but you guys uh... known a long time and i appreciate so much of your ministry several of you have had in my church and uh... some of us go back a long way brother calvert uh... was one of you could either blame me or not blame me on this but was one of the men that is a protege it is a man that became our song leader and and uh... before he went over to new lisbon and i and uh... took his business over there and i praise the lord for brother delbert he's always been a dear and close friend Of course, we know Brother Stringer's been in our church, and of course, Brother Vauder. Good to see you guys up here. It just blesses my heart. And Brother Brown. Brother Brown and I go back to the 80s. And we were at, what was the name of that camp? Fairwood. And we were sitting there with Bill Darrow, just saying, it's time that we pulled our churches out of the GRDC. And I let off. and then those guys uh... boom boom boom right behind me and then there was a minor price to pay but it was worth it and uh... god had blessed as a result of that and uh... i think of uh... brother selloff he and i go back to our youth his children we shared the same mother now he's not a brother with a different from a different he is a brother with a different mother but we share the same mother we both sat at her feet amen She was his fourth grade teacher, and she was the one who slapped me down every day. So, before I got saved, I went to a Baptist college. I don't know if you knew that or not. University of Chicago, you know? Anyway, it's a privilege to be here. In my heart, for, I don't know, a couple years at least, two, three years, I had been very burdened in saying, God, how are we going to lay our mantle and our robes upon the next generation? And I was excited that it wasn't just me thinking that. Men like Dr. Ketchum and others who had had the same burden. And, you know, some shots were being fired and volleys being fired across the bow of the great ship. Zion taking away the Bible version. and big Bible colleges that had really struck a hard chord in my heart. And Calvinism is an issue and other things that were beginning, boom, boom, boom to come. And so it was with great joy and nervousness that as we met together last year, and I appreciate Brother Ketchum because really he has been the spearhead to help organize it and get us all together. And thank you, Dr. Ketchum. I appreciate you for what you're doing. Now, I've heard these great sermons. I've thought, how can I take them home and preach them? And yeah, yeah. And then you've got me now. And it's after lunch. And I don't have a great sense of humor. Some of you guys, man, I just envy you, the jokes you can tell. I tell funny stories about things that I've done, but I don't have a lot of good sense of humor. I tend to be more serious sometimes. My passage of Scripture is even going to be something that's totally uniquely different. We have been dealing in the subject, and I ask now, what, brother, is the subject of the theme of the conference? You said holiness. And of course, I've heard some great stuff, but I'm going to really narrow mine down and speak to the preachers on one particular subject that is regarding holiness. And in that, I'm going to throw a little something in there, a little something to chew on, a bone to chew on, in defense of the scriptures that we use, our King James Translated Bible. In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, and it's so happened that Brother Ketchum called me when I was in serious meditation over this chapter and particularly chapter 11. That God seemed to speak to my heart about this in verse 13, it says there is no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man, but God is faithful who will not suffer you to be able to be tempted above that you're able, but will with a temptation also make a way to escape that you may be able to bear it. We all memorize that in Bible college. Wherefore, my dearly beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as wise men, judge ye what I say. Now, here it gets into the context of where I'm talking. Verse 16. This cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion? We know that's koneo from the verb, and it means fellowship, but it doesn't just mean some kind of an ethereal fellowship. It means in a very intimate, close, personal fellowship. within the context of the ordinance of what we call the Lord's Table. Of the blood of Christ. The bread which we break is if not the communion of the body of Christ. And so he's trying to teach them, you know, the issues of idolatry that they were wavering back and forth into. And so he would bring that up again in chapter 11. And when we go to chapter 11, He declares in verse 17, he has now his third salutation to the church at Corinth. Knowing this, that I declare to you, I praise you not. She come together, not for the better. But for the worse, how do you like a salutation like that? How would you like your pastor to write a letter like that to you or maybe the former pastor of the church to you? In this church, Paul is going to be talking about what we're worth. So I decided to look up on the internet, and I'm learning to use it, and I decided to say, what are humans worth? I know I frustrated Brother Ketchum because he said, do you ever read your email? And the answer is no, please mail it to the church where I got three secretaries to give it to me because I don't even go on it. But I said, okay, what are humans worth? What are you worth? What are human beings worth? And so I looked it on, and one guy was as low as 50 cents is all that he can find the value of a human. I looked again, and I liked this guy. He said 8,000, and I found some other researchers that said anywhere from 80,000 to $1 million. And I guess that depends on how many extra parts you got put into you. Not sure. Well, from Christ's perspective and what we have just read, The communion, the fellowship that we have with Jesus Christ, it is around his blood and it is around his broken body. And so from his perspective, I would say it's priceless, wouldn't you? The heavenly father so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. I would say priceless. And when you ask human beings and even some Christians, what are we worth? Their estimation of what they're worth is even higher than God's perspective. because of the age that we live in is such a prideful age. When we gather around the Lord's table, this is where Paul is going here. He's saying, what are you guys coming together with? And I'm going to be bringing this in and you'll find out where I'm going by the end of the message and I draw the applications. But he says, when you gather around the Lord's table for his communion, what is the value of that to our people as a ceremony, as a memorial? But more importantly to us as Baptists, you know, to the sacerdotalists, the Catholics, which I was raised up to. I was trained to be a novitiate priest. Went to Notre Dame, went to Mount Carmel Seminary in New York. To the sacerdotalists, it is a means of earning grace points, of meriting favor with God. All right? You go to heaven or hell if you don't get it once a year. I can remember as a young, novitiate, older boy, some really bad stuff that I did. And I nearly died for it. Not because of what was said here, but because the person in charge of what I was supposed to be doing nearly killed me. I wasn't going to tell you that, but then I thought, if there aren't enough ex-Catholics in the crowd, they might not think it funny. But, you know, Baptists and belated Protestants, to us, this is a memorial. And it is a memorial, it is given as an ordinance, and we do it as a semi-ritual in our churches. But I fear that all too often, when we think of communion, we do not often think of it as a solemn occasion, as a holy convocation unto the Lord. We do not often think of us pastors like the high priest that would come before the Lord and on his miter would be written holiness unto the Lord before the people. And so this morning, I want to take a chance at this, hoping that it hasn't become something mundane, duty, common, less than a sacred, sanctified celebration and take a look at some things, refresh our ideas and maybe some notions. of what the Apostle Paul was saying to the church, but we who lead the church, the onus of responsibility that that puts on us as well. So, let's read the rest of that and we'll have a word of prayer. Verse 18, For first of all, when you come together in the church, I hear that there will be divisions among you, and I partly believe it. For there must be also heresies among you, that they which are approved may be made manifest among you. And when ye come together therefore in one place, this is not to eat the Lord's supper. For in eating every one taketh before the other his own supper, and one is hungry, and another is drunken. What? Have ye not houses to eat or to drink in? Or despise ye the church of God, and shame them that have not? What shall I say unto you? Shall I praise you in this? I praise you not. For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you. that the Lord Jesus the same night in which he betrayed took bread and when he had given thanks he break it and said take eat this is my body which is broken for you this do in remembrance of me and after the same manner also he took the cup when he had stopped saying this cup is the New Testament in my blood this do as often as you drink it in remembrance of me for as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup you do show the Lord's death and here's the promise till he comes Father in heaven now, open up our minds, our eyes of understanding. May we make application to our own people. But most importantly, as pastors, may we make application to ourselves as administrators of this great command, of this great privilege of showing the people the death, the crucifixion of Christ as a promise of hope till he comes. Father asks us in Jesus' name, Amen. We're in Corinth now with Paul. He's writing there. You know, in chapter 18 of the book of Acts, he went there to start a church, spend a little extra extended time because of the great revival coming out. This was a soul-winning church, by the way. Many men, the Bible tells us in the book of Acts 18, that many of those of the priesthood, of the Levitican priesthood, got saved and joined themselves to the church. That's wonderful. But in this salutation that we started off, Paul had something to say. This was also Corinth. It was a very wealthy community. It was a mercantile community at the crossroads. Not only a wealthy community at the crossroads, but it was a playground. If you will, it was the Cancun, the Jamaica, the South Florida of the ancient world. It was there that the aristocrats and the nobility in the wintertime would go to play. In fact, in the great temple at Corinth, they would hire there a group of ladies known as temple prostitutes, around a thousand or better every single year. This was a place that was the hideaway, the playground often for men that would run away from their spouses as well. So there was lewdness and wickedness, and you can begin to understand some of the trappings and the temptations that would come upon the people and the problems that would have to be dealt with in this community and the problems with paganism. So, Paul opens up this letter in chapter one and he says, you know what? There's some real divisions amongst you. You've got problems here. You've got the crowd, the time of Cephas. You've got the other... This wasn't merely him mentioning this for a personality cult. This was something greater than that. This was around doctrine, around heresies that were amiss in the church. You had the group that was I am Paul and loyal to him, the Cephas, that were Jewish or Judaizers. You had the crowd that were the I am of Apollos, one of the former pastors of the church that had left, and Paul was going to hopefully try to talk them back into coming back in chapter 16. But he said he's not of a mind right now to come back. You and I have been there, haven't we, at different places. And so they were the Greeks. And some of the libertine behavior that was going on as well that represented in those various factions. And so Paul is identifying in the salutation here some real problems. And he opens this, first of all, with a strong disapproval. And he says to them, I want to tell you something in verse 17. I praise you not. I know sometimes when my mother would speak to me. Always there was the reminder, I'm going to say something to your father. Now, Brother Sella, I don't know if she ever said that to you, but I'm going to guess she probably did anyway, yeah. But I always feared that. Now, my father was seldom home. He was a commander in the Navy. He was a war hero. He was a spy. So often we didn't know if he was coming home or coming home alive during the Cold War. But when my mother said that, we figured we'd butter her up, we'd make everything nice, and we'd put on all the superficiality. And my mother had a steel trap. She could hold a grudge longer than anybody I knew, and didn't matter if my father was back at a month first thing in the door, do you know what your sons did? We had to answer. There was accountability here. And my dad was hoping to hear happy things, and now he had to come face us and say, I'm going to tell you boys something. I am not happy with you. Well, that's the tenure here that that Paul says, he says, he says in contrast here to the remembrance, the Christ who is coming to him and he's going to speak on that in verse 70. He says, when you come together, I praise you not that you come together. You're assembling the Ecclesiastes. not for the better but for the worst when you guys get together it isn't because you're having a good time I remember you know and I believe the Lord's Table Communion is a very serious time we don't put it on once a week we could but we don't put it on once a week because we don't want it to become something less than special and we we we we look at these guys we don't know how often they had it maybe in the early days they had it every week That's a possibility. We don't know. It seems that that was an apostolic method in the book of Acts. But he said, when you're assembling, I want you to know he was speaking, by the way, to the whole congregation. The whole congregation was being held by the Apostle Paul as at fault. Now, he isn't mentioning the pastors yet. Because there's a lot of personalities and diverse teachers that are in this very large church. And he's saying, I've got a problem here with you guys. And he said, I hear that there'll be divisions among you, and I partly believe it. And what was happening is here, it didn't matter what the sin was, what the scrapings and the fightings and the infightings and the doctrinal issues that were going on, it was being tolerated by the whole of the congregation. I would say if you were a pastor of that church, you'd have your hands full, wouldn't you? In fact, some of us may have pastored churches like that. And we've asked God, Oh, God, find me another church. And what was God's response to us? Well, really, I'm looking for another man. And then we get on our knees and we say to God, is it all right with you if I become that man? And that's the reality of how God works with us, is I'll never forget when I was being placed into Tomah I remember some pastor spoke there, could have been Brother Leeds of Wisconsin, and he said, you know, God calls a man to a church, but he also calls a church to that man. And it's not that we laud over or we think we're so much better or aren't they great that they got us, but we need to say, isn't it great that we got the church we deserved or need? And that's, God's in that working and conforming business. And I, you know, I look at this and I wonder how come you still kept him? I look at the churches in Revelation and say, why didn't you just blow him out of the water, God? Sometimes we look in our own people's lives and we see what's going on. So first of all, he had disapproval, but then he, he spoke with great disgust. Verse 18, for first of all, when you come together in the church, I hear that there be divisions among you. And I partly believe it. There were divisions. The word here, divisions, means that which is a rent cloth to tear our clothes. So the concept of that is when there was going to be, in the Old Testament, the word is pantah, the great repentance. They would, as a symbol, tear the cloth of their clothes and they would bring it into a schism, into a division, into a fraction. Now superficially, we look at what these were. What he mentioned here was what the problem was. And we look at this and we say, in verse 19, he identifies, uses the word heresies. We're going to come back to that among you, that they which are approved may be made known or made manifest to you. And so he says, you know, when you come together at the Lord's table, you got people eating and you got people not eating. You got people drinking and you got people not drinking. And then you got people that are drunk. I mean, can you imagine a Baptist church that's like this in a Lord's tables time? And I mean, in our church, I don't know what you do in your church, that's fine, but in our church, we never have a church fellowship and communion tied in together. You know, it's probably part of the influence of my Catholicity and upbringing, but it's also because I want to stay as far away from having God mad at me, to be honest with you. I don't fear what other people may say about me. I respond to it, and like you, Brother Brown, You know, sometimes you've got to walk away and go into a prayer closet and say, take away my sin. But I would like to have it just once. So. Yeah, you don't want to ask God to turn his back, because that would be on you, too. But anyway, superficially, it was the haves and the have nots. It was between the Jews and the Gentiles and their leaders. It was the drunken and the selfish. But as I said, It really ran much deeper than that, the problems that were in the church. It was the situation. There were some real hard core problems because into the mix of this community I described, you have a modern day Western and even American looking type of church and people. philosophically of all of the schisms and all of the rather of all of the genres of Grecian philosophies coming in, Hellenistic Jews that were sucked in by the worldly and Hellenistic and Jewish and combined Greek notions. You had the hardcore Levitican Jews. And then you had the liberated Gentiles who were just happy to be saved coming into this mixture. And so Paul says this in verse 19, For there must be also heresies among you. And I truly believe that at any given time there are heresies floating in the background of our local churches. I hope you understand, the brother that spoke on technology and not synthetic Christianity, but anyway, I hope you realize that many of your people, 40 on down, are on the Internet and in combined ignorance going to these chat sites that are quote-unquote Christian chat sites. and they are networking with friends from the E-Freeze and the, oops, I wasn't going to name names, from the Neo-Evangelicals and the Pentecostals and all these other groups and they're networking on a personal basis, they're on the internet and so all this hodgepodge of nonsense that the devil has out there is coming into your churches, like it or not. And that's why it's imperative for us to identify it and preach against it, but also teach the why's and the what for's, and make sure that you reassert doctrine, because doctrine was at the very core of what was the problem here. And he mentions the word heresy. You guys know it's translated from the word heresy. And they transliterated the word heresy into an English word, heresy, kind of like the word baptism. But they did it for a very good and specific reason. Now, if you go to look in any of the critical texts, They're not going to tell you it's the word heresy are they? They're going to tell you it's either the word division or the word faction. But that is an inadequate word and that's a very broad type of word and that's why the word heresy had to be used here and transliterated because it was for a specific purpose. that's going on then and now, and probably through all the ages of Christianity. The battle line, the devil is not new, he's got just the same old plot every time, divide and conquer. And so when he comes here and he uses the word heresy, now the word heresy, it means a faction of course, but it has to do with a sect that is based upon a belief or carnal behavior. and that was what our our translators were trying to get across here it wasn't just factionalism rich and poor have and have nots the drinkers and the non-drinkers the smokers and the non-smokers the people who you know in my when i went to bible college it was in the seventies and you know all the girls they were you know under cedar home they had to wear bonnets to church to hats because in case they might go down south And then the girls all had to wear these full-length dresses down to the ground, which my wife and I were saved out of the hippie genre, so that was kind of cool, but that was all right with us. That was the dress of our day. And so, as they were dealing with that, it was more than just that. You know, Albert Barnes put it this way. He said, why do sects creep about in the church? He said, number one, a love of power and popularity. Number two, a respecting teachers above Jesus Christ. Number three, and listening to them. Number three, multiplying all the creeds and confessions. And number four, passions of pride, ambition, or even bigotry. And so we would find the word translated again, Galatians 520, where he says, the sins of the flesh are idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, and heresies. Peter says in the last days concerning that he says, but there were false prophets among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you who privilege shall bring in damnable heresies. Can you imagine if he used the word damnable? factions. It doesn't make sense, does it? And so it is imperative that this word is translated heresies because he's trying to make a very pointed statement and that there was not simply divisions based upon personality cults. We've seen that. Not simply divisions based upon, you know, she's wearing a blue dress and it was my turn to wear a blue dress this week. Not that kind of silliness. But it was very serious, serious, erroneous, doctrinal errors that were undergirding and coming into the church through false teachers who people were being divided up on the various sides. So what was it? Paul then began to stake with those more. Think of this book, I think of and reflected back on all of the problems that were dealt with. And like I said, Two things can be noted about this church. They were a soul winning church. But it didn't prevent them from having the serious problems. And they were a financially giving church. Yes, the church in Macedonia embarrassed them by percentage wise per capita what they gave. But at the same token, they were pretty good giving church. Paul would commend them for their good giving and use that against them to make sure they gave even more. He was a good Jewish man. I say that because my lineage is Irish, too. In chapter 1 and 2, there was a division that were based upon men and upon teachers of varying beliefs. In chapter 5 and 6, Paul had to deal with gross immorality that was tolerated because, by the way, that was the custom of their community. In chapter 7, you have morality of singleness and proper marriage. In chapter 8 and 10, you have Christian liberty versus legalism, lawlessness, or libertine behavior. And so learning not to be a stumbling block. In chapter 9, you have the challenge to Paul's apostolic authority by these heretical teachers because if they can dethrone him as an apostle and worthy teacher, then they can come in and take over the church. Any of you ever experienced stuff like that? In chapters 10 and 11, you had Paul dealing with purging them from the paganistic practices and inclusions of those paganistic practices. Now, here we go into the Lord's table. Meats offered to idols. I know. It was a good deal to buy meats at the Zeus's temple. I agree, that was a good deal. You wouldn't want to be a stumbling block and let anybody catch you doing that. Okay, but there was more to it. The drunkenness that he mentions here, there was more to that too. It was a pagan worship, by the way, called libation. It was part of the pagan offering system that when they would come together to celebrate the pagan deity, they would come together and as part of the libation, they would get drunk as a skunk, take the drinks, spit it out all over the offering table or all over the sacrifice table, which would be the communion table here. And it would be an honor and a homage to get drunk like that to their gods. Now keep that in mind why Paul would use this concept of heresy. In chapters 12 to 14 you know is the misuse of spiritual gifts. In chapter 15 it was a correct the errant teaching on the resurrection. Is it any wonder our King James translators use the strongest more meaningful language of the word heresy and not just division or factions that are among them. And now Paul goes on and he identifies some further common things. Tell me if you don't identify with this some days at your communion table. In verse 22, 21 if you will, it says this, For in eating every one taketh before other his own supper, and one is hungry and another is drunken. What, have ye not houses to eat, to drink, and to despise ye the church of God? Shame them that have not. What shall I say to you? I praise you in this. I praise you not. Okay. In the early days, in the first two centuries, the Lord's table, communion, was called the love feast. In the persecution days that would come about in the second and third centuries, those love feasts were used as to qualify Christians for persecutions because they said that they were pagan, that they were a cult, and they were eating people. And that became some of the legal pretext for persecution here. Well, the very fact that they were sitting down to sup and didn't share means, you know what? At this love feast, there was no love for one another. The absence of agape love at the agape feast. Next of all, we see the confusion that would come about here in verse 22. Have you not houses to eat and to drink? And he goes on to that. In verse 23, he says, I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you. So he's reminding them, hey, guys, do you remember what I taught you? Do you remember anything that I taught you? And so, as he goes here, there was abuse and confusion of the symbolism, but also of the sacredness of the ceremony of the Lord's table. And so, in their reconstructing of pagan libation at the offerings, their abusing of the church, which was Christ's body and Christ's espoused bride, there was a problem in the church. There was a problem that they were having. You know, brethren, at any given time when we are going to put forth communion, there are husbands and wives that are having serious ought or marriage issues. Are there not? There are children that are... I tell you, I wonder sometimes that I'm alive, that God hasn't killed me. There are children that you know in their heart that you know maybe they got saved maybe they got baptized but you know you wonder are they really saved? There's teenagers that are sneaking around on their parents or on the internet and it doesn't matter how hard we preach the parents still seem to buy them their iPads and their and their telephones and you wonder why is this going in one ear and out the other? Not too long ago I was sitting down with a young couple And the man was saying, you know, I had to speak to my wife because we went out with two other young couples. And honestly, our wives went out and they went and had drinks and was like, what? And it's like and these are like, what are you talking about? Two of those couples went off, went to Bible college. And they all took communion, too. And they all sat at the Lord's table singing all the right songs, and now they're mad at one another. I'll be interested this weekend to see if they take communion. But we also had a disaster. We come down to verse 27 and 29. He delivers them, he tells them, and he reminds them of the wonderful imagery and the wonderful symbolism. And as we read in chapter 10, it's more than just symbolism and memorialism. It is actually the communion, the fellowship with Jesus himself, wherever two or more gathered in his name. Do we believe he's in our midst or not? I do. And I believe the ceremony, the sacred memorial service is a very holy thing, a very special thing that oftentimes we have diminished into let's get it done, let's get it over with, because I want to preach more about that in a little bit. In verse 27, he goes on to say, and here is another correction of our correctors. Wherefore, whosoever shall eat of this bread and drink of this cup of the Lord unworthily shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord. I'm narrowing in on communion because I'm going to even narrow the gun with a scope here in a second. There was a disaster that was occurring as a result of this paganism infusion of the lack of separation of the mixture of the teachers and of the treatment of one another. They were eating and drinking unworthily. That, by the way, that is the correct and the only translation you can use for that word. Whether it's the New King James, which claims to be the King James, but only kind of new, except they take the critical text passages. Whether it's that or all of the other critical texts, to translate this unworthy would be an errant form of translation. You know, sometimes, brothers, when we're... And I realize about the Elizabethan language, that was one of my majors, the grammar. Ain't you got any sense? Listen to me better. But I understand that. all of the troubles you have. But the word unworthily, there is no English equivalent of it. It is an adverb. And the word unworthy is either a noun, a verb, in some occasions, but normally a noun or an adjective. And there's an important critical doctrinal distinction here. Words are important. We know that as preachers, don't we? For instance, Unworthily being an adverb is a descriptive adverb. It is from the word Anonsios. It is on means that which is unsuitable or improper manner or indecent, vile mockery or contemptible to make that which is sacred common. Not a holy sacrament, but it is a hallowed ceremony. That is what the word, the adverb unworthily, the L-Y ending being an adverb, means. Now, what comes to your mind when you say, he that eateth and drinketh unworthy? Well, then another thing would evoke our mind. If it were unworthy, as every other modern translation, being a noun or an adjective, it would mean this, to be or not to be suitable. qualified, worthy of participation or to merit." Wow! Were I to ask Brother Paul, are you worthy of communion? And he would fall prostrate and say no. Were I to ask Peter, were I to ask any of the great men of God through the ages, and they would all fall down and say, no, I am not worthy of the Son of God to die for. I am not worthy. I cannot merit worth. What a breach against the doctrine of grace to translate that unworthy. Just a simple little thing, but you see how it changes the very direction And here the author of grace specifically chose not the author, pardon me, but he that is the apostle of grace specifically would choose a word in our translators, put it in the accurate word, and it can never be changed. We just have to teach our people this is a right word. Unworthily. We cannot merit, we cannot earn the worth of Christ. One commentator said this from about 150 years ago, thinking about how modern translators will begin to translate that unworthy, he said this, we are all unworthy so much as to gather up crumbs under the Lord's table. And amen and amen to all of us that could say that, for we are all unworthy. It is purely by grace undeserved, unmerited, that I stand before you, a renegade saved by the precious blood and body of Jesus Christ. And that is how we assemble around the communion table. To churches and to pastors, often our people, as I said, lives are a mess personally and wrongfully partaking in the Lord's table. And even sometimes our deacons, we are not having, you know, cameras in their homes, are not where they need to be. And even sometimes we pastors are harboring sins, all the secret ones that we talked about a little bit. But more closely to our hearts are certain oughts that we hold and bitternesses toward people of the past that have hurt us. Perhaps a form of covetousness. It used to be, you know how big it was in the 70s and 80s? Brother, you were saying you used to hate to go to the pastor's meetings because they'd be brag sessions and you'd go there and feel like, I'm a worm. I am undone. What am I doing here? And they would be extremely discouragement. So you'd get caught up in lying too. Hey, praise God. I had 25 in my church this Sunday. We've doubled in the last two years, you know, or something like that if you were in a mission church. Pridefulness. We come to the table filled with pride. You know, and some of us may even have had words with our wife that afternoon. Well, of course, with the cell phones, you get on the cell phone and say, honey, we're about ready to have communion. I just want you to know that I forgive you and that I want to be right with God, you know. Or something like that. But issues with our children, some of us hiding the fact that there were issues with our children, and yet we administer the ordinance and we are administering it, are we not unworthily, unholy before a holy God? And we are the examples upon the miters of our foreheads saying holiness unto the Lord. Worthy example, follow us. I know this is Not funny stuff. This event or ordinance is not just a duty, brethren, or plain symbolism. It is, as I said, a solemn assembly, a holy convocation and a celebration where the Lord definitively is present in our midst. One pastor I know of in a church that I came to reopen up in tomahawk wisconsin with held because there was bickering among the people with held communion for a year to the church got it right apparently in twelve months they never got it right he left i was able to help get it right you know even the apostle paul and i think we need to be careful about in our administration of our office even paul put the onus of responsibility on the individual's conscience and choice and we shepherds need to be mindful of our offices, power or authority, but also our limitations. And here we need to revert back to where it needs to be. This one holy service, a hallowed celebration where our Lord is present. And finally, we see Paul's sentence. This is the part that scares me. When I was a young man, working with the sacerdotalists, the Roman Catholic Church. And I was, it was communion. And I, this is, it's funny, but it's not funny. And if you're Roman Catholic, it's more funny, ex-Catholic, pardon me. But we were sitting there kneeling and doing this pre-Easter Advent stuff is what they call it. And we had broken and did something horrible. We broke into the priest's cabinet there. Eh, we figured, nothing to worry about. 630 in the morning, who's going to bother us? So we took out their sacred wine and we took out their communion chips, about yea big. Now we figured we weren't going to go to hell because they weren't blessed by the guy yet. But the other guy had cards and so we played poker with him. That's bad. But in walked Mrs. Oliveri. Every day for 10 years, her poor husband died. She dressed in black and came to church every day. She saw that. She saw Satan. Fell over, passed out. Her grandson was one of my friends. I had to meet with all the authorities, and I thought I was going to die. And then I got home and had to face the family back then they had ways of dealing with issues. I was what they called an ADHD kid. Never had a drug in my life for that. I had my mother. Paul says in verse 27 here. Wherefore, whosoever any of us that eat this bread and drink of this cup of the Lord and worthy Then he says this, "...shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord." Guilty. Anoxous is the word. It means fit punishment on account of their crime. It is in the annals of heaven a crime to be unfit and without its proper intended meaning and design and designation to participate in the Lord's table. It is a holy thing that we render unholy by doing it. And he says, we are equivalently guilty, pronounced guilty, of the body and of the blood of Christ. Literally, punishment is due us for the deed as if the congregation at Corinth, or any of ours, had done it personally to Jesus Christ, stood at the cross and nailed Him, and shed His beautiful, innocent, guiltless blood. Because of two things, the symbolism of this memorial service, but the koinon, the communion and the fellowship that we have with each other and that we have with Jesus at that moment. And so in verse 29 to verse 33, here is Paul, the lawyer and the judge. Remember, he was both of those. And so he's using legal terms. You read Paul like you're reading a law book. Coming from a family of lawyers, that was easy. He said this, For he that but let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread, drink of that cup, for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning of the Lord's body. Krimah. Damnation or condemnation here. Damnation. It is the sentence that a judge would render after he pronounces you guilty, he says, now capital punishment for this capital crime is due you. And so there were some that were diseased and some that had died. Have you ever wondered in reading this passage why more of your people are dead? I mean, I wonder, well, Lord, was it, were you just, and he was, were you just more serious then because it was the first generation Christianity? And I think what I've described to you goes to show you how heinous a thing that they were doing in this soul-winning, heavy-giving church. How reprehensible a behavior, and yet people constantly come to the table I wonder sometimes why me as a pastor, maybe should have died, maybe should have been sick. I don't know. All I know is that. Whether with Paul or Peter or the greats of the past, I fall prostrate on the ground and say, I hope I am unworthy. I do not deserve this. And so it's practical. He has a solution. First of all, the practical and verse 22, remember, What we're supposed to do as he deliberates, as he tells us. Look, you all got houses and homes. If you didn't catch that, I tried to be a Biden, you all go home, eat or fellowship in your own homes, drink there, whatever you got to do, you do it there. Don't bring this stuff into the Lord's house. When we were having all that crazy stuff going on in Madison. Tremendous vitriolic, the neighborhood I live in happens to be a federal jobs. People that are working for the military or are soldiers and then the mental hospital. The VA meant large mental national hospital. So it goes to show you kind of members we got in here, the extremes. And so he said in the practical home and eat, they were up in arms and one of the guys in our church You talk about modern technology. He got offended as a state worker and didn't come to church. And so I went to him and I said, on behalf of our local church. And I told our people, let's not argue this thing in the church. Go in your own homes and argue this. But keep it out of the church. And I said, look, I apologize for anybody in your Sunday school class or whatever that offended you in words. Well mumble next thing I know my daughter's telling me last week this guy put something up on the Facebook How that I admitted how the whole church is wrong and in sin or something like that or whatever? But I just don't know as a leader what what what people are gonna put where anymore? But he said practically go eat at home spiritually here's what I want you to do in verse 23 through 26 I I received of the Lord that which I delivered unto you. And he gives the whole recognition of what it was. Verse 26, he says, as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you to show the Lord's death till he come. He said, I want you to repent and I want you to restore. The very meaning of the Lord's table and of communion to its holy, rightful place in your heart and in your life. So you're going to need to repent. You need to repent to establish the fear of the Lord, both the terror and the awestruckness of God around this event and in the congregation. You need to restore the hallowed reverential meaning to the celebration. You need to put the love back in the love feast. And you need to do this until Jesus returns and keep your eye on the prize because Jesus is coming back and sooner than when Paul wrote this. And finally, he said, let a man examine himself, self-examination, to constantly restore back to our own lives, fellas, and to the lives of our people, a tender, teachable spirit by us being the example of just what that is. A humble man in the ministry. Pastors, it does begin with us and it does fall upon us. To be humble to be those holy examples even if we fear criticism. I wonder I don't raise hands as hands. Don't raise your hands. But how many of us here have ever knowing in your heart that not all things were right with the Lord refuse to either administrate communion or to partake of it the day you've served it. Are we serious about this thing called holiness under the Lord? So if we fear criticism being found wanting or imperfect, there can be and never will be a revival of holiness and fear of the Lord in our church until it begins with us, especially where we lead and overseas as the bishops of the Lord's heritage. God bless you. Thank you so much for your willingness to listen to me.