Well, I invite you to turn tonight in your Bibles that are in front of you to the book of 1 Corinthians chapter 3, 1 Corinthians chapter 3. We're working through what we believe and what we confess tonight, and if you have those books in front of you, the forms and prayers book, I would ask you to please turn to Lord's day 25 in the back, page 226. We'll read that first, and then we'll read a section out of 1 Corinthians chapter 3. Again, that's page 226, Lord's Day 25, and we're moving into a section on the sacraments. This introduces it tonight to us, the means that the Lord uses to bless his church and to strengthen his church and to help his church and create faith. So we're going to say these four question answers together. I'll ask the question, and please respond tonight with the answer that is in front of you. Again, Lord's Day 25, page 226, question 65. It is by faith alone that we share in Christ and all his benefits. Where then does that faith come from? The Holy Spirit works it in our hearts by the preaching of the Holy Gospel and confirms it by the use of the holy sacraments. What are sacraments? Sacraments are visible, holy signs and seals. They were instituted by God so that by our use of them, He might make us understand more clearly the promise of the gospel and seal that promise. And this is God's gospel promise. He grants us forgiveness of sins, and eternal life by grace because of Christ's one sacrifice accomplished on the cross. Are both the Word and the sacraments then intended to focus our faith on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross as the only ground of our salvation? Yes, indeed. The Holy Spirit teaches us in the gospel and confirms by the holy sacraments that our entire salvation rests on Christ's one sacrifice for us on the cross. How many sacraments did Christ institute in the New Testament? Two, holy baptism and the Holy Supper. Now, in 1 Corinthians chapter 3 tonight, I'm going to be reading 1 through 15, 1 Corinthians chapter 3. It's found on page 1132. This is the word of the Lord. But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you're not ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way? For when one says, I follow Paul, and another, I follow Apollos, are you not being merely human? What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor. for we are God's fellow workers, you are God's field, God's building. According to the grace of God given me, like a skilled master builder, I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it, for no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now, if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one's work will become manifest for the day will disclose it because it will be revealed by fire and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If that work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. And there we'll end tonight the reading of God's Word. The practical question that we are exploring tonight in the Lord's Day that is in front of us, in Lord's Day 25, and looking at 1 Corinthians chapter 3, is really the question of what does God call us to use in the Christian ministry, and how are we to build in the Christian ministry? What are we to use and what is the best way to build the church, to build the kingdom? It's an important question that the Apostle's wrestling with. What are the consequences, you might say, of not using the right materials? As Paul uses a great building analogy, doesn't he? This is a really important point for the Apostle tonight because there's been so much confusion over how we do church, how we're supposed to do church. And sometimes I think we have so characterized things today as traditional and conservative and progressive and liberal and what gets lost is really, is there something that God has chosen that even our categories at times have not made clear that God has chosen for the church to use to build his kingdom in a way that is honoring and glorifying to him in true success? It's always been a struggle for the Christian church to appreciate what God put into place. This problem is just like every other aspect of life, isn't it? What's easy about the Christian life? Is there anything easy about this? You heard a whole sermon this morning talking about trust in the Lord and how we have to trust him in our personal lives in all circumstances as we're tried and tested. That is no less true for the church. the church faces the same pressures. The church faces the same pressures to do what is right in their own eyes, in its own eyes, to lead with and doing things that are right in its own eyes. The church faces a great pressure this way, and we've often given in to that pressure. We've said, well, you know, the way that God does things just could be a lot better, couldn't it? He could have done things better. And so we've tried to fix what we have been unhappy with in the way that God told us to minister in the church. And this is one of the things I think is very important for us to consider tonight because the challenges in our day are not any easier than previous generations. They're, in fact, I think in many ways more complicated and more difficult in our day. In light of the new challenges that happen, I think this is why there's been so much reaching with all the culture ideas to try to say, well, how can the church keep up with all this stuff? We have to change what we do. We've got to make some adjustments with our message. And we need to use different tools and resources to make this work. And this is not a sermon saying, I just like being a stuffy old traditionalist, by the way. That's not what this sermon is. That's not what we're after. I don't really care for stuffy old traditionalists. I don't want to be one. I want to be what God tells us to be. And I know that there's always a fight of the human heart, studying Israel and studying its history, against the ways of the Lord, to be satisfied with them. And that's what tonight we're exploring. What are the means of grace? What are the means? Maybe you've heard that phrase, boys and girls, a lot. We talk a lot about the means of grace. And what are you talking about when you talk about the means of grace? And it simply is what are the primary materials God told us to use to build the kingdom of God? That's really what we're looking at tonight. What did he choose? What are his ways when it comes to the church? What did he tell us to do principally? And matters of first importance. Sometimes people will say to me, well, you know, you put God in a box because you think he can't work outside of... I remember Reverend Cammingo used to use this. He'd say, whenever he had that, when somebody said, you put God in a box, he would always reply quickly, no, you put God in a box because you think he can't work outside of what you think are the solutions. He has told us what he wants us to do. And that's what we're looking at tonight. We're considering how faith is created. We're considering how people are actually saved. How does God do the work of saving people? What does God do to accomplish salvation in people's life? What does he use to accomplish that? That's what we're talking about when we're thinking about this issue of the means of grace. And that's exactly what Lord's Day 25 is all about tonight. The origin of faith, where does it come from? How does he create faith? And what is the object of our faith? This is what we're looking at tonight when we think about the means of grace from Lord's Day 25. And that's why I thought 1 Corinthians 3 might be a great help to us. Paul is addressing a sort of besetting sin in Corinth. You know that Corinth was a lot like the churches in California, if you will. It was known as a very full of sexual morality, all the places in Corinth. And it was like 1 California. many of the challenges in Corinth are so interesting in light of first century life compared to the day in which we live, it's important to look at and remember the struggles of Corinth. And the basic besetting sin of Corinth, the struggle in the church of Corinth was they were using worldly wisdom to do ministry. What works? It's pragmatism, of course. But what will work in the culture? What will make ministry a success in the culture? In this culture where we can't really talk about a crucified Savior. Nobody puts their gods on a cross in Rome. They build statues and show strength. That's not a message that will really work in this culture. They knew. They faced that. So, the problems that he's dealing with here in Corinth are many, and what began to happen is they began to look everywhere else to try to solve the dilemma of how to do ministry in first century life with all of the challenges of their society. And one of the particular problems was that they were looking to mere men to solve all their problems. There was pastor worship, there was hero worship, there was super pastors, and everyone had their own favorite pastor, and everyone had their own favorite idea. Everyone in Corinth was looking to the greatest gifts, tongue speaking. Everyone had their focus on the wrong things. And so here we notice in verse 1 what Paul says, brothers, I could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it, and even now you're not ready for you are still of the flesh for where there is jealousy and strife among you are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way that's a this is a really in your face kind of charge the apostle is making to this church isn't he um apostles looking at the church and saying you are you're still fleshly what he means is you're still very sinful and weak in the way you're looking at the whole design of Christian ministry. He addresses them as believers, but you'll notice here he goes on that I fed you with milk and not with solid food, for until now you couldn't receive it. That's been an interesting verse to think about. I've always heard people say that there's two kinds of churches out there. There's the milky churches and then the meaty churches, and you've got the milky churches that really just stay on the surface of everything, and then you've got the meaty churches that those baby Christians really couldn't handle because they're too in-depth about doctrine. You know, that's been the sort of way we've looked at these verses, and I've never been convinced that that's at all how Paul was saying this and when he wrote these things. Hebrews said something similar, you need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he's a child. Milk was never a good thing really in the scriptures. Solid food is for the mature. For those who have their powers of discernment, meat had to do with discernment. What was he saying? They couldn't receive his ministry. Why wouldn't they receive his ministry? Well, Paul just said, in the previous sections, God chose something very foolish to build the church. He says, it pleased God. Listen to this verse in 1 Corinthians 1. It pleased God through the foolishness, foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. Paul's been saying the whole time, This is God's power. This is God's wisdom, contrary, countercultural to the wisdom of the age. Look at all the wisdom of the age and all the ideas that come out. This is God's chosen wisdom. And so he labored to preach the cross and do it. What he was saying is, they didn't go on in that. What do I mean by that? The ministry of Jesus is a great treasury. It's a great blessing. We have this scripture. Think of Ruth this morning. Ruth is showing you a kinsman redeemer, working hard to labor to show you the struggle of Israel to receive their kinsman redeemer, to receive a story of one who would come and buy them and shed his blood for them. This is the story of Jesus through and through. Who's interested in that? It's never that we get milk, we get Jesus, and then move on to something else beyond that, some deeper idea of the Christian faith. What Paul's saying here is that when we grow in Christ, and we receive that milk, we grow into maturity, and that is the place we stay for growth. In other words, we never get beyond the basic message of the cross. We never get beyond the basic message of the cross. but we grow to maturity in its power. We grow to maturity in its power. It's exhilarating to study the Scriptures and see Jesus everywhere. It's wonderful to see the Lord's wisdom in crafting this Word and giving it to us to show the work of His Son. It's wonderful to see how the Scriptures all hold together by inspiration and to show this marvelous design of redemption, the story of redemption, so that we would understand and appreciate how good God has been to us. The more you grow in that, the more you grow in maturity. Paul is pressing this on them. Now this is why Lord's Day 65 is so helpful. Think about what it's asking here. It is by faith alone that we share in Christ and all of its benefits. Where does faith come from? Notice here, where does that faith that God creates by which we receive Christ and embrace Christ and all of the blessings that he has for us. How does God create that in the human heart? And you'll notice the beautiful answer here. The Holy Spirit works it in our hearts by the preaching of the gospel and confirms it by the use of the sacraments. So there's two things that the scriptures have constantly shown to us all over. As Paul had said to the Corinthians, that the primary way God creates faith is through the foolishness of the message preached to you. That's what he loves to do to create faith. There's no great evidence today, at least from the world, there's nobody out there saying, wow, a great thing's happening today. It'll never be like that. What we believe is that the whole of Christian life is lived by faith, from faith to faith, from growing from faith to faith, growing more in Christ that way. And Paul is saying that the Corinthian church was struggling with the basic message of Christ crucified. They were sacrificing the message and getting caught up in everything else. They were sacrificing that great power that the Lord had put in place. Now, they were looking for more, looking at the problems in chapter one. This was a church full of problems. They were following their pastors in chapter one. They were ripped apart with divisions. Remember, I follow Apollos and I have Cephas. They were talking about baptism. They were worried about the messenger himself in baptism. Well, I was baptized by Paul. You were baptized by Cephas. And Paul had to say, I had to stop baptizing because this got so bad. And then he said, you guys are using your human wisdom in your speech. You think that when you come to church, this is about entertaining you. And it's not about entertaining you. They were borrowing all the tactics of the world to try to make the gospel effective. And in that, they were stripping it of its power, Paul says. I think that's exactly, if you can't see this by now as mature Christians, you're missing the point of all of the scriptures. Think about this. When a man is preaching to you, the Apostle Paul would write later that they have a form of godliness, but they deny his power. You can hear it in the message. Where is the power to change a life? They've borrowed everything from the world to tickle ears. Paul says there's no power in that. There's no power of the scriptures and Jesus being brought to bear on the conscience so as to create faith. We believe today in the Christian church, almost universally, that the power is in the programs. The power's in the music. The power is in how I feel. The power is in what creates life in me and it's on our terms. And this is what Paul's saying. You're very carnal. I don't believe in carnal Christianity. He's saying you're fleshly. Where there's envy, strife, divisions, where you're having all this evidence of problems in the life of your church is because you're behaving like men in the way that you, mere men, in the way that you approach the ministry. While there's jealousy and strife, are you not of the flesh and behaving only a human way? Some of you are saying, I'm of Paul and I'm of Apollos. That's carnal. that's fleshly. You'll see that there in the first verses. If you think like that, if you think that the power is in the man, think the power is in the human wisdom to build Christianity, to make it something that will be acceptable, you're an infant in the faith. You've not moved on in maturity. You're not growing in the power of God. I think that's a really important point for us today. For I think still, even in a church that was, when was this established? In the 50s? We might still have people who say, you know, I just wish we would do something better. I wish we could make this a little more lively. I wish I felt differently. I wish I had more. Just seems like everyone else out there has more. Paul says that's infancy. It's time to move on. It's time to move on in the power of the gospel. It's time to have your minds engaged with the scriptures and be confronted with this great drama of redemption that's all over the pages. Yeah, it takes work. Yeah, it takes a mind to engage. Yeah, you've got to give yourself to God's word. There is real movement and growth and power in this message. And that's why the catechism says this is the power of God to create faith. Faith in the heart. The Corinthians thought they were wise and mature by adopting all the human wisdom of the day. And Paul's been saying, no, no. Notice how he says, I planted a pulse water. You forget who gives the growth here. God's the one giving the growth in the ministry. God's the one creating faith in the heart in the ministry. We're just ministers. We're just stewards. We're just, I don't know if James Boyce used to say, we're just postmen. We deliver the mail and we can't take out your bills. Did you know that? I got to deliver the bills too. I got to deliver the bad IRS mail too, don't I? We've got to deliver the whole truth, the whole counsel. And the fact is, is when we do that, this is God's chosen means. To create faith in you and your children's hearts. But you have to trust the Lord in that. Just like in your personal lives and everything, you have to trust the Lord. You have to trust the Lord in his ways of ministry. It's difficult, isn't it? It's challenging for us. That's why the church is so divided across the way and trying to find something they think will work. This is one of the most understood aspects of church life, I think. All success, all growth, all progress, all that you're after for your Christianity belongs to him for the result. So do what he says. Do what honors him. He's not going to take Gideon's army and take 3,000 to battle and show that it's in the strength of an army to win. He's going to take 300 that lap like dogs to prove a point. The point is simple. Ministry is not in any way dependent even on the one who is preaching or upon those who plant. It's dependent upon the one who waters. So use what he told you to use. This is what Jesus was saying in the Great Commission. Go and preach and teach and baptize. make disciples that way. Now this takes us tonight to this means of ministry. Paul's working hard on this point. When Christ said that, he's thinking a lot about that. And now in verses 10 or 11, he moves. He says, according to the grace of God given to me, he wants to switch now to this helpful analogy, this comparison, so that we would understand the consequences of this. He says in verse 10, according to the grace of God given to me, look at this. Like a skilled master builder, I laid a foundation and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. What a statement. He goes on, you know, we are God's field. God's building. Paul's describing something similar, something familiar to them that they knew about. He's using the language of a grand building project, and we know what that looks like. We've got one going up, and it takes a lot of care to build this thing correctly, doesn't it? A lot went into this. You have to work hard. There's a lot of skill that's required in terms of craftsmen and those who take part in the building project. As a matter of fact, according to a contract of the day, here it was, an ancient contract of the time. He shall work continually, hire enough skilled craftsmen, and is warned along the way with any who take part in the work against dealing fraudulently. In these contracts, there was a warning. Be careful how you're building on the foundation. Inspector would come along. He would look. And he would look at the buildings being built according to specifications. We know this. What he's saying here is God allows subcontractors. These subcontractors are Paul and Apollos. And they're preachers of the word. And then these preachers are sent. And we minister the word and we teach the word and we baptize. The church must be built, what Paul's saying is, with great care. If God is sovereign over the whole work, if God is the Lord over the whole work, he wants us to think about, okay, how do we build on this great foundation who is Jesus? Whoever takes up the role of the building project and to have a work in God's kingdom, think of all these people who say, I'm going to work in God's kingdom. I'm going to be a part of God's kingdom. That's wonderful. So what do we build with? Well, there's a foundation that's laid. It's Jesus. What is that foundation? It's built upon a message, a message of the gospel. It's the message of a dying Savior on a cross and a risen Savior in glory. It's a message that is life-changing. It's a message that changes the world. It's a message that gets into your hearts and changes your lives. So, whatever is added to the foundation cannot, as one pastor said, exceed the limits, or introduce confusion that would change the character of the building so as to threaten its eventual collapse. You can't build on top of the foundation with something that won't support it. So this is exactly what he's saying. The point is, Jesus has come. Jesus has lived. Jesus has died. The message of Christ crucified is that foundation. And Paul says, let each one take care how he's building. What was Paul dealing with? Well, people wanted to build with everything that was wrong. People wanted to build and use human innovation. They were using the wrong materials. How will our gospel make such advance in an innovative culture? Think of the challenges today. In a technological culture, we say first century wasn't full of technology like this. And is technology bad? Technology is not bad. Until it removes the pulpit. Until it becomes a great show. Until we've turned it into a drama. Until we've made it look like a play. All of which was in the first century. See, we're doing the very same things. How will the gospel be successful in this culture? We're so worried about that. how's faith created? How's faith created? It pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. What have we done to preaching? So I'm thankful for the church because we love preaching, but I'm saying, in general, we've not had a lot of confidence in it. You ever think tonight, it was Pastor Voss said it years ago, how do you know the Lord wouldn't create faith tonight in your child's heart. Remember who said that when I was in seminary thinking, well, it might be good for my kids to be at evening church. This is what the Lord does. Are the people confident in that? You see, this is important. What is God accomplishing in the ministry? I think question 60 is so helpful. You know, what are sacraments? Isn't this beautiful? Sacraments are visible and holy signs and seals. They were instituted by God so that by our use of them, what's he going to do? That he might make us understand more clearly the promise of the gospel. What's the gospel? What's the gospel promise? Here it's all summarized. This is why I love this question and answer. It's almost as if I think the authors of the Heidelberg were right on here when they summarize all the promises of Scripture in two. This is beautiful. He grants the forgiveness of sins and everlasting life. Do you know God wants to strengthen your faith, help you every week when you come together and reassure you in all these wonderful promises that he's given you? And what is the summary of them? I want you to know, says the Lord. I promise I've forgiven all your sins. I want you to know that I have everlasting life for you. And you want to be entertained? You see? It's hard when everything else is the emphasis today. Whoever says, I want to come take the supper. Whoever says, I want to see a baptism that signs and seals God's covenant love to our children. whoever says i want to eat the bread and drink of the cup that signs and seals the broken body and the shed blood of our savior for us what do they say when they want to come to church what do they want what do you want what do i want see why it's important tonight sacraments are intended to focus your hearts on jesus as confirming the word that shows you jesus and how great his steadfast love is to you. How wonderful that love is to you. And he wants us growing in that. He wants us filled with that. He wants us to appreciate that. He wants us to engage our minds and be filled with the wonders of his covenant love. He wants us to engage our minds and let the love of the gospel fill us so that we are growing and marveling in his wondrous works and wondrous ways, studied by those who take pleasure in them. It's hard when everything else is the emphasis today, isn't it? And great pressure is put on us. What will make and break the church? What do you want to fill in that you think will make and break the church? I could go through a list, but I won't. I already probably have. Paul leaves a sobering warning on this. If anyone builds on the foundation, notice this, with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw. Each one's work will become manifest. I want you to notice what he says here. This is really important in verse 13. Each one's work will become manifest for the day will disclose it because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one's done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. What Paul is saying is this. Some are building with the right materials. And the day is going to show it. It may not show it right now. We don't know what that's all going to look like and how many have been brought into the kingdom through the ministry of the gospel. But when people are building with the gospel, people are building with the word of God, when people are focused on the message, when people are focused on the means, you watch what that day is going to show. It's going to be a great reaping. It's going to be a great reward. I think it's what Paul was saying. You're my reward. He's going to look out and see all these people he ministered to who heard the gospel, and he stayed focused on preaching the word in season, out of season, and a great harvest came in. But you never saw it when you're doing it because it's tough work. It's trench work. Ministry's trench work. But the day of judgment will also reveal something else. That a lot of what is so-called ministry has been building with everything that's wrong. And that will all be burnt up. That's a lot of time and effort and energy wasted. Wasted. There will be work that endures and work that won't. and even very sincere people. I think this is what Paul's saying. Sincere people who will be in the kingdom, escaping, but whose work didn't accomplish what it should have because they used all the wrong materials. Notice this in what's being said here in the last question and answer, verse 67. Are both the word and sacraments then intended to focus our faith on the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross as the only ground of our salvation? Yes, indeed. The Holy Spirit teaches us in the gospel and confirms it by the holy sacraments. Listen to this. That our entire salvation rests on Christ's one sacrifice for us on the cross. All of ministry is intended to be focused. That's a great word. Focused. Ministry has to be focused. On what? what the word and the sacraments intended to show you? Jesus. Jesus. Take heed how you build is what he's saying here. The intention of Christian ministry is to fill you with Jesus and to be growing in him. I think that's why Paul said in Ephesians, I have a great prayer for the church. I want the church to be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. This is how that is achieved. Build with it. Be confident in it as a church. It's a great witness. May the beauties of the message of Christ and him crucified fill us every week. May we love to come to church to receive his grace. May we have our hearts prepared to discern from the wonders of this word, all the treasures that are shown to us of his beloved son from Ruth. And go on in it. Grow in it. It fills your life with praise. when you see the word showing you Jesus and you see the great inspiration of the spirit that is intended to focus your faith on him so that you would be spiritually satisfied and filled, enjoy this great journey. That's what the ministry is all about. That's what he wants for you. What a God. He wants you to know tonight your sins are forgiven and you have everlasting life. You still want to be entertained? I don't think so we'll leave that to the world to try to do show us Jesus show us Jesus it's where the power is and let us rest satisfied in him let's pray together tonight Heavenly Father thank you for your word that helps us and strengthens us and fills us with delight that our hearts and faith are focused on the one sacrifice of Jesus for us on the cross. Give us confidence in this. It's not just looking at others and saying what they're doing and critiquing them. May we have the proper hearts that appreciate your ministry. Then, O Lord, as we've learned to trust you in this life, we will trust you in the church and trust your ways and on that day, see how great a reward will be reaped of so many, a number of so many that it can't be numbered. People praising you and acknowledging you and giving you thanks for the precious blood of the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Thank you, O Lord, for this day of rest and gladness. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.