Paul Bursts Corinth's Bubble | October 8, 2025

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The message you're about to hear was preached at Liberty Baptist

Church in Easton, MA. You can find out more about us

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message from God's Word will be a blessing to you.

Who's. Ready for the Word of God this

evening. All right, two of you.

All right, everyone else, why don't you open up the First

Corinthians? That's why I don't normally ask

that. All right, First Corinthians

chapter #4 I don't ask you. We just give it to you, all

right? But I'll say, all joking aside,

I mean, the fact that you're ready to hear the Word is that

you're here tonight. Amen.

You came to the House of God. You logged in tonight if you

weren't able to be here. Thank you so much for that.

It's sure a pleasure to be able to be in the Word with you this

evening. I would tell you as a pastor,

sometimes the hardest people to be able to work with are the

ones who already know everything.

You know what I'm saying? It's not those who maybe are

struggling in their Christian walk or those who have more

growing to do. If we've learned anything on

Sunday morning the last few weeks, we've all got a lot more

growing to do, don't we, in our Christian life.

Just like the old children's song says, He's still working on

me to make me what I ought to be.

But the ones who are sometimes the most difficult to pastor and

sometimes it caused the most heartaches in the life of a

pastor are the ones who already believe they know everything

they need to know. Benjamin Franklin said this.

The proud hate pride in others. Think about that for a second.

The proud hate pride in others. And pride is a very, very

dangerous thing. And that's the exact problem

that we find here in the Corinthian church.

They are puffed up in their own conceit, thinking they are

something that they are not. It's not even the fact that they

are not godly. It's even beyond that.

It's that they think they are godly when they are not because

Paul has to first of all, deprogram them from thinking

that they are godly. They are doing well, they are

knowledgeable, they are wise. He has to remember, remind them

as he said, the beginning of chapter #3 you're babes in

Christ. You're, you're drinking milk.

You ought to be eating meat, but you don't know what you think

you know. So he's got to kind of break

them down a little bit before he starts to build them back up to

being what they need to be. Paul, in essence, is going to

have to burst their bubble. You ever had someone burst your

bubble before you ever had someone kind of put you in your

place? And I'm not even talking about

someone that maybe is doing it in a worldly way or someone

that's doing it out of their own pride or arrogance, but someone

that gave you a reality check. I remember I was in Bible

college and you know, when you're at any kind of college,

usually they have resident assistants, Ras, and usually

those are the better students. Those are the ones that follow

the rules and toe the line and all that type of thing.

And I remember meeting with Brother Jett.

Some of you might remember Jamie Jett.

He's preached here a couple times before at Liberty.

And one of the things I love about Brother Jett, he always

tells you what he's thinking. And I remember sitting in his

office and I've been in maybe a little bit of trouble and I want

to say what for because this is live, but I was in his office

and I was kind of being self deprecating as sometimes my

habit is. And I said, look, Brother Jet, I

know who I am. I know I'm not RA material.

And I kind of threw that out there as a way for him to say,

Oh no, no, Adam, really. No, you really are, you know,

you should be in RA someday. We just get this little thing

fixed and all of that. And he looked at me with those

loving eyes like only Brother Jet could say, as I said, you

know, I know I'm not RA material.

And he looked at me and says, you got that right.

Head deflated immediately. He popped the balloon.

He, he had me all of a sudden realized I wasn't who I thought

it was. By the way, he was right.

I wasn't RA material. I wasn't listening to the RA's I

had, let alone being able to tell other people what to do.

Sometimes we need someone with some godliness within them to be

able to tell us what we need. We we've talked about that a

little bit on Sunday night, didn't we?

About the prophet preaching confronts us about the things of

life that we need to know. Well, here tonight, Paul is

going to talk about this issue of Hey, Corinth.

You're not who you think you are and you're not where you think

you are. And so he's going to give him a

bit of a reality check and a message that I have titled

tonight. Paul bursts Corinths bubble.

Paul bursts Corinths bubble. So let's go ahead and read First

Corinthians chapter #4 we're going to read verses 6-7 and

eight tonight. And it says this and these

things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and

to Apollo's for your sakes, that you might learn in us not to

think of men above that which is written, that no one of you be

puffed up for one against another.

For who maketh thee to differ from another?

And what hast thou that thou didst not receive?

And if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory as if thou

hast not received it? Now ye are full, now ye are

rich. Ye have reigned as kings without

us. And I would to God ye did reign,

that we also might reign with you.

So what's happening to the people of Corinth here?

What is Paul trying to deflate within their own mind to try to

get them to the place where they need to be spiritually?

Well, I see two things tonight, and the first is this.

They were deceived by pride. These people of Corinth had been

deceived by pride. Paul sets out to deflate the

arrogance that these babes in Christ have blown up within

their own heads. And he starts with this phrase

right there in verse number six. He says, and these things,

brethren, and I just want to stop right there.

That's a phrase right there. It has a few words and then a

comma. And these things, brethren.

Now let me remind you something that I've talked to you about

before in the past when it comes to the issue of Bible

interpretation. When you're reading your Bible,

you're studying your Bible, you're trying to make sure you

rightly divide the word of truth, right?

That we don't read into what the word of God says, but we allow

the word of God to read us. So when you see something like

and these things, brethren, well, you have to ask yourself

the question, what things, what's Paul talking about here?

Because if we don't know the things that he's talking about,

then we don't really understand what he's trying to tell us.

So listen, when you're reading your Bible, and again, this is,

this is just free tonight. All right, I'm giving you this

at no charge tonight. When you're reading your Bible,

you're trying to go a certain distance in your Bible read.

You're trying to read a chapter, 2 chapters, 3 chapters, whatever

it may be. Don't get so caught up making

sure you reach the goal that you just plow through the reading

and you don't get what God is trying to tell you.

Now listen, I know you're not going to understand everything

from what you read. You know how I know that?

Because if you live to be 100 years old, you still wouldn't

get it all, would you? I mean, the Holy Spirit will

keep teaching you and guiding you and helping you, but there's

always something new to learn. If you could learn at all.

Could you imagine getting to a point in your Christian life

where you said, well, basically, I learned everything?

Those are the people I'm worried about.

Those are the people Paul's talking about here.

So if you get into your Bible reading and you see something

like that, well in these things, brethren will say, well what

things is Paul talking about? And so we read the rest of the

verse and he says, and these things, brethren, I have in a

figure transferred to myself and to Apollo's for your sake.

So he says, there's some things I want you to know about me and

Apollos. And I can't go all the way back

to the beginning, but we understand Apollos was another

preacher who had been very influential in Corinth.

Remember, I'm of Paul, I'm of Apollos, I'm of Cephas, I'm of

Christ. And so he says there's a figure

that I want you to understand about us that we've talked about

before. Well, what is it?

Well, I believe that if you go back to verse number one and

two, you'll see what it is. And this goes back to our

message before. So you might need to go back a

page. Just go back a few verses.

What does it say in verse number one and two?

Let a man so account of us as of the ministers of Christ and

stewards of the mysteries of God.

Moreover, it's required and stewards that a man be found

faithful. What did we see last week?

We are to be ministers and stewards.

Now, are those lofty positions, are people spending billions of

dollars on television advertisements to run as

stewards and ministers? No, They're spending that money

to be able to go to Washington, aren't they?

Or to be able to go to Beacon Hill.

No one's saying, you know, my name is Adam Rivero and I

approve this message. I'm running for minister.

Unless you're in Great Britain, I guess, your Prime Minister.

But that's a whole different thing, isn't it?

But the idea is this. That's a lowly position, being a

minister, being a steward. It's not up high, it's up low.

And So what is Paul saying? He's saying these things, the

issue of being a minister and steward.

He says I'm really referring to myself and Apollo's.

He said I'm not just telling you to be a minister.

I'm saying this, I'm a minister. I'm not just telling you to be a

steward. I'm a steward.

And he's trying to hammer this point across to the people that

they, yes, they may be in the ministry.

They may have a, a place out in front of other people, but

listen, they're no heroes. They're just doing that which

God has called him to do. By the way.

This is just something else that I, I want to give you this

tonight just to think about a, a little bit of a tangent here

this evening, but I'm so thankful for other pastors.

I'm thankful for missionaries. We're going to have some

missionaries here in a couple weeks.

We have our missions conference. We have another pastor who's

helped plant over 100 churches through his church and the

missionaries that have come from his church over here in the next

few weeks. I'm so thankful for them.

Pastors and missionaries, though, are not our heroes.

Say pastor, what are you talking about?

Sometimes if we're not careful in the course of a church, we

can build the culture of, well, we don't want sports stars to be

our heroes. And I'll wait till everyone

says, Amen. We don't need sports stars to be

our heroes. We don't need Hollywood stars to

be our heroes. We don't need recording artists

to be our heroes. We don't need influencers to be

our heroes. So we could actually take that

and say, well, you know who should be our heroes?

Missionaries and pastors and evangelists and and pastors

wives and and those are the people that need to be our

heroes. Now listen, should we be

thankful for them? Yes.

Should we look at them with respect?

I believe so. But what does Paul here say?

Can I put it this way? He says I'm no hero.

Don't lift me up. I'm a servant and I'm a

minister. The thing that I told you to do,

he says I got to do too. And it's easy to be behind a

pulpit. Listen, it's easy to stand

behind a pulpit and have people sit here and listen to you for

30 minutes. There it is, John.

I was waiting to would laugh first.

All right? Not 30.

Say, when was the last time you preached 30 minutes?

I don't know. I think.

I think it was when the AC went out a few months ago, and I knew

everyone's gonna walk out if I didn't stop after 30 minutes.

But you listen to me for 40 minutes, 50 minutes.

Tick, tick, tick, tick. All right?

If I'm not careful, that could make me build myself up.

And they will look at what all these people think of me.

But what is it? I'm just a minister and I'm just

a steward. We're all to be ministers and

stewards. And so he says this, these

things, brethren, I have a figure transferred to myself and

to Apollo's. For your sakes.

What did he want them to learn about this ministry and the

stewardship? He said that you might learn in

us not to think of men above that which is written, that not

one of you be puffed up one against another.

Paul basically says this, I want you to look at how humble I am

and you be humble. Now, first of all, that kind of

sounds like a little bit of a contradiction, doesn't it?

Like kind of like, say, hey everybody, see how humble I am?

That's like, well, you're probably not that humble if

you're telling everybody how humble you are.

Call that a humble brag, don't we?

That we want everyone to know I'm the most humblest person

you'll ever know, and I'm going to tell everybody about it.

That's not really humility. But that's not what Paul is

saying here. Paul oftentimes will say things

like this. In fact, he says it in chapter 4

verse #16 Look down a little bit in the column there in your

Bible. Wherefore I beseech you, be

followers of me. He actually says, I want you to

follow me. Now that shouldn't bother us

because in Chapter 11, and we're going to move a lot in our Bible

tonight. So I hope you got your Bibles

and you're ready for some exercise.

Go over to Chapter 11. Leave your ribbon there in

chapter 4, and then let's go to Chapter 11 and look at verse #1

Paul says this being ye followers of me and what

follows, even as I also am of Christ.

So Paul is very comfortable in saying this.

I want you to follow me, but the only way he can say that is if

he's following Christ. Now let me ask you tonight, is

there something within your life that you could rightly tell

people, hey, follow me. Is there something to be found

in your Christian life that you would be comfortable enough to

tell people follow me. Hey, you want to learn how to

share the gospel with someone? Follow me.

Do you want to learn how to be able to raise children in a

godly manner? Follow me.

Do you want to learn how to pray?

Follow me. Do you want to serve?

Follow me. Now again, that could sound very

presumptuous and it could sound very prideful.

Paul, listen, Paul's saying this by the inspiration of Holy

Spirit. So there's no pride here.

And if Paul could say this, I'm not saying that necessarily our

posture should be, hey, let me, let me teach you something and

going around trying to teach everybody everything.

But kind of what I found. If you're just a faithful

Christian and you just keep your head down and you do what God's

called you to do, there will be people that will come around and

say, hey, can you explain to me how I should read my Bible?

Can you help me with that? I've heard you give testimonies

before about your Bible reading. Will you talk to me about that?

You might even see someone on a Saturday morning.

We have outreach. You say, hey, can I partner up

with you today because I want to learn how to talk to somebody

about Jesus. By the way, you can't do that if

you don't come outreach on Saturday.

But they got a little bit of a nervous laugh there.

All right, but do you have a faith that others could follow?

Or would you say this? I hope nobody would follow my

faith, boy, I hope nobody would follow the way that I go.

I wouldn't want them to talk like I talk once I get out of

the church. I wouldn't want them to look at

the things that I look at once I get out of church.

I wouldn't want them to read the Bible as much as I read the

Bible when I get out of church because honestly, I don't read

my Bible between Sunday to Sunday.

I pick it up for church, I put it down and I'll pick it up

again till the next time I go to church.

Paul says this follow me, but not because I'm me, but follow

me because I'm trying to follow Christ.

And that's what he's saying here.

He says if you want a pattern of humility, follow me.

But he's not saying this in an arrogant way.

He has to be saying this in a way of humility.

He's telling these people that are so out of whack in Corinth.

He says this you, you, you think you are something and you're

not. So if you want to see humility,

look at me. And he's not even talking about

himself. He said look at Apollos.

He says we're the figures that you need to be following.

Could we even put it this way? He wasn't just preaching the

Word. He was living the Word.

He wasn't just getting up behind the pulpit and say thus sayeth

the Lord. You know, every time I point a

finger at you and say thus sayeth the Lord, there's three

fingers pointing back at me. I would say there's almost more

responsibility. Some of you were just trying

that. I've also thought about

preaching just doing this so that I don't have any fingers

pointed me. But that doesn't seem fair, does

it? But the idea is this, that if

I'm speaking from the pulpit and telling you thus, saith the

Lord, there's a greater responsibility to me to make

sure that I'm living it if I'm putting it out there to you.

Amen. All right.

And so here's Paul saying this. I need to be humble.

I need to be humble. Our lives should be signposts

for unbelievers to see Christ, but our lives also should be

signposts for other Christians to learn how to be Christ.

Like that's what Paul is saying here.

Listen, don't, don't be proud. Listen.

Are you willing to be taught? Could you be taught by a Paul?

Could you be taught by Apollos? And that's what was so crazy

about it. And he even says it at the end

of the verse. He says, he says that no one of

you be popped up for one against another.

They're puffing up with somewhat about themselves, but they were

puffed up that there was the group that said, well, we like

Paul better and the other group says, well, we like Apollos

better. And he says, do you realize you

are carrying the flag for people Paul and Apollos in arrogance?

And neither of these guys are arrogant.

Neither of us are honored. He's saying, by what you're

doing by puffing yourself up. Well, this idea, what is what is

puffing up? What does that even mean?

We'll look at verse #18 drop down just a little bit.

Now some are puffed up as though I would not come unto you, but I

will come to you shortly if the Lord will and will know not the

speech of them which are puffed up, but the power.

Look at chapter 5, verse 2. This is a problem they had in

court. The being puffed up and ye are

puffed up and you have not rather mourned that he had done

this deed might be taken away from among you.

We're going to see when we get to chapter #5 there was a man

who is in gross sexual immorality and what do they do?

Instead of making sure they, he took the steps they needed to

take to make sure that he repented, they kind of left him

in the church and they were puffed up about it.

They said, hey, listen, how listen, how liberal minded we

are. You can live any way you want.

You can be a member of this church.

Well, that's OK if the church belongs to you, but the church

belongs to Jesus Christ, and he's the one that decides what

the proper way of living is for a member of a church.

And so they were puffed up about this.

Well, what do we know about true love?

In fact, they would even say, well, you know, this is love and

this is what it is. Maybe they even said love is

love, which doesn't even mean anything because he can't define

the word by the word. That's a way for the world to

try to confuse what the Bible says about marriage between

being between one man and one woman for one lifetime.

But what do we see the Bible says about true love?

You could say that it says in First Corinthians 13 verse #4

that charity is not what puffed up.

It's not puffed up. These people thought they were

loving that. These people thought they had it

all. And, and what's Paul doing?

He's taking the needle to that balloon and he's just putting

holes in it. He's saying you aren't who you

think you are. Pride promised to make us

bigger, better and more important.

But typically it just makes us smaller and meaner.

It doesn't make us who we think it'll make us.

And then verse #8 he says this now year full or or rather verse

#7 he says, for who maketh thee to differ from another?

And what hast thou that thou didst not receive?

So he asked this question. He he says this.

Who made you different from one another?

If you want. You know, we think of Paul and

Apollo's, OK, they're different and you all are different.

Well, who is the one that made you different?

Can we put it this way? He's asking the people of

Corinth, who's the one that gave you the gifts and the talents

that you have in the first place, if you're going to be

proud and haughty about these things that you see in US or in

others. Who's the thing?

Who's the person who gave those things in the 1st place?

And we know it wasn't a person. We know it was God Almighty.

He says this, well, who made you a different from one another?

He says, What do you have that you didn't receive from God?

He says, what do you even think you've accomplished apart from

God? John 15 Five.

I am the vine, ye are the branches.

He that abideth in me, and I and Him the same, bringeth forth

much fruit. For without me you can do

certain things, but just not as much as others.

No, it says this, for without me you can do nothing.

He says what are you glorying in?

It's not of you in the first place.

What are you so puffed up about? There's nothing you have.

There's nothing that you are that you could have accomplished

on your own. Listen, you couldn't come into

this world on your own. You can't breathe on your own.

You can't do anything on your own.

It's only by the good graces of God that you and I can be who we

are. So why would we be so proud

about what we are when we're not who we are because of us?

Listen, I can't be proud of going to heaven, Ephesians 28

and 9, not of works, lest any man should boast.

If I can't boast of getting to heaven on my own, how on earth

can I boast about the things I can do on this earth on my own?

It's only because of him. He says stop being so prideful.

Stop being so prideful. Told you before I worked for the

Tampa Bay Lightning, they won a Stanley Cup.

And I'll tell you this, they never gave me a championship

ring. They never do.

You believe they don't give the sanitation crew A championship

ring? Could you imagine me walking

around the Saint Pete Times Forum in the bowels of the Saint

Pete Times Forum around 2:00 in the morning, which is what I

would usually have to do to get rid of everyone's trash out of

the form after a concert or after a game, as I was working

in the ministry. But I was working overnight just

to be able to put food on the table.

And could you imagine me tell it?

Listen, guys, I mean, I don't understand why they don't give

us championship rings. I mean, listen, we worked for

the Lightning. I mean, I don't see any of the

players around here at 2:00 in the morning.

This trash doesn't take out itself.

And someone walks up to me and just kind of slaps me a back of

the head and says, you think you had anything to do with what

they did. You pick up trash.

I said, well, but yeah, do a good job at it.

But I kind of feel the same way about us taking glory from the

Lord, from our own life. Someone gets saved.

Look at what we did. He it's almost as the Lord slaps

to the side heads. He said, yeah, I used you, but

you think you could have done that on your own, Lord?

Pretty good preacher. See how many views we're getting

online, It's in the dozens. Now we're going viral.

We're going viral. It's not a very contagious

virus, but we're going viral, right?

You know what you say? You think that's you?

Hey, Lord, doing pretty good in my ministry at the church.

I think people are starting to see how good I am at my

ministry. You think you had the strength

to get up this morning? You think you had the dexterity

to be able to get behind your wheel and drive and to be able

to get here and to articulate what you needed to to those

children. To be able to let the notes come

out of your mouth. To be able to sing so that you

could stand at the front door and shake people's hand and say

the right thing at the right moment that someone need to

hear. You think that was you?

Sure you were willing, Sure I used you.

But if I had taken my hand off of you and told you go ahead, do

it on your own, you'd be gone in a second.

And we start to think about how great we are.

Oh friend, pride kills. It kills, he says.

Now without it's receiving. Why does thou glory as if thou

is not receiving? He said.

He said, why? Why are you acting the way that

you are? Why would you carry yourself

this way? Why would you glory in yourself?

You. What Paul often had to reiterate

to the people of Corinth, he had to say this.

We've already read this before 1st Corinthians 131.

According as it is written, he that glorieth let him glory in

the Lord. He said in Second Corinthians

2 Corinthians 10:17

chapter 10 verse 17, But let he that glorieth let him glory in

the Lord. Pride cuts ourselves off from

God, for who needs God if we're self-sufficient within

ourselves? Pride cuts ourselves off from

others, for who needs to be dependent upon others if in our

pride we are independent. And pride cuts ourselves off

from ourselves, for it does not permit us to face accurately our

own self, self evaluation of who we are in Christ.

If I'm going to glory in something, you can go all the

way back to the Old Testament, Jeremiah Chapter 9 verse 24.

Jeremiah 9:24

But let him that glorieth glory in this that he understandeth

and that he knoweth me, that I am the Lord, which exercises

loving kindness, judgment, righteousness in the earth.

For in these things I delight. Say it, the Lord.

There's something to glory in that.

We can glory in our Lord. You could worship right there

and go through all of those words and all those beautiful

characteristics of our Lord, and you would never exhaust the

beautiful nature of our God. There's something to glory in.

There's something to glory. You know, we oftentimes we talk

about Bible study. We talk about the principle of

first mention. You've heard me say that before,

that sometimes we see the first mention of a word in the Bible.

It helps us understand how to interpret that word throughout

the rest of the Bible. And I actually was looking this

up today. I didn't realize this.

I would have thought the word pride would have been very early

on in the word of God. And I look for pride in all the

forms of the word of pride, like prideful.

But do you know the first time it's mentioned as Leviticus

2619? I will break the pride of your

power, and I will make your heaven as iron and your earth is

brass. And God was telling Israel this.

If you do not, once you go into the promised land, do not follow

me and become prideful in your own selves, I'm going to have to

break you. Now listen that.

That sounds like a threat, but I will tell you it's God in his

loving kindness saying this. He says I will break you of your

pride before pride breaks you, because that's what it'll do.

I will break you of your pride before pride will break you.

You ever heard of a wild horse that needs to be broken?

Often times that's called the meeking of a horse, meeking a

horse and we hear that word meek and we don't think that's very

good, do we? We often use the term meek means

weak, right? But that's not what meek is

taking that horse and meeking it, taking that horse and

breaking it of its pride and its arrogance because that's what it

is. It's wild.

Listen to this, actually read this from a horse breeder today

because I I follow a lot of horse breeding blogs, probably

like you do, but big in that real big in that animal

husbandry is a passion. But that's probably why we have

a couple dozen views right there, all right?

But anyway, making a horse does not mean to strip the power from

the horse, but rather to harness the horse's power from a state

of wild independence to 1 of loyalty so that the horse could

be used as the master of the horse intended.

What does he have to do? Break us of our pride before

pride breaks us. And that first word of the use

pride and breaking is not an accident.

Why? Because God wants to meek us so

that we can be used for Him. So we start there with the

people at Corinth. They were deceived by pride.

But secondly, they were also deceived by position.

They were deceived by position. And what I love here in verse #8

is that Paul gives us what I would call some sanctified

sarcasm. I don't mind sarcasm.

In fact, I kind of like it, to be honest with you.

I have to be careful sometimes in the pulpit about laying on

the sarcasm a little bit too thick.

But I will say this. Paul uses some real sarcasm in

verse #8 he's not doing it again in an arrogant way because this

is inspired by the Holy Spirit. But what he's trying to do is

he's trying to put in front of them the lunacy of the way that

they're living. He's trying to show them how

absolutely crazy it is that they think that they are here, but

they are actually here. How that they think they are

doing so well, but they're actually doing so poorly.

Look at verse #8 He says now you are full, now you are rich.

You have reigned as kings without us.

I would to God He did reign that We also might reign with you.

Well, we'll find more context for this because you really have

to go later on to verse 10 and beyond.

And as we look at the next time we're together in this passage,

we'll see a little bit more about what he's talking about

here. But I will say he has this ID

says, hey, you're full. Now were they actually full?

No, you're rich. Were they actually rich?

No, you've reigned as kings without us.

Now, were they actually reigning as kings?

They thought they were all those things, but they were not those

things. And that's why Paul basically

says this, I wish we were doing as well as you're doing.

Remember you, you said Paul and Apollo's how, how great we are.

We're not even doing half as good as you all are because

you're full. You are rich.

You have reigned as kings. They had their position.

But Paul says this, I wish I had that position.

I wish I was doing as well as you.

You know, it's interesting, Paul later on in Second Timothy

2 Timothy 2:12

chapter 2, verse 12 would say this.

If we suffer, we shall also reign with him.

You know what Paul understood? You want a position.

It's not about being full and rich.

In fact, it's quite the opposite.

And I'm not saying you have to empty your bank account out

before you can finally be right with God.

I don't think the Bible teaches that.

But I'm talking about spiritual poverty in your life where you

realize I'm nothing without him. I can do nothing without Him.

There is nothing within me that is good and right apart from

what God has done within me in my heart and life.

In fact, my flesh is evil and wicked.

It's just the fact that the Holy Spirit lives inside of me now

that I have a fighting chance because greater is He that is in

me than He that is in the world. There's nothing within me that

that I can hang my hat on. But Paul says this, you're full,

you're rich, you've reigned as kings, but you don't understand

that that's not the way that you reign.

In fact, I would even put it this way, that God calls us in

this life to be able to be the ministers and servants because

someday there will be reigning to be had.

There will be a Kingdom someday. 2nd Revelation 20 verse 6 says

Revelation 20:6

Blessed and holy is he that hath a part in the first

resurrection. On such the second death hath no

power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall

reign with him 1000 years. There will be a time to reign,

brethren, but it's not now. You know what we learn now.

It's not about finding a position, it's about having a

posture of humility. You know, right now is not about

finding a position, It's about having a posture of humility.

We say, well, pastor, I mean, that just doesn't make any sense

because obviously people have positions there.

There's a hierarchy in church. You have a pastor, you have

trustees and and you could have deacons, you'll have deacons

right now, but you could have deacons and there's leaders of

ministries. And so it doesn't even make

sense that you would say that there would be no positions.

And my answer that would be I didn't say that there were no

positions. Pastor is a God-given position.

Deacon is a God-given position. We understand that there has to

be hierarchy in church if there's to be decency in order.

I'm not talking about the hierarchy like the Catholic

Church and the the abomination that that is.

No, I'm not talking about that at all.

I'm just talking about if you have a ministry, there needs to

be someone in charge of that ministry.

If there's something going on, there probably ought to be

someone who knows what's that ministry is supposed to do so

that other people who are newer that ministry know what needs to

be done. What I'm saying is this is that

we don't need to be seeking a position.

We need to be seeking A posture. Say this, I'm not trying to see

how high I can get up the ladder.

By the way, the ladder at Liberty Baptist Church isn't

very high. We don't have many rungs on our

ladder. OK?

Even someone with, you know, a fear of heights could probably

get up the ladder of the rungs that we have here.

It's not very high, but it's amazing how many people want to

try to scale the ladder. Even preachers trying to scale

the ladder over other preachers, even though we're independent

preachers. Well, I have this many of my

church and I have this many of my church.

Do you know what I try to do when I go to a preacher's

meeting and people ask how many are at our church?

I try to avoid the answer all together.

What does it matter? What does it matter?

Are we just being faithful to Christ?

That's what really matters. No one says, hey, how how

faithful are the people at your church?

They want to know how many. You don't want to know how many

because they want to make sure they have more than we do.

And the times I've asked, it's because I want to know that we

had more than the other guy did. Because in my pride, if I'm not

careful, that could be what it is.

No, I'm just being honest with you.

But what does it matter to to posture this?

Lord, I'm just your servant and however many you put in front of

us, how many you put in these seats?

How many people were able to minister into our town?

I just want to be faithful to the ones you've put here.

I don't need a position. I don't need to be prideful

about it. I just need to be a servant.

I could go to 3rd John, and we're not going to go there

right now. But in 3rd John there was this

man named Diotrophes, and I believe that was the beginning

of the priestly Assumption, the idea of the priest gathering

power to himself to the exclusion of others.

Listen to what John said about Diotrophes.

We therefore ought to receive such that we might be fellow

helpers to the truth. I wrote it to the Church.

But Diotrophes, who loveth to have the preeminence among them,

receiveth us not. Wherefore if I come, I will

remember his deeds which he doeth, praying against us with

malicious words, and not content therewith, neither does he

himself receive the brethren. So Can you imagine the apostle

John writing to the church and wanting to come to the church?

The apostle John, the one who lay on the bosom of Christ at

the Last Supper, he says, I want to come to your church, and I

want to talk to you. This man Diotrophy says We have

no part of you, John, we don't want to hear from you.

What did he do? He wanted the preeminence.

Can I tell you what kills churches faster than anything?

People that want preeminence, we're all servants.

We're all ministers. And again, you might say,

pastor, it's easy for you to say because you're the one that gets

to stand in front of us and talk for all the time, all the time

in the world. And the answer is, with that

comes a lot of responsibilities too.

And with that come a lot of heavy burdens too.

And I'm not asking you for pity and I'm asking you for sorrow.

I'm just saying it's not all that you think.

Well, if I got up there and I got to tell people for 40

minutes three times a week, I tell them what's going on, like,

well, you can, but there's some other things that come with

that. So what do we do?

We don't seek the position. What do we do?

Well, Psalm 75 versus 6 and seven says this promotion cometh

neither from the east nor from the West or from the South.

But God is the judge. He put it down one and set it up

another. You know what I was never

looking to do? Be a pastor.

That wasn't something that was on my radar, but God put it on

my radar. You know what I wasn't looking

to do? Plant a church in Boston.

They remind you, I live in Tampa, FL where all the people

from Boston came. You could have planted a church

in Boston, in Tampa and probably had it filled with Bostonians

that are snowbirds and the people who migrated down there.

To be honest with you, I wasn't looking for that, but it's what

God had. Every single one of us have to

get to the place where it's just listen, if I'm promoted or I'm

not, that's God's business. I just want to serve.

I want to help. I'd rather be a doorkeeper in

the House of the Lord, the psalmist said.

At least I'd be in the House of the Lord.

I'd be doing something. I'd be there and listen if the

Lord ever was to the place that had me in the place where maybe

later on in life, I don't know, but that I was retired and I

wasn't a pastor, I would tell you this, my joy and my desire

to be in the House of God wouldn't diminish at all.

And I'd be glad to shake hands when people came into the

building. I'd be glad to clean up.

In fact, I still do clean up. Plunge toilet.

I fixed the toilet a couple weeks ago.

That's why it's still messed up. But do you know you could fix a

toilet flapper with a paper clip?

Anybody know that? That's why it's still messed up.

All right. But it's all about just, hey, we

don't need a position. You know what his position needs

to be this high and lifted up and everything else just needs

to be us being low. I want to show you something

that will be done. Turn to Isaiah chapter 14.

Isaiah 14 · chapter mention

Isaiah chapter #14 we're looking verse #12 Isaiah 14, verse 12.

Isaiah 14:12

People court were deceived by pride, and the people court were

deceived by position. Pride and position.

What says verse #12 How art thou fallen from heaven?

Oh, what's that next word? Lucifer, son of the morning, how

art thou cut down to the ground which did weaken the nations?

For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into

heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God.

I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation in the sides

of the north. I will ascend above the heights

of the clouds. I will be like the Most High.

And I've said it before that you can see that Satan has an eye

problem here, doesn't he? And not one of these, but the

letter, I, I, I, I, I, I will, I will, I will, I will.

What is he doing? He is deceived by pride and he's

deceived by position. Do you realize that Corinth fell

for literally Satan's oldest trick in the book, His oldest

trick that he first played upon himself was pride and power, and

he fell for it. But I'll tell you, you and I,

when we go towards pride and power and fall for it in a

different way, that there are consequences.

It's literally Satan's oldest tools to have you filled with

pride and to have you seek power.

Matthew 5 three says this. Blessed are the poor in spirit,

for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.

Look, the Kingdom of earth is for those who are proud, but the

Kingdom of heaven are for those who are poor in spirit.

God has something for you if you are willing to put aside pride

and you are willing to put aside position.

I was 22 years old. I was a senior in college.

We had Bethany and that was it. And as I've told you before, I

was working probably 50 hours a week and going to school, work

40 hours a week at Kay Jewelers, and I was working another day,

day and a half a week shift at build-a-bear.

I'm not proud. Don't talk to me about it after

church, all right? Look, I knew what God had called

me to do, and I was going to make some money, all right?

So I don't want to talk to nobody about it after church.

But I'm being honest with you, all right?

That's what I was doing. And I got a couple calls from

Brother Jett, who knew I couldn't be an RA.

But I'd gotten better in a several ways.

And he said, there's a church in Chickasha, Chickasha, OK, that I

want you to preach at. I was a senior in college and

now I'm preaching at this church.

And they they wanted me to preach there.

I remember Diane and I and Bethany who was just, I mean,

so, so small. We drove out to Chickasha and

I'd preach in the morning and we'd stay in the missions house

in the afternoon. I'd preach at night.

I was so I couldn't preach my way out of a wet paper bag.

I remember preaching once and I was 3/4 through the message and,

and it was just about right near the end that I realized what the

message was about. Like, I just finally made the

connections about what the text was saying and I'm preaching and

I was like, that's it. That's it.

Like Eureka, I'd found it. I mean, I finally found the

point of the text while I was standing in the pulpit preaching

the word of God. It shouldn't have been for the

love or money, but I did that a few times.

And Speaking of money, they would give us a $200 love

offering. Now, that meant I could skip at

least a couple shifts at build-a-bear every month, which

was very helpful. That was a lot of money in

Oklahoma when we made somewhere around, I made somewhere around

$14,000 a year back then. So Deacon came up to me.

Brother Adam, could I talk to you?

Yes, Sir. And he took me off to the side

and he said this. Talk to some of the folks around

here. They'd like you to be the

pastor. All Right, Reverend, I could

feel it and listen. I knew there were problems

there, but I was like that woman that always looked at the man

said I can change him. I was like I could change these

people. And he laid it all out to me.

And the more he talked about it, the more I felt like this is it.

This is what God put me on this earth for.

And I was excited and I said, well, I can't answer you for

sure. I need to talk to my pastor.

That was Sam Davidson, some of you that know him.

And so I remember going to him and I said, brother Sam, here's

here's what it is. There's this church in Chickasha

that wants to take me as the pastor.

And I told him I'm ready, but I need to talk to you first.

What do you think? And I was sure he was going to

say, go in peace and serve the Lord and just kind of that's it.

And he looked at me and I kid you not, he said, there's a

fifth grade Sunday school class that needs a helper.

We're going to get you plugged in there.

And I thought, are you hearing me?

I went from being a pastor to a fifth grade boys class helper

didn't even make me the teacher. He made me the helper.

And in that moment, I thought, who are you, Sam Davison, to get

in the way of what God has for me.

I thank the Lord that over the next few days, he worked in my

heart, the Lord, not Sam Davison, but the Lord worked in

my heart saying, you know, brother Sam's been in the

ministry a long time. He knows that church in

Chickasha. He knows you got at least pray

about it and make sure that you're being cautious.

And listen, can I tell you, and I mean this with all sincerity.

I'm not trying to say this to to try to be dramatic, but like in

that church, I never would have been here.

You say why? Because you would have been in

Chickasha. No, I don't even think I'd be in

the ministry. I had no business pastoring that

church. I'll tell you.

It was appealing. Why appealed to my flesh.

I wasn't even at a Bible college.

I could be a pastor and I'm not even at a Bible college.

Think of what people would think about that.

And honestly, people probably think he has no business being a

pastor. But in my mind now, I would

never have articulated this, but the flesh chews on that, doesn't

it? The flesh thinks that's pretty

good and I'm pretty good. But I know this now, God

protected me from what could have been a ministry ending

decision, but I was very tempted to give in to pride and

position. Now, I'm not saying that God's

calling you to be a pastor somewhere.

That's not what I'm trying to tell you tonight.

But I will tell you this, pride and position, the lust of

position, the quest for pride, or rather I wouldn't say the

quest for pride, but the accumulation of pride in the

Spirit will be your downfall spiritually.

The church at Corinth, Paul says this.

I wish I was as good as you. You guys are really good in his

sanctified sarcasm. And we'll look more of what he

was talking about the next couple weeks about the trials

and tribulations he went through that they weren't ready to go

through because they were too rich, they were too full, and

they were reigning as kings. So I want to encourage you

tonight that pride is the thing that we hate in other people,

but we don't necessarily hate in ourselves and we don't

necessarily recognize in ourselves.

Lord, maybe you need to pray tonight.

Lord, show me any pride or arrogancy within my life.

Lord, help me to not seek a position, but to seek you.

And when you just seek Him, you know what?

He'll put you in places you never thought you would be when

you just patiently seek Him out. Can I tell you, in the 21 years

since I was offered that position, can I tell you that

God did things that I can't even describe for lack of time

tonight that never would have happened if I'd given in to

pride and position? And none of us, no matter who

you are or what your experience is, we must all make sure that

we avoid the same. Thank you for listening to the

sermon from the pulpit of Liberty Baptist Church.

If this message was a blessing to you, or if there's any way we

can serve you, please let us know by contacting us at

[email protected]. Or you can visit us this Sunday

at 800 Washington St. in Easton, MA.

May the Lord bless you as you grow in His Word.