Because you have this knowledge and you love your knowledge about what you have more than you love God. Because if you love God, you're going to love His people. And when you love Him and you love His people, you're going to suffer along with His people. You're not going to be easily offended. You're going to endure. You're going to endure through. And that's not going to bother you when people misunderstand you. Why? Because we all misunderstood who Jesus was. We misunderstood how he worked. More than anybody that ever lived, there's never been anybody more misunderstood than Jesus Christ. How did he deal with it? In a corrupt world that he entered into, because of his relationship with his father. He who knew all, humbly and meekly, gave his life up to do his father's will which would result in our redemption and the fact that some people love what they know about God more than they love him. And that's who Paul was getting at in this situation. What's the evidence? The evidence is how you treat one another. All right, well let's jump off into this message that the Apostle sent to the church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul, or anywhere else. Is there something else y'all been gleaning that you want to share, give away, that you just can't help yourself? Brother Shannon said he had a sweet time with Some folks today getting to pray with somebody that had asked between themselves that they needed somebody to pray for them, and God's providence, be right there and be the one to get to pray for them. And so that's a blessing, that's a blessing. You ask the Lord to open those doors, he opens them, doesn't he? In his time and in his way. Chapter six. verse 9, 1st Corinthians chapter 6 verse 9. Tell us what you saw. Well, it says, know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God, be not deceived, neither fornicators, nor adulterers, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves of mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor shall inherit the kingdom of God. And I guess it cuts in with the next verse, but that got me thinking about the lineage of Christ. And there were harlots. There was a harlot. David was an adulterer. And then I thought, he said, well, what makes the difference? They had been saved by God's grace through the merit of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why he says in verse 11, and such were some of you. You wasn't all these things, but you were some of these things. And no matter how you look at it, we were unrighteous. That covers us all. So the unrighteous, which would be those who live and practice these specifics that he outlines there, which Paul is getting to the point they were going to the unrighteous to deal with issues among the righteous. And he says that was an utter failure on their part. And he says, if they are not going to inherit the kingdom of God, that would mean they have not inherited the kingdom of God, and because they have not inherited the kingdom, they have nothing of the kingdom value to give you. They can't help you from a kingdom perspective. You are in the kingdom, you're operating in the kingdom, you were once part of that, but God rescued you from it. They need to be rescued, but you're not gonna rescue them when you're going to them with your problems. You are a stumbling block now. You are a poor witness to them of the solutions and the glories and the graciousness of the Lord. You are a misrepresentation of the kingdom. To the point, he even says this, look in verse number four, verse number four. If then you have judgments concerning things pertaining to this life, Do you appoint those who are least esteemed by the church to judge? Now notice that, least esteemed or despised or the idea is from the perspective of that these people are at the bottom. They don't have anything of any kind of eternal value to help you with. They are least esteemed universally by the body of Christ. Now you're operating in a way that does not represent the body. Because as a whole, the body looks at the judges of the world and those that are unrighteous as the least esteemed of people. Why? They're unrighteous. So their judgments will be unrighteous. Even if they have a just judgment, it is still from the perspective of God, it's unjust because everything the unrighteous do is unjust. It's all tainted with sin. So no matter how you look at it, he says, so if you go to the law and the judges, which are the least esteemed among the church, now you are acting contrary to how the body of Christ functions. You went rogue on this, doing something that the rest of the body would never do. which is showing that these people were operating out of their natural flesh, cornality, and pride, and wasn't operating under the grace of God, led by the Spirit of God. And see, we live in a society today that would tell us that if you think of people as being least esteemed among other people, you're showing partiality or you're being intolerant. Paul tells him that, hey, these people are the least esteemed. Why in the world would you go to somebody like that? He made a distinction of showing partiality that your body should be wise enough to deal with some of these things. Why in the world would you go to somebody? How does the old King James read that verse when it refers to, I use the word, in the new King James, least esteemed by the church to judge? What word does it use? Verse four. What's that? Oh, it does say least esteemed. Okay, what does yours say, Steph? who are not respected by the church. You see, we live in a society, if you refer to or think of or show any kind of disrespect or doesn't value, say that system, they would say that would be a problem. But you see, that's how far we've gotten away from the authenticity of the truth. Now, if you do think somebody is least esteemed, you're the one who looks like the oddball. But in that day, Carth looked like the oddball because they didn't think they were least esteemed. Are you with me? That just shows you how far we've come away from the practical application of the word of God. Many, many people would tell you that they believe God's words is infallible. And I believe that too. But in practice, how they put the word of God to practice Their practice will tell you that they think God's word is not infallible. They think it's not worth listening to or not worth following in practice. They'll tell you it's God's word and it's God's word without error. They can trust it, but the way they live will tell you that it ain't God's word and they have another or a better way to live than what God says live in. Are you with me? And this is where we are today in our society as a whole. Yeah, it's, hey, that worked for them, but it doesn't apply to us. That's why when you teach on these things and you teach about the Older Testament, half the people will just turn you right on off and say, look, he ain't up to the times. He doesn't have fog going on and smoke screens in their church and the lights down low. He's out of touch with everybody. He needs to get in touch with modern day stuff or he's not gonna be able to reach a modern society. Look, I'm gonna do my best to stay with the book, amen? To stay with the word. Yes. Take it. Today, that's not acceptable. For anybody to take wrong, to take, well, I did wrong, I'm sorry about that. And the point he was making in this right here is obviously they were having trouble among themselves. And Paul was basically saying, look, why can't you just be cheated? Let them cheat you. If they misuse you, abuse you, speak bad about you, you don't have to defend yourself on that. Don't worry about it. Christ is the greatest example of that, right? How he lived, he didn't revile back. It goes along with this. Look down in verse number eight. And he tells them why. Know you yourselves also wrong others. So when you wrong others and you cheat others, you are in a position that you are in the defensive and you're taking and manipulating the situation. So there's no way when you are attempting to get somebody, when they get you, you're gonna get them. It's just this tit for tat back and forth that you're not gonna let them get you because you're always gonna have to have the last word. You're gonna have to lab the last word, and that's not what we've been called to be known for. You've heard me say this before, that we wanna be known for who we love, that we're in love with Jesus. Not for what we're against, but we're in love with Jesus. And this is what Paul is, in essence, this is what he's teaching them. And because he's gonna draw that out, matter of fact, in look in chapter eight, look in chapter eight, verse number one. I know this is in tomorrow's reading, but some of you probably done looked into it. He's gonna say something to him that's gonna be important for us because he's getting in the area of knowledge and the area of love from the perspective of this. He says, now concerning the things offered to idols, We know as the people of God, we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge, what does knowledge do by itself? It puffs us up. But love does what? Builds up, it edifies. So when you're puffed up with pride, you're gonna be defensive. But when you are filled up with love, what do you do? Love bears all, love endures all for Jesus. Love suffers long for Jesus. Love is patient for Jesus. Love is kind for Jesus. Love bears no record of wrong for Jesus. Love can take a lot of blows and it can suffer a long time. It covers a multitude of sin. Love will edify, it will build up. Verse number two, and if anyone Not that he knows, but if anyone thinks that he knows anything, not knows anything, but thinks he knows anything, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know. But if anyone loves, if he loves God, this one is what? He's known by Him. Because when you're dealing with God, you don't approach God from the perspective of how much you know. you approach him from your love for him. And when you're in the presence of him who knows all things and knows you because you are in love with him, you've opened yourself up to him, you don't have anything in you whatsoever that can be elevated and exalted so you come humble before him and you are open and known by him because you love him. But you see, there are times if we're not careful, What Paul is doing is, he says, there are some there in Corinth who love what they know about God more than they love God. What they think they know about Him, they love it more than they love Him. And the evidence is, is how they are prideful and arrogant about the knowledge that they have. They love the knowledge they have about God more than they love Him. Because if you love Him, you are humbled before Him. And those that are humbled before Him are fully known by Him. In the sense that there's nothing you have to hide before Him. There's nothing you have to argue with or bring before Him as if you know more than Him about the circumstances or situations of life. So you are meek and humble and you're known by God. You're exposed fully to Him. You don't come to be puffed up before Him. You come in adoration to edify him, to lift him up and elevate him in the right position. And some people love what they know about God more than they love him. And that's who Paul was getting at in this situation. What's the evidence? The evidence is, is how you treat one another. how you self-preservation and you can't be cheated and you can't be wrong because you have this knowledge and you love your knowledge about what you have more than you love God. Because if you love God, you're gonna love his people. And when you love him and you love his people, you're gonna suffer along with his people. Then you're not gonna be easily offended. You're gonna endure, you're gonna endure through and that's not gonna bother you when people see you and misunderstand you. Why? Because we all misunderstood who Jesus was. We misunderstood how he worked. He was misunderstood. More than anybody that ever lived, there's never been anybody more misunderstood than Jesus Christ. More than anybody that's ever lived, there was never anybody more unwanted than him. How did he deal with it? In a corrupt world that he entered into, because of his relationship with his father. He who knew all humbly and meekly gave his life up. to do his father's will, which would result in our redemption and the fact that we could even know the Lord was all in how he loved his father and laid his life down to give his life as a ransom for our lives. I mean, he's the greatest example. I'm not that example. You're not that example. We're collectively are not that example. He is that example. And he was so misunderstood. in what he came to do. But just think about that. Sometimes if we're not careful, we can love more what we know than who we know. Oh, it does. It does. That's what knowledge will do to you. It's going to manifest like, for an example, you ever been trying to show somebody something and they just didn't get it, but it was so simple you seem like and you just, instead of being patient, and kind because of your relationship with them. You knew they should know it or they could have it, but they don't have it. You get more aggravated with them because they're not seeing it how you see it and you mistreat them because of what? The knowledge that you have about that, not the love that meets that knowledge out with compassion. We've all done it before. I do it with this one every once in a while. I was thinking, are you talking about with mama when you're trying to teach her something? you know, with her phone that you've already taught her. A thousand times? Yeah. Stretching me. I have to ask my son a hundred times, too. Yeah. I tell Stephanie that her mind doesn't think that way. It's not wired that way. These young people, their minds are wired that way from beginning. Hers is not. Because not only do I have to work with her, she's got to work with her, too, and show her a hundred times. And talk with her on the phone when... I was with Mama Rob in the remote. Come on. We would be in Nashville, and she would call and say, I hit some button on here. Yeah. And finally, I took a picture of our remote and put it on my phone so that when she called and said that, I couldn't read it. Look, I've been part of that. Y'all were in Nashville and they couldn't figure it out, so y'all called me and asked me to go over there and take care of it for her. Yeah. They didn't come down there and say, that TV's messed up again. And I'd have to go down there and I'd have And first of all, he had the volume up to 110. And so I had to turn the volume back. Well, you can't hear nothing anymore. I said, I can hear it. Yeah. I mean, it's only three feet. Right. Yeah. I know exactly what you're talking about there. I would have to just break that off. I had no idea. He'd just start punching everything. And a lot of it goes with when you're in a personal relationship with somebody that you know they can. They can get something you get frustrated With them more than with somebody that you are not familiar with and you trying to show them the same thing You can take a little more time with them to show them and you do it more kindly But with somebody that you close to that you thinking well, I've showed you this I've showed you this we've talked about this. We've done this you've seen this you can do it You're just not really paying attention you get frustrated With the individual where with somebody that you really don't know you'll spend a little more time Kindly and patiently with them and and it goes back to that same idea though see a knowledge about a thing in comparison to somebody that doesn't have that knowledge and you will elevate yourself above them. But what love does is keep you, allows you to meet it out with patience and kindness. And when we look at that from the perspective of us with the Lord, we don't ever want to get in a position where we are more in love what we know than we are with him, because when we're in that position, we get to where the church at Ephesus was. They were in love with what they knew about God, and when everybody was wrong on that, what did they do? They let them know it. And they became known as somebody who was against this and against that, but not in love with Jesus. And we don't want to put ourselves in that position. And it's just a good way to always evaluate, well, am I more prideful in my love for what I know or am I humbly and meekly grateful that I can know anything? that God has given me, that I can know Him and He knows me. And I have nothing to pridefully exalt, as Paul already mentioned in the first chapter of the book of Corinthians in verses 30 and 31, that no flesh will glory. No flesh will be able to glory in the presence of God. For He is our wisdom. Jesus is our righteousness. Jesus is our sanctification. Jesus is all that. He is all that. We're not all that. He is all that. He is our wisdom. And we then are open to him. So somebody that loves God is someone who is not just knows him and knows things about him, but that person is known by him. because they have opened themselves up to him and they approach people and life differently than everybody else. It just comes right, yes, yes it does. See that's part of him illuminating that to us who he is because we couldn't know him unless God showed himself to us. We couldn't know a thing about him unless God. That's what Paul started out in chapter four. Remember in chapter four he says, why do you act like you didn't receive it? You act like you come up with this on your own and you are pridefully exalting yourself, but you received this. But why are you acting as if you didn't receive it? Like you figured all this out and nobody helped you with this. He said, wait a minute, wait a minute. You are elevating yourself above everybody else as if you figured all this out on your own. But there's not one thing you figured out on your own. If you got it, it was given to you and you received it. So don't deceive yourself and don't deceive anybody else. That's in chapter four. Because they were having a problem with the leaders and they were looking down on Paul and those with him thinking that they're low lives. They ain't nothing. Just look how they live and what they got. They ain't got nothing. They don't possess anything. They like vagabonds just traveling through the world, barely making it by. They can't be all that is claimed to them to be. Look what we got. I mean, we sitting high on the hog here and look at them. And Paul said, look, you might have a thousand instructors, but you only got one father who labored to birth you into the kingdom. And like a father, I love you. and I'll lay down my life for you." You think about teachers. I mean, teachers will do a lot for kids, and teachers go a long way to help them. But teachers don't invest the time praying and laboring and going through the difficult things at home and what is gleaned and picked up at school or wherever it may be of laboring over a child's life and praying for God's work to be done in their life. They don't do that like a mama and daddy would. And that's what Paul is saying, that yeah, you may have a lot of instructors, you may have a lot of teachers, and he's being sarcastic when he says 1,000, because they didn't have that. He could have used the word a million. But he was saying that, hey, we care for you. And to the point that we gave up our life, was in jeopardy every day of our life. to not only bring the gospel to you, but also to try to grow you and labor for you and pray over you and love you. We had teachers tell our kids when we would give them insight on what we were gonna be doing and how we were gonna do this, and teachers thinking they had the kids' best interests and what they knew best for us as a family, putting seeds of doubt to go against what we were wanting to do. And we counseled with the girls and said, look, when your teacher, works and lives and prays and labors and does all that they do that we do for you, then they can have the right to tell you what we're gonna do in life. Until then, we are mom and daddy. This is what we're gonna do. I know they think they're doing good for you, but all they're doing is hurting you and attempting to tell you to do something different than what we're telling you that we're gonna be doing. And that's exactly what Paul was doing with the church at Corinth. That was one of them, yes, yes. And so you see some of those things and so I'm just relating it in an application that this is how Paul was approaching this church at Corinth from a fatherly role of saying, number one, we want God's best for you. You've been misguided and misled and there's a root of rottenness that's festering here, and we gotta get to the root of it. The evidence of that root is how you're treating one another, how you divide it and set up, this one's with this group, and this one's with that group, and this is going on, and that's going on, and you're going to law, that's just evident that you're not right with God, going to outside sources that deal with inside things, and then you're letting trouble go on in the church, and you're separating yourself from everybody on the outside. Said, no, that's not how it works. I told you don't let things go on in the body of Christ that are contemptible, that are filled with immorality, but you can't escape that out in the world. How are we gonna win the world if we try to isolate ourselves from the world? No, deal with it within so that you can have influence on outside, amen? So they had gotten everything flipped around because anytime we go our own way, we're going to flip the things of God to fit our way and that's just a root of rottenness that's going to manifest how we treat one another and then how we treat the society that we're living in and the message that we have for them. So Paul is openly, openly rebuking them in a very gracious way as a father would. I don't know if you noticed it, but in chapter 5 and 6 in these two chapters, he says those words, you brought the word up, do you not know? He says that seven times. He has seven questions. When he asked it, do you not know? That was an open rebuke to say, and you should know. I shouldn't have to bring this out to you. You should already know this because we're dealing with basic fundamental things that you have missed. And the only reason you missed it, and it's not that you missed it, you departed from it when you've gone your own way. So seven times, if you go through it, you'll find it. He says, do you not know? Do you not know? Seven questions and that's just an open rebuke. And what does the Bible teach us about open rebuke? Open rebuke is better than love carefully concealed. When we openly rebuke the way that he did, he was showing his love for them by correcting them in an area that they should have had. See, they thought they had superior knowledge. So Paul then turns around and says, but you don't even know these basic things, and you're telling me you're superior in all this knowledge, and you're more in love with your knowledge than you are with the Lord, or you would know this already. You know things, or you think you know things. And they thought they knew a lot, but he was getting to the root, they didn't know a whole lot to begin with, and what they needed to know more than anything is who God is, in the way that he works. So in those two chapters, you'll see it. Seven distinct times that he does that. I underlined them in my scripture. And in chapter five, it's verse six. In chapter six, it's verse two and verse three. Also verse nine. Verse 15 and verse 16 and verse 19. Do you not know? Seven questions that was actually open rebuke of saying these things you should be fully aware of. But you don't know because you departed from the truth in what you were doing. Now, in chapter 7, what he does is that he begins to deal with some questions that they had. And we've talked about these things on several occasions over the last few times we've been through it. And a matter of fact, I was just listening to a message from 2011 just before I came over. I didn't finish it, but I was going through it. And I brought some cups in here. and we had a bunch of different cups and bowls and how we designate, for an example, bowls and cups for certain things. We got coffee cups and soup cups and soup bowls or cereal bowls or we have our special dishes for this or that, how there's bowls that are designed for specific usages. And God's created a bowl for intimacy, and that is within the bowl of marriage. And so I hadn't got through the whole message, but I'll go through it. We'll upload that and share that in a little bit. We see a couple things in this, and for time's sake, we're not gonna be able to get all up in the chapter number seven, but there's a lot in here of some of the questions they had about marriage, questions they had about being single, questions they had about their daughters, and their daughters getting married. They referred to as maidens or virgins and what to do with it. And Paul wanted to help them because they were getting distracted with these things. Should they do this or should they not do this? In some of the cases, Paul was saying, if you do this, you're okay. And if you do this, you're okay. There's not necessarily a right or wrong. It goes back to a conscious thing. And then if you can do it and what you're doing in faith, do it. But don't let it become a distraction to you because if you let it distract you, it's gonna distract you in the work that God has called you to do. And he makes an emphasis of just how important the work is that if a person could remain single, let them remain single. Because if a woman that is married has to care for her husband and her family. A man that is married has to care for his wife and his children. And he says, if you can stay single from that perspective, that the time is at hand, stay single. But if you can't, meaning if there's a problem with you, like for an example, he starts out, it's not good for a man to touch a woman. What does that mean? It's not good to give any extra attention or touch a woman that's not your wife. It's not that a man can't touch a woman, a man can touch his wife, but he shouldn't be touching other men's wives or other women. It's not a good thing. And then he gets into the idea about having a wife and how verse number three says, let the husband render or give to the wife the affection or benevolence due her and likewise also the wife to her husband. That word affection, in the Greek, it's a neat word and I'm gonna share it with you how it sounds. King James used the word benevolence, if I'm not mistaken. The new King James used the word affection. It means a word to support. to give support that would be beneficial or good or support the well-being of both your wife and the wife to the husband. The Greek word sounds like this, eunoa, eunoa. I'll just pronounce it the way it's spelled, the way it reads out. It's a Greek word, it's only used twice in the New Testament. And it's both in relation to how one serves their husband and wife and how one serves the Lord. You Noah. And this is how I want to use it in this context. If there's anybody in the world that knows Stephanie, it's me. And I need to know. I need to know my wife. I need to know what blesses her well-being. As a husband, it is my duty to show her that benevolence or that affection that I know her and I know what elevates her. I know what lifts her. I know what blesses her. I know what helps her. I know what she likes, what she doesn't like. She knows me better than anybody else. She knows me. She knows me. So I want you to think of it from that perspective. Same way with how it's used with the Lord, that when you serve the Lord, you serve the Lord, men as unto the Lord, in the sense that you know what the Lord values, you know what the Lord appreciates, you know what is acceptable to the Lord, because you know the Lord. So you serve that man as if you are serving the Lord, whom you know. You may not know much about that man, but you know him. You know the Lord. So serve that man as you would serve the Lord, because you know what is acceptable to God, and that's how you serve that man. Well, you see, that's what you do with a husband and wife. That's that due attention that you give her. That's the idea, don't lay hands, don't put your hands on another man's wife, but you can put your hands, you can give attention to your wife. And wives give attention to their husbands. And affection and intimacy. These are the three things that relationships need, attention, affection, and intimacy. That's how we cultivate and nurture a relationship between a husband and a wife. And if you missing those elements, we set ourselves up for an attack of the enemy. And that's what Paul was saying, the enemy's crafty. He'll use you. If you're not given the proper attention and affection and intimacy in a relationship, that devil's gonna misuse you and take advantage of you. That's why he says it's very important for us to do that. But just remember that word, you know-a. You know-a. You know. Nick, you know Stephanie. Now, what I know, I am responsible to cultivate. That's my responsibility. And if I don't do that, I rob them. I cheat them. And that's the word he uses, to rob, to cheat. Notice verse number five. Do not deprive or defraud or rob or cheat. Same word used over in 6.8. Know you yourselves wrong in what? Cheat. You rob from one another. That is saying that you know what needs need to be met in your spouse's life, and if you are not meeting those needs, you robbing them of something that God designed for them. And you don't wanna rob them from that. And he uses those words, render, do, and rob. All those are words that you gotta give. You gotta give, if you ain't giving, you what? Taking, you're robbing, you're cheating, you're stealing. So just think about that. You know, you knowa, you knowa. You know your spouse, and because you know your spouse, the things that they appreciate, the things that they enjoy, what supports their well-being, it's us as husbands and wives to undergird that, amen? to undergird that, and that's the idea that we have here. Verse three, let the husband render, give his wife what he knows she needs to support her well-being. It's do her. And likewise, the word do is owe, you owe that to her. And likewise, wife to the husband. For the wife doesn't have authority over her own body, but the husband does. And likewise, the husband does not have authority over his own body. So do not rob one another except with consent for time that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer and come together again quickly so that Satan does not what? tempts you because of your lack of self-control. And then he just goes through, there's so much more to talk about, we're not gonna be able to do it tonight. But some really, really good practical teaching that they obviously had some questions on. So, Brother Shannon, you know her. I do. Miss Pat. And Miss Pat, you know her. Brother Shannon. And most of us in here, I would imagine, Miss Barber knows Mr. Billy better than anybody, and likewise. And that's what we want to help people. These younger women and these younger guys, help them with this area of giving attention to their family, to their wives and their husbands, and that affection. Hey, you know her. Don't fight it. Don't rob her. Don't cheat him. Don't rob him. You know what will support their well-being. Undergird that. it'll pay you good in the end, amen? It sure will, it sure will. Anybody have any questions? Praise Jesus, amen. Father, we thank you, we bless you. Thank you for these wonderful, wonderful words of wisdom that we find in your revelation. I pray we don't get to the place where we think we know better than you. that we submit ourselves and humbly come before you and that we don't find ourselves pridefully being more fond of the things that we think we know about you than really just loving you. We want to know you. We want to love you. We want to grow in you. And Lord, we know that we are known to you. And apart from you, Lord, we are nothing. So Lord, we're depleted of ourselves and just asking you to fill us up, fill us up, because we know that the life you lived then, you want to live in us. And we want to be crucified with you in the life that we live. We live by faith in the son of God. So help us walk through this life, magnifying you, being a blessing of your kingdom, because we know you, we serve our brothers and sisters And those that we're around the way that is pleasing to you, because we want to bless you. And we know that we may be misunderstood, but ultimately you're going to be glorified. So when we get cheated and misunderstood, we're in good company with you. You know what it's like. So Lord, thankful that we can rest ourselves upon your grace and your mercy. I ask you to be with our church family as they're spread out. Many are on the road this week. Many will be gone in various places. We ask that you do what you did for Brother Shannon today, the doors you opened for me today. that you'll do that for each one where they are, that you'll provide opportunities for them to share their love for you and what you've done through the cross for each of us. So Lord, we praise you. We thank you. Thank you for meeting our needs, taking care of us, and doing exceedingly abundant and more than we can ever ask or imagine. We bless you in Jesus' name. Amen. Love y'all. Y'all have a good night.