The Cross and Divine Wisdom, Part 1 | Christ, His Cross, His Church

1 Corinthians 2:1-5

 Looking at 1 Corinthians chapter 2, Paul writes this: “And I, when I came to you, brothers, I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I was with you in weakness and in fear, and in much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

“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. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would have not crucified the Lord of glory. 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.’

“These things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. But the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 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. And 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, and we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom, but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, and he is himself to be judged by no one. For who, who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him. But we have the mind of Christ.”

Three points we’re going to run through this chapter, and we’ll see how this chapter really does set a direction for our ministry. Number one, it’s this: Unleash God’s power in the cross and of course, I will offer this caveat, that I don’t mean unleashed by our own strength, by our own power, by our own wisdom, by our own understanding of God’s power. It’s not us who unleashes it, but it’s just in the fact that if we do preach the cross, clearly, articulating the truth about the cross, not pulling any punches, making it clear, understandable, that is God through us by his grace, unleashing the power of that message through our preaching, through our ministry.

That is to say that the power of God is actualized. We could say the power of God is made effective when the wisdom of God is heard through the preaching of God’s Word that’s centered in the cross. If we say this a different way, when we focus all our attention on hearing the voice of God in the Word of God, people hear the wisdom of God, and that unleashes the power of God, and that power is an effectual power. It is a real power. Another way to say it, it actually does stuff. It accomplishes things.

So the Corinthians, and as we discern from Paul’s letter, they were jeopardizing this whole process, this whole enterprise. They became distracted. Their attention was fractured among the various teachers that they had elevated over against one another, teachers that they had rallied behind and then formed behind and formed factions underneath those teachers, and then pitted one teacher against another. And these are all servants of God, even one of them Christ himself. This worldly-mindedness was blinding them from the whole point of God sending teachers in the first place.

Paul starts addressing the problem. You can go back to 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and see right away in this letter, back in 1 Corinthians 1:10, he gets right after it. “I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree, and that there would be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind, the same judgment. For it’s been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers. What I mean is this, that each one of you says, ‘I follow Paul,’ or ‘I follow Apollo,’ or ‘I follow Cephas,’ or ‘I follow Christ.’”

And it’s from this point on through chapter 4, Paul is confronting this problem, this Corinthian factionalism. He’s confronting it, he’s correcting it through these four, first four chapters. By pitting Paul against Apollos, against Cephas, against Christ, dividing into factions, this has caused them to miss the point entirely, which is evidence of a man-centered thinking. This is theology-of-glory thinking, and it’s depriving them of true wisdom and true power.

So to help the Corinthians, Paul takes them back in time. He takes him down a little trip down memory lane in order to help them remember how it is that God planted this church in the first place, how he planted it in pagan soil in the most unlikely city and in the most unlikely of circumstances. And we go back to 1 Corinthians 2:1: “When I came to you, brothers.” So he’s talking about when he first arrived, and you can read about this in Acts chapter 18.

“When I came to you, brothers, I didn’t come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my message were, were not in plausible words of wisdom,” read “human wisdom,” there, “but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

The record of Paul’s entrance into Corinth is in Acts chapter 18, and it was, as we read there in Acts 18, that entrance into Corinth was attended, as per usual, with controversy, with Jewish opposition. The Jews became particularly angry, not just at the message of the cross, which to them was a stumbling block. How could this man, clearly cursed of God, how could he be the promised Messiah?

So they were offended from the very start with Paul’s message, particularly offended when Paul looked at the Jews and said, “You did this. You crucified your Messiah.” They became particularly angry, though, when the ruler of their synagogue, a man named Crispus, “believed in the Lord,” Acts 18:8 says, “together with his entire household.” After that, many Corinthians were hearing the gospel and then believing and then being baptized. That bugged them.

So the Jews tried to bring a case before Gallio, the Roman proconsul in Corinth, and Gallio, he decided not to mess with it at all. He just made a summary judgment, dismissed the case outright, which angered the Jews even further. And to protest Gallio’s decision, they took a man named Sosthenes, who is the new synagogue ruler, Crispus is gone, he’s in their place, and he, they beat him in public, too, right in front of Gallio’s tribunal. And Gallio simply ignored them.

But once again, what the Jews intended for evil, God used for good. Because contrary to all human expectation, God used that public beating that he endured to open the heart of Sosthenes to the gospel. Paul names him in the very first verse, 1 Corinthians 1:1, calling him “our brother Sosthenes.” God, God turned Sosthenes into a preacher of that same gospel that got him a beating, the very same gospel the Jews hated so much, the very same Gospel they tried to silence.

Now listen, that is power, and that is power displayed in the moment of the, the weakness of Crispus and the weakness of Sosthenes, when they are at their lowest, when they are beaten in front of, in public, as Don was going through the crucifixion of Christ, a public display of, of hatred, of despisal, of, of shame, of rejection, of cursing. Here’s these two men; their entrance into the Christian faith is through a public beating, a humiliation, them shown to be at their weakest point. And God used that to open their hearts to the Ggspel and bring about salvation. Now that’s power. That’s power.

The Jews, coming from a functional theology of glory, they thought that by opposing the gospel with human power, they could stop the Gospel. That’s theology of glory. They thought by a, a display of physical strength and power and domination, that they could silence its preachers. And God then took the men who had been so terribly shamed with this public beat-down, Crispus, Sosthenes, he saved them through the Gospel, turned them into his agents, and they became trophies of God’s unstoppable power, his sovereign grace, evidence of the gospel’s power.

So in the face of Jewish hostility, Paul turned to the Gentile audience. “You Jews don’t want to listen? Fine, I’ll go to the Gentiles. They’ll listen.” And he preached the cross to them, and God, even though the message to them was foolishness, folly, “You’re worshipping your God crucified on a cross, can’t save himself, he’s going to save us?” and yet, preaching that bold, unadulterated message, God saved many Corinthians, converted many more Corinthians. In fact, it seemed to be an effective evangelism strategy: more opposition to the preaching of the cross, more people saved.

Jewish opposition of the word of the cross became so fierce, the pressure so great, bearing down on the Apostle Paul, himself being a man, having a limit to his strength, the risen Lord Jesus Christ chose to appear to Paul one night in a vision, encouraging him to continue preaching. “Keep on, Paul,” assuring him. “Don’t be afraid, Paul. Go on speaking. Do not be silent, for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many people in this city.” What a promise. “If you keep preaching, you will find them. If you keep preaching this message of the cross, they will come, they will come out, they will show themselves. I will draw the people whom I’ve chosen by the clear proclamation of the gospel by the word of the cross. Keep it up.”

Luke tells us in Acts 18, Paul stayed for a year and a half in Corinth, very productive ministry. He was teaching the Word of God among them. The message of the cross came with power, and it was evident in the conversion of the most unlikely people, evident in the planting of a church. In a climate of violent opposition, even, even hostile soil, the gospel of the Cross has produced lasting fruit.

Somewhere between Paul’s initial ministry there, the planting of the church, and the writing of this first Corinthian epistle, many of the Corinthians had reverted back to their worldly thinking. They had forgotten that message that came with such power, such demonstration of the Spirit’s ability to save. They had forgotten it. They’d, they’d kind of, as many of you can attest to, you sometimes forget the, the beauty and the, and the power and the glory of the message that saved you. And time can go by, and you, you find yourself back into your old thinking.

It happened with the Corinthians. They had forgotten so much. They’d forgotten that Paul and other ministers are only servants through whom the Corinthians had believed. They never elevated them before. Whatever they were hearing from Paul, Apollo, Cephas, Christ, they were just hearing truth. They were hungry for it. They were hungering and thirsting for righteousness, finding themselves to be poor in spirit. Nothing od, to offer to God, mourning over their sin, longing for a Savior, longing for a righteousness they didn’t possess. And they found in the message that was coming through these servants, this message that saved their souls from eternal death.

And yet, over time, instead of focusing on the message itself, they started focusing on the men of the message. They started focusing on the servants. Instead of magnifying the wisdom and power of God, they had returned to their native paradigm, which was what? A theology of glory, right? A theology that elevated human wisdom, a theology that focused on the man, not the message, focused on that which impresses people: eloquence, oratory, skill in moving a crowd. And so that necessarily dulled their thinking. It dimmed their vision. It turned them away from the manifold grace of God, where they should have been focusing, continuing forward to understand the true wisdom of God, all of it packed into the Gospel of the cross. They had so much to learn, but they, they were side-tracked.

I think every single one of us can say, “I’ve been side-tracked before, and God has been so gracious to bring me back on track,” and I hope that that’s what this conference is doing for many of you, it’s bringing you back on track, to get your focus back on the theology of the cross.

But instead of seeing God’s power in the message of the cross itself, the Corinthians, as I said, were elevating the human agents, and they were taking pride in the servants, boasting in their favorites. “I follow Paul,” “I follow Apollo, Cephas, Christ,” and Paul rebukes them and he says, “Is Christ divided? No. Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized in the name of Paul?” Three rhetorical questions, all in, emphatically answered in the negative. “No, no, no, no, no. None of that’s true.” And then he says this in verse 17, chapter 1: “For Christ did not send me to baptize.” “I didn’t come to create personal disciples. I didn’t come to win fans and followers and friends, that they’d be devoted to me. Christ sent me not to preach myself. He sent me to preach the Gospel,” and “not in words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.”

When he refers to “words of eloquent wisdom,” Paul brings that up again in chapter 2, verse 1, as “lofty speech or wisdom,” we just read. In verse 4, he calls it “plausible words of wisdom,” and he’s referring to what the Corinthians considered wise, what the Corinthians saw as lofty, lifted up, elevated, esteemed, that which they regarded as plausible, believable, worthy of listening to. Paul says, “When I came to Corinth, I communicated in ways, I was intentional to speak in such a way, that I would not impress everyone. I did not want you to be impressed with me. And I made sure that my language did not impress you in and of itself.”

He used a manner of public address called preaching. “And the content of my preaching and my sermonizing was something that you hate and despise, something that you make fun of, something that is, that is not spoken in polite company and in, in rude and crass company. It’s a joke. I came to you in that way even though I knew both my manner and my message, when correctly interpreted, would be disregarded, rejected, maligned, made fun of by the wisdom of Corinth, by the wise people of Corinth, by the sophisticated.”

That’s what he’s saying here. Why would he be saying this? Why would he be saying this to the Corinthians? I mean, what preacher is that intentional about making sure that his target audience, having clearly understood his message, is certain to reject what he’s preaching? Not seeker-sensitive of him at all, is it? I mean, clearly he has not read all the modern church growth manuals, all the books. He is way behind the times, isn’t he?

But what we need to see here is that every faithful preacher of the gospel thinks exactly this way because every faithful preacher of the Gospel knows that Paul’s paradigm for preaching and Paul’s paradigm for ministry is the only way to come to Christ, be converted, be saved. If it’s going to accomplish the salvation of anyone, it’s going to come through the bold proclamation of an offensive message confronting people in their sin, warning them of coming judgment and eternal hell, warning them about the wrath of God, telling them that the wrath of God is not only coming, but they deserve it, and that the only, the only salvation comes in self-denial, cross-bearing, following Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord and putting their faith in what he has done and accomplished on the cross. No longer about a, an accomplishment of men, no longer of man-centered; all focused on what God has done, what God has accomplished. No boasting.

There is some historical context to what Paul says, here. Little background of this, about this that I need to tell you about. In the Greco-Roman world, there developed this class of professional orators called Sophists. Sophists, a word formed off the Greek word for wisdom, which is sophia. And these men, these Sophists, made a living from sounding good, from looking good and then they taught others to polish their image and protect their image. It was all about brand management, image management. You might think of them, to use a modern expression, you might think of them as influencers.

These Sophists were known for their punditry, their commentary, philosophical insight, worldly wisdom. They had mastered the skill of performance. They made an impressive appearance, an impressive entrance accompanied by powerful oratory, fine-sounding rhetorical delivery. To sum it up, they just had stage presence. They could captivate an audience, spellbind them and capture them, and hold them to the very last pregnant pause.

So the oratorical skills of these Sophists were highly regarded. These men were experts. They were employed, in fact, by ambassadors to represent governors, even emperors. As one commentator says, “By this means cities secured financial concessions, provincial honors, imperial favors.” These guys were there on the side, coaching these ambassadors to benefit the cities or benefit the, the cause that they represented. And further, since Corinth was a highly litigious society, as ours is, Sophists and their skills were in demand in arguing cases in court.

So this professional class of orators, the Sophists, they were in high demand, as I said, to teach oratory, rhetoric, logic, debate, politics, philosophy, and joined with this highly affected, dramatic, theatrical presentation. Stage presence was essential in order, as I said, to gather, hold fast, and sway a crowd. Many of these Sophists, at least at first in their life, they were itinerant teachers. They would travel from city to city, and it was the successful ones who were able to plant somewhere, open schools, take on students. And they called these students, disciples. Students learn by lecture, but mostly by imitating their teachers, following them wherever they went, imitating their oratorical style, dressing in the same way that they dressed, and even walking in the same way that these guys walked.

Since there were only so many students to go around, and only so many able to pay the exorbitant rates of these Sophists, these guys were in constant competition with each other by trying to undermine the other guy, trying to gain students, steal students. So you can understand them, making, when they entered into a city, making a strong first impression was everything. That was their livelihood. This is their bread and butter.

So when a Sophist came into town, he had to make a grand entrance. Bruce Winter gives us an idea what this looked like. He says, “On first arriving, the teacher advertised by sending out invitations indicating the time and the place where he would present his credentials and then declaim.” Declaim means to kind of present oratory. “And at the appointed hour, he addressed the gathered assembly. Seated, he would engage in an encomium on the city.” An encomium means to flatter them, you know, praising the city. Flattery is their stock and trade. “And then he’d make an oblique self-commendation,” a subtle, it’s kind of like a humble brag, we’d call it today. “And then the Sophist would invite the audience to nominate any topic on which he would declaim, and once known, he would rise from his seat, declaim immediately, thereby displaying his great ability and extemporary rhetoric.” End quote.

These guys were good. These guys were people you would want to listen to. You would, you would cross the street for these people. You would buy tickets for these kind of people. So by making a good first impression, and get this, they did that by speaking to whatever interested the audience. Felt-needs philosophy is nothing new. They would appeal to whatever felt needs, whatever interests the audience had. Philosophical speculation, political controversy, all of it delivered with wit, all of it with a hint of intelligent comedy.

This is how the Sophist grabbed attention, secured interest, won himself a following, gathered disciples after himself. He had to bring notoriety to his name. He had to elevate his brand, and this is why Paul said back in 1 Corinthians 1:14: “I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus in Gaius, so that no one may say you were baptized in my name.” He’s not dismissive of Christian baptism, there. He’s just cautious, extremely cautious. He doesn’t, he didn’t want to come across like a Sophist. He does not want them to think that he’s playing them at all.

The greater the notoriety for a Sophist, the more disciples he could train, the more money he could charge, which spread his fame, which attracted more disciples, which increased his fees. And by building his brand and by building momentum for his brand, a Sophist could turn his, this entire thing, into this thriving, money making, self-perpetuating business. That’s what’s going on here.