Sunday February 7, 2021
Welcome . Our scripture readings this week we find in; Isaiah 40:21-31, Mark 1:29-39. And our message today will be based on,1Corinthians 9:16-23.
Please open your Bibles and read with me;
1Corinthians 9:16-23.
(16) Yet when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! (17) If I preach voluntarily, I have a reward; if not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. (18) What then is my reward? Just this: that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge, and so not make use of my rights in preaching it.
(19) Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. (20) To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. (21) To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. (22) To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some. (23) I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.
This is the word of God. For the people of God. Thanks be to God.
The message today I’ve titled; ”All In”.
There is one big difference between going “All In “ in poker and going “All In “ in life for Jesus Christ. When you go “All In “ for Jesus, when you decide to become and all in and an all out follower of Jesus Christ you do it not just for Christ, but you do it for those who don’t know Christ. When you go “All In “ for Christ you take self completely out of the picture.
Jesus told us as recorded in Luke 9:23. “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.’”
Going “All In” means you deny yourself, you die to yourself and you devote yourself completely to Christ.
When Jesus Christ died on the cross He went “All In”, but He didn’t go all in for Himself. He went “All In” for you and He went “All In “ for me. He went “All In” for others. We are to do exactly the same thing.
Today, we are going to look at the life of a man who did exactly that. He literally went ”All In” for those who are not in at all.
“All In” is not just an action, but an attitude. It is a “whatever it takes” attitude. This attitude is described in the scripture we read together today.
I would like you to listen to it again as it is written in, The Message by Eugene Petersen.
1 Corinthians 9: 16-23
Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, non-religious, meticulous, moralist, loose-living, immoralist, the defeated, the demoralized – whoever. I didn’t take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ, but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I’ve become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life. I did all of this because of the Message. I didn’t want to just talk about it. I wanted to be in on it.
In other words, Paul was saying for the sake of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and for people who do not know God, I will do anything. I will go anywhere. I will pay any price. I will endure any cost. I will make any sacrifice to win anyone, at any time, that I can to Jesus Christ. When it comes to others and especially others who don’t know God I am “All In”.
Five times in these five verses Paul talks about winning others. He believed he had in Jesus Christ and the Gospel the winning hand. He was determined to go “All In” for both this message and his Master. Here is what he is going to teach us and take this statement with you forever.
To be “All In” you have to give All up.
There was a riding stable one time that actually had this sign posted for people who wanted to ride one of their horses. The sign read this way:
We have fast horses for folks who like to ride fast. We have slow horses for folks who like to ride slow. We have big horses for big people. We have little horses for little people. For those who have never ridden horses before we have horses that have never been ridden before.
What they were really saying was, “We are going to do everything we can to get everybody we can to ride one of our horses.”
We ought to have the same sign posted on our church. We are going to do everything we can to reach as many people as we can for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Those of us who know God should be “All In” in doing all that we can to reach people who are far from God. I say it again, “To be”All In” you’ve got to give All up.” To be “All In” comes with a cost. There are some specific things we have to give up as a church and you have to give up individually if you are going to be “All In “ for Christ and for others. The winning hand means…
I. We Must Be Willing To Give Up Our Preferences
(1 Corinthians 9:20) “To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.”
Paul was a Jew, but he was not just an ordinary Jew. He was a brand-new Jew. He was a free Jew. He was no longer under law. He was under grace. His life was under new management. He no longer had a legalistic relationship to God, but he had a loving relationship to God.
Paul had something that other Jews didn’t have. He had freedom. Specifically, he had freedom from the law. Remember that the Jew of Paul’s day was a person of legalism. They felt and were taught that they had to keep the law to be right with God. From the moment that Paul met Jesus Christ he realized he was no longer under law, but he was under liberty. Liberty does not mean you get to do what you want to do, but it means you get to do what you ought to do. Paul was still under God’s moral law, but he was no longer under the ritual law. He understood that being right with God was not dotting every religious “i” and crossing every ritualistic “t”. Yet, Paul said, “When I am with the Jews I will submit myself to their laws and their requirements so that they will listen to me, when I give them the message that can free them from that very law.
When he was with the Jews he became a Jew. Whatever their ceremonial law dictated he was willing to do it. If they didn’t eat pork he didn’t eat pork. If they didn’t eat meat sacrificed to idols then he didn’t eat meat sacrificed to idols.
Why did Paul do this? He didn’t do it to appease them or even to affirm what they believed. He did it in order to open a door of opportunity that he might reach them with the Gospel of Christ. In other words, Paul said I will do what I don’t have to do and I will even do what I don’t want to do if it will help others do what they need to do.
Once Paul met Jesus he realized he could eat pork, work on the Sabbath, and he no longer had to sacrifice sheep, but he was willing to lay aside his preferences in order to give him an open door to people who needed Jesus.
Understand there is a difference between compromising a conviction and minimizing a preference. Paul never gave up his convictions, but he did give up his preferences. There is nothing wrong with having preferences and there is nothing wrong with having difference preferences. There is something wrong when you elevate a preference to a conviction. Style is a preference; substance is a conviction. The style of music that we do in church is a preference. The style of clothes that you choose to come to church in is a preference. The fact that our music should honor Christ and speak biblical truth and the fact that what you wear should be decent, not necessarily dressy is a conviction.
When you go”All In” in reaching people for Jesus you will build bridges and burn barriers. A lot of churches do just the opposite when it comes to reaching people who are far from God. They build barriers and they burn bridges. If we are going to be a church that reaches the next generation we must be willing to give up our preferences. If we are going to reach people who are far from God, people who are on the outside looking in, we are going to have to willingly and even joyfully accept those who don’t live the lifestyle we wish they did, who don’t look exactly the way we wish they would look and who don’t dress the way we wish they would dress. To be “All In” you’ve got to give All Up.
II. We Must Be Willing To Give Up Our Privileges
In 1 Corinthians 9: 21, Paul writes; “To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law.”
Now, Paul moves from the Jew to the Gentile. He moves from the super-religious, to the party-hardy crowd. For this crowd, to go ”All In” didn’t mean to give it up, but it meant to live it up. Paul said to those who live without the law, “I’ll do without the law.”
Don’t misunderstand what Paul was saying. He was not referring again to the moral law, but to the ritual law, the ceremonial law. Paul was not saying, “If you want to reach drunkards you’ve got to get drunk.” If you want to reach adulterers you’ve got to commit adultery.
What he meant was he did just the opposite with the Gentiles that he did with the Jews. When he was with the Gentiles he dropped all of those rituals and ceremonial traditions. When he was with the Jews, he followed their customs. He observed their feast. He kept their Sabbaths. He followed their dietary laws. When he was with the Gentiles, he didn’t do any of that. So, I’ll put it this way. When he was with the Gentiles he would eat barbecued pork. When he was with the Jews he would eat barbecued beef. To coin a phrase, ”When in Rome do as the Romans do”.
Paul is not being deceptive. He was simply putting down the privileges that he had so he could eliminate any hindrance, tear down any wall, break down any barrier, or try to remove any excuse that anybody might give why they would not listen to him share the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
That is why he goes on to say in verse 22, “To the weak I became weak that I might win the weak.”
Who are the weak? This referred to immature believers who really didn’t understand that in Jesus Christ they were free. There were still some brand-new Jewish believers who even though they had trusted Christ still thought they had to observe the Sabbath, attend the Synagogue, follow the dietary laws, maintain the feasts and observe all these ceremonies to be right with God. Paul just simply said, “When I am around them I’ll act like them and I’ll gently show them the right way.”
These Jewish believers didn’t believe in idols. They believed in God. They had no trouble eating meat sacrificed to idols, because they knew there was no such thing as an idol. On the other hand, many of these Gentiles had come out of paganism. They had been saved out of idolatry, so when he was with them he would not eat meat sacrificed to idols.
I know what you are asking. You are saying, “What did Paul do if he was sitting with Jews and Gentiles and the Jews felt it was ok to eat meat sacrificed to idols, but the Gentiles felt like it wasn’t?” That is easy. He would just eat more chicken!
Here is the point. Paul is not talking about compromise. He is talking about compassion. To compromise is to set aside truth; to either change the Gospel or so weaken the Gospel it doesn’t mean anything. We are not going to do that. We are never going to do that. To show compassion means we are going to take anything away that would unnecessarily offend other people, would unnecessarily keep people from coming to Christ, would unnecessarily cause people never to come back. Too often, we wait on people to come up to our level when the Gospel calls us to get down on their level. If we are going to reach people far from God, we are going to have to give up our privileges.
III. We Must Be Willing To Give Up Prerogatives
Here is the overriding principle. (1 Corinthians 9:19)
“For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.”
I want to tell you that is absolutely one of the most incredible statements that anyone has ever made anywhere at anytime in any place. Let me tell you why.
Normally, a slave would do anything to win his freedom. In this case, Paul said, “I’m going to give up my freedom to become a slave. Though I have Jesus Christ in my life and I am free from having to please anybody else I am free from everybody else’s laws and everybody else’s expectations. I am going to willingly become a slave to those who are far from God, so that God might use me to bring them close to Him.”
Do you know what that attitude is? It is the winning hand. It is understanding that to be “All In” you give All up. When you give All up and you go All In that is when you win it all, not just people for Jesus, but the approval of Jesus.
As we partake communion today I want you to remember that, from eleven men in an upper room in Jerusalem a movement began that eventually spread across Asia, Europe and around the world so that today there are 2.6 billion people on this planet who profess to be followers of Jesus Christ. Why? All because of believers who said, “Whatever it takes I’ll do anything. I’ll go anywhere. I’ll pay any price. I will count any cost that I might win anybody I can to Jesus Christ. I’m, ”All In”.
To be, ”All In” , is to give All up . You must be willing to give up you’re preferences, privileges and your prerogatives. That is what Jesus did when He gave His life for us.
That is the least we can do as we give our lives to Him.
In His Service,
Pastor Joe