If you would like to download and print the transcript, please click here.
GRACE IN THE MESS: Wisdom from God
1 Cor. 2:6-16
A young preacher asked an elderly, wise pastor the secret to a long and peaceful ministry. The old pastor smiled and said, “It takes two things: good judgment and experience.”
“And how do you get good judgment?” the young man asked. “From experience,” the old pastor replied. “And how do you get experience?” The old pastor sighed and said, “From bad judgment.”
Isn’t that the truth? We learn so much more from the mistakes we make. When we suffer the consequences of our bad decisions, we are, or should be, motivated to not repeat that mistake again.
Today we continue the topic of wisdom here in 1 Corinthians. The struggle between man and God’s wisdom adds to the internal conflict in the church in Corinth resulting in its lack of unity.
In this section we see what wisdom is and isn’t.
- True wisdom is not humanly discovered.
1 Corinthians 2:6-9, “We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. 7 No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. 8 None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 However, as it is written: “What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived”—the things God has prepared for those who love him”
When I was a teen we were shown a video in Sunday School once. The video illustrated the difference between God and man by having God represented by a man and he sent his son to the ants. The other ants killed him and the video told the gospel story in terms of those ants being saved by God, a man.
What hit me in that cheaply produced video was that the difference from man to an ant is a much less gap than the gap between God and man, and yet God loves us.
Despite the huge gap between man and God, God choose to provide a way for us to get His wisdom. It is a mystery. Rember that a mystery in Scripture is a truth that has not yet been revealed. But now God is revealing that mystery.
Man, in all of our wisdom, crucified the savior of the world. If we had been truly wise, we would have never done that.
Paul, reflects on his own lack of wisdom before he came to Christ when he writes in:
1 Timothy 1:12-13, “I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me trustworthy, appointing me to his service. 13 Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief.”
Verse 9 says, “What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived”—the things God has prepared for those who love him”
This is a quote from Isa 64:4 & 65:17. We love this quote, don’t we? The things God has prepared for us, heaven. Can you imagine it? Except one thing here, it’s not about heaven.
No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived isn’t about heaven, it’s about the wisdom of God. That is the context here.
This wisdom is about God’s revelation of Himself. Our eyes, our ears, our mind hasn’t ever conceived of God’s true nature.
Do you see the difference here? What God has prepared for us is to truly live right now, right here on earth and it is given through His Word. Now watch how Paul builds on how God is revealed to us.
- True Wisdom is divinely revealed.
Man cannot come to God on our own. God comes to us, He pursues us. He does this through the Holy Spirit in 3 ways. They are:
- By Revelation.
1 Corinthians 2:10-11, “these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.”
This is the work of the Holy Spirit so in revelation it is the Holy Spirit who is the author of Scripture. You see, the Holy Spirit alone knows the mind of God.
The Holy Spirit knows the Father intimately and that is who the Father sent to reveal God’s wisdom to us in Scripture.
- By Inspiration.
1 Corinthians 2:12-13, “What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13 This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.”
The Holy Spirit inspired the writers of Scripture to bring God’s revelation to us. So, the Bible is the vehicle which the Holy Spirit uses in that revelation.
John 14:26, “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.”
The Holy Spirit taught the disciples and reminded them of what Jesus taught them and they recorded it.
2 Timothy 3:16-17, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
OK, before moving on let’s review: The Holy Spirit knows the mind of God and then inspires man to reveal God’s truth.
- By Illumination.
1 Corinthians 2:14-16, “The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. 15 The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, 16 for, “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.”
Again, the Holy Spirit knows God’s mind, inspires men to reveal God’s truth and now we see that the Holy Spirit will illuminate our minds to understand God’s truth. Do you remember my story of Mac from last week?
People have read and studied Scripture for years and sill do not understand anything of God. Isaac Asimov, a scientist and popular author who wrote such books as I Robot also wrote a commentary on the entire Bible. That commentary is worthless because he didn’t know the author. He tried to understand the Word of God without the wisdom of God.
We saw how the most religious leaders of Israel, who knew all the Scriptures, had memorized huge portions of Scripture, knew nothing about the true Messiah of Israel and were instrumental in the crucifixion of Jesus.
Natural man can know nothing about God, where the Spiritual man is open to the Holy Spirit who will teach everything about God.
Those last words of this chapter, ‘we have the mind of Christ.’ Because we have turned to Jesus and received Him as Lord of our life we have been given the Holy Spirit. That Holy Spirit will help us as we diligently pursue truth as we study Scripture. The Holy Spirit is our helper on this journey.
Since we have this helper, it means we don’t know everything, but through the Spirit we will have the opportunity to learn all things.
The key here is our reliance upon the Holy Spirit.