Date : Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany, February 7, 2010

Text : 1 Corinthians 14:12b-20

Title : Strive in building up others

A week from today is the ultimate love holiday of the year, yet it is today that I am wrapping up more than a months worth of talking about how to live Gods definition of love. If your Valentines Day winds up going better for you because of these sermons, I am always pleased to receive gift cards to Little Caesars, Pasta House, Joes, Pizza Hut . . .

The thing about reading Pauls first epistle to the Corinthian Christians is that the church was not anything near a century-and-a-half old, as is ours, but that it had only been around for a few years. This makes it clear that congregations are like babies: you dont have to teach them how do wrong, but you sure do have to teach them how to do right.

The topic for this portion of Pauls letter is speaking in tongues. Not only did the Corinthians need to clean up their language, they werent even speaking in tongues in the manner of Pentecost.

See, on Pentecost, as the Holy Spirit made it so that all of the visiting foreigners could hear the apostles speaking as if they were only speaking in the tongue understood by the foreignersthus, if you understood Latin, you heard Latin; if you didnt know Latin, but you understood Hebrew, you heard Hebrew; if you understood neither of those, but you spoke in Spanish, you heard Spanishthe problem that Paul is combating is a separate sort of a tongue-twister.

The Corinthians were talking, but no one was understanding. Thats why Paul wrote that if someone speaks in a tongue, there needs to be another person there to interpret it to the rest of the congregation. There was a bunch of babbling, but no one was getting anything from it.

But, thats not what the apostles did on Pentecost, in their special glossolalia. So, from where did the Corinthians form of tongues come? Beats me. But, it wasnt biblical, so the Corinthians should have known better.

Even more, they should have known better than to fill their churches with a bunch of babblingwith a bunch of people babbling, at the same timeleaving the non-babblers to wonder what was going on.

The Holy Spirit had Paul address that aspect, head on: "If you give thanks with your spirit, how can anyone in the position of an outsider say Amen to your thanksgiving when he does not know what you are saying?"

True, Paul says, you might indeed be giving thanks to God in your strange tongue, but no one else is being built up in his faith. You, the babbler, might be built up, but is the hour of corporate worship for individuals to shine, or for the whole congregation to be blessed and built up?

The thing which amazes me is that churches still do exactly what Paul said not to do, with worshipers breaking out in tongues; or being slain in the Spirit and falling to the floor in ecstatic rolling about; or closing their eyes and waving their arms above their heads, oblivious to what others are doing, in the sort of ritual one observes at rock concerts.

And, you ask, whats the problem with this? The problem is that we sinners are too full of ourselves. We want to experience special things, but the more special things we experience, the more we crave special experiences. We want to experience special things, but we dont want the burden of having to do special things.

Lets look at both of these problems. First, we want to experience special things, but the more special things we experience, the more we crave special experiences. Whats the problem with this? Special religious experiences work like drugs: the more we use, the more we need. We get addicted to experiences. We have one; we want two. We have a second; when will the third arrive?

But, what if the special experience cease? What if I can no longer speak in tongues? What if that dries up? Does it mean that God has dried up for me? Has my faith dried up?

Is your Christian faith built on your having special experiences, like speaking in tongues, or God giving you some sort of a signyoure just sure that the cloud formation you saw was God telling you that everything is going to be all right, as a lady once told me that she experiencedor is your Christian faith built on the experiences of Jesus Christ, and His taking on your human flesh, and dying for your damnable sins, and being raised for your eternal lifeand the experiences which He has promised to you: forgiveness through His Word, salvation through His Baptism, eternal life through His Supper?

Second, we want to experience special things, but we dont want the burden of having to do special things. This one speaks directly to the theme of the sermons of this new year. Its easy to have stuff happen to us, and for us, but it takes work to perform acts of love.

Todays epistle closed with, "In your thinking be mature." This sums up Pauls admonition, with which I opened the sermon, "Since you are eager for manifestations of the Spirit, strive to excel in building up the church."

Which will strengthen faith in your fellow Christians: you speaking in a tongue, or you being slain in the Spirit, or you seeing some sign which you are just sure is a sign from God . . . or, you using your mouth to put the best construction on someones behavior, or you demonstrating a spirit of service to a friend in need, or you being the special sign from God by living the Golden Rule in your home, at school or work, or wherever you might be?

Have you noticed the challenge in both aspects of the error of this discussion? The challenge is not to be focused inwarddont get hung up on yourselfbut to be focused outwardget hung up on Jesus Christ and your neighbor, as in, "Love the Lord your God, and love your neighbor as you love yourself."

A Christian, who is speaking in a tongue, is focusing on himself. A Christian, who has Christs law of love on his tongue, is focusing on others.

God made you to serve. Sin causes you to want to be served. The battle is to put down the mirror and look out the window of your life, to see where you might serve.

Its all about love. Patiently, with kindness, thinking good things, putting them into practice, building up your wife, your husband, your childrenyour classmates, your co-workers, your employees, your bossesthe lady who styles your hair, the guy who cuts your meat, the kid who knocks at your door with the latest fundraiser.

Its all about love. Its all about Jesus Christ and His love for you, which all of you share, equally. There is no pointing at any other Christian in this congregation, experiencing anything from Jesus that you dont experience.

Each one of you receives the full Gospel proclamation. Each one of you is fully forgiven for the sake of Christ, received by you through His gift of faith and the Holy Spirits moving you to speak words of repentance.

Each one of you received the same Holy Spirit, in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism. There was no parsing out of the Spirits gifts, so that this one might speak in a tongue, and this one might see visions, and this one might become a faith-healer. God does not play favoritesyou can look it up, Acts 10:34. The only gifts, which deliver a person from death, devil, and damnationand, those are the only gifts you needHe lavishes equally upon His every baptized child.

Each one of you receive the same Jesus Christ, in the Sacrament of Holy Communion. Jesus body and blood serves His sacrificial death to every communicant who eats and drinks in remembrance of Him, and builds up each one in His resurrection from the dead for the coming resurrection of all who believe in Him.

"Since you are eager for manifestations of the Spirit, strive to excel in building up the church." There it is, dear Christians: the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in His Word, and in the Sacraments of Baptism and the Lords Supper, is the basis for building up the church.

The Gospel of Jesus is where your building up begins, middles, and ends. The more you are built up, Sunday after Sunday, year after year, the stronger you are to be able to build up others. And, thats what God made you for: to serve.

Just as Jesus Christ serves you, with His love. He serves you to build you up for now, so that you will enjoy His forever. Amen.