BACKUP SERMON-Wisdom

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Tax receipts

board member

alpha

church potluck

what’s up this week

The Message we Preach is ‘Foolishness’

1 Corinthians 1:18–19 NIV

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”

It’s my experience that people don’t usually come to faith when it makes sense to them - they often come to faith when nothing else in life makes sense anymore.

And paul here says, the people walking toward destruction - these words are foolishness to them. And i’m sure we’ve all noticed or felt that in some fashion.

but that’s not a strike against christianity. Because paul says here - God’s goal isn’t to upload human wisdom, it’s to destroy it.

Our Wisdom is Foolishness, God’s ‘Foolishness’ is Wisdom

1 Corinthians 1:20–21 NIV

Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.

STORY - 1700 people in britain were surveyed. SERENA WILILAMS. 12% of men thought they could score a point on her, and 14% on top of that weren’t convinced that they couldn’t.

It’s ARROGANCE on our part to assume that we could come anywhere near God in terms of wisdom. Ya, there’s basic concepts we can grasp - but our thoughts, our values and our knowledge, it’s all ashes compared to God’s riches.

1 Corinthians 1:25 NIV

For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.

We believe that God in HIS wisdom is going to challenge every notion we have of what wisdom truly is.

What we think is ‘foolishness’ on his part is more wise than anything we could imagine.

And later, paul says, to the spiritually mature - our message IS wisdom. It just looks nothing like we think wisdom should look like.

True Wisdom is a Person

1 Corinthians 1:26–31 NIV

Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.”

We’re not here to show the world, as a people, how wise we are.

In fact, our ‘foolishness’ in life is meant to show the power of God that goes beyond our foolishness

Paul later says, ‘i applied this to my own life - i committed to not coming as one of those powerful and wise speakers you’re all so used to. I came in weakness, trembling, but committed to showing you the power of God that goes beyond your wisdom’.

We Constantly Need the Spirit to Be Wise

1 Corinthians 2:14–15 NIV

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. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments,

Wisdom from God was never meant to be something we could operate by ourselves in a vacuum.

We maintain our wisdom by:

Praying regularly

Reading the word for ourselves regularly

True Wisdom Starts with Following Jesus

1 Corinthians 1:23–24 NIV

but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.