The 260 Journey

Day 145

Today’s Reading: 1 Corinthians 12

An incredible phenomenon occurs every winter in the sky. It isn’t with constellations but with migrating geese.

When geese migrate, they can be seen flying in a V-shaped formation. To us on the ground, it is a thing of beauty. But to the geese, it is essential for survival. Science has recently learned that the flock actually travels up to 71 percent faster and easier by maintaining this pattern.

At certain intervals relative to the strength of the wind, the lead bird who is doing the most work by breaking the force of the wind will drop off and fly at the end of the formation. The flapping wings create an uplift of air, and the effect is greater at the rear of the formation. So the geese take turns uplifting one another. By cooperating and working together, the geese achieve long migrations that otherwise would be exceedingly difficult for even the strongest.

In 1 Corinthians 12, we see Paul’s V-formation for the church. It’s one of the significant chapters of the New Testament for the church, because it is in in this chapter that he teaches us how to fly. This is the chapter on the gifts of the Spirit.

Spiritual gifts are tools to build with, not toys to play with, or weapons to fight with. Paul tells us something we all need to hear—that every believer has a gift: “A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other” (verse 7, NLT). They are gifts of the Holy Spirit—not our gifts. He owns them. You might say they are on loan to us.

How do we find what our spiritual gift is?

Practically speaking, here are a few simple questions to ask yourself to begin that journey:

• What do I find joy in doing?

• What do I do that tires me but never burns me out?

• What are some things I do that others are helped by and encouraged with?

After you ask yourself those questions, ask your spiritual leadership what they see as a dominant gift in you.

In the New Testament, we have three gifts chapters— Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12, and Ephesians 4. God’s purposes are designed around these gifts.

The job of every believer is to identify and employ their gift for a specific reason. As 1 Peter 4:10 tells us, “God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another” (NLT). It seems that every time the Bible reminds us that we are all gifted by God, it reminds us why! “Use them to well to serve one another,” Peter says. And Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12, “so we can help each other.”

When we identify our gift, we have just found our place in the geese flight plan. We are part of the V to move the church forward. And we all must do our part.

Why does part of my body fall asleep? Because I sit on my foot and then it falls asleep. If it is doing what it’s supposed to do, then it isn’t sleeping. When a church is asleep, it is because people are not doing what they are supposed to do with the gifts they have been given. In order to be effective, we must know where we belong in the body and then participate.

Let me say one important thing about understanding gifts. To pursue gifts without the development of character is to sabotage the platform that the gift provides. Gifts can get you a position. Character is what keeps the position.

Don’t separate the gifts of the Spirit from the fruit of the Spirit. We need both gifts and fruit in the church. The gifts provide a power far beyond natural abilities. By the fruit of the Spirit, the life of Christ is manifested. And by the gifts of the Spirit, the ministry of Christ is continued.

Spiritual maturity is not measured by the gift but by the presence of Christlike fruit. The fruit keeps the gift in check. We must be careful not to let the gifts replace the fruit as standards of spirituality. Jesus said you will know Christians by their gifts? No. You will know Christians by their fruit.

I wonder if the Holy Spirit was being strategic to put the greatest fruit of the Spirit—love—(in 1 Corinthians 13) right next to the gifts chapter? I think God was trying to tell us something. We will talk about that tomorrow.

A. T. Pierson, a Bible teacher from an earlier era, said,

Every one has some gift—therefore all should be encouraged. No one has all the gifts—therefore all should be humble. All gifts are for the one body—therefore all should be harmonious. All gifts are from the Lord—therefore all should be contented. All gifts are mutually helpful and needful—therefore all should be studiously faithful. All gifts promote the health and strength of the whole body—therefore none can be safely parted with. All gifts depend on His fulness for power—therefore we should keep in close touch with Him.

We are all part of the church’s V-formation. We need you to use your gift to help others.

Day 144

Today’s Reading: 1 Corinthians 11

The generation you are from will determine which historical tragedy you will remember as an American.

On Sunday morning, December 7, 1941, Japanese war planes bombed Pearl Harbor. Eighteen battleships were sunk or destroyed. Two hundred airplanes were put out of commission. And the servicemen who were either killed or wounded numbered 3,581. America’s war cry as she entered World War II was, “Remember Pearl Harbor.”

I grew up when that changed to “Remember 9/11.” That was the day—September 11, 2001, when the towers fell.

The world does not need so much as to be informed as it needs to be reminded. The Bible tells us again and again to “remember.” That is what Communion is. And that is what Paul is challenging us to do in 1 Corinthians 11. Some churches participate in Communion every week, some do it once a month, and some churches a few times a year.

Communion is a mini drama of salvation, using the props of bread and wine. Here’s what Paul says about Communion in verse 26: “Whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are retelling the story, proclaiming our Lord’s death until he comes” (TPT).

Here’s how it reads in The Message translation: “What you must solemnly realize is that every time you eat this bread and every time you drink this cup, you reenact in your words and actions the death of the Master. You will be drawn back to this meal again and again until the Master returns. You must never let familiarity breed contempt.”

Communion is one way we can express our love for Jesus, because it is a way we can say to Him, “We remember what you did for us.” Whenever we participate at the Lord’s table, we too have a battle cry: “Remember Jesus Christ.” Remember the cross.

And to help us remember, we get the bread and wine props.

Props are important reminders. When we get married, an important prop is part of the wedding ceremony. When we get the prop, we say, “With this ring I thee wed.” When we say those words, we don’t mean that the ring or putting the ring on the finger is what makes us married. It’s a prop to remind us, and to show everyone around us, the commitment we have made. That’s what the sacraments of the church are. Props to remind us.

To make it anything more than a symbol is dangerous. It’s like loving our wedding band, when we need to love our spouse.

To cling to a symbol is what many try to do and they miss what God was trying to show us. What was God reminding us of with the bread and the cup?

The bread means God came. We say the bread is His body—that's God in person. In his first epistle, John says that this Jesus came in bodily form: we touched Him, we saw Him, we heard Him. He did not write a message in the sky for us. He did not shout it audibly. He came to tell us that God loves us. God came in person for us.

The cup reminds us that God cares. The blood means God cares. The cup of juice reminds us that it should have been us paying for our sins, but God cares so much for you and me that He took our place. He cares and He died for you and me on the cross. The juice means God cares and took our place.

Did you know that some astronauts had Communion on the moon? On July 20, 1969, two human beings changed history by walking on the surface of the moon. But what happened before Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Neil Armstrong exited the Lunar Module is perhaps even more amazing. We know that Neil Armstrong was the first man to walk on the moon, but Buzz Aldrin took Communion on the surface of the moon. Some months after his return, he wrote about it in Guideposts.

Aldrin knew he would soon be doing something unprecedented in human history and he felt he should mark the occasion somehow, so he took Communion elements with him out of the earth’s orbit and on to the surface of the moon. He and Armstrong had been on the lunar surface only a few minutes when Aldrin made a public statement: “This is the LM pilot. I would like to request a few moments of silence. I would like to invite each person listening in, wherever and whomever he may be, to contemplate for a moment the events of the past few hours and to give thanks in his own individual way.” He ended radio communication and there, on the silent surface of the moon, 250,000 miles from home, he read a verse and took Communion. Here is his account of what happened:

In the radio blackout I opened the little plastic packages which contained bread and wine. I poured the wine into the chalice our church had given me. In the one-sixth gravity of the moon the wine curled slowly and gracefully up the side of the cup. It was interesting to think that the very first liquid ever poured on the moon, and the first food eaten there, were communion elements. As so, just before I partook of the elements, I read the words which I had chosen to indicate our trust that as man probes into space we are in fact acting in Christ. . . . I read: “I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me, and I in him, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without me.” John 15:5 (TEV)

“And of course,” says Eric Metaxas, writing about the event, “it’s interesting to think that some of the first words spoken on the moon were the words of Jesus Christ, who made the Earth and the moon.” So whether we take Communion on the moon or in our home or in our church, it has one purpose: to remind us that God came and God cares.

Day 143

Today’s Reading: 1 Corinthians 10

We are always warned about dwelling in the past. Especially the bad past. Dwelling is one thing; forgetting is entirely another. Why? As George Santayana, a former philosophy professor at Harvard, said, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

We have a responsibility to look to the past when it will guide our steps into a successful future. The past is not meant to be cement to hold us hostage to our mistakes and blunders, but it should help us reflect when we need the past to make a wise future decision. Reflecting on the past is not the same as living in the past. Certain parts of all of our pasts can either keep us stuck and condemned or reflective and wiser. It’s up to us how we use it.

This is the truth the apostle Paul is bringing to the light for the Corinthians in chapter 10. Listen as he reflects on the Israelites’ blunders while they were in the desert:

These things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did. Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written: “The people sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry.” We should not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did—and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died. We should not test Christ, as some of them did—and were killed by snakes. And do not grumble, as some of them did—and were killed by the destroying angel. These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come. (1 Corinthians 10:6-13, NIV)

I don’t have to sin to understand sin better. I can evaluate others’ experiences to help me come to a wise conclusion. And Paul is asking us to use a scenario from almost two thousand years earlier. Paul is asking the Corinthians and us to evaluate their bad decisions so we can make good decisions.

Paul starts the section by reminding us that these are not just Old Testament stories we are reading but “these things occurred as examples” to keep us from doing the same things. That means when we read the Old Testament, we read those stories not simply with a historical mindset but as present-day students imposing the question to the text, “What is this saying to me? How can this story help me?”

Look at the four things he warns us against.

1. Do not be idolaters. We probably should pause on this word idolatry. When we hear it, we immediately think of an ugly statue that people bow to and claim to be over them. Twenty-first-century idolatry still exists. The statues are less conspicuous. They may have an apple on them and we can carry them in our hands. They can be a little box on top of the television that will not let us stop playing. They can be a person, a sport, a casino, or something in a glass. Idolatry is whatever has the power over you. So Paul tells us not to be idolators.

2. Do not commit sexual immorality. That means having sex outside of marriage.

3. Do not test the Lord. What does that mean? It means when we go into tough seasons with no regard of God’s faithfulness and deliverance before. We test God when we go into a difficult moment with no recollection or memory of what He did before to help us. This is an affront to God.

4. Do not grumble. No complaining.

Then Paul reminds us again in verse 11: “These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us” (NIV). He starts in verse 6 with the words, these things happened as examples, and bookends the passage with those same words in verse 11. Paul is saying that we need to pay attention to these markers, reminders, reflective materials for us to live in the future. The challenge is for us to read them that way.

Paul ends with this exhortation: “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).

Keeping all the past in mind, here is how we get out of the difficult present: endure and exit. It’s two ways through hell. There’s always an exit for us and there’s always strength too. Satan’s job in those times is to blind our eyes and create a narrative like this . . . “No one has ever gone through this. You’re the only one, so God must hate you” or “This is so intense, there’s no way out and this will finally crush you.” Neither is true.

It will never be too much to handle. No one can say, “There’s no way to overcome this.”

God is faithful to provide the way. He will offer us escape or endurance.

Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 4 that Satan blinds eyes. In temptation, in the casino, in the arms of a lover, at a website, around a bottle, he blinds people so they don’t see their family, our future, and God Himself. And Paul says that those people in the desert went blind and forgot that God provided a way out and strength to make it through.

Paul connects three important words with every trial and temptation. Don’t miss them.

God is faithful.

Theologian Wayne Grudem explains about God’s faithfulness: “God’s faithfulness means that God will always do what he has said and fulfill what he has promised.”

Whenever I think about God’s faithfulness, my mind goes back to this hymn I sang so many times growing up in the church:

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father,

There is no shadow of turning with Thee;

Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not

As Thou hast been Thou forever wilt be.

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!

Morning by morning new mercies I see;

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided—

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Day 142

Today’s Reading: 1 Corinthians 9

George Washington Carver once said, “When you can do the common things of life in an uncommon way, you’ll command the attention of the world.” The apostle Paul lived for God in an uncommon way. He commanded the attention of the world with how he lived for Christ. He made the Christian life a pursuit of doing it the best he could:

You’ve all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race. Everyone runs; one wins. Run to win. All good athletes train hard. They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You’re after one that’s gold eternally. I don’t know about you, but I’m running hard for the finish line. I’m giving it everything I’ve got. No sloppy living for me! I’m staying alert and in top condition. I’m not going to get caught napping, telling everyone else all about it and then missing out myself.

(1 Corinthians 9:24-27, MSG)

We live in a sports infested society, just as they did in the first century. Paul speaks sports to get our attention and he gets it. The image Paul uses is of the Greek games. The Greeks dated their calendars based on those games. The Jews dated their calendars by what they thought the creation date was. The Romans dated theirs by when they thought Rome was founded. And we date ours by the life of Christ.

Because sports were important to the Greeks, those calendars were based on their sports games. And so to get our attention and to help us better grasp about the Christian life, he uses a sports image.

I want my goal to be what Paul is speaking about, which is not just to get to heaven but to win on the way there. In order to help us do that, he chooses two sports that are the most grueling in their training: boxing and running. They both require treacherous workouts in order to be good and to compete. And they both require even more sacrifice to win. To win at Christianity Paul puts everything on the table. He says that Christ and that relationship is worth giving up anything else. Everything else is a distant second.

Look at what Paul puts on the table in the preceding verses: he would give up certain eating habits (verse 4), getting married (verse 5), and even a salary (verse 6-7). Think about it. To be a world-class athlete, they are also willing to give up certain foods, committed relationships, and even a career to pursue their passion. So was Paul—but for a greater reason than sports. The end he is reaching toward is eternal. He says:

You’ve all been to the stadium and seen the athletes race. Everyone runs; one wins. Run to win. All good athletes train hard. They do it for a gold medal that tarnishes and fades. You’re after one that’s gold eternally. (1 Corinthians 9:24-25, MSG)

The power and strength of anything is determined by what we are willing to sacrifice for it.

Is it worth giving things up for?

Is it worth dying for?

Only fanatics make a difference. Those who follow the status quo won’t even make a dent. Baptist preacher Harry A. Ironside said: “No sacrifice should be too great for Him who gave Himself for us.”

Notice how many times Paul says “that I may win” in verses 19-24:

For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I may win more. To the Jews I became as a Jew, so that I might win Jews; to those who are under the Law, as under the Law though not being myself under the Law, so that I might win those who are under the Law; to those who are without law, as without law, though not being without the law of God but under the law of Christ, so that I might win those who are without law. To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak; I have become all things to all men, so that I may by all means save some. I do all things for the sake of the gospel, so that I may become a fellow partaker of it. Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win. (1 Corinthians 9:19-24)

Six times in six verses. Winning was on his mind. And you can’t win unless you sacrifice. He was in it to win it!

When it’s all said and done, in five years, even in one year, no one is going to care who won the NBA finals, Wimbledon, the Super Bowl, the World series, or the NCAA men’s basketball final four. Those athletes hold up their trophies that no one will care about even the following week. That winning has an expiration date. Ours doesn’t.

Jim Elliot was a missionary in the 1960s who not only knew that concept but lived it. Jim put these words in his journal: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.” Later, he wrote, “‘We are the sheep of His pasture. Enter into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise.” And what are sheep doing going into into the gate? What is their purpose inside those courts? . . . Those sheep were headed for the [sacrificial] altar.” He gave up his life trying to reach a group of South American Indians with the gospel, and they eventually killed him. He sacrificed. He was in it to win it.

Don’t just be a Christian. Don’t just do Christian. Win. Give it all.

Day 141

Today’s Reading: 1 Corinthians 8

People see Christian maturity as I don’t mess up a lot like I used to. I see it differently. Maturity is when you see others before you see yourself. That’s what 1 Corinthians 8 is about. It’s an encouragement to live the Christian life wider and bigger. And by that, Paul means that our decisions and lives are to help others grow. How I parent, how I treat my wife, what I do with my free time, what I listen to, and what I watch is not just about me, but it’s to be an example to others. As A. W. Tozer said, “There are rare Christians whose very presence incites others to be better Christians. I want to be that rare Christian.”

At our church we have four services every Sunday, each with the same message. One of our elders had a conversation with me one Sunday when I wasn’t preaching but was at each service since I was participating. His words both encouraged and inspired me. At our 5 p.m. service, he said to me, “I can’t believe the way you listened to that sermon. Wasn’t this the fourth time you heard it today?”

“Yes,” I said.

“You looked like you never heard it before,” he said. “You sat on the edge of your seat and took notes as if this were the first time you ever heard that sermon.”

What I learned from that interaction: (1) people are watching our lives; (2) we can inspire others unknowingly by our decisions.

I chose to take notes.

I chose to be excited four times.

I chose to sit on the edge of my seat and put myself in the posture of a learner.

I just forgot that it could be an example for someone else.

I realized that a good example is more powerful than a good sermon.

In 1 Corinthians 8 Paul is showing this same principle but from a different standpoint—but still with the power of influencing others. He speaks about the freedom that Christians have, though we must be careful if our freedom trips up someone newer and weaker in the faith. The challenge Paul gives us is that it isn’t for them to step it up; it’s for me to take a step back and a step down for their benefit.” Here’s what he says:

Christ gave up his life for that person. Wouldn’t you at least be willing to give up going to dinner for him—because, as you say, it doesn’t really make any difference? But it does make a difference if you hurt your friend terribly, risking his eternal ruin! When you hurt your friend, you hurt Christ. A free meal here and there isn’t worth it at the cost of even one of these “weak ones.” So, never go to these idol-tainted meals if there’s any chance it will trip up one of your brothers or sisters.

(1 Corinthians 8:11-13, MSG)

We must care for their growth by adjusting ourselves for their sakes. If a nice hotel that we stay at has a casino and if that trips up anyone who has stumbled with gambling, then guess what? We don’t stay there. For their sake. This could be with the music we listen to or a movie with a certain rating we watch. If it affects a weaker or younger Christian, we stop—for their sake.

Why? Because maturity in the Christian life is putting others first. It’s living a life that is not just about ourselves but about seeing and being concerned for others.

Young Christians are called children in the Bible. James Baldwin said something profound about elders and children that can apply to parenting and even in the church: “Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.” Paul is preaching that example in 1 Corinthians 8. He wants us to realize that it’s others before ourselves, which is a sign of maturity.

I remember as a teenager in church someone telling me, “Tim, do you know what joy stands for? Jesus first, others second, you last.”

That still holds true today. If you want joy . . . put others before yourself.