1 CORINTHIANS 1 (FIRST READING)
1 CORINTHIANS 1 (FIRST READING)
CAC One feels the importance of connecting the thought of the fellowship with the calling of God.
Ques Would it of necessity detach us from every other association?
CAC Yes, and it would lead us to see that the partnership and common interests which we enjoy together are in no sense voluntary; they cannot be taken up or laid down at pleasure.
Ques Do we see the calling in Abraham?
CAC Abraham is the conspicuous example in Scripture of calling. “The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham”, Acts 7: 2. Country, kindred and father’s house all had to be left; the truth of fellowship involves that.
Ques Is there a call in the gospel?
CAC Yes. The call to the fellowship comes through the gospel. In this chapter there is a call to look at the brethren in the light of divine calling, to take stock of the saints, to look at them as they really are. It is very important to take up the fellowship from the side of the divine calling.
Rem “Consider your calling, brethren ...” (verses 26 - 29). Have a look round and see what the saints are like.
CAC “Foolish things”! We sometimes press the thought that we should look at the saints from the side of [p. 2] the calling but the other side is ‘nonentities’! That is the sort of people. The calling of God is sufficient to dignify people like that. In the light of the calling they are dignified. Nothing is of real value but what is the fruit of the calling of God.
Ques And that is sovereignty?
CAC Yes. If I ignore a believer I am out of harmony with God. The fellowship is a matter of light. Both Paul and John put it that way. It is not mere information but light in the soul. Take the Jew; he desires a sign; he has not got light. The Greek seeks after wisdom, but Christ preached as the crucified One becomes to those who are called God’s wisdom and God’s power. That is light in the soul.
Rem The calling of God gives us divine light.
CAC It did that to Abraham. If the God of glory appears to a man there is light.
Peter says that God “has called you out of darkness to his wonderful light”, 1 Peter 2: 9. It is “wonderful light” that God has called us into the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord. The world is a sphere of darkness. “What fellowship of light with darkness?”, 2 Corinthians 6: 14. The apostle uses different words there: “For what participation is there between righteousness and lawlessness? ... and what consent of Christ with Beliar ... ?” but fellowship is connected with light and darkness. Fellowship is largely a question of divine light. Our fellowship together is determined by the amount of spiritual light we have. “His Son” gives you the full revelation of God; God has fully come out. “His Son” means a great deal to God. We do not think enough of the joy that it was to God to have at last a Person in manhood to reveal Him. “His Son” is God’s side; “our Lord” shows that there is refuge from lawlessness.
Rem In 1 John 1: 7 it says, “If we walk in the light as [p. 3] he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another”.
CAC That bond is established down here in the midst of darkness, formed in people by the shining of the light in Christ. God is faithful in relation to the fellowship (see chapter 10 where it is our individual pathway and His faithfulness to us in our weakness).
We want to recognise the truth of the fellowship. God is faithful in regard of the fellowship; He will not fail us or leave us to our own resources. It is an immense comfort to us in conditions of weakness. We have to do with the fidelity of God, not of the brethren; we have to do with the faithfulness of God, carried through successfully by Him. The bond of the fellowship is the Person, a living Person able to hold us; indeed He does hold His saints.
Rem There is no lowering of the standard.
CAC No. “His Son” sets forth, firstly the full light of the outshining of God; we are called into a circle where the effulgence of God shines in the Person of His Son; and, secondly, that God has established all the pleasure of His love in a Man. He has found in His Son an answer to all His love and He is restful in it. ‘Nonentities’ is one side of it and finishes that side. God comes out in the calling and lights them up with celestial splendour. What light when the holy splendour of God shines in! We are blessed in His Son; God says, ‘I will bless you in Him’. The fellowship subsists at this moment and every called one is in it. Many do not recognise it but we want to do so. It is an immense loss not to recognise it for then we are the losers. All saints are essential to the fellowship. If we felt that we could not do without them, and told the Lord so, perhaps we would get them.
“Our Lord” — it is a wonderful thing to escape from lawlessness; it should be a real exercise with us to do so. To accept that in the fellowship nothing can rule but the [p. 4] will of God and that it is the fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord is the language of subjection. One of the great features of the fellowship is that we can really say, ‘our Lord’. He is the supreme One and it is such a wonderful lordship. The kind of authority is a lordship of blessing.
The first sense you get of it is in Romans 5, that from justification up to eternal life all is administered “through our Lord Jesus Christ”. You are subdued because you are enriched. You are never subdued otherwise. Divine authority and rule have come out in the way of blessing. Thank God for it! There is everything in me contrary to my enjoyment of it but subjection to the Lord ensures it. If I am hindered in the enjoyment of it I am not owning the lordship of Christ because He could deliver me from what hinders. Nothing else does. It is a great thing to call on the name of the Lord. He is able to command and subdue us so that we are liberated to enjoy the blessedness. It is a great thing when we say ‘Lord’ to Jesus. It requires the power of the Spirit. There is virtue in Him. The Lord touched the leper and cleansed him; I suppose we have all known His touch in that way. He put the link on from His side, but when we put the link on from our side and say ‘Lord’ there is virtue in Him for me and the benefit of His delivering power is known. You cannot afford to be insubject for you lose the liberty and the support. God has called us to walk together in the blessedness of all this. We are all partners together.
Ques What would you say as to the fellowship of His death?
CAC 1 Corinthians 10 gives us the character of the fellowship, the particular way in which it separates us from the idolatrous world. The Corinthians did not understand the character of the fellowship.
Ques What is the fellowship of the blood of Christ?
CAC “The communion of the blood of the Christ” would show that all blessing has come through death. It puts you, as to the source of all your blessing and joy, outside this world. “The communion of the body of the Christ” is His dead body clearly. It gives us the character of what we enjoy together and the measure of our separation from the idolatrous world. It is the enjoyment of things that come to us through the precious death of Christ.
‘Thou dost make us taste the blessing,
Soon to fill a world of bliss’. (394:5)
Rem I suppose the blessings themselves are not unfolded in chapter 10 but rather how they come to us.
CAC It is not the actual Lord’s supper there but the moral import of it. That all christians do break bread is taken for granted but the moral character of it is shown. There is a great gulf fixed between all that we enjoy in the fellowship and what is in the circle of the world.
Rem “Ye cannot drink the Lord’s cup, and the cup of demons: ye cannot partake of the Lord’s table, and of the table of demons”, 1 Corinthians 10: 21.
Rem The question is raised there, “Do we provoke the Lord to jealousy?”
CAC It is a serious thing to play fast and loose with the fellowship. The Lord is jealous. If we become careless and slack He does not. If we become careless and slack we lose the value at the present time of all that we have been called to. The fellowship is the great feature of the present moment; we shall not have it in heaven. The Lord valued fellowship when He was here: “With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer”. It is most touching. He valued the companionship of the disciples here. The privileges of the fellowship are not eternal but are limited by time. We ought to value it much more than we do because it is not [p. 6] eternal. Let us hold to it for we shall never have it again. The Lord cherished the peculiar bond that there was between Himself and His own on earth. “Ye are they who have persevered with me in my temptations”, Luke 22: 28. His own walked with Him and He valued it. The fellowship is that of the body of Christ, the One who has died here. It has been seen that there is no place in this world for God; hence we should not seek recognition here. We start out with that because the fellowship is the fellowship of the body of Christ.
The Lord sets the highest possible value on what is of or for Himself; He never undervalues it. If we are provoking the Lord to jealousy, how can He kiss us with the kisses of His mouth on the Lord’s day? How can we know His embrace of love then, if through the week we have not been true to the fellowship?
There is a character of things in the fellowship which is inconceivably great. It is the direct fruit of divine calling and the calling is the fruit of divine love and brings dignity with it. Two can have it but one alone cannot; you must take account of your brethren. You could not have a partnership with less than two members. We are to be enlarged towards our brethren, “using diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace”, Ephesians 4: 3. The way we comport ourselves with our brethren will be on that line as we recognise what is the effect of divine calling.
“To those that are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ God’s power and God’s wisdom”, 1 Corinthians 1: 24. If I can help a christian to recognise that, I shall help him towards the fellowship. We are very much dependent on the Lord to give us access to souls. If I can approach a soul in the grace of the Lord I may do him good. I must first get access and then use the access to further the fellowship. Darkness hinders it. One covets the ability to [p. 7] bring a little ray of divine light of Christ as the wisdom of God and the power of God to a soul. God is operating in every one of His called ones that Christ may become to them the power and the wisdom of God. It is good to have divine light shining on us and doing its work.