Tuesday 24th May - 1 Corinthians 4

Today’s chapter is 1 Corinthians 4, you can read it here

Tom writes:

Paul continues the same argument. We are back with the delivery man and the ming vase. We are just servants. We have been entrusted with deeply precious things, even secret things. These precious and secret things have unrivaled power. They have the only power that can really change things and so it’s imperative that we simply serve them up, that we deliver them intact. And - this is the crucial thing - because we live in a hostile and foolish world, doing that exacts a heavy toll on us. To minister pure unadulterated Kingdom into people brings us into disrepute. We become dishonoured. We are slandered. We get treated like scum. The huge temptation when being treated like this is to talk ourselves up, to turn our mission into sounding clever or looking good. The huge temptation is to hype. But true servants of the Kingdom come out in a rash when they smell a whiff of hype. Now I know how controversial that is when church culture has become obsessed with creating a “worshipful atmosphere”, of “winning others”, of “raising the faith” of the flock. None of those things are problems as long as they sit in their proper place, but our obsession with them has become like idolatry and so we shun the slightest suspicion of having to suffer or feel dumb.

You can experience the power of God among smoke machines and flashing lights, we all know that. But they do sometimes get in the way. More normal is to experience the power of God while feeling stupid on the streets or paying a heavy price to minister Jesus to some friends. We need to rewrite the narrative, recast the vision of what it looks like to be mature in Christ. The “way of life” of a mature believer isn’t prancing from one “supernatural” experience to another but it is rolling from one grubby moment to another, doing your best to  get out of the way, serve up Jesus, and praying for God’s extraordinary power to break in. When we pray for others is where this really shows itself. When we lay a hand on a shoulder do we click straight into speaking - thinking the person needs to be soothed or directed by what we say? Or do we act as a delivery man, delivering Jesus to the person and trusting his power to do the job? The latter leaves us open to looking foolish if “nothing happens”. But it also gives the space for “kingdom power” to do its job.