Truly Seeing The Cross As Supernatural Series

Today is Palm Sunday. It’s a day when we stop to remember Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. It was the last week of His earthly life. Today, Jesus enters into the most important religious city to the applause and praise of multitude of people. From Sunday’s praise and Palm branches to Friday’s chants of “Crucify Him!” Have you ever wondered, “How did the people change their opinions of Jesus so quickly?”

Today’s message is designed to answer two questions: 1) Why People Conspired Together to Kill Jesus Christ and 2) Why Do Only Some People See This.

“Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. 7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. 8 None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 But, as it is written,

“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”—

10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. 13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.” (1 Corinthians 2:6-13)

1. Wisdom Isn’t the Same as Being Smart

Americans live in an age of information. Better said, we live in a day of where information acts a tsunami wave threatening to overwhelm us. Recently, The New York Times published a report by the University of California, San Diego where the average American has 100,000 words cross their eyes and ears in a single 24 – hour period. Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace was 460,000 words in length. This is a 350 percent increase in the amount of information we consume since 1980. We all know smart people who don’t have common sense. Yet, the Bible gives us a category called “wisdom” that is different than common sense. Paul is trying to tell us what wisdom is on this Palm Sunday. He’s trying to tell why some people kill God and His prophets and thinking they’re serving God: “Indeed, the hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God” (John 16:2)

And he does it by contrasting the real wisdom versus the myth of wisdom. At least seven times so far Paul has assaulted “wisdom.”

1:17 — “For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom...”

1:20 — “Where is the one who is wise?”

1:21 — “in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom...”

1:22 — “Jews demand signs, Greeks seek wisdom, but...”

1:26 — “Not many of you were wise . . .” (v. 27)

2:1 — “I … did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom.”

2:4 — “my message were not in plausible words of wisdom…”

The false impression that you could get here is that there is no place for wisdom in the Christian faith. But Paul corrects that impression in what follows, but he does it in a way that takes back none of the humbling words he has spoken so far. His aim is still to guard against any ground of boasting in man. “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord” is the big picture of these chapters. The Bible gives us a test of weather a person is wise. If you are wise according to God, you will need to acknowledge there exists wisdom that comes from God and is not associated with the outside world. We see this from the end of verse five: “…it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away.” (1 Corinthians 2:5) The rulers who put Jesus to death are probably the most vivid example of the fact that you can measure a person’s true wisdom by whether they recognize Jesus as the Lord of glory:

“None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” (1 Corinthians 2:8)