>> Jen: Fava listeners, grab your cup of coffee, because today we're going to be discussing the book of first corinthians. Well, good morning, everybody. I am just so thankful for how beautiful the weather has been recently. Right now I'm looking outside, I got my windows open, and it is so still, you know, that there's not a cloud in the sky, and it's so still that the trees, like the leaves aren't even moving. It's just beautiful outside.
Been so, uh, temperate here where I live, so I hope the weather's been fantastic for you guys as well. Tell me how it's been. I love hearing from you guys, and I love hearing about where you're from and how you found the podcast and also what the weather is typically like where you live. Faithful listeners, let's go ahead and read first Corinthians 316 through 23. Today this will be finishing up one Corinthians
three. As always, I will be reading out of the w e b, as I always do, or the world English Bible. But if you prefer a different version of scripture, that is absolutely okay, grab that version. Let's go ahead and read this one. Corinthians 316 through 23. Don't you know that you are a temple of God, and that God's spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, which you are.
Let no one deceive himself. If anyone thinks that he is wise among you in this world, let him become a fool, that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, he has taken the wise in their craftiness. And again, the Lord knows the reasoning of the wise, that it
is worthless. Therefore, let no one boast in men, for all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come, all are yours, and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's. Even though first Corinthians three is a very short chapter, we've been in it now. I think this is our second week going into one Corinthians three, because it's just so dense with
content. Earlier on in this chapter last week, we talked about how Paul was pretty upset with the corinthian church because they were still babies in Christ, even though the church was very well established, and even though they literally had Paul, like, teaching them things. And they also had apollos and other, uh, disciples of the church that they could have access to the corinthians were still babies in Christ. And so Paul starts out one corinthians three by getting pretty
upset. He's like, why are you still babies in Christ? This is unacceptable. You should be growing in your walk with. With Christ, instead of letting the city of Corinth determine what your actions are, determine the culture of your church, you shouldn't be doing that. You should be growing. So that was the first part of first Corinthians three, and the second part that we talked about this week. Paul talked about how there are two types of people, a builder and a foundation layer.
Paul, obviously, being the foundation layer, he was the one who founded the corinthian church. And then other people came and built upon the foundation that Paul Laiddeh. But anybody who builds upon a foundation that is already there needs to be very careful what they're doing to build on that foundation. Paul kind of talks about it in analogies, using, like, actual
building materials. He says, if you build on it with gold or silver or marble or granite, those building materials are obviously sturdier and better than wood, hay, or stubble, or something like
that. So if somebody comes into the church and they are an asset to that church, and they're teaching good theology, and they're, uh, serving with a good heart, and they're bringing people closer to Christ, those people are building that church with better materials than if somebody comes into the church and they are bringing in corruption, or they're teaching bad theology or philosophy, or they are promoting ideas that are
not conducive to scripture. Those people are building on that foundation with worse materials, like wood, hay, and stubble. Paul says, we have to each be careful what we do to build on that foundation and what materials we use. Because in the end, on, um, the. After we die and we go to see God, there is going to be a day of judgment for each of us, and we're going to have to present all of the things we did on
earth to God. And either all of those things are gonna be burned up, and we'll have nothing to show to God, or they will be accepted, and they'll be able to stand the test of the fires that we are going to experience. So I talked about, um, the idea of purgatory and also the day of judgment on my episode on Tuesday. But now Paul's expanding more on that idea about building the temple or building the church. Verse 16, what we read today, don't you know that you are a temple of God and that God's
spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys God's, temple. God will destroy him, for God's temple is holy, which you are. This verse could mean two things. Either, uh, Paul could be talking about the church as a whole. You know, like the church of Corinth and all the other churches that make up the body of Christ. That is the new temple. You know, back in Paul's day, the jewish people still had their temple, and that was where they would go to worship God.
That was where they would perform the sacrifices. But Paul is saying the new temple is the church because all of it is the body of Christ. So somebody comes in to that temple, into any one of these churches, and destroys that temple through whatever means God is going to destroy that person. Because God's temple is holy, and we are supposed to be holy. Holy means set apart. Holy means different. We are supposed to be holy by following the gospel message, which is very different
than what the world wants to do, right. The gospel message is, like, as different as you can get from what the world likes. You know, the world wants you to follow whatever your heart desires. But then the gospel message says, no, don't do that. That's really bad. Don't follow your heart's desires. Instead, follow God, and he's going to give you the desires of your heart because you don't actually know what your heart's desires truly are.
That's what the gospel message is. It's a different kind of message than what the world teaches. It's holy, it's set apart. It is different, and that is what the church is supposed to be. So if some jerk comes into the church and starts promoting bad ideology, like, uh, new thought, for example, I'm on a new thought kick right now. I just taught the students, uh, last night at my youth group about new thought. So I'm really on a new thought kick.
Say a pastor comes in and starts preaching new thought ideology to the church that is possibly going to destroy that church. Because new thought teaches that each and every one of us can become like God. It takes us back to the original deception in the garden with Adam and Eve that human beings can be like God. That is what new thought teaches. So if somebody comes into the church teaching something like that, and all these people go astray, God is going
to be angry with that. He is going to, it, uh, says, destroy that person who came in and defiled his holy temple, who made his holy temple, like the rest of the world, no longer holy anymore. This actually brings me to Ezekiel, chapter 43. I've been reading Ezekiel in my spare time, and I just read a verse that was really interesting to me, very shocking to me, actually.
Ezekiel the prophet had just toured the temple with a supernatural being who was literally mapping out the entire temple for him and measuring every single corner of the temple for Ezekiel so that Ezekiel could see it. Because typically, you know, people weren't allowed in the temple. It was really only for the priests to go into certain areas of the temple. But yet this, this supernatural being
allowed Ezekiel to tour the entire temple. And there was, unfortunately, very sad things that were going on inside the temple, like these altars to pagan gods during the time of the Israelites, before they got, um, uh, taken over by Babylon. So Ezekiel was just touring the temple. And so God appears to Ezekiel once again, and he tells Ezekiel in verse eleven, he says, describe to the people all the specifications of the temple, including its entrances and its exits.
Tell everything about it. Tell them about its decrees and its laws. Write down all of these specifications and decrees as they watch so that they will be sure to remember and follow them. And this is the basic law of the absolute holiness. The entire top of the mountain where the temple is built is holy. Yes, this is the basic law of the temple. The basic law, the first and foremost law of the temple, which Paul here in first corinthians three says
is the church. The basic law of the temple or of the church is absolute holiness. And those words are straight from God's mouth. So we need to be extremely careful with what is going on inside of our churches, because our churches are supposed to be holy, and that is the basic principle of the church, meaning everybody should be able to understand that. But unfortunately, people do not. So Paul says here, the basic law is to make sure the
temple of God stays holy. And if anyone destroys that temple, God is going to destroy that person. So that's the first thing that Paul is talking about here, is that the temple is just the church in general. But we also know that our bodies are a temple because the Holy Spirit resides in each one of us. And so we need to be very careful of how we are treating our bodies as well, because they are a gift from God. We need to be making our
temples comfy for the Holy Spirit. I have said that before on the podcast when I was going through the book of Exodus with you guys, we talked about the building of the first tabernacle. And the tabernacle was supposed to be built very beautifully with excellence, and it was supposed to be just a, uh, gorgeous site for sore eyes. And this was where the Holy Spirit was going to reside was in the most holy place inside that temple. That was going to be his, his living
quarters. But now the temple, the tabernacle, is no longer the spirit's living quarters. Now the spirit's living quarters is in each one of us. And so we need to be making sure that we keep our temples holy and comfortable for the Holy Spirit. And the best way to keep our temples comfy and holy is just by following God's laws. So this doesn't mean you have to go out today and get a gym membership.
And I, uh, work out every single day and change your lifestyle 100% in order to, you know, take care of our physical body, though there is part of that as well. This is talking more about, are we going to follow the laws of God and reject sin as best we can and instead worship God in spirit and in truth, or are we going to continue to sin like the Corinthians were? Are we going to make excuses for our sins? No, we can't do that. We have to remain
holy. And the best way to remain holy, once again, is to follow God's laws and to worship God in spirit and in truth. So that is the two meanings of the temple here that Paul is talking about, the church in general and our, each individual bodies. Moving on to verse 18, Paul goes back to the idea of wisdom. The first two chapters of one corinthians so far has been basically talking about wisdom and how the world thinks Christianity is just absolute
foolish nonsense. And as I said before, I'm sure you know somebody who is like that, who just doesn't want to hear anything about Christianity because they think it's foolish. Paul goes back to that idea once again. Let no one deceive himself. If anyone thinks that he is wise among you in this world, let him become a fool that he may become wise. So Paul's like, you know, anybody who wants to achieve, uh, true wisdom, and you think that
you are very wise, you're not. You have to become a full first in order to become wise. What Paul is saying here is that in order to become truly wise, you have to follow the scriptures, even though they might sound foolish at first. That is the only way you are going to achieve true wisdom. If you read through the entire book of proverbs, actually, there is so much about wisdom because Solomon, who we are discussing on the Old Testament side of stuff, Solomon was the
wisest man on the planet. He was extremely wise. God gave him so much wisdom. So Solomon liked to talk about wisdom. It was kind of his niche in the book of proverbs, wisdom is mentioned quite a bit. And the one thing that Solomon always says is that fearing God is the beginning of wisdom. So Solomon knew that the only way to gain wisdom, like true wisdom, was to fear God and was to follow God. And so Paul is echoing that same idea
here. We have to become like a fool. We have to get rid of that arrogance and that pride of man made wisdom. And instead, we have to follow the principles of scripture and to, uh, worship God and to fear God in order to gain true wisdom. Then he says here in verse 19, it's very funny. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. He does not sugarcoat that one at all. He says, look, everybody who thinks that they are very wise here on earth, it's actually foolishness to goddess.
In Romans chapter one, Paul talked about that once again, where he said that people believed that they were so wise, but instead they became utter fools. Wisdom of this world is truly foolishness to God because God is so above any, um, amount of wisdom here on earth. Even Solomon, the wisest guy on the planet, didn't come anywhere close to the wisdom of God. He couldn't possibly come close to the wisdom of God. It says, for it is written, he has taken the wise in their craftiness.
And again, the Lord knows the reasonings of the wise, that it is worthless. Therefore, let no one boast in men. That is how Paul concludes that. But then he says here, for all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas, meaning Peter, or the world or life or death or things present or things to come, all are yours. You are Christ's, and Christ is God's. So Paul says, the main reason we shouldn't be boasting in men, because don't forget what the corinthians were
doing. They were, uh, dividing themselves because they liked Paul better than Apollos or they liked apollos better than Paul. And they'd be like, well, I actually follow Apollos or I actually follow Paul, or I follow this guy, or I follow that guy. And so they were dividing themselves. And Paul was making, uh, this argument that it is very stupid to divide over mere human beings because Paul and Apollos and Cephas, Peter, they were all teaching the same
gospel. So why are they dividing over what disciple they like best? Or something like that? So Paul argues here, you shouldn't be boasting in men because everything belongs to you. The message of me, Paul, he says, the message of apollos, the message of Peter, all of these things belong to you. And on top of that, here's the other things that belong to the Christian, the world, life, death, things present, things to come, all belong to us. And here's why.
Because all these things belong to Christ. And Christ the messiah, Jesus shared all of these things with us because we've been adopted into the family of God. So Christ has become our big brother. And because we are a part of God's family, he shares all of these things with us. Paul says, all are yours and you are Christ's. And Christ is God's. Meaning we have communion with Christ, we have fellowship with Christ, and then Christ has union with God. Not that, you know, God the
Father owns Jesus or something like that. That is not what Paul is saying here, but that Jesus is God's son who does the father's bidding. Jesus himself said that I do the father's bidding. Jesus is of God. And because of what Jesus obeyed God the Father in by coming down to earth and becoming the sacrifice for sinful humanity, we now can have that union with God, with Jesus and God the Father, we are adopted into the family of God, and God shares all of these
wonderful things with us. That does not mean that we are divine or that we have any godlike power, but it just shows how much God loves us. That even though we are sinners and we do wrong things all the time, God sent his son Jesus to come down to earth and to save us from all of those sins so that we can be adopted into his family and have this fellowship and union with Christ in the end. Like I said, I'm really on a new thought movement kick right
now, so I think I'm going to do a blog post about it. Maybe I'll share some of what I taught last night to the students on my blog. And that'll be a, uh, blog post for all of you guys. I also talked about it with my sister this week for an episode of discussions. So a new episode of discussions will be coming out this week, and we will be discussing new ageism M and the new thought ideology in a lot
of depth in that episode. So if you would like to gain access to the discussions episodes, make sure you go over to Ko Fi, which is linked in the description of this episode, and become a tea tier member or a ko fi tier member, which the Kofi tier member gains access also to Friday's episodes. So check all of that out in Kofi. Faithful listeners, have a fantastic and wonderful rest of your day. Happy listening and God bless.