teaching and preaching the Word of God, before he departed for
the city of Ephesus. You’d think that after he’d
spent so much time with them the congregation would be fairly
stable. But they had problems with sexual immorality in their
midst, they were arrogant, they misunderstood and misused God’s
gifts (especially the Lord’s Supper). There were factions
and disagreements in doctrine. There were abuses in
worship. And they were in danger of being led astray by false
teachers. A congregation like this today would hardly be the
first choice among most pastors waiting to take a call. We might
not even want to consider such a congregation Christian. And yet,
Paul addresses them as the Church of God. He delivers God’s
grace and peace to them, and he thanks God for them and how He’s
enriched them with the gifts He’s given them in Christ.
We must confess that we here in Pacifica have our
own problems. We are not the perfect congregation either.
No congregation is. If we were perfect, we wouldn’t need
God’s gifts. But God gives His gifts to sinners.
Looking simply at the outward appearance of the Corinthian
congregation, we might determine that instead of Christians, they were
a bunch of hypocrites. Maybe we’re seen that way,
too. But as with the Corinthian congregation, so with us -
God’s gifts are among us. His Word is being preached, and
His Sacraments are being administered according to the Gospel.
And where these things are going on, there the Holy Spirit is bringing
people to faith in Christ, strengthening them in that faith, and
working to conform them more and more into the image of Christ. I
can thank God, as Paul did, that He has enriched you in Christ, so that
you are not lacking in any gift as you eagerly await the coming of
Christ.
The evidence that the Corinthian congregation had
been so enriched by God’s gifts was that their speech and
knowledge were affected by those gifts. By their confession they
confirmed that they had received the message of the Gospel about Jesus
Christ and taken it to heart. Paul would later write that no one
can confess “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy
Spirit. Upon being given the Gospel by Paul, this is exactly what
these Christians confessed. They knew the Gospel, and they
confessed that Gospel, evidence that God was at work among them.
His Word, Baptism, and His Holy Supper were having their way with these
people. They still had a lot of problems. But the Holy
Spirit would work those things out, as long as they kept the Word among
them in its truth and purity.
It’s comforting to know that with all our
faults, God still considers us His people, people whom He has purchased
with the blood of His Son, people He has cleansed and purified in the
waters of Baptism, people who are sinners, unworthy of His mercy, and
yet recipients of it by His grace. And just as God would
faithfully keep these Corinthian Christians in their baptismal grace,
blameless until the day of Christ Jesus, so He will keep us blameless
as well. Though the Corinthian Christians were far from perfect,
God did not count their imperfections and their sins against them for
Christ’s sake. Neither does He count your sins against you
who are also in Christ. To look at us, one could rightly
determine that we are not blameless. We have our faults just as
those Corinthian Christians did. But when God looks at us, He
sees Christ and His righteousness. Therefore, He can find no
fault with us, because He can find no fault with His Son. There
is no condemnation for you who are in Christ. He is your
righteousness, holiness, and redemption. Whether you feel like it
or not, you are considered blameless by God.
If you want more assurance, consider that God has
placed you into fellowship with His Son. This word for fellowship
is the same word used of communion. To have fellowship with
Christ, is to receive His body and blood, given and shed for you for
the forgiveness of your sins. Jesus places Himself into your
bodies. He makes your bodies His abode. He incorporates
Himself into you and incorporates you into Him. Not only this but
He incorporates you into one another, so that you are one body, though
individual members of it. This kind of fellowship with Christ is
so intimate that no union between man and wife can compare with
it. No family ties come close to it. Not even the closeness
that a child has with his mother while in the womb can even compare
with it. Jesus is closer to you than you can even imagine.
This fellowship that we have with Jesus as He gives us His body and
blood assures us that God considers us blameless.
Want more assurance that God considers you
blameless? Consider the fact that you also have fellowship with
Him through your Baptism. The whole triune God - Father, Son, and
Spirit - gave Himself to you at your Baptism. Where God’s
Name is, there He is. You can’t get any closer to God than
He has gotten to you. With Him comes all His gifts and
blessings. You don’t lack anything in Christ. Just as
Paul could say of the Corinthians, that they were not lacking in any
gift of grace, so you are not either. If the entire God has given
Himself to you completely, what don’t you have? You may not
have the same temporal gifts as others do, but those gifts concern only
this life. You share with the rest of God’s people in the
same eternal gifts - the gift of salvation and eternal life,
God’s divine favor and forgiveness, the inheritance of the new
heavens and the new earth. The gifts and blessings that are yours
in Christ are infinite, and we’ve only just begun discovering
them in this life. The fact that God has placed His Name on us in
Baptism and claimed us as His own assures us of all these gifts and the
future life to come.
The Corinthian Christians looked forward in eager
anticipation to their inheritance to come. I think for the most
part we have somewhat lost that anticipation. We’ve lost
it, because we take all these gifts God has given us for granted.
His Word and promises to us begin to sound hollow. This is all
the more evident by the fact that, if we read the Scriptures at all,
when we do read them, we immediately forget what we’ve
read. I know I can hardly remember what I’ve read ten
minutes after I’ve read it. Neither do we remember what
we’ve heard when we hear God’s Word preached. Our
celebration of the Lord’s Supper also often becomes
commonplace. No wonder we aren’t eagerly awaiting the
coming of our Lord. We’re too wrapped up in the cares and
concerns of this life. And just as the Corinthian congregation
needed to repent of their sins, so we need to repent of this, that we
so easily forget God’s mercies and gifts.
But the comfort is that He doesn’t forget
us. Even with all our faults we are still the baptized in
Christ. He still calls us saints. He still grants us His
grace and peace in Jesus. He still enriches us through His Word
and Sacraments, using these gifts to bring us to repentance and to
strengthen us in the faith, causing us to remain steadfast in His Word,
faithfully keeping us blameless until Christ comes again for us.
God is faithful, and He will keep His Word. Grace and peace to
you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.