The world looks down on Christianity is something that we Christians witness every time. Faith in Jesus is seen as ignorant and uninformed in a unfriendly culture.
Of course, we don’t be shocked. Jesus told us,” If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you” ( John 15: 18, ESV).
Advertisement
In his first notice to the Corinthians, the Apostle Paul expanded on this fact. He wrote:
The power of God is revealed in the term of the mix, which is absurd to those who are suffering, but absurd to those who are saved. For it is written,” I will kill the knowledge of the sensible, and the judgment of the discerning I did block”. Where is the intelligent one? Where is the scholar? Where has the modern orator gone? Hasn’t God created world intelligence in a way that is dumb?
1 Corinthians 1: 18-20 ( ESV )
Dr. Albert Mohler compared the knowledge of the world to that of God in a new lecture on this book. Paul’s quotation from Isaiah 29: 14 was cited in this passage.
” It’s mockery to those who are dying, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God”, he said. ” Paul, around, like Isaiah in a horizontal manner, is drawing a contrast between two forms of intelligence. One is a piece of world intelligence that doesn’t address how to repair a light. It’s about the great questions of life. There is a worldly intelligence that contradicts God’s knowledge.
He continued:
A word of wisdom that comes from inside of ourselves saves us. And it is most frequently found in the Old Testament through the prophetic expression.
Of course, the prophetic word includes the Scripture in such a way that we who would not notice these things you see them and who would not know these things may understand them. And it contradicts the world’s intelligence. The Egyptian philosophers ‘ wisdom, the Egyptian king, and two other different kinds of knowledge are in direct conflict with the intelligence of the prophetic term given to Israel.
This is a crucial bible style that Paul directs us to see in the Old Testament. There’s the knowledge of God, and then there is a contrary intelligence that turns out to be people folly. It’s not to suggest that it doesn’t operate in this time, that it doesn’t lead to benefits in this era. It doesn’t imply that it doesn’t result to development and success and status.
Advertisement
Paul continued in his text:
For Jews need evidence and Greeks seek intelligence, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the knowledge of God. For God’s folly is wiser than men, and his weakness is stronger than males. For consider your asking, brothers: not many of you were smart according to earthly standards, not some were strong, not some were of honorable birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to put down the intelligent, what is poor in the world to put down the weak, and what is low and hated in the world, even things that aren’t, to bring about nothingness in the presence of God, so that no one can boast in front of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us intelligence from God, righteousness and sanctification and forgiveness, so that, as it is written,” Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord”.
1 Corinthians 1: 22-31 ( ESV )
The concept of the cross is inconsistent with the knowledge of the world. It’s not for people who think they have it all up. It’s not for those who think that their knowledge is enough.
Otherwise, it’s for the sincere people of all facilities of living who realize that they need a Savior. When do things that the world perceives as dumb start to make sense? That knowledge is flipped when we are called to following Him.
Advertisement
Associated:  , Sunday Thoughts: Calling
Mohler preached:
We can’t arrange the function of the Spirit in terms of calling, which leads, of course, to our knowledge that it’s an economical call. The one in whom this process begins, God sees it through all the means to execution. Who begins a fine work with you will finish it that day.
It’s fascinating that Paul brings this message to them in more ways than one that may be initially understood, about the merit of being Christians and the gift of grace alone. Because we didn’t really volunteering for this. We were called to this. There’s a popular asking. We’re all these as followers, not because we were all intelligent enough to read the Gospel and then intelligent enough to read this religion.
” We have a wisdom”, he said afterwards. ” It’s a superior wisdom. It’s an vastly superior wisdom, but it’s the intelligence of Christ. Without the cross’s intelligence, you won’t receive the revelation of Christ. Then the others come after justice, repentance, and forgiveness.
The freedom to no circle the world’s wisdom with the cross has a mental gratifying effect. Instead, we believers have the excellent knowledge of Jesus, and that should guide us to love and devotion.
