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March 15, 2009
“The Wisdom and Power of God”
Isaiah 29: 13-21/I Corinthians 1: 18-25
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Last Spring it was announced that the winner of the National Spelling Bee was a resident of West Lafayette. A few months ago it was announced that West Lafayette was one of the smartest communities in America. The next morning the TV headline had changed to specify that West Lafayette was the best educated community in America.
I suppose the change in the headline had to do with quantifiability. You can determine who is well educated. That is a matter of record. Determining who is smart is not so easily determined. We are the best-educated community in America but we don’t seem to be able to build a road through a bog that won’t sink. Oh well, everyone needs something to keep them humble, maybe that is what Lindberg Road does for us.
For those of us who live or work in West Lafayette, it is a matter of record that we value education and that many of us have pursued it.
It is not unusual that there should be several Presbyterian churches of different denominations in such a community. Presbyterians have always valued education and have set the highest educational standards for their Pastors. Until recently all who applied for ordination as a Minister of Word and Sacrament in the PC(USA) had to take courses in Hebrew and Greek and pass exams on exegeting a Scripture text from one of those languages.
So as a new member of the best educated community in America and an old member of the best educated group of ministers in the world, I was shocked, I say shocked, to read what Paul wrote about human wisdom in this passage. He actually quotes one of the verses in our OT passage to demonstrate that God often acts in ways that frustrate the knowledge of the wise. Although the word order is slightly different, Verse 19 in our Corinthians passage is a quotation of verse 14 on our Isaiah passage. The world order is slightly different due to language and translation issues, but the meaning is the same. Sort of.
In the Old Testament passage, the prophet Isaiah was pronouncing judgment on the ruling class of Israel. The members of that class were using their wisdom and their educations to develop ways of cheating the other classes of people, so that they would remain in their positions of power and authority. They were using those positions to dominate others. Isaiah was prophesying the elimination of the ruling classes and the increasing of the other classes. He was also clearly stating that people, no matter how smart or how well educated they might be, cannot outsmart God or permanently impede God’s purposes.
But writing over 600 years later, Paul quoted this verse to prove a slightly different point: that God chose an unwise and illogical way to get people into his kingdom, at least unwise and illogical according to the standards of worldly wisdom and logic.
In the 20th verse of our NT passage, Paul wrote a rhetorical question: “Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?” The implied answer is “yes He has”. But lest you misunderstand what Paul meant and think him to have been an anti-intellectual, please let me remind you who and what he was.
Paul was one of the elite Jews of his day. He was schooled by the revered Jewish Rabbi Gamaliel. He was one of the most knowledgeable people of his day in the Hebrew Old Testament, Hebrew Literature, and Israel’s history. But the breadth of his education went far beyond his Jewish origins and culture. In the speech he made to the people of Athens Paul quoted an obscure Greek poet. Paul was well educated in all the areas that were considered valuable in his day. He was so well educated that the Roman Governor Porcius Festus once said to Paul “Your great learning is driving you insane.” (Acts 26:24)
So when we read Paul’s comments about God making human wisdom foolish we need to remember who and what he was lest we think he was saying that an education and intellectual pursuits are worthless. Paul greatly valued his education and spent much of his time teaching his Gentile coverts Biblical Jewish History. Paul honored the scholars of his day.
But he knew that human wisdom and scholarly pursuits could not lead anyone to God. God, in His infinite wisdom chose to bring people to Him through an act that made no sense to the knowledgeable people of this world. The Almighty God sent his almighty Son into this world to live as a human being and die on a cross. That was the act of Salvation.
And the greater intellects of Paul’s day could not fathom such an act on the part of God. The well-educated Gentiles could not understand it because for them a cross was the most inhumane form of execution reserved for rebellious slaves, notorious criminals and other sorts of human refuse. They could fathom worthwhile and honorable people being killed by other means or being forced to commit suicide, but they could not conceive of a great human, let alone a God dying on a cross.
The Jewish scholars could not accept a dead Messiah. They had studied the Old Testament and they understood that God was going to send a Messiah, but they could not comprehend that the Messiah would die. Suffer, maybe, but not die, and certainly not die as a criminal on a cross.
The doctrine of Jesus’ death on a cross was unacceptable to the Jewish and the Gentile scholars of Paul’s day. And it is equally unacceptable to many scholars in our own day. I am sure that each one of us knows someone whose knowledge and intellect we admire who does not believe in God or his son Jesus. That is because human knowledge, as valuable as it is, cannot lead one to accept Christ as the savior who died on a cross.
But the message of Jesus dying on a cross is the only doorway to God, so Paul preached it, so do I and so does every truly Christian preacher. The cross is the number one symbol for those who believe in Jesus. We have one lifted up above the highest point of our church building. Whenever we worship on this property we worship under the shadow of the cross.
In this passage, Paul refers to the crucifixion of Jesus as the power of God and the wisdom of God. He says that the supposed foolishness of God is wiser than human knowledge. He says that the weakness of Jesus on the cross is stronger than any human strength.
The Christian message of salvation through the death and resurrection of Jesus sounds silly to many educated ears. That is not because it really is silly but because academic knowledge cannot lead one to salvation through Christ. Human intelligence cannot lead one to salvation through Christ. Only faith can bring us to Salvation through the crucified Jesus, and Faith comes only from God.
So do not allow yourself to be cowed or intimidated by brilliant scholars who do not believe that there is a god. Do not be afraid of geniuses who consider faith to be a prop or a crutch for the weak or uneducated. They are people of great intellect and great learning and they deserve our respect in their disciplines, but their intellects and their learning can not lead them to Jesus, only the faith that comes from God can do that.
On the other hand, do not be embarrassed at your wisdom and education. Human wisdom and education are great things. They, too, are gifts of God given by Him to help the people of this world. Christians are to pursue knowledge and wisdom wherever and whenever we can. But do not allow your wisdom and your education to lead you away from God. Continue to embrace the foolishness of the death of the Son of God on the cross. It is by that degrading and foolish act that the door to God and his eternity was opened for us. Even the wisest, most educated people of our world need to hear about the death of Christ and what it means. Will you tell them?
Pastor David Horner
Faith Presbyterian Church
West Lafayette, IN 47906
Posted by faithpres at March 15, 2009 02:34 PM