The Freedom to Give Up Our Freedom (1 Corinthians 9.1-23)

If you remember last week, Paul told the Corinthians to renounce certain rights for the sake of their brothers and sisters. The context was that of eating meat sacrificed to idols, which was a common practice in Corinth at this time. People would get together for a birthday or a wedding, they’d eat in a pagan temple. As Christians, is eating this sort of meat allowed? Sure—because (as we saw in 8.6), there is “one God, the Father…and one Lord, Jesus Christ”. 

But a younger Christian, who may not know as much about the gospel, may look at that and think that eating this meat is tantamount to participating in idol worship. And seeing an older Christian doing it may encourage him to engage in behavior against which his conscience is warning him. Paul will go further on this later, in chapter 10, but that’s the gist of the situation we saw last week.

So he said that even if we “have the right” to eat this meat, we should be willing to give up that right to protect the holiness and conscience of our brothers and sisters, out of love for them.

This is a massively important principle, and Paul knows it’s going to be a hard sell, because naturally people don’t want to give up a legitimate right, for any reason. And he knows the Corinthians may feel like they could argue with Paul on this point, because there isn’t a lot of precedent for his application of the principle in this particular situation.  

It’s the exact same situation as the one we see often in church today: a couple are dating, and they want to live together. So they ask, “Does the Bible explicitly say ‘Do not live with your girlfriend?’” And because the Bible does not explicitly say that, they think it’s okay. Obviously the Bible says plenty of other things that should make living with your significant other before marriage a no-go, but it’s surprising what people how hard people will fight to keep hold of a right when they want to.

So in today’s passage, Paul’s going to pick a much clearer, and much more painful example than eating meat offered to idols. He’s going to pick an example that hits everyone where they’ll feel it—the example of money. And instead of telling the Corinthians what they should do with their money, he’s going to tell them what he’s done with his.

His whole point in this chapter is to shift the focus. The Corinthians were asking: What am I allowed to do? But the better question is: What serves the gospel?

1. The Rights We Actually Have (v. 1-14)

Paul’s’s going to do this by shining the light on himself and on Barnabas (his collaborator), and he’ll use several specific arguments to do it. 

Argument 1: Apostolic authority (v. 1-3)

His first argument is simple: “I, Paul, am a legitimate apostle, and have the authority to demand financial support for my ministry.”

Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are not you my workmanship in the Lord? 2 If to others I am not an apostle, at least I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord. 3 This is my defense to those who would examine me.

So he’s just establishing his credentials here. The Corinthians know Paul is a legitimate apostle because he was sent by Jesus, and because they have seen his ministry in action among themselves—he says, “You are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.”

Argument 2: Apostles have normal human rights (v. 4-6).

4 Do we not have the right to eat and drink? 5 Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas? 6 Or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working for a living?

The Corinthians know that the other apostles have basic human rights too that everyone should enjoy—the right to eat and drink, the right to be married, the right to be paid for ministry without seeking a second job. Paul is not anti-rights; he is affirming them.

Argument 3: This is how the world works (v. 7).

7 Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard without eating any of its fruit? Or who tends a flock without getting some of the milk?

Even in the ordinary world outside the church, this is how it works—if you do a job, you should receive a material benefit from the job you do.

So far, all of Paul’s arguments have been logical—and as we know, you can argue logic with someone as much as you want, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll agree with you. But his next argument is where he really hits hard.

Argument 4: Scripture affirms the right to be supported (v. 8-13).

Christians cannot easily argue with something the Scripture clearly teaches. So now Paul’s going to give clear support  from the Bible in favor of his right to be paid for his ministry. V. 8: 

8 Do I say these things on human authority? Does not the Law say the same? 9 For it is written in the Law of Moses, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.” Is it for oxen that God is concerned? 10 Does he not certainly speak for our sake? It was written for our sake, because the plowman should plow in hope and the thresher thresh in hope of sharing in the crop. 11 If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it too much if we reap material things from you? 12 If others share this rightful claim on you, do not we even more? Nevertheless, we have not made use of this right, but we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ.

Simply put, God provided such rights to animals in the Law of Moses. Don’t muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, because if you put a muzzle on him, he won’t be able to eat some of the grain as he works. You may lose a bit of grain in the process, but you’ll be taking care of your animal.

Paul says that God’s point in giving this law wasn’t merely to take care of the animals, but to show that this is the way normal practice should be shaped within the people of God. God says in his Word: “If someone works, they should receive something for their work.” That’s the idea. If Paul has served the church, he has the right to expect compensation for his service, and it has always been this way.

And then he goes even further in v. 13: 

13 Do you not know that those who are employed in the temple service get their food from the temple, and those who serve at the altar share in the sacrificial offerings? 14 In the same way, the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel.

Since the beginning of the religious life of God’s people, those who served in the temple lived by the temple. They received part of the food that was given as sacrifices as a way to provide for their material needs. The precedent was set at the very start of the Old Covenant.

So at this point it should be indisputable for the Corinthians. They may want to disagree with what Paul said about Christians not eating meat sacrificed to idols even if they have the technical right to do so. But no one could legitimately says that Paul doesn’t have the right to expect payment for performing his ministry.

And, as a side note, I think this is still the case today. This should be the norm. A pastor may have to go without a salary for a short time, but it shouldn’t be for an extended period, because churches need pastors, and pastors need to live. In everything Paul says after this, he’s not arguing against this good practice. 

But this is where we reach the turning point of the passage. Paul is unequivocally, inarguably free to receive compensation for his ministry. This right is way more clearly established in Scripture than the right to eat meat sacrificed to pagan idols. Even so, Paul is in a unique situation in his ministry, that pushes him in another direction. Even though Paul has this freedom, and even though this freedom is indisputable, he is giving up that freedom for the sake of the gospel.

Or rather, he’s exercising a different kind of freedom. He’s free to be paid, yes. But he’s also free to give up that payment, if it serves the gospel.

2. The Freedom to Give Up Our Rights (v. 15-18)

V. 15: 

15 But I have made no use of any of these rights, nor am I writing these things to secure any such provision. For I would rather die than have anyone deprive me of my ground for boasting.

Paul refuses to make use of his rights to be paid—not because it’s wrong, but because there is something far better at stake. 

His reasoning may be confusing to us here, because it may be hard to see how his not being paid for his ministry could serve the gospel. The situation in Corinth at the time goes a long way to explaining this. At this place and time (as we saw in the earlier chapters of this letter), itinerant speakers were regularly paid to come teach “wisdom”. They’d come, put on a good show, and give a good speech, and then be off—almost like a form of entertainment, like a stand-up comic might do today. 

Paul wants to be abundantly clear that that’s not what he’s doing. He’s not a performer, and he’s not teaching wisdom. What he’s doing is entirely different.

V. 16: 

16 For if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! 17 For if I do this of my own will, I have a reward, but if not of my own will, I am still entrusted with a stewardship. 18 What then is my reward? That in my preaching I may present the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the gospel.

In other words, this isn’t a career for Paul. He’s not serving for compensation; he’s compelled to do it by Christ himself. Whether he’s paid or not, he has to do this, and he wants everyone in Corinth to know that this is why he’s serving. He does receive a reward for his service, but it’s not the sort of reward most people would look for. His reward is presenting the gospel free of charge, free of obstacles.

So you see how he’s refocused the question. It’s not “What am I allowed to do?” It’s not “What are my rights?” The question Paul has been asking is, “What am I willing to give up for the sake of the gospel?” And his answer is, Whatever I have to!

It’s a good thing for every Christian to ask themselves the same question—What am I willing to give up for the sake of the gospel? Because the answer to that question will show the true extent of our maturity and our freedom. Silvain said something excellent last week, speaking about this freedom. He said that this freedom “me rend capable de pouvoir renoncer à quelque chose par amour pour Dieu et par amour du prochain, et si je trouve cela trop difficile, voire impossible, c’est peut-être que je ne suis finalement pas si libre que ça.” 

That’s Paul’s point. If I’m willing to give something up for the gospel, then I’m proving that that thing—whatever it is—is not my master. Christ is my Master.

And now Paul will apply this principle more broadly, to show that he doesn’t just live this way in terms of his finances, but over the spectrum of his entire life.

3. The Freedom to Live for the Gospel (vv. 19–23)

V. 19: 

19 For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.

This isn’t a contradiction. Paul is absolutely free—and he uses his freedom in just the right way. What “controls” him, what “masters” him, is not anything material or personal; it’s not an opinion or a feeling. It is the call of the gospel. So Paul’s willing to give up everything, if necessary, in order for more people to hear the gospel.

Here’s what this looks like in practice. He gives three different categories of people to show how he uses his Christian freedom to live in such a way that the gospel might be heard. 

And before we get going, it’s really important that we understand this distinction. Paul’s not going to explain how to live in such a way that the gospel is simply proclaimed. When I was in high school a girl in my church got it in her head that it would be a good idea for her to stand up on a table in the cafeteria during lunch and preach the gospel. Her intentions were excellent—I wish I’d been motivated by the same intentions when I was a teenager. But it didn’t occur to her that there may be a better way to do it. When she stood up and started yelling at everyone about how they’re going to hell if they don’t accept Jesus, everyone just thought she was nuts. 

She proclaimed the gospel, but no one really heard the gospel. The way she lived—the way she went about sharing the gospel—actually got in the way of the message of the gospel.

So Paul is going to explain exactly what he is willing to give up, not so that the gospel may be proclaimed, but that the gospel may be heard.

The first category of people he’s going to mention is the Jewish people. 

V. 20: 

20 To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. 

This is a fairly incredible statement because Paul himself was Jewish. But his ethnic identity as a Jew was no longer the primary reality of his life. He was a Christian, a child of God, a servant of Jesus Christ. So what does he mean when he says “he became as a Jew” to the Jews?

He probably means that when he was with other Jews, when he was ministering in a Jewish city, he observed the Law of Moses as the Jews did. He observed the Sabbath and the purity laws. We see in Acts 16 that he circumcised Timothy. Timothy didn’t need to be circumcised in order to be a Christian, but Paul wanted Timothy to be present in the synagogues where Paul was working. Observing this ritual law gave Timothy access to people he wouldn’t have had access to otherwise. There are several other examples of this sort of thing in the book of Acts. Paul did things that he didn’t have to do in order to be able to have access to as many people as he could.

Of course, “those under the law” is pretty much the same thing—the Jews are those who were “under the law”—but I think he includes this because there were some Gentiles who had converted to Judaism, who weren’t ethnically Jewish, but who observed the Law. 

So we see his point: Paul doesn’t need to adhere to these laws in order to be saved—we are saved by grace, through faith in Christ. We are no longer subject to the Law under the Old Covenant. Even so, when Paul is with the Jews (whether they’re ethnic Jews or converts to Judaism), he’s happy to follow the ritual practices of the Old Covenant in order to have access to all of them. 

The second category is the opposite. V. 21: 

21 To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law. 

To put it simply, he’s referring here to almost all Gentiles in the Roman world. When he’s with them, he doesn’t adhere to the ritual and purity laws of the Jews. It would have been counterproductive. These laws were often seen as boundaries between the Jews and Gentiles, and Paul knows that in Christ, these boundaries have been broken down. So he wants to show these Gentiles that although he’s an ethnic Jew, that’s no longer his identity.

He’s careful to say that this doesn’t mean he’ll do everything the Gentiles do. He says that he’s not outside the law of God; he’s under the law of Christ. There are many moral norms in the Old Testament law that Christ didn’t just maintain, but actually intensified. So there are certain sinful practices of Gentiles—like the sort of sexual immorality Paul referred to in chapter 6—that he will not participate in. But he will exercise his freedom wherever he can to be with the Gentiles on a level playing field, to show that whatever boundaries used to exist between Jew and Gentile no longer apply under Christ.

The third category is beautiful, because it gets to the heart of Paul’s entire argument in chapters 8, 9 and 10. V. 22: 

22 To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. 

So let’s go back to the situation Paul had initially spoken about in chapter 8. Meat offered to idols is nothing, because there is only one God. But a weaker Christian may not yet understand this, and may be provoked in his conscience by this idea. So if Paul is with a weaker Christian, he’ll come down to their level, and give up his right to eat meat. He’ll actually act like a “weak Christian”, giving up something he could enjoy, for the sake of his brothers and sisters in Christ.

This is true freedom. Yes, Paul can eat this meat if he wants to. But he’s also free to choose not to eat it, if his abstinence will help a brother come closer to a true understanding of Christ. It’s not hypocrisy—it’s intentional adaptability to the person he has in front of him.

This is what true, Christian maturity looks like. V. 22b:

I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. 23 I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings.

Think of it this way. Paul may be speaking with someone in Corinth, and really investing in this person and sharing the gospel with them. Over the course of several days, Paul may eat several meals with this person. He has the right to eat meat—even meat bought in a market, which probably would have been sacrificed to an idol beforehand. He’s totally within his rights to do this. But instead, in order to keep this person from stumbling over the idea that they ate meat sacrificed to idols, Paul chooses to eat only vegetables.

Now here’s the question. Do you really think Paul is going to be complaining about his veggie burgers in heaven? Do you think that thousands of years later, Paul will be sitting and regretting the steak he didn’t have for this guy? Of course not—he’ll be rejoicing in the salvation of his brother, sharing in the blessings of the gospel with him. 

I can say this with absolute certainty: even if our rights are absolutely legitimate, no right given up for the sake of the gospel will be ever missed. In heaven, we will look back and know that we made the right call.

Conclusion

So let me give you two diagnostic questions you can ask yourselves, to see where you land on this spectrum of freedom and maturity.

1. What am I unwilling to give up? 

This is probably the hardest question we could ask ourselves. What would I not give up for the gospel? We can say we’d give up anything, but if we’re honest, most of us have at least a few things we’d find very difficult to let go of.

So ask yourself the question, and be honest with yourself. If God asked me to give up:

• a relationship

• a pastime

• a job

• a home

• security

• an opinion

• vacation

• free time

• any other thing you can think of—

what would I say?

Obviously there are some things God will never ask us to give up (if you’ve got kids, for example, he’ll never ask you to abandon your kids). But there are an awful lot of things that our life with Christ may ask us to give up for the sake of the gospel.

We were faced with this decision when we had the opportunity to come plant this church. Loanne and I both had good jobs, making decent money, a nice house we’d bought in Normandy, financial security, and a brand-new baby boy. And to be clear: when the opportunity to plant this church came, we were under no obligation. We were fully within our rights to say, “No, we’d rather stay where we are.”

But we knew at that time that for the sake of the gospel, it would be better for us to leave. So we left our home, we left our jobs, we left our financial security, and we came here. We don’t regret it. It’s not always easy, but we don’t regret it.

Is that to say we still don’t struggle with this question, that there’s nothing we’d have a hard time letting go of for the gospel? Of course not. But the answer to that question, “What am I willing to give up?”, shows us what we still need to work on—it shows us where the gospel hasn’t yet fully taken hold.

Second question:

2. Am I making the gospel easier for others to hear, or am I making it harder?

There are a million examples I could give of this, but the one I see the most often in our church is relational. Either in couples, or with parents and their kids, or brothers and sisters—it often goes the same way. A disagreement shows up; you both know you are right; but neither wants to back down. 

In almost all of these cases there is someone in a position of authority, either real or imagined. The person in authority is the person with the power. And that person almost always wins the argument. But often, they don’t win the argument because they’re right, but rather because they are able to impose their will on the other because of the authority they have. They win because they’re smarter, or they think more quickly, or they’re more assertive, or more physically imposing. 

We might win the argument—but what are we showing when we win the argument like that? Maybe the argument had nothing to do with the gospel; in fact, it probably didn’t. Most likely, it was about something totally ordinary. But if we belong to Christ, then the gospel should motivate our words and our actions across the board, in every situation. We’ll come to this in chapter 10, where Paul says it in no uncertain terms: Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

So if the gospel is what motivates our words and actions in every situation, then surely it should be influencing the way we go about having that discussion, shouldn’t it? Wouldn’t we rather lose an argument than win it by exerting pressure or intimidation? This person in front of me, this person I love, who knows that I’m a Christian—what are my relational tactics teaching them about the gospel?

This should always be on our minds, because we have a perfect model of it—not in the apostle Paul, but in Christ. What did Christ model for us? 

Christ was always right. And yet he didn’t exert pressure or intimidation to get his point across. He displayed protective anger on occasion, and he used strong words on occasion, but he didn’t cling to status; he didn’t insist on his own rights. He became “all things to all people” in the deepest possible sense of the word when he took on human flesh, and lived our life and suffered the death we deserved on the cross. He easily could have won the argument against the authorities who were trying to kill him, and he would have been absolutely right. But out of love, he gave up that right. The cross was the ultimate act of voluntary limitation for the salvation of others.

Christian freedom is not doing whatever we want. It is not asserting our rights at all costs. Christian freedom is being so secure in Christ that we can give up everything if it helps someone else to know Christ more.

We are absolutely free—but what we do with that freedom reveals whether the gospel is really shaping our lives.

Easter: What Does Jesus Do After Easter? (John 21)

I’d like to start by telling you about a parrot.

Not just any parrot. A chocolate parrot.

Not just any chocolate parrot. An Easter chocolate parrot.

Because once you accept rabbits that bring eggs (even though rabbits are mammals and obviously don’t lay eggs, let alone chocolate ones), and flying bells, an Easter parrot doesn’t really raise the oddity level much.

I didn’t want this parrot to be finished by Easter Sunday.

I wanted Easter to last as long as possible.

So I kept it under my bed, nibbling at it from time to time… until July!

It raises the question - what happens after Easter?

Easter is the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection.

After his resurrection, what does he do?

It’s easy to think he kept a low profile.

Yes, he is risen, he is alive. But what is he doing now? Is he at work? How?

What does Jesus do after Easter?

On a far more significant level than with the chocolate parrot, we would like the Easter experience to last.

Last Sunday, Jason told us about Thomas, the sceptical disciple, who was absent the first time Jesus appeared alive to his disciples, and who said that unless he saw him and touched him, he would not believe.

What did Jesus do? He appeared to Thomas in the flesh.

It would be so much simpler if we could have the same experience!

Imagine if Jesus were physically here this morning! You’d be asking me to stop with my talk of the Easter parrot: we want to see Jesus, touch Jesus, listen to Jesus!

Think about our evangelism. It would be so much better, wouldn’t it, if we could invite our friends to church and introduce them to… Jesus!

Do you have any questions? He’s here. Ask him!

Some of you are getting ready to go to North Africa on a mission trip. Wouldn’t it be more effective to go… with Jesus! Come and meet him, he’s come with us!

You can’t.

What does Jesus do after Easter?

The state of the world prompts us to ask the question: wars, economic crises, injustices. What does Jesus do?

Our own experiences too. What was Jesus doing when our prayers seemed to go unanswered? When a relationship broke down? When illness struck?

Jesus has risen, it’s wonderful! But what is he doing today, after Easter?

***

The first readers of John’s Gospel asked themselves similar questions.

John was probably writing to people of Jewish background faced with a choice: Jesus or the synagogue?

They were interested in Jesus, but choosing Jesus meant risking exclusion — social, economic and family death: one became a filthy pagan.

Following a Messiah they could see would have been costly enough.

But a Messiah who seemed absent and inactive? It seemed absurd.

The same question applies to us: what does Jesus do after Easter?

John 21 shows that the resurrection is not the end.

This chapter speaks of what follows before Jesus’ return.

It presents the resurrection as the beginning of a new era, indeed a new creation, where Jesus is still at work to give life in abundance through his word, the Bible.
Three points this morning.

The first: after Easter …

Jesus still feeds us

After his resurrection, Jesus still offers the abundant food of eternal life.

John 21:1

After this, Jesus appeared again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias. This is how he appeared. Simon Peter, Thomas (called Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples of Jesus were together. Simon Peter said to them, ‘I’m going fishing.’ They said to him, ‘We’ll go with you.’ They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

It is not clear why the disciples went back to fishing.

Some think this shows their obedience. Jesus had told them to return to Galilee, even though this instruction does not appear in John’s Gospel.

Others see it as disobedience. In last Sunday’s passage, Jesus says: ‘As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ They resume their former work.

The reality is probably somewhere in between.

It is not because Jesus had sent them that they no longer needed to eat.

They fish at night, the best time.

But John is a subtle writer. For him, night symbolises ignorance.

Remember Nicodemus, who came to see Jesus ‘at night’ and did not yet know his true identity.

In other words, at the start of John 21, the disciples still don’t quite see things clearly.

They have seen the risen Jesus, but are slow to understand. They have not yet grasped the implications.

Verse 4

When morning came (or rather, in the early morning, as day was breaking), Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realise it was him. He said to them, ‘Children, have you anything to eat?’ They replied, ‘No.’ He said to them, ‘Cast the net on the right-hand side of the boat and you will find some.’ So they cast it out, and they were unable to haul it in because of the great number of fish. Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’ As soon as he heard that it was the Lord, Simon Peter put on his outer garment—for he was stripped for work—and threw himself into the lake. The other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the shore, about a hundred metres away.

Some believe that the recognition stems from a recollection of another miraculous catch when Jesus had called Peter, John and James.

But it is Luke who recounts it, not John.

The parallel is rather with a miracle recounted by John, on the shores of the same lake: the feeding of the 5,000 with loaves and fish.

What was the significance of the feeding of the 5,000?

On a superficial level, it shows Jesus’ compassion for those who were hungry.

But in John’s Gospel, there is always a deeper meaning. The ‘signs’ – John speaks of signs rather than miracles – always signify something.

What did this one signify?

John 6:35 (page 692)

Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

Verse 51

I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live for ever, and the bread that I will give is my body, [which I will give] for the life of the world

Jesus … truly nourishes …

To know Jesus is to be invited to a banquet.

A banquet that never ends.

I don’t know what the longest meal you’ve ever had was.

When I arrived in France as a teenager, I discovered that meals could last a very long time.

Perhaps some of you here come from cultures where they last even longer.

Jesus invites us to an eternal banquet when we believe in him.

A banquet… or rather a barbecue.

Let’s go back to John 21 and look at verse 9

When they had come ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there with fish on it and some bread. Jesus said to them, ‘Bring some of the fish you have just caught.’ Simon Peter climbed into the boat and hauled the net ashore, full of 153 large fish; despite their great number, the net did not tear. Jesus said to them, ‘Come and have some breakfast.’ None of the disciples dared to ask him, ‘Who are you?’ because they knew it was the Lord. Jesus came over, took the bread and gave it to them; he did the same with the fish. This was already the third time Jesus had appeared to his disciples since he had risen.

I love barbecues even more than chocolate parrots. A barbecue has everything you need to be happy: good food, fine weather, friendship. And it’s reassuring to see that the first meal Jesus serves after the resurrection is fish and chips on the barbecue. :-)

On this beach by the Sea of Galilee, we see what Jesus does after his resurrection.

He is still feeding people.

He spends time with his friends.

He invites the disciples who had abandoned him just a few days earlier to a barbecue with him.

Let’s pause for a moment. Can you imagine how delicious the fish must have been, prepared by the three-Michelin-starred chef Jesus?

Perhaps a little marinade. A salad.

Even if you don’t like fish, I reckon you’d have fancied it! It’s not the frozen fish from Lidl. Jesus created the fish on the fifth day of creation, with all their flavours, knowing that after his resurrection he would serve them to his disciples.

Small details reveal the depth of the scene.

There are 7 disciples. Why 7?

John pays attention to numbers. The number 7 reminds us of… creation! In particular, the 7th day, the day of rest in communion with God when everything is as it should be. :-)

Another detail: the time. The start of a new day.

Not just a reference to the fishermen’s working hours. It is the start of a new seventh day, when light will shine, ignorance will be dispelled, and life, rest and friendship with God will reign :-)

It is as if Jesus were saying: ‘Here I am, risen, and now I invite you to eat, to feast with me, as friends, just as God has always wanted to do!’

For the disciples, it is almost too good to be true. They dare not ask, ‘Who are you?’ They know it is him… but we understand their hesitation. Is it too good to be true?

And there is plenty.

Jesus doesn’t need the 153 fish caught by the disciples. He already has some cooking. There is far more than enough to feed eight people.

There’s still room at the table for others!

What does Jesus do after Easter?

He continues to feed us with the abundant life of his new creation. He invites us to a barbecue with him!

Perhaps you came here this morning thinking you would never be satisfied.

Today, Jesus is still feeding us!

But how do we get hold of the food?

We aren’t on that beach in Galilee, and even if we went there, we wouldn’t meet Jesus.

Second point…

Jesus still feeds us through his apostles

After his resurrection, Jesus feeds through the men he has chosen, commissioned and restored for the task.

Verse 15

When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me more than these?’ He replied, ‘Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my lambs.’ He said to him a second time, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?’ Peter replied, ‘Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Tend my sheep.’ He said to him a third time, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?’ Peter was grieved because he had said to him a third time, ‘Do you love me?’ and he replied, ‘Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my sheep.’

Jesus and Simon Peter are still sitting around the barbecue when Jesus tells him to feed his sheep.

As if he were saying: this food I have prepared, this eternal life, this taste of the new creation — now it’s your turn to serve it!

I listened to a programme this week about Paul Bocuse, the great French chef known throughout the world.

He is no longer with us today, but we can still enjoy his cuisine, for he trained disciples.

He passed on his recipes, his expertise, his high standards. He trained chefs to carry on his work.

Unlike Paul Bocuse, he is still alive and still at work.

But he works through the disciples he has trained, restored and commissioned for the task.

The conversation with Peter takes place around a brazier. Why is this significant? Peter was warming himself by a brazier when he denied Jesus.

Jesus re-enacts that scene, but this time with a better outcome. :-)

Three times Jesus asks him the same question: do you love me? do you love me? do you love me?

Why three times?

Peter had denied Jesus three times. Jesus gives him the chance to make amends for his failure.

Before the crucifixion, Peter had promised to lay down his life for Jesus. He failed.

But look at what Jesus says to him in verse 18:

‘Truly, truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.’ He said this to indicate by what kind of death Peter would reveal the glory of God. Then he said to him, ‘Follow me.’

Peter would indeed end up giving his life in the service of Jesus.

Jesus takes this man who had failed so miserably, restores him, re-engages him and makes him a servant on whom, this time, we can rely.

Feed my lambs.
Take care of my sheep.
Feed my sheep.

If we are familiar with the Gospel of John, this may ring a bell.

Jesus had said: I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.

After his resurrection, Jesus is still the good shepherd… but he feeds his sheep through the men he has chosen, commissioned and restored — his “apostles”.

***

Why is this important?

In a sense, what Jesus does for Peter, he does for everyone who comes to him.

We have all failed; we have all disappointed God. By coming to Jesus, we are forgiven and called to serve him.

We are restored, just like Peter.

But that is probably not the first thing John has in mind here.

***

What John wants to show is how Jesus acts in the world after Easter.

He still feeds… through his apostles.

On the eve of his death, Jesus had prayed for them that God might “sanctify them through the truth”. That he might sanctify these men, so that they might pass on Jesus’ spiritual nourishment.

Jesus’ work after Easter is… “apostolic”.

What does “apostolic” mean? It sounds like a religious word we don’t quite understand!

It means that Jesus’ nourishment is served by the apostles, such as Peter and the other 12.

By restoring Peter, Jesus makes him a servant—one might say a reliable server.

To understand why this is important, let’s ask ourselves what a ‘non-apostolic’ faith would be like.

***

Many religions accord an important place to Jesus. Islam does so, Hinduism does so, and Buddhism too.

Many sects stemming from Christianity believe in Jesus, but a Jesus imagined according to the ‘revelations’ of their gurus.

Many of our contemporaries respect Jesus, but say: “for me, Jesus is like this”; “for me, Jesus is like that”.

Some Christians take a similar approach.

In all these cases, we have a Jesus disconnected from the apostles.

We project our own ideas onto Jesus instead of turning to the apostles whom he commissioned to nourish us.

If we want to be nourished by the true Jesus, this must be through the apostles.

They are all dead.

How can Jesus nourish us through them today?

Third point.

Jesus still nourishes us through the written testimony of the apostles

After the resurrection, Jesus nourishes us through the Bible.

Verse 20

Peter turned around and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved coming behind them, the one who, during supper, had leaned towards Jesus and said, ‘Lord, who is the one who is going to betray you?’ When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, ‘And what about him, Lord? What will happen to him?’ Jesus said to him, ‘If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you? You, follow me.’ From that time on, the rumour spread among the brothers that this disciple would not die. However, Jesus had not told Peter that he would not die, but: ‘If I want him to live until I come again, what is that to you?’

It is this disciple who bears witness to these things and who has written them down, and we know that his testimony is true. Jesus did many other things as well. If they were all written down in detail, I do not think the whole world could contain the books that would be written.

The disciple whom Jesus loved … is anonymous. The ancient tradition of the Church is unanimous: it is John, son of Zebedee, brother of James, John the Apostle.

Why does he present himself in this way? Did Jesus not love the others as well?

***

‘The disciple whom Jesus loved’ is the title he uses for himself. The other Gospels do not use it.

It is as if he were saying: who am I? What is my identity? Not primarily my first name. It is having been loved by Jesus!

His presence is noted at key moments during the week of Jesus’ death:

at the Last Supper, after the washing of the feet;
at the crucifixion;
and after the resurrection.

All bear witness to the great love of Jesus.

He appears in this way not because Jesus did not love others, but because he saw with his own eyes the depth of that love for him.

Who am I? Someone whom Jesus loved.

But above all, he writes so that we may be nourished by understanding that the same is true for us.

Several details present John as particularly qualified to bear witness.

In verse 7, after the miraculous catch, it is he who recognises the Lord.

Verse 20 reminds us that, during the Last Supper, it was he who leaned towards Jesus and asked, ‘Lord, who is going to betray you?’

When they ran to the tomb with Peter, it was he who believed first.

He is the witness par excellence.

The rumour that he would not die, which circulated later, suggests that John was very old at the time of writing his testimony – the Gospel we are reading.

Peter died a martyr. John was no doubt writing in his old age.

This is important.

When he was young, and Jesus was physically present, John acknowledges that he did not understand everything.

He didn’t grasp a lot of things even though Jesus was there.

That is why meeting Jesus in the flesh would not have been any more effective, for that matter.

The disciples did just that. It wasn’t enough.

But here is the disciple whom Jesus loved, decades later, having savoured and taken in, with the help of the Holy Spirit, the love of Jesus throughout his life, writing his testimony.

The Spirit, sent by Jesus from heaven, enabled him to mature in his understanding and to write.

The result: the words of his book, together with the whole Bible, tell us everything Jesus wants to say to us.

This is how his sheep are fed.

After Easter, Jesus still feeds us… through the written testimony of the apostles.

***

Christians have often had confused ideas about how to connect with Jesus and the apostles in order to be nourished.

Some believe that one must follow ancient traditions dating back to the apostles.

Others believe one must belong to an institution whose authority is traced back through a chain of succession to them.

Still others believe one must have miraculous experiences like theirs.

But John is crystal clear.

It is through the writings of the apostles that Jesus nourishes us. If we have a Bible, we can meet Jesus and delight in him!

But they’re just words! Just words on a page!

Do you really mean that Jesus Christ is at work today to nourish the world… through a book?

Many people have written books. Every time there’s a presidential election, the candidates publish them (even if they didn’t write them themselves).

Couldn’t Jesus have done better?

***

John 21 is the epilogue of the Gospel. There is also a prologue.

There are parallels between the two.

What does the prologue say?

The Creator God became man; he came to us to offer life, and the apostles saw his glory – the glory of the only Son who came from the Father.

What does the epilogue tell us?

That the Creator God comes to us to offer life, the life of a new creation … through the words of the apostles!

Reading this book is like meeting God and feasting with him! :-)

It is listening to the eternal Creator speak to us, as if around a barbecue with friends, of his love!

If we have this book, we have everything we need to be happy.

What is Jesus doing today? He is still feeding us… through the written testimony of the apostles.

The only question is: are we hungry?

Mary Jones was a young Welsh woman born in the 18th century in a village called — brace yourselves — Llanfihangel-y-Pennant, Abergynolwyn.

Do you find Malagasy names complicated? Come to Wales!

Mary gave her life to Jesus at the age of eight and had only one desire: to read the Bible.
Born into a poor family, she couldn’t read. School was neither compulsory nor accessible in the countryside. She decided to learn anyway.

A Bible was expensive. She worked for six years to save up.
At the age of 15, she learnt that Bibles were on sale about 40 kilometres away.
Mary walked the distance barefoot to get her own.

Why go to such lengths for a book? Because she was convinced that, through this book, Jesus still nourishes us.

If we feel as though we are never satisfied, Jesus wants to nourish us! He promises to do so… through the words of this book.

Let us put ourselves in the shoes of the first readers, faced with the choice between the synagogue and its threat of exclusion… and a Messiah… who was absent?

Admittedly, they could not see Jesus, but John tells them: if you have these words, the Shepherd is there, at work to nourish you with eternal life.

This is how Jesus acts today.

If we want to be at the heart of his work, in the front row to see what he is doing, well nourished — and our children too — this is where it’s happening!

For this living and active word.

How do we put this into practice, individually and as a family?

Let us also recognise that this is how Jesus cares for us when life is difficult.

Your pastors can do nothing for you.

They are neither therapists, nor psychologists, nor doctors.

They can do nothing… except help you listen to Jesus speaking in this book. I have no other skills.

Jesus’s true work happens when we open these pages and listen to him.

I know there are times when we ask ourselves: but what is Jesus doing? I’m at the end of my tether — what is he doing?

A year ago, when my brother-in-law passed away, my family and I asked ourselves the same question. What is Jesus doing?

But it was in this context of death that his words of life became all the more precious.

Jesus truly nourishes us with the life of the new creation—eternal friendship with him—through this book.

That is why it is so sad when someone, because of a trial, closes their Bible.

In what other way do you think Jesus will help you — something he wants to do?

In a church of two hundred people, the leaders cannot accompany everyone individually, and that is not their calling.

Jesus cares for us personally… through his word.

That is why the times when we listen to him together, on Sundays and in small groups, are the times when Jesus acts to nourish and heal our wounds.

Perhaps this is what some people need to hear.

When we’re at rock bottom, Jesus always invites us to a barbecue with him to tell us again how much he loves us… provided we listen.

I also know that not everyone likes reading.

Some are avid readers. Others find it a chore.

But what nourishes us is not reading in itself — as if it were Victor Hugo or Émile Zola.

It is hearing the One who loved us so much that He gave His life… speaking to us.

If reading is difficult, let’s persevere. Jesus has promised to nourish us.

After all, Jesus does not speak only to Christians.

He has the whole world in mind.

You may have seen this logo on the shirts of those collecting donations: Action Against Hunger.

That is what Jesus is doing today!

He is taking action against world hunger!

If we have his words, we can be part of it.

With colleagues, friends or neighbours, in France or North Africa — wherever this book is heard.

Perhaps you can think of someone with whom you could open these pages to offer life.

John concludes by saying that if everything Jesus did were written down, the whole world could not contain the books that would be written. I don’t think he is referring only to other deeds accomplished during his years on earth.

Perhaps he means that Jesus’s words have not yet finished bearing fruit.

The story of his work against hunger is not yet finished.

If we have this word, let us savour it and share it; perhaps there is still a page of history to be written.

Easter: For Those Who Doubt (John 20.19-31)

I want to start today with a confession that may bother some of you and relieve others. I’ve said this before, but it’s relevant to today’s text.

I think I’m a reasonably intelligent guy. I love to read, I love to think, I love philosophy and reason and logic. I also love science-fiction and fantasy—stories about fantastical worlds and magical realms and supernatural creatures.

When I preach, I have a manuscript that I’ve prepared, and I’m reading the manuscript a sentence ahead of when I’m speaking, so obviously I know I’m about to say before you do. And literally every Sunday—every single time I get up to preach the Bible—there is at least one moment when I know I’m about to say something that even I find hard to believe. I hear these words coming out of my mouth and in the back of my mind I’m going, “Come on… That sounds insane.” A lot of what I say week after week when I preach sounds to my own ears like fantasy; it sounds like science-fiction.

Every week, I affirm as true things that even I myself find difficult to believe.

I know that sounds strange. But does the fact that I have a hard time believing certain things I say make me a hypocrite? Does it make me intellectually or morally dishonest?

I believe—and this I can say with absolute certainty—that the answer is, absolutely not. It does not make me a hypocrite; it does not make me dishonest. I can stand here, and say things even I have a hard time believing, and affirm these things as true, and I can do it with a totally clean conscience. 

The big question is, how is that possible?

That is the question with which this text confronts us.

So let’s remember where we are in the story. At this point, the disciples are coming out of the worst weekend of their lives. Jesus was arrested in the garden of Gethsemane, and they all ran away out of fear. Jesus was put on trial and crucified and buried. The disciples are now feeling what must be incredible guilt for letting it happen, and profound incomprehension over why Jesus let it happen, why God let it happen. He was supposed to be the Messiah, the Savior…and he died. 

And now Mary Magdalene comes with this strange and disconcerting story that she saw Jesus alive and well, outside the tomb. Peter and John both saw the empty tomb as well, but they haven’t seen Jesus. 

They know the news of Jesus’s body disappearing would have gotten the Jewish religious leaders all worked up, because if anyone was going to steal Jesus’s body to make it look like he’s come back from the dead, who would it be? The disciples. If the religious leaders are going to come after anyone for this, who will it be? The disciples.

So they’re terrified. They’re together in a house, and they’ve locked the doors.

I. Jesus Meets Us in Our Fear (vv. 19–23)

That’s the situation at the beginning of v. 19. And that’s where Jesus meets them.

19 On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.” 

John will make it clear a little later, when it happens again: the doors are locked, and yet Jesus is suddenly there, in the midst of them. This would have been frightening, to say the least, so what does Jesus say? He says, “Peace be with you.” Don’t be afraid.

V. 20: 

20 When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. 21 Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you.

So he says it again, after showing them his hands and his side, where they could still see the marks of his crucifixion. “Peace be with you.” The fact that he repeats the phrase twice shows us that the “peace” he’s referring to goes beyond simple reassurance. He’s telling them that now that he is raised, they have peace. 

The sin that separated them from God has been dealt with, once and for all. Jesus took it on himself and was punished for them; and now, through his resurrection, the disciples have the life that he’s been promising them for the last three years.

The cross obtained their peace with God, and the resurrection now delivers it.

But they don’t just have peace for themselves; he’s not just talking about emotional stability. They’ve been saved, and that is wonderful news; but they’ve been saved for a mission. 

As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” 22 And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”

When Jesus breathes on them and says “Receive the Holy Spirit,” he’s giving them a sort of object lesson of what will come very soon. In Acts 2, after Christ’s ascension, we see the Holy Spirit come to the disciples in a powerful way, and why does he do it? He does it to give them the power to begin and to lead the church. That’s what he’s saying when he talks about the disciples “forgiving sins”; their job will be to explain to the church what is acceptable and unacceptable for a Christian to do under the new covenant, to explain to the church how they can be forgiven, what it means to be a Christian. That’s what they did, and their writings and teachings—which we find in the New Testament—are still authoritative for us today.

But this object lesson is deeper than that. When Jesus breathes on them, it’s an echo of the very beginning of the Bible. In Genesis 2, when God creates man, he forms him out of dirt and then breathes into him in order to give him life. When Jesus breathes on them here, he’s indicating that through his resurrection, God’s people is becoming something entirely new: a new creation, a new people, a new humanity. 

We’re not superheroes…but we’re no longer in slavery to sin. We are free. And it is as free men and women that he sends us.

II. Jesus Confronts Our Doubt (vv. 24–29)

At this point comes what is probably the most relatable story in all of Scripture (for me, anyway). Let’s read the beginning and then talk about it. V. 24: 

24 Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came. 25 So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.”

Thomas gets a really bad rap; he even has the nickname “Doubting Thomas”. It’s a pretty big bummer to be remembered forever for one moment of weakness.

Doubt is one of the most universal states we see in the Bible. Everyone struggles with doubt, in some way or another. 

But some of us, it is true, cling more firmly to that doubt than others—and it looks like Thomas falls under that category too. Look at what he says: he doesn’t just ask for evidence of the resurrection (he has that, in the testimony of these people he knows well). He puts conditions on his belief. He says, “Before I can say I believe, I’ll need this, and this, and this.”

And the surprising thing is that when Jesus comes to him, he doesn’t ridicule Thomas for his stubbornness; Jesus actually meets Thomas’s conditions. V. 26: 

26 Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” 27 Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.” 28 Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!”

Thomas said, “Unless I see his hands and his side, unless I touch his wounds, I won’t believe.” So Jesus miraculously appears in a locked room and says to Thomas, “Here you go. Touch my hands. Touch my side.”

This proves a couple of things to Thomas. First of all, it proves that when the disciples saw Jesus, they didn’t see a ghost. They didn’t see a spirit. This is Jesus, physically present and alive, the same Jesus who died on the cross. That’s the most important thing.

But there’s a wonderful secondary truth that Jesus proves here. As Gavin Ortlund said it, this moment proves that Thomas isn’t Judas. Thomas’s doubt wasn’t betrayal; it wasn’t rejection. It was human. It was expected. It was perfectly normal. Jesus doesn’t shame Thomas for his doubt, but he does confront him with it. He does tell him, “Do not disbelieve, but believe.”

To which Thomas responds with the highest confession we see in the gospel: he calls Jesus “My Lord and my God!” Not just “my Lord,” but “my God.” I believe that you are the Messiah; you are God. 

At this point, I know what I thought the first time I read this—what I’m still tempted to think. 

Of course Thomas believes, now—he got his proof! He saw Jesus and touched his wounds. I didn’t get that. Jesus never appeared to me physically. Thomas and the other disciples do have a pretty incredible leg up on the rest of us, it would seem.

Then we come to v. 29. 

29 Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

This is one of the most mind-boggling verses in all of Scripture for a doubter like me. Jesus doesn’t say that it’s bad for Thomas to believe because he got to see Jesus. Thomas got proof, and he believes—good for him. 

But Jesus does say that those who haven’t seen, and who still believe, are “blessed”—literally, happy. In other words: it’s good that Thomas got his proof; but it’s even better for the rest of us who didn’t get that same proof.

Theologians have wrestled with this idea for centuries, because it is so hard to see why this would be the case. Why is it better to believe without seeing?

Part of the answer comes in Hebrews 11.1, which says: 

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

If you have to see something to believe it’s true, then it’s not faith you have, but a simple conclusion. But that still doesn’t really answer the question, because why is faith better than a conclusion based on proof? Why is it better to believe without seeing?

One of the best answers I’ve found—one of the answers that best reflects what we see in this passage, I think—comes from Blaise Pascal, in his Pensées. He says a couple of things that are very helpful. 

First he says that all of us are confronted with doubt by the world that we live in, because what we can see in creation, despite being visible and tangible, doesn’t help us understand its meaning. Pascal says: “Nature has nothing to offer me that does not give rise to doubt and anxiety. If I saw no sign there of a Divinity I should decide on a negative solution: if I saw signs of a Creator everywhere I should peacefully settle down in the faith. But, seeing too much to deny and not enough to affirm, I am in a pitiful state” (Pensées, 429).

In other words, nature is good, not just because it shows us God’s handiwork (as Paul says in Romans 1), but because it shows us that we cannot find truth on our own; if all we have is nature, and if we are honest, we will always be second-guessing our own conclusions about what we see.

According to Pascal—and, I’d say, according to Jesus—that’s actually intentional. God made it that way. He left some questions unanswered on purpose; he left some proofs hidden on purpose. Why would he do that? Pascal says: “It is not only right but useful for us that God should be partly concealed and partly revealed, since it is equally dangerous for man to know God without knowing his own wretchedness as to know his wretchedness without knowing God” (Pensées, 446).

It’s a good thing that God doesn’t give us all the answers, because if we had them, we’d be tempted to forget we didn’t find those answers on our own. The fact that God doesn’t give us all the answers keeps us humble; it keeps us always conscious of our own limitations—and that is terribly important, because the moment we think we have all the answers is the moment we forget where those answers come from. That’s when pride comes in; that’s when we start imagining we were so smart that we found the solution.

So it’s important that we not know everything, because if we did, then submission to the God of all things would be forced upon us; we would have no choice but to bow down to him. 

But God has shown us time and time again that this is not how he earns the allegiance of his people. He doesn’t strong-arm us; he invites us, and he draws us to him, and calls us to make the decision to believe. 

This is Pascal again: “God wishes to move the will rather than the mind. Perfect clarity would help the mind and harm the will” (Pensées, 234). He’s absolutely right. Perfect clarity takes the will out of the equation—and a lot of the time, that’s a good thing. When I understand how gravity works, I no longer want to jump off of a tall building, because I know I’ll fall. My will is altered by my understanding.

But part of the joy of life—of starting a new job, of meeting a new best friend, of starting a family, of moving to a new city, of becoming a missionary, of beginning a new hobby—is not knowing exactly how it’s all going to play out. If we had every answer to every question, how dull would our lives be! 

And that’s what God wants for us. He doesn’t want forced submission; he wants our lives with him to be voluntary. He calls us to believe, and he gives us what we need to believe… but not necessarily everything we want. Because he knows the value of taking a leap of faith.

Go back to Thomas, in v. 25.

“Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.” 

This is what we do all the time, and it betrays what we really want. I can’t tell you the number of people I’ve known over the years who are (if they’re honest) pretty well convinced that the gospel is true, but because they can’t show proof, because they can’t quantify or measure their conviction, they hesitate for far too long to actually say it out loud. Because they still have unanswered questions, they can’t bring themselves to say that they believe.

We, like Thomas, put conditions on our belief because, at our core, proof isn’t what we really want. What we really want is control. We don’t want to take a leap unless we can control our own descent. But at a certain point, continuing to demand proof stops being honest and becomes refusal. Faith actually requires us to make the decision to say, “I don’t know everything I want to know; but I know enough to trust that this is true.” It’s a hard decision to make; it can be scary. But it’s the only way our decision will be ours to make.

And it is an incredible decision to make. It’s an incredible experience to make that decision to trust, without all the answers we want…and to find after a while that God really is worthy of that trust. That when we made a leap of faith, he held us up. 

It’s a risky choice to make, but it is a marvelous choice to make too, because God is trustworthy, and rewards the faith of his people. 

III. Jesus Calls Us to Believe (vv. 30–31)

This is the faith to which God calls us. I would love to see Jesus face-to-face, like Thomas did; and I know I will one day. But if Jesus is telling the truth, it is better for now to believe even though I haven’t seen. 

That is the realization that came to me far too late: that the disciples didn’t have a leg up on me. They had a different experience than me, but they didn’t have it better. We have everything we need. 

And John says explicitly that his entire purpose in writing this gospel is to give us what we need to take that leap of faith, and believe. V. 30: 

30 Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; 31 but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

Notice what he doesn’t say. He doesn’t say, “These things are written so that you can think about them,” or “so that you can admire Jesus’s teaching,” or “so that you can debate them until you have an opinion.” He says, “These are written so that you may believe.” 

Faith in Christ is both a gift and a command in the Bible. God gives us faith in Christ, causing us to be born again (as Jesus explained earlier in this gospel, in John 3). At the same time, the Bible gives the repeated command to believe—to actively make the decision to trust in what God has revealed to us in his Word.

And he doesn’t call us to believe in some vague kind of spirituality, or believe in the possibility of moral improvement, or believe in the right group of people to belong to. He gives us his Word—“these are written, so that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

Not so that we might develop better habits, or have less anxiety, or have a more comfortable situation. 

So that we by believing we may have life. Real, eternal, present life.

Before we see, before we have all the answers, before we have proof, we have everything we need to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing we may have life in his name.

Conclusion

Let me come back to the question I asked at the beginning. Every week I affirm as true things that even I have a hard time believing. Does this make me a hypocrite? No—it makes me an imperfect human being who has made the choice to trust in a God who knows far more than me. I don’t know everything I’d like to know. But I know enough to believe I can trust him. I know enough to make the choice to call him “My Lord and my God,” and to believe I can trust him with all the questions I don’t yet have answers to.

What about you? Where are you in this story?

Are you still standing behind locked doors, afraid of what will happen if you open? Jesus offers the peace of God that he purchased on the cross.

Are you stuck in doubt, circling your unanswered questions like water going down a drain? Jesus calls you to believe.

Are you comfortable in your Christian life, but relatively inactive? Jesus sends you on his mission to make disciples of all nations, and gives you what you need to fulfill it.

Do you already believe? Jesus calls you to even deeper life in his name.

All of that is enough. We have to stop negotiating terms with Jesus, because it isn’t a negotiation. He never promises to give us unlimited evidence, or perfect emotional clarity, or total control. 

What we do get is a risen Savior; a call to believe; a purpose and a mission; and the promise of life.

So the question is very simple: Will we keep on doubting, or will we believe? Will we stay in the locked room, or will we step into life?

Easter: Jesus Doesn’t Play Hide-and-seeK (John 20.1-18)

Has this ever happened to you? You look for something, and you can’t find it…because you weren’t looking in the right place?

That’s exactly what’s happening on Easter morning. Everyone is looking for Jesus, and they think they know where he’ll be. But as it turns out, they’re looking in the wrong place.

Now before we get started, we have to remember what happened in the story just before this.

Three years earlier, a man named Jesus arrived in Israel and began teaching about the kingdom of God. He assembled a group of disciples to follow him and learn from him, and he traveled, teaching and healing people of their diseases.

He did this for three years, and people from all over the territory came to love him—but others came to hate him. Because Jesus wasn’t doing things the way the religious establishment in Israel did them, and people were turning away from that establishment to follow Jesus. So he was a big threat to these religious leaders. They came up with a plot to falsely accuse him of insurrection against the Roman Empire, so that Rome would have him killed.

And that’s exactly what happened. They falsely accused Jesus of crimes he didn’t commit, condemned him to death, killed him, and buried him.

What no one realized was why he let this happen. Jesus had incredible power, and he had proved it by doing incredible things—he could easily have escaped from Rome. So why didn’t he?

He chose to die, because he is the Son of God, God made man, the only person who could solve the problem of our sin, which is our rebellion against God that separates us from him. On the cross, Jesus took the sin of all of his people on himself, and God punished Jesus in the place of his people, so that we could be united to him.

But at this point of the story, no one realizes that yet. No one understands what just happened. His disciples are horrified and grief-stricken, because their Master, this man who had walked on water, healed the sick and raised the dead, has died, and has been put into a tomb.

That’s where we are when we pick up our story.

I. The Empty Tomb (vv. 1–10)

Now on the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.

Mary Magdalene had been following Jesus for a good while. She was close to him; she loved him and knew him well. So she comes to the tomb, early in the morning on the third day, when it’s still dark.

Some of us have done this before. We know people who have died, so we go to visit where they were buried.

But none of us have experienced what Mary did.

When she got there, she saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. Tombs in Israel were different than they are in France. They were usually dug into a hillside, and they had a door, like a small house. There was a small room inside with a table on which they laid the body. And then they rolled a stone, shaped like a giant, very thick coin, in front of the door, so it would be really hard to open.

When Mary shows up, she finds that the stone has been taken away.

This is, obviously, scary—no one wants to see an open tomb when they’re coming to visit. So she runs and gets the others. V. 2:

2 So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” 3 So Peter went out with the other disciple, and they were going toward the tomb. 4 Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. 6 Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, 7 and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths but folded up in a place by itself. 8 Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; 9 for as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead. 10 Then the disciples went back to their homes.

Mary came to visit a grave—but the grave was empty. So she assumes that someone has taken the body. That makes sense. If someone wanted to make it look like Jesus had come back from the dead, this would be the way to do it. You see, even though Jesus had said this is what would happen, no one quite believed it yet. They believed something happened, but they didn’t understand what it was.

It’s very easy to see the right thing and still come to the wrong conclusion.

The tomb is empty, the cloths are lying there, Jesus is gone…but they still didn’t understand.

It’s important for us to understand that Easter didn’t start with joy; it started with confusion. When we find ourselves confused about God, that doesn’t mean we’re doing something wrong; that’s almost always how it starts.

But that’s not how it ends.

II. The Man Mary Doesn’t Know (vv. 11–15)

V. 11:

11 But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. 12 And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. 13 They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” 14 Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. 15 Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”

So we see what happens here. Everyone is confused—no one knows what happened. The disciples leave, wanting to do something, to be active in the situation…but Mary doesn’t. She stays. Maybe it’s because she doesn’t know what to do, or maybe it’s just because she’s so sad. We don’t know; all we know is that she stands weeping outside the tomb, and looks into the tomb, and she sees two angels sitting there where Jesus was laid.

They ask her why she’s crying, and she tells them: it’s because someone has taken my Lord, and I don’t know where they put him. It’s still clear she doesn’t fully understand the situation.

But then, it gets even better.

When I was a kid my family took a trip across the United States. We stopped at a restaurant in Colorado, hundreds of miles from our home. And while we were waiting in line to get in the restaurant, my dad saw someone in line who looked very familiar, but he couldn’t quite place who it was.

This is the sort of thing that happens all the time, and it happens to Mary here in our text. She turns around and sees a man standing behind her. It’s Jesus!

But Mary doesn’t recognize him. Maybe his face was a little covered, or maybe it was just so outside the realm of her imagination that she couldn’t see him for who he was. But she doesn’t know it’s him.

The only thing she’s saying to everyone is, “My Master has been taken.” She’s looking for Jesus—and Jesus is right there, she’s talking to him…but she doesn’t know it’s him.

It’s possible to be very close to Jesus and still not recognize him.

Something needed to happen for Mary to understand what had happened, to understand it really was Jesus standing there with her.

III. The Man Who Knows Mary (v. 16)

So let’s remember where we were. Mary arrived at the empty tomb; she ran to get the disciples, who came and then saw and then left. Two angels appeared in the tomb, and Mary asked them who’s taken Jesus; then Jesus himself shows up behind her, asking why she’s crying, and Mary doesn’t recognize him; she thinks he’s the gardener, and says, “If you’ve taken him, please tell me where you put him.”

And everything changes with one word that Jesus says.

V. 16:

16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher).

Jesus didn’t say, “Hey, it’s me! I’m alive! Why don’t you recognize me?” He didn’t give her a lengthy teaching. He didn’t explain what was happening to her.

All he did was say her name.

Remember before, when I told you about our trip across the United States, and how my dad saw someone in line who looked familiar, but he couldn’t quite tell who it was? Well, after a minute, that man looked at my dad, and he said his name—and suddenly, my dad remembered him. It was his old roommate in college, someone he hadn’t seen for twenty years. He didn’t recognize him because both of our families lived very far away from this city. We didn’t plan on meeting there, so my dad didn’t even realize it was him!

That’s sort of what happens here. Mary doesn’t know who the man behind her is; but he knows her, and he says her name. That’s the only thing that changes. They’re still in the same place, in the same situation, and he’s still the same person.

But when Jesus says Mary’s name, she recognizes him.

She doesn’t figure out some difficult mystery. She’s not convinced by a rational argument. She hears him call her name.

It’s sort of surprising, but this is how it works. Jesus didn’t just die and resurrect to save “people” (in general); he knows people personally. He knows your name. He knows my name. He knew us before he ever made us. It’s exactly what he said to his disciples earlier in this gospel—in John 10, he called himself “the good shepherd,” who “lays down his life for his sheep”. He said, “The sheep hear [the good shepherd’s] voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.”

What changed everything for Mary wasn’t that she figured out some difficult mystery. She wasn’t convinced by a rational argument. She simply heard Jesus call her name—and because he knew her, she recognized him.

IV. Go Tell (vv. 17–18)

Kids, what do you do when you’ve been on a trip or when you get out of school and you see your parents? If it’s been a long time, you yell, “Daddy! Mommy!” and you run to them to give them a hug. That’s good, and that’s probably what Mary wanted to do. She was so excited to see Jesus alive again that she probably wanted to stay there with him, just to see him and talk to him and be with him.

But Jesus makes it clear that now that he’s been raised, they’ve got work to do. He says (v. 17):

17 Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ ”

To put it another way, Easter is the most glorious day we can think of, because it means that Jesus really did everything he came to do. Martin Luther called it “the great exchange”. Imagine you have a report card that tells everything you ever did in your life, that we will have to show to God. In order to be united to God, we need a perfect report card, with no red at all.

None of us are perfect; in all of our report cards there would be red everywhere.

Jesus, though, lived a life without sin. His report card is perfect: no red at all. At the cross, he took our report cards with all of our red, showed them to God, and was punished for our sin. And at his resurrection, he gave us his perfect report card, so that we can show ourselves to God, and he can open it and see that in this report card, there’s no red. So God says, “You’re perfect. Just like my Son.”

Easter is the proof that Jesus really did accomplish this incredible gift for us. And now that he’s done it, we can’t keep it to ourselves.

He tells Mary to go find the disciples and tell them that he is going to God—but he says it in a way he’s never said it before. Several times in the gospels, he’s referred to God as “our Father,” but in sort of a general way. He’s made it clear that his relationship to the Father is particular. But now he says, “I’m going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”

Because Jesus is alive, people can now belong to God as Father—people can be adopted by God as his sons and daughters.

So what does Mary do? V. 18:

18 Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”—and that he had said these things to her.

She goes from crying to announcing. She’s not sad anymore; now she’s excited, and courageous.

This is pretty incredible—at this time in history, in this society, women were not sent to give important news to men. And yet, the first person Jesus sent to proclaim the message of Easter wasn’t a preacher, or a leader, or someone who had great confidence or a position of authority. It was a woman, who had just been crying, and who now has this incredible message that she proclaims to the rest of Jesus’s people.

Conclusion

The pattern we see in this story is what we always see.

It starts with confusion. “What’s going on? What’s true? Can I really believe this? Can I trust it?”

Then Jesus meets us—in some way or another, he helps us to recognize him for who he is.

And finally, he sends us—he tells us to go and tell others about him.

Now let me ask you something. Kids—do you understand everything I’ve said today? Probably not.

Grown-ups: do you understand everything about this story? Do you understand how God works in every circumstance? No, you don’t.

And that’s okay. We see here that we don’t have to understand everything to come to Jesus. All we have to do is come.

And if you’ve seen him, you can speak. It doesn’t have to be complicated or polished; you don’t need every answer to every question. Look at what Mary said. “I have seen the Lord!”

That’s enough.

On Easter morning, everything changed—not when the tomb was empty, but when Jesus said Mary’s name.

And he still does the same thing today.

He invites us to come to him—and we see here that if we come to him, he is there. Jesus doesn’t play Hide-and-Seek. He is not far off, he’s not distant; He knows our names.

It’s incredible: when we look for Jesus, he’s there, because he is wherever we are. And we can look for him at any time, in any place.

He is here. Come to him.

If Only I could Stay Single… (1 Corinthians 7.25-40)

Someone in our home group this week asked two very good questions, and I’d like to start with them. He talked about how it seems like everywhere, you land on one of two sides: either you think marriage is dramatically important, and should be a major goal in your life; or, you unconsciously reject the idea of marriage because you don’t want to have to fit in a specific mold. So here’s the first question he asked: Why is the framework of marriage so omnipresent in the Christian subconscious? Why do churches talk about marriage so much, to the pleasure of those who are married, and the frustration of those who aren’t?

Well, a simple answer to that question is that the Bible speaks a lot about marriage. It’s the first institution of order that God set up after creating the world, and it is the framework in which he intends for humanity to do what they must do to survive—that is, have babies and have societies. It’s also, as we’ve seen multiple times in the past, meant to be a living picture of the relationship between Christ and his church. The images of marriage and adultery are very frequently used to represent faithfulness to God and rebellion against God. So we talk about marriage a lot because the Bible talks about marriage a lot.

Here’s the second question, though, and it’s an important one: Is there a reason why we don’t speak that often about voluntary celibacy, of the advantages of remaining single for life? That’s a very good question. Part of the answer is, of course, statistics: most of you are likely to get married at some point in your lives (that’s changing a bit these days, though not for the right reasons). But I think a big part of the reason is that it makes people—it makes pastors—uncomfortable, because we can easily have the feeling that we’re laying a burden on single people.

I’ve never had that problem—I don’t mind encouraging single people to stay single—but I’ll admit I’ve fallen into the trap of not speaking enough about this, for the simple reason that I got married very young, I’ve been married to Loanne for over half my life, so I forget what it was like to be single. Pastors naturally choose illustrations that are personal to them, which means most of my illustrations end up being, unintentionally, about my wife and kids.

I need to apologize for that, because it doesn’t remotely reflect what I believe. The funny thing is that single people often look at this passage with a scowl, because they don’t want to stay single, while married people often look at this passage and say, “He’s totally right.”

So today we want to examine why. Why would remaining single for life be a good thing for a Christian?

Quick note: This message isn’t just for single people, so if you’re married or engaged, please don’t check out on me, because the reasons Paul gives for not getting married are actually the same truths that should change the way we live in either situation.

Last week, Joe ended his message with a simple question. He said a sentence, and he left one word blank, and asked what word we would put in that blank. The sentence was: “If only I could change ___________, then I’d be able to live the life I was meant to have.” What word would we put in that blank?

The point of that exercise was to show us what Paul has been telling us since the beginning of chapter 7: if we belong to Christ, then there is no word that could legitimately go in that blank. Paul said it three times in last week’s passage: In whatever condition each was called to live for Christ, there let him remain with God. Wherever he has put us is where we’re called to live for him, and he gives us everything we need to live for him where we are. It’s not always going to be easy, but God doesn’t call us to do what is easy; he calls us to do what is right. And what is right is to live in obedience to his commands, where we are, because as we saw last week, God’s call on our lives is not for us to a job or to a partner or to a city or to a vocation; his call is that we follow Christ.

That is the reason for everything Paul said at the beginning of chapter 7, in the middle of chapter 7, and here at the end of chapter 7. But in order to really be on board with what he’s saying, we need to understand that God’s goal for the lives of his people isn’t primarily their happiness in this life. We’re promised eternal joys in heaven, and we do get to experience a foretaste of that joy in our lives today. But God’s goal is not to make us happy right now. His goal is bigger. His goal is the glory of his name displayed in the gospel, and proclaimed in the lives of his people.

If that is God’s goal, it should be the goal of his people too. And if it is our goal, then it will also reorient our priorities.

I think that’s one of the reasons Paul does what he does here. In today’s text, he comes back to the subject of marriage and singleness, that we saw two weeks ago. I think he comes back to it here because, a) the Corinthians had asked him about it, and b) there are few situations in which we are tempted to maintain the right priorities, to follow our own desires and our own ideas, than the situation of our marital status: whether we spend our lives with a spouse, or without one. At least 80% of the pastoral meetings I have are focused on this subject of marriage and singleness.

So in this text, Paul is being a pastor. He even says so in v. 25:

25 Now concerning the betrothed, I have no command from the Lord, but I give my judgment as one who by the Lord’s mercy is trustworthy.

Paul isn’t giving commandments here; he’s giving pastoral counsel. Being married and being single are both morally neutral situations, provided we go about them the way God wants us to. But Paul has been in the ministry a long time, and he is a single man filled with the Spirit of God. He has a very well-informed opinion on this topic, and he’s saying that even if this subject is morally neutral, we should take what he says very seriously.

So Paul is going to make a case for staying single, for life. He’s going to give several very practical reasons for doing so, and he’s going to give a foundational statement that explains why he feels so strongly about this. But as we’ll see, his statement actually applies to all situations, not just singleness.

So we’ll start with Paul’s practical counsel first. He’s going to give four practical reasons why those who aren’t married or engaged should stay single.

Marriage Brings Worldly Troubles (v. 26-28).

26 I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is.

Very quickly—there’s a bit of debate over what Paul is talking about when he mentions “this present distress.” Some suggest it refers to a famine that was hitting Corinth at the time, or some kind of sickness that was making the rounds. And those things may be partially true. However, the context of a famine or of an illness doesn’t really change much; it doesn’t add much weight to his argument. So in light of what we see in the following verses, I think Paul is speaking mainly of the very simple difficulties of living the Christian life in the “present form of this world”, as he says in v. 31—that is, this period of time between Christ’s first coming and his second coming. We’ll come back to this subject in a few minutes.

V. 26 again:

26 I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is. 27 Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be free. Are you free from a wife? Do not seek a wife. 28 But if you do marry, you have not sinned, and if a betrothed woman marries, she has not sinned.

So essentially, Paul is saying here the exact same thing he’s been saying since the beginning of this chapter: live faithfully for God, wherever you happen to be. If you’re married, stay married, and obey God faithfully in the context of your marriage. If you’re single, don’t be in a hurry to get married; obey God faithfully in the context of your single life. In either case, in terms of our holiness, in terms of our relationship with God, one is just as good as the other. Married or single, we can serve God faithfully.

But there is a big “but” that Paul wants to make very clear. At the end of v. 28, he says this:

Yet those who marry will have worldly troubles, and I would spare you that.

Now of course, everyone will have worldly troubles—that is, troubles that are related to our day-to-day life in this world. Everyone needs a place to live. Everyone needs to eat. Everyone has to deal with the world around them. Everyone has to manage their relationships with their parents, their brothers and sisters, their neighbors, their colleagues.

But Paul says that when you get married, those troubles will increase.

When I met Loanne, I wasn’t looking to get married, but I did have a romanticized view of marriage. Here’s what I mean by that: I didn’t think that marriage would be easy, and I didn’t think that marriage would be perfect. But I did think that marriage would bring me something I was missing—the love of a wife for the rest of my life. This was true. I’d never had the love of a wife, and I got that. My mistake was in imagining that having a wife that loved me would enable me to better face the challenges of my life, that my wife’s love for me would give me something extra, that would make it easier to live the life God called me to live.

And nearly every single person who wants to get married makes that same mistake, even if you don’t think you do. You may look at your life today and say, “I have a huge amount of ‘worldly troubles’, and having a spouse would help me manage those things.” That’s completely true: I cannot overstate how much Loanne has helped me with a lot of the problems I brought into our marriage, and (I hope) vice versa.

Here’s the thing, though: for all the things we’re able to help each other with, we’ve both brought in ten more problems that we can’t help each other with, and that we now share. The number of practical, everyday problems you have to deal with greatly increases when you get married, and that’s before you add children to the mix!

Being married definitely brings you things you don’t have today. But those things don’t make life easier; they don’t give you what you need to living the life God has called you to live.

And this is a very important distinction to make. Paul has a very specific goal in mind. His main priority is not our happiness, it’s not procreation, and it’s not companionship. When God said in Genesis 2 that “it is not good for man to be alone,” he was speaking about man in general—he was speaking about humanity, which would be far less populous without men and women together. He wasn’t speaking about every individual man.

God’s goal for every individual man and woman is that we live faithfully and wholeheartedly for Christ. That is the goal; that is the priority. And if we belong to Christ, that becomes—or should become—our number-one priority as well.

So marriage is good, yes…but it may be counterproductive. It’s going to make this goal of living joyfully and wholeheartedly for Christ more difficult, rather than easier, because it’s going to bring in a whole host of worldly troubles. The reason for this is very practical and very simple, and it brings us to our second argument in favor of singleness:

Marriage Brings a Divided Mind (v. 32-35).

Even though our worldly troubles do not make it impossible to live for Christ (what we’ve been seeing for two weeks now), they do make it harder to stay entirely focused on Christ. People who hear Jesus say, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light” and who respond with a skeptical “Really?” are probably being pulled in several different directions. Most older Christians can tell you that there is more joy in Christ when he has all of our attention, when he really is the sun in the solar system of our lives.

That’s where Paul is going; that’s what he wants for us. He wants joyful, wholehearted service to Christ, not halfway, pulled-in-ten-different-directions service to Christ.

V. 32:

32 I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. 33 But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, 34 and his interests are divided. And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit. But the married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband. 35 I say this for your own benefit, not to lay any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord.

Paul says one or two things here that I personally find really surprising.

Here’s the first thing, and it should be a wake-up call to a lot of single folks out there. In these verses Paul assumes that all men and women are “anxious”, or preoccupied, by something—and that’s always true, of everyone. But here’s his assumption about single folks, and it’s surprising: he’s assuming here that the single people to whom he’s speaking are preoccupied by the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. V. 32: “The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord.” V. 34: “The unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit.”

It doesn’t take a genius to know that this isn’t always the case—which tells us something. It tells us that he’s speaking to an ideal; he’s not saying what all unmarried Christians are like, but what they should be like. If you’re unmarried, your main preoccupation in life should be how to please the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit.

That’s the first thing.

The second thing is that he also makes an assumption about married men and women. He says (v. 33): “The married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, 34 and his interests are divided.” And v. 34: “The married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband.”

It seems obvious, but here’s what’s surprising: Paul never suggests that it’s wrong for the married man or woman to be preoccupied by their relationship. He never suggests this is a bad thing. It is, in fact, the way it’s meant to be—if the goal of marriage is to present to the world a living picture of the relationship between Christ and his church, then that relationship should be taken very seriously. It’s not a bad thing.

However—and this is what Paul is getting at—this serious and good relationship does bring significant challenges to focus. It brings a divided mind.

People might hear that as idolatry, and marriage can certainly become that—but that’s not what Paul’s saying. He’s talking about the very normal reality that when you get married, that person becomes more important for you than anyone else you have ever or will ever know. No one has more power over you than your spouse. No one has more influence over you than your spouse.

If any of you criticize me, it probably won’t be pleasant, but I can take it; my skin is pretty thick. There’s enough distance there for me to think rationally about what you’re saying. But if Loanne tosses that same criticism my way—especially if she puts just a hint of zing in her tone of voice—she can break me. You guys can complement me, or say you appreciate me, and it feels good. But if we come home and Loanne says she loved my sermon today—I’m soaring. When she expresses appreciation for me, I feel like Superman. No one else can do that.

So because she is more important to me than anyone else, a considerable portion of my time and energy is spent trying to make her happy, trying to love her well, trying to build her up. Again, that’s as it should be—but it’s still a fact. Because I have her, there will be times when I’ll have to say no to you; our relationship places limits on the service I can give you. Because I have her, if she’s going through a problem, she’s going to become my primary focus, instead of you.

That’s the case for every married couple…and then you start having kids, and your mind gets exponentially more crowded.

This is the sort of thing Paul is talking about. It’s hard enough in any life to maintain good order and an undivided devotion to the Lord, as he says in v. 35. And it gets even harder when there are two of you. It’s not a bad thing—on the contrary. But it is more difficult.

Here’s his third argument in favor of singleness:

We are free…but called to be wise (v. 36-38)

36 If anyone thinks that he is not behaving properly toward his betrothed, if his passions are strong, and it has to be, let him do as he wishes: let them marry—it is no sin. 37 But whoever is firmly established in his heart, being under no necessity but having his desire under control, and has determined this in his heart, to keep her as his betrothed, he will do well. 38 So then he who marries his betrothed does well, and he who refrains from marriage will do even better.
39 A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives. But if her husband dies, she is free to be married to whom she wishes, only in the Lord. 40 Yet in my judgment she is happier if she remains as she is. And I think that I too have the Spirit of God.

Just a quick note here: people debate over male/female power dynamics in these verses, because in v. 36-38 he speaks to the man, and in v. 39-40 he speaks to the woman. There’s a bit of truth to that, because the man was the one with the power to validate or invalidate an engagement of marriage; the woman did have less power.

But I’m not going to get into the weeds on that subject, because Paul isn’t encouraging those kinds of power dynamics in these verses, he’s simply speaking to the reality of their situation at that time in history. And ultimately it doesn’t matter—what Paul says here absolutely applies to both the man and the woman in any given relationship. So we’re going to use what he says to the man and the woman interchangeably.

In v. 36, Paul wants to be clear that he affirms the full liberty of each person to do what they wish in the matter of marriage and singleness. V. 36: let him do as he wishes: let them marry—it is no sin. This comes back to what Paul said earlier about not having a command from the Lord—being married or remain single is a morally neutral subject. In both cases, this isn’t a question of sin.

It’s more a question of wisdom and efficiency.

If a couple wants to get married, that’s great—it’s fine. They’re not sinning. But if a single person is able to keep his sexual appetites under control and not marry, then that’s a good thing for him to do, for all the reasons we saw earlier. Both marriage and singleness are good—but, Paul says, singleness affords you more opportunities to serve the kingdom of God. It helps you keep your mind undivided, entirely focused on the Lord, and gives you the time to dedicate to his kingdom.

The other domain of wisdom Paul addresses here is the simple heaviness of the commitment of marriage. A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives (and vice versa). If he dies, then she can get married again, as long as it is to another Christian, “only in the Lord.” But it would be better, simpler, clearer, if she remained unmarried.

In other words, marriage is not a small thing. Marriage is for life. Once you’re in it, you’re in it until death, either yours or your spouse’s. The simple weight of that commitment should be enough to help us see that the church needs people who can remain unencumbered, and totally focused on serving the kingdom.

It’s possible to do so whether you’re married or not, and we need both; but Paul is speaking from experience when he affirms that it’s easier to do this when you’re single.

Living for What Lasts (v. 29-31)

I hope you can see the freedom that Paul has granted us here. If you’re single and you want to get married, that’s fine. If you’re married, that’s great too. There is no obligation for a Christian to be in one situation or the other. And there are great advantages to both: Paul is speaking here mainly of the advantages of remaining single, but he speaks elsewhere (notably in Ephesians 5, for example) of the advantages of marriage.

Sometimes that kind of freedom makes us uncomfortable, because we’re in a specific situation today, and we don’t know whether or not we should go in one direction or another.

That’s why I think it’s vital to remember what Paul says in v. 29-31, which is sort of a guiding line for everything he’s said during this whole chapter.

29 This is what I mean, brothers: the appointed time has grown very short. From now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none, 30 and those who mourn as though they were not mourning, and those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing, and those who buy as though they had no goods, 31 and those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the present form of this world is passing away.

If we need a north star to navigate the situations of our life, this is it. None of the situations in which we find ourselves will last longer than our lives. The only situation that will last is the eternal kingdom of God. And the present form of this world is passing away.

So how should we live, in whatever situation we find ourselves? We should live for what lasts.

If we marry, we’ll build our marriage on the knowledge that this marriage is temporary—only as long as we’re alive in this world—and that our marriage comes with a call.

If we remain single, we’ll do it with the knowledge that our singleness is temporary—a bridegroom is waiting for us, and we will live united to our perfect spouse, our perfect King, forever.

If we’re grieving, we’ll endure our grief with the knowledge that this grief temporary, and joy is ahead of us.

If we’re happy, we’ll rejoice with the knowledge that whatever joy we feel today is nothing compared to the joy waiting for us.

If we gain material wealth and resources, we’ll think hard about how we spend our money, armed with the knowledge that a greater treasure and a greater pleasure than we can even imagine is waiting for us in Christ.

When we deal with the world around us, we’ll do it with the knowledge that this world, in its present form, will not be here much longer.

In every situation, we’ll live with the knowledge that this situation is temporary, and that our real situation, our permanent and eternal situation, is far greater, far more substantial, far more promising.

This is not theological fluff; I’m not trying to just make you feel better with churchy words. The truth Paul lays out in v. 31—that the present form of this world is passing away—should influence every single priority of our lives.

Think of it this way… How often do we look for fulfillment in other things than God himself? If you’re looking for fulfillment in your marriage, or in a future marriage, you will be sorely disappointed. If you’re looking for fulfillment in your kids, you will be disappointed. If you’re looking for fulfillment in your freedom as a single person, you will be disappointed. If you’re looking for fulfillment in your job, you will be disappointed. If you’re looking for fulfillment in your friendships, you will be disappointed.

None of these things are bad, but if they are what you’re looking for to be fulfilled, you’ll always be disappointed, because you weren’t made to find fulfillment in these things. You were made to find fulfillment in him alone.

So whatever your situation is, serve God faithfully where you are. Because where you are is where he is, and he is the source of your eternal joy.