Jan. 30, 2011 1 Cor. 1:18-31 C & Z “Foolish or Not?”
I think that memories are great things. I was reading this week about a pastor named Wayne Major who was remembering a stunt they pulled when they were in high school. One of the two guys would get into the back of the car and lay the backseat down and hide in the trunk. The other person would drive and pick up one of their friends. The two in the front would get involved in a deep conversation and one in the trunk would sneak back out behind the rider and suddenly join in the conversation. Wayne had all kinds of stories of the various startled reactions that they got. It was just a silly foolish prank that left many memories. I’m sure that if some of us think back to our younger years, we will remember some of the silly foolish things that we used to do. This morning we are going to look at foolishness in a little different light. We are going to look at what Paul says is foolishness and I hope that there is no one here this morning who thinks this message is foolish. But if you do, don’t give up. Keep listening and allow Jesus into your life.
Scott Carmer tells the story of a pastor colleague of his who had a mother call him and say, “Pastor, can you come over to talk to my daughter? She’s been acting strange ever since she went to college. Now she has joined the Moonies!” The fellow was a good pastor and rushed over immediately to try to help the young girl see that she was mistaken in her new found beliefs. “What on earth convinced you to get involved with these folks?” he asked. She said that she had met a couple one evening who had taken her to a movie featuring the Rev. Moon. “When I heard him preach that night, I thought that I hadn’t heard such good preaching since the last time I listened to you! That’s why I’m a follower today. I owe it all to your preaching!” It was at this point that this preacher remembered a conversation he had with an older and much more seasoned pastor. When he had asked what the older man had learned in forty years of preaching he said, “What I have learned in preaching is that the possibilities for being misunderstood are virtually unlimited.”
Being a pastor is a wonderful way to make a living because we have the best boss there can be. But it is also very interesting. Sometimes I wonder where I’m heading in a sermon. Sometimes I feel that I struck out with what I have said. Other times I can see on your faces that I did all right. And sometimes people just misunderstand what I tried to say and that is because I probably didn’t say it well enough. Putting all this together is very fragile and it really takes the steady hand of the Lord to do it. I try not to let this be about me but sometimes that just happens because I am human just like all the rest of us. I am always a part of the process and I am human. Therefore I preach foolishness when it comes from me and this is part of what Paul is talking about.
As we begin to look at this writing from Paul we need to look at the people of the time. The Jews thought that preaching the news of the cross was the most foolish thing they had ever heard. We have heard many times how they thought that the Messiah would be a conquering king who did miracles. But Jesus had not restored the throne of David. He was not a king. As a matter of fact Jesus was nothing more than a common criminal in their minds. He was considered to be the least of people if he was even considered to be anything at all. Anyone would have to be foolish to proclaim him to be a king from the cross. After all this is just plain nonsense.
In today’s world it isn’t much different. We have millions of naysayers in this country alone. Often times these are the people who can quote a passage in the Bible but have never bothered to read this great book. These are the people who watch the History Channel and think that what they say is the new gospel. These are our friends and neighbors who get bombarded with all of this false information and need our help to get them on the right track. People who don’t know Jesus think that the Bible is foolishness.
I think that most of you know that I will write a letter to the editor from time to time. This week I tried to stress how important it is for Christians to give thanks to God before their meal, no matter of where you are when you eat. There are many people who will disagree with me on this and those are the ones who don’t know Jesus and think that the message is foolish. And this is ok. Every time we state something from the Gospel we are adding a little bit of knowledge to the non-believer so that someday the Holy Spirit will get a hold of them and they too will believe. I think we have to be more vocal in proclaiming the truth.
Paul is very vocal and blunt. He says that the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. These people are dying and have no hope at all for eternal life. These are the saddest people of the world. When you hear that someone is making fun of Christ or our religion, you don’t need to get angry. You need to get sad. These are the lost. How in the world do we help these people to know Jesus? I guess that the answer is that it is not in this world at all. We need to just keep planting seeds. We need to keep praying for our meals in restaurants and every place else. We need to keep helping the poor in the name of Jesus. We need to keep on doing the wonderful things that we do in our churches.
Then Paul goes on to tell us that for the believers the message is the power of God. We come to church on Sunday to hear the Word of God. Hopefully you don’t ever come to hear me but to hear God’s word because I am foolish. God’s word is not. I am foolish because no matter how hard I try, I will always present a part of myself when I preach and the part about me is foolish. But don’t give up. Don’t stop! It’s ok to be foolish in this way. So don’t ever be afraid to pray in public or read your Bible in public or do anything for the Lord in public.
Paul then goes on to quote from Isaiah when God says, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.” Now before I talk about this I don’t want us to misunderstand what I say. God is not against people who are wise or smart. This is not what Paul is saying. Basically he is saying that all the brains and wisdom of the world pale in comparison to God. The world in all of its wisdom didn’t even recognize Jesus when he came so they had Him killed. Now that is wisdom!! You see, none of those people got it. The priests, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the kings and many of the common people didn’t recognized Jesus even though they were the learned class of people. All their wisdom of the world meant nothing in comparison to God.
God mocks our attempt at being scholarly and wise and uses unlikely people. Look at David. He was shepherd or one of the lowest classes of people. Can you imagine how much people made fun of Noah before the flood? Joseph was a younger son and could not expect much in the line of blessings. Matthew was a hated tax collector. Other disciples were lowly fishermen who were considered to be as low as the shepherds. The list goes on and on. God is not impressed with our brains in the ordinary sense of the word. He is only interested in our brains as they help Him in His mission of spreading the Good News everywhere.
We really have to be careful of this as we live our lives. I have to go to seminary a couple of times a year and I see people get so caught up in being scholarly that they forget that it is the relationship that is important. We shouldn’t be impressed with theologians. Our wisdom comes from knowing Jesus Christ. I have been blessed by getting to know some of the wisest people in the world who come to these two churches. You are wise in the sense of God.
I love this line in verse 25 that says, “For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.” This pretty much says it all. I know that we have all done some foolish things. It is just part of life that we end up doing these things. But I would like you to think about this a little. The next time you do something that you consider to be smart or wise, know that it will pale in comparison to God’s wisdom or intelligence. This doesn’t mean that you are not wise. If we know Christ, then He will allow us to use some of His wisdom just like He will allow us to use some of His strength. The more faithful we are and the better we follow His ways, the more He lets us in on this wondrous way of life. When things don’t go that well is when Satan, who is also working through other people, comes along to thwart us.
Now if you have a hard time believing this, Paul then wants us to think about where we were when we were called. You all know my story where I was so smart that I was down and out and had lost about everything. Some of you may have been in a similar position. Maybe there is someone here this morning who is struggling to make ends meet in this tough economy. Maybe there is someone here this morning who is struggling in their marriage. Maybe there is another struggle that you just can’t seem to win no matter what you do. If this is the case, then confess your sins to Jesus. Then ask Jesus to live in your hearts and give Him all your troubles. You will have a changed life and it will be for the better. This will be the beginning of your road to wisdom, Godly wisdom.
There is not a one of us here this morning that was better off before we knew Jesus, not one. One would think with a track record like this that people would be lining up to know Jesus but that is not the case and it never has been. We want to do things on our own. Usually we have Jesus trying to help us and we don’t understand Him or even know that He is there. It is kind of like the story of a man from a third world country coming to this country as told by Wayne Major. He went with a friend to a restaurant and they ordered tea. The waitress brought them boiling water in a kettle and set the cups down. The third world man picked up the tea bags and tore them open and dumped the tea into the hot water. The man with him had to explain that the tea bags were special so that they could be put in the water and water would seep through and there would be no messy leaves in the cup. Well the newcomer thought that was a great idea. Then as the man was stirring his tea and he looked up to see the foreigner take two sugar packs and drop them in his cup, unopened. The man had good logic but the wrong idea.
This is the same as when we try to figure God out in our limited worldly ways. There are so many people who demand proof before they will believe. Remember what Paul has said here. These people who demand evidence of Jesus are the ones who cannot see the miracles that He performs on a daily basis. All the things that we try to tell them is just foolishness and the same can be said about the proof we present. The best way for us to reach the unbelievers is to keep doing what we do. We need to live the Christian life. I know that it is not easy in the world today but don’t give up. Keep on praying in public. Keep on reading your Bibles. And keep on coming to church and inviting new people to come with you. We are not in the business of converting people, we are only in the business of planting seeds. Maybe someday some of these people who consider us to be so foolish, will see us with wisdom, Godly wisdom.
Just this past week we had our President give his annual state of the union address or as a colleague puts it, ‘the state of the onion.’ Anyway I don’t remember ever listening to any of these speeches because I can usually get the drift of it by reading the paper the next day. But this is an important message. It is supposed to tell us how we have been doing and where we are going. President Obama talked about many things that we may have to do as we seem to still have a pretty large problem with the economy.
He said that we will have to spend a lot more on technology and education in order to save this country and get it back on the right track. He might be right. We may need to spend some more on education. But all the education in the world will not save us unless we are anchored in Jesus Christ and the cross. Our message is in the cross.
So I ask you this question. Who would you rather have help us deal with our national problems, someone who has many degrees and is the smartest person in the world and looks at us Christians and the Bible as foolishness or someone who is uneducated and is a completely committed Christian and knows and lives by the Bible? As for me I would pick the Christian any day and every day because he has access to all the wisdom of the universe and then some. Jesus loves us and will help us if we just follow Him. I praise the Lord that He loves us this much. Let’s pray.
