The Way of Wisdom, Part 2

Outline

Big Idea: The wisdom of God is the safest and truest wisdom to live by.

The Truth of God’s Faithfulness - 1 Corinthians 1:4-9.

Corporate Worship’s Affect On Our View of Life - 1 Corinthians 1:18-25.

The Strength of Trust in Uncertainty - 1 Corinthians 1:18-31.

The Measure of One’s Potential - 1 Corinthians 1:26-31.

The Centrality of the Gospel - 1 Corinthians 2:1-5.

Corporate Worship’s Affect on Humility and Thankfulness - 1 Corinthians 2:6-16

Introduction

Video - The Foundation (Skitguys)

Trying to build a fort while failing to properly understand the criteria, ends in disaster.

Trying to build a fort without the proper time and resources, ends in disaster.

Trying to build a fort while taking short cuts, ends in disaster.

In much the same way, trying to build our lives not properly understanding that criteria upon which we are trying to build it, ends in disaster.

Trying to build our lives by taking shortcuts, using man’s, worldly wisdom, instead of God’s wisdom, ends in disaster.

We must learn to grow and build our lives upon God’s wisdom and not the worlds.

We began last week…

Review

Big Idea: The wisdom of God is the safest and truest wisdom to live by.

We saw that Godly wisdom acknowledges…

The Truth of God’s Faithfulness - 1 Corinthians 1:4-9.

Corporate Worship’s Affect On Our View of Life - 1 Corinthians 1:18-25.

The Strength of Trust in Uncertainty - 1 Corinthians 1:18-31.

Today, let us consider three more examples of Godly wisdom to live by.

Body

So fourthly, let’s consider…

The Measure of One’s Potential - 1 Corinthians 1:26-31.

How would you describe someone’s “potential”?

Existing in possibility

Something that can develop or become actual

Where does one’s potential come from?

Man’s wisdom wants to measure ones potential according to one’s own talents, gifts, abilities, health, experience, knowledge, etc.

But where does the fullness of one’s potential come from?

Tripp notes…

Faith is about measuring your potential not on the basis of your natural gifts and experience, but in the surety of God’s presence and promises. Paul Tripp

Consider what Paul says in…

1 Corinthians 1:26 ESV

26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.

What were the occupations of most of the disciples?

Fishermen

What was their average education?

While I do not know their specific level of education, based on this text, it is understood that they were generally not “educated” men.

The extent of their education would have been limited to their craft and trade.

These were “simple” men of “simple” means.

But God chose them, ON PURPOSE.

1 Corinthians 1:27–31 ESV

27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. 30 And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, 31 so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

It is NOT our potential…

It is NOT our natural talents…

It is NOT our trained and honed talents…

It is NOT my knowledge…

It is NOT my age, my health, my physical prowess…

It is NOT my looks, my charisma, my people skills

That matter.

For God chose the FOOLISH things of the world to shame the wise.

God chose the WEAK things to shame the strong

God chose the LOW and DESPISED things…

Even the things THAT ARE NOT…

To BRING TO NOTHING the things that are…

SO THAT

When the good, the great, the awesome, the spectacular, the amazing happens…

IT IS NOT man that gets the glory, but God.

Our potential is measured, NOT BY OUR OWN contributions, BUT BY HIS.

How does this play out, practically speaking, in our day to day lives? What does this look like? How is this truth lived out, fleshed out, applied in every day life?

We can focus on obedience and not results

We strive to do our best, to live with excellence, but leave the final result to God.

We do not get anxious about HOW it will turn out…

We only need to focus on our obedience, our excellence in what we do.

We do not need to stress about the result…so long as we put our very best into it.

We do not need to place limits on what can be.

We need to be careful not to LIMIT what can be BY looking up and focusing on WHO God is and what HE can do.

That broken marriage…the potential to fix it is in God’s hands…as each half surrenders to Christ.

It may SEEM impossible to fix, but God can.

That weakness of the flesh and spirit…that susceptibility to a certain sin that you struggle with…

The potential to live free of succumbing to its allure, is not found in one’s own strength, but in God’s. Only as we learn to live humbly and sacrificially (dying to self), relying upon HIS strength, can we live victoriously.

We can live with optimism instead of cynicism.

With God, all things are possible.

His potential is limitless.

We can live humbly instead of pridefully

When we remember that our fullest potential is found in God and not in ourselves, we are humbled. The focus comes off of us and onto Him.

We are careful to give Him the glory He is due and not take it for ourselves.

We can live more thankful lives

When we acknowledge that all our potential, and thus all the results, are up to Him, we are led to live more thankful lives instead of complaining lives.

We can live more hopefully

Confidently expectant

Faith is about measuring your potential not on the basis of your natural gifts and experience, but in the surety of God’s presence and promises. Paul Tripp

Let’s live by God’s wisdom…Trust in the potential of HIS promises and power instead of our worth and talents.

Fifthly, The wisdom of God calls us to live with the gospel at the center…every day.

The Centrality of the Gospel - 1 Corinthians 2:1-5.

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.

Why should the gospel be central in our lives?

What affect does keeping the gospel central have for our lives?

The gospel informs and shapes EVERYTHING…or it should be.

It shapes and forms how we view ourselves, our identity.

We are not sinners.

We are SAINTS

Just this week in my morning meditation this truth came up.

The world sees a saint as someone who has achieved an extraordinary spiritual accomplishment

Scripturally, a saint is an ordinary person who belongs to an extraordinary God. HE does the extraordinary things. Not us.

Being called a saint is God’s claim of ownership of us.

As David Powlison observes, being called a saint is our enlistment papers and our dog tags.

We are SAINTS not sinners.

We still sin, but we are not defined by the sin anymore.

Worldly wisdom was to identify us by our skills, our looks, our attractions, our successes.

God’s wisdom finds its identity in WHO GOD claims we are…nothing else.

It shapes and forms our value and worth.

The gospel is not about our intrinsic value and worth BUT it is about the fact that God considered us valuable enough to send his Son to die for us.

When the world around us, the ones we love most in this life, fail to ascribe to us value, worth…when we fail to find it from them, we are not devastated. Why? Because our worth is found in who GOD says we and in what HE ascribes to us.

Worldly wisdom seeks to tell you that your worth and value comes in HOW YOUR SEE YOURSELF. Your self love, self esteem, self value is where your true worth comes.

Godly wisdom tells you that it comes from one who is higher and better than we and who ascribes it to us.

The gospel shapes and forms our values and priorities.

The way we spend our time

The way we spend our money

What we hold dear is changed and shaped by what Christ did for us on the cross.

Worldly wisdom seeks to tell us that whatever makes the flesh feel good and be happy is what we ought to invest ourselves into.

Godly wisdom tells us that is about the SOUL, the SPIRIT and that only HE can truly satisfy and thus that is what we must spend our lives running after.

The gospel shapes our view of truth, honesty, and integrity.

The gospel should shape the integrity of our lives.

Even if we disagree with a law or rule, do we follow it and keep it (unless of course it asks us to violate God’s commands)?

Does the gospel shape how we speak? Are we people of truth? Or do we not have any problem twisting, manipulating, omitting, and outright lying?

God is truth. Those who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth.

Meaning, AS HE IS…in light of the TRUTH of who he is and not some conjuring of our own.

However, it means our lives and our lifestyle must also reflect truth, integrity, and honesty.

Worship of God means we worship Him AS HE IS and not as we want or imagine him to be

AND

It means we worship BY living a life of integrity and truth IN EVERY WAY.

Worldly wisdom seeks to tell us that truth is subjective, variable.

Worldly wisdom seeks to tell us that it is ok to lie, to twist, distort, and manipulate in certain situations.

Godly wisdom tells us that we must speak truth, in love, all the time. That we must be people of integrity, of trustworthiness at all times. In public and in private.

The gospel shapes our view of trustworthiness, reliability, dependability.

God was faithful to the death.

Will we be? (As much as depends upon us in a world of constantly shifting circumstances and challenges)

The gospel shapes our relationships

We are not just in them for our own benefit, but rather for the sake of others.

We remain faithful to difficult people because it is about them, not about us.

If you’re God’s child, the gospel isn’t an aspect of your life, it is your life; that is, it is the window through which you look at everything. Paul Tripp

Tripp has written another devotional, which I hope to read this year, called EVERYDAY GOSPEL.

Even the name invites me and entices me to read it.

The wisdom of God ever and always keeps the gospel dead center of our view. Is overlays our view of EVERYTHING and we can see NOTHING without it obscuring our view.

Paul knew nothing among them except Christ and Him crucified.

He preached the gospel.

He spoke the truth.

It shaped and informed His actions.

For Paul, nothing was more important than for people to see Christ and to trust in His wisdom, not Pauls.

He was careful to live with the gospel central so that others would learn to do so as well.

So that they would learn to see Jesus, to live with the wisdom of God at the front, and to honor and obey Him in all things.

Sixthly, God’s wisdom invites us to view corporate worship as a means to live humbly and thankfully.

Corporate Worship’s Affect on Humility and Thankfulness - 1 Corinthians 2:6-16.

1 Corinthians 2:6–16 ESV

6 Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. 7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. 8 None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”— 10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. 13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. 14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. 16 “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.

Why do we know what we know?

Why do we understand anything that we understand?

Because God revealed it. Because the Spirit granted it.

How much can we truly discover or find out or know on our own?

Very little, if anything.

We are dependent on God.

How does the truth that we are dependent upon God to know or understand anything impact our day to day lives?

It keep us coming back time after time after time to God.

It keeps us linked to him.

It keeps us close to him as we realize we need him daily. Moment by moment actually.

In Scripture, we see this concept of “mystery” from time to time.

This idea of mystery is something previously unknown that is later revealed by God to man.

The Church is a mystery. It was not something revealed to the prophets, to the OT saints, but was always something God intended to begin. THUS, it was a mystery, kept hidden by God, until the right time when he revealed it.

Truth is, if God had not revealed anything to us, we would know nothing.

We are dependent upon it.

EVERY TIME we open His word…

Every time we gather as a church for the purpose of worship and study…

…we are reminded of our dependency on God to reveal, to teach, to instruct, and to help us GROW up in our faith and trust of Him.

THUS, our corporate and private worship is a means by which we learn humility and thankfulness.

Corporate worship is designed to keep you humble by reminding you of your need and thankful by reminding you of God’s gift. Paul Tripp

While worldly wisdom is teaching us that we can independent, strong, powerful, and self sufficient people…

Godly wisdom is teaching us to be dependent upon HIM.

How will we choose to live?

Self assured and self confident?

Or humble, God dependent, and thankful for His grace to see us through each day?

One is the way of wisdom.

The other is the way of death.

Conclusion

Big Idea: The wisdom of God is the safest and truest wisdom to live by.

Six Truth’s that worldly wisdom teaches us…

The Truth of God’s Faithfulness - 1 Corinthians 1:4-9.

Corporate Worship’s Affect On Our View of Life - 1 Corinthians 1:18-25.

The Strength of Trust in Uncertainty - 1 Corinthians 1:18-31.

The Measure of One’s Potential - 1 Corinthians 1:26-31.

The Centrality of the Gospel - 1 Corinthians 2:1-5.

Corporate Worship’s Affect on Humility and Thankfulness - 1 Corinthians 2:6-16

Which wisdom to you want?

Which wisdom will you live by in 2025 to help you be growing together to become more like Jesus for the glory of God?

Application

How can we actively seek to measure our potential based on God's promises rather than our own abilities?

In what ways can corporate worship help us cultivate humility and gratitude in our daily lives?

What steps can we take to ensure that the gospel remains central in our decisions and actions?

How can we encourage others to rely on God's wisdom instead of their own in today's culture?

How can you remind yourself of God's presence when faced with challenges in your daily life?

What are some practical ways you can focus on obedience rather than the results in your schoolwork or activities?

In what specific situations can you choose to respond with optimism instead of cynicism?

How do you think understanding our identity as saints rather than sinners can influence our daily interactions?

What does it mean to live with the mindset that our worth comes from what God says about us?