Pastor Nate Brosher
Mar 11, 2026
1Corinthians 3:5-9 NLT - 5 After all, who is Apollos? Who is Paul? We are only God's servants through whom you believed the Good News. Each of us did the work the Lord gave us. 6 I planted the seed in your hearts, and Apollos watered it, but it was God who made it grow. 7 It's not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What's important is that God makes the seed grow. 8 The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work. 9 For we are both God's workers. And you are God's field. You are God's building.
1. Ministry is Participation, NOT Ownership
Ministers are instruments, not sources.
Carey Nieuwhof - “Gen Z is looking for hope over hype, for real over rehearsed, and for authenticity over performance.”
Faithfulness is the assignment; Growth is God’s department.
1Corinthians 3:9 NLT - 9 For we are both God's workers. And you are God's field. You are God's building.
2. Building Poorly
1Corinthians 3:11-15 NLT - 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have--Jesus Christ. 12 Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials--gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. 13 But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person's work has any value. 14 If the work survives, that builder will receive a reward. 15 But if the work is burned up, the builder will suffer great loss. The builder will be saved, but like someone barely escaping through a wall of flames.
The Foundation is Christ
3. This is God’s Temple
1Corinthians 3:16-23 NLT - 16 Don't you realize that all of you together are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God lives in you? 17 God will destroy anyone who destroys this temple. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple. 18 Stop deceiving yourselves. If you think you are wise by this world's standards, you need to become a fool to be truly wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness to God. As the Scriptures say, "He traps the wise in the snare of their own cleverness." 20 And again, "The LORD knows the thoughts of the wise; he knows they are worthless." 21 So don't boast about following a particular human leader. For everything belongs to you -- 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Peter, or the world, or life and death, or the present and the future. Everything belongs to you, 23 and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.
Destroy - phtheirō - Corrupt, Damage or ruin.
Psalm 94:11 NLT - 11 The LORD knows people's thoughts; he knows they are worthless!
Futile - mataios - empty, pointless, producing nothing of eternal value.
Isaiah 55:8-9 ESV - 8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. 9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Romans 1:21-22 ESV - 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools.
1Corinthians 1:25 ESV - 25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
James 3:13-16 NLT - 13 If you are wise and understand God's ways, prove it by living an honorable life, doing good works with the humility that comes from wisdom. 14 But if you are bitterly jealous and there is selfish ambition in your heart, don't cover up the truth with boasting and lying. 15 For jealousy and selfishness are not God's kind of wisdom. Such things are earthly, unspiritual, and demonic. 16 For wherever there’s jealousy and selfish ambition, there you will find disorder and evil of every kind.
“Worldly wisdom produces competition; Godly wisdom produces Humility”
2Corinthians 10:2-5 NIV - 2 I beg you that when I come I may not have to be as bold as I expect to be toward some people who think that we live by the standards of this world. 3 For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. 4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.