The Mystery of God’s Wisdom

Transcript

GR 1301
08-28-05 The Mystery of God's Wisdom
1 Corinthians 2:6-9
Gil Rugh

We are going back to 1 Corinthians and we are in chapter 2.  It's hard for me to emphasize enough how pertinent this section of the Word of God is for what is taking place in the church of Jesus Christ today.  There is a loss of focus and moving away from what is the emphasis of the church as given in the Word of God and the confusion multiplies.  The present issue of Newsweek magazine, some of you may have seen it, September 5, 2005, has as its cover story, Spirituality in America: Our Faith Today, What We Believe, How We Pray, Where We Find God.  And I just want to draw your attention to one survey that was taken, the results of which, I think, point up a situation of concern.  They divide the religious groups down into different breakdowns, including evangelical Protestants.  And they have a section there where they give some definitions and evangelicals are those who believe you must be born again.  You are familiar, evangelicals are generally those who believe the Bible is the Word of God and salvation is by faith in Christ.

What's interesting to me is the response to one of the questions.  Now remember evangelicals are those who believe the Bible is the Word of God and you must be born again by faith in Christ.  So there was a question asked on the survey, can a good person who does not share your religious beliefs attain salvation or go to heaven?  Can a good person who does not share your religious beliefs, and for evangelical Protestants they would believe that the Bible is the Word of God and salvation is by faith in Christ.  Could a good person who doesn't believe that obtain salvation or go to heaven?  Among those who responded to that, 68% of those that classified themselves as evangelicals said that's true.  68% of those who claim to be evangelicals say if you don't believe the Bible is the Word of God and you don't believe that salvation is through faith in Christ, you can still go to heaven if you are a good person.  Now I have to say I read this and I scratch my head and say what do these people who marked themselves as evangelicals believing the Bible is the Word of God and salvation is by faith in Christ, and then they can turn around and say, "You can go to heaven if you're a good person, even if you don't believe that.”  In other words, “I call myself an evangelical, but I really don't believe any of it.” Now that just generates confusion—68%. Among non-Christians only 73% responded yes to that.  Non-Christians have (inaudible) and then there are Roman Catholics and non-evangelical Protestants as a separate group.  And you realize, do those who call themselves evangelicals really believe what they say they believe?

I receive various mail, I refer to it at times and I get a regular mailing inviting me as a senior pastor to take advantage of a training program, field-based coaching relationship designed to accelerate the gift development of senior pastors who want to grow strong, healthy and effective churches.  And you take modules. You can get seminary credit for this.  It's evangelical and the term is generally used.  You would recognize some of the names that I would mention, some for good and some for evil, not so many for good.  And they do these modules in different places.  Let me just read you.  For example, I could take module 7, and you can see everything is really well done, everything is in full color.  Here's the one on worship, preaching and transition.  I think I know about worship, and I know preaching and transition.  And there will be 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 leading individuals who are prominent in the evangelical world or pastoring large churches who will be teaching in this.  And you will develop the following competency if you take this particular training program in worship, preaching and transition.  You will be able to 1) experiment with a marketplace preaching approach to biblical communication, including the use of narratives, stories and multimedia.  Now when I read that, you will experiment with a marketplace preaching approach to biblical communication.  They always put the word biblical in there, but I wonder, does it get lost in everything.  Including the use of narratives; stories.  We're not going to focus, of course, on theological content or doctrinal teaching.  Narrative, people like stories, so we're going to focus on that.  2) You'll be able to set goals, evaluation points and feedback loops, designed to support your church's progress toward achieving its vision.  3) You'll blend together biblical content, music, drama and other art through a culturally relevant philosophy of worship. You'll note that they mention biblical content, but you note it just gets mixed in.  It's like we're going to throw this into the pot with everything else and then you're going to learn to be culturally relevant.  You've learned to get everybody working on the same page together, and of course that doesn't mean you have to have the same theology, because these leaders come from a variety of theological positions under the broad evangelical, from what we would consider hyper-charismatic, Methodist, Baptist.  So you learn all together on the same page, but don't let your theology become an issue here.  Then on it goes.  So you are going to raise up teams to help your target community respond to God through worship.  You help your target community respond to God through worship.

I don't know if that's the worst one. I just picked it out because it's the first in the list.  They list 9 modules you can take here.  That's not as bad as the one on learning to balance your personal life.  You'll be able to deal with those patterns in your life that foster workaholism, co-dependency, adrenaline addiction, infidelity, greed, abusive power or other harmful behavior.  Sounds to me like the Word of God didn't do much when I got saved.  It says now I am going to learn to deal with those things that foster workaholism, co-dependency (whatever that is.  I know what it is, but I don't know what it is), adrenaline addiction.  I'm not going to read anymore, I won't get through Corinthians and then you'll say, I knew he wouldn't get to Corinthians.

You know if people would read the opening chapters and believe what is said in the opening chapters of 1 Corinthians in the church of Jesus Christ today, these things would be non-issues.  The very kind of things being addressed 2000 years ago, the Spirit of God directed the Apostle Paul to write to address this kind of problem in the church at Corinth.  Not these particular issues, but the same problem, the problem being that they were attempting to bring the wisdom of men and join it to the message of Christ so that they could be more effective, more appealing, have a greater impact.  So Paul was spending the opening chapters of this letter, showing them the impossibility of the church doing that.  And the tragedy in the church at Corinth, when you begin to turn the attention from a focus on Jesus Christ and His work on the cross, you end up fragmenting and dividing the church.  So you begin to look for other ways to produce unity.

For example, the church begins at Corinth and it’s built around one person, Jesus Christ; one work, His death and resurrection to pay the penalty for sin.  But now we have the wisdom of men brought in, now we begin to divide around personalities, people we like, their approach is more appealing, and I've developed a relationship with them.  And all of a sudden, the church is fragmented now, because Jesus Christ is not the central person in the life of the church, and all the members of the church.  We divide over other things, and we could go on.  One person made a list and I may use it yet if I lose my good sense.  But churches, you know music becomes the focal point of what they do, their stance on abortion, home schooling.  All could become the focus.  Not saying anything is wrong with having positions on this or whatever, depends on the thing, but that becomes the focal point of the church, the thing we divide over, what's happened to Jesus Christ and the cross?  The big thing now is you build your church on the style of music you have, and that's what draws people.  All of a sudden the cross is no longer the focus.  Come to our church, because we'll have the kind of music you want.  A leading spokesman in the evangelical world in church growth today says the style of music determines how your church will grow. Well you know I lose perspective on whether we're starting a franchise like a McDonald's or a Wendy's when we're talking about building the church of Jesus Christ.

Well, that's what Paul is talking about in the opening chapters of Corinthians.  Let me just remind you in chapter 1 verse 4 Paul writes, “I thank my God always concerning you for the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus.”  You by God's grace have been the recipients of God's grace, you've experienced the power of His salvation and that grace that brought you salvation also enriched your life in every area so that you might serve Him effectively together.  Verse 5, “in everything you were enriched in Him.”  Verse 7, “you are not lacking in any gift”, and some day he is confident they'll be presented blameless in the presence of Jesus Christ.  What a church.  And then verse 10 says, he has to put an end to the divisions, the conflicts.  You need to be made complete, the end of verse 10, and of the same mind, the same judgment.  I've heard there are quarrels among you.  The church that has been the recipient of God's grace, that has made them one in Jesus Christ, that has enriched them in every area and blessed them with all the gifts necessary to function as a unified body in bringing glory to Christ, and they're characterized by conflicts and quarrels.  You know what the problem is?  The Corinthians thought they could improve on the message of Jesus Christ, they could enhance its effectiveness so it becomes wedded with the wisdom of men, and it's been destructive for the church.  The cross, the person of Christ have to remain central.

Verse 17, Paul says “Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech”, and we noted that word translated cleverness is the Greek word wisdom.  Not in wisdom of speech, “so that the cross of Christ would not be made void.”  You know we think we are enhancing the effectiveness of the ministry of the church, we don't deny the preaching of the cross, no implication that the church at Corinth has denied the Gospel.  They are simply adding to it, but that will make it more appealing, that will give us a greater impact.  Paul says that anytime you corrupt the Gospel by adding man's wisdom, you render the Gospel null and void.  We've emphasized this, I want to emphasize it again.  We think that we get more people and draw bigger crowds and therefore more will hear the Gospel.  But you know what happens—when you use man's wisdom mixed with the Gospel. You've given the antidote to the Gospel so that it doesn't work.  The cross is made void, Paul says, I wouldn't use wisdom of speech, man's wisdom mixed with the message of the cross, because then the cross would be rendered void, ineffective, doesn't work.  It's like you've given someone the antidote, there's no impact. It's a danger for the church at Corinth, it's a danger for the church of Jesus Christ today.

Over in chapter 2 verse 1, “and when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.”  Why is it so difficult for the church to stay on focus?  Paul tells the church at Corinth, when I came there was one thing—Jesus Christ and Him crucified.  Now what's the issue over wisdom?  I didn't dress up the message, I didn't try to display human wisdom to make it more attractive, more appealing.  I just said I have one thing, Jesus Christ was crucified to pay the penalty for sin.  Verse 4, “and my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith will not rest on the wisdom of men but on the power of God.”  The dichotomy in these opening chapters is final and complete.

Look at verse 18 of chapter 1, “for the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”  This is the foundation for all that Paul is developing.  We're going to be picking up in chapter 2 verse 6, and that connects to what he said in chapter 1 verse 18.  The word of the cross is foolishness, it's stupidity, it's moronic to the perishing.  But to those who are being saved it is the power of God.  That is the dichotomy, that is the difference.  There is no middle ground, there are no neutral people, there are no people in between, there are no seekers in that sense.  We'll see where there are people we might call seekers, but that is a different category than we use the term today.  There are no people out there just hoping that they could come to know God's wisdom and God's plan.  Doesn't happen that way.  Soon as we start thinking that way we begin to think, now we would be more effective in reaching the lost if we did this and if we did that.  Now common sense things, not a problem.  I don't think we have to go out of our way to make things inconvenient.  Let's turn off the air conditioner so everybody can be hot in here, we'll find out who's interested in the Word.  Let's make the lighting as poor as we can.  Those are not issues, but that's not what the church is all about.  When we start thinking that we can make the message of the cross more effective, more powerful, we've decided we don't want to do it God's way.  And that's why it doesn't produce genuine conversions.  We're dealing with those who view those who are perishing, who view the message of Christ as foolishness, and those who are being saved who view it as the power of God.

          
We come to chapter 2 verse 6, and Paul's development of this.  If the division is between those who view the cross as stupidity, foolishness, and those who view it as the power of God, Paul didn't use wisdom, didn't use man's wisdom, then how do we explain verse 6 which begins, yet we do speak wisdom.  He's belabored the fact that he was very careful not to use wisdom.  Now he says in verse 6 after saying in verse 4, my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom.  Verse 6, “yet we do speak wisdom.”  There are two kinds of wisdom that we're talking about in this section—the wisdom of the world and the wisdom of God, the wisdom of man and the wisdom of God.  And there is no mixing of the two.  We are talking about two different worlds, two groups of people, they live in different worlds, they think differently.  Paul says, yes, but in contrast with that I don't use wisdom.  We do speak wisdom among those who are mature.  And he's going to go on to show that the message of the cross of Jesus Christ is divine wisdom.  It is wisdom that has only one source, it comes from God.  And the wisdom found among men never, ever on any occasion leads a man to the knowledge of God.  It cannot happen.  What if someone somewhere did begin to desire to know God?  Then we sometimes say, well then God would have to send him a missionary to share the Gospel. Well, first point, the premise is totally impossible.  There is never anyone anywhere who through the wisdom and observing things and thinking through things comes to the conclusion there must be a living God, and if there is a living God, I must be saved by believing in Him.  And I wonder what it takes and I would like to know Him.  It never happens.

Let's look at verse 6, we do speak wisdom among those who are mature.  Now he's already talked about this wisdom.  Look back in verse 23 of chapter 1, “we preach Christ crucified.”  Then look down at the end of verse 24, “Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”  The contrast is between man's wisdom and God's wisdom.  And when we preach Christ, we are preaching the wisdom of God, because Christ is God's wisdom as He has planned redemption for sinful human beings by the death of His own Son.

Look at verse 30 in chapter 1, “but by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us”, to us who are in Christ Jesus, “wisdom from God.”  So then he says in verse 6 of chapter 2, “yet we do speak wisdom”, in contrast to the world's wisdom, man's wisdom.  We speak wisdom, but it's among those who are mature.  The mature in this contrast are those who are believers.  This is not a contrast between two kinds of Christians, this is a contrast between those who are believers in Jesus Christ and those who are not.  This is a contrast between “those who are perishing”, as chapter 1 verse 18 put it, and those who are being saved.  Believers are those who are mature, because they have come to know and understand the message of the cross of Jesus Christ.  They are mature, perfect, in contrast to the unbeliever who does not know and understand the message of the cross of Jesus Christ.  So that's the contrast here, not between two kinds of believers.  Be careful, because this passage has been misused by many in the church to imply some kind of superior knowledge on the part of some Christians versus other Christians.  We'll talk about immature Christians when we get to chapter 3 in a couple of weeks.  But the contrast at the end of chapter 2 is between believers and unbelievers, and believers are the mature, and they see Christ as the wisdom of God.  They know by God's grace that this is the Savior and the one who has saved them from their sin.

Now this wisdom, in verse 6, is a wisdom “not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away.”  This wisdom does not find its source or origin in this age, or in the wise men of this age.  Talking about the world.  You don't find the knowledge of God's salvation through man's thinking, through what goes on in this world.  It doesn't happen.  It's not of this age or of the ruler.  Who are we talking about, the ruler.  We're talking about human beings, they are the kind of people that were involved in the crucifixion of Christ, as he'll talk about in the next verse.  He refers to this back in chapter 1 verse 26 when he said, “not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble” were called.  The wise, the mighty, the noble, that's not where you go to find God's wisdom for salvation.  So we're speaking divine wisdom, we're speaking divine wisdom to people who are taken up with human wisdom.  They are not impressed with divine wisdom, they think it is foolishness, moronic, stupid.  They think Christians are less intelligent, backward, narrow, uneducated, because Christians aren't speaking the wisdom that appeals to this world, the wisdom that impresses this world.  It's not the wisdom that comes from this world, it's divine wisdom. It's in total contrast and conflict with the self-centered approach that characterizes mankind as a fallen being.

It's not the wisdom of this age, the mighty, the powerful, the rulers of this age who are passing away.  A reminder, divine wisdom is eternal, human wisdom is transitory.  To look at that we study history, and what seems to be great science.  I believe it was the history program, I think it was on George Washington, and the medical science of the day.  He was having health problems, so they bled him.  In fact they said they drained so much of his blood, it probably accelerated his death.  But the wisdom of the day, you have to get that bad out of him, so you bleed him to death.  They think they're bleeding him to health, they were bleeding him to death.  But that was the science, the medical knowledge of the day.  Now we look at it and say, that was just the opposite of what he needed.  And the knowledge and the wisdom of the rulers, the wise men.  Where are the wise men?  They die, they're gone, and all their wisdom.  Oh they're going to find life, they're going to find eternal life.  They say, well you know the beginning of the 20th century man only lived to be 47 years of age, now the average age is 72 or whatever it is.  Isn't it interesting?  David wrote about 1000 years before Christ, the average age for a human being is 70 years.  And if he makes it to 80, he'll have extra pains.  Things haven't changed as much as we like to present in all our wisdom and all we've learned.  Man's wisdom is passing away, God's is not.

Go back to Isaiah 40, right in the middle of your Bible.  This is not new.  Hundreds of years before Christ, Isaiah the prophet wrote under the direction of the Spirit of God.  Isaiah 40:6, “a voice says, ‘Call out.’  Then he answered, ‘What shall I call out?’”  Here is the message from God, “all flesh is grass, all its loveliness is like the flower of the field.  The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass.  The grass withers, the flower fades, but the Word of our God stands forever.”  You see that, the contrast.  Man is transitory, he is passing.  The most influential, the most powerful, the wisest, they come and go.  God's truth stands forever.  That's the contrast between the wisdom of man and the wisdom of God.  Look in verse 21, “do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been declared to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundation of the earth?  It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.  He it is who reduced rulers to nothing, who makes the judges of the earth meaningless.  Scarcely have they been planted, scarcely have they been sown, scarcely has their stock taken root in the earth, but He merely blows on them, and they wither, the storm carries them away like stubble. ‘To whom then will you liken Me that I would be his equal?’ says the Holy One.”  And yet why do we, even as God's people of the church of Jesus Christ have become so infatuated with the wisdom of men?  Why do we so desire that man would honor us and would recognize us?

A few years ago there was a book written that I reviewed with you back when it came out, I believe it may have gotten an award for perhaps the best Christian book of the year in that category that year.  You know what the man wrote? That his solution was, an evangelical writer teaching in an evangelical college?  What Christianity needs is a Christian Harvard, where Christians can go and be intellectually trained so they can compete in the intellectual world of those who are graduating from institutions like Harvard.  So that Christianity becomes credible.  Have we never read the opening chapters of 1 Corinthians?  This just isn't some religious guy, this is an evangelical in an evangelical school.  What we really need is an evangelical Harvard, that's what will impress the world.  We turn out men who can think on the level of others and argue and reason and prove the validity of Christianity.  And all of us, if we're honest, go through these times.  Aren't there times when you see scientists and those denying the creation of the Bible, don't you wish you had a dozen Christian scientists who could really overwhelm them and demonstrate that it's biblical Christianity that’s scientific and credible?  And they'd just wither in the face of those arguments and would have to believe.  You know what?  It can never happen.  We start thinking that way, we start thinking of ways to help God out.  I mean He has given us a message that the world views as moronic and stupid, He's chosen to entrust it to men and women that are the world's nobodies as we saw in chapter 1.  This is just not a good plan, Lord.  But that's all right, you're fortunate to have me do some thinking.  And I have decided how we can really..........  Lord, I won't change your message, but you've put it in the hands of a person who knows how to go forward.  We'll do some marketing, we'll do some analysis, and this business is going to grow.

Well you understand, God is not looking for help in that sense.  He's not sitting there thinking, you know I have this great invention, so to speak, if I only had some men who know how to make it go.  The church starts to think this way.  We say, that doesn't sound right when you say it; no, we just start to do it.  So I read you, here I am, senior pastors ought to come to this and then I can learn and I'll develop competencies in this and I'll learn how to mix this, and I'll know how to do this, and I'll know how to develop my target audience and put together the right package that will reach the target ..........  I say, wait a minute, I don't want to start a hamburger joint, we got a church.  Well, isn't all truth God's truth?  Let's just put all this truth in the pot and mix it up and we'll come out with a better cake, so to speak.  Well, it doesn't work.
Come back to 1 Corinthians 2.   Since the world views it as stupidity, none of us like to be looked at by the world as stupid nobodies.  So we think we'll adjust and we'll become an influence, we'll become noted for something as the church.  And then we gain respectability.  A movement among evangelicals today, some of you if you've been reading at all you'll see this, and it is just becoming dominant.  The church has to begin to become more influential in social issues, in ethical issues, we have to become part of the solution for helping poverty in this country and in the world, helping illiteracy.  We have the purpose driven nation, as I've shared with you, in Somalia, and National Association of Evangelicals taking strong position on this.  The problem with evangelicalism is it hasn't exerted enough influence socially so we haven't gained respectability.  You know how do we lose....?  We need to come back and reread 1 Corinthians 1 and 2.

Come back to 1 Corinthians 2:7, “But we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory.”  We speak God's wisdom in a mystery.  God's wisdom is a mystery.  Mystery in the New Testament is something that cannot be known apart from revelation.  God's wisdom is supernaturally revealed.  It is not possible to come to know God's wisdom through human wisdom.  That means we cannot reason or argue people into salvation, we cannot back them into a corner so they will have no alternative intellectually but to turn from their sin and believe in Christ.  We speak God's wisdom in a mystery.  You cannot know this truth by any means but by revelation from God.  That's why mystery is by definition.  We speak God's wisdom in a mystery.  Not we speak in a mystery, but God's wisdom is the mystery here.  It is hidden and that word translated hidden is a perfect participle.  I know you're thrilled with that.  A participle in English usually means we have “ing” on it.  There are participles in English, not always, but we usually identify them as wording ending in “ing.”  We translate this the having been hidden wisdom, perfect tense.  Something happened in the past but the results continue to the present.  So this is the wisdom that has been hidden and continues to be hidden.  Perfect tense.  But I thought we were speaking this wisdom, and down in verse 10 he'll say God revealed it.  But there is a dual sense in revelation here that will come out clearer even in our next study as we proceed through this chapter.

The message of the cross of Christ is God's plan of salvation. It's something that can be known only through the revelation of God.  And He has made it known now, so we present the Gospel that is the wisdom of God, that was a mystery.  We'll say more about that in a moment.  Up till it was revealed following Christ's death and resurrection.

But to those who are perishing, to the unbeliever it continues to be hidden.  He cannot know it, because there is not only the revelation of the truth of the Gospel, but then there has to be the ministry of the Spirit of God who will take that revelation and enable the unbelieving heart to understand and believe it.  And without that ministry of the Spirit, nothing happens with the revelation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I could share the Gospel with 10,000 people a year, every year of my life and not one of them would be saved, if the Spirit of God did not supernaturally work on their hearts.  Furthermore, there is no possibility that the unbeliever can understand ever the Gospel in a truly understanding way apart from the ministry of the Holy Spirit.  Now I can't get into all that, we'll do that next study.
But in verse 7, it is a mystery that continues to be hidden to the lost.  I want you to note that, we have to break this up in pieces.  This is the wisdom which God predestined, the end of verse 7, before the ages to our glory.  Now the Old Testament prophets spoke about the coming of Christ.  Isaiah 53, the great presentation of the suffering and death of the Messiah, how come it was called a mystery?  Well even with all the revelation of the Old Testament, there was not enough revelation that the Old Testament people understood God's plan of salvation.  1 Peter 1 tells us, the Old Testament prophets wrote about the suffering of Christ, wrote about the glory of Christ, but they didn't understand how that all went together.  In fact, Peter says in 1 Peter 1 that they were writing for our benefit, on whom the ends of the ages have come.  Even John the Baptist, the greatest of the Old Testament prophets, didn't understand that the Messiah he was introducing, was going to provide salvation by His death on the cross.  So that when he got imprisoned he said what?  He sent messengers to ask Christ, are you truly the Christ?  I don't understand this.  The disciples themselves, after three years with Christ in ministry, didn't understand that He had to go to the cross and die to pay the penalty for sin.  They only came to understand that after His resurrection, when He explained it to them.  So there is revelation in the Old Testament, but the fullness of revelation and the understanding to come with that revelation had to await the finished work of Christ on the cross.

Back up a page to Romans 16, just before 1 Corinthians.  Romans 16:25, “now to Him who is able to establish you, according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which has been kept secret for long ages past, but now is manifested, that by the Scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God, has been made known to all the nations, leading to obedience of faith.”  So you see it was something that was not revealed before in its fullness, but now, Paul says, with the finished work of Christ accomplished on the cross, it's God's intention to make that known in its fullness.  So that's the mystery.  It has been hidden, now it's made known.

Come back to 1 Corinthians 2.  Don't misunderstand, we say it has been hidden and now it's made known.  That doesn't mean it's new in the plan of God, it's just newly revealed.  God planned this in His wisdom before He ever started the creation of Genesis 1:1.  He predestined, God predestined, this before the ages to our glory, He predestined, determined it beforehand.  Basic word in predestined here, the word translated predestined, is horidzo.  We get the English word horizon, horizon marks out the boundary, sets the limit.  So you put the preposition before on the front of that word, marked out before, determined before, ordained before.  He predetermined this, He determined before the creation that He would provide His Son to die on the cross to pay the penalty for sin so that those who place their faith in Him would experience His salvation.  He predestined that to our glory.  You'll note here, we go from beginning to end.  He predestined this before the ages, that's before creation, to our glory, which looks to the culmination of our salvation when we are glorified in His presence, a glorious presence.  So it's determined by God.  You'd think the church at Corinth would be now in confusion, because now we have to deal with the subject of fore-ordination or the work of God in predetermining this work.  The details of it, we don't have time to go into, but the fact is, it was predetermined before the ages.  Peter wrote about that in 1 Peter 1, Christ was the Lamb of God foreknown before the foundation of the world, foreknown being foreordained, predetermined.  God just didn't look down in time and see Christ would be crucified and to say, oh, I have to work that in to my plan.  No, it was His predetermined plan determined in His wisdom that that's what He would do.  For our glory.  Remarkable salvation, we have.  And it's His plan from the beginning.  He's now made it known through revelation that this is the way of salvation.

Look at verse 8, this is “the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood.”  The religious and political rulers of the world were in ignorance of God's plan.  With all their wisdom, with all the resources available to them, and they were ignorant.  They didn't understand it, they had no knowledge of God's wisdom, they didn't know who Jesus Christ was, they didn't understand the wisdom of God in sending His Son to earth.  You know if they had understood God's wisdom, they wouldn't have crucified the Lord of glory, I mean at the very beginning, if they had recognized this is the Son of God, the Lord of glory, a divine title, this is the Lord of glory.  Think they would have crucified Him if they knew who He was?  Annas, Caiphas, high priests in Israel; Herold, Pilate; the movers, the shakers, the people with the resources of the world in wisdom available to them.  They didn't have any idea, so they went ahead and crucified the Lord of glory.  An amazing thing, even in their sinful ignorance, they were doing what God in His wisdom had planned for the accomplishing of man's salvation.  That's remarkable.  They crucified “the author of life”, as Peter said in Acts chapter 3, verse 15 (New International Version), but they did this according to the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God.  We say, the wisdom of God, to use even the sinfulness of man to accomplish His plan of redemption.

His support is from Scripture, pulling together some Scriptures from Isaiah 64:4 and 65:16.  “But just as it is written, things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him.”  Now you'll note here, what he is saying in verse 9 is, the wisdom of God cannot be known through human ingenuity or wisdom.  What God's wisdom entails cannot be known or learned through what the eye can discern, what it can see, what it can read, or what the ear can hear or be taught, which have not entered the heart of man.  That would be a Semitic way of talking about never crossed my mind, never entered my mind.  Somebody will say, I think you were planning this.  You say, it never entered my mind, that means you never thought about it.  Well that's what happened here.  They never even began to think about such a thing.  We're talking about all that God has prepared for those who love Him.  You cannot come to know the living God, His plan of salvation and all that He provides in that salvation through human means.  But this is not talking about what happens to Christians after they die.  Now it's true, with our finite minds, we don't begin to grasp, when we step into glory we're going to be in awe, overwhelmed.  I mean, what he is saying when we appear in the glories of heaven.

But that's not what he's talking about here, because look at verse 10, “for to us God revealed them through the Spirit.”  He's not talking about these are things yet to be known that are unknown, he said they are known for believers.  He's revealed them to us, to the mature, to believers, through the Spirit.  So this is God' wisdom, His plan of salvation, and that salvation includes glory for us.  He's predestined us to glory, and we know that as His children.  But you didn't learn that through reading, through studying, through being taught in the secular world, or devising it, even the greatest minds.  That comes through revelation.  This leads to where we're saying, God's wisdom cannot be known apart from revelation.  That's the Gospel, the truth concerning Christ and God's plans in Christ.  But then even when that is presented, you cannot understand it apart from the ministry of the Spirit.  There are people who have sat under the ministry of the Word of God for years and years and years, and they still do not understand.  You could sit here under my preaching for 30 years and know the general facts of what I preach and what the Gospel is, and be lost and go to hell.  It will take a supernatural work of the Spirit of God to open blinded eyes to see and believe the truth of the Gospel.  We as believers must believe this.  We'll be developing the work of the Spirit as we move on from here, but we do not understand it is God's message delivered in the power of God's Spirit that brings about salvation, and that alone.  We slide into looking for devices with methods, techniques, things that will enable us to be more effective with the unbeliever.  And in other words, we will begin to try to mix the wisdom of the world with the message of God and think when it's all said and done, because we've increased our popularity and we've become more appealing, we've become more effective.  But all we have done is given the antidote to the cross, and it's not any wonder they don't view us as foolish anymore.  We've rendered the cross void.  And we have people making decisions, because they are responding to the wisdom of men, not the work of the power of God.

Verse 5 of chapter 2, Paul said, I didn't use these techniques, because I didn't want your faith to “rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.”  Terrible thing to throw the message of the Gospel in so that people respond, but they really are responding to the wisdom of men, and not the moving of the Spirit of God that brings true salvation.  But we are successful, our churches get larger, and there is a certain popularity, because it is appealing to all, and the world even begins to speak well of us.  And while the may not agree, they're willing to honor us.  But a tremendous cost, because the message of the cross has been rendered void.

The message of the church is the most needed message in the world.  There is nobody else to proclaim it.  We come to declare to you divine wisdom. Oh, what are your degrees? Well, I really don't have any. Well, how much science are you talking about?  You know I don't believe in the Bible, the story of creation and all of that.  Well you know I'm not a scientist, and I can't debate with you on the issues of science, and I want to admit the Bible even says, those who believe that God created the world out of nothing, that simply is an article of faith.  Hebrews 11, by faith we understand that the worlds were created out of nothing.  So I want to give that point to you.  And I can't debate science with you, but I can tell you something.  The living God has said that you are a sinner and that you are lost, you are separated from Him and you are doomed to an eternal hell, and your only hope of salvation is that you turn from your sin and place your faith in His Son, who came and died on the cross so that you might have life.  That's your only hope of salvation.  

You say well don't you think it's more important if you took a couple of scientists who are Christians with you and they could argue and demonstrate the validity of Christianity and then they might be willing to hear.  Do I believe 1 Corinthians 1 and 2, or don't I?  Do I believe it's a mixture of the wisdom of the world and the message of Christ, or do I believe it's a mixture of the message of Christ and the power of the Spirit?

Remember Jesus said that it's enough for a servant to be like a master.  If they've rejected our master, ridiculed and despised Him and thought Him the worst of lowly criminals worthy of crucifixion, why do you think that we ought to be honored by the world and respected by the world.  We come with a message of foolishness, but it is divine wisdom.  Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died to pay the penalty for your sin.  Your only hope of salvation is to believe that message, which means that you enter into an understanding through the gracious work of the Spirit of God.  We'll talk about that work next time.  And that enables you to recognize the truth of this message, be overwhelmed with the reality of your sin and turn from your sin to believe in Jesus Christ.  The divine wisdom is overwhelmingly simple and clear, and God calls all everywhere to repent, for He has appointed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness, and He's furnished proof to all men by raising the judge, Jesus Christ, from the dead.

Let's pray together.  Thank You, Lord, that You have opened our eyes that we might understand and believe the message of divine wisdom, so contrary to the way that sinful man thinks, so contrary to ways that we thought that You should send Your Son to be the Savior, that the best efforts, the most righteous deeds from the wisest of men are nothing but filthy rags in Your sight.  And yet with a simple act of faith as we turn from our sin and believe in Your Son who died on the cross to pay in full the penalty for our sin and was raised in glory, we can know what it means to be forgiven.  We can know what it means to belong to the living God.  We can understand divine wisdom and know that You predestined us for glory from before the ages.  What a tragedy that the church should compromise that message, be attracted to the wisdom of the world, and ashamed of the wisdom of our God.  Our desire is that we would be faithful to You, faithful to the truth that has been entrusted to us, that by Your grace many more might come to salvation in Your Son, in whose name we pray.  Amen.