The Love One Another Podcast | Episode 13 - Justice and Reconciliation Among Believers

This is the Love One Another podcast from Beach Point Church.

Together, we're exploring the first letter to the Corinthians with the hope that we will be formed by the wave of the cross and the love of the one who bore it.

Admitting, as this letter says, that we are nothing without love.

Love empowered by the Spirit through the work of Jesus is an unstoppable force.

It invites each of us to join God in the work of redeeming all things back to God.

With that in mind, let's open our hearts to God's word today.

If any of you has a dispute with another, do you dare take it before the ungodly for judgment?

Instead, or before the Lord's people?

Or do you not know that the Lord's people will judge the world?

And if you are to judge the world, are you not competent to judge trivial cases?

Do you not know that we will judge angels?

How much more the things of this life?

Therefore, if you have disputes about such matters, do you ask for a ruling from those whose way of life is scorned in the church?

I say this to shame you.

Is it possible that there is nobody among you wise enough to judge a dispute between believers?

But instead one brother takes another to court, and this is in front of unbelievers.

The very fact that you have lawsuits among you means you have not been completely defeated already.

Why not rather be wronged?

Why not rather be cheated?

Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers and sisters.

Or do you not know that the wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God?

Do not be deceived, neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who have sex with men, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor slanderers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

And that is what some of you were.

But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the Spirit of our God.

Baptism is a beautiful story being told.

It is our story that Jesus died for our sins, was buried, but God raised him from the dead.

But what is also powerful is to think of what it says of the new believer's life from this point on.

It's now our story that our old life has died and is being buried, and we are rising to live a new life with Christ.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote in his book Discipleship that baptism implies a break.

It is a break from the old life, autonomy, and the world's values into a life of discipleship as followers of Jesus.

The church in Corinth had a problem, and truthfully, it's a problem we still see today.

Finding themselves in conflict with each other, they let ungodly people give them counsel instead of those they were in Christian fellowship with.

Brothers and sisters in Christ were dragging their disputes before unbelieving judges, airing their grievances in public, and in doing so, damaging their witness to Christ.

Paul doesn't hold back.

He was grieved by what this revealed.

These believers were acting as if they were still living by the world's rules, not as people transformed by Christ.

They were living as if they had something to prove and something to protect, rather than remembering that they had already been given everything they needed in Jesus.

Jesus had justified them, but were now living unjustly towards each other.

Paul reminds them who they are.

He helps them reclaim their identity.

They were washed, sanctified, and justified.

They've been made new, and yet they were still treating one another like enemies rather than family.

His predominant image is that we are siblings in the faith, brothers and sisters.

What family would act this way toward each other?

It's easy to read this and feel above it.

Most of us are not filing lawsuits against people in our church, but Paul's warning goes deeper than the legal action.

The real issue is what happens when pride, bitterness, and unforgiveness take root in the heart.

We may not sue someone, but we often hold a grudge against them.

We might not take our issues to court, but we do discuss them in our group chats or social circles.

We seek sympathy instead of seeking peace.

I found myself feeling justified in cutting off someone or treating them with contempt.

I figure people would side with me.

This is normal.

I'm warranted in closing my life off from this person.

And yet the conviction of the Holy Spirit leaves me wondering if I've embraced the world's values or those of Jesus.

I have been made new in Christ.

So then why am I going back to my old ways?

The kingdom of God does not operate the way the world does.

In God's economy, winning looks like laying down your rights for the good of the body.

It looks like choosing humility over holding a grudge and seeking reconciliation over holding out for vindication.

This is what Jesus did.

Instead of insisting on our rights, we engage in loving concern for one another.

That is the model we're called to follow.

Paul even says it would be better to be wronged than to wrong a brother or sister.

That statement challenges everything in us that wants to be right, to be heard, to be justified.

But that is the power of the gospel.

Jesus gave up his rights to bring us back to God and he calls us to live with that same grace toward one another.

Paul reminds them and us that this is how you used to be, but you encountered the grace of God.

Now that we have been made new, we must live like it.

We no longer live like those who are rejecting the kingdom of God.

Instead, our lives, our lifestyles, are marked by the grace we've experienced in knowing Jesus, our Savior and Lord.

Here's today's reflection.

This is a very challenging teaching.

Forgiving and laying down a rights is something that requires a lot of contemplation on Jesus and strength from the Holy Spirit.

Think about someone in your life with whom you have experienced conflict.

Maybe it is someone in your church.

Maybe it's someone in your family.

Have you held on to resentment?

Have you kept your distance to protect yourself rather than pursue peace?

He restored you.

He laid down his rights so you could be made right.

If we've been forgiven like that, we cannot afford to live like we are still trying to win every battle.

The real question is not who is right or who should win.

The question is, what should love require of me now?

Live like someone who's already won.

Live like someone who's been forgiven.

Let that shape how you treat the people around you this week.

Thank you for taking intentional time to align yourself with God's love and the call to love one another.

You can find the Love One Another Sermon series and other resources at Beachpoint.com slash messages or on the Beach Point Church app.

May you carry the love of God into every encounter you have today.