The Benefits of Being a Saint
1 Corinthians 1:4-9
First Corinthians Chapter 1 is our study for this morning. We're going to be continuing what we began last time On the Benefits of Being a Saint. As I mentioned to you last time the word saint has come far from its original New Testament meaning. And today when you think of the word saint you think of some angular figure crystallized in stained glass or you think of some person long dead who has been officially declared as an ecclesiastical relic. Ambrose Beer said one of the best definitions of a saint I ever read, he said, "A dead saint is a dead sinner revised and edited."
Unfortunately none of those is the biblical perspective on what a saint is. In all of Paul's letters Paul uses the word saint to refer to Christians, not dead ones but living ones, not a few but all. In fact, I think, it must have been his very favorite word for Christians because he used it about 60 times. We who know the Lord Jesus Christ are saints.
Just to review that go back to verse 1 of I Corinthians where we began and studied in detail last week. "Paul called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God and brother Sosthenes, unto the church of God, which is at Corinth. To them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called saints, and they are not the only saints but all also that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord both theirs and ours." And so here he says you are saints along with everybody else that calls upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. So a saint is somebody who calls upon the name of Christ, a Christian, anyone who is saved, who knows the Lord Jesus Christ is a saint.
And we said last time that he starts out by saying, "You are sanctified," it's the same root word as saint, "You are called saints in order to make them aware of the fact that the foundation for his exhortation to their behavior is in the fact that they are saints. In other word you have been made holy, you are called holy; therefore, I am writing you this letter to tell you to act holy. That's really the purpose of his first nine verses where he talks about being a saint.
We talked about that in some detail last time. That the basis or foundation for all behavior in Christian life is our own identity. The fact of who we are is the premise on which the word of God bases the fact of what we ought to act like. You might put it this way: the indicative you are is the basis for the imperative you ought. And that occurs all through the New Testament. In fact, it tells us we are holy because of what Christ is; therefore, we ought to be like him. We ought to act like him. Our lives ought to conform to him. I think of an illustration, you remember in John 8, the woman taken in adultery and Jesus said to her the words, "Go and sin no more." And I think that's an interesting thing to look at because he was commanding a woman who was a prostitute, who lived a vile life, who had been caught in the very act of adultery to go and stop doing it.
Now to ask her to do that would have to assume there had been some kind of change in her process of thinking or in whatever dominated her behavior. What had happened, of course, to the woman I believe was she had been saved. She had been granted a new life and Jesus said, before he said, "Go and sin no more," he said, "Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more." In other words from now on I hold no sin against you. You are holy in my eyes; therefore, act like it. See that's the same point that's made throughout the New Testament. As a Christian you are not condemned, you are holy. Your sin is forgiven, your sin is set aside; therefore, you ought to act in consistency with your own nature.
In Colossians, for example, Paul says in Chapter 3, verse 5, he says, "Kill; therefore, your members, which are on the earth. In other words your orientation to the world, your physical body and its physical desires and mental desires are to be killed. Why? For you are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God. Since you have come into a unique relationship with Christ and God those things have no part in your life. And that again is the same impetus .
In Colossians Chapter 3 again and verse 9, I think, it interesting to see what the apostle says. He says, "Lie not one to another." Quit lying. Now what's the basis of that? "Because you have put off the old man with his deeds, and you've put on a new man, renewed in knowledge after the image of him who created him." The reason you are not to lie is because it's inconsistent with who you are. You have put off the old man and you put on what, the new man and the new man doesn't do that. The new man is conformed to the image of Christ. You are holy in Christ before God so act like Christ. And you can govern your life that way. Since I'm in Christ, I would never do anything that He would not do. I don't lie because He won't. I don't steal because He doesn't. I don't commit adultery because that's totally foreign to the life of Christ. All of the things in my life are to conform to His life because I am in Him.
And that is the foundation then of behavior in the Christian life. And so Paul begins the first chapter of Corinthians verses 1 to 9 by telling them who they are. And he lays down that foundation of here's who you are than from 1:10 clear through the end of chapter 16 he says here's how to act commensurate with who you are.
Now Paul then in verses 1 to 3 just simply calls them saints. Now from 4 to 9 he expands what that means. What does it mean to be a saint? What is involved in being a saint? What is it to be a saint in terms of what do I receive for it? What are the benefits of being a saint? Now if you've come this morning looking to find out the benefits of Christianity, this is a sales pitch. This is a divine presentation of why you should be a Christian as opposed to not being one. So if that's in your mind to consider then these are the things you ought to think about. These are reasons to be a saint and they are the results of being a saint that become the reasons to be one. They come in verse 4 t 9.
Now there are three dimensions in this and you have an outline there to follow and you can look at it as we go. Simple things, but they come in three dimensions and in three tenses: past, present and future. The benefits of being a saint cover all of the periods of a life: the past, the present and the future. In the past there's grace, for the present there are gifts and the future there are guarantees. What it boils down to is your past is forgiven, your present is taken care of and your future is guaranteed. You can't beat that. That's the greatest kind of policy there is. Takes care of all the past mistakes, gives you all you need to live in the present, and secures absolutely your future. That's what Christianity offers. If you want all that, all that's necessary is for you to be a saint. You say right. How do I be a saint? Not becoming canonized, but by believing in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we're going to talk about.
All right first of all let's look at the grace concept, which deals with the past. Verse 4 and verse 6: "I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace of God, which is given you in," the preposition in the Greek is en e-n, in Jesus Christ. I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace of God." The first benefit of being a saint is grace. And these are Eros verbs. It was given you in Christ Jesus. The idea is some time in the past at a very point in time, a moment of time, that's what an Eros verb is, it happens in a moment of time, you were given grace. When did it happen? Verse 6, "when the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you." And that again is an Eros verb, something in the past that happened in a moment of time.
So from the past standpoint, at a moment in time, you received grace, and it was at the moment the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you. So he says the first benefit of being a saint, just think of it people, he says to the Corinthians, just think of what you have had. I thank God that you had received the grace of God. At a moment in time in the past it became yours. And he refers, of course, to their salvation, the time when they received God's saving grace. This is the first, and most obvious benefit, of being a saint. It's what happened to you when you became a saint you were saved, you received salvation. It was commensurate with you being a saint. And he says, "I thank God for this."
Now notice the term in Christ Jesus. This is familiar to Paul and all blessing and all grace comes when you and I are united in Christ. And again this is unique with Christianity. This isn't believing the teaching of Christ. Many do that. It isn't believing about Christ. It is being in Christ. And that is an appropriation of committing myself to Him in total unity by faith. And once I am in Christ then the grace of God is mine.
Now what is this grace? I want to look at it for a minute because it's so basic to Christianity. I mean we talk about grace all the time. That's the name of this place, Grace. That's a very important thing for us to understand. Now the word grace is charis a very familiar word and it was a greeting people used back in verse three. Grace be to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. That was the familiar Christian greeting. It's a lot better than hi how are you? And we ought to use it. But here we find the word grace and it means favor, but it doesn't mean favor like we think of. We use the word for party favors, and I do so and so a favor, and it really is kind of watered down. But the word literally means undeserved, unrecompensed kindness. It means mercy. It is not some little ingratiated act. It is undeserved unrecompensed kindness. It is super magnanimous for it is undeserved. And it cannot be paid back. Grace always in Scripture has to be a free gift, unearned.
Now let me expand this for a minute. In order for us to understand grace and saving grace we need to understand some things. And I think maybe the best way to approach this would be to see three things that can't coexist with grace. And this will help you to define grace. First of all any recognition of human guilt cannot coexist with grace. Now mark it. Grace and guilt cannot go together. Grace must provide for the alleviation of guilt. God cannot say I am gracious and I give you salvation. One false move and I'll take it away. No, that's not very gracious; that's just laying a law on us, isn't it? Grace cannot coexist with human guilt. Grace must provide for the elimination of guilt. It has to. Grace is not grace if God says I will be gracious unto you if you don't sin. That's no grace.
If grace is withheld from the sinner in the least degree because of his sin then it isn't grace. Grace is undeserved unmerited forgiveness. Grace must allow for sin. Grace can only operate if there's sin there. If there's no sin there's no grace, right? There's got to be something to forgive or grace isn't grace. And so what happened? God knowing that the penalty for sin had to be paid sent Christ to the cross. And in Romans 3:25-26 it says, "Christ died to take care of sin so that God might still be gracious." God had to do with his justice. God had to deal with it. God is a God of justice. He can't just say, "Well forget the sin who cares." No, no, because of justice he sin had to be taken care of. Once sin was taken care of in Christ God could be gracious to sinners because the price had been paid.
So the cross pays the penalty for all sin? It fees God from the obligation of His justice and He says I will be gracious to you and He acts in grace. Now watch, once God acts in grace, grace will never be able to recognize guilt. So once you are forgiven and have received saving grace how much guilt do you have? None because grace is that by definition, which over rules guilt.
I talked to a Christian this week who is so absolutely distraught with guilt that he cannot even cope with life. He cannot accept forgiveness, he continues to hold himself guilty for things, he is overwhelmed by his sin and will not recognize the freedom he has in being forgiven of God, he does not understand what grace is. He may understand it theologically; he doesn't understand it practically. Grace means there will be no guilt. I forgive you. I will be gracious to you. I know you don't deserve it. I know you can't earn it and I know you can't pay it back. That's okay grace is grace and grace means you can't pay it back and aren't expected to.
How much then of a sinner's sins are forgiven? All of them! Listen no wonder he thanks God for grace. Are you thankful for that kind of grace? Are you thankful for the grace that's forgiven you all your sin and holds you absolutely guiltless before God for the rest of your eternity? You say that's terrific. And I say to you if you're not a Christian isn't it somewhat inviting for God to say to you, "I will cleanse all your sin before My eyes, I will forgive all of it, I will set aside all your guilt, I will hold you blameless and holy forever." Isn't that kind of nice offer?
Well that's the first thing. Grace can't coexist with human guilt so mark it. When God saved you He took away all guilt and all sin, forgiven all your trespasses for His name's sake, all of them. Grace reigns in your life. Secondly grace can't coexist with human obligation. Grace is not something you have to pay back. Grace is not to be remunerated. You're not to say, "Well God was gracious to me and He saved me and now I've got to pay Him back." You can't do that. It was a gift. Can you pay a gift back? No. It's not a gift if you do.
In Romans Chapter 4 it says, "Whatever is earned is not grace." Grace cannot be reckoned of debt. In other words when the week is done or two weeks and the guy comes around with a paycheck you don't say, "Oh my boss, my boss, how gracious you are. Oh this extended love is beyond me. I thank you, I thank you." No. No if the check doesn't come you go and say, "Where's the money?" Why? It isn't grace. You earned that money, you want that money. Whatever is reckoned of reward, whatever is earned is not grace. So if you could do one single thing to earn saving grace it isn't saving grace. And believe me, friend, it is saving grace so you can't earn it. You can't pay God back so don't think that because of what God has done for you, you've got to pay Him off. There's no way you can do that. Besides that'd be like throwing pennies at J. Paul Getty. God is so far richer than you can even dream and His holiness is so absolute that you're little pittance of offering Him your works and your recompense wouldn't even be minimal. You see there is no way that you can find grace coexisting with human recompense or with human obligation. And one of the wonderful things about salvation is God just gives it to you and you don't have to pay Him back. Notice this, you don't have to pay Him back. I'll tell you one thing, you will want to show Him your love, won't you? But it's one thing to want to, it's one thing to love Him, it's one thing to serve Him out of a heart of gratitude, it's something else to think that you've got to pay Him back because you owe Him something. You owe God nothing. God gave you salvation as grace. In a deep sense we own Him affection just naturally and I think that comes to the genuine Christian. But we cannot pay God back for His gift.
Thirdly, grace cannot coexist with any recognition of human merit. That is it does not come to the best people. You can't say, "Well it's obvious who the good people are. Look at us who are saved." You're no better than anybody else, neither am I, and that's wonderful consolation. It wasn't my goodness that got me here. Aren't you glad of that? Some of you aren't too sure about that. Grace cannot exist with human merit. In other words God didn't save the good ones. You know who got that in their heads and had it there for centuries? Israel. Yeah, they thought that God chose them because they were better than everybody else. And in Romans Chapter 3 Paul really nailed that one down. Are we better than they? No. God renders all of you guilty. "He stops the mouths of the whole world," Romans 3 says. No you're not better than anybody else. Paul said, "I am the chief of what, sinners." You did not deserve salvation. Grace doesn't go with that. Grace is the free loving forgiveness of God independent of your deserving it. All of us are vile sinners. "There is none righteous," Romans 3:10 says, "no, not one. There is none that understand it, there is none that seeks after God. The poison of asps are under their lips. They are full of bitterness and cursing." All men are the same, sinners before God. No, grace cannot coexist with human merit. You did not earn your salvation. It was only God's grace.
Now do you see how giving you those three concepts help you to understand what grace is? Just think of it people, just think of it. When you were saved grace included the fact that no sin or guilt would ever be held against you the rest of your eternity. When you were saved you were given the freedom to know that you'd never have to pay that back. That's His gift. There are no have to's. Thirdly, know this: that He saved you even when you did not what deserve it. That's grace. That's the sum of it. I don't know about you but that helps me define it. And I'll tell you, I can say with Paul, I thank my God for that kind of grace.
You know I've been looking at the television, like you, and I've been watching the masses of humanity running and Viet Nam and Cambodia and I say to myself, "God why me? Why me? Why did you do this for me?" Have you said that? Why such grace? And grace beyond saving grace, the grace of Christian fellowship, the grace of a blessed church, the grace of a precious wife and beautiful children, grace beyond grace beyond grace, and I say to myself, "Well did I deserve it?" It takes me about one half of a second to answer that, no. Can I pay Him back for it? No. Beyond that He never holds a sin against me.
That's the first benefit of salvation, people. Let me help you to understand a little further why God is gracious to us. There are three reasons for which God did this. Three motives. God saved us by His grace in order to produce good works. You know why? Because god knew that good works could touch the lives of the people in this room. Saving grace is to produce good works. Titus tells us this in 2:14. "God, our Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us in order to redeem us from all iniquity, watch, purify a people of His own zealous of good works." All right He wanted us to be zealous of good works. Why? Verse 8 of three. "This is a faithful saying: These things I will that thou affirm constantly that they who have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works for these things are good and profitable unto man." You know God saved us to do good works because good works benefit men. I mean it's good to do good in the world even from the standpoint it's good to do good. I mean even when we do good we bless them. God want us to touch all the people in the world with our goodness and so first of all saving
Secondly, saving grace is to bring blessing to Christians. I can't help but think of Ephesians 2, where he says he has quickened us together with Christ, raised us and made us sit together in heavenly places. Then in verse 7, "In order that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace and His kindness toward us." God saved us, not only to do good works for the world's sake, but He saved us to pour blessing on us for our sake, to pour out His riches on us forever.
And lastly, and most importantly, saving grace is to glorify God. God saved us to be to the praise of His glory. And that's in so many passages. Ephesians 3, He said, "I saved you that all men might see the mystery that was hiding in the past." He says in Ephesians, "Now unto Him by glory in the church." He says if you let your light shine among men they'll glorify your Father who is in heaven.
God saved us number one, to do good works for the sake of unsaved men, two, to pour out blessings on the sake of believers, three, to give glory to His name, because when we do what is right God is honored. And so He was gracious for our sake, for the world's sake, for His sake. You say, "That's great, that gift. How did it become ours? How does it become ours?"
Look at verse 6. "You have the grace of God given you in Christ Jesus, when, when the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you." The word confirmed means settled, made steadfast, made solid. How is it that the testimony of Christ is made solid? The word testimony in the Greek is marturion, from which we get the word martyr. It is translated in Acts 1:8 witness. It's the same word as witness and it refers to the gospel. Look at it there. Even as the gospel of Christ, the witness of Christ was confirmed in you or settled in you, made steadfast in you. It could have reference as well to the apostles who came and preached and did signs and miracles to confirm it. But the thing that He's point out is that they accepted it and it became theirs. It was confirmed, not before you, but where, in you. It was settled in you. It was made solid in you and how is it that the gospel of Jesus Christ becomes confirmed in me? It is by what, faith. It is by believing.
In Acts 20, we find the very same word, just to give you some verses to support its meaning as referring to the gospel. Acts 20:21, testifying to the Jews and the Greeks. And the word testifying is marturio, same word, and He testified repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. That was the message, the gospel. The same term exactly. Verse 24, Paul says, "I received of the Lord Jesus to testify, or to give witness of the gospel of the grace of God." This term then is used to refer to the gospel. In Acts 22:18, again he says, "They will not receive your marturion concerning Me, your witness, your presentation of the gospel." Chapter 23:11, The Lord says to Paul, "You have given witness of Me or testified of Me in Jerusalem; you will also do it in Rome." Same word again. It refers to the preaching of the gospel. So, and it's used also to refer to that in II Timothy 1:8, "Don't be ashamed of the testimony," marturion. It's used in I John 5, "And this is the record." That word record is the word marturion. "This
is the witness that God has given life and that life is in His Son." So the word martuions used here refers to the gospel. When the gospel of Christ was settled in you then that grace was made yours.
So you have in verse 4 the divine side and in verse 6 the human response. You hear about saving grace and all that it is and you believed it and it was settled in your heart. And then the benefit became yours. Saving grace. All sin totally forgiven forever; no guilt ever yours again. What a fantastic thought. And that grace includes the pouring out of riches and more riches and more riches on your life for now and throughout eternity. That's the blessings of grace. And the grace equips you to do good deeds to men. That's the first benefit of being a saint.
Let me give you the second one. The first benefit is past tense. You received grace. Present tense, gifts. Verses 5 and 7, saving grace continues in the present and it manifests blessings through all the believer's life. Let's look at verse 5. This is so great. Just think of what you have in being a believer. "That in everything you are enriched." Did you know that you are enriched in everything? That's right. Do you know I Corinthians 4:8, this is a verse we really ought to plug into. It says, "And you are full and you are rich and you have reigned as kings." Isn't that fantastic? We have everything. You are enriched in everything by Him. And again it's the word en. It's e-n in the Greek. It's the preposition in. "You are enriched in Him in all utterance and in all knowledge."
Now hang on to this for a minute 'cause this is tremendously important. He says you are rich and you have everything. And, of course, where he says everything it's a qualified everything. It doesn't mean you have everything, literally everything everything. It means you have everything that you need. Does a Christian lack anything? No, according to II Peter 1:3 you have all things that pertain to life and godliness. You have all things. Keep that in mind. In Colossians 2:10 Paul says, "You are complete in Him." And that's fantastic. Ephesians 2 tells we're enriches with everything. And I like I Corinthians 3:21 where he says, "You have all things, and you are Christ's and Christ is God's." You have everything. You lack nothing. And then to pull out a few of those things that you have he says this: "You have all utterance and you have all knowledge." Two general benefits. You say you mean all utterance? Yeah, but it's a qualified all. You have all the utterance you need to do the job. Obviously we can't speak everything. You can't get up and talk about things you don't know, but we have all utterance to accomplish what God wants us to accomplish.
Now the utterance is to tell forth the truth. Now this to this Christian, this is so exciting: do you know that God has given you the capability and the capacity to speak the truth? That's right, and you know I think the biggest problem that Christians have apart from just the internal holiness, the biggest problem and the manifestation of their life is the ability to speak and they invariably say, "Well I don't think I can do it." Well actually it's a case of simply reading the verse that says, "You have been enriched in all utterance." You can do it. You have the ability to speak.
Listen to Acts 1:8, "But you shall receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be witnesses." Do you see that? There's aren't any options there, those are facts. You are a witness. You can speak. You've been given utterance. Chapter 2:4, "They were filled with the Holy Spirit and they spoke the word." Chapter 4 of Acts, verse 31, "And they met together and they prayed and they were filled with the Holy Spirit and they spoke the word with boldness." Do you have the Holy Spirit as a Christian? Can you respond to the Holy Spirit and be filled with the Spirit as a Christian? Yes! Then can you speak the word with boldness? Absolutely! You have all utterance.