Christ And Him Crucified

1 Corinthians 1:26-31 & 2:1-5

This passage of Scripture is one of the greatest commentaries on the knowledge of Jesus Christ that I have ever read. It takes the focus off of man and places it rightfully on God the Father, God the Son, and essentially God the Holy Spirit.

What brought me back here is something I heard from someone in LGBQT community claiming to be Christian and claiming to know what Jesus is doing in a particular event in Jesus’ life. I will get to that point in just a minute, but there are many that take events in Jesus’ earthly ministry and try to use them for their own purpose.

This man was stating that when Jesus raised Lazarus from the grave in John 11, Jesus told Lazarus to come out......in the KJV Jesus says to “come forth” which basically is the same as coming out. Anyway, this guy states that Jesus’ purpose in that was loosing us from our grave clothes, telling us to come out of our shame of being gay or whatever our situation is and live as you are, the way God made you.

Now, those are his words not mine and this is not what the purpose of raising Lazarus from the dead was about. I have heard many preachers use what Jesus done in John 11 to teach more about us (humans) than what it means about Christ. I possibly have done this same.......but according to Jesus, before He even got to Lazarus, that this was to manifest the Glory of God. I quote this many times during our Wed. night Bible Study.....John 20:31 “But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.”

As a pastor, preacher, teacher, brother or sister in Christ, our duty is to exalt Jesus Christ. Our motivation is to teach or tell others about Jesus, Jesus within us, not based on anything that we have done. No matter what is going on our lives, Jesus is our source, true life is not based on who I am or what I have achieved or not achieved. I have life in the essence of Jesus Christ, Jesus does not give us the power to be ourselves, ourselves is fallen, but He gives us the power to live through, in, and with Him!

We miss this because of a low or poor view of God............we talk more about our situations than we do of the true nature and essence of God! A resurrected life is one that is reconciled to God, that is actually the true nature of eternal life. Reconciled to God, means that life has been giving back to us, otherwise we are dead in our sins. How your life turns out here is not determinate for your reconciliation, it is only what Christ has done. Jesus is the basis on which I can stand before God!

We miss this because we are so narcissistic! The definition of “narcissism” is: extremely self-centered with an exaggerated sense of self-importance. The last part is important, an exaggerated sense of self importance. This is how we get to the place of making Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead about us instead of Jesus! Jesus said in John’s historical account after Jesus was told that His friend was sick, John 11:3-4 “Therefore his sisters sent unto him, saying, Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick. When Jesus heard that, he said, This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby.” Jesus even waited 2 more days before He started toward Bethany.

This event in history was not for Lazarus’ glory, our glory, it was for the glory of God revealed in His Son, that if we want out of this fallen world then Jesus is the only way! Jesus is not opening the tomb for us to come out and live free in a sinful life, He is not opening up a way for us to live like kings and queens, He has just simply revealed the Glory of God through doing what is impossible for man. A man was dead for 4 days and his body was decomposed and Jesus prayed to the Father John 11:41-42 “Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up his eyes, and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me.”

Lazarus came out of the tomb, whole again.

This was done to reveal that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God sent from God! Nothing else to read into this.

You can come out of the closet in the name of Jesus Christ and you have missed Jesus. You can live in any kind of sin in the name of Jesus Christ and you have missed Jesus, You can live out your “destiny” in the name of Jesus Christ and you have missed Jesus.

Jesus plus nothing else, it is only in the life of Jesus Christ that we live!

Now, to our text, this is simple reading, but hard for most folks because they want so much more. In Christ there is an unsearchable amount of spiritual riches but most folks is not seeking after the spiritual, they are earthy and they want earthly! Being “earthy”, “fleshly” causes us to have a poor or low view of God, because it becomes about us.

1 Corinthians 1:26-31...............Paul tells them to look at their state of grace and blessedness to which they were invited, look at their fleshly appearance and their fleshly characteristics.......

Not many are wise according to human standards........ “not many” seems to suggest that there was some but not many at all, the majority were not wise.

Not smart according to the world’s standards, how many times have charlatans come in and deceived? These deceivers come in on the basis of wisdom, they met a certain physical or mental standard, and/or nobility.

This is how you get people that start making God’s Word their own!

Not many strong according to human standards.......this could mean physically and also mentally. We look for those. Mainly, however, I think it means powerful people, important people. Important to the world maybe.......

Not many noble......Influential people......Royalty.......Kings and princes........famous people.......

This is what Paul just revealed to this church about themselves, according to the world they were unimpressive and basically that is what they were.

The reason for the unimpressive nature, was that they would only glory in the Lord, they would only glory in Jesus Christ!

Only someone who has come to the Grace of Jesus Christ, would deny themselves.

They would understand, Who really is worthy!!!

There is one preacher that I listen to and he says over and over again that one of the things that will stand out in a Christian is their humility.

They are not proud, they are not loud, they are not over-bearing with themselves, it is not about them........This mainly is because they are in state of repentance having realized Who they are believing in the True Righteous One, Jesus Christ!

They have come to understand that the flesh profits nothing, but it is the Spirit which is only in Christ Jesus, gives life!

This is the way it should be, because when we glory or boast, we will boast in our true source not in a false one! Which my flesh is false because it is cancelled out because of it’s sin and it’s temporary nature. If I could live forever then God might would have some competition, but we all die, therefore if I cannot bring life to myself then I must trust in the Only Source, that is Jesus Christ!

Death is brought on by my sin, therefore I am not capable of sustaining eternal life, resurrected life, I need someone and that someone is Jesus Christ!

It is no longer I that lives now, it is Christ living in me. So..........I boast in the life that Christ lived, the Life that He gave and resurrected, I boast in the character and attributes of God, as I have witnessed through the Scriptures and through the life of Christ.

The “base” things, the things which are despised, has God chosen.......The things which are not to bring to nothing the things that are......

The things that seem to be progressing will be brought down by the things that have the appearance to be nothing!

I love to tell this because it exposes the human view or fallen view of our flesh.......This lady told me one time that there were many churches that were dead because they didn’t do certain things.....not having been to those churches but stating this based on what their sign said. I asked had she ever been to those churches and she said no, but knew what went on in there because sha had been to churches like them.

These are peoples belief........when I hear that I think of what Paul said here.......what that woman said was based solely on man’s creation of church and solely on what men and women do inside of a church..

Appearance is not a determinate for death and life according to God, it is only in what is believed about Jesus the Christ the Son of God and because of that belief we will have life in His essence!

Colossians 3:3-4 “For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.”

Jesus and Him crucified..........I read this in a book titled None But Christ, writer speaks that Jesus was crucified from the cradle to the grave......

Having been born to a woman, who Jesus made......and she thereby lived only because of Him

Being limited to the human body, God the Son having to mature from a child to an adult.....being restricted in speech, and the basics of life......

He was crucified in having to be circumcised

He was crucified by allowing Himself to be tempted

He was crucified in His whole life 30 years of living having no reputation....He was despised and rejected

He was crucified in the garden as He God of all the universe was in extreme agony

He was crucified when He allowed devilish men to apprehend Him......Judas killed Him with his lips and sought to kill Jesus in his heart....

They bound Jesus with cords to teach us that by nature we are bound with the cords of sin and deserve to be bound hand and foot and cast in to hellfire.

There is more I will just quote Isaiah 50:6 “I gave my back to the smiters, And my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting.”

All the way to the cross He was crucified.............Listen to what the writer also says.......

“hence it is that all men’s sins cannot exceed the price that was paid for them because our sins are but the sins of men, but Christ’s sufferings are the sufferings of God. Now God loves the blood of His Son more than He hates all our sins. And if Adam, one man, was able by his sin to condemn a world, surely God, by His sufferings, is able to save a world. Also Christ must be God to make His satisfaction effective to us by application of His merits to us by faith, and to put us into possession of purchased life and glory.”

“Now, Christ must be God, not only to support the human nature to bear the wrath of God from sinking under it...........................but also to give worth to His sufferings and to make them of infinite value because they were the sufferings of God. For we, having offended an infinite God, deserved infinite wrath, and therefore of necessity there must be an infinite satisfaction. Now it is more for God to suffer anything than for all men and creatures to suffer all things; as the blood of a sheep is more precious than the blood of a thousand adders, toads, and serpents. The blood of a man is worth more than the blood of a thousand sheep. The blood of a king is worth more than the blood of a thousand common men, and the blood of God is more precious than the blood of all the men in the world. And hence it is that all men’s sins cannot exceed the price that was paid for them because our sins are but the sins of men, but Christ’s sufferings are the sufferings of God.”

Paul is teaching this church and us......that our faith stands in the power of God which is the Gospel of Jesus Christ......it is upon Jesus that all our spiritual blessings flow.............

This cannot be done by fancy talk, earthly devices, and manufactured excitement........all that does is put the emphasis on man......

Paul didn’t come to them or us in that fashion, Paul just taught his faith to them.....

He was weak, fearful, and trembling.....he didn’t have fancy speech or some jaw-dropping wisdom....it was just in the life and finished work of Jesus Christ. That was his life

Philippians 1:21 “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”