1 Corinthians 4A

Sermon Transcript

We are here in 1 Corinthians chapter 4. There is a lot of great information here so I am only going to get through the first seven verses — basically one third of the chapter — in this sermon, because there are just different topics that come up in 1 Corinthians 4. The name of this sermon is Judge Nothing Before the Time, which is a phrase that pops up here in these verses.

To get the context, remember that one of the big themes in 1 Corinthians chapter 3 is talking about the judgment seat of Christ. Truly, we do not know who is going to get what rewards at the judgment seat of Christ. Obviously we can have a general idea — if someone never goes soul-winning, does not go to church, is living as a drunkard but believes on Christ, are they saved? Yes they are, because all you have to do is believe. They are not going to get a lot of rewards. But at the same time, there are a lot of people serving God that are in different situations, and you do not necessarily know how many rewards they are going to get — or even how many rewards you yourself will get. We are going to see that in this chapter.

Stewards of the Mysteries of God

Verse 1: "Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God." We often hear the expression being a good steward linked to finances — be a good steward of the resources or finances God has given you. But here the Bible speaks about being a good steward of the mysteries of God. That is a little bit different from being a good steward of money or resources. It says being a good steward of the mysteries of God, and it mentions this in the context of the ministers of Christ. So as a minister of Christ — someone who is not only a soul winner but someone who is preaching sermons and delivering messages — the Bible is saying to you, be a steward of the mysteries of God.

What does that mean? Go to Ephesians chapter 3.

Ephesians 3:1–4: "For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, if ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward: how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; as I wrote afore in few words, whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ." Paul speaks about the fact that it was known to him by revelation of the mystery. But notice this in verse 4 when it talks about the mystery — whereby when ye read ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ. Any mystery that is to be found in the Bible, you can actually read it and understand it for yourself as a saved person. With the Holy Spirit of God inside of you, the deep mysteries of God, the deep things of God — as a saved person you can understand these things.

Remember in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, it talked about the natural man versus the spiritual man, and the spiritual man can understand the deep things. And comparing spiritual with spiritual is one of the ways you get to an understanding of what the Bible says. So the Bible speaks about the mystery, but the key is that you read. And when you read, you may understand. There are a lot of things you are just not going to understand unless you read the Bible for yourself. You might hear somebody preach on something and learn that information. But what about someone who is not hearing good preaching from the Bible? And what about someone who is not reading the Bible? If you are not doing those two things, how are you going to understand these mysteries? How are you going to learn these doctrines? You are going to believe what the world is teaching you. That is just the way it is.

Unfortunately at a lot of Baptist churches, they do not really believe it is their job to teach the mysteries of God. They just teach generic things about hey, we should love, we should care, we should have grace, we should be longsuffering. And look, all of those things are important and there is a balance to what is taught. But as a pastor, you need to be teaching the Bible, showing a lot of verses, teaching people new things, and teaching them the mysteries. And when it comes to the mysteries of the Bible, they are not even necessarily deep and complicated things. But as you teach and explain stories that people maybe just do not know that well, it will help them understand how to be a better husband, wife, father, mother, employee — the mysteries found in the Bible actually help us. And it says when you read, ye may understand.

Verse 5: "Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit." Living in New Testament times, there is something special where we have the entire word of God and we can read and understand. People living before Christ had portions of the word of God, but you cannot tell me that every household had the entire word of God in front of them. They did not. They had portions of it. The Bible speaks about people going out with the book of the law, and when a prophet came and preached they would write down notes and commit things to memory. But now we have the Bible. We have the Bible on our phones. There are Bibles all over the place. Yet in the past, Bibles were very expensive and not everybody had them. Now though, Bibles are everywhere. Unfortunately, that does not always result in people reading more, because when something is precious and rare you tend to really value and care for it. But since Bibles are everywhere, we can easily forsake our Bible reading and not take it seriously. The Bible says there are mysteries you will understand when ye read.

Go back to 1 Corinthians 4.

So why does the Bible speak about being a steward of the mystery of God as a pastor or teacher or spiritual leader when everybody can understand the word of God? Well, here is the thing. Everybody can understand the word of God if they have the Holy Spirit to guide them. If you are not the natural man, if somebody has given you the gospel and you believed on Christ, you have got the spirit of truth inside of you that will help teach you. But realistically, the pastor of a church should have more knowledge of the Bible than at least the vast majority of members, if not all the members. It is your job to know the Bible.

And obviously at churches like ours, people really do know their Bibles. They have read them, studied them, memorised them, and know how to go soul-winning. So that means as the pastor or teacher, you have to look at yourself as a steward of the mysteries of God and say hey, I am going to dig into this book and read and study and learn and teach people, because it is my job. All of us should be reading the Bible, but the pastor especially should have knowledge of it. And of course if people are new to this kind of preaching, they are not going to know these things yet. So it is your job as the pastor, whenever you get up to preach a sermon, to make sure you are teaching people what the Bible says. You are a steward of the mysteries of Christ. And that is an important job. It is something you ought to take seriously as a pastor or a spiritual leader.

Verse 2: "Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful." God is saying this is an important responsibility, but there is a requirement — you had better be faithful. You had better be someone who faithfully reads the Bible, faithfully tries to obey the commandments, faithfully takes church and soul-winning seriously. If God has picked you for a job, if you have been ordained and chosen to preach sermons or be a pastor, you need to take that very seriously. Just as God gives you the opportunity, it is something he could take away in the future. So you need to make sure you take it very seriously. This is something I have to remind myself because sometimes life gets busy, you get tired, you might get a little bit lazy. I need to remind myself — you know what? I am a steward of the mystery of God. God expects me to take this word of God very seriously and make sure I am teaching people.

Point 1: Judgment From the Outside

Verse 3: "But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man's judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self."

As a pastor, what about being judged by you or by man's judgment? Paul says it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you. The attitude is — I do not care what you think of me. If you do not think I am a good Christian, that is up to you. You can think whatever you want. If you do not think I am good at teaching the word of God, that is up to you. And of course inside a church, you should have respect for your pastor. You should have respect for your spiritual leader. And if you do not, maybe you are at the wrong church. But he brings this up because there are people at the church of Corinth that have no respect for him. There are certainly people that do not respect Paul the Apostle. And of course outside the walls of a Bible-believing church, do I expect people in this world to think very highly of me? Not at all. Even most Baptists would not think very highly of me. They would say you are a renegade pastor, a Pastor Anderson wannabe, you are hateful, you are mean, your church is not as big as ours. They are going to say all kinds of things because they disagree or they get envious or whatever the reason may be. But Paul says you know what? Who cares? Think whatever you want about me. Other Baptist churches can say whatever they want about us. Other denominations can say whatever they want about us. You can say we are a hate group. Say whatever. It is a very small thing that I should be judged of you.

If you are always concerned about what other people think of you, you will not accomplish much for God in this life because people are going to tear you apart. People criticise me. People hate me. It is what it is.

Go to 1 Samuel 17.

In my personal life, at my old secular job, the news broke inside the company about what I believed about the LGBT. I had never said anything about it at work, but somehow they had seen an old sermon clip or found out. I got called into a room with the big shots in the company. They said we have heard that you hate the LGBT and that you are sexist against women. And then we started talking to all your co-workers. And they all said that you are very polite, a hard worker, a good worker, very kind. So I guess there is no problem. I was left confused because I came in thinking I was about to get fired and now you are saying there is no problem. I said can I ask — is there going to be a problem in the future? I said I come to work, I work hard, my personal beliefs have nothing to do with my job here. They said no problem. So the thing is in my personal life I get along well with people that know me, but once they find out what you believe, oh man, you are hateful, you are a bad person. It is funny how zealous Christians are considered nice and polite and good people by the people who personally know them, but once they find out what you believe, all of a sudden you are this hateful person. You are attaching certain things to someone just because of what they believe, when in reality you have seen for yourself they are a nice and polite person.

1 Samuel 17:28: "And Eliab his eldest brother heard when he spake unto the men; and Eliab's anger was kindled against David, and he said, Why camest thou down hither? and with whom hast thou left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know thy pride, and the naughtiness of thine heart; for thou art come down that thou mightest see the battle." Eliab just attacks David. This is what you call slander and railing — making false accusations. He is implying that he knows David's heart, that David came here because he is prideful. Who did you leave those few sheep with in the wilderness? But the Bible is very clear — Jesse sent David to the battle. And David left his sheep with the keeper. He made sure to take that responsibility very seriously. He takes his job so seriously that when they are selecting a king, David does not even go because he is out caring for the sheep. So who did you leave those few sheep with in the wilderness? He left them with a keeper. That is a false accusation. Why did you come down? Because dad sent me. I know thy pride — David was not prideful, he was not naughty, he was not bad. He was told to come down.

And David said: "What have I now done? Is there not a cause?" He is saying is there not a reason why I am here? David ends up getting involved in the battle because he sees something important. But that was not his intent when he arrived. He came and listened to his dad and respected his dad even though he was chosen to be the next king. But people will throw out railing accusations and slander you just because of what you believe when you are right with God. It is annoying. It is frustrating. But it is reality.

Job 42:7: "And it was so, that after the Lord had spoken these words unto Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two friends: for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath." Job's friends tear him apart chapter after chapter after chapter. Just a bunch of lies, false accusations, slander, criticising him, kicking him when he is down. And you know what? It is a very small thing that I should be judged of you. That is the attitude we need to have. And this is important to preach because it is hard to have that attitude when people are kicking you. Because we do care what people think. It is frustrating. It is annoying when people rip you apart and criticise you. But it is what it is.

Soulwinning Baptist Church Melbourne — do not be surprised when every Baptist church in Melbourne and all over Australia is criticising you and ripping you apart and saying all kinds of evil about you, when all you are doing is trying to go about your life, serve God, read the Bible, and go soul-winning. You will be considered horrible just because you are actually doing something for God. And people get envious. It is like — why are you not fighting, Eliab? You are older than David. Instead of complaining, why are you not out there fighting in the battle?

Luke 6:26: "Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets." Look, if everybody spoke well of me and said great things, there would be an issue. If Joel Osteen was praising me at his church — there is this pastor I love, he is such a great guy — unbelievers and false prophets praising you, everybody speaking well of you. That is what they did to the false prophets. Because you will be hated by the world when you stand up for the things of God and stand up for Christ. It is just the way it is. You try to get along peaceably with people but you will be hated. That is why it is a very small thing if I should be judged of you. And for everyone listening, it is a very small thing if people criticise you for what you believe or what you stand for. Now look, if they criticise you because you stole something or committed some major sin, that is something different. But if they criticise you for being hateful — it is like you are just serving God. It does not really matter what people think about you.

Point 2: Judgment From the Inside

Not only is judgment from the outside kind of meaningless, but a large part of judgment from the inside is also meaningless. Notice this in 1 Corinthians 4:3–4: "But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man's judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self. For I know nothing by myself; yet am I not hereby justified: but he that judgeth me is the Lord."

People criticise you if you are serving God. And the thing is, people can think whatever they want about me. But I cannot even look at my own life and really know for sure how great I am doing as a Christian. And that is why I do not stand up and talk about this is what I am doing or this is the level I have attained. I am trying to serve God and do the best I can. Like everybody else, I sin every day, but I am reading the Bible and I am trying to do what is right. And the thing is, it is a small thing that I am judged of you — I do not even judge my own self.

Now obviously to some degree we can tell whether or not we are right with God. The Bible speaks about that especially in 1 John. If I am not obeying the commandments, I know I am not right with God. If I am not going to church, I know I am not right with God. If I am not going soul-winning, I know I am not right with God. But even if you are trying to do everything right, the Bible speaks about secret faults and secret sins, about sins of the heart — there might be a lot of areas in our lives that we need to fix that we are not even sure about. And that is why at the judgment seat of Christ, we are all going to find out how many rewards we get.

Obviously there are people in this life that you could look at and say you know what, there is someone doing great things for God, I think they are going to get a lot of rewards — they are zealous, they love God, they are soul-winning. And there is probably a lot of truth to that. But the reality is we do not fully know. And self-assessing how spiritual you are is a very difficult thing. Everybody thinks they love God. Everybody thinks they are humble.

Go to 1 John 4.

We have to be honest with ourselves. But even if you are trying to be honest with yourself and trying to do what is right, we do not fully know how close we are to God. Obviously you can tell if you are closer to God at certain times than others. There are certain signs. When you are filled with boldness, it is a great sign that you are right with God, because the Holy Spirit will give you boldness. But we really do not know how many rewards we are going to get.

1 John 4:20–21: "If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, That he who loveth God love his brother also."

How can you say you love God if you do not love brothers and sisters in Christ that are doing things for God? And when people hate churches that are doing things for God and hate believers doing big things for God, they are not right with God. It might be a sign someone is a bad person, or it might be that they are just bitter, envious, or covetous — like Eliab in the Bible.

1 John 5:1–2: "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God: and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous." When we keep the commandments of God, it is showing that we have love for other people. Because when we break the commandments, when we transgress against the law, when we sin, we are showing we care more about ourselves than about other people. Because sin always affects other people in one way or another. And so when you are breaking the commandments, it shows you care more about yourself than others.

Some signs of whether or not you are right with God — do you love brothers and sisters in Christ and churches doing big things? Are you keeping the commandments or breaking them? But it is still hard to self-assess yourself because when we are living in sin we tend to justify ourselves. And so it is very difficult. That is why Paul is saying I judge not my own self. Jeremiah 17:9: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" To some level we can tell if we are right with God. You know if you are reading the Bible. You know if you are going to church. You know whether or not you have big sins in your life. You know how much you are praying. But our heart is deceitful and will lie to us and deceive us.

Self-assessing how spiritual you are is a difficult thing. I pastor churches with a lot of soul winners — people that go soul-winning all the time, read the Bible all the time, are at church and love God. How do I know whether or not I am going to get more rewards in heaven than other people who are also serving God? That is why we really need to worry about ourselves.

Point 3: Judgment From Above

Point number three is what really matters — judgment from above. Jeremiah 17:10: "I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings."

You might know the actions you are doing, but that does not necessarily tell you why you are doing them. You can do things for the wrong reason. And there are certainly people that do things in order to be seen of men. The Bible speaks about that. It is certainly a characteristic of false prophets, but there are certainly believers too that do actions in order to impress other people. And the reality is God searches the heart. He sees what is in the heart. And there could be people that appear to be doing great works for God and they are doing great works for God, but if their heart is not in it for the right reason they might not get as many rewards as we expect.

Now I do not make that statement to say that we should be judging other people doing things and trying to attack them. It is a wicked thing if you are trying to tear down what someone else is doing. Charity believeth all things. I think we ought to give the benefit of the doubt to people. If people are going soul-winning and going on missions trips and serving God and reading the Bible, I believe in having the benefit of the doubt that they are doing it for the right reason. Unless they are giving off a lot of signs that they just want to be seen of men — like making a big show of everything they are doing. What I am saying is do not judge somebody else because we do not know what is in their heart. Now this does not negate the fact that if people are doing actions that are wrong and sinful, we can certainly judge that and see they have done wrong, of course. But if somebody is doing what is right, we do not necessarily know what is in their heart.

1 Corinthians 4:5: "Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God." I believe that my heart is right with God right now. I do not believe that I am doing everything perfectly. I do not claim that everything in my life is 100% right. But I do believe I am right with God — I am reading the Bible, going to church, going soul-winning. To the best of my ability I do believe my heart is cleansed and right with God. But we do not know for sure perfectly. And of course we all have things to work on. Eventually God will make manifest the counsels of the hearts.

It is a wicked attitude to look at churches doing great works for God and try to tear that apart and say man, the Lord looketh on the heart, and just because you are doing great things for God it does not mean you are more right with God. What I find is that churches that are not doing much for God will attack churches doing big things for God. All you talk about is soul-winning, that does not mean you are right with God. And look, there is a shred of truth to that — just because someone is doing a lot of soul-winning does not mean their heart is automatically right with God. But it is a wicked attitude to presume you know that their heart is not right with God when they are doing great works for God. If they are doing great works for God, they are probably right with God.

Go to 1 Samuel 16.

1 Samuel 16:6–7: "And it came to pass, when they were come, that he looked on Eliab, and said, Surely the Lord's anointed is before him. But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart." We could criticise looking on the outward appearance. But the thing is, I do not see your heart. I do not know your heart. If you are not doing any soul-winning and you have the physical health and ability to go soul-winning but you are not going, you are not right with God — that is just what the Bible says. Now if you are going soul-winning, that does not necessarily tell me what is in your heart. If I am going soul-winning zealously, that does not necessarily tell me what is in my heart either, because the heart is deceitful. It is a good indicator but it is not a perfect indicator.

Obviously if someone is doing a lot of sins on the outside, the outward appearance matters because it will manifest what is really in the heart. But at the same time, somebody could put on the perfect presentation and it could be an act. Man looketh on the outward appearance. That is true. The Lord looketh on the heart. All we have is the outward appearance to go off of. From an outward standpoint, David was not as physically impressive as Eliab. But even outside of that, you might look at their character and from a human perspective not notice the things that God sees — that David is actually more right with God than Eliab. As people we can just kind of pass over certain things and not really realise it. But God sees. Once again, if someone is never doing any soul-winning, does not go to church, does not read the Bible, obviously they are not on fire for God. But there are going to be people that are really on fire for God and you just do not necessarily know that.

If you are around somebody a lot, eventually you are going to start to see signs that give you a good idea. You can start telling if people are prideful, covetous, gossipers, and railers — these things will start to make themselves manifest. So obviously that can take place. But we still need to just worry about our own selves and fix our own hearts.

1 Corinthians 4:5 again: "Therefore judge nothing before the time." We can look at actions, but we cannot see the heart for sure. Until the Lord come, who will bring to light the hidden things of darkness and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts. Remember this is on the back of 1 Corinthians 3 that talked about the judgment seat of Christ. And then shall every man have praise of God. Why is that? Because even if you do less for God than any other saved person in the world, your sins are not being brought up. In fact I think this verse is a good proof — I never thought about it before this way — that you are not going to have your sins revealed at the judgment seat of Christ. You are not going to have your wrongdoings revealed at the judgment seat of Christ. The Bible says everyone is going to have praise of God. Of course if other people are getting more rewards in heaven than you that is a shame, and you want to do as much for God as possible. If you do not get many rewards because you did not do much for God, that is unfortunate and you ought to be motivated to serve God. But nobody is going to be mocked at the judgment seat of Christ for all eternity because they did not do much. It is not going to be like that.

Go to Matthew 7.

Now I preach all these things and it could give you the wrong idea. Are we saying we should never judge anybody for any reason? Because the Bible says judge nothing before the time. Well, the context there is looking at the heart. And we do not fully see somebody's heart, but we can see actions. If somebody is sinning, take two people that commit the same sin — I do not know the story of those people or what is in their heart or what motivated them to commit the sin. Somebody might have been more likely to commit it due to various things in their life. But they are both going to be held accountable for what they did. There is no excuse for sin at all. If somebody is doing what is wrong, it is sin no matter what. It does not matter their excuse or reason or what is in their heart — they did what was wrong. There is no excuse.

Matthew 7:1–5: "Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye." I heard recently that Matthew 7:1 had passed John 3:16 as the most quoted verse in the Bible. But honestly I generally just hear people say judge not — I do not really hear them quote the whole verse.

The man admitted to committing murder — yeah, but you are not supposed to judge him. Is that what the Bible is saying here? Judge not. Well, God gave us the rules and he gave us the book of Judges where the judges would look at the case against scripture and pronounce judgment. Judge not that ye be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, ye shall be judged. What the Bible is saying is that people who have major issues in their life tend to see small issues with other people. But this does not mean we can never judge anything for any reason.

If I am looking down on somebody's life and criticising them for a sin, and I have got a bigger sin in my own life, I am a hypocrite. Thou hypocrite. You have got this big beam in your eye. Sometimes when people take super hyper-spiritual stances, it is sort of a cover. I would never do this because I just would not want to be around that kind of environment. But secretly in your life you are watching pornography or committing adultery or whatever. Thou hypocrite — you have got something much bigger in your life and yet you are finding small little things in other people. You are looking for them. But you have got a beam blocking your view. You cannot see clearly and yet you are trying to make judgments.

I relate to examples with the eyes because I have bad vision. I am wearing contacts. My glasses are super thick. If I were to take my contacts out, I am legally blind by definition. I cannot recognise people more than about five feet away. The thing is, I cannot see clearly, and for me personally I think of it this way — if I am not right with God, if I have got big issues in my life, it is kind of like me without my glasses or contacts, trying to see issues in others when I cannot see. I need to have my spiritual contacts in. I need to be right with God and then I can see more clearly.

Now I am not saying it is wrong to say anything that is true. If I say adultery is a wicked sin and I am not living in adultery and have not committed adultery, I am not being a hypocrite. Obviously as a pastor, your job is to teach the entire counsel of God. So from time to time all of us are hypocrites because we say one thing and do another. We do not perfectly follow everything we say even if we strive to. But what you are going to find is that people who are against judgment for any reason whatsoever are very judgmental about people like us. How dare you guys take this stance. Blah blah blah. Wait a minute — you are judging me. I thought you said judge not. And yet you are judging me. You cannot have it both ways.

Of course we judge situations. You see somebody walk up to someone and stab them in the street. I cannot judge them? I do not know the situation so I cannot say what they did was wrong. I cannot judge. Judge not. That is ludicrous. Nobody actually believes that. They want to pretend like that — they are just dishonest and misleading. Look, if somebody commits sin — sin is the transgression of the law — and if somebody does something that violates God's law, it is a sin, it is wrong. No excuses. So yes, we can judge. But we just cannot fully comprehend or know somebody's heart. And that speaks to the difficulties with judging.

Verse 6 — Not to Think Above That Which Is Written

1 Corinthians 4:6–7: "And these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and to Apollos for your sakes; that ye might learn in us not to think of men above that which is written, that no one of you be puffed up for one against another. For who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?"

Paul is basically saying hey, we are just ordinary people. We struggle with the same sins everybody else does. We sin. We do wrong. We are ordinary people just trying to serve God. And he is explaining one of the problems with judging — verse 7 — God made people different. People have different abilities, different situations, different backgrounds, different skills.

I look at my life and I had a very good childhood. I was raised in a good home with two parents that love me. I was homeschooled when homeschooling was not popular in America. My parents put me on the right path in life. I got saved at 18 before I went down a road of partying or drinking. I was around other people that wanted to read the Bible and go to church. I had the opportunity to be friends with pastors doing great works for God who taught me a lot of things. I have been a member of great churches doing awesome things for God. And then I got ordained, came here, and from day one entered into the labours of other people. I have always been around people that love God. I have never really been on my own. But there are other people in life that do not have a good background — they got saved and were not around other great Christians. Of course it would be kind of ridiculous to expect that person to grow as much as someone who had a much better circumstance.

I look at my life and say yes, I am a pastor that I believe is accomplishing something — preaching bold sermons, our churches have grown, we are doing soul-winning and great works for God. But I just had better opportunities than other people to be in this position. I could look at the works I am doing and say, well, I am doing more than somebody else, that means I will get more rewards in heaven. Not necessarily, because we do not even have the same situation. What hast thou that thou didst not receive? You are given certain things in life, certain opportunities, and you take whatever you have and you go with it.

Take for example the church in Melbourne or the church in Pampanga. The members of these churches are probably doing more for God now because they have a church. Before that, you knew what you had to do. But now that you are around other people that love God, it motivates you and it is an advantage. But there are other people in Australia and other people in the Philippines that are saved and do not have a great church. They are not around like-minded believers. You cannot really expect them to accomplish as much for God as you, because you have been given something better. You are in a better situation.

How is God going to hand out the rewards? We are going to find out. Judge nothing before the time. At the judgment seat of Christ, we are going to find out. Just go with what you have and do as much for God as you can. The Bible says we dare not make ourselves of the number or compare ourselves with some that commend themselves — but they measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise. It is an unwise thing to compare yourself with other people because situations are different. You are not in the same place in life. It is just not the same. It is hard to make that comparison.

The biggest person I am worried about is myself, because the only person I can for sure make certain is doing certain things is myself. I need to make sure I am doing what is right and doing the best I can. And I worry about my family — I want to make sure they are on the right path. And I am going to find out one day what rewards I get. None of us really know 100% for sure. God speaks about the parable of the talents and certain people are given more. That applies to talents and skills as well. There are people that love God but just do not necessarily have the ability to speak and teach. I can just worry about myself and do the best I can. All of us should worry about ourselves and how we are doing and do the best we can. At the church of Corinth, this is one of the issues — people having divisions and schisms and judging one another. Even if you are doing more for God than somebody else, even if you will get more rewards in heaven than somebody else, you should still just worry about yourself. That is what we should do in life.

Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be here today. I ask you to help all of us just worry about our own lives, to serve you and love you and do the most we can. And I ask you to just continue to bless our churches. God, help us to apply this sermon to our lives. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.