This is a really fun way of getting to know more people!
Sign up (there is a pink flyer in your church newsletter) and hand this into the information table after a service in the church foyer, or speak to Ps Marjory for more details.

Summary

What: shared lunch in each others homes
When: Sunday 1 August & Sunday 29 August
Time: After church

Len is a fellow of the NZ Institute of Professional Engineers and an Honorary Member of the New Zealand Concrete Society – and an all round nice guy! Come along and be share some time with other guys, lets cement our relationships together as we eat and learn more about concrete.

Summary

What: Men’s Breakfast
Where: PBC Foyer
When: Saturday 31 July 2010
Time: 8:30am to 10:30am
Cost: $10 per person

Over the last few weeks I’ve been pondering the whole question of friends: ‘how do we make friends?  How do we make better friends?’

Last week as I was looked out over the Combined congregation I was pondering that same question.  We live in such an ethnically diverse community.  The experts rate Auckland as ‘super-diverse’ –even more diverse than Sydney.  Auckland can be a very lonely place to live in or move into, so how do we connect with people?

My answer last week was ‘hospitality.’  Show hospitality to each other, but what I realise is that we need far more than this.  What we need are the skills to know how to make new friendships and how to strength the old ones we have.

E.g. I’ve probably shared with you that at the start of the year I started attending the Pakuranga Running Club on Monday nights.  At 6pm a group of people gather for a 5km run.  It’s the first time in ages I visited a new group, so I turned up a few times, spoke to other runners, talked to the President and finally helped set up in order to get to know people, but nothing seemed to happen.  Finally I prayed “Lord, please help me to have just one really good conversation with someone.”  I did.  It turned out he was a visitor from another club just there for that night!  My friends said, “You need to give things more time,” and I agree, but I wonder if it is an issue for any others of us, ‘How do you break in?’

I mean, is it me or have you found yourself asking that same question?  You move up and into a new school and a new classroom.  You have to figure out how to fit in.  You change jobs.  There’s a new crew to get used to.  What do you do?  You might be new here at church, or it simply might be that you need to grow a wider circle of friends at church (this can often happen as groups change).  Have you found yourself asking the same question?

Because we all need friends. Just recently I’ve been reading a good book called ‘Educating Boy’s’ and it makes the good point that boys need friendships at different levels in order to thrive.  They need 2-5 close mates, a group of 10-20 other friends, 20 or more peers -and they’ll also have a wide group of contacts that is constantly changing.  But this is true, not just for boys, but for everyone.

For example, it was true of Jesus.  He had Peter, James and John who were His close mates.  He had twelve disciples and others who made a wider group of friends.  Then there were other peers, and beyond that was ‘the crowd.’  It’s fascinating how Jesus, the Son of God, still needed friends, and if Jesus needed friends, then do we.  As the old quote goes, “No man is an island…”

So how do we make friends and keep them?

Well one friendship that has always intrigued me in the Bible is Jesus friendship with Mary, Martha and Lazarus.  It’s unusual because they weren’t part of Jesus chosen band of disciples, and it’s unusual because in that culture two of them were women.  Martha and Mary were sisters who lived together in the village of Bethany, about 3-4 km east of Jerusalem.  Their brother Lazarus appears to have lived off and on with them.  Jesus built a good friendship with them and I think there‘s a lot that we can learn from them.

1. Their friendship begins in Luke 10:38 when it says “As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him.” This tells us that ‘Good Friendships start with an invitation.’ Martha invited Jesus to visit her home.

Now it takes a lot of courage to approach a famous Rabbi like Jesus.  His followers would have surrounded him.  There may have been crowds around him.  He was only 3-4km from his destination.  He had more important things to do surely.  Why stop now?  But Martha displayed great courage to invite Jesus in.

And that’s how all great friendships begin –they begin with a bold invitation.  You can’t sit around hoping that others will invite you.  Sometimes you have to take your courage in hand and take a risk in inviting someone.

In fact it doesn’t even have to be a very good invitation at times.  I remember the first time I asked Nan Yong out on a date.  It was totally klutzy.  She was the first Korean I’d ever meet.  There was a Korean Cultural exhibition on in town.  I said to her “I’m interested in Korean culture.  You’re a Korean.  Would you like to take me along?”  In the end we couldn’t get tickets and we wound up seeing “Sleepless in Seattle” instead.  She liked it.  I thought it was dreadful, but more importantly we are still friends!  That’s how our friendship started.

But also to put the shoe on the other foot, one of the things is that you need to do is to recognise invitations.  It might be that someone is making an invitation to you and you can’t see it yet.  You know so often we are looking at the people we want to be friends with and we completely miss the people who want to be our friends in the process.  Are you doing that?  I remember inviting a guy ages back to come along for a game of ten pin bowls.  He said, “no, but if you’re ever going to play pool, let me know.”  I’m not sure he understood what was actually going on.  It wasn’t so much about playing ten bin bowls or pool at all.  It was about getting to know him better, but he missed the cue.  So make (and learn to spot) invitations.

2. But then we notice that Martha offered Jesus hospitality.  The text implies that she made him a meal.  This was their way of inviting him into their lives so another step is that ‘Good Friendships begin with hospitality.’

But I think this is where many of us get stage fright.  We don’t know what to do.  You know “If I ask someone, and they say “Yes,” what do we do, and when do we do it?”  Have you ever seen the toilet cleaner advert where the mother in law comes over and the women of the house panics and rushes around trying to clean up her house in time?  Some of us are like that.  We make hospitality way too complicated.  We set the bar way too high.  It often much better if we just keep the hospitality simple.  So don’t clean the house (much.  Just a little).  Don’t cook a five-course roast meal.  Find something nice and straightforward.  The main thing is not to ‘do’ hospitality but to be hospitable in our attitudes.

So what about these for ideas?  Go to MacDonald’s or Wendy’s!  (oops, no advertising).  Check out a new restaurant in the Entertainment Book (“Hey, we’re going.  Would you like to come too?”)  Invite them over for X-Box –depending on their age.  Go out for a picnic (but not today).  Suggest a movie.  Catch up for coffee some day.  Watch the Warriors (if you dare).  Share the gift of Sky with someone during the Tri-nations.  Invite them along to a club you attend.  Take them on a hike or a bike ride.  Have them home for soups and sandwiches.  Get them to help you with a job around the house!  (Free labour!)

The main idea is to invite them to do just whatever you are doing.  Do you eat out?  Just add one or two.  Is your home group having a social event?  Just add one or two.  Are you going to watch sport?  Just add one or two?  Are you going to the WOW exercise group?  Just add one or two.

Okay, you do have to be a little careful in your choices.  I once asked a mate to come and match the movie ‘1984,’ the most depressing movie ever made.  We couldn’t talk to each other for a week after that, but generally most people are pretty forgiving.  Some folks will remember for years that you asked them out.  They’ll really appreciate your efforts as Jesus clearly appreciated Martha’s.

3. But as we carry on in the passage, notice what happens next.  A dispute arises between Martha and Mary.  Martha is busy in the kitchen preparing the food.  Mary is swanning around in the lounge listening to Jesus.  Luke 10:39-42 says, “She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said.

But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made.  She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself?  Tell her to help me!”   “  Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed.  Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

What happens is that Martha asks Jesus to be the referee and to tell Mary to help her in the kitchen.  Jesus says Mary is doing the right thing, so what is she doing?  [Pause]  Mary is listening.  Mary is practising the lost art of listening and Jesus considers this to be the better thing.

The thing is that there comes a stage in a friendship where one really needs to listen well.  Listen to these quotes.  Psychologist, Mary O’Reilly says, “Attention and deep listening are important.  People are dying in spirit for lack of it.”  Kathleen Fischer says, “When I listen to other women and they listen to me we get such tremendous hope from listening to each others stories.”  Writer, Eugene Peterson says “Listening is in short supply in the world today; people aren’t used to being listened to.”  People aren’t used to being listened to in this world, and if you can listen to a person, to what they are really saying, you have the opportunity to get to know them better on a deeper level.  That’s partly what Jesus was getting at.

So remember to ask questions of people.  Start with the typical ones.  Where are you from?  What do you do?  How do you feel about the netball?  What do you think of politics?  Maybe even throw in a few slightly unusual ones, like ‘what’s been one of the most exciting things you’ve ever done?”  Find out what gets the other person talking and then simply listen.  Don’t interrupt except to keep the conversation going.  You’ll be giving them a gift.  You’ll be offering them more than simply food.  It will be food for their soul.  ‘Good Friendships continue with listening.’

4. But notice also that Mary and Jesus had found a common interest.  We’ll assume it was there, but it’s natural to suppose that Mary and Jesus were interested in God.  That was probably why they were engrossed in conversation.  They had found a topic of mutual interest.  This tells us that ‘Good friendships share a common interest.’ They just go so much easier.  So look for that common interest with a person.  Look for that key.  Keep asking questions until you find them.  It might start with food, movies, travel, sport, and lead on from there.  It doesn’t matter what it is -it could be anything.  It could be computers, current affairs, fishing, kids, home repairs, cooking, and the things you’ve been learning about God.  If people are your spiritual brothers and sisters it will ideally be spiritual matters, but find something in common if you want to take the next step in friendship.

And do let others know your own interests and hobbies too.  What I mean is that it is very hard to befriend people who are like a blank wall.  For example, for quite a while Nan Yong and I tried to befriend a couple who we hoped would link up with our church.  What we realised though was that they had no real interests outside their kids that we could talk of.  So there was nothing to grab hold of.  There was nothing else we could discuss in conversation.  It was like trying to climb to the top of Mount Aoraki without any handholds.  Are you like that?

Then help people know what you’re passionate about.  And find out what they like.  One interest in common can lead to hours of fun and fruitful conversation, like for Jesus and Mary.

5. But we also need to give friendships time.  Because ‘Good friendships take time and investment.’ Good friendships take time and regular contact in order to grow.  Jesus friendship with Martha, Mary and Lazarus starts with this story, but what you’ll notice later is that Jesus often stopped in when going past to Jerusalem.  In other words, He kept up regular communication.  He stayed in touch.

This too is a key to friendships.  As I often say to people it can take 6-12 months to make good friends at church.  There’s a sense in which you have to stick it out and keep working at those friendships.  You have to invite, entertain, listen to and share your interests until those good friendships grow.

And when you do, the result will be a friendship that is significant and lasting for you.  For if you turn to John 11 there you’ll see how much their friendship really came to mean to Jesus -because as the time went by it became increasingly difficult for Jesus to visit Bethany.  Jesus first year of ministry is called the ‘Year of Inauguration,’ the second is called the ‘Year of popularity,’ but the third year is called the ‘Year of Opposition.’  By the third year of ministry Jesus was headed into deep conflict.  He was becoming a marked man.  The religious leaders of Israel were actively seeking reasons to arrest Him so when a message came from Martha saying “please come to Bethany and help us, Lazarus has died” the disciples thought Jesus was risking His life to help them.  “Thomas (called the Twin) said to his fellow disciples, “Let us all go along with the Teacher, so that we may die with him!” (John 11:16).  Yet Jesus went.

As it turned out Thomas was right.  Once Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead the Pharisees then decided to kill Him.  None-the-less Jesus made the dangerous journey up to Jerusalem to help his friends.  After all friends do that.  Friends help each another.  Friends take risks for their friendship.  And you’ll see that the favour was returned in John 12 when, despite the danger to Lazarus, Mary, Martha, they courageously gave a dinner in honour of Jesus.  They had built such a good friendship that nothing, not even the fear of death, could get in its way.

Isn’t this the kind of friendship that everyone would want?

So let me ask you a few questions.  Let’s do a quiet little audit to work out what your friendship index is like and what you might need to work on.  Answer these questions for yourself.

1.  When was the last time you gave an invite to someone?  Are there invites you have overlooked or missed?  2. Do you invite people to join you for meals or other events in your life?  3. Do I really listen?

4. Am I interested in finding out other people’s interests?  Am I good at sharing mine?  5. Do I follow up the friendships I have already begun?

Now don’t pick all five to consider.  Just chose one, that stands out to you as an area you need to work on.  It might be giving or accepting invitations.  It might be including other in what you are doing.  It might be learning to listen.  It might be finding out other people interests or sharing yours.  It might be following up on friendships that you have begun.  What is it for you? Can I encourage you to do that this week?

Because can you imagine how might it bless PBC if we were good at making friends?  And how might it help our neighbourhood, our school or our workplace, if we were better at starting friendships?  I think this world would be a much better, happier place if we did this, so let’s start today.  And if it’s in your heart to have healthier, happier friendships with the people around you, can I invite you to stand as I pray.  Let’s pray…

As I look around I can see people from many different ‘neighbourhoods’ and backgrounds.  One thing about these combined services is that there is a whole lot of variety amongst us.

For start we have five main languages: English, Cantonese, Mandarin, Samoan, and Korean.  We represent many different nations, different ethnic groups, different villages, different suburbs, different social classes and different backgrounds.  Even amongst people who look the same we can be different.

For example, when I was learning Maori, they had words for ‘live in,’ ‘work in’ and to come from.  There was a word like “toku Kainga”, which spoke of your place of belonging, your ancestral roots, and your mountain.  The other day I was with three Europeans when we realised that we were all from the South Island, and not from Auckland originally!

But all this variety raises a big question -as Hamish Keith said in a recent art programme, “We all came here in different boats, but now we are all in the same boat.”  So how are we going to get on?  How do we get on as a nation and as Christians together when we are all normally proud of the different ‘neighbourhoods’ and traditions that we come from?

1. Jesus addressed this issue one day in a parable. It’s the lectionary reading for this Sunday.  When someone asked Him ‘who is my neighbour?  Who are the people I’m supposed to love and care for?”‘  He told them the story of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:30-37.

(30) Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers.  This road was very steep, rugged and it was easy to ambush people on the bends. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead.  (31) A priest who had been worshipping in Jerusalem happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side.  (32) So too, a Levite, a Temple worker, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side.

(33) But a Samaritan, who was despised by the Jews as a half bred and a heretic, as he travelled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him.  (34) He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine.  Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him.

(35) The next day after looking after him he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper.  ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

(36) Jesus “Which of these three do you think was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”  (37) The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”  Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”

2. So we are faced with the question ‘who is my neighbour?’ and we must respond.

The thing is that we can be very proud of our churches and our traditions.  We can feel very secure in our cultures and our churches ways of doing things, but Jesus calls us to reach out to the strangers and newcomers amongst us.  He asks us to go beyond our comfort zones.

So how do we do this?

Well the young people told us earlier in their readings –through Hospitality.  Romans 12:13 says “Practice hospitality.”

Here are three suggestions on how you can do this:

1. Simply cross the room

Early last year we did a course by Bill Hybels called “Just cross the room…”  It was about how he can help people come to faith in Jesus.  He said the key is to just walk across the room and to greet someone new.

That can feel a little artificial thing, but you can make the right choices.  Instead of looking at the floor as you walk past someone, smile and greet them.  Instead of just reading the banners on the wall, turn and say hullo to the person beside you.  Or once you have said “Hullo’ then ask some questions like where are you from, and what do you do?  The Samaritan crossed the road and so can we cross a room.

2. Secondly invite a stranger at church for a meal. Invite them to a restaurant (Yum Char) or your house for sandwiches or a church meal, like an umu or hangi.

You might have to spend a bit more on money on food, but you were probably going anyway, and it’s important to do this because we have to invite newcomers not just into our churches, but into lives and our homes, and eventually into our hearts.

The Samaritan paid for the man’s food and bed.  He gave hospitality.  That’s what we can do.

3. Thirdly we must suspend our stereotypes long enough to get to know each other as people. We must get past our prejudices and appreciate the good in people.

E.g. The Samaritan had a battle with the Jews.  When a Samaritan village refused to welcome Jesus as a Jew his disciples said, “Lord, why don’t you nuke them?  Or call down fire from heaven and destroy them?”  The Jews would never dream that a Samaritan would treat a Jew like this, but he did!  Here was something the Jews could have learnt from him, and there is always something that we can learn from others.  Every tradition, every background, every person has something interesting and valuable that we can learn.

The Samaritan showed compassion to the Jew.  I wonder, what the world would look like if did that for each other?

C. The supreme example of hospitality of course is this one [Hold up wall hanging of Lord’s Supper]. In our prayer chapel we have a faded wall hanging.  It’s a Jewish scene set in medieval European style on a Pacific Island (?) medium.

In the middle we have Jesus:

1. God from heaven –who crossed the road (came to earth) to us

2. He is offering a meal to his disciples.  God and man are sat down at the same table.  It is symbolic of God offering us each eternal life.

3. But note the key things: your side of the table is open –open for folk like you and me, for the whole wide world, to come in!

Now I don’t know what Pastor James wants to say about The Lord’s Supper, but right at the heart of the Christian faith is God’s hospitality to us, so we must take Jesus words from the Parable of the Good Samaritan and “Go and do likewise” this week.

We meet at 10:30am, however you are welcome to join us from 9:45am for a tea or coffee before the service.

A great opportunity to meet with other believers who share our building or grounds. Come and worship with fellow believers our great and wonderful God.

Sumamry

What: Combined service
Where: PBC church
Time: 10:30am (9:45am for morning tea)

Don’t tell the kids, but there might be icecream, drinks and we’ve heard a rumor about “all you can eat” pizza – but you know, you’ll just have to come along and see what this is really all about.

Come along and have fun with your children and other families – and our Special Guest (ah you think we’re going to tell you … well you’ll have to come along – or read your notices – to find out more).

In Summary

What: family night out
Where: PBC Activities Centre
When: Sat July 3, 5pm – 9pm
Cost: $6 per person OR $24 per family

Do you know how to reach out to others? Do you know how to share your faith? Can you answer the question “Why are you a christian?”

On Saturday 26 June we are running a 2 hour short course focusing on evangelism, giving you some new skills and confidence when it comes to sharing your faith. Why not come along? If you are keen please contact the office and let them know you are interested.

In Summary

When: Saturday 26 June
Time: 9:15am to 11:15am
Cost: $0 (free)

This 9 week course starts at 7pm on Wednesday, 21 July at the church. You (and your family, friends) are welcome to come along on the first night to sample the course and then decide whether or not you will sign up for the whole 9 weeks.

We do need to know how many are coming, so please sign up at the information table or drop us a note via our “Yellow Card and let us know if you are joining us.

We’d love to see you there

In Summary

Start: 7pm – Wed 21 July
Where: Here at PBC
Cost: $0 (free)

If you’d like to contact us, drop us a note via our “Yellow Card” – tick the option about ‘Getting baptised’

Looking at our new sermon series today I suppose we should be talking about football.  Football would be very topical at the moment (wouldn’t it), but I think the ‘Sex and the City’ movie released in NZ recently raises a whole lot of stuff that we need to talk about as Christians.  How many of you will confess to seeing it?

For those of you who haven’t seen the movie, it is kind of fun because it’s focused upon fashion and you get to see the very latest in fashion styles, but it is also quite disturbing.  As an elderly woman (a heroine of mine) explained when she was interviewed about the movie, she said, “It’s about a group of women who are more concerned about which dress they will wear than which man they will sleep with.”

Maybe there is a generation gap, but somewhere in last 40-50 years something has gone seriously astray in our society.  And not just for the general public, but also for Christians.  We have become unsure about our standards of sexuality.  Over the last year people have asked me a number of questions about what do Christians think of sex.  For instance, is it okay for people who aren’t married to sleep together?  What about gays –are they welcome at church?  How about divorce and remarriage?  So I want to try and answer these questions from a Biblical and evangelical perspective over the next three weeks.

Now I’m aware though that culturally some of you will be uncomfortable.  “No sex please, we’re British.”  Or “No sex please, we’re Asian or Kiwi or whatever.”  But can I encourage you to bear with us, because the question is whether you and your household would rather get your guidance from the media, from shows like ‘Sex and the City,’ or from the wisdom contained in God’s word?

-Anyway one of the major facts that we all have to face is that this world has changed forever since the 1960’s. We cannot simply put things back in the box and go back to the way things were.  There is no going back to the past.  Western society is in the middle of a major social change right now that is affecting personal relationships right across our planet.  Other civilisations like Islam are only just beginning to grapple with it, but you and I are in the middle of it.  What is this change?

Well George Friedman, a leading futurologist from the United States says that the situation facing women has changed so thoroughly in the last few years that life will never be the same again.  For example, in the 1800’s the average number of children per woman in Europe was what?  6.5-8 kids!  Now not all those children survived, but it made economic sense to have as many kids as you could, because the more hands you had working down on the farm the greater your security in old age.  Since women died relatively young in those days, this meant that they spent most of their lives raising kids.

But compare that to now days.  Today most women tend to marry much later in life, around about 28 or older (if they marry at all) and they might have on average two kids before going back to work (usually when the second child starts school at 5).  This means that the total time when childbearing is the ‘primary’ activity of a woman is now only eight years.  Given that modern women tend to live to 80 years on average –this means that the modern woman is only engaged in full time childbearing for just 10% of her life!

Okay it’s not as easy as it sounds, but the net result is that today’s women quite simply don’t need men and marriage as much.  As one bumper sticker said, “A woman needs a man in the same way that a fish needs a bicycle!”  Quite simply the time in which women need a man’s support and his money is now much more limited, and with an adequate social welfare system there is little or no economic necessity for marriage.  So why do people get married and stay married now days?  It’s for love -and we all know how fickle love is, don’t we?  The old social pressures on how one should behave (like village life with everyone telling you what to do), the financial constraints of having kids for years on end, and a legal system that once favoured marriage over being single are now mostly gone.  There is a remarkable degree of freedom for folk to hook up with whoever, whenever, “whatever” and that’s clearly what large numbers of folk are doing.  The question you have to answer is ‘how do we as God’s people adjust to this new reality that we live in?’

-Well one major argument is that while the world has changed a lot, human nature and spirituality have not changed that much! In some sense we have been in this quandary before!  The passage that we read earlier, for example, was addressed to the church in Corinth, which was a city in southern Greece, which sat on a 6km long strip of land between northern and southern Greece.  This city was morally corrupt even by Roman standards and it was renowned for its depravity -because high above the city on an acropolis stood the Temple of Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of love.  At one stage her temple housed over 1,000 priestess or religious prostitutes who would come down after dark and offer their ‘worship’ in the city at night.  This was a very popular attraction for travellers and locals alike.  (Think of Las Vegas –what comes to mind?  Gambling!  Think ‘Bangkok’ –what comes to mind?  Maybe rioting, but also prostitution?  Think ‘Corinth?’  You get the picture).  Life expectancy in Corinth was around about 25-35 years tops and with all the free sex going on in the streets the idea of staying faithful to one person for life was quite novel.

So imagine growing up in this culture and then becoming a Christian.  What would it have been like?  They lived in an over-sexed culture.  They must have found it very hard to break free of this mindset.  Much like many children today –these people did not know of any other way of life!  As a result they had a man in their church fellowship who was committing incest with his stepmother and no one batted an eyelid.  In fact they felt kind of proud to have him around to show just how modern they were, and just to complicate matters further Christianity had given greater freedom to the women.  God had given women spiritual gifts and they were playing a leading role in this new movement.  But now some married women in the fellowship were wondering if they could take their newfound freedom a wee bit further by asking, ’is it okay to ditch my unbelieving husband for a higher spiritual purpose?’  So the apostle Paul is forced to offer a crash course in Christian sexuality in order to bring everyone up to speed.  And this is where it gets interesting for you and I because of what Paul does and does not do.

1. What Paul does is that he reminds them of what is right and what is wrong. Whether they are supposed to know right and wrong already, I’m not sure, but he does not try and fudge things.  He doesn’t try and minimise the issue.  Paul just lays everything right out there in the open for everyone to see.  You know sometimes we can be tempted to be very gentle and to downplay things – “It doesn’t matter.  It’s not that bad.  You didn’t know.  You had a good excuse to sin,” but Paul blows the trumpet loud and clear.  Verse 18 is the key.  He tells them that you should not be involved in any kind of sexual immorality at all.  “Flee from sexual immorality.”

The Greek word he uses here for “flee” means ‘to run away, escape, or vanish’ and the word he uses for sexual immorality, ‘porneia,’ covers every kind of sexual behaviour you can conceive of, except for sex between a husband and a wife.  So sexual sin like prostitution is out, adultery (having sex with someone other than your spouse) is out, sex before marriage is out, sex with animals is out, and so is pornography too -pursuing any insatiable lust for sexual pleasure is out in full.  In fact Paul makes matters very clear.  God’s standards have not changed or moved because of their context.  Just because you are Gentile Christians living in the Sex City of the ancient world, you do not receive a special exemption clause.  You are not free to violate any of these values.  This is what is acceptable and unacceptable to God [square].  God has very clear boundaries.

However, where Paul is different is that he tells them why -because the temptation here would be to simply tell the Corinthians (and along with them us too) “do not touch, do not go near, do not get involved” in any kind of sexual sin because I tell you to.  I mean this was Paul’s background in Judaism.  They had some very strong social controls.  After all the Jews knew the score.  He could have threatened these Gentiles with the Ten Commandments, all the punishments of the Old Testament (in Exodus and Deuteronomy), and even the fires of hell.  He could have told them to do what your parents, the church and other authorities tell you to do.  Like a parent he could have said, “Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord (Col 3:20).”  In other words, he could have tried to assert some form of social control.  He could have put them in a pastoral headlock – “Do as your Pastor tells you to do,” but as we all know being bossy very seldom works.  Don’t we?  Most of us like to make our own way in life and to figure out for ourselves what we need to do, and so Paul offers some reasons why they should go in this direction.

In short Paul’s answer is that, “You are responsible for what you do with your body.  You are responsible for what you do with your body.”

2.  For a start (v12-13) you are responsible for any harm that you do with your body. No one else is.  You are the one.  If any damage is caused through your willing sex with somebody else, then the responsibility usually comes back to you.

The thing is that the people of Corinth had a saying that basically meant ‘I have the right to do anything I like with my body.  I am free.’  Paul says, “Yes, you are free, but you are not free to do harm to yourself or to others.  Even something that is good can enslave you and do harm to others so beware.”  In other words, don’t believe all of the ‘spin’ that you hear.

I don’t know how many of you have heard this story, but recently an Australian woman discovered that her great-Uncle was not only a famous horse thief, who was sent to the Melbourne Gaol, escaped and then robbed the Melbourne-Geelong train six times, before finally being convicted and hung in 1889, but she also discovered that he was the great-uncle of the Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd as well.  This is the only known photograph of the man, Remus Rudd, standing on the gallows in Melbourne Gaol.

So she emailed the Prime Minister asking him for information and a member of his staff replied: “Remus Rudd was famous in Victoria during the mid to late 1800s.  His business empire grew to include acquisition of valuable equestrian assets and intimate dealings with the Melbourne-Geelong Railroad.  Beginning in 1883, he devoted several years of his life to government service (that’s when he was in prison), finally taking leave to resume his dealings with the railroad.  In 1887, he was a key player in a vital investigation run by the Victoria Police Force.  In 1889, he passed away during an important civic function held in his honour when the platform upon which he was standing collapsed.”  Now that’s spin for you!

In a similar way Paul points out that you need to be cautious about all the spin surrounding sex.  Sex is not always good all of the time.  There is ‘bad sex.’  For example, we know that you can damage your health through sexually transmitted diseases like Chlamydia, syphilis, or gonorrhoea, or as a large number of women recently found out on TV in Australia you can contract aids by sleeping with strangers.  The wrong use of sex can also destroy homes.  Marriages that were intended for life can be broken, often beyond repair, and children devastated so that they carry the emotional effects well into adulthood (just ask Tiger Woods).  Ultimately the wrong kind of sex can also destroy your soul through guilt, and the loss of friendships whose trust you violated, and it can increase your sense of isolation.  Some reports I have read recently say that sex before marriage actually reduces your chances of being married in the future, reduces the odds of your marriage being a success once started, and raises the likelihood that you will have an affair once married.  I have had to tell quite a few young couples, “You have damaged your future marriage by living together beforehand.  Now what can we do to fix this?”  It would have been far better if they had simply avoided the trouble in the first place.  The bottom line from Paul is don’t believe everything you see at the movies or read in the magazines about sex!  It is only wise within one context and that context is marriage.

2. But more than that Paul goes on to say that you are responsible spiritually for what you do with your body (v13-17).  You are spiritually accountable for your sexual activity.  This is because the Corinthians were saying that ‘Well I can do whatever I like with my body.  It doesn’t affect me spiritually or change me as a person.”  How many of you have heard this expressed before?  In effect they were saying, “Sex is just like food.  Food is made to be enjoyed.  It simply goes into your stomach.  It’s the same thing with sex.  It’s just a physical pleasure to be enjoyed.  Sex is natural.  It’s no big deal!”

However what Paul argues is that you cannot separate the physical from the spiritual and psychological quite so easily.  The holistic view is far more complex.

For instance, did you know that you are your body?  It sounds like an odd comment doesn’t it?  But Paul says that your body is very much a part of who you are and who you will be in the future.  Sorry folk, you can’t get away from it!  For example, your body is not like some disposable container that gets thrown away when you die so that your spirit can float off somewhere else to be with God.  What you do in your body stays with you.  How do we know this?  Well such is God’s care and respect for the body that He raised Christ’s body physically from the dead and one day if you trust in Jesus He will raise your body to new life too.  Although your new body will be different in certain ways from your old body, just as Christ’s body was different in certain ways from before, it will still definitely be the same you.  There will some form of continuity.  People will know that your resurrection body is you.  According to the Bible you have an eternal bond with your body.

Secondly did you know that whenever you have sex with someone else you are united with him or her at a profoundly deep level?  However it happens there is a merging of one human being with another so that, in effect, where there were previously two people, now there is only one.  As Jesus says in Matthew 19:4 “Haven’t you read that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’?”  Here the word ‘one flesh’ means that you are cemented or glued at a very deep level with another person, and according to Paul that union can be formed just as easily by a one night encounter with a prostitute as on the first night of marriage.  I don’t think we yet know all that this means, but I think it means that us humans carry around in our flesh the memory of everyone we ever willing slept with.  It remains a part of who you are -for better or worse -forever.

Thirdly, when you become a Christian you receive the Holy Spirit and are spiritually united to Christ.  Again in some profoundly deep way your body and soul become a part of the body of Christ.  There is a bond formed between you and Christ who sits at the right hand of the Father (and incidentally a bond is also formed with the rest of us).  So whenever you have sex Paul says you spiritually drag Christ right in there with you -so you’d better make sure you’re having the right sort of sex at that time!  Don’t take God with you on a misdemeanour!  Again we don’t know everything this means, but it’s enough to say that nothing is ever hidden from the eyes of God.  Stay holy.  Stay holy!

Anyway the guts of Paul’s argument is this.  The Corinthians are saying, “Sex is nothing.  It simply affects your body.  It is only skin deep.”  Paul says that on the contrary sex affects you at the very deepest of human levels, so be spiritually responsible in the use of your body.

3. And then finally Paul points out that you are responsible for the good that you can do with your body. Your body has tremendous potential, so use it for good -use it in the right way, use it in the way for which it was intended.

The thing is that if you let it, this world will try and squeeze you into its mould.  It will try to tell you that your body is just a toy -that you are in fact just a toy, just a bundle of uncontrollable appetites just needing to be fulfilled.  That’s the message that the Corinthians heard.  “If it feels right, if it feels good, if it’s convenient, then just do it.  Just do it!  It’s your body and you’re going to die one day so have sex whichever way –whatever way you can.”  This world if given its way will often try and turn you into some kind of animal or sex object.  Paul says ‘Don’t let it!  Don’t let it!”  You are worth so much more.  You are worth so much more.

I hope you know it.  The men and women of this world certainly need to know it.

Look quite a number of years ago I heard a young woman speak who had been a groupie, I think with Mick Jagger’s group, but I could be wrong.  She described how she had come from an abusive background.  Her father had sexually abused her at 13 and so she’d grown up thinking there was only one reason why she would ever appeal to men.  You can guess what it was and she decided to exploit it.  She was attracted to the lights and glamour of the rock world and so she began to hang around various groups.  In the end she was taken in by one of the men and she would just make herself available whereever she was needed, if you know what I mean.

For a long while it looked good on the outside.  On the outside, living with the gods of the rock music life looked really good, but one day she said she realised that the sex, drugs and rock and roll really wasn’t really cutting it.  She figured that there had to be more to life than this.

Maybe she was growing up, but one day, somehow, I don’t remember how, someone told her about Jesus, and she began to catch of glimpse of what that was.  She heard about how Jesus came and died for her on the cross –so she could have an eternal relationship with God.

It was then she realised that God was different.  God loved her for herself, not just for her body.  Right away she stopped sleeping with the guys.  She couldn’t do it anymore for she discovered that she had become the Temple of the Holy Spirit.  God was changing her inside, making her different, and making her to want things that she had never wanted before.  Like to be holy.  Like to be pure.  Like to be good.  She began to realise that she needed to treat herself and her body with new dignity, new respect and a new worth.

In the end she left and got board with a Christian family.  She joined a local church and got good Bible input.  She sorted out her life and then around the time of her baptism decided to dedicate her life to God’s service.  When I last saw her she was travelling around the world with YWAM telling young people about God’s goodness, telling everyone she meet about God’s awesome love.

I simply mention her because what the men and woman of this world really need is a higher vision of what life is all about.  They need to lift their eyes a little.  If you have only eighty years to live, then you need to know that you are worth so much more than just your body’s appetites.  You are so much more than just sex.  You are God’s beloved children.  You are God’s beloved people.

See things from God’s point of view.  See things from God’s perspective.  In the end your body doesn’t belong to you any more.  Christ purchased you on the cross.  You and your bodies now belong to God.  Your body is simply back on loan.  God has made you a dwelling for the Holy Spirit.  You are now part of His church dedicated to the service of God, so make sure that your whole life is used for this highest of callings.  Make sure you treat your body with the dignity and respect it deserves and serve God and His purposes.  Verse 20 is a key.  Serve God with your body!  Glorify God with your body!  Honour God with your body!  Give Him your very best!  Make your choices, but whatever you do, do it all for God.  In the end you are responsible for the use of your body to God so offer your best for His highest.  Let’s pray…