OT Reading: Micah 6:1-8
NT Reading: 1 Corinthians 1:18-31
Last Sunday, Paul took the Corinthians
to task for worshipping the person who baptized them, and for being so
impressed with their wisdom, knowledge and Christianity that they believed they
had an inside track to divine blessing even when they willingly ignored
Christ’s teachings. The final verse of last week’s reading, 1 Corinthians 10:18
begins today’s reading:
“For the message about the
cross (that Christ died for sins in weakness) is foolishness to those who are
perishing (or suffering eternal loss), but to us who are being saved, it is the
power of God.” (19) “for it is written, ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise
and frustrate the intelligence of the intelligent.’” (from Isaiah) (ref 2)
This verse illustrates Paul criticism of
human knowledge. The original Greek was written in capital letters with no
punctuation. The wisdom of our modern scholars decided to punctuate the text
into paragraphs and divide into sections with titles to make it easier to
understand. Unfortunately sometimes that can confuses the text and we may miss
part of the message. Most Bibles put this verse at the beginning of a new
section of Paul’s letter but this verse links the whole content of last week’s reading
about arguing, dissent, philosophy and human wisdom to this week’s text about
the “folly” of God’s wisdom and the message of the cross. The scholarly
punctuation obscures the close connection of the important arguments, in verses 10-17
and in verses 19-31.
The main reason for Paul’s anger at the
Corinthians in verses 10-17 (last week) is they thought the human wisdom of mature,
Greek Christians allowed them to understand good and evil, and made them immune
to the world of temptation. Logical human wisdom and reason can only see the
horror of crucifixion as folly and wonder that only a crazy and mad God would
allow Jesus to be crucified in the most ignominious imaginable death.
Paul says this grievous error of the
Corinthians analyzing the cross with human reason caused a second problem. They
lost the core message that the empty cross is the sign of the death and
resurrection of Jesus.
I want to step back a minute and remind
you about Paul’s view of the kingdom of God and the present world to help with
these ideas of foolishness. Jesus confronted Paul on the road to Damascus and
showed him that God used the crucifixion and resurrection to totally upset,
defeat and condemn the old way of human living as the way of death. God opened
to us a new world in the Kingdom of God that gives salvation to all who simply
believe it. This new world of salvation is here, but it is not fully in place, until all of the old ways die out.(ref 2)
Paul understood that the whole former
way of life of Jew and Gentile changed.(Paul used Gentile and Greek virtually
interchangeably.) The previous worldview of Jews saw the world divided between
Jews with the wisdom of the Law and Gentile, or between those who try to live
under the law against those who are outside the law and simply out of luck. The Greeks and Romans
divided the world between Greek and Roman, and the barbarians, or between their
cultural superiority and the lack of culture of the barbarians. In the empty cross, God has judged and condemned both of these old ways of living. The old way of
human wisdom, of Jews v. Gentile, and Greek/Roman v. the barbarians is over, but
not all gone yet.
Now remember philosophy to the Greek really
means rational scientific argument. Those with philosophical wisdom can
effectively argue the case for rational religion. The Jew, of course, has wisdom and the Law to abide.
The end result is the old Jewish, Roman
and Greek wisdom can only explain the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ as
the foolish act of an insane God. The only ones who can truly explain it are those
who believe it is a loving act, regardless of what common wisdom. Rational
human wisdom says to claim the cross and crucifixion is an act of power is as
outlandish and ridiculous as trying to fry ice. All you get is grease spatter
and steam until the ice is turned to water and gone.
It is inconceivable that
God would do such a foolish and stupid thing as allow the Messiah to be
crucified. Paul says this kind of wisdom and reason is death and we are redeemed only by belief in the foolish message of the cross and resurrection.
Why would human wisdom think that the
act of crucifixion is foolish? We have had 2,000 to become inured to the horror of Roman crucifixion. Crucifixion is a punishment reserved for rebels, and
slaves. It is the ultimate Roman act to assert power.
This is why Paul pursued and persecuted people who believed this
foolishness of crucifixion. As a Pharisee he was enraged by this idea of a crucified Messiah.
The Messiah is a sign of power. Crucifixion is the sign of total humiliation
and weakness. The two ideas are mutually exclusive.
Moses in Deuteronomy reserved the act of hanging bodies in a tree for blasphemers and idolaters
after their execution. How can a Jew honor someone as God who was hung on a
tree after he was killed?
You can see why both Jewish tradition and Roman/Greek
philosophy see the crucifixion of Jesus only as pure madness and folly by God.
Measuring God with human wisdom drains the cross empty of the power of God.
The Romans and Greeks of Corinth could rightfully lay claim to the label, “self-made
men.” Many came to Corinth as freed slaves, built up very successful businesses
and converted to Christianity. The Greek civilization as a whole rightfully
merits praise for the accomplishment of using reason to explain and control the
world. They used their wisdom and philosophy to abandon the old traditional
gods (they thought they worshipped the unknown god). They advanced civilization
intellectually far beyond anything that preceded it. Rightfully, it was a
magnificent accomplishment. The Greeks made their mortal mistake by deciding
God is the source of ultimate human reason.
This means they made God’s mind human’s mind; therefore, God only does things
that we think are humanly reasonable.
We can look around at the great
accomplishments of the United States and probably relate to how the Corinthians fell into
the trap of letting the magnificence of their accomplishments overshadow God.
Haven’t we brought the power of science and knowledge to the entire world with
inventions beyond belief? We have computers in iPhones more powerful than any
you could buy 40 years ago and the ones that weighed more than a ton in 1945.
We are on the verge of eliminating polio and most childhood diseases. Life
expectancy is continually increasing. We have robotic vehicles driving around
on Mars and landing on asteroids, launched satellites that have left the solar
system. We have weapons with power to destroy entire nations. We might want to brag we are a self-made people, but Paul says, remember that is a terrible heresy.
What does Paul says about God’s and
human wisdom? In 1 Cor. 1: 20 he asks three questions: Where is the wise man? Where
is the expert in the Law? Where is the philosopher, or rational thinker of this
age? No one of them can explain God and God’s action. In the next verse (22), “The Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom” but the
only way to salvation is believing this foolish act of crucifixion, the death
reserved for traitors and slaves. To believe that God used a humanly foolish
act of crucifixion and resurrection to judge and condemn the old ways of
rational judgment and wisdom is the only way to salvation in the Kingdom of God.
Paul makes his case that
the ultimate idolatry is to insists that God acts and thinks the way we believe a wise and sensible
God should act and think. The Jews of Jesus’ time had waited hundreds of years for a new
Moses, a Messiah who would come with spear and outstretched arm of power to lay
waste to Rome just like before in Exodus, in spite of all the available Old
Testament Scripture that says he will do a new thing.
So God did a foolish
thing. He allowed Jesus to be crucified in weakness in his wisdom and power
that makes it impossible not only to measure God by human reason but also
judged and condemned those old ideas of wisdom and law. They are done-in.
The Romans and Greeks used
reason and knowledge to build a great civilization and became understandably self-made
men victimized by the two great idolatries: (1). they thought God must be the
ultimate form of human reason, and human minds define what “reasonable” means, and (2)
they believed they had the power to do it.
The cross and crucifixion is
the ultimate contradiction. 1 Cor. 1: 23-25 says, “We preach the crucified Christ,
a scandal to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those Jews and
Greeks who are the called by God, Christ is the wisdom and power of God (to
defeat death). For God’s
foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than
human strength.
In other words, God proved
his power using weakness and folly. The Jews think you can’t be a Messiah and
be crucified, and the Greeks think to be crucified willingly is madness. For
both it is scandal, yet scandal is exactly what God did.
You will hear almost
the same words today by some noted scientists, some famous philosophers, all
sorts of folks in high places and plain people like our neighbors who think they are wise. They say, “It is foolishness.”
God acted to use the foolishness of the wise and powerful, to cause every rational human perspective to see the Gospel as foolish and something that can only
be known through belief. He has fried ice, some thing you cannot do logically.
Paul concludes in the closing verses that God’s
foolishness is wiser than our wisdom, his weakness is stronger than our
greatest power. We do not have the wisdom to judge our neighbor because our
wisdom is less than even God’s foolish wisdom.
God uses the poor and
disadvantaged to embarrass us. The wise and the philosophical person is left
with a terrible risk, trust God and be saved by His folly, or keep up the pretense he is not and perish forever. It is not a happy choice for a rational, intelligent, person.
A commentary (1) says these
verses are the greatest challenge for today’s church, as it was in Corinth. Do
we abide with God’s foolish scandal and live as citizens of this new kingdom or
rely on our own reason and power and live in a world that is already condemned
and ending?
I know each one of us has
thought this world is getting crazier and crazier and less and less religious.
For all the good reasons we want to use our reason and power to make it right
again. The problem is according to Paul that only God can do it, and he has already judged it all, the old ways are ending. They are on the way out.
Paul loves us, he always
leaves us with his explanation. The last verses, (26-31) ask when you were called
to be a Christian, how many of you were wise, how many were rich and powerful by human
standards. Not many, only a few were.
God chose use the foolish ones in this
crazy world, the weak and lowly ones, the despised, all those who are
invisible, the uneducated, the people we read about in the beatitudes, the poor
in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who are hungry and thirst for
righteousness, the merciful, the peacemakers, those who are persecuted for
seeking righteousness, those who are ridiculed and reviled on the account of
Jesus. God uses his foolishness to shame the wise by their own foolishness as the walk among these people.
This message of foolishness
is brought home every time we look at someone who has less than us or who
suffers and we think They ought to know better,” or ”They ought to just get a
job” or “They ought to take their meds.” They are talking about the foolish people of the beatitudes who
know and boast of God’s greatness in the new kingdom of God.
So when we boast,
we ought to forget our strength and leave behind our wisdom that makes us think
we know righteousness better than another. Only boast in the foolishness of the
Lord who can fry ice.
sources
1. The idea of "Fried ice" came from a blog posting that I cannot discover. If you find it let me know, it serves attribution.
2. Some of the translations and ideas used in this sermon came from the commentary on 1 Corinthians by Fee: Gordon D. Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, William B. Eerdemans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, MI., 1987, see pp 66-90.
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