With God
This past weekend, Pastor Ryan taught from 1 Corinthians 7:17-24. So much can be learned from this passage about remaining in Christ, regardless of our circumstances. Yet two little words at the end of verse 24 provide a wealth of hope, wisdom, and direction for followers of Jesus. Those two words are: with God. 1 Corinthians 7:24 says, “So, brothers, in whatever condition each was called, there let him remain with God.” Oh what an incredible comfort those two words bring to the soul of a believer who is longing for intimacy with his or her Lord.
So what does it really mean to be “with God”? I can recall times in my life when the shame of sin caused me to resist honesty and vulnerability with God, and yet, my soul still longed for intimacy with him. I was afraid to face my selfish decisions, yet my Savior was wooing me to himself with his love, mercy, and grace. He longed for me to be “with him”. Have you ever had the experience where you can barely look yourself in the mirror, and yet, you know that your Abba is standing there with open arms calling out, “Come, my child, be with me… abide in my love.”
One definition of intimacy says that it is a state of being fully known. When we are fully known, we have nothing to hide. This is why the word intimacy is often used to describe sexual relations. Two people are willing to be fully naked with each other with nothing to hide. Intimacy with God however goes even deeper to the in-most depths of our soul. All of our sorrows, anguish, fears, joys, hopes, and expectations are revealed to God with honesty and transparency. There is no fear of judgment and no concern about getting it right. We just long to be with our God.
Henri Nouwen says, “Intimacy is not a happy medium. It is a way of being in which the tension between distance and closeness is dissolved and a new horizon appears. Intimacy is beyond fear.” You see, when we experience full intimacy with God, all fear is gone because we fully trust him. We have come to a place of surrender regardless of our circumstances. We relinquish our will to him and nothing matters except for being in his presence. This is the gift that your Abba is holding out to you. Do you long to be with your God?
Lynette Fuson
Director of Care & Counseling
Bound By?
1 Corinthians 7:22
For he who was called in the Lord as a bondservant is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise, he who was free when called is a bondservant of Christ.
Do you feel free? The question is broad and the simple answer is yes, of course. I remember the freedom of riding my bike and feeling like I was invincible until a crash with another bike and I realized I needed to pay more attention! Do you remember when you first got your driver's license? For me, it was a feeling of freedom, I could now go wherever I wanted. Of course, I was bound by the rules of my parents, the state laws, and the cost of gas. The freedom I thought I had, was still tied to so many other factors. I was not free in an actual sense. In Corinth, Paul had to address the real issue of freedom and slavery in the congregation.
In Galatians, Paul had to deal with the bondage of tradition and desperately wanted the people to accept their freedom (Galatians 5). However, that was more heritage and the sign of Abraham than the issue in Corinth. Jesus talked about freedom in John 8, which had more to do with being a slave to sin than to man. That is what makes this passage unique. Paul uses some reverse thinking to get the whole congregation on the same page. Jesus determines who we are, so if we were a slave, we are now free. If you were free, then you are now a slave to Christ. He does this to help people understand that their current circumstances (it could be traditional, spiritual, or cultural) might make things difficult or painful, but we have to trust in Christ. Of course, when I think about Paul's statement in light of the desire of being free from slavery, this is not the answer I would want from him. Yet he says something profound that is needed to hear his advice. We all are bound to Christ, we are all under his authority for eternity. Whatever position you are in now remember it is temporary. The freedom we find in Jesus allows us to face the struggle of circumstance because he redeems the hope for the future.
So back to my first question, do you feel free? Here is what I would like you to do: Take a moment and talk to Jesus about what he has done to set you free. Next, take a moment to talk to Jesus about where maybe something still has you bound, confess it, and ask him to help you find freedom. As always, we are here to talk and pray, to help where we can. Praying for you all.
Jeremy Johnson
Family Pastor
The Vicious Spiral of Obedient Love!
Some things don’t matter and some things really matter.
Sometimes the things that don’t matter get the most fuss and attention.
Sometimes the things that really matter get neglected.
Paul writes about this tendency in 1 Corinthians 7. People were getting caught up in debates about different kinds of status: circumcised or not, enslaved or not, married or not. In verse 19 he writes about what is important, “Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but what matters is the keeping of the commandments of God.”
Paul said almost the exact same thing in Galatians 5:6, “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.”
This devotional is badly named. The term vicious spiral is there to invoke the image of a scenario in which one action cascades and builds upon another. A vicious cycle (or spiral) represents things progressively getting worse and worse. I see the Scriptures describing obedience in a similar spiraling way, but without it being mean, vicious, or negative. Paul says what matters is keeping God’s commandments, which he explains means a life of faith expressing itself through love towards God and others. Jesus further emphasizes what obedience looks like in John 15:17 when he point-blank explains obedience, “This is my command: Love each other.”
Obeying God’s commands looks like loving people. This is what really matters! Pray that our church might spiral in obedient love.
John Riley
Junior High Pastor
Limitless Limits
“Only, as the Lord has assigned to each one, as God has called each, in this manner let him walk.” (1 Corinthians 7:17)
In tomorrow’s devotional, Pastor John Riley is going to share with us what it means to walk with God. But for today I want to think together about the circumstantial limits we sometimes put on ourselves, limits that lead us to believe we are not in a position to “walk well”.
A rather famous saying around Emmanuel Faith is, “Do the next right thing.” I wonder, are there ever any external limitations that prevent this from happening? It seems the Corinthians would have said, “Yes.” In fact, I think we can discern from the text that there are some in the church who believe they cannot walk well unless and until they are no longer slaves. And while it’s not in this week’s passage specifically, I don’t think it a far stretch to say there are others who think they can’t “walk well” until they are married, or maybe even until they are divorced.
A challenge for all of us, when we experience the Lord assigning situations we find uncomfortable or undesirable, is to avoid going to a place where we feel comfortable making excuses for our lack of obedience. It’s as if we say, “Well if He really wanted me to obey, He wouldn’t have ordained this. He knows obedience is literally impossible right now.” The biggest problem with this line of thinking is simply that Paul refutes it!
The reality is this -- if God knew there to be some particular set of circumstances He could send our way which would make obedience impossible, He would then be guilty of deceiving us as well as setting us up for failure. Fortunately, that is not who He is. And because that is not who He is, we are presented with this challenge from verse 17 -- rather than looking at our lives in order to identify all of the (perceived) barriers to obedience, we are to look for all of the opportunities for obedience. And there is a gazillion! Emmanuel Faith, we are called to “walk well” as we travel the road the “Lord has assigned” to us. Sometimes that is easier said than done.
I don’t know what limits have been placed on you right now, but I do know the opportunities for obedience, the opportunities to do the “next right thing,” are limitless. It might take a perspective shift to see them, but they are there.
My prayer for you and for me today is that God will open our eyes to the boundless opportunities for obedience and for “walking well,” regardless of what obstacles we might face. And why would I pray this? Because I know, as do you, that it is in obedience to Him that we come to know Him better. And I know we all want that!
Scott Smith
Connection and Growth Pastor
First of Their Kind
It was 1989 when my parents, my brother, and I decided to follow Jesus. We didn’t know it at the time, but our decision isolated our family from most of our relatives and friends. All of a sudden, our grandparents weren’t welcoming us to their house any longer, our relatives stopped inviting us to their parties, and our friends began to make fun of us. This was a very tough season for my family, and we didn’t know how to react or what to do in order to be accepted. But we weren’t the only ones. In 1990, in Mexico, less than 5% of the population was Protestant and most evangelicals back then shared similar experiences to ours. I know it sounds terrible, but as I recall, it wasn’t as bad as it sounds. Certainly, our social lives were drastically changed as we became “Hermanos” but God opened up our lives to new and exciting things and relationships. God provided for us a new family and a new group of friends within His people who taught us the fundamentals of how to live as disciples of Jesus. I’m grateful that God put people willing to spiritually invest in us during those formative years of our walking with Christ.
I’m sure that since I was living in a different social context than you, my experience may be completely different from yours, in the same way, that both our experiences may differ from the experience of the members of the first-century Corinthian church. To begin with, the Corinthian believers were the first of their kind, and they lived in one of the most promiscuous and pagan cities in Greece. In Corinth, marriage was nothing more than a simple transaction and the divorce rates were very high. On top of that, about 70% of the Corinthian population lived as slaves. So, most likely some within the Corinthian church members were former pagans, who may have gone through divorce or remarriage, and who most likely lived under the oppression of slavery. It’s without a doubt that the Corinthian church members were trying to live their new lives in Christ under unthinkable social pressure.
As you can imagine, it didn’t take long for some of them to consider using some of their new beliefs as a justification to react socially. The slaves wanted freedom, the married wanted a divorce, the Jewish believers wanted the Gentiles believers to get circumcised, and so on. To all of this, the apostle Paul responded that they should remain in the situation they were in when God called them (1 Cor. 7:20, NIV). Paul’s words to this first-generation church challenged them to embrace and invest themselves in their spiritual transformation instead of trying to change their social circumstances on their own. For God is more interested in transforming our hearts than in changing our social reality.
Esteban Tapia
Pastor of Spanish Language Ministries
Hold On
For today’s devotional, I want to talk about a passage that I have been tempted to ignore, thinking that it didn’t apply to me. Here’s what 1 Corinthians 7:12-14 says,
12 … if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever, and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her. 13 If any woman has a husband who is an unbeliever, and he consents to live with her, she should not divorce him. 14 For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband.
Now, to be clear, this passage doesn’t directly apply to me. I am very blessed to be happily married to a follower of Jesus who, very fortunately for me, also “consents to live” with me. But I believe there is still a challenge for me and for you in this, no matter what your marital status is.
In The Message, Eugene Petersen translates this passage the following way:
If you are a man with a wife who is not a believer but who still wants to live with you, hold on to her. If you are a woman with a husband who is not a believer but he wants to live with you, hold on to him. The unbelieving husband shares to an extent in the holiness of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is likewise touched by the holiness of her husband.
I love the phrase, “hold on to her/him.” Not only does it speak of more than just staying in a hard marriage relationship, but it is actually a great way to get at the real meaning of the equivalent phrase in the ESV, “should not divorce.” The literal meaning of the Greek word for ‘divorce” is to send away, to leave, or to let go. So when Paul recommends that believers “not” let go, he is basically telling them to “hold on” to those relationships.
And this is where I see a challenge for all of us. We may not be in marriage relationships with people who are unbelievers, but I'm guessing that all of us have at least some lesser form of relationships with people who are not yet believers.
If Paul doesn’t encourage people to let go of the most intimate of relationships, I don’t think he would encourage us to run from any number of lesser relationships. The general principle is, don’t run from relationships with unbelievers … in fact, embrace them … hold on to them.
Who has God placed you in some form of relationship with? It could be a spouse, a relative, a neighbor, a co-worker, or any number of other relationships. Whatever you do, don’t let go of these relationships. Don’t lose them. Hold on to them … you never know what God might do. And maybe, or rather hopefully, the unbeliever will be touched by the holiness of you.
Josh Rose
Teaching Pastor
Let it be so ...
This statement is so interesting because it can be used in so many different ways. One time I did laundry and left a red shirt in with other clothes and then I made a lovely pink shirt -- let it be so. At the DMV I was in a line that would have taken all day, but a kind employee had grace and let me cut in line (to the chagrin of the 200 people in line) -- let it be so. Good, bad or other -- the phrase can be used to just explain this happened especially when I can’t do anything about it. Pastor Paul, however, used it in a way that encapsulated Corinth culture, and applied to divorce/separation.
In 1 Corinthians 7:15 Paul says, “But if the unbelieving partner separates, let it be so. In such cases the brother or sister is not enslaved. God has called you to peace." After statements about remaining together for God’s design for marriage, for holiness, for the good of the family; Paul now says let it be so ... God has called you to peace. Why does Paul make this ambiguous statement? Because his hope is to allow everyone to have peace with one another if you can (Romans 12:18). He is saying to people who came into the church with unequally yoked marriages do everything you can to remain together (remember these people did not grow up in a church!), By remaining together it would allow God to work. However, sometimes you have to “let it be so” if your unbelieving spouse leaves, for the sake of peace with others and unity. We are to strive for peace and unity because Jesus modeled that for us. He came into this fallen world to bring peace with one another and of course with God. He did this to show us the need for understanding during difficult times.
When the pain is unbearable, when life doesn’t make sense, when people hurt us, when choices send shock waves, we do everything we can, and then we look to God. Jesus came to give peace during tribulation (John 16:33). We are to turn to God in prayer in everything so our hearts and minds can be protected in Christ Jesus (Phil. 4:6-8).
I think Paul said “let it be so” knowing he would be asking believers to choose peace in the midst of heartbreak. He knew the God of peace would be there in the hurtful and struggling times. There is hope in those times and there are people here to help.
Jeremy Johnson
Family Pastor
Working the System
Nick Saban, who has been the head football coach at the University of Alabama since 2007, was recently quoted as saying something along the lines of, “You gotta work your system, even when the results aren’t there, and trust they will come in due time.” If you know anything about college football, you know the results have come for Nick. He is one of the most successful coaches around.
Part of God’s maturity system for some of us is marriage. But marriage can be hard, and especially so when one is married to an unbeliever. But that doesn’t mean we quit working the system, does it?
My father-in-law John and mother-in-law Carrie were not Christians when they married. Along the way Carrie became a Christian and experienced a profound and lasting transformation. Not so with John. Among other things, God used her marriage, her kids, and her life circumstances to form her more into the image of Christ. And all along the way John just watched. He wasn’t interested in the least bit. He didn’t discourage her walk with God or her spiritual leadership of their three daughters, he just didn’t participate. And he didn’t leave. He wanted to be married to her. He loved her deeply.
As Carrie stuck in there, she didn’t have any specific promises that God would save John, but she did have the hopeful “For how do you know?” of verse 16. I believe she held tight to that as she lived out her life of faith and growth in front of him. No one has ever had more of a front row seat to watch the transforming grace of God working in a life than John.
In the year 2000 Carrie was unexpectedly called home to heaven. Her race was finished. She did so well. But John was still unmoved by the gospel…until about five to seven years later. I’m sure my wife remembers the day vividly when her dad called and shared the news that he had committed his life to Christ. It sure seemed out of the blue for us. But what great news!
Carrie had worked the system, trusting God would bring the results He had ordained. And brought them, He did. She grew in the grace and knowledge of Christ, and in due time her husband was won over and converted. And while I know not every story ends like this did, we can all have full assurance, as we follow Christ, that He will grow us to maturity, that He loves our spouses even more than we do, and that He will work in their lives for His glory.
As we close out today’s devotional, just remember this - He’s got a plan and He’s got your marriage in His hands.
Scott Smith
Connection and Growth Pastor
Applying Scripture
One of my favorite classes in seminary was Biblical Hermeneutics. In the class we learned how to study the Bible. It’s a class that’s served me well over the years. The professor taught a three-step process for studying the Bible:
~ Observation: what does the text say?
~ Interpretation: what was the message for the original readers?
~ Application: What is God saying to us today?
The application part of the process is often the most challenging because we are taking a message that was given to a specific audience, and applying it to a different audience who live in a different context, while attempting to do that in an honest way.
As I was reading through Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, I noticed that application was something Paul dealt with as well. In 1 Corinthians 7:10, he wrote, “To the married I give this charge (not I, but the Lord)...” “Not I, but the Lord” means that he was taking Jesus’ teaching and applying it directly to the Corinthian believers. It was straightforward and applied to them exactly as Jesus taught it. However, in verse 12 he wrote, “To the rest I say (I, not the Lord).” I love the honesty Paul exhibits when he wrote, “I, not the Lord.” He’s shooting straight and telling the Corinthians that he didn’t receive this teaching from Jesus and in order to speak to the situation the Corinthian believers were in, he needed to apply Jesus’ teaching to their context, rather than simply relaying Jesus’ teaching to them. He was going beyond what was written or taught at the time.
We know that Paul did a good job of application because his instruction was guided by the Holy Spirit and canonized in Scripture, but it still took work to discern God’s leading. Application always takes work because it’s going beyond what is written, and discerning what God would say to us today. Applying Scripture is often more of an art than a science because Scripture doesn’t speak directly to every situation we find ourselves in. Paul had to do that 2,000 years ago, and we have to do it now.
Applying Scripture to life is a great joy, but it’s not easy. Here are a few things to keep in mind as you apply Scripture to your daily life. First, make sure that your application is in alignment with the teaching of Scripture as a whole. Second, look for examples to follow, promises to embrace, or prayers to echo. Finally, prioritize the teaching and commands of Jesus, seeking to be obedient to him above all else.
One of the things Paul subtly points out is that God wants to meet us in the unique situations of our lives, and by the power of his Spirit and through the instruction of Scripture, he will be faithful to guide us. Today, ask him to help you apply Scripture to something you’re facing in your life.
Ryan Paulson
Lead Pastor
Divine Design
1 Corinthians 7:10
Marriage was designed by God for a bigger purpose than just itself. Marriage is a depiction of our relationship with God and Christ’s relationship with the church. Just as we are called to love, study, know and respect our God, we are also to do the same in our relationship with our spouse. As such, our marriage relationship becomes one way we can glorify God here on earth. (That doesn’t mean all Christians must get married. God calls people to the single life for important purposes as well).
But what about couples who get a divorce? First we should remember God says, “I hate divorce,” not to hurt those already suffering from broken marriages but to reprimand unfaithful spouses. Malachi 2:14 says, “The LORD was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant.” The religious teachers asked Jesus, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” (Matthew 19:3). Jesus answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate” (Matthew 19:4-6). Jesus then noted that the Law had allowed divorce only because people had a “hardness of heart” and were bent on doing what they wanted anyway. Please remember divorce was never part of God’s original design (Matthew 19:8).
So why would God say he hates divorce? Well, divorce is destructive, not only to the souls and lives of the couple, but to friends, family and children, if they have any. God hates the pain of divorce. God in his infinite love for us, would never want divorce to tear us apart emotionally or physically. He knows the fallout and collateral damage divorce causes is sometimes irreparable. God’s directives aren’t meant to punish us but to protect us. (However, living in a miserable marriage where there is no peace is not part of God’s divine design either. Both destroy the example of a Christian marriage to those around them and bring no glory to God).
Every marriage has difficult seasons. I believe God will reward those who dig deep, work hard, ask for forgiveness, and keep trying again and again. It’s not always going to be pretty, but when you fight through challenges together, you are stronger on the other side. As Christians, we have the opportunity to live out God’s divine marriage design to those around us. We can lift our spouses up and let them know how important they are to us and God every day.
To those living with the repercussions of divorce or separation, know that God loves you and desires to heal the hurt in your heart and give you purpose and a hope. We have people and groups here to help you. The same is true of people struggling in their marriage. Please reach out, God wants to help and so do we.
Deb Hill
Executive Assistant
