Sermon Transcript
The following is a lightly edited transcript generated from the audio; it may contain small errors.
- 1 Corinthians 10–11 and the Agape Feast
- The Love of the Brethren
- The Love of the Father
- Ungodly, Sinners, and Enemies: Romans 5
1 Corinthians 10–11 and the Agape Feast
Okay, open your Bibles to 1 Corinthians 11. We’re going to talk about the Agape feast. The Agape feast. 1 Corinthians 11, we have pretty much a well-known text on what we call the Lord’s Supper. Some people call it communion. In the early church it was often called the agape feast. In 1 Corinthians 11, well let’s start in 10, 10:14. Paul says, “Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as to wise men; judge for yourselves what I say. The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread.” And then over in chapter 11 he continues his discussion of the church in Corinth and how they were operating if you will when they were together. And he says in verse 17 he says of chapter 11, “Now in giving these instructions I do not praise you, since you come together not for the better but for the worse.” So they were having church and instead of being edified and built up, they were being torn down. “For first of all, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, and in part I believe it. For there must also be factions among you, that those who are approved may be recognized among you. Therefore when you come together in one place, it is not to eat the Lord’s Supper.” Now, in fact, it was to eat the Lord’s Supper. But what he’s saying is by the way that they acted, it was as if they were coming together to not eat the Lord’s Supper. Because what they were doing was contrary to the point of the Lord’s Supper. “For in eating, each one takes his own supper ahead of others; and one is hungry and another is drunk. What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you in this? I do not praise you.” So we see here that the Lord’s Supper was part of a meal, a larger meal you could say, and many scholars believe that the meal which was called the agape meal or the agape feast, that often what we call communion or the Lord’s Supper was taken during, some believe before but most scholars believe either during the meal at some point or at the end of the meal they concluded the meal with what we call communion. They recognized the one bread, the one cup, they recognized the new covenant, they recognized the one body. So we today separate, and it’s just tradition really. We separate communion from a common meal generally. Now today we’re going to do both, right? We’re going to have the Lord’s Supper and then we’ll have a common meal. And it’s actually very appropriate. In the early church, it was generally literally in the meal that they would partake, they would stop, and they would recognize the one body symbolized by the bread and by the one cup. In Corinth, the problem was that people were selfish, people couldn’t wait. The idea here was that everyone brought food, we call it a potluck, right? I don’t think that’s in the Greek anywhere. So they had a dinner, but people would bring because there were some that didn’t hardly have anything. And so those who had more would bring more for those who had less. But unfortunately, some people were using the meal really as a way to gratify themselves and they weren’t concerned about other people. In acting this way, they were despising and shaming the body of Christ. So then Paul reminds them of what we call the institution of the Lord’s Supper in verse 23. “For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, ‘Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’ In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.’ For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death till He comes. Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body.” So here Paul is challenging the Corinthians to examine themselves in light of a very obvious abuse of the Agape feast. Now you’ll find other references to this feast in Jude, verse 12. I would say one chapter, so you just say 12, Jude 12. And in 2 Peter 2:13, it refers to there in that text, those false teachers who were spots and blemishes reveling in their love feasts while they feast with you. So this is a common practice. Now, why did they call it an agape feast? Well, does anybody know what agape means? It means love. And this is one of the Greek words that many Christians know. And in Greek, there are actually four words for love. Eros, which is where we get the word erotic, which is romantic or sexual love. Storge, which is family love, natural affection for parents and children. And philia, which is a love of friendship and even the love of strangers. And then agape was the highest, most really divine form of love. This is the word that is almost exclusively used of God’s love. Now I say almost because in a couple texts, philia is also used of God’s love, but it is primarily agape that is the love of God. So as we take the Lord’s Supper, as we call it, we’re celebrating agape love, amen? Amen. It is a, thank you. It is a celebration of both the love of the brethren and the love of God, it is both.
The Love of the Brethren
So let’s talk briefly about both of these. Let’s talk briefly about the love of the brethren first. In 1 John, if you want to turn there, the first epistle of John, it’s way toward the back of your Bible. John says this, he says in chapter 3, he says, “Behold.” Whenever you see the word behold, that means you’re supposed to pay attention. This is important what I’m going to say. “Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God.” And so here John is turning the focus of his attention on this quality of love. But not only God’s love for us, but our love for one another because the two are intertwined and they’re really inseparable. Verse 11, “For this is the message that you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another.” Amen. Thank you. Thank you. “Not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his works were evil and his brother’s righteous. Do not marvel, my brethren, if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love his brother abides in death. Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” And then he gives an example of a brother who was in need. And then he says in verse 18, “My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.” In other words, let’s not talk about love. Let’s live it. Let’s live it. Let’s do it in the way we act and the way we treat one another. And he goes on and talks about the love of God being perfected in the body. And then in the end of chapter 4 he says this in verse 19. My version reads this way. “We love Him because He first loved us.” Now some of your versions just say we love because He first loved us. “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.” So the love of God and the love for the brethren are intertwined. They’re virtually inseparable. If we hate our brother, if we don’t walk in a righteous way toward our brother, then it reflects not just a lack of love for our brother or sister, it reflects a lack of love for God. The two are inseparable. So the Lord’s Supper is a symbol of the love that the brethren have because the one… Well, in our case, we’re actually using a symbol, which is not a really good symbol. So this is a wafer, a cracker, bread, right? Now, sometimes when we have the Lord’s Supper, we use a loaf of bread, right? And the loaf is really the perfect symbol. Why? Because it’s one loaf. And then everyone takes a piece of the loaf because we’re individual members, but we’re one body. Now, in the early church, the tradition was that they would drink not from separate little cups, but they would pass a cup around. You’re like, ooh, cooties. I think it’s a great tradition as long as I can go first. I don’t want to be at the end of that, baby. That’s when you got to really believe in God. I mean, it’s like taking the Lord’s Supper at the end of the line is like, okay, God bless this cup, amen. So the symbols speak of oneness. That’s why Paul said in Corinthians, he talked about the cup of blessing, he talked about one loaf representing one body. So in the Lord’s Supper, we’re celebrating the unity, the oneness, and the love of the body of Christ. Amen. However, as we see in John, John’s epistle here and really elsewhere, the love of the brethren is inseparable from the love of God. Look, let’s all be honest. It’s hard to love people. At least one person’s honest. It’s hard to love people. It’s hard to love the people you love. Do you know what I mean? I mean it’s hard to love the people you like because people disappoint you, people sin against you, people, you have expectations, there’s miscommunication. All the many, many, many things go into this where, you know, well, if we have trouble loving the people we like or the people we love, we say we love, what about loving those that are really unlovely? What about loving those that are enemies, right? When Jesus taught His followers about love, He didn’t say the model was for us to love one another the way a parent loves a child or a friend loves a friend. Jesus said that we, and the reason was because, even the sinners and the tax collectors can do that. People can love the people they like, but how about loving the people you don’t like? How about loving the unlovely? How about loving the ungodly? How about loving the people that are unlovely toward you? Well, that’s the challenge. Amen. Amen. And the truth of the matter is, it’s not humanly possible. We cannot love the unlovely unless we first have experienced God’s love for us. Amen. The only way we can love those who are unlovely, the only way we can love our enemies, those who persecute us and criticize us and slander us, the only way we can be kind to those who are mean is that we must have experienced first the love of God for ourselves. And that love of God toward us is a love of God that dwells in us and empowers us to love other people. It is a supernatural love.
The Love of the Father
Let’s look for a moment at God’s love. Let’s look at the love of the Father, if you will. Look at John 3:16. You all know this, but I just want to read it. I think we need to read it often. In John 3:16, another well-known passage, it says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” As we contemplate this statement, that God so loved the world, two words jump out at me. One is the word so. And the other one is the word world. Now the word so here doesn’t mean like John saying, so, God loved the world. No, it’s for God so, the emphasis is on that. It’s not just God loved the world, but God so loved the world. The demonstration of the so is in what He gave and for whom He gave it. And what the Father gave was His own Son. His own Son. Now, if you’re a parent, you should be able to feel the force of this, because how many of us would literally give one of our children for a friend? Suppose your friend needed an organ, and your child had the organ, they had the blood type. Your child could save that person, but your child would die to save that person. Would you give your child? Everything within you screams no. No matter how much you love your friend, you love your child more. Because quite frankly, in the natural realm, the greatest love is not eros. The greatest love is storge. The love of a parent for a child is the greatest love. And this is the love that Jesus talks about when He talks about God. God the Father, loving His children, He uses analogies of human fatherhood because that is the strongest passion. The love of a father, the love of a mother, for their child is the most powerful human passion there is. That’s why Jesus said if we’re going to follow Him, we have to crucify that passion. That doesn’t sound very family friendly, does it? But the reality is, if we’re not careful, we make our children an idol. And our love for our children becomes an obstacle to obeying Jesus and following Him. As much as we love our children, that intense, natural, good love can become an obstacle if Jesus isn’t first. Jesus must be first in our lives. So the Father so loved the world that He gave that which, or should I say, He whom was most precious to Him, His own Son. We talk about the gospel, we talk about, well, God forgives sins. God will give you eternal life. God will give you this and God will give you that. And that’s true. But we need to be careful because we end up depersonalizing the gospel. What God really gave was His Son Jesus. He gave you Jesus. He gave Jesus to die for your sins and then He gave Jesus to rise from the dead and to give you eternal life through union with Jesus. By knowing Jesus, you experience all the blessings that God wants to give you. It’s not as if God gives you eternal life, God gives you forgiveness, you’re going to go to heaven, you’re going to get this. And by the way, you get a little bit of Jesus too. No. When you open the box this Christmas, it says Jesus on it. You open up, inside that box is everything that God wants to give you as a Christian. It’s in the Jesus box. So God gave us the most precious thing to Him, the most valuable thing to us. But the thing that blows my mind, this is what blows my mind. Might not blow your mind, but my mind is blown. It’s not only what or whom He gave, it’s for whom He gave it. He gave His Son for the world. Well, what does that mean? Go to Romans 5, and we’ll see what it means because Paul really unpacks this in Romans 5.
Ungodly, Sinners, and Enemies: Romans 5
I’ll start in verse 1, it says, “Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory” or boast “in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.” The love of God in our hearts through the Holy Spirit. Notice verse 6, “For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.” Three words are used here to describe those for whom Christ died, those whom God loved. The three words are ungodly, verse 6, sinners, verse 8, and enemies in verse 10. It doesn’t say Jesus came and gave Himself for the good, for the righteous, for the holy, for the benevolent, for the kind, for the loving, for the religious. He came for those who were just the opposite of all of those virtues. As I said, loving the lovely is one thing. Loving the unlovely is another. I go back to my analogy of would you sacrifice your child for your dear friend? Let me ask you this. Would you sacrifice your child for your most hostile enemy? Would you sacrifice your child for the one that hated you? That’s agape love. That’s agape love. Because that’s what God did. Paul says that He gave His Son, or that Christ died, for the ungodly. It describes those who live without God, those who don’t care about God, and it describes a whole slew of actions, if you will. For example, in Romans 1, here’s a great description of what Paul’s talking about. In Romans 1, he describes the world without Christ. He says in verse 29 of chapter 1, they’re filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful, and it’s for those that Jesus died. That’s agape love. It is for those. Those are the ungodly that God was willing to give His Son for. So then secondly, Paul says that they were sinners. Well, if they’re ungodly, of course they’re sinners. But we’re not understanding how Paul’s using the word sinner. He doesn’t mean sinner like ungodly, he means sinner as someone who’s condemned by God. Because the word sinner has a specific meaning. Not just those who sin, but those who because of sin now stand in a particular relationship with God. That is to say they stand under the judgment of God’s law. And Paul references this in Romans 3. He says, in 3:10, as it is written, “There is none righteous, no, not one; there is none who understands; there is none who seeks after God.” And he goes on, and then he says in verse 19, “Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.” To be a sinner is a technical word really, and it means to be guilty before God for having violated His holy law. Now if you are a true follower of Jesus, if you’ve been born with His Spirit, that means you have been justified. That means when God looks at you, you are no longer a sinner. It doesn’t mean you don’t sin because you’re not totally perfected yet. But what it means is you stand before God acquitted, forgiven. You are righteous. There’s no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. None. Doesn’t mean you don’t sin. It means your sins have been covered by the blood of Jesus. That’s what it means. If you’re outside of Christ, you stand over here and you’re guilty because the blood of Christ has not covered your sins. You have not accepted the payment of Christ. You have not called upon Him to be your Savior. So there’s only two classes of people in the world, the justified and the condemned, the acquitted and the guilty. Those are the two classes. So Paul is saying here that Christ died for all for those in this class, not for those in this class. In fact, the matter is there are none in this class unless they accept Him while in this class. You know what I’m saying? When Jesus was reproved by the Pharisees for having dinner with a harlot or a dinner with a tax collector, He said it’s not the whole who need a physician but the sick. I didn’t come to call the righteous to repentance, but sinners. The righteous don’t need to be called to repentance. They’re righteous, but sinners do. So Jesus came for those who were ungodly, for those who were sinners, and just to put the icing on the cake, He came for those who were enemies. Now that’s a strong word, isn’t it? Enemies. I think that this is a hard teaching to swallow. But the Bible tells us that those outside of Christ have a hostility toward God. Now, I’ll tell you, when I lived without God, without Christ, without hope, if you said, are you hostile toward God? I’d probably say no. I’m not even sure I believe in God. I’m just living my life. But God knows the human heart. And so what He tells us here in Romans 8, He says this, “To be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God.” In other words, the carnal mind is hostile toward God. When you think about the gospel, the gospel is such good news that God loves you, God will accept you into His family, forgive your sins, bless your life, take you to heaven, give you literally a new heart, a renewed soul, that God will do all this for you, and people go, man, that’s, okay? That’s hostility. Now they may not feel angry, but that’s hostility. The evidence of the hostility is that rejection of Christ, the rejection of the good news, the invitation of the gospel, if you will. So in our fallen state, we’re ungodly in our behavior, we’re sinners in our standing, and we’re enemies in our attitude. Those are the ones for whom God gave His Son. And that is agape love. That is agape love. Try loving your enemy. Really try and be honest with yourself and you’ll just see how amazing agape love is. It’s one thing to love the lovely, to love the righteous, to love your friend. But God showed His love for us while we were ungodly, while we were sinners, and while we were enemies. This is agape love and this is the love that we celebrate in the Lord’s Supper. This is what we’re celebrating because the symbols speak of the giving of the Son, the bread, His body, the wine, His blood, the bread is broken, the wine is poured out. These are symbols of His incarnation and of His death, and of God’s love in giving His Son, and even the Son’s love in giving Himself. And it’s because of that love of God for us, that agape love which can dwell in us, that we can love the brethren, and we are called to live as Christ lived, and John tells us that we know love because He laid down His life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. Amen. Let’s stand and pray. We’re going to serve you the elements today.
Heavenly Father, we thank You, Lord, for the revelation of Your love, through the giving of Your Son Jesus. Lord, words are not sufficient. We need You to really open the eyes of our heart, for You to open our minds to understand that we might know the height, the depth, the width, the profundity of Your love displayed in Your Son. I pray, Lord, that through the ministry of Your Spirit Your love would be poured out in our hearts, not a few drops, but poured out. And that we would then walk in love, toward one another. And finally, Father, I do ask for any here that may not know You, maybe they came in today not knowing the gospel. I pray, Lord, that You would enable them to understand that through Your Son, they can be made right with You. They can be forgiven and cleansed and renewed. They can receive eternal life. They can be assured of heaven. They can be born again. And I pray that today, even now in their hearts, they would call upon Your Son, Jesus. For as Your Word says, whoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. So I pray that they would, and we ask this all in Your name, Jesus, amen.