1 Corinthians 2:1-5

Introduction

The teaching of the whole Bible emphasizes the power of God in the word of God. At the very beginning, God created by His powerful word (Gen. 1). Throughout the OT, the word of God is to be trusted and obeyed and feared, and all other supposed gods are weak and mute (Jer. 10:5; Hab. 2:18-19). When God the Son took on flesh in the person of Jesus Christ, He was called “the word” of God, who always was and who had come to dwell among men (Jn. 1:1-14). And the last special revelation recorded for us in Scripture ends with the repeated refrain, “these words are trustworthy and true” (Rev. 21:5, 22:6); therefore, everyone ought to “hear” and “keep” the “words” of God (Rev. 22:7, 11, 18).

Today we’re picking up with our study of 1 Corinthians by focusing on a passage that speaks to a faithful word ministry… a ministry of the word of God which converted unbelieving sinners, and which also established and built up those Christians who believed. The Apostle Paul had been contrasting God’s wisdom with the worldly kind, and he’d been urging the Corinthians to stop trusting in any apparent wisdom or power that centers on what the world values. His call to them was instead to trust and even to glory in the power of God in the word of God.

As it was in Corinth back then, so it is here and now: if worldly wisdom ultimately fails, and if God’s word is immeasurably powerful, then how does that effect the material and the method of a faithful ministry of God’s word?

Scripture Reading

1 Corinthians 2:1–5 (ESV)

1 And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. 2 For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

3 And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, 4 and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.

Main Idea:

A faithful ministry of the word centers on the gospel, avoids clever devices, and displays the power of God.

Sermon

1. The Material (v1-2)

Our passage today is the beginning of chapter 2 of this letter from the Apostle Paul to the church in first-century Corinth. Remember that the chapter and verse divisions are not original to the text of Scripture. The chapter numbers were inserted in the Latin Vulgate sometime in the 1200s, and a Frenchman named Stephanus (or Robert Estienne) added verse numbers to the Bible in the 1500s.[i]

The reason I’m telling you this is so that we can all understand that the passage we’re reading today is directly connected to what has already gone before (don’t let the chapter division throw you off). After his greeting, Paul launched into his pastoral plea for the Corinthians to unite under their shared belief in Christ and their shared experience as converted sinners. Our passage is now the third point in Paul’s argument as to why they should be united.

Back in chapter 1, verse 10, Paul stated his “appeal.” He said, “I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment” (1 Cor. 1:10). Then in v18, Paul made his first point. He said, “the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Cor. 1:18). The idea there was that the very message of the gospel is moronic and scandalous to unbelievers, but the power of God is able to overcome even hostile and disinterested unbelief. They ought to be a united church because God’s power and wisdom (not theirs) has brought them together.

Then in v26, Paul made the second point of his argument that the Corinthians Christians should be united. He said, “consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth” (1 Cor. 1:26). Paul’s rationale in v26-31 is that God purposefully “chose” sinners who are largely unimpressive and undesirable to be His people so that He alone might be glorified for the great salvation He has achieved. They ought to be a united church because God chose them according to His purposes (not theirs).

And now, in our passage, Paul is making the third point of his argument about church unity (specifically) and Christian unity (more generally). And his point here centers on past experience, both his and theirs. He says here that they ought to have been united because the word or message that converted them and formed them into a church in the first place was decidedly unsophisticated.

Paul referred, in v1, to that time “when I came to you,” which he did in Acts 18. You might recall (from our recent study through the book of Acts) that Paul made his way into Corinth on his second missionary journey. The Jewish leaders in Thessalonica had formed a mob and tried to attack Paul, so he traveled on to Berea. The mob chased him all the way there, so some of the Christians in Berea shipped Paul off to Athens. While in Athens, Paul preached at the Areopagus (or Mars Hill), and most all the Greeks laughed at him when he got to the part about resurrection. Some of them did believe the gospel, however, and they seem to have formed a small church there in Athens before Paul left for Corinth.

In Corinth, Paul teamed up with Aquila and Priscilla (two tent-making Christians from Rome) because the rest of Paul’s missionary team had not yet caught up to him. As usual, Paul’s evangelistic efforts began in the synagogue, where Jewish men (and some God-fearing Greeks) would gather to read and study the Old Testament. After a while, Silas and Timothy (two of Paul’s companions) finally did arrive in Corinth, and Paul’s ministry there lasted a year and a half.

And what was Paul doing in Corinth for 18 months? He said in v1 of our passage that he was “proclaiming” or “preaching” (KJV) to them “the testimony” (or literally “the mystery”) “of God” (v1). And we can know what Paul means by this language, because he tells us the material or the substance of his preaching in v2. He said, “I decided” or “I determined” (KJV) to “know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (v1).

In other words, Paul resolved to make the material of his preaching nothing more and nothing less than the person and work of Jesus Christ… especially the work of Christ upon the cross, which is the mystery of God revealed!

Paul ministered the word for 18 months (to Christians and non-Christians), and he says that he never went beyond “Jesus Christ and him crucified” (v2)!

Now we know that Paul said more than “Jesus died for sinners.” You can read about some of what Paul taught in Acts 18. Paul argued with the Jews, testifying that Jesus was indeed “the Christ” or “the Messiah” (Acts 18:5). Paul taught that Jesus was the true Savior for anyone (Jew or Gentile) who would trust in Him (Acts 18:6), and Paul called sinners to repent and believe.

He even organized converts into a church by “baptizing” them into fellowship with Christ and with one another (Acts 18:8).

We need to understand here that “Jesus Christ and him crucified” is an unsophisticated message, but it is also a profound message with widespread implications. If Jesus is “the Christ,” then He is God’s promised Savior and anointed King. If Jesus is “the Christ,” then God will certainly judge sinners on the last day, and Jesus Himself will separate the sinners from the saints. If Jesus is “the Christ,” then His “crucifixion” was that moment in real human history when the legal demands of God’s righteous law were satisfied and simultaneously the atonement was accomplished for sinners who repent and believe!

Friends, if Jesus of Nazareth is “the Christ,” and if He was “crucified” in the place of guilty sinners, then this changes everything! Sinners like us can become saints, children of God, and ambassadors for King Jesus in this fallen world!

We can rest in the promises of the gospel because we know that God has forgiven our sin by nailing it to the cross! We can strive for holiness because we know that our striving is a labor of gratitude and love! We can be contented and even joyful in the worst of times because we know that the present affliction is not to be compared with the glory that is to come! We can persevere in faith all the way to the end because we know that the same Jesus who lived and died and conquered death is with us now, and because we know that we shall see Him as He is (face to face) when He finally returns to make all things new!

Charles Spurgeon said it like this, “Keep within the limit of Christ, and him crucified, and you have… all the essentials for this life and for the life to come; you have… the root out of which may grow both branch and flower, and fruit of holy thought and word and deed. Let a man know Christ crucified, and he knows him [who] is [Himself] life eternal. This is a subject which does not arouse one part of [a] man, and send the other part to sleep; it does not kindle his imagination and leave his judgment uninstructed, nor feed his intellect and starve his heart. There is not a faculty of our nature but what Christ crucified affects for good… Christ crucified affects mind, heart, memory, imagination, thought, everything. As in [a mother’s] milk there are all the ingredients necessary for sustaining life, so in Christ crucified there is everything that is wanted to nurture the soul.”[ii]

Indeed, Christ crucified changes and affects everything…

2. The Method (v3-4)

The material or substance of Paul’s ministry of the word was “Jesus Christ and him crucified” (v2), and the method of Paul’s word ministry was humility and weakness. We’ve already seen how Paul contrasted “lofty speech” and “wisdom” with the substance of the “testimony” or “mystery” of God in v1 (again, this is referring to the facts about the person and work of Christ), and Paul speaks negatively of “wisdom” again in v4. Verses 3 and 4, however, are dealing especially with the method of Paul’s word ministry in Corinth.

Paul says, in v4, “my speech” (or literally “my word”) and “my message” or “my preaching” (KJV) were “not in plausible” or “enticing” (KJV) or “persuasive” (NIV) “words of wisdom” (v4). Here Paul is talking about the way he preached the facts about Christ. Paul did not deliver the material of his message using the same methods as the orators which were well-known in first-century Corinth.

As we’ve talked about before, Corinth was a posh city with high Greek culture, which included a kind of sophisticated entertainment by notable public speakers. Professional showmen would perform at dinner parties, public appearances, and on various special occasions, and they would compete for notoriety. They were poets, philosophers, and actors, all presenting themselves (their own ability to entertain and dazzle) for the rewards of applause and wealth.

Paul is saying here that he intentionally avoided that method of public speaking. His “speech” and “message” came, not from one who was powerfully persuasive, but from a speaker who was “weak” and “fearful” (v3). Paul feared God and he seemed quite weak, especially when compared to professional teachers and speakers. And the “power” that was displayed in Paul’s word ministry was not his own, but it was the “power” of the Holy “Spirit” (v4). In other words, we might say that Paul’s word ministry was both simple and supernatural.

It strikes me that Paul’s example here is so often the opposite of what many Christians aim for today. Read just about any “church growth” book of the last 50 years, and you will find all sorts of strategies to make your church attractive to non-Christians. Church growth gurus and consultants will tell you that what you need is a “seeker-friendly” or “attractional” model of church ministry. They think of church as a service provider and attendees as customers.

But Paul says he purposefully avoided that sort of word ministry. He did not adopt the marketing strategies common in Corinth, and he intentionally preached and taught a simple message without the sort of entertainment methods that Corinthians expected from someone like him. Brothers and sisters, I say we follow Paul’s example, and not the sales techniques of the church growth movement.

But friends, this principle is not only true for churches; it’s true for individual Christians as well. So often, Christians will think about evangelism as a sales pitch: “What do I have to do to get you to buy into Jesus today?”

Does your friend have trouble believing some of the strange stories in the Bible? Then (some will say) just don’t focus so much on those. Point out the stories of forgiveness, sacrifice, and good ethical living.

Does your family member have trouble obeying one or more biblical command? Then (some will say) stick to the parts about God’s grace, and don’t worry too much about sin or repentance. After all, Christians sin too… don’t they?

Does your co-worker have some objections to Christianity? Maybe he thinks the Bible isn’t reliable. Maybe she thinks Jesus wasn’t truly God. Maybe they think that Christianity just isn’t philosophically rational. Ok (some will say), brush up on some apologetics, and make a better argument. If you could just find the answer to their objection, then they would turn from sin and believe the gospel… right?

Paul’s example here doesn’t encourage any of that! In fact, he seems to imply that some strategies would actually undermine the work of the power of God to truly convert sinners (v5)!

Brothers and sisters, we don’t need to be better Christian salesmen. We just need to know “Jesus Christ and him crucified” (v2). We need to know who Christ is and what He did and does. We need to know the gospel well enough to explain it simply and understandably to those around us. And we need to stop thinking of our weaknesses as a hindrance to powerful evangelism… since it is in our weakness and fear that God’s power is most gloriously displayed.

Have you sinned, and found forgiveness in the crucified Savior? Then tell other sinners about that! Have you failed to live up to God’s requirement of you, and learned that Jesus died and rose again in order to give you His own righteousness to wear? Then tell other sinners about that! Did you once live in terror of facing a holy God, and have you come to know that Jesus’s atoning death grants you access to God as your loving heavenly Father? Then tell other sinners about that!

Tell other sinners that they are sinners. Tell them that they are far worse sinners than they could possibly comprehend. And tell them that God has loved sinners just like us. And tell them that Christ has died to save sinners just like us. And then, urge them to repent and believe… plead with them to turn away from their sin and to cling to Christ… call them to throw themselves upon the mercy of God in Jesus… and see what the Holy Spirit might do!

Now, in Paul’s day, when capital “A” Apostles were still walking around on earth, the “demonstration of the Spirit and of power” (v4) included visible signs of spiritual authority. When Jesus commissioned His Apostles, He gave them the ability to perform miraculous signs that would validate their authority and their message (Lk. 9:1-6; cf. Acts 1:12-26). There are none of these signs recorded in Acts 18 during Paul’s ministry in Corinth, but I assume they happened. In this very letter (1 Corinthians), Paul later addresses the use of some of the spiritual gifts which were unique to the first century (the Apostolic period). So, we have good reason to believe that miracles did accompany Paul’s word ministry in Corinth.

But I don’t think that’s what Paul is talking about here in v4. It would seem odd for Paul to say here that sensational miracles were hallmarks of his word ministry, and then later in the same letter to speak so negatively about focusing on those spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 12-14). The spiritual power that Paul does emphasize in the first 5 chapters of the letter are those of regeneration and holiness.

It seems to me that Paul is saying in v3 and 4 that his word ministry was simple, but it was also supernatural, and everyone in Corinth could know that the Holy Spirit was at work among them because they had believed the gospel and because their lives were being changed by it. Only those who had been born again or spiritually regenerated could hear the gospel for what it was – good news. And only those who had been made spiritually alive in Christ could both desire and strive for the kind of holy living that Paul was calling them to embrace.

Brothers and sisters, we want to see sinners converted and we want to see Christians grow in maturity. And so, we must follow Paul’s example of a simple ministry of the word, so that the Holy Spirit might show His power among us.

3. The Motivation (v5)

Now that we’ve talked about the material of a faithful word ministry (the gospel of Christ, especially centering on Christ crucified), and we’ve talked about Paul’s exemplary method (simple preaching and teaching, without the use of clever devices), now let’s look hard at v5 to see his motivation for his faithful ministry, which has huge implications… for churches and for individual Christians.

Paul said, in v5, the reason for his material and his method was “so that” the “faith” of the Corinthian believers “might not rest in the wisdom of men,” but instead that their “faith” might “rest” or “stand” (KJV) or literally “be” in “the power of God.” Paul wanted those Christians to remember and to keep on remembering that they had come into the family of God, not by “lofty” or “superior” words (v1) or by “plausible words of wisdom” (v4), but by “the power of God” (v5). In other words, Paul wanted them to remember and to understand what it means that they were not converted by a good argument, nor were they converted by a good sounding presentation… but they were converted by the power of God, which was exercised by the Spirit of God, through the simple preaching and teaching of the word of God.

They needed to remember this because they were talking and acting like there was some sort of strength or gifting or ability in them that justified their dividing up among themselves. Some of them were more inclined toward philosophy, some seem to have been interested in Jewish traditions, and some seem to have been more radical in their approach to Christian living. But Paul wanted them to remember that none of that stuff was particularly important to the means by which they were converted.

No Corinthian believed in Jesus because Paul’s preaching cleverly mimicked the philosophers of their day. No Corinthian trusted in Christ because Paul’s teaching explored the details of first-century Jewish tradition. And no Corinthian became a Christian because Paul tapped into their deep desire to live sacrificially for something greater than themselves.

They might have been interested in any or all of these emphases, but these were not devices or strategies Paul used to bring them to Christ. Instead, Paul preached and taught the straightforward message of the gospel, and he relied entirely on the power of God working in and through the word of God to do the converting… And he did it so that the content or substance of their faith would be based on the “power of God,” and not the “wisdom of men” (v5).

As I said a moment ago, this has huge implications for churches and for Christians, so let me briefly mention some of them… 2 for churches and 2 for Christians. These, I trust, are some practical applications for us today.

First, churches that employ worldly methods of attraction and growth undermine the very mission they’ve set out to accomplish. The mission of every local church is to make disciples, and the way churches do that is by preaching the gospel, by baptizing into membership those sinners who repent and believe, and by teaching church members what Christ has commanded and what it looks like to obey. If we (or any other church) treat the gospel like a sales pitch, or if we treat the church itself like a service to be produced and consumed, then we will make it harder for people to understand what the gospel is and what we are calling them into. We must, as a church, resist the temptation to produce results. The results are not up to us… It is for us to aim for a faithful ministry of the word.

Second, churches that do follow Paul’s example of simple and humble word ministry can expect the power of God. Our passage this morning reminds us that God does convert sinners and mature Christians through the efforts of faithful ministers of the word. God used Paul’s efforts in Corinth to establish a whole church-full of Christians! Not only this, but God also used Paul’s ongoing pastoral efforts in Corinth to build up at least some of those church members toward maturity in Christ.

Brothers and sisters, many of us in this room can personally testify that a simple and faithful ministry of the word can and does display the powerful work of God in the life of a church. Ultimately, God decides how quickly a church will grow in number, but we can rest assured that God has and will continue to grow us up in every way, producing spiritual maturity in us until that final day.

Third, individual Christians that rely on worldly methods of persuasion show that they don’t actually understand what evangelism and conversion is. Evangelism simply cannot be done by manipulation or by force, and our goal in evangelism is not to get someone to “say a prayer” or “make a decision for Jesus.”

When we have gospel conversations with our friends and family, we are often talking about spiritual things with people who are spiritually dead. You can have all the persuasive power in the world, but you will not ever get a corpse to respond. But if you open your mouth and simply explain the gospel, then God Himself just might reach into that sinner’s dead heart and grant the gift of life!

That’s what evangelism is! It is telling the good news of the gospel of Christ to people who are spiritually dead in the hope that God will (by His grace) grant them spiritual life. And that’s what conversion is. It is the transfer of a sinner from “the domain of darkness” to the “kingdom” of Jesus Christ (Col. 1:13).

Fourth, Christians that follow Paul’s example of simple and humble word ministry can expect the power of God. I am not saying that you will most definitely see a lot of people converted if you talk about Jesus a bit more often. But I am saying that you can expect the power of God to be on display in your life and in the lives of those around you if you talk about Jesus and the gospel and repentance and faith more often.

You will likely see some of the people you talk with start to grow more hostile toward you. The more you press upon them their need for a Savior, the more they will feel the weight and guilt of their sin… and unrepentant sinners don’t like that one bit. They may get angry with you, they may distance themselves from you, and they may even blame you for their feeling of shame. All of this is to be expected when we make it a stronger effort to have more gospel conversations.

You will also likely see some of the people you talk with start to grow more eager to learn. The more you gain a reputation for being an honest and informed source of biblical wisdom, the more some people will rely upon you for spiritual counsel. You and I can just keep tossing out the seed of gospel truth, pointing others again and again to the only hope we have in Jesus Christ, and we will find that (over time) God will make some of that seed take root and begin to grow.

I’ve pointed to Kathy Ford as an example on a couple of occasions already, but she has come to my mind again as a great example of this kind of simple and humble word ministry as an individual Christian witness. It’s not been quite 2 years since she died, and her witness is still bearing fruit.

She was not an extrovert, and she always thought she didn’t know enough or speak well enough to be a good evangelist. But she loved her mom and her sisters, and she wanted to do what she could to encourage them to be true followers of Jesus. So, she invited them to her house for dinner and Bible study once a week.

Sometimes, Kathy would simply read a portion of the Bible out loud, then she would say a little something about it, and then she would pray. Sometimes Kathy’s sisters would read and pray some too, and I can remember how happy Kathy was when she heard her mom read the Bible out loud for the first time.

Through Kathy’s simple and faithful ministry of the word of God, along with investments from others too, we were all able to see Kathy’s mom and one of her sisters come to repentance and faith in Christ. So too, I know that Kathy’s daughter attributes a lot of her spiritual growth to the work of God through Kathy’s faithful life and efforts.

Brothers and sisters, we don’t have to be somebody special or have some unique ability to be an effective evangelist or a growing church. Our passage this morning teaches us quite the opposite is true. If we will stick to the main thing (“Jesus Christ and him crucified”), if we will embrace our weaknesses as opportunities to rely upon God, and if we will aim toward a faithful and simply ministry of the word (both corporately and individually), then we can expect to see God work in power among us… converting sinners, growing us in holiness, preserving us in faith and hope, and making us the witnesses He’s called us to be.

May God help us to trust Him… and may God make us faithful.

Endnotes

[i] Here’s a great introduction to Stephanus and his printing of the textus receptus: https://www.ligonier.org/podcasts/5-minutes-in-church-history-with-stephen-nichols/robertus-stephanus. [ii] C. H. Spurgeon, “The Man of One Subject,” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, vol. 21 (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1875), 644–645.

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