In "Plurality of Elders: Preventive Counsels," Pastor Albert N. Martin expounds on 1 Corinthians 1-3, addressing the problem of division and party spirit within the Corinthian church. He argues that such divisions stem from a misunderstanding of the supremacy of attachment to Christ, the carnality of detachment from one another, and a flawed theology of Christian ministry and the church. Martin applies these truths to the context of a plurality of elders, urging believers to embrace all God-given ministers with thanksgiving and to avoid lining up behind human instruments, which grieves the Spirit and destroys the temple of God.
Primary Texts
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1 Corinthians 1:10-3:23This entire section of 1 Corinthians forms the doctrinal backbone of the sermon, as Martin systematically addresses the Corinthian divisions and Paul's corrective theology.
Introduction: The Value of Friendship and the Call to Ministry0:03
The Occasion for Preventive Counsel: A New Elder and Spiritual Warfare2:12
The Problem Addressed: Contentions in Corinth6:19
The Supremacy of Attachment to Christ11:27
The Carnality of Detachment from One Another17:35
The Theology of Christian Ministry: Ministers as Instruments and Fellow Laborers25:59
The Theology of Christian Ministry: Ministers as Stewards Accountable to God32:28
The Theology of Christian Ministry: Ministers as Gifts to the Church37:21
The Theology of the Church: God's Building and Temple39:58
Preventive Counsel: Guarding Against Division45:15
Key Quotes
“the older I get, the more I'm persuaded that next to a faithful Savior and to a faithful wife, the greatest gifts God can give us in this life are trusted, faithful friends.”
“the Bible teaches anyone dominated as a lifestyle, dominated by carnality, is not a Christian.”
“For the theology of anything, is what God said about something.”
“He that plant his own reward according to his own labor, for we are God's fellow.”
“We are stewards of the mission. The mysteries, that is, the revealed truth of God at this stage in redemptive history. Do words that a man be found faithful.”
“You see the church is either the validation or the negation of the gospel. People need to know what does the gospel do if you really believe it.”
“The spirit of God dwells in you. If any man destroys the temple. The spirit. And destroy God's temple.”
Applications
All listeners
Understand how to prevent spiritual diseases and reduce their impact within the church.
Get your act together and address divisions, recognizing them as shameful.
Remember the supremacy of your attachment to Christ and avoid lining up behind human leaders.
Recognize that having preferences for different ministry styles is not sinful, but using those preferences to create divisions is carnal and sinful.
Do not treat ministers as cheerleaders or 'our man' to be championed, but rather as Christ's gifts.
Receive each minister as Christ's gift, recognizing that God loves you so much He has given them to you.
Remember who and what you are as a church: not a religious club, but God's building and field, meant to bear fruit that validates the gospel.
When tempted to line up in your affections behind one man or another, remember that this grieves and quenches the Spirit and destroys God's temple.
Guard against disaffection or distance towards fellow believers or ministers, as it will eventually manifest in speech and disrupt unity.
Continually return to the principles of supreme attachment to Christ, avoiding carnal detachment from one another, and understanding the sound theology of ministry and the church.
A full transcript is available on the
tab. 139 paragraphs, roughly 48 minutes.
Machine transcription
Introduction: The Value of Friendship and the Call to Ministry
Well, I certainly reciprocate those thoughts that Pastor Mitch has shared with you. As we said at the table last night, the older I get, the more I'm persuaded that next to a faithful Savior and to a faithful wife, the greatest gifts God can give us in this life are trusted, faithful friends. My house could burn down. I'd lose all my books, all my clothes, my shoes, my hats.
The whole shoot and match. They can be replaced in due time. But friendships tried and tested in the crucible of the pressure of our own indwelling sin, a wicked devil who goes about seeking to disrupt relationships, those are precious treasures. And I'm thankful that I come in the context of the felt reality of that treasure and that I'm privileged to minister the Word of God to you, the Lord's people here, in this place.
Well, let's pray and ask this great triune God to bless our meditations this morning. Our great and glorious triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, one God in the mystery of your triune personhood, we have worshipped you in our opening hymn of praise, and we now worship you and seek your face, for your righteousness, a rich blessing to distill upon our hearts this day. Holy Father, according to your promise, send the Spirit to us, that he may take of the things of Christ and reveal them to our hearts with power. Help your servant that he may speak as he ought. Help your people to have ears to hear what the Spirit would say to the church this day, and in this hour, hear us for the sake of Christ we plead. Amen.
The Occasion for Preventive Counsel: A New Elder and Spiritual Warfare
It was in the summer of 1973, that's ancient history for some of you younger people, that would go in the category of your ancient history studies. It was in that summer that a man by the name of Ashiel Blaze, a dear brother from the West Indies who has become to me a veritable Jonathan, with whom my heart was knit, in the deepest bonds of Christian friendship and affection, some three years before that, but it was in the summer of 1973, that the church there in North Jersey, Trinity Baptist Church, called our brother to come and share with me in the oversight of that assembly. Thankfully, we had had other lay elders, but this was a first in our experience, to have a man called to labor in the word, in teaching, to be set apart, to be supported by the church, to labor in the gospel. As I was prayerfully considering that new dimension of our congregational life, it occurred to me that the devil was not at all pleased.
He would do everything in his power to make the... As I prayed and sought the face of God, my mind was turned to some of the material that I'm...
I'm going to lay out before you this morning to give to our people, not as... ...free to people's needs.
You have corrected... ...in an operating room, as friends would say, an operating theater, and have your prostate dug...
...in, and that's preventive.
Now, go to the doctor's office, and you give him your bared arm, and he sticks a needle in, and he inoculates you against a disease that could be serious and perhaps even fatal. Well, I want to give you a good...
...good dose of corrective medicine, because I have absolutely no indications whatsoever that you are time to gather...
...admission, that...
...teaching, and to share that ministry with the man who's embedded in the life of this assembly from its inception.
The devil... ...today, and he does not like the kind of spiritual comradeship that exists between these two men, and the present way... ...way...
...way...
...way...
...way...
...in terms of how to prevent the spiritual diseases, how to reduce it.
The Problem Addressed: Contentions in Corinth
Spiritual diseases are going to open up some things out of 1 Corinthians under two major headings. Number one, the problem...
...see, the problem addressed.
Turn with me, please, to 1 Corinthians chapter... ...says in verse 10 of chapter 1,
"...through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, among you, in judgment,
signified unto me, concerning you, my brethren, by the household of Chloe, that there are contentions among you." What kind of contentions were they? The focal point of the contention was, now this I mean, each one of you says, I'm appalled.
...contentions because God had blessed among them.
You see what had happened with the multiplicity of the ministry of highly...
...but I hear a lot of preachers, in church,
the problem... ...the problem...
...now for the bulk of our time, let's consider together the problem addressed.
How does... ...pastoral...
...said, shame on the bunch of you, get your act together and get with it.
...combination of what we would call sanctified horse...
...problem addressed under those three headings.
The Supremacy of Attachment to Christ
First of all, the supremacy of our attachment to Christ. Find the problem in verse 12. He said, ...to Jesus Christ, reminding them that in coming to faith and to see
as members in his body, O Corinthians, listen, here you are lining up some... ...and see this one saying, we don't need teacher, we have... ...into many parts,
then you may split up into many parties. But if he is one Christ, one head, and you've been attached to him, do you see how full divisions lining up kind that's divided? You might be his gibbet under the ... ...of God?
Remesie of... ...hine your faith was... ...there is obviously no.
Then he asked the third... ...Ubaptum...
...signed and handed over to an attachment to that person in chapter 10.
He speaks of the Israelite nation betized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea. What did that mean? That they were handed over to the leadership of Moses, God-appointed head of the theocracy, into a loyal relationship ...to Moses...
...as the great administrator of the...
...attachment was...
...are never to be ...centers of...
...my dear brothers and sisters...
The Carnality of Detachment from One Another
...before them, the matter of the supremacy of their attachment to Christ, but the carnality of their detach...
...from one another...
...chapter...
...first one.
Carnal. In a specific way were they carnal, for whereas there is among you...
This is what I'm talking about. When one says...
in the same language of chapter 1, I am of Paul. You see what he's saying? When you line up behind the human instrument to bring the word of God, or Apollos, or...
This is an expression of carnality. Now what is carnality? ...here means to be much under the influence of the flesh, or corrupt human nature. Same family of words as you have in Romans 8. For the minding of the flesh, that it is not subject to the law, it can it be so. Then they that are in the flesh cannot please God, but you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit.
In other words, the Bible teaches anyone dominated as a lifestyle, dominated by carnality, is not a Christian. ...dominated by carnality as a lifestyle, is not a Christian. ...that their entire lifestyle was dominated by carnality. He's very specific. For when one says, I am of Paul, are you not men? You are those who are dominated by carnality.
will sit in the barbershop and have a rip-snorting argument over politics. Oh, here's my man. No, no, no, here's my man. Well, this is my man.
You'll find people doing this over sports. Oh, this guy, he is the top man. He can't hold a candle to Michael Jordan, LeBron James. He can't hold a candle.
What do you mean he can't hold a candle to Michael Jordan? He's exceedingly...
When they go back and forth, they line up behind their heroes and their champions, and then they go at one another's throats. That's what men dominated by the flesh. And Paul says, you're acting just like men dominated by the flesh.
We just have Christ.
This would not have sent them. The Spirit then says, this is a manifest carnality. As God's people, seeking to give to the ministry of these two men publicly, has his own style of opening up the Word of God. And it is not wrong.
Well, you know, the way we gather in my mental furniture, and the psychology, my emotional life, and the rest, I really prefer the way Pastor Mitch teaches. I really prefer the way...
Any more than... Some of you like the...
I mean, you can't stand blue, and you look wretched.
I know a woman that doesn't like any coverings over her windows. I happen to like coverings over my windows. She likes her windows...
Distant taste. What's wrong with that?
God's given differences. They do the kind of ministry with which we feel more comfortable. And there's nothing sinful in that. But when we...
...to another, that wretched, sinful carnality that...
...feel more comfortably in these beginning days, going to Pastor Mitch with a deep, deep concern.
Is it wrong for you to feel more comfortable because you've known him, you've seen his place in your confidence? That would be...
...to the Corinthians.
...is giving us a good...
For the theology of anything, is what God said about something.
So ultimately, never forget that.
...and preaching that is vigorously theological.
Lessons on seven ways to spruce up my marriage. Get seven ways that aren't deeply...
It'll do you no good. And it won't be...
...to give some practical marital counsel.
What does he do? He takes us to the rich theology of Christ's death. And the church's submission to Christ. And the union of Christ.
The Theology of Christian Ministry: Ministers as Instruments and Fellow Laborers
And his church. What higher, more profound theology is there than the death of Christ? The union of Christ with his people? ...a reluctant problem at Corinth, not only by pointing to the supremacy of their attachment to Christ, the carnality of their detachment from one another. He gives them a good dose of the theology of the Christian ministry and of the church. Now let's spend some time looking. What does he say about the Christian ministry itself?
He says... ...train to the Corinthians.
Look, if you were in Cephas, you'd never do this. You have either misunderstood or totally forgotten the theology of the Christian ministry. ...about the ministry that Paul gives.
Number one.
...are mere instruments in God's hands.
...used.
God has instruments by which to accomplish his work. And Paul's going to tell them, Paul, all simply instruments in the hands of God.
And to think, what is the... ...the identity of these men behind whom you're lining up?
What are they? What is sound theology of the ministry? Then, his...
...less watered ministers in your life.
Instrument in the hands of the God.
Everything to you.
The theology of the ministry is this. Same end. Splitting up over them, but they're not split. He that plant his own reward according to his own labor, for we are God's fellow.
This is another metaphor. You are God's split up over him to the same end. We are shoulder to shoulder. We're locked.
United. We are one in our purpose and in our labor. And furthermore, when you read chapter 16 in verse 12 of this letter, we're one in our affections, where Paul expresses his obvious esteem and affection for Apollo.
Pastor Mitch made a comment at the opening of this service about the oneness. One in their understanding of the word of God. One in their vision for Christ's church in this place. One in their commitment to the supremacy of the word of God governing the totalities.
One in their goals to understand.
The Theology of Christian Ministry: Ministers as Stewards Accountable to God
He says a third thing in his theology of the ministry. They are individual stewards in God's eyes, accountable to God for their labors. Accountable to God for their labors. Verse 8 of chapter 3.
And, I see that waters are one, but each shall receive his own, his own, to the grace of God, which was given unto me. As a wise master builder, I laid a foundation, and another builds thereon. I was the church planter. Others have come in and worked that field.
I laid the foundation blocks. Paul labored there for 18 months. Others come along and add.
Each man must have a foundation. No man can lay, then that, which is laid, which is on the foundation, gold,
a stubble. Each man's works, having their work assessed in the day of judgment. Each man's work shall be made manna. For the day shall declare it, because it is revealed in fire, and the fire itself shall prove each man's work of what sort it is.
He paused to give.
He's not going to evaluate what size. Each man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work shall abide, which he builds thereon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved.
He to these different workers work in God's temple. Someone who was entrusted with the household management and the household goods of the householder. You people need to think of us in terms of who and what we really are. In terms of what terms of who we are. We are stewards of the mission. The mysteries, that is, the revealed truth of God at this stage in redemptive history. Do words that a man be found faithful.
Small thing that I should be judged of you or of man's judgment? Yea, I judge, or I do not make a final examination of my own self. Think against myself? Yet am I not hereby justified?
He that judges me is the Lord. Wherefore, judge nothing before the time until the Lord come, who will bring to light the hidden things, the things of darkness, make manifest the counsels of men, and shall equal have his praise.
The Corinthians understand. Individual stewards are accountable to the household owner, our God. And the final day, he will sort out the nature lining up behind him. He doesn't want you to do it.
And don't try to reward us by lining up behind us. He's our man. Or Cephas. Don't do that.
The Theology of Christian Ministry: Ministers as Gifts to the Church
The final day, God will judge righteously. And the fourth thing he tells them. God to be received with thanksgiving. The things that come, all are yours. He's telling them. He says when you line up behind to the ministry of God.
All given to you out of the gracious disposition of the heart of God. Embrace them all with equal faithfulness to God. As you do. That from their style of individual path input.
Need to have cheerleaders. Johnny. Johnny. Here's our man.
He's our man. If he can't do it, nobody can. No, no. They don't need cheerleaders in the pew.
Need humble. This man stands. Man stands to preach. When you sit in the counseling session with this one or that one.
Or this one or that one comes into your home. This is Christ's gift to me. He loves me so much. He's given me up the sin.
Does he give them a dose of the theology of them? But he gives them a dose of the theology of the church. He says you've got to understand. You Corinthians men are laboring in the church.
The Theology of the Church: God's Building and Temple
But you've got to understand what the church is. If you understand that, you will rightly relate to those sent to labor among you. Notice what he says about the church. Verse nine of chapter three.
For we are. If any man destroys the temple of God is holy. And God is word.
Remember who and what you are as a church. You're not a religious club setting your own rules and your own standards. This in that field. That what you want to be as a church of fruit.
This is up from outsiders seeing your love one. Your commitment to each other and to Christ smell the fruit. You see the church is either the validation or the negation of the gospel. People need to know what does the gospel do if you really believe it.
We should be able to say come to our church and see. See husbands. Years I'm so thankful I witnessed this at Trinity. People would come in.
Out of an egalitarian. Society. Out of a matriarchal. Society.
And they're not there long before they realize. Hey men run the show around. And treated like mindless little. Very people.
They miss on their head and eyes downcast and depressed. They're outgoing. They're treated with their talent. That's what the gospel does.
Fish men. The burden of their headship. And their leadership. And they see the kids.
To mom and dad. To set standards for the kids. And then to enforce those standards with appropriate training. And discipline.
And discipline. And discipline. And discipline. And discipline.
And discipline. And discipline. And discipline. And discipline.
And discipline. And discipline. And discipline. And discipline.
That's what the gospel does. So God's building. Look like. Shouldn't be some half built rickety thing.
It should be well. The block. And a polished. Sanctuary of God.
The spirit of God dwells in you. If any man destroys the temple. The spirit. And destroy God's temple.
Preventive Counsel: Guarding Against Division
God. Over the years. You'll find it out. So when you are tempted.
By lining up in your affections. Behind one man. Or another. You're going to be.
You're going to be. You're going to be. You're going to be. You're going to be.
You're going to be. You're going to be. You're going to be. You're going to be.
You're going to be. You're going to be. You're going to be. You're going to be.
One man or another. Said. Oh no, no, no, no. That would grieve.
And quench the spirit. And that disaffection. Or distance. That I allow.
Will creep out. For out of the abundance. Of the heart. The mouth speaks.
To begin. To be heard. Of the whisperer. That sinks down.
Into the innermost part. Oh, God. Keep me. Another pastor.
Will have the benefit. Of a multiple. Getting yourself. Back again.
And again. To these principles. of any detachment from one another, the sound theology of the ministry and of the church. Ministers are mere instruments used according to God's good pleasure, whole laborers seeking the same ends, individual stewards accountable to God, and all of them God's gifts of the church, whom God places in the hands of the church.
This transcript was generated by automated speech recognition and may contain errors.
It is provided for study and reference only; the audio recording is the authoritative source.
Passages Expounded
1 Corinthians 1:10-3:23
This entire section of 1 Corinthians forms the doctrinal backbone of the sermon, as Martin systematically addresses the Corinthian divisions and Paul's corrective theology.
Texts Expounded
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This verse introduces the core problem of contentions and divisions among the Corinthians, which the sermon addresses.
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This verse highlights the specific nature of the Corinthian divisions, where people were aligning themselves with different leaders like Paul, Apollos, and Cephas.
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These verses are used to define and explain the concept of carnality as the root cause of the Corinthian divisions.
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These verses are central to Martin's explanation of ministers as mere instruments in God's hands and fellow laborers with the same end.
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This verse emphasizes that ministers are individual stewards accountable to God for their labors.
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These verses describe the assessment of each minister's work by fire on the day of judgment, highlighting individual accountability.
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These verses define ministers as stewards of God's mysteries, emphasizing the requirement of faithfulness and God as the ultimate judge.
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These verses are used to show that all ministers are gifts from God to be received with thanksgiving, as 'all are yours'.
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This verse introduces the theology of the church as God's building and God's field, emphasizing its sacred nature.
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These verses describe the church as the temple of God where the Spirit dwells, warning against its destruction through division.