The Power of the Cross

Welcome

Announcements

Budget committee meeting right after service today

May 29th we will have a church potluck. I need someone to be in charge of that (having some sort of list of what people need to bring and getting the main dish which I would recommend chicken from Food Giant). The church will cover the cost of the chicken, so whoever does that bring the receipt and the church will reimburse you.

I am planning to take a vacation July 30 - Aug 13th. This is two weeks and the church is going to have to function without me. I will find someone to fill the pulpit but everything else will have to be done by you all.

Scripture Reading:

Psalm 37:1–9 NASB95

Do not fret because of evildoers, Be not envious toward wrongdoers. For they will wither quickly like the grass And fade like the green herb. Trust in the Lord and do good; Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord; And He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, and He will do it. He will bring forth your righteousness as the light And your judgment as the noonday. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him; Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way, Because of the man who carries out wicked schemes. Cease from anger and forsake wrath; Do not fret; it leads only to evildoing. For evildoers will be cut off, But those who wait for the Lord, they will inherit the land.

Pastoral Prayer

Pray for the lost

Pray for transformation of our hearts

Pray for God presence in this place

INTRODUCTION

I know we have taken a turn from our study on discipleship through Matthew, but we will be returning to it soon. Next week is Mother’s Day so we will have a Mother’s Day sermon, but after that I plan to return to Matthew.

We are going to focus on one verse today from 1 Cor 1:18. “The Power of the cross”.

There is one symbol that we will always reflect the Christian faith and it is the cross. Many people wear them around their necks, they have them tattooed on their bodies, and they have them hanging in their homes. But what does the cross really mean?

The cross is so much more than a wooden beam that Christ carried up to Golgotha and was nailed to. It is the very center of who we are as children of God because ONLY the cross can make us acceptable to God. The cross divides everyone in the world into two classes of people: those who think it is foolish and live their life by it:

Look what Paul says in 1 Cor 1:18:

1 Corinthians 1:18 NASB95

For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

What is Paul talking about when he says, “the Word of the cross”

The NIV rightly translates this as: “the message of the cross”

Paul says it is the message of the cross that is foolish to some and saves others. He is talking about the biblical doctrine of the cross. He is talking about the message that we have been given to proclaim to the world that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures. The message that proclaims the blood atonement that Christ made on behalf of the whole world (1 Tim 2:6) through His perfect sacrifice on the cross!

It is this message that Paul labored and suffered so greatly for. It is this message that Paul trusted would be sufficient to convert sinners. This is why Paul said, “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes!”. It is this message that was central to Paul’s preaching, this message that was central to Paul’s church planting, and this message that demonstrated the power of God to a lost and dying world!

God can save anyone, but He chose to do it through human instruments proclaiming the message of the cross. And even though most people think this message is foolish, outdated, naive, it was worth proclaiming because this is what God uses to save.

This message of the cross is THE central message of the entire Bible

It doesn't matter where you turn in the pages of Scripture, somewhere in the shadows of every story, every institution, every law, every truth you will find an arrow pointing to the cross.

When life began and sin entered the world through Adam, God declared the message of the cross to the world!

The Seed of the woman would crush the head of the serpent (Gen 3:15).

Noah’s ark is a picture of God saving his people from His wrath on sin.

Abraham bundled and took sticks to the alter to sacrifice his son just as Jesus carried his cross to Calvary.

The sacrificial system foreshadowed the Lamb of God

The priesthood mediated God and man

The message of the prophets proclaim a Savior

And the message of Jesus Christ himself who gave us life through His death.

The message of the cross is the message of the epistles

And it is the final message is the book of Revelation, the lamb who had been slain!

The cross is the central truth of the entire Bible.

And if this is the central message of the Bible, then it must certainly be the central message of the church!

Every soul that has been saved by the power of the cross has the responsibility to proclaim the message of the cross

No one is exempt! We must not be content with proclamation that only takes place inside the four walls of the church. How would this church in Corinth had ever become a church and not the gospel been proclaimed to the people of the world. How would Paul be able to write this verse if he had never preached the message of the cross to the world?

I cannot think of a better time for the church to tell this message than now. Our churches are dying at an astounding rate and I believe it is partly because the church as a whole has neglected this great message in their personal lives. This is the message that God has given to us to give to the world 🌎. This is the message that God has ordained by which he will use to bring people Who walk in darkness to faith in Christ.

We are not to proclaim it arrogantly or harshly, or with condemnation, but from love because it was from love that God sent Jesus Christ to die for us!

Every church planter must have a vision for the church he is planting. He must have a vision or I do not think he will make it. A vision is a description from God of what a church will look like some years down the road. And a vision is specific! A vision is not a generalize thing such as having 100 people in service on Sunday morning, but a specific design that God has created that particular church to become. And a true vision only comes from God!

When God began to call me to plant this church, I learned real quick this church belongs to God and not me. I also learned that it didn’t really matter where I wanted the church to be in 10 years or what I wanted the church to look like. This was God’s church and all that mattered is what God wanted the church to look like and thast i got on board with it.

I want you to see what Paul’s vision of the Corinthian church was. Look in verse 17, “For Christ did not send me (mission) to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not in cleverness of speech, so that the cross of Christ would not be made void (vision).”

The vision Paul had for this the Corinthian church was to have a cross centered worldview. They were to know and understand that it was not the words of Paul that converted them, but the power of God through the cross.

This is what they had drifted from! This is why there were divisions in the church. This is why they were showboating spiritual gifts. They had drifted from the central message of the cross! They had lost sight of the fact that everything they are depends upon the cross of Christ and nothing that we do can ever replace that! They had begun to think too much of themselves, and forgotten how much they needed Christ.

All things are made right at the cross.

All relationships are restored through the cross.

All sins are washed away at the cross.

Unity comes through the cross.

The enmity between God and man is reconciled at the cross!

Everything that pertains to this life should be interpreted through the cross.

Application

This is not only the vision for the Corinthian church, but it is also the vision for this church!

The message of the cross must be central to who who we are and what we do!

It is to be central in our hearts

It is to be central in our homes

And it is to be central in our speech

When we drift from the cross, things fall apart

If we begin to depend on ourselves we will fall!

None of us are here because we deserve it, but because God’s grace

The cross divides the world into two classes of people: those who are perishing and those who are being saved

Those who are perishing

The word perishing means “to be destroyed or ruined”

The present tense of this verb refers to a process, not just something that will happen at the end of one’s life.

The idea is this is a road that people are on and headed down toward a final destination.

This is also what Jesus said when He said, “for the road is broad that leads to destruction and many who enter through it”.

There is a whole world full of people who are perishing. They are in the process of dying and it will be a permanent spiritual death which should break our hearts and overcome all fears of proclaiming the message of the cross to them.

Why do people think the cross is foolish?

1) The cross stands for the very opposite of what people naturally do.

We want to do good works thinking if we will do enough or try hard enough then we will be accepted by God!

Here is a danger in our churches, telling others that all they must do is come and join us and do what we do, and pretty soon you begin to look like us, and then you will become on of us.

What must be communicated is that no matter how much good we do, we will never be good enough because the cross is the only means by which people may be saved and become children of God.

There is nothing that you or I could ever do that would make God love us anymore. To think God would loved us based upon our own merit is to totally miss the point of the cross. The cross makes us acceptable to God right where are in our sin apart from our so that no man can ever boast!

The natural inclination of man is to pursue a works righteousness and do this or that to become accepted. The cross says we could never be accepted apart from the righteousness that becomes ours through Jesus Christ.

I cannot tell you how many people stumble over the cross. In fact, so many do that I ordered a small evangelism book that is titled, “The Cross” so people can better understand the doctrine of the sacrifice of Jesus.

Here is primary argument: I cannot follow a God who would send His own Son into the world to die on the cross. Any God who would do that is not loving and is cruel. I just heard this a few weeks ago from young man who claimed to be a Buddhist. His whole hang up with Christianity was, How could a good God send his Son to die”.

They stumble over the cross because they do not understand the cross! They Do not understand sin, nor the consequences of sin, nor the holiness of God and all they see is God sending one of his own to die and that must be cruel and wrong. The entire beauty and glory of the cross is eclipsed by the foolishness of man’s wisdom.

The cross is the end of human wisdom and understanding.

It is the end of what we think and the beginning of what God says.

2) The cross becomes the way of the redeemed

To be saved by the cross is not just an adoption of a symbol that we carry around our necks, but it is something we carry On our backs. Jesus said a servant is not above his master.

True Christianity is about picking up our cross daily and following Christ. It is about the willingness to suffer as Jesus suffered, to renounce sin and the pleasures of this world as Jesus did, and to walk in full trust of our heavenly Father.

What will separate those who think the cross Is foolish from those who are being saved from it is their willingness to suffer. And this is not for a few, but Jesus said anyone who wishes to follow Him must take up their own cross.

Those who are being saved

Notice how Paul words this: “those who are being saved”

Is Paul indicating that salvation is some sort of process? No, you don’t have to read Paul to know his theological view on salvation is a one time event. But what Paul is talking about here is the process of transformation that is not completed until we leave this world. Our salvation will not be fully revealed until we step into glory and we will be freed from sin like Jesus.

1 John 3:2 “Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is.”

There is a transformation that take place in those who are being saved by the cross that changes the way we see reality. No longer is the world seen through human eyes, but it is seen through faith in the finished work of Christ. No longer is it about power, status, self, or achievement. It is about the finished work of Christ

Application:

How does this apply to us?

None of us who are still breathing have made it. We are all a work being continuously transformed into the image of God. Those who think they no longer need to grow have fallen into the sin of self-righteousness and have begun to fall and drift from God.

Everyone of us must practice repentance

Everyone of us must continue to live by faith and take steps of faith

Everyone of us is continually in need of the grace of God

“To us who are being saved it is the power of God”

The reason believers continue on in the midst of trials and hardships is because they have faith in the power of God. They believe that no matter what happens in this life, they already have the victory through the power of the cross.

CONCLUSION

Scripture has so many paradoxical statements that make the wisdom of the world foolish

Here is a few:

“The last will be first, and the first will be last”

“Blessed are those who are hungry”

“Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted”

“He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it”

To be saved by the cross of Jesus Christ one must be willing to lose his life upon and take up a new life in Christ. This is the only way we can be justified. It is to join in the death and burial of Christ and when that happens the old man dies and a new man is born. It is only when a man dies to the old way of life that the curse of sin can be broken over his life, and new life can then come.

This is why Paul said: “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”

Is the cross of Jesus Christ central to your Life? If not, what needs to change? Don’t leave this Bible Conference the same way you came. Let the power of God pour over your life and transform you into what He had envisioned you to be.

~PRAYER~