Easter - The Wisdom Of The Cross

Easter - THE WISDOM OF THE CROSS

This morning’s message

as we draw close to resurrection Sunday

is entitled “The Wisdom of the Cross”

Text:

1 Cor. 1:23-25

but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, [24] but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. [25] For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.

PRAYER

A. The ancient Gentiles saw the cross as foolishness

In Acts 17 The apostle Paul went to Athens and started telling them about a God who was unknown to them. This God came to earth, walked among men, died on the cross, and rose again.

But it was all foolishness to them

Reason tells you that babies aren’t born to virgin girls.

Reason tells you that God doesn’t become flesh.

Reason tells you that almighty God will not allow puny men to nail Him to a cross.

Reason tells you that when a man dies he cannot be resurrected back to life again.

None of that makes any sense.

So the Gentiles looked at the cross as foolishness.

B. The ancient Jews saw its message as a stumbling block to their way of faith

The Jews stumbled over it because Jesus wasn’t the kind of Messiah they wanted.

If He had marshaled an army,

and led them into battle, and defeated the Romans –

if He would have shown them that He was successful and victorious –

they would have marched behind Him.

But the cross got in the way.

You see, dying on the cross doesn’t look like success or power.

It doesn’t look like victory.

It looks like weakness.

It looks like failure.

It looks like defeat.

So they kept stumbling over it.

It kept getting in the way.

C. But for we who have been saved and transformed by the power of the cross

The CROSS is the Wisdom of God

The good news we have to share to everyone

That being said………….

As we grow farther and farther in time from the event of the cross

We no longer encounter Jews and Greeks with the message of the cross like they did in the first century

But we still encounter two kinds of people

D In a way our neighbors in OUR TOWN or wherever we live are like the ancient Gentiles

For them the cross has become irrelevant and foolish

they don’t understand its purpose or meaning

for them the cross is just some jewelry

Everything we stand for appears upside down to them

We see America winning a war against Iraq

They feel sorry for poor Saddam Hussein

We see that abortion as being murder

They see it as liberating unwanted tissue form the body

We see a lack of prayer and the ten commandments in our society as its down fall

They see prayer and the ten commandments in our society as its down fall

We see Christ crucified as the hope for mankind

They see the message of the cross and go HUH!

E. Then there are the Jews in our life

The message of the cross is a stumbling block for the religious people of this world

Whether their religion be

Church

Money

Sex

Fast boats

Drugs

Alcohol

Exercise

Or Nature

You get around these religious people with the message of the cross

And they will stumble over it every time

It is a bold faced “God Faced”: Obstacle in the broad road to their destruction

They trip over it every time

Though the audience has changed a little the message has not..

E. The message of the cross is the manifestation of God’s wise plan to save all mankind from sin and death

And the messenger has not changed either.

If we ever hope to reach the world around us we are going to need two things

1. To understand the wisdom of God in the cross

2. To realize that we ourselves are a result of that wisdom and that we are the ones who must LIVE and proclaim Gods wisdom,

I. DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE MESSAGE OF THE CROSS?

Many people do not

We live in a time where

The Christian message is being slanted by some in the direction of the current fashion in order to make it acceptable to the public.

The new message of the gospel promises the same thing the world does, only a higher level.

Whatever the world happens to be clamoring after at the moment

is cleverly shown to be the very thing the gospel offers,

ONLY THE RELIGIOUS PRODUCT IS BETTER.

Michael Bird, a minister in Australia, tells about a well-known American preacher who gave some advice to an Australian congregation.