The Life God Assigned You

1 Cor 7:17 – 24

Connection/Tension

I’ve lived in the city for the last twelve years (both Minneapolis and St. Paul). At first, living in the city was quite enjoyable (and continues to be so in many respects). Yet, it’s gotten harder in a couple ways- things that didn’t used to bother me as much as a single person do so now that I have a family. Also, since 2020, it feels like the peacefulness of the city has deteriorated in some noticeable ways.

These things have led us to dream about the possibility of moving one day. Now, there’s nothing wrong with moving (in most circumstances) and there’s nothing with thinking about the future. Yet, when dreaming distracts from what’s right in front of you or discontent crowds out joy and peace from your heart, there’s a problem. I don’t know how long we will live in the city (maybe the rest of our lives; maybe not), yet while we are here, we are called to be all the way here- without our hearts distracted by the thought of something else.

Every one of us can say that there is discontentment and things we wish were different in our lives. Some things we have the freedom to change (as this text will say); some we don’t.

In a world of unideal circumstances, how can we live with all our hearts and minds in the circumstances we find ourselves rather than our hearts drifting towards distraction or discontentment? How can we place a small amount of attention on the things we wish were different so we can place our greatest attention on the Lord Jesus the purposes he has in front of us day to day?

And if you are not yet a follower of Jesus yet, we are so glad you are here this morning. What you will hear is that there is a God in heaven, and that he’s not first and foremost interested in changing your life to be more convenient or more glamorous, but he’s interested in changing you. We hope you find that truth to be as freeing and wonderful as it is.

Context

Paul continues down his list of things he needs to address in the life of the church in Corinth. He’s in a section right now on marriage, singleness, and social status. This week, he’s zeroing in on the life circumstances we’ve received and how to live and operate within them. Let’s hop into verse 17 and learn,

Revelation

17 Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him. This is my rule in all the churches.

Paul had just taught Christians to remain in their marriages whenever possible (v. 12). Now, he extends the thought of remaining where you are to encompass most areas of life. In these verses, he mainly has in mind social and economic status (vv. 18,  20), yet, the principles we see here apply to so many other areas of life.

With a few short words in this verse, Paul builds a massive view of the world and of our lives.  He says that “each person” has a life God has assigned them. Which means that you have a life God has assigned you.

This calls for us to humble our hearts before our God deeply. He chose the set of circumstances in which you find yourself today – a mix of great things, terrible things, and ordinary, monotonous things. Chip Dodd has said, “wonderful and terrible things have happened to every one of us.” It’s true other people made choices that affected you and you made choices that affected you, yet, behind all those things, there is a God with a plan who has you right where you are at.

While it’s true you committed evil and others committed evil against you and those things contribute to your story, the God in heaven who arranged your life never has done evil and never will. His plan takes the darkness that’s present in the world due to rebellion against him and incorporates it into the rescues and the deliverances he’s planned for each of us and for the whole world.

There’s often low-grade anger or resentment we can live with in day-to-day life because of the obstacles, injuries, and deficits we must endure. It can be the steady trial of chronic pain, or just some maddening inconvenience or silliness that keeps interrupting you. We may not be conscious of it, but that anger is against God.

Joni Erickson Tada is a paraplegic who follows Jesus. Her life has got quite a bit more miserable lately in some sad ways. She recently wrote,

“Nowadays, who among us would dare quarrel with God….? Yet we do, every time we bellyache, quibble over some inequity, or whine about God’s timing or lack of provision.”[1]

God is inviting us into something truly wonderful when he reveals to us the truth that he rules the world as king and is sovereign over all our stories- to come to peace with who we are and where we are in the world- to accept and even be grateful for our history and our present situations. There’s endless room for improvement and growth in the Christian life, just not for regret and discontentment (the laying on of blame against God).

In fact, when we embrace the truth that “he rules the world”” our hearts have surrendered and are not fighting or kicking against him. And, from that place of surrender, we begin to heal, and change into new versions of ourselves. The angry you can’t become the Christlike man or woman God means for you to be; only the surrendered, grateful (and humble) version of you can.

We see this same truth repeated in the phrase, “to which God has called him.” It’s a word that’s all over our passage this morning (8 times). And it’s a word that refers to the kingly rule of God who has the authority to shape our lives as he pleases. In chapter 1, the word “call” refers to God’s power to cause people to become Christians who otherwise couldn’t become Christians without his help (v. 24). And now that word refers to God’s rule beyond the biggest circumstance in our life (whether we become Christians) to all the big and small details of our lives.

And Paul clarifies that this is his “rule” in all the churches, that is, for them and us.  

Now, Paul is going to clarify more a circumstance this truth applies to in his own day,

18 Was anyone at the time of his call already circumcised? Let him not seek to remove the marks of circumcision. Was anyone at the time of his call uncircumcised? Let him not seek circumcision. 19 For neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God.

In Paul’s day, circumcision was a much bigger deal than in our own. It was a day of antisemitism, and some young Jewish men would try to reverse their circumcision surgically to fit into Roman society.[2]

In addition, traditional, religious Jewish types pressured Gentile Christians to undergo circumcision, to maintain the Old Testament requirements and culture.

We can see that both these are pressures to belong. It’s to change something about one’s appearance or one’s cultural practice to gain acceptance. Circumcision is not as big of a deal today- group belonging in our culture tends to come through status symbols (cars/houses/powerful positions) or showing public support for the “right” social causes. In both of those modern examples, there is an external conformity to something that gains access to a group or some kind of acceptance.

On the other hand, Paul is calling us not to be concerned with our outward conformity to any sort of standard to gain acceptance from people. He’s commanding us to be concerned with the transformation of the inner self and the enjoyment of acceptance from God. The Scriptures are clear again and again that keeping the commandments of God comes from a heart that the power of God has transformed (Jer 31:33). The concern of the Christian becomes far less who you fit in with rather than who you are (that, is what kind of person God is making you into).

This is a big reason we are called, “All Peoples Church-“because there is not an external identity marker that qualifies anyone to belong to this community. The only identity marker we have is an internal identity marker, that is, having the life of God within us making us into new creatures.

20 Each one should remain in the condition in which he was called. 21 Were you a bondservant when called? Do not be concerned about it. (But if you can gain your freedom, avail yourself of the opportunity.) 22 For he who was called in the Lord as a bondservant is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise he who was free when called is a bondservant of Christ.

Paul is going to work through the same point again in these verses using a different example than circumcision- this time he will refer to ancient-world slavery. The word “bondservant” refers to ancient world slavery. I use that term “ancient world” because slavery in Paul’s day is different than slavery in the American South in more recent history (which we tend to think of), it was not racially based or always permanent. This is not to say that slavery was acceptable or good- but it can be helpful not to import our feelings or thoughts about chattel slavery into the biblical texts that are referring to something different.

Now, the Bible is critical of slavery from cover to cover (as we will see in this text).[3] It’s a distortion of Eden where people were made as royal rulers of creation (Gen 1:28). If God meant for people to be royal rulers, isn’t something off when people are being ruled over- it’s a sign that we live in a fallen age? In the story of God’s people, their low point from which God rescues them is from slavery.

Yet, in Paul’s day, God’s people lacked any political or military power to make any changes to the social order. They had to exist within a distorted social order (as all of us do in some ways until the return of the king). So, Paul is not teaching, this is what life ideally looks like, but rather, this is the best life can look like for some in an age of darkness before all things are made new.

Paul speaks to those people who are in the institution of ancient world slavery, yet have become followers of Jesus and tells them, “don’t be concerned about it.” That doesn’t mean their slavery is not hard (he’s about to tell them to gain their freedom if they have the chance!). He just means, and this is a big statement, that even being in the social position of a slave does not inhibit someone from forming just as deep of a connection with God as anyone else and live as spiritual and beautiful of a life.

Your circumstances may be hard this morning- but they are not what’s keeping you from getting closer to God. Nothing external can keep you from his favor, love, and relationship. Paul will show us further:

22 For he who was called in the Lord as a bondservant is a freedman of the Lord. Likewise he who was free when called is a bondservant of Christ.

[[It is not your outward set of circumstances or social or economic location that determines what’s most true about you or who you really are. I submit to you today that if you carry around with you a sense of inferiority or of depression/anxiety it may be the case that you’re assigning too much weight to what’s been done to you (by others) and not enough weight to what’s been done for you (by Jesus). This is not meant to minimize the immense amount of pain any one of us may have experienced, just to say that there’s no such thing as a situation too hopeless for the gospel to triumph.]]

This text also pushes against us who may have an inflated ego or sense of self-worth due to our external accomplishments. Paul says, you free people out there are slaves of Christ. And what he means by that is if your external circumstances can’t condemn you, neither can they commend you. At the end of the day, all of us are simple, needy people who need the nearness of God to have fulness of life. If any Christian has a sense of any superiority over any other Christian (maybe one who is poorer or comes from a far more difficult background than you), that needs to die, since sharing an identity in Christ elevates the weak and humbles the strong so we all approach God on the same level.[4]

23 You were bought with a price; do not become bondservants of men.

Again, we see Paul’s stance towards slavery. Before he said “get out if you get the chance.” Here he says, “don’t sell yourself into it.” And the reason is huge- someone else already owns you; “you were bought with a price.”

That is, God owns you because he made you, and if he saved you through Jesus, he doubly downs you- you now belong to him twice over. So, don’t allow yourself to belong to someone else if you have any say in it. On the cross, Jesus paid the ransom price to set us free from our slavery to the serpent and carrying out his desires. We are now free. We get to obey God and walk on a path of life and joy he has established. Nothing can keep us from this if we set our hearts on it. And so Paul teaches, don’t give anyone else sway over your life if you can help it so that you have more opportunity to belong to Jesus.

Thankfully, we can’t sell ourselves into slavery in the same way anymore. Yet, when we take on excessive debt, give into addictions (especially to smart phones and electronics), or give unhealthy relationships too much sway over us, we’re becoming a servant of something other than Christ, and obscuring the truth that he set us free. We demonstrate and show the reality that he has made us free by becoming in servants in all of life.

And Paul finishes,

24 So, brothers, in whatever condition each was called, there let him remain with God.

God is calling us into a deep contentment and peace with himself. As Calvin says, he’s calling us away from the restlessness we tend to feel towards a deep acceptance of the circumstances he’s allotted for us and the people he has made us.[5] God doesn’t forbid us from making changes, but from anxiously making changes or greedily making changes or for as long as we are in our present circumstances, not living in them with all our heart. We should not have our heart anywhere else than where we are on a particular day. God gives us life one day at a time and we should live it one day at a time.

Whether we are employed or unemployed…

Single or married…

Old or young…

Wealthy or poor…

So, how can we quiet our restless, anxious Spirits and live with a sense of calm and contentment in our circumstances, especially when they are not ideal as is often the case before Jesus comes back?

Paul says something so amazing here. He says, “let him remain, with God.” That is, we remain peacefully and fruitfully in our circumstances by remaining in them with the presence of God within us and flowing through us to others.

When we do that, our lives can take on an “enchanted feel,” which is something we are each longing for. We yearn for a life that has a sense of spiritual significance and beauty that’s worked out mysteriously in the ordinary circumstances we find ourselves. I think so many give into reality TV and social media because they have this misplaced longing for wonder and adventure and look for it vicariously for others rather than seeking to embrace life in your ordinary circumstance “with God.”

I don’t think the Apostle’s message to us this morning is to “grin and bear” your circumstances, but to live with a connection to heaven that the beauty and power of heaven come to earth in you ordinary life. Your life gains a sense of poetry and beauty when you have a very ordinary life with an extraordinary, otherworldly power operating in and through you- when the supernatural encounters the natural in the day to day. This is what we are after when we say in our mission statement we want to “follow Jesus in everyday life.”

And so, the answer is not to claw your way to some possession of or status beyond yourself, but to walk with God- the mysterious and majestic creator. Walking “with God” is how the Bible talks about the godly heroes of the ancient world in Genesis before the flood- it gives us few details of their lives except that they “walked with God” (Gen 5:24). That’s the kind of life God is calling you into right where you’re at.

I want to share a story of what this may look like (at what it looked like for me one day this last week as I take gradual steps forward):

I talked about how hard life can be in the city for me and my family at times, yet, when I seek life with God in the city, it can change my life:

On Tuesday, I met my friend at a Wabun disk golf course. It’s a beautiful outpost of green in the city- a place that does not make me frustrated with the city but reminds me of the potential of the city. I paused to admire the beauty and appreciate what God had made. The future of the world when Jesus come back is a garden city, so images like these should nourish my soul.

There was a man playing behind us pushing his one-year-old daughter in a stroller as he played. God has been challenging me to be warmer to others lately (something I struggle with) and so I tell him “I like his frolfing partner.”

As my friend and I are leaving, he’s beside us in the lot. I feel God nudging me to turn this ordinary moment into a supernatural one, so I ask him, “do you have a spiritual community?” He responds that he used to go to church, doesn’t anymore, but may be interested in spiritual community for his kids. I ask him about a cross he has for an ear ring; he responds that it’s not an ear right- it’s a dagger from the anime show Naruto, I was like, “ah, of course.” My friend who is with me already is not yet a believer and we go on to a restaurant to talk about spiritual things over dinner. I’m not fighting with anyone, forcing anything on anyone, but merely living under the influence of God in my circumstances and calling in life. I didn’t arrange any of that- God did. And it gives me a sense of joy , adventure, and excitement to live that way day by day rather than being a slave to my routine or my lane.

This is what I mean by living “with God” right where we’re at. On one level, I was just a thirty something throwing a disk around a park. Yet, at the same time, I was increasingly being filled with the warmth and power of heaven, saying and doing things I wouldn’t otherwise do. I didn’t know how that situation would go or end up, I still don’t. Yet, God is taking my ordinary life and filling it with divine meaning, purpose, and presence.

The world has been changed more than once by ordinary people living in their stations in life, exuding the power and character of God as they walk with him. I want to encourage us to take our preoccupation off changing our external circumstances to cultivating a focus of having communion with God, and for our lives not to be dull circumstances to bear, but exciting opportunities to minister with the power of God.

Let’s pray.

 

Reflection

1.      Which circumstance do you need to grow in contentment with as long as God has you there? Is it your living situation, your marriage, your singleness, your job, your health, your emotional health?

2.      What’s one way you would carry yourself differently in that situation if you lived with more of God’s presence and power?

 

Benediction

Num 6:23

 

[1] https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/worse-than-any-affliction

[2] Bruce Winter, “1 Corinthians,” in New Bible Commentary: 21st Century Edition, ed. D. A. Carson et al., 4th ed. (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1994), 1172.

[3] Denny Burk’s article helped me to see this, https://www.crossway.org/articles/did-paul-endorse-slavery-1-timothy-6/?utm_source=Crossway+Marketing&utm_campaign=4a06b31985-20240727+Eld%2FDeac%2BTeach-WhatMinistryFreshness&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-891f981364-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID%5D

[4] John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries on I and II Corinthians, trans. Henry Beveridge, vol. XX (BakerBooks, 2009), 249-50.

 

[5] Ibid, 251.