First Corinthians 11:17-22 Problem of Mockery of the Lord's Table
1 Corinthians 11:17-22 · Mike Doyle · Apr 11, 2021
Letters to the Corinthians, No. 52
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261922294906

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Okay, so today, as we move along in 1 Corinthians, the verses I'm gonna cover today is 17 through 22. So, like we used to do, and we probably still need to do, and I'm gonna read the verses, and then we'll go back and dig into them a little bit. 17, but in giving this instruction, I do not praise you because you come together not for the better, but for the worse. For in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you, and in part I believe it. For there must also be factions among you, so that those who are approved may become evident among you. Therefore, when you meet together, it is not to eat the Lord's Supper, For in your eating, each one takes his own supper first, and one is hungry and another is drunk. What? Do you not have houses in which to eat and drink? Or do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you in this? I will not praise you. Now just put it in context.

These are the verses that go right before 1123. We do 1123 around here once a month, the Lord's Table verses, which we'll do next week. But in giving this instruction, I don't praise you because you come together not for the better, but for the worse.

Now, in the way of background in ancient times, meals typically were accompanied by public worship in the early church and in Judaism and in the pagan world also. The early Christians observed the Lord's table as part of such a meal. And it was called or termed the love feast. And you'll see that term quite a bit. A love feast is a meal in which every, the early Christians took part in common.

The aim being to cultivate social contact among those who are strangers and pilgrims on the earth. who were, as believers, they were called to endure here and to spend eternity together in the glory of the Lord. This was a really good way for believers to get together.

The Corinthians, however, had lost the sense of Christian fellowship. They had let in from the world the rivalry of schools of philosophy with its favorite teachers, and we've talked about that in the past. They had a tendency to form cliques around teachers that they liked, and they did it around Paul and Apollos and others. So they degraded even the love feast by holding the class distinctions. The rich feasting on their own contributions to the meal, while those who had nothing to give were made keenly to feel their poverty.

Hamilton Smith quoted, regrettably this serious disorder existed in the church at Corinth, that the celebration of remembrance is what the Lord's table is, which should have been for their blessing, had become the occasion for bringing the governmental dealings of God upon them. Their coming together was not for the better, but for the worse.

Notice in 1 Corinthians 11.2, Roger covered this. Now I praise you because you remember me in everything and hold firmly to the traditions just as I delivered them to you. So Paul uses this term a lot. I praise you, or in this case, I can't do it because you're not functioning in a praiseworthy manner.

In thinking about this, if a church has something going on in its gatherings that is disruptive or harmful, for the purposes of edification, because that's why we come together. The problem has to be fixed, and that's what Paul's trying to do here. And in our case, it would have to be fixed by those who are in authority in the church. If it's not corrected, what happens is you may see the Lord intervene. You may see him fix the matter himself.

When we come together for the better and not for the worse, So what was the problem? The first abuse reflects a problem on a horizontal level between believers. The second abuse was more serious because it showed an abuse this way, involving the church and the Lord. So there are two issues going on here at the same time.

In the next verse he says, for in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that divisions exist among you, and in part I believe it. If you take a look at this word for, it introduces the justification for what Paul has just said. For, this comes from Macaulay, it was really good for him to point that out. In the first place, Evidently refers to all that follows from verse 18 through 34, which we'll cover in the next few weeks.

Paul decided to wait to deal with similar matters until he arrived at Corinth. And Macaulay points out really interesting, he says, when Paul says in the first place would lead us to look for a problem in addition to the one being discussed. But there is no in second place or lastly. However, we look and look and look in vain and we don't see it. The problem, however, is solved by noting in verse 34, Paul says, and the remaining matters shall arrange when I come to see you. Because he's gonna come see him and he's gonna resolve whatever other issues he didn't resolve in this letter.

First, the coming together in the church instead of expressing their unity as members of the one body, as presented in the Lord's table in the loaf and the bread, it only exhibited a spirit of division that existed among them. For in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions existing among you. Now, the word division in the Greek means schism, and which were leading to heresies. You start out with a schism and then you go, it keeps building and pretty soon you have a heresy being formed in the church.

If you look at 1 Corinthians 1.10, Paul says, now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you. that you may be complete in the same mind and in the same judgment. You know, on Sunday school, we're going through the person and work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is all about unity. The Church of Christ is all about unity. Disunity is the work of the flesh.

First Corinthians 3.3.

Paul says, for you are still fleshly, for since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly and are you not walking like men? So at Corinth, both apparently existed within the assembly. There were divisions and there were schisms within, and if unjudged, they soon would lead to a heresy or a sect without. even the entire breaking up of a church into different sects. Why do you think we have so many denominations in Christian circles today? It's because this little seed gets planted, a seed of jealousy or whatever it is, or someone has an idea or his own personal doctrine, and he creates a division. Or at what they were doing here, at what they call the love feast, they were not sharing. and they were drinking too much wine. We see these divisions today. We see them in society everywhere. You see it in liberal versus conservative. You see it in race. You see it in gender. You see it in education. You see it in social status and wealth status.

What's interesting is that if you look at what God is doing in His Word from Genesis 1 all the way. It's all about unity in Him and peace and rest. The opposition to that, we were talking this morning at Sunday school, you know, Satan has never had an original idea. He just looks and sees what God is doing and he tries to duplicate it, although he has to duplicate it in a way that he's against everything that God is for. So God is for peace and unity.

What do you think he's for? division, disruption, and that's why you see it everywhere in our society. We think that it's because the people that are involved in our country are stupid. No, they're all members of the satanic society. They come out of the sin nature. Disruption, that's what it's all about.

When you abandon God in your society, what happens? By trying to fix the sins of the society by men enacting laws about them, what do you get? You get intimidation, you get sanctions, you get a legal system or peer pressure to enforce their viewpoint. But you have, I don't know if you see it the way I see it, I look at what's going on in the world and I see purposeful division. because most of these people wouldn't have a job if there was no division. Oh, there's division.

Nobody knows I created it or I'm fomenting it, but I'm here to fix it. I learned when I was in the military that at the end of the year when the branches of the military did their budgeting, they always created problems so that they could get more money. The Marine Corps was the only branch of the service that actually gave money back to the government every year. None of the others did, but I think the Marines have changed now.

They know the game. So they have to have problems to fix. If you don't have a problem, you don't have the money, and you don't have people to fix it. That's what division is. So strife and division are tools of the flesh. Only the spirit of life in Christ Jesus unites people. The principles of the spirit of life in Christ will promote unity and eliminate strife. Within the body of believers, it's the only place you'll see it.

Galatians 5.14 lays out, the law is fulfilled in one word, in one statement, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. But if you bite and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another, but I say, walk in the spirit. and you will not carry out or you cannot carry out the desires of the flesh.

The flesh is the thing that's divisive. For the flesh sets its desires against the spirit. There it is. And the spirit against the flesh. And these are in opposition to one another. There's no agreement between them. So that you may not be able to do the things that you would like to do.

But if you're led by the Spirit, you're not under law. And if you go to the next verse, 519 through 21, it amplifies this understanding a little more. When you follow the desires of the sinful nature, and I purposely translated the New Living translation because I think it says it easier. When you follow the desires of the sinful nature, the results are very clear. sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, divisions, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these, let me tell you again, as I said before, that anyone living this sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God. And then you get to 522, and it says, but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, and against such things there's no law. We as believers have both of these natures in us, and it's a matter of who rules, who we walk in, who we allow or let the life of the Lord Jesus or the life of the flesh manifest through us. So he says, for there must also be factions among you in order that those who are approved may have become evident among you.

The two words are distinct, divisions and heresies, conveying different ideas. A schism or a division is just a difference of opinion though and feeling, thought and feeling existing within the assembly. And I would say that, you know, Roger and I don't have to deal with this a lot, but we do deal with it. People call and want to, you know, some people call and just want a clarification. Other people call and they want to impose their thought about a certain verse on the whole congregation. We gotta be teaching this way. We haven't had that in several years, but we've had it in the past.

A heresy is a sect or a party formed among the saints to maintain a particular opinion or to follow a chosen teacher. It comes from Strong's. The evil that reached a point that there were no other way of maintaining a witness for the truth. they were really serious about their divisions. So it's necessary, look what God does, it was necessary to allow the evil to assert itself so that the truth might be made visible. The condition of the church at Corinth appears to have become so bad that God had to allow these divisions to work into sects and parties in order to make visible those who stood for the truth, here called the approved. I find it interesting that God is of such a nature and such sovereignty that he would do this, he would allow a heresy to take hold. Why? So that he could raise somebody up to deal with it, so that there would be a clear understanding. And without that, there wouldn't have been the discussion.

If you look at Titus 3.10, Paul says, here's what you do with a heresy, and this, again, from the living translation. I like this.

Don't get involved in foolish discussions about spiritual pedigrees, or in quarrels and fights about obedience to Jewish laws. These things are useless and a waste of time. If people are causing divisions among you, and I think only the Living Translation comes up with this idea, give a first and second warning and after that have nothing more to do with them. I can't find where the first and second warning part is.

You deal with it right away. For people like that have turned away from the truth and their own sins condemn them. So usually these kind of dissensions come because somebody gets headstrong about something they think that others should adhere to. But you know, God doesn't leave himself without witness. We've said that divisions or factions or heresies of this type have a positive side. And the positive side, they clarify whom God approves as faithful and trustworthy and who aren't.

In 1 John, John says they went out from among us, but they were not really of us. For if they had been of us, they would have remained with us. but they went out so that they would be shown that they are not all of us. It's interesting in all of our experiences in Christianity, there are people that go out from among us, that leave us, and it's usually over what we would call a doctrinal issue. And it's designed by God that to show us that, well, they really were not one of us. Now, sometimes we'll use that as an excuse. We say, well, they must not have been one of us, so they left.

But it may be because we, in brotherly love, didn't counsel with them and sit with them and work through the issue. At the same time, though, like in this case, with the heresies and the sects and what's going on in Corinth, pretty stubborn people and pretty self-absorbed and self-centered people as we've discovered in all these weeks that we've been talking and studying Corinthians. It does sound a bit contradictory, though, to expect benefits to arise from problems.

But God's sovereignty, however, is able to bring us blessing from all things. Examples, Gnosticism brought us the book of Colossians. Legalism brought us the book of Galatians. And factions and divisions brought us 1 Corinthians. The good benefit of factions is to cause those who are approved to stand out by way of contrast. When I noticed, when I saw this, I thought, gee, Colossians, Galatians, and 1 Corinthians all written by the same guy. Shall I say then, shall I praise you? This I will not, praise you in.

Therefore, when you meet together, it is not to eat the Lord's table. Now there was a really interesting thing here from Macaulay where he said you can translate this in two ways. The first one was that this is not the Lord's Supper, this is a debacle. That's what he's saying in these verses. Or on the other hand, If he says it's not possible to eat the Lord's Supper, he'd be saying they were invalidating the spiritual significance of the Lord's Supper or the Lord's Table. You know what's interesting about that?

Either way, their conduct was negating the significance of the Lord's Table. No matter which way you translate it, both of them are a problem. In the Christian church early years, the Lord's Table occupied a more central position in the life of the church than it does in churches today. Early believers, it appears, sometimes celebrated the Lord's Table every day.

And then it got to be more on a weekly basis. And when you get to Acts 20, verse seven, says, on the first day of the week when they gathered together, to break bread. Paul began talking to them, intending to leave the next day, and he prolonged his message until midnight. So I think it became maybe a tradition that it was once a week with them.

But I want you to notice from chapter 10, it was just impossible to observe this feast properly in an atmosphere of social discrimination as it is to do so while we were attending feasts that honored idols. Remember last week we were talking about feasts that honored idols? that you can't, I think it was four weeks ago, we were talking about, you can't celebrate a feast that's made for idols and the Lord at the same time. In verse 10, 21, you cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the demons at the same time.

Now, I found this quote that probably puts it in pretty good perspective, because sometimes when you look at 1 Corinthians or others, you think, oh, well, whatever the problem was, it was a long time and festering and growing. This is a quote from Dr. C. Hodge from William Kelly, and this is what he says.

Quote, if within 20 years of its institution, the Corinthians turned to the Lord's Supper into a disorderly feast, although the apostles were then alive, we need not wonder at the speedy corruption of the church after their death. The case is yet stronger, for the corruption began almost immediately after the apostle had planted the church at Corinth. It is only as walking in the Spirit that anything goes right in the church. And so would God have it who has for us judged and ended forms in the cross of Christ.

I just love that because it says, boy, you know, Paul leaves town and right away it starts. The opposition is gathering its forces. For in your eating, each one takes his own supper first, and one is hungry and another is drunk. The failure here is not that they stopped celebrating the Lord's table. They kept up that practice.

It was that when they came together, they did not act as a church should act, in which there was no distinction between Jews and Greeks and slaves and free or rich and poor. What is it about the human Well, maybe I shouldn't say it that way. What is it about a man who's controlled by the sin nature that he always has to be dividing? Well, I'm a Jew. Well, I'm a Gentile. Well, I'm free. Well, I'm a slave. Well, you're a slave. I'm not a slave. I'm a Republican. You're not a Republican. I'm rich. Oh, you're poor. Or I'm richer than you are.

Or, you know, I got, you know, or I go back to the old Borgward story, which you've all heard. The first church I ever went to as a believer was in Aurora, and I was, I didn't know how Christians functioned. I had no idea. And I'm watching this church, it's a fairly big church, and I noticed these kind of weird-looking cars in the parking lot. I asked about them, I said, what are they?

And they said, well, they're a borg ward. And I said, well, why do they have borg wards here? He said, well, the pastor has one and he restores it. And so all the elders started buying and restoring borg wards. I thought, well, that must be the sign of spirituality around here, whether you got a borg ward or not. You separate yourself out. You got a borg ward or you don't have a borg ward.

That's the sin nature. It always wants to be, well, I live on this side of town. You live on that side of town. Oh, I went to Florida last year. Oh, I went to Hawaii. Or I like baseball. I don't like baseball. I like hockey. Division, division, division, division. The sin nature is all about division. It doesn't matter what the subject is. It's division all the time. Find it interesting. It's just fascinating when you start thinking about, pick up the newspaper tomorrow, or those of you who read the news on your computer. Every story is about division. Every single story is about division. So the Lord's Table was celebrated with this agape meal, or love feast, and intended to establish an equity or equality between rich and poor, between all of those who attended the church.

The essence of the Corinthian behavior was self-centeredness. Some in this verse by the position of the words, shown in this verse by the position of the words each and his own. These are the first words in the verse giving them great emphasis. You know, in a Greek sentence, the first words are always the ones of most importance. It was not even an ordinary supper, much less the Lord's table. When they came together, it was supposedly to eat the Lord's table.

Practically, it was to indulge in a feast of their own. The apostle says, each one in eating takes his own supper. In other words, they were having a potluck, but they weren't sharing anything. And if you weren't very wealthy and all you brought was a P.P. and J., You were eating the P, P and J and nobody else was. Many of those who think that they are eating the Lord's table, and this is a different thought here that I picked up from of all guys, Charles Coates. Listen to how he goes at this.

Many of those who think they are eating the Lord's table are really eating their own supper. That is, They take what they call the sacrament or holy communion, but they take it entirely on an individual basis. Though it may be with a grateful and an affectionate sense of the Lord has died for them, they delight to think of that, but it is more what the Lord has done for them that is before them and not what the Lord has done for me in the prominent thought in my mind. I am not eating the Lord's Supper, I'm eating my own supper. You get that idea? Do you get what he's saying?

That the Lord's Supper was divinely intended to bring saints together. You can't eat the Lord's Supper alone because it's a collective matter. We have to enjoy the fellowship of it. That's why we do it together. And Zoom has made it really hard, really hard. We all take part in that one loaf, that one bread, and that one cup. It's a collective matter. The Lord's Table is designed to remember Christ, all of us together. It should be done in remembrance of the preeminently selfless act of Christ's death on behalf of others.

Instead, the Corinthians had turned the memorial of selflessness into an experience of selfishness and had made a rite of unity a rowdy disunity. While one brother went hungry because he lacked the means to eat well, another brother drank to excess. Constable says in Corinth, instead of sharing their food and drinks, each family was bringing his own and eating what they brought. The result was that the rich had plenty and the poor had little and suffered embarrassment because of it. The Lord's table was instituted by the Lord at the end of the Last Supper. The Corinthians apparently taking this as an example, came together for a preeminently social meal, and at the end of which they took part of the Lord's table.

So Paul says, what? Do you not have homes in which to eat and drink? Or do you despise the church of God and shame those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? I shall praise you? Nope. In this, I will not praise you. This is the second time that he has said, I will not praise you.

When they remembered Paul and listened to his direction resulted in his praise, but their division and abuse of the Lord's table, he can only condemn them. They introduced into the assembly a social element which led to social distinctions and fleshly indulgences. Their coming together was therefore a practical denial of the Lord's Supper, and it was a practical denial of the church of God.

This verse is divided into two concerns, and the word and shows, highlighted the word and in there. In the first half of the verse, Paul charges that their conduct is a sin against the church as a whole. Then as the word and introduces the second half of the verse, he charges that the sin is against the poor individuals in the church. What shall we, what do we have?

Do you not have houses in which to eat and drink? Or do you despise the church of God? So Paul stated in verse 21 that the Corinthians wanted private parties, they could have them in their homes. The meeting at the church was no place for a bigoted spirit of any sort, especially since the Lord's table was intended to commemorate just the opposite spirit. To act in a spirit of selfishness, disregarded for the needs of your brother, was to despise the church of God, composed not of lifeless stones but of living people who could be grievously hurt. At this meal, the poor were allowed to go hungry, while some were drinking to access. But apart from these excesses, the assembly, the church, was no place for social feasting. Have you not houses to eat in or to drink in, says the apostle? And were they putting to shame the poor and despising the assembly of God, which embraces rich and poor together?

So what Paul is telling them, you need to make some changes in the church in Corinth. What they were doing cut at the heart of both the gospel and the church itself. This situation that Paul is dealing with actually runs through 1 Corinthians from chapter 7 all the way to 16. And this is one of those things that Paul observed. And a lot of the first Corinthians letter has to do with Paul responding to questions. This wasn't something they asked him about.

Somebody came and said, look, there's some problems in the church, and he's responding to that. So when you think about it, when he wrote the letter to Romans, he wrote it from Corinth. And the Corinthian church at that point was meeting in a man's house. His name was Gaius, Romans 16, 23.

The division to which Paul referred here were social groupings within the church, not differences involving a loyalty to leaders. They were just social differences. Evidently, those who reported these abuses in the Corinthian church to Paul had given him much detail about what was happening, so Paul said he believed enough of this to conclude that there was a serious problem. In conclusion, the early church was the one place In all the ancient world were the barriers which divided the world were down. The ancient world was highly rigidly divided. There were free men and slaves.

There were Greeks and barbarians. Barbarians were the people who didn't speak Greek. There were Jews and Gentiles. There were Roman citizens and lesser classes of people without the Roman law. There were cultured and there were ignorant. And those people, you talk about divisions, imagine these divisions, oh, I don't have to imagine. These are still the divisions we have today. We just don't call ourselves Romans anymore.

The church is the one place where all men could and did come together. The church where social class and distinctions exist is no true church at all. A real church is a body of men and women united to each other because of all are united to Christ. The constable said that. So I think in conclusion, one of the really great things about the Christian church when I became a believer as a young adult.

I marveled at how most groups of believers, everybody was welcome, and nobody cared what your status was. They really didn't. I went to a men's Bible study in which there were really wealthy guys and people off the street in the same room, and they treated each other the same. I'd never seen that before. So I think the church really is the place where it gets leveled. Because when you love your neighbor as yourself, when you have the life of Christ in you, these distinctions go away. Because you care about people based on who they are and where they are in Christ Jesus.