1 Corinthians 1:18-25 Foolishness

1 Corinthians 1:18-25 (Evangelical Heritage Version)

18For 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. 19In fact, it is written:

I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;

the intelligence of the intelligent I will bring to nothing.

20Where is the wise man? Where is the expert in the Jewish law? Where is the probing thinker of the present age? Has God not shown that the wisdom of this world is foolish? 21Indeed, since the world through its wisdom did not know God, God in his wisdom decided to save those who believe, through the foolishness of the preached message. 22Yes, Jews ask for signs, Greeks desire wisdom, 23but we preach Christ crucified—which is offensive to Jews and foolishness to Greeks, 24but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25We preach Christ crucified, because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

Foolishness

I.

“Jews demand signs.” You heard Paul say it moments ago.

The history of the Jewish people was full of signs. Today’s First Reading had one of their favorites. They remembered the context of the Ten Commandments. That list was given to God’s Chosen People as they camped at the base of Mt. Sinai. Moses received those words from the hand of God himself.

There were so many other signs. Leading up to the history of the Ten Commandments, the plagues in Egypt were well-known. The recitation of those miraculous plagues accompanies—to this day—every Passover celebration by every Jewish family. The plagues were followed by the parting of the Red Sea, and the Manna that fed the people throughout their journey to the Promised Land. They could read all about the miracles from God as the people entered and conquered the Promised Land, starting with the walls of Jericho tumbling down.

It wasn’t such a stretch, Jewish people of Paul’s day thought, to want some signs.

There had been signs that accompanied Messiah when he came. Were not the Feeding of the 5,000 and the Feeding of the 4,000 signs? Were not the many instances of Jesus healing people or driving out demons signs?

“We preach Christ crucified—which is offensive to Jews” (1 Corinthians 1:23, EHV). The Jews of Paul’s day wanted still other and more signs from heaven about Jesus. Christ crucified was “offensive.” That word in the original Greek has the connotation of a stick in a trap or a snare. When an animal bumped the stick, it would trigger the trap. The idea that the promised Messiah would be executed on a Roman cross triggered the Jews. They simply could not stomach it.

People still seek signs from God to “prove” that he is real, or that what he has said is real. Books and movies popularize the supposed visions some have had that purport to give further “evidence” for those who are skeptical that God is really real.

Jesus told about a rich man, who found himself in hell, pleading with Abraham to send Lazarus to his brothers who were still alive so they would believe in the true God and not find themselves in hell. In the story, Abraham told the rich man: “If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead” (Luke 16:31, EHV). If people of today do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, and the New Testament completed history of God’s saving activity, they will not be convinced by some supposed modern-day vision, either.

Many today look to the sign of their own feelings. Look inside you, just like all the Science Fiction stories say, there you will find the answer. Feelings, however, aren’t a sign from God. He has given you the facts, in his Word. Paul says: “All Scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, and for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16, EHV). Don’t look to your feelings for the answers, look to God’s Word. In Scripture you will find all the answers about salvation.

II.

“Greeks demand wisdom,” Paul said.

The term philosophy means a love of wisdom. Greek philosophy was based in reason and logic. Proving things by logic and reasoning them through was of utmost importance.

“But we preach Christ crucified... foolishness to Greeks” (1 Corinthians 1:23, EHV).

Since Greek thought processes were dominated by a love of wisdom, they demanded information that was logical, and could be proven by human reason.

They could see no logic or reason supporting the idea that God would send his Son to take on human form to help us. It wasn’t reasonable to think that the very Son of God would die to complete some godly plan. It made no sense that the death of one—even if that One was the very Son of God—would make any difference to any person, or increase his or her chances for life after death.

Human wisdom has increased exponentially since the days of the Apostle Paul.

Back in 1981 a futurist and author named Buckminster Fuller developed a theory he called the “knowledge doubling curve.” He believed he could demonstrate that human knowledge had doubled about every 100 years from the beginning of recorded history until the year 1900. By the end of World War II, knowledge was doubling about every 25 years. He presumed the doubling of human knowledge would start to gain speed even more as the years rolled on. In 2013, David Schilling postulated that knowledge was doubling every 13 months and said that IBM speculated that by 2020 knowledge would double every 12 hours.

Whether his theory holds or not, human knowledge is growing at a frenetic pace. Perhaps that fuels a desire for AI—Artificial Intelligence. With such a huge amount of knowledge, machines seem to be necessary to quantify the knowledge—to corral it and harness it and put it all to good use. All that additional knowledge and information has been able to make profound innovations and improvements during our lifetimes.

“Where is the wise man? Where is the expert in the Jewish law? Where is the probing thinker of the present age? Has God not shown that the wisdom of this world is foolish?” (1 Corinthians 1:20, EHV). AI has been programmed by the so-called “great” thinkers of the present age, but it gives results that show the biases of the programmers. Has all this expansion of knowledge improved mankind’s ability to understand God? Is the wisdom of this age able to decipher God—to quantify and explain God’s plan of salvation?

“Has God not shown that the wisdom of this world is foolish?” Paul asks. All the doubling of knowledge deals with the physical world.

All that doubling of knowledge has made no progress at all where spiritual things are concerned. All that knowledge is still “foolish,” because it would look at the cross and the crucifixion of Jesus as foolish. The foolishness of human wisdom has simply been multiplied 100's of times over from the time Paul first wrote.

III.

“Indeed, since the world through its wisdom did not know God, God in his wisdom decided to save those who believe, through the foolishness of the preached message... “23we preach Christ crucified” (1 Corinthians 1:21, 23, EHV).

Even Google with it’s AI has to admit that the Bible is still the best selling book of all time. Nothing else is even close. Centuries of expanding human wisdom have not eclipsed or altered the reality of Scripture.

The message of the cross is foolishness. Human beings instinctively know—everyone has a conscience, no matter how much they try to suppress it—that there is a God and that they have sinned against that God. They are accountable to God for the sins they have committed.

No human being or artificial intelligence, even with all the accumulated wisdom of thousands of years of recorded human history, would ever come up with a plan such as God devised to save people. It isn’t logical. It isn’t reasonable. It makes no sense.

God sent his One and only Son to be born of a woman, born under the law of the Ten Commandments he gave to all people in the conscience, and wrote down for them later on tablets of stone. That Son, whose name is Jesus, lived under the law in perfect obedience for his whole life. He then willingly gave his life on the cross as the ransom price God demanded for the sins of everyone in the whole world who ever has lived or ever will live: billions and billions of people.

That message of seeming-foolishness is the most important news ever. God in his wisdom decided to save those who believe through the foolishness of that message.

IV.

“But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Corinthians 1:24, EHV).

Not all Jews demanded signs and were excluded from God’s kingdom—neither at the time of Paul or now. Not all Greeks—non-Jews—either then or now, demand proof from human wisdom about God. In his unknowable grace, God calls many through the power of the gospel to believe in Jesus as the Savior from sin whom God sent.

“We preach Christ crucified, because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Corinthians 1:25, EHV). What God planned and carried out is called the “foolishness of God” because of how ridiculous it seems to human beings. What God planned and carried out is simply beyond any potential human wisdom. When Jesus died up on that cross, that appeared as the weakness of God to human understanding. It was not weakness at all. What Jesus did displayed how much stronger than any group of human beings God is.

That’s the Jesus Christ you and I still preach. That’s the Jesus your friends and neighbors need to know. Not the Jesus of signs and miracles and wonders. The Jesus who has been crucified and has risen to take their sins away.

Keep preaching Christ and him crucified, even though the world sees it as foolishness. Amen.