Paul makes the point that all that happens in our public worship should be useful to all and build them up in the Lord. Also, all believers should show love and everything should edify.Having just explained certain regulations on the use of tongues in the assembly, Paul also placed regulations on prophetic speaking. People in the church should never accept the words of any person, gifted or not, without careful discernment and personal knowledge of God’s word; otherwise, false teachers could easily obtain a hearing and lead people astray.
In order for the worship service to continue in an orderly manner, further guidelines were needed. The reason that the church service must be controlled and orderly is that God is not a God of disorder but of peace. In worship, everything must be done in harmony and with order.
When everyone in the Christian assembly is truly in tune with the Holy Spirit, there will not be disorder, but harmony and “peace” that pleases God and encourages his people.
In the Greek culture, women were discouraged from saying anything in public, and they were certainly not allowed to confront or question men publicly. Apparently, some of the women who had become Christians thought that their Christian freedom gave them the right to question the men in public worship. This was causing division in the church. In addition, women of that day did not receive formal religious education as did the men.
The “speaking” to which Paul referred was the inappropriate asking of questions that would disrupt the worship service or take it on a tangent. Therefore, the women should be silent during the church meetings, not because they were never to speak, but because they were not to speak out with questions that would be ineffective in edifying the entire church.
This entire chapter corrects the Corinthian believers regarding their insistence on the gift of tongues as a sign of being “filled with the Spirit” and allowing it to overtake their church services. They have been guilty of taking off on a tangent and leaving the gospel behind. So Paul asked, sarcastically, Do you think that the knowledge of God’s word begins and ends with you? The Corinthian church was out of line with what was acceptable behavior in the churches, and they needed to make some changes.
Paul truly loved these believers and sought to correct their errors so that they could continue to grow in the Lord and not be sidetracked by anything.
As we begin chapter 15, we see that the central theme of the gospel is given here. It is the key text for the defense of Christianity. The three points that are most important are as follows:
Christ died for our sins. Without the truth of this message, Christ’s death was worthless, and those who believe in him are still in their sins and without hope.
He was buried. The fact of Christ’s death is revealed in the fact of his burial. Many have tried to discount the actual death of Christ, from the false teachers of Paul’s day to false teachers today. But Jesus Christ did die on the cross and was buried in a tomb.
He was raised. Christ came back to life from being a dead person in a grave on the third day as noted in the Gospels (Friday afternoon to Sunday morning—three days in Jewish reckoning of time). This also occurred as the Scriptures said (Psalm 16:8-11; 110; Jonah 1:17).
SO WHAT? (what will I do with what I have read today?)
As I read today's passage I am reminded of the phase - "keep the main thing the main thing". As I said yesterday, there are so many things that hold the potential to divide the church. Yesterday I mentioned that while COV is clearly not a charismatic church, we are not anti charismatic. Speaking in "tongues" frankly is not that big of a deal. It is not essential, therefore, we extend grace and liberty with each other.
There are other issues come up from time to time in the church. For instance, should we sing more hymns or more modern songs in the church? Should Christians work on Sundays or allow their kids to play sports on Sundays? Others, have questions about the second coming of Jesus Christ. Let me expand on that one. At COV, we say there are probably three main positions. You're either pre-millennial, post‑ millennial, or amillennial. (If you have no idea what this means, don't worry about it!) There is liberty.
I don't know when Jesus is coming back, I just know He is coming back. We're not going to argue about it. We're not going to allow people to get bent out of shape of non essentials. It is our responsibility to be ready, to have our hearts ready to meet Him. Beyond that there are so many divergent views about the second coming of Christ. As long as you believe that, we can have liberty, we can discuss it, we can go back and forth in discussing. As long as the essential is you do believe Jesus Christ is coming back.
Someone asked me one time, "Will smoking send you to hell?" This is one of these disputable matters. I said, "No, it'll just make you smell like you've been there." A disputable matter.
How about the issue of drinking alcohol. I grew up in a church where anyone who drank at all was very suspect. No good Christian ever drank at all. At COV, we don't teach that because we don't think the Scripture reaches that. We think that the Scripture teaches drinking in moderation is all right. The operative words are "in moderation".
Anything that causes you to give over the control of your life to something besides God is very dangerous. Drunkenness is always wrong in every circumstance. There is no place ever for drunkenness. Drinking in moderation is something else. However, as pastor I have taken a vow of abstinence -- complete abstinence -- partially because I don't want to add anything into my lives to get caught up in. But it is a disputable matter so there is freedom between you and the Lord, the Holy Spirit, in your life.
The point is: In essential things we have unity. There are eight essentials @ COV that you need to agree on if you're going to join Church of the Valley. There are many other things that are open to interpretation and we have liberty in those. And in all things we have love, we have charity. 1 Corinthians 13:2 says, "If I hold in my mind, not only all human knowledge but also the very secrets of God and if I have the faith that can move mountains, but have no love, I amount to nothing at all."
You can be so theologically correct, and you can have all the things worked out in Revelation about who the beast is and who the red horse is and what the bowl is and what the trumpet is and when this happens. And you can have Daniel figured out to the nth degree, but if you are not a loving person, who cares? It doesn't matter!
The bottom line is we have unity in the things that matter, that we allow each other liberty in the things that aren't as important, and above everything else we relate to each other in a loving way.
I know I've gone long today, but let me say this a well. You're going to run into some people here at COV you don't like. You're going to run into some people that may hurt your feelings either intentionally or unintentionally. You may find some people who take credit for an idea that was yours. You may find you don't get credit for something you did that you worked so hard on and it hurts you.
You may find some people who are obnoxious. Why? Because this is a church made up of people just like you. Imperfect, sinners, saved by the grace of God, who make mistakes. You have to make a decision, if you're going to join this church, that you will have a loving heart toward those you meet and that you would be willing to do work of reconciliation and forgiveness if it's ever needed. You're going to need it! You're going to need to learn to forgive and you're going to have to be willing to do that if you're going to join here.
We don't want people to join this church who aren't willing to go through that process. If you decide to join, you come with an attitude that says "If I run into trouble, when I run into trouble, when I run into difficulties, when I run into situations, I promise before God to do what the Bible says and that is to work through with a loving heart to reconciliation and forgiveness."
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