Win By Losing (January 29, 2023 Version)

WIN BY LOSING

Text: I Corinthians 1:18 -25

1 Corinthians 1:18-31  For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.  (19)  For it is written, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart."  (20)  Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?  (21)  For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe.  (22)  For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom,  (23)  but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles,  (24)  but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.  (25)  For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength.  (26)  Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.  (27)  But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;  (28)  God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are,  (29)  so that no one might boast in the presence of God.  (30)  He is the source of your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification and redemption,  (31)  in order that, as it is written, "Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord."

The statement that we could win by losing is a paradox. One of the definitions of a paradox is usually something that sounds absurd but is actually true. Just think, the cross was a place of execution. It was therefore considered a place of defeat---the final word for the executed and a warning from those who did the executing. Usually, it was a criminal who was executed on crosses. Jesus’s crucifixion is an exception to that rule. Jesus, God’s only begotten Son---the Word made flesh, who was without sin (John 3:13 & John 1:14) died in the place of sinners who were God’s enemies because they were friends with the world.

The world tells us …

> that every man must be for himself.

> we win only if we play by the world’s rules.

> we can be self-sufficient and make our own way.

We would like to think that we have more control over our lives than we actually have. We like to think that “we are masters of our own fate.”(a line from William Ernerst Henley’s poem “Invictus”). What a contradiction to claim that we can be master of our won fate when beyond a shadow of doubt we are certainly masters of our own destruction! We might have perseverance but we are not unconquerable!

LOST

Have you ever been lost? Did it make you panic?

Billy Graham tells the story of a police officer on night duty in a city in northern England. As he walked the streets, he heard a quivering sob. Shining his flashlight into the darkness, he saw a little boy in the shadows sitting on a doorstep with tears running down his cheeks. The child said, “I’m lost. Please take me home.” “I’ll be glad to take you home. Where do you live?” the officer replied. But the little boy was so tired and so scared that he couldn’t remember his address. The policeman began naming street after street, trying to help the boy remember where he lived. He named the shops and the hotels in the area but the little boy could give him no clue. Then he remembered that at the center of the town stood a church with a large white cross that towered high above the rest of the city. The policeman pointed to the cross and said, “Do you live anywhere near that place?” The little boy’s face immediately brightened up. He said, “Yes, sir. Take me to the cross and I can find my way home.”

https://www.sumsacchurch.com/sermons/easter-14-1-cor-21-5-how-to-find-your- way-home-carlcrouse

How many are lost today because they have been deceived?

How many have lost their way because of the world’s wisdom?

1) The god of this world: How many have been blinded to the light of the Gospel by the enemy (2 Corinthians 4:4)?

2) Blind leaders: How many have have been blind leaders leading those who follow them into a ditch (Matthew 15:14)?

3) Inverted values: They see evil and call it good; they see good and call it evil (Isaiah 5:20).