What’s Important
1 Cor. 3:1-9

† I.H.S.†

May the grace and peace of God our Father and the Lord Jesus help you see God at work, causing you to depend on the fact God loves you!

 Teaching Little Ones ( or Big Ones!)

There are a lot of amazing things in life. The Grand Canyon, the dawn on the Atlantic Ocean’s beaches and the sunset’s you see sitting on the sands of the Pacific Ocean. Things people do also amaze me, whether it is skilled athlete, or our musicians.

Or our preschool teachers, especially Lisa and Lorena – who work with the tiniest of toddlers. Keeping them focused on a lesson, and sitting still in chapel, well, mostly still

Keeping big kids focused is hard enough, I can’t imagine the faith that results in patience that God gives our teachers!

That’s why Paul will compare the Corinthians (and us) to infants in Christ!  For while they should be focused on what is important, they are not. And so in frustration Paul tells them that he has to treat them like toddlers, or people that have absolutely no clue about the love and mercy of God.

Sounds kind of harsh, doesn’t it?

But all we have to do is look around, and we see the leaders who act as if they are playing out back in the playground.  Then we see similar things among our church leaders. I will freely admit to getting distracted from what is important, and acting more than a toddler at times!  I want what’s mine!  Give it back! That’s not fair!

In the background, Jesus waits, for the Holy Spirit is at work… and will use God’s word, including these words penned by Paul, to correct us, to help us to focus, to get us back into what comes close to a line!

Distracted by what is not important

In the readings from 1 Corinthians, we see what was the distraction of the day. It was who the people followed.  It must have been a significant problem, for Paul spends some time on it.

For some reason, they tried to establish a spiritual pedigree.  I have seen that – even among pastors!  They somewhat jokingly compare whether they were trained at our Ft. Wayne Seminary, or St. Louis Serminary!  How ludicrous, especially when they know that the best pastors come from Irvine!

Can you imagine if people here argued about whether the Lord’s supper was better from the hand of Pr. Mazemke, or Pr. Rossow, or Pr. Hsu, or Pr. CHen or from me?  The bread and the wine are what is important, not whose hand put it into your hand.

If that is true for the communion we serve, it should be true for the message we give.  As long as that message is about Jesus, about His love for you, about His forgiveness, that message that we sum up in a couple of statements…

The Lord is with YOU! ( and also with you)

Alleluia! His is risen! (He is risen indeed!) and therefore (we are risen indeed!)

Everything else, including which pastor brought you to know Jesus, or where you learned about His love, isn’t as important as the fact that God loves YOU!

What is important

You see, the intellect, the charisma of the pastor, that is not what caused you to believe.  It was not by your reason or strength nor mine. It is, and always will be the presence of the Holy Spirit that causes the growth.

All of us and everything we do is used by the Holy Spirit, whether it is the music team, or Lisa teaching the kids, or Sandi keeping the books, or Dane, Bob, and Tom as they bring other people the Lord’s Supper. Even our coming to the altar is about one thing – letting God do the work of making a masterpiece of our lives,

Hear the verse again,

What’s important is that God makes the seed grow.

To truly being to understand that verse, we need to replace the word seed with the word, us,

What’s important is that God makes me grow!

or

What’s important is that God makes us grow!

God causes the growth in each one of us, and in us as a while.
We must realize this my friends, this is what is important, the work God does in your life!  In our lives together. Seeing that He is working in our midst, through each other, all to the same purpose of helping everyone know God is actively part of their life. That is perfecting them, transforming them as Paul writes in 2 Corinthians,

“¹⁷ For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. ¹⁸ So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image. ^[1]

That is the purpose – that God is making us more and more like Jesus… that’s the goal and that is how God will continue to work in us, and through us.

That is what encourages pastors to do what we do, and empowers us to be there… -when we see people grow in their ability to depend on God, to trust in Him, to believe in Him. For the miracle we see occurring is that transformation that only the Holy Spirit can be credited for…

and so we shall…  (lead into doxology…)

Amen!