Be Careful that You Don’t Fall!
1 Corinthians 10:1-13
Before I read this morning’s passage from 1 Corinthians, I need to read a very important Old Testament passage from the book of Numbers chapter two.
The Lord said to Moses and Aaron: 2 “The Israelites are to camp around the Tent of Meeting some distance from it, each man under his standard with the banners of his family.”
3 On the east, toward the sunrise, the divisions of the camp of Judah are to encamp under their standard. The leader of the people of Judah is Nahshon son of Amminadab. 4 His division numbers 74,600.
5 The tribe of Issachar will camp next to them. The leader of the people of Issachar is Nethanel son of Zuar. 6 His division numbers 54,400.
7 The tribe of Zebulun will be next. The leader of the people of Zebulun is Eliab son of Helon. 8 His division numbers 57,400.
9 All the men assigned to the camp of Judah, according to their divisions, number 186,400. They will set out first.
10 On the south will be the divisions of the camp of Reuben under their standard. The leader of the people of Reuben is Elizur son of Shedeur. 11 His division numbers 46,500.
12 The tribe of Simeon will camp next to them. The leader of the people of Simeon is Shelumiel son of Zurishaddai. 13 His division numbers 59,300.
14 The tribe of Gad will be next. The leader of the people of Gad is Eliasaph son of Deuel. 15 His division numbers 45,650.
Now who can tell me the significance of this passage? What is the application to your life in this coming week? Anyone? If you have read through the whole Bible, did you skip over this section with all of these numbers and difficult to pronounce names? Why did you skip it? Well of course the answer must be because it has all of these numbers and difficult to pronounce names, right!? Shame on us for skipping this section! Shame on me also, because I know I have done it. But we should not skip these sections because we really need these sections of Scripture. Let me tell you why.
If we did not have this section of Scripture with all its numbers and names, we would not clearly see how God’s promise to make Israel into a great nation was fulfilled. When the promise was first spoken to Abraham, it was only he and his wife Sarah. Three generation later they were only 72 in number. Hardly a great nation. They entered Egypt as 72 nomads who were starving to death because of the great famine. They left Egypt four hundred years later numbering approximately three million strong. To put this in perspective, we average eighty people on a Sunday morning when you count up all the kids and babies. Imagine if our small group would multiply to become the size of the city of Chicago! God fulfilled his promise while they were suffering as slaves.
We need these parts of Scriptures and we should not so easily skip over them. In the same way, in the tenth chapter of 1 Corinthians, Paul directly applied several OT passages to this NT church, and to our church, but if we are not reading the OT and don’t know these stories, we will completely miss the application. Now I will read 1 Corinthians 10:1-13. In my opinion, there are several places where the ESV translation is better than the NIV, so I will be reading from the ESV.
I want you to know, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 and all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. 5 Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
6 Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. 7 Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” 8 We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. 9 We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, 10 nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer. 11 Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. 12 Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. 13 No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.
The first thing to notice about this passage is the two summary statements from verse six and verse eleven. In verse six Paul wrote, “Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did,” and in verse eleven he wrote, “Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction.” Just from these two verses we have strong motivation to read the OT. Paul is going to pull out a few key OT passages to make his case, but he wants his readers to clearly understand that these OT events from Israel’s history have great relevance. This alone should be sufficient motivation to not only read the OT regularly, but also to look for the relevance and application to our everyday lives. Read it. Read it regularly, including the numbers and names.
In later verses Paul will show how the Israelites fell into great rebellion and evil, but in the first four verses Paul wanted to explain how the Israelites were given every spiritual advantage. He wrote, “I want you to know, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, 2 and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3 and all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.” Notice the fivefold repetition of the word “all.” Every Israelite man, woman and child was given these advantages. They were under the cloud, meaning the manifest presence of God who moved within the cloud of glory and led the Israelites through the desert. They all passed through the sea, meaning of course the miraculous parting of the Red Sea. Then Paul said, “all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea.” This is an interesting way that Paul put these two miraculous events into one. This was a type of OT baptism. The Israelites were “baptized” into Moses through these events. Another way pf saying it would be that just as we are baptized into Christ and Christ is our deliverer, the Israelites were baptized into Moses and Moses was their deliverer in human form.
Verse two is a type of baptism and verses three and four then are a type of the Lord’s Supper, a kind of foreshadowing of the actual Lord’s Supper: “all ate the same spiritual food, 4 and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.” Do you see it? Through these miraculous provisions from God, the Israelites were given every possible spiritual advantage. They had their own baptism and their own Lord’s Supper. And what did these huge spiritual advantages accomplish for them? Verse five is the conclusion: “Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness”. Can you see the play on words here? First we have the fivefold repetition of the word “all” and then we see that despite all of these advantages, God was not pleased with most of them. The word “most” is meant to be an obvious contrast to “all” of the advantages. The NIV reads, “their bodies were scattered over the wilderness.”
If you have a pen, in the margin next to verse five, write this phrase: “two million shallow graves.” You know what Paul is referring to here, don’t you? If you don’t then it shows that you need to spend more time in the OT. Do you remember what happened after the spies returned from exploring Canaan? They refused to enter the land out of fear. God’s punishment for their lack of faith was that every person over the age of twenty, except for Joshua and Caleb, would die in the desert and not see the Promised Land. In a very literal sense, “their bodies were scattered over the wilderness. Because of the book of Numbers, we know that there were 600,000 fighting men serving in the army. If you add in older men, and all women and children, I arrive at an estimated population of three million. If roughly two-thirds of them were over the age of twenty, that means that two million people died and were buried in the desert. As they wandered for thirty-nine years, they left behind them two million shallow graves. That would average out to 140 graves per day, every single day for thirty-nine years. All of their spiritual advantages resulted in two million shallow graves.
Paul was attempting to make the believers in Corinth sit up and listen. Like us, they had every spiritual advantage, represented in their Christian baptism and the Lord’s Supper. However, despite these obvious advantages, they were willing to participate in idol feasts. Verse 21 is a great summary of his warning, “You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons.” We may not struggle with the temptation to eat at the table of demons, but the warning in verse twelve applies as much to us as it did to the first century Corinthians. “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.” What do you think Paul meant when he said, “take heed lest you fall”? Admittedly, falling into sin is not a good thing, but it’s not the end of the world, right? Well, actually it is the end of the world for the person who “falls,” because clearly Paul had in mind those who fell in the desert. To “fall” in the desert meant to die in judgment. Those who fell in the desert had every spiritual advantage but they refused to believe in God’s power to save. When Paul said, “take heed lest you fall,” he was undoubtedly referring to those two million shallow graves.
Paul’s sobering warning was to not depend upon what you perceive to be spiritual advantages. The Corinthians were depending on their baptism and the Lord’s Supper. They believed that these things brought a sense of absolute security. But Paul sternly warned them against falling in the desert of God’s eternal judgment: “take heed lest you fall.” What are you depending on for your spiritual life? Are you depending on your prayer of forgiveness you uttered as a six-year old child? Are you depending on your baptism to save you? Are you depending on your good works to save you? Are you depending on the faith of your mom and dad? These are all spiritual advantages that we have been given, and they are all good things, but like the Israelites and like the Corinthians, none of them will save us. It is faith in Christ alone which saves. I don’t care if you were saved last week, last year or fifty years ago—the only thing we can bring before a holy and just God is faith in Christ alone. It is faith in Christ which keeps us from setting our hearts on evil things, as the Israelites did. All of these OT examples are warning passages to keep us from straying into unbelief. Scripture nowhere demands sinless perfection but it does require a heart that is bent toward continual, ever-increasing belief in Christ. If you are routinely setting your heart on evil things, it is strong evidence that there is no saving faith. There were two million shallow graves among God’s chosen people. What makes us think there won’t also be some shallow graves in our churches? “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.”
Lest we miss the point of the two million shallow graves in verse five, Paul proceeds to fill in our missing gaps with four specific instances of unbelief followed by God’s judgment. Remember, “these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction.” This was written down for you and for me!
The first is the incident of the golden calf in Exodus 32. While their deliverer was on the mountain communing with God, these recently-rescued redeemed slaves were dancing around their brand new, shiny demon. Paul is very clear here. This was not a golden calf but pure demon worship. Paul even quoted from Exodus: “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.” The eating and drinking in front of this golden idol was an idol feast. It was a drinking the cup f demons. When it says they “rose up to play,” he wasn’t referring to playing backgammon or softball, was he?
Which leads right into the second event Paul refereed, which was the sin of sexual immorality from Numbers 23. This was the same event I referenced in our series on sexual immorality, when an Israelite man committed sexual immorality with a Moabite woman near the entrance to the Tabernacle. Paul is demonstrating the common link between idolatry and sexual immorality. These examples would have hit the Corinthian believers right between the eyes.
Verse nine describes an event from Numbers 21 where they tested the Lord. Here is one reason I prefer the ESV translation. The ESV more accurately translates the original when it says, “We must not put Christ to the test.” It was actually the Lord Jesus Christ they were putting to the test. What was this sin of testing Christ? In Numbers 21 we read, “The people grew impatient…and spoke against God and against Moses, and said, ‘Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the desert? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!’” God delivered them from slavery and they thanked him with a slap in the face. “We don’t like your gifts, God! We don’t want your stinking help! Why don’t you just leave us alone!”
How often are you tempted to question God when life becomes difficult? How many times have you been fed the lie that it is OK to be angry at God? These Israelites who “tested Christ” were angry with God and it was NOT OK! Don’t believe anyone who tells you that anger at God is acceptable. If you have ever been told that it is acceptable to be angry at God, I believe what the person was trying to communicate was that it is OK to express your anger and frustration to God. This is what many of the Psalm writers were doing; they were pouring out their hearts to God in anguish, pain and sorrow. This is good and necessary, but there is an enormous of difference between expressing your anger to God and expressing your anger at God. The first is a matter of resting in God but the second is rebellion against God.
As a result of testing and grumbling, many were killed by poisonous snakes. Do you recall the solution to these poisonous snakes? Moses fashioned a bronze snake and put it on top of a pole. Anyone who had been bitten by the poisonous snakes and looked at the bronze snake would live. We are all familiar with John 3:16, but do you know John 3:14? Jesus said to Nicodemus, “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up.” The effect of these OT passages is to show what happens to a people who set their hearts on evil things and not on Christ. In effect, Paul is using these OT examples to say, “Turn from your idolatry and turn to Christ. Turn from your sexual immorality and turn to Christ. Turn from your testing and grumbling against God and turn to Christ.”
This leads to our last verse in this section of Scripture. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it. After severe warnings to be careful not to fall—not to fall into your own shallow grave—in verse thirteen, Paul gave one of the most precious promises in all of Scripture. I would guess that this verse is in the top ten verses that Christians have memorized or turn to for comfort. But even with a popular verse like this, many of you may have an incomplete understanding. Let’s break it down into its parts.
No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man—This is a reassuring promise, is it not? No matter what we are facing, we will never face anything that is worse than what other humans have faced. Everything that comes our way is “common to man.”
God is faithful—Here is the key to the whole promise. Whatever you are facing, the outcome is not dependent upon your strength and your perfection, but upon God’s perfect faithfulness. We have a sufficient record of God’s faithfulness in Scripture. Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction. The entire word of God is written down for our instruction so that we can read story after story of God’s faithfulness; so that when we are tempted to think that God is not faithful, we need only to pick up and read the record of his faithfulness. The Israelites were tempted in this way but they refused to look at the evidence all around them of God’s faithfulness. They chose to look at their problems and turned away from the Rock which was Christ.
will not let you be tempted beyond your ability—this part of the promise is likewise precious to us. It may often feel like we are being tempted way beyond our ability, but this is simply not true. When I started seminary I was placed in the top Greek class with this brilliant professor whom I respected immensely but whom I also feared. I did not know if I would be able to handle his class and after sitting through the very first one, I was certain I was in the wrong Greek class. After class was over, I went to see him in his office to tell him that I needed to be placed in an easier class. He said very little, but just looked at me and said, “You can do it.” You see, I respected this man so much that when he said that I could do it, I actually believed him! His confidence overcame my fear and lack of confidence. In the same way, when God says that we will not be given anything more than we can handle, you must believe him. You must allow his confidence to overcome your fear and lack of confidence, especially when you understand the last part of the verse.
but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.—This may be our favorite part of the verse, because when life gets hard, what we really want is a way of escape. Am I right about this? When trouble comes a walkin’ in the front door, we want to run out the back door; we need a way of escape, and this verse promises just that, right? You know, I’m not quite so sure that is what this verse means. Let me ask you a practical question. Every time you have faced a temptation or trial, have you always been given a way of escape? Was there always a back door to your problem? I know that has not always been true for me. So then, we have a problem: either God is not providing a way of escape, or else he gives a way of escape and we don’t always see it. I think this is an artificial problem we have created that begins to be cleared up when you look at this verse in the ESV. The NIV, “He will also provide a way out,” but the ESV says “he will also provide the way of escape.” Do you see the difference? The key difference is the definite article in the ESV, which is also in the original. God will provide THE way of escape. This is not a promise for a magic back door to all our problems, but it is a promise to provide a specific way of escape—THE way of escape, and THE way of escape is Jesus Christ!
This changes the whole verse. As we run to THE way of escape what happens? We are “able to endure” the temptation and trial. I think this is why we don’t always get an escape hatch to our problems, because this is not a promise to take away our problems. It is a promise to run to Christ so that you will be able to endure your problems. The Israelites fell in the desert because they ran away from the Rock which was Christ. We will fall to temptation when we don’t run to the way of escape. God is faithful and he always provides the way of escape, so that we can endure.
Rich Maurer
March 18, 2007