Growing up, do you remember wanting a certain something—it
could be anything from a pair of shoes to a car, and your parents told you that
you could have it, but you would have to make sacrifices in order to get it? Do you remember the sacrifices you made for that
item? Now let ask you this, “Where is
that item today? Where are those shoes,
that toy, those clothes or even that car today?”
Truth is we sacrifice so much for temporal things, for
things that don’t even matter at this moment much less for eternity, yet we
sacrifice very little for the things of God.
In 1 Corinthians 9, we are given a wonderful example of what our
priorities in life should be. In the
Scriptures, we learn that the Apostle Paul made huge sacrifices in his life and
ministry with the major difference being the fact that he slaved for things
that matter for eternity because he sacrificed for others and invested in
people.
Though he admits at the beginning of chapter 9, he is free
in Christ he tells us here in the later half of this chapter that he out of
love for the lost limits the freedom he has and makes himself a slave to everyone
in order to win as many as possible for Christ.
He says, “Though I am free, I set that liberty aside to win people.”
In this chapter, Paul explains that if exercising your freedom
becomes a roadblock for people coming to Christ, you should waive that right so
that God’s Gospel can advance. Believers,
this message from Paul to this messy church in Corinth is one that is necessary
for us to hear today because limiting liberty for others is not an easy thing for
us to do.
Let’s be honest, it’s hard enough to resist sin, much less waive
the rights that we have and refrain from something that is lawful for us to do. Yet God tells us in His Word that this is a sacrifice
we should be willing to make. The Bible
tells us that before we exercise freedom, we need to be considerate of others
and allow love to limit our liberty for the sake of the Gospel.
