Build Carefully

September 29, 2024|Build Carefully|1 Corinthians 3:10-23

John-Daniel Cutler

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This morning we continue our Life in the Church series through 1 Corinthians. Having made our way through the first 9 verses of chapter 3 so far, today we will finish out our study of chapter 3. As a way of introduction, I want to briefly touch on what we saw last week. 

Last week we looked at the strong words from Paul to the Corinthian believers concerning their maturity in Christ, specifically, their lack of growth since he had left them. It is estimated to have been about 5-7 years since Paul had left the Corinthian church and much to his surprise, from the letter and the reports he had gotten, they had not progressed or grown much in the faith at all. 

Now, they thought they had. They had taken to attaching themselves to various teachers as evidence of their maturity. Some claimed to be disciples of Peter, some of Paul, some of Peter, and others seemingly refused to acknowledge any one’s contribution to the church outside of Christ’s. Over the last couple of weeks, we have seen that Paul has diagnosed the primary problem as bringing the world’s wisdom into the church and trying to judge by it. 

Last week Paul landed the blow that had been building in the letter. 

1 Corinthians 3:1-3 (ESV) 1 But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. 2 I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready, 3 for you are still of the flesh.

In verse 5 Paul turns their attention away from their teachers and on to themselves.

(ESV) 9 For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field

Paul says, yes I planted, yes Apollos watered, but don’t you understand it is God who gave the growth? We are nothing but laborers, servants of God. You think you are honoring us by elevating one over the other, but you are missing, first, that God gets all the credit, and two, God will do the determining of what wages the worker deserves, not you. 

What is Paul trying to do here? The greater context of last week's verses as well as this week's verses is Paul’s objective to dissuade them from putting their faith and hope in men rather than God. Whether it is Paul or Apollos or Cephas, or anyone else, there is only one foundation for the church and everything comes from Him and is weighed against Him. 

At the end of verse 9 Paul switches metaphors. 

1 Corinthians 3:9 (ESV) 9 For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.

Paul continues a similar application from his agricultural metaphor to his architectural one in the rest of chapter 3, it is God’s building just as it is God’s field, Paul is a worker in that building, just as he was a worker in God’s field. But within this greater context Paul issues a warning. He is going to use the idea of building to help the Corinthians and us see that we must build carefully in the church. It matters what we do in regards to the way we contribute to the body. 

Listen, believer, it matters how you interact with and contribute to the body of Christ. Otherwise Paul’s warning that each man must be careful how he builds on it wouldn’t be much of a warning. 

This morning I want to give you three statements built around Paul’s warning (pun intended) that we must build carefully. 

If you haven’t already, open your bibles to 1 Corinthians 3 at verse 10. 

Let’s read verse 10 together. 

1 Corinthians 3:10 (ESV) 10 According to the grace of God given to 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. 

Every Christian is called to be a builder in the church. 

There are two principles at operation here that we need to unpack. 

The first is Paul’s statement at the end of verse 9. You are God’s building.

The point here is that God is the owner of both the field and the building. The people of God belong to God. The reality of the church is that, although we talk about autonomous and independent local bodies, although we govern ourselves in matters of practice, we do not belong to ourselves, but to God. This is the reality of who the church is. 

The Bible uses many metaphors to talk about the church. 

It is God’s field, it is God’s building, it is God’s temple, a dwelling place for God, the body of Christ, the household of God; to name some of the most common NT phrases. 

This is pretty easy for us to understand, and yet the Corinthians seemed to be missing it, didn’t they?

I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, I am of Cephas. Right?

Before we can talk about who does what in the church, we have to recognize the fundamental truth that it all belongs to God. Christ is the head of the church. 

Why is this important? Because whatever you contribute to in the church, whatever you are responsible for building, ultimately is not built for yourself, but for God.

If we set out to build a name for ourselves, if we set out to build up our own little kingdom, if we set out to build for ourselves and our ends, we will have already missed the whole purpose and reason for laboring within the church. 

Now, although Paul’s primary subject is preachers and teachers, do not think that the warning of verse 10 does not apply to you. 

(ESV) Let each one take care how he builds upon it. 

This is the second principle at operation here. 

According to scripture, you are both part of the building and tasked with building it. 

Listen to what Paul says in Ephesians 4.

Ephesians 4:11-12 (ESV) 11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ,

He goes on…

Ephesians 4:15-16 (ESV) 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

Paul tasks the individual saints with the collective work of ministry, for building up the body. 

He says that when each part of the whole body is working properly, it makes the body grow so that it builds itself up. This is the responsibility and calling of every Christian who makes up the body of Christ. We are all collectively called to labor in the building up of the church whether we use the imagery of a body or a building.

Jude, in his letter reminds us that we also additionally are called to build up ourselves. 

Jude 1:20-21 (ESV) 20 But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, 21 keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.

These words are not written to just the leaders in the church, just the elders and deacons, but as Jude puts it in his opening words, ​​(ESV) To those who are called, beloved in God the Father and kept for Jesus Christ:

Understanding that Paul’s warning then is applicable to every Christian, what does he say?

Let each one take care how he builds upon it. 

Take care- may be translated take heed, or must be careful-

The idea of the greek word is- to turn the thoughts or direct the mind to a thing, to consider, contemplate, 

Let me give you a real world example. As many of you know, Brittany and I work in a place that makes large batches of dough. In bread making the measurements are precise and weighed out to the gram. If we get in a hurry or get too comfortable, sometimes there is a mistake. Recently, someone else had measured some ingredients out for us and when we mixed the dough, we could immediately tell something was off. We had to stop, weigh the dough and start trying to figure out what measurement was off. Fortunately, we were able to figure out where it went wrong, make adjustments and get back on track. But what do you think we told our employees?

You have to be more careful. You have to double check your measurements, you have to make sure you are paying close attention during the whole process. 

In the same way, Paul wants everyone in the Corinthian church to stop and take a careful look at how they are contributing to the church. He warns us that we must be careful how we build. 

You cannot abdicate your responsibility to build in the church either in your own life, or in the life of the church. 

Don’t think for a minute that refusing to contribute is not building. 

What you do or don’t do, what you choose or don’t choose has implications for you, for your neighbors, for your children, and for your church. 

Everyone Christian is building, for good or for bad, Paul’s command  is don’t be careless in it. 

Maybe this is the first time you are hearing that you have a responsibility to build in the church, to labor among God’s people, and you are thinking, I don’t know how to do that. I haven’t given much thought to that. Maybe you have always kind of assumed that building, laboring in the church was the job of those who work at the church, and now you're thinking, how do I do that? 

Here’s the good news, Paul is going to tell us, which brings us to our next statement. 

Every Christian should understand how to build in the church. 

After issuing one of the few imperatives, one of the few commands in this whole section of scripture, be careful how you build, Paul is going to give us three reasons why we must be careful. I believe, in understanding why we must be careful, we can also learn how we are to build. 

Let’s pick up in verse 11. 

1 Corinthians 3:11-17 (ESV) 11 For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— 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 has done. 14 If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.

16 Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.

The first reason Paul says each of us must be careful is that there is only one foundation in the church. Jesus Christ. 

In verse 10 Paul tells us that he was the one who laid the foundation in the Corinthian church when he came to Corinth and preached ‘Christ and him crucified’. 

Like a skilled master builder. This word is where we get our English word architect from, but it is more than that. The idea is someone who both designs and oversees the actual building process itself. 

But just to further squash any unnecessary division over who's who in the church, he says that his labor was according to the grace of God given to me. He says, I proclaimed to you Christ, the foundation of the church and you believed, the church was established, but it was all by the grace of God. 

Paul reminds the Corinthians that you cannot lay a foundation over a foundation. There is only one foundation. So everything we do in the church must connect to the foundation, who is Jesus Christ. We cannot build on anything else and still consider it to be a part of the church. 

A few of us went to a seminar this past week and there was much discussion around our table, in particular, about volunteers in the church. The main question was ‘should we use non-believing attenders in volunteer roles’? There were differing opinions about whether it helps connect them or if it actually does more harm than good, but in light of this text, we have to ask, if they were the best volunteers ever, but are not connected to the very foundation, which is Christ, what are they building on? 

Christ has to be at the center of everything that we do here, whether it is rocking babies or opening doors for people. 

Why you do what you do is in some ways more important than what you do. 

When it comes to what you do in the church, what foundation are you building on?

Do you serve because you want recognition or acclaim? 

To make yourself feel better? 

To somehow earn favor with God? 

All of these are false foundations and in reality contribute nothing to the church in any meaningful way. No one can lay a foundation other than that which has been laid. 

Everyone of us needs to evaluate ourselves and what we are doing and whether it is driven by and done for Jesus Christ or for some other reason. 

Paul’s second reason is more detailed. In essence, he says not all work is of the same quality. 

12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—

Let’s assume you are building on the right foundation, not all labor is the same. 

Paul works from the most precious to the least precious in his list.

The first thing we need to understand is that Paul is not addressing the quantitative nature of our work but the qualitative nature of it. 

Gold and straw is not preaching for 40 years vs teaching a 2-3 year old class.

A man can preach for forty years and it amounts to straw or stubble, and a man can lead a weekly devotional for 12 people and it be gold. God does not and is not impressed by the amount of work we do. 

The second thing we need to understand is that there is no reason for us to try and allegorize these elements and try and figure out what kind of work, or building is better.

The test is not what men think about what you are doing or even what you think about what you are doing, but what it turns out to be in the end. 

1 Corinthians 3:13 (ESV) 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 has done.

Each one’s work will become manifest- plainly known. It will become evident to all. There won’t be any question. 

Why? Because it will be revealed by fire, that is the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. 

Fire in this case is not punitive, but purifying and revealing.

How do we know? There are two reasons to hold to this interpretation. One, because the word translated in the ESV as ‘sort of work’ deals with the quality of something. It is a figurative refining fire where Gold and silver are purified and wood and hay are burned up. Two, because the Bible says that they will be saved but suffer loss. Your salvation is not dependent on your work, and even if everything you did was found to be hay and stubble, what a great loss, to have your life count for nothing eternally, but the loss of your salvation is plainly not in view here, this much Paul makes clear.  

So first, be careful how you labor in the kingdom, how you build in God’s building, because there is only one foundation upon which anything can truly be built. 

Second, be careful how you build because not everything you do will withstand the test of the day of the Lord, only that which is truly precious will endure. 

Thirdly, Paul says in verse 16-17 is that God cares deeply for his temple. 

1 Corinthians 3:16-17 (ESV) 16 Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.

Paul’s point is that the church is not just a building, but the very temple of God. 

In the Old Testament, God was fiercely protective of his physical temple, why do we think he would be any less protective of his spiritual temple?

I believe this reason is aimed at those who would try to infiltrate the church and lead her astray, corrupting her purpose and thinking, not Christians whose works are not as precious as they think they are. But the point is the same. 

You should be careful about how you labor in God’s temple, because it is holy and set apart by God and for God. God will not look the other way while you harm his temple. 

It’s not hard to see from these verses that Paul took the actions of believers seriously. There are eternal ramifications for what we do in the church. It matters. 

I can’t imagine any genuine Christian who wants to be standing before their Lord and Savior in a pile of ashes because everything they did for Christ amounted to wood and straw. 

I know that I pray amid the things that I have done in the church of Jesus Christ that there will be some things that are genuine, Christ-centered, God-honoring, precious things that will stand in the day of our Lord. I have no doubt that some things will be burned up because of my motive, or because I didn’t work unto the Lord, but I pray that my life will have mattered in and for the kingdom of God. I can’t imagine that you don’t feel the same way. 

So how? How do we work in such a way that we can build in the church in a way that lasts? This brings us to our last statement. 

Every Christian needs the wisdom of God to build in the church. 

Paul concludes this section with two commands, one in verse 18 and one in verse 21. Let’s read those final verses of chapter 3 together now, beginning in verse 18.

1 Corinthians 3:18-23 (ESV) 18 Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is folly with God. For it is written, “He catches the wise in their craftiness,” 20 and again, “The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.” 21 So let no one boast in men. For all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, 23 and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.

Paul brings the conversation back to the contrast between man’s wisdom and God’s wisdom he has been discussing since chapter 1. 

Where does this idea of wisdom make its way into the conversation about building on the foundation of Christ? In the very beginning. 

(ESV) 10 According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation

The word skilled is the word for wisdom, translated as skilled to emphasize the idea of applying wisdom to the task of building. Where did this wisdom come from? The grace of God. 

Here is Paul’s challenge to the Corinthians. If you are going to genuinely contribute to the building of the church, you need the wisdom of God. Building in any other way is to deceive yourself. If you think you are wise enough in your own wisdom; if you think you know the best way to labor in the kingdom because you are smart enough or wise enough, Paul says you are deceived. Here’s the command if that is you. Let him become a fool.

Literally, become foolish. 

This hardly seems like solid biblical counsel, does it? Unless we understand it in the greater context of what Paul has been teaching.

(ESV) 2:14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him

Paul is saying that those who think they are wise in the world’s wisdom, will actually have to become foolish according to the world, in order to experience the wisdom of God. 

Think about it this way, if the very foundation of the church is considered foolish by the world, which Paul has already established (ESV) we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, then why would we think that anything that is built on that foundation would not be folly to the world?

Listen, if the way we organize, labor, serve, gather, makes sense to the world, we are probably not doing it right. 

If a lost person can look at your life and say, I get it, makes sense to me, then you are probably in trouble. 

This is why we need the wisdom of God.

Losing your life in order to gain it doesn’t make any sense to the world. 

Embracing suffering at the hands of the world to follow Christ doesn’t make any sense to the world.

Sacrificially serving those who cannot repay it, does not make any sense to the world. 

Honoring God with the best portion of your time, your talents, and your treasure doesn’t make any sense to the world. 

Listen, as a woman in today’s world, choosing to not pursue a self-satisfying, successful career in order to pour your life into your husband, kids, and home doesn’t make any sense. And God help any public figure that tries to say otherwise. 

As a man, refusing to climb the corporate ladder because it would cost you investing in your family or gathering with the saints, would seem ludicrous to the world. 

As a child, saying no to an invitation to join a team, to attend an event, or to play in a tournament because it interferes with church, even in the church today, is seen as radical. Why?

Because too many of us, like the Corinthians, are satisfied being infants in Christ, building in ourselves and in the body of Christ things that will not last the day, like little children on the beach making sandcastles that will not survive the tide. 

You may be thinking, Pastor that sounds hard. Welcome to following Christ. 

But you may be thinking, I can’t do that. I know Paul did, and I know Peter did, I know men and women that have come before us have, but they must have had something more than I have. I’ve got good and bad news for you from the Apostle Paul. 

The good news, is that according to Paul’s words here, you have everything you need. 

1 Corinthians 3:21-23 (ESV) For all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, 23 and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.

In the immediate context, Paul is saying that all of the teachings and teachers they are trying to divide up over belong to them, because they belong to Christ, and Christ is God’s. But Paul goes further. Things of the world or life or death or the present or the future. 

Friends, if you are in Christ, you have everything you need to follow Christ, because you are his and he is yours. You are indwelt with the very Spirit of God who knows the mind of God. 

What could you possibly lack?

The bad news is that means you are choosing to not live and build in a way that will last, in a way that will make an impact for the kingdom of God, because you are using the world’s wisdom to dictate how you live, how you serve, and how you follow Christ. 

As we have looked over Paul’s words to the Corinthians I hope you have understood clearly that…

As a believer, you are called to labor in and for the kingdom. You are called to build. 

So you should be careful how you build, making sure you are building on Christ, that you are building with materials that will last, and that you are honoring the fact that both you and the rest of the church belong to God. 

And finally, that you absolutely need God’s wisdom if you are going to be a skilled builder in the house of God.  

 As individuals, I pray that you take Paul’s warning seriously today. That you would ask yourself, am I trying to follow Christ in the wisdom of the world or have I embraced the seemingly upside down and foolish, to the world, wisdom of God?

There is only one foundation on which anything has a chance of lasting, and that foundation is the person and work of Jesus Christ. No other foundation will stand. 

Not a foundation of your good works, not a foundation of your morality, not a foundation of your religious devotion. 

Jesus Christ died for our sin, making a way for man to be reconciled to God through his atoning work on the cross. He paid the penalty for our sin and by faith freely gives us his righteousness that we may stand before God one day, clothed not in what we deserve but in the gracious righteousness of Christ, forgiven, reconciled, saved. If you are building your life on anything else, I pray that God would show you the truth today. 

As a church, we are here today because someone laid the foundation of Jesus Christ and him crucified. We get the chance to build on that foundation daily, may we all build in such a way that what we build will survive the day of our Lord.