Thinking About God=s Wisdom.
1 Corinthians 2:1-16
Scripture Reading: 1 Corinthians 2:1-16
Text: 1 Corinthians 2:16
Sermon Idea: Man=s wisdom comes not from himself, it comes from God.
Sin runs rampant in our society. Daily newspaper and television reports of overcrowding of prisons can attest to that fact. Child abuse, pornography, serial killers, terrorism, anarchy, corrupt politicians, and ruthless warlords. They fill the world with violence, hatred and corruption. Reading, hearing and perhaps even experiencing these situations first hand. We begin to understand the necessity for God=s judgment. We may even find ourselves wishing for vengeance by any means upon the violent offenders. Surely they are beyond redemption! Just suppose that God told you to take His Word to the worst of these offenders, how would you react?
In the Bible Jonah was given this very task. He was told to go to a place called Nineveh. Nineveh was the Capitol of the Assyrian empire. The Assyrians had flaunted their power, before God and the rest of the world through countless acts of heartless cruelty. When Jonah received the Word of the Lord to go to Nineveh. He began to run as hard and as fast as his little legs would carry him. In the opposite direction.
His journey took him to the belly of a whale and other points until he decided he would be better off delivering his message. Jonah knew no one, deserved the grace of God less than the dreaded Assyrians. That is not why he did not want to go. He knew even with his weak preaching they would turn away from their sin and worship God. Jonah hated the Assyrians and he wanted vengeance not mercy, to fall on them. He knew the power contained in his message.
Paul did not use a philosophical approach to preaching. Scholars say Paul was not a textual or topical preacher. He was an expositor of the Word of God. Paul did not use pretty words or pretty speech.
Paul did not come with the worlds of wisdom. He came declaring the testimony of God. What is a testimony? It is a declaration or statement made to establish a fact. The fact that Paul preached was that they had crucified Jesus. Something before which they had never preached. In the Old Testament they always alluded to it as shown through prophecy. The revealing of the actual event was something new all together.
Paul did not enter into philosophical debates that cause arguments. He preached the Cross of Christ. A crucified savior. One who died for the sins of the world.
Paul begins to open his heart and allows us to look inside at his innermost thought. He makes it perfectly clear that when he was with the Corinthians he was scared. He came to them Ain weakness and fear, and with much trembling@ (v. 3). It was no wonder that he could say God had chosen the weak things of this world. Paul did not hold himself in very high esteem. He was a man with great intellect and was a great man in many ways, but if you were to ask Paul himself, he would not tell it.
Today we have libraries full of man=s wisdom. There is a great deal of preaching being done but not much else is done Awith a demonstration of the SPIRIT=S POWER@ (v. 4). Many feel that the right method, topic, or style is what they need. In all actuality what they need is the HOLY SPIRIT!
If they win one with the wisdom of man then his faith lies in the wisdom of man. When a man comes to faith in Christ through the power of God. Then his faith lies in the power and wisdom of God. Many lives are proof positive. There are many who think that their salvation lies in proving whether God inspired the scriptures or whether Jonah was actually swallowed up by a whale or if the flood actually happened. We have skeptics within our midst. However, God is beginning to prove these things to the skeptics. The big question is this: What does your faith rest upon? Searching for the answers will point out the Wisdom of God. Our faith must rest upon the power of God.
Paul says that his wisdom does not come from man=s wisdom. He talks about God=s secret wisdom and how it has been hidden. It is a secret and hidden because it is given only to those who believe. It is not the popular or fashionable wisdom of the psychics. When Jesus spoke His parables and He told the disciples that the vast majority of people would not understand them. It is because He was giving them the direction that the Kingdom of Heaven was headed. Jesus revealed all that had been hidden and Jesus can only reveal that in your life.
In this letter to the Corinthians Paul takes hold of this word secret and tells them that these truths revealed have always been there. However, mere human wisdom could not discover them. Human wisdom can understand God=s wisdom only through the revelation of Christ.
The late Mel Ellis, was an expert on wildlife and conservation. Before his death he wrote a book of fables. The final fable of that book is a conversation that is between him and his daughter:
Daughter: Now that I have read your fables I am disappointed because you have no space to the Anew morality.@
Father: Well, there are many, many things I did not touch on. As for morality, almost every generation claims a new morality. It is a vagary.
Daughter: I=m not quite sure I understand.
Father: Consider the climbing vines. Honeysuckle, for instance, always twines clockwise, to its right. Jasmine always twines counterclockwise, to its left. Nothing can make either do otherwise. Yet there is one twining plant B Scyphanthus Elegans B which will start turning in one direction, making a couple of loops around its support, and then go back the other way, reversing itself every couple of loops or so.
Daughter: Well it would seem that is the most interesting way to climb.
Father: Most interesting, perhaps, but not a very tidy system.
Daughter: I still don=t get the point.
Father: The point is that no matter how vines climb, whether to the left or to the right, or both ways, each is always seeking the same thing.
Daughter: And that is?
Father: Light.
The rulers of this age did not understand who Jesus was because they were not willing to understand God=s wisdom. It is the same today. People do not understand God=s wisdom because they are not willing to understand who Jesus is.
Many people say that we will be able to get all the answers when we get to heaven and everything is revealed to us. What Paul is actually trying to tell is that we get much of our information through our eyes. We learn from our ears. When we combine both our eyes and our ears, we learn a great deal. What do you think Paul is trying to tell us? We cannot even begin to see, hear or even think about what God has in store for the believer that truly loves God. God has so much in store for each and everyone of us! All we have to do is allow God=s love to flow freely through our lives. We are the ones who put limitations on God=s love. When we put limitations on God=s love puts limitations on God in our lives. The things God has prepared for our lives are not just received through our eyes, ears, or mind. You may ask well how we receive them.
The SPIRIT OF GOD becomes our teacher. Oh we can learn many things by reading the Bible like a history, poetry, how to live our lives but the SPIRIT must reveal the deep things of God! Why some may ask? The SPIRIT has searched the deep things of God.
We can understand each other because we have human spirits. I know how you feel when you fall down. It is embarrassing, is it not? One snowy morning a man was coming out of his house to empty two buckets full of ashes. He was on his way to the alley where his trash cans were. On his way there he slipped and fell. He held onto the buckets and didn=t spill an ash. He got up and looked all around. He wanted to see if anyone had seen him. Why did he do that? He was embarrassed. We all know exactly how he felt. We can all imagine how he looked. We would have probably laughed had we seen him. We have the spirit of man and we know how it feels. We on the other hand do not know how God feels. If we are to understand how He feels He will reveal it to us.
We can only understand the mysteries of God if we allow the SPIRIT OF GOD to be our teacher. He is just waiting for us to say the word and he will begin His tutoring.
Paul says that here when he talks about using words of the SPIRIT. Natural man cannot receive the things of God. Some may ask why? Things of the SPIRIT are foolishness to him. If you are not a believer then what I am saying is foolishness to you. God says that the preaching of the Cross for salvation is foolishness to natural man because it does not make sense to him.
J. Vernon McGee tells about how a young college student thought he could understand anything any man had written. He found out he could not understand the Scriptures unless the Holy Spirit opens his heart to understand the Word of God. Jesus said, AWhen he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will bring glory to me by taking from what is mine and making it known to you@ (John 16:13-14). This letter to the Corinthians means very little to you if the Spirit of God does not reveal the things of Christ to you.
AThe Spiritual Man@ is the man who has the Holy Spirit within him, he is a child of the King. AMakes judgments about all things@ means that he understands the things of the Spirit. ABut he himself is not subject to any man=s judgment@ means that they do not understand him. The spiritual man is an exact opposite of the natural man. He understands divine truth, but the natural man misunderstands him.
AFor who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?@ Who can instruct God? Who understands the mind of God? We cannot tell God a thing. Nevertheless, He can reveal a great deal to you and me. The SPIRIT OF GOD cannot reveal spiritual things to us unless we have the mind of Christ. If you are not saved you really think that preaching of the Cross is foolishness. You would rather be out doing something else. A man dying on a cross as a way of salvation is a bit ridiculous isn=t it? You think a man dying on a cross is total defeat? That really does not impress you at all? God says that His method and His wisdom were to have His Son die on the Cross. That they might save us and that we must put our trust in Him.
J. Vernon McGee once again relates about a letter he received from a man who listened to his radio program. In the letter the man told McGee that he was a comedian. The man told McGee that he thought McGee was an oddball and that he was funnier than McGee. McGee says that is exactly how that man should have felt. You ask why? He is a natural man and cannot understand spiritual things.
God=s wisdom corrects man=s wisdom. Paul has given us two classes of man: the natural man and the spiritual man.
The natural man is the man who is the son of Adam, born into the world with his sinful nature, a willingness to do evil. Actually that is all natural man can do. Even when we do well we have mixed motives. We must check our motives to see if we are accomplishing them to do the will of God or our will. Paul tells us a natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit. Its foolishness!
Many registered voters will soon begin to receive mail from candidates who are going to bring in Utopia and the Millennium all at once. They have happy solutions to all the problems of the world! Of they are the only ones who have the answers. If you have ever read one of these letters or flyers you have to come away disappointed. First we know he can=t accomplish all he says he will. Second, we must realize that he is a natural man. He has no understanding or interest in the spiritual things. He has no interest in the spiritual answers to the problems. He knows how to solve the drug problem and lawlessness. Not in a spiritual way. He knows no more about spiritual matters than sheep grazing on the side of a hill. Years ago a man named Gladstone said: Athe mark of a great statesman is that he knows the direction God is going to take for the next fifty years.@ Most candidates would not qualify by that definition. We really can=t expect him to. They always tell you they have done their best. That is an accurate statement from a natural man.
We now come to the other man, the spiritual man. Paul says that the spiritual man, Amakes judgment about all things,@ he understands, he has spiritual insights. His spiritual insights cause him to be misunderstood by the world because natural man cannot understand why he does the things he does. That is the difference between the spiritual man and the natural man.
They are the kind of men and women they are because of their relationship to the Book, the Word of God. To the natural man it is foolishness. Spiritual man understands the Word of God and recognizes its importance.
The world is made up of those with the Spirit and those without. WHICH ONE ARE YOU?
This morning we have heard about the wisdom of God. We are faced with a decision. Accept His wisdom or our own. As we sing the chorus I will praise you. Take time to reflect upon whose wisdom you will accept.
Works Cited
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Keener, Craig S. The IVP Bible Background Commentary New Testament. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1999.
Radmacher, Earl, Ronald B. Allen, H. Wayne House. eds.
Nelson=s New Illustrated Bible Commentary. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1999.
Thompson, Frank Charles. AWisdomBOf God; 3839" Thompson Chain Reference Bible. Indianapolis: B. B. Kirkbride, 1995.
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Zodhiates, Spiros. The Complete Word Study Dictionary New Testament. Chattanooga: AMG, 1999.
