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The Church, Culture & Rights | 1 Corinthians 9:1-27

(1) Pastors Have The Right To Live A Normal Life

What exactly does it mean for a pastor to live a normal life?

Paul answers that question from three angles – logic, Scripture, Jesus.

This says something—it says that this is really important, and that he doesn’t want us to miss this.

(1) What LOGIC says about a normal life for a pastor:

Paul asks a series of rhetorical questions: everyone knows the answer intuitively

1. To eat and drink what they want

Do we not have the right to eat and drink? (1 Corinthians 9:4)

2. To be reasonably paid for their work so that they can support and enjoy their family:

Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas? Or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working for a living? (1 Corinthians 9:5-6)

Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard without eating any of its fruit? Or who tends a flock without getting some of the milk? (1 Corinthians 9:7)

If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it too much if we reap material things from you? If others share this rightful claim on you, do not we even more? (1 Corinthians 9:11-12a)

(2) What the BIBLE says about a normal life for a pastor:

Do I say these things on human authority? Does not the Law say the same? For it is written in the Law of Moses, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.” Is it for oxen that God is concerned? Does he not certainly speak for our sake? It was written for our sake, because the plowman should plow in hope and the thresher thresh in hope of sharing in the crop. (1 Corinthians 9:8-10)

Where this verse is found in Deuteronomy, it is surrounded in context by human to human interactions. This ox metaphor is clearly about the relationship between people.

Paul says this exact same thing when he writes to his young protégé, Timothy, about how to treat pastors in Ephesus:

Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. For the Scripture says, “You shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain,” and, “The laborer deserves his wages.” (1 Timothy 5:17-18)

(3) What JESUS says about a normal life for a pastor:

Do you not know that those who are employed in the temple service get their food from the temple, and those who serve at the altar share in the sacrificial offerings? In the same way, the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel. (1 Corinthians 9:13-14)

Pastors have the right to live a normal life.

Many Christians and Churches don’t REALLY believe this.

Because many pastors don’t feel like they have the right to live a normal life, this is what is true of them:

  • Every month, 1500 pastors leave the ministry in the U.S.
  • 40% of pastors routinely consider leaving the ministry
  • 70% constantly fight depression
  • 80% of pastors wives have wished their husbands would get another job

What does this look like at The Village?

  • Personal freedom for our pastors (different freedoms)
  • Pastors salaries (how we assess them)
  • Pastors wives working (freedom to work or not work)
  • Time with family (weekly, vacation)
  • Lay pastors

I believe Pastors have a right to live a normal life as an example to all Christians that they too have the right to live a normal life.

“If my pastor can live like that, then I can.”

As a Christian, you have the right to …..

  • Enjoy the good everyday things of life like good food and drink—this is actually God’s common grace to you. You don’t have to be bound by legalism and guilt and shame. (Never gluttony or drunkenness)
  • Enjoy your family—you don’t always have to be overburdened by all the needs around you so much so that you don’t enjoy your family. You don’t have to be so pressed into service and mission that you don’t spend adequate time with your family.
  • Enjoy your work, work hard, and get paid well for what you do to take care of your family the way you sense you need to—you don’t need to feel like you need to sacrifice your performance at work and earning a good living for your family to squeeze out the most ‘ministry’ at your work. Your work is a ministry, to those you work with AND to your family.

Paul gets us all fired up about our rights just to go on to say this:

Nevertheless, we have not made use of this right … (1 Corinthians 9:12b)

(2) Pastors Can Lay Down Their Rights To Live A Sacrificial Life

There are certain reasons and seasons when pastors forgo their rights, like being paid for their work, or being paid what they deserve for their work, to live sacrificially, for the benefit of others:

  • Going to a church were not the best financial decisions have been made and the church is in a hard financial spot
  • Going to a church were the members are newer Christians and don’t understand the reasons they should pay their pastor
  • Planting or replanting a church
  • There’s a recession in the economy
  • The church is going through a transition time and the resources that were once there aren’t there
  • The place that the church is in is expensive, so the church is led mostly by lay pastors and leaders

Paul has an even better reason to live sacrificially ….

Nevertheless, we have not made use of this right, but we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ. (1 Corinthians 9:12b)

But I have made no use of any of these rights, nor am I writing these things to secure any such provision. For I would rather die than have anyone deprive me of my ground for boasting. (1 Corinthians 9:15)

This is the most powerful moment in Paul’s argument—the DEFINING MOMENT of this section.

For if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! For if I do this of my own will, I have a reward, but if not of my own will, I am still entrusted with a stewardship. (1 Corinthians 9:16-17)

What then is my reward? That in my preaching I may present the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the gospel. (1 Corinthians 9:18)

Paul’s boast is not just in the Gospel itself, but in the fact that the way he lives is a reflection of the Gospel itself—that its FREE .

The Gospel: if you’re not yet a Christian, this is what the Bible teaches about the Gospel, the Good News about Jesus – that it’s a FREE gift.

  • God created us with every good right given to us by God as men and women created in His image, including the right to be rightly related to Him.
  • Instead of being satisfied with all of their God-given rights, including the right to be rightly related to Him, our first parents thought that God was holding back certain, good rights from them.
  • Our first parents sinned against God by rejecting Him to chase after what they thought were better rights. And, while they retained their God-given rights as people created in His image, they forfeited their right to have a right relationship with God.
  • The rest of human history is the story of people demanding the right to live their own life without God (rebellion) OR trying to earn this right relationship with God back through religious practices (religion).
  • God knows that neither of those approaches will give us the rights we’re all ultimately looking for—he right to know Him again.
  • So, Jesus gave up His right to the comforts of heaven to come and live among us, as God in human flesh.
  • He lived a sinless life on our behalf, then gave up the right to His perfectly right life before God by going to the cross and taking on all of our sin on Himself on the cross, and gifting us with His sinless record, when we believe and trust in Him by faith.

But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:12-13)

Good News: Jesus laid down His rights, so that we could have the right to have a relationship with God again.

I believe Pastors can, like Jesus, lay down their rights to live a sacrificial life as an example to all Christians, that they too can lay down their rights to live a sacrificial life.

“If my pastor can live like that, then I can.”

As a Christian, you can lay down your rights to ……

  • Enjoy the good everyday things of life like good food and drink – you don’t have to exercise your right to all of these things all the time, especially when it helps to love people well and proclaim the Gospel well.
  • Enjoy your family with every free minute you have – there are times when you can sacrifice time with your family to meet the needs of others.
  • Enjoy your work, working hard, and getting paid well for what you do to take care of your family the way you sense you need to – there are times when you can sacrifice a few more hours at work to invest in a different way in the people at your work.

Paul ends by telling the Corinthians that this sacrificial life is an intentional life—a missional life.

(3) Pastors Can Lay Down Their Rights To Live A Missional Life

For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. (1 Corinthians 9:19)

To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. 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. To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. (1 Corinthians 9:20-22a)

I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings. (1 Corinthians 9:22-23)

“I’m more concerned about the mission than my rights.”

  • Only 14% of Pastors said they “Seek to lead themselves and the church to ministry beyond the walls of the church.”

As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. (2 Timothy 4:5)

I believe Pastors can lay down their rights to live a missional life as an example to all Christians, that they too can lay down their rights to live a missional life.

“If my pastor can live like that, then I can.”

As a Christian, you can lay down your rights to ……

  • Enjoy the good everyday things of life like good food and drink—devoid of mission—be as intentional as you can be with the normal things over everyday, ordinary life. Use meal times to invite others into your life for the sake of the Gospel.
  • Enjoy your family while on mission—be as intentional as you can be about the ways Jesus could use your family to connect with other families for the sake of the Gospel.
  • Enjoy your work, working hard, and getting paid well for what you do to take care of your family the way you sense you need to ….. devoid of mission—be as intentional as you can be with your time, reputation and role at work for the sake of the Gospel.

Living this way requires a self-control and self-discipline that is only possible by the grace of God.

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified. (1 Corinthians 9:24-27)

Olympics This Summer: Olympians are willing to give up many things, sacrifice much to do what they do—for the joy of running the race.

Jesus knew what it was like to run this race with the tension of joy and sacrifice:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:1-2)

LOOK TO JESUS

Ultimately, everything about a pastors life ….. and everything about a Christians life ….. is meant to point to the life of Jesus.

1. Jesus had the right to live a normal life

Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. (Hebrews 2:17)

2. Jesus laid down His rights to live a sacrificial life

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:5-8)

3. Jesus laid down His rights to live a missional life

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:5-8)