May 30 Click on verses for Full Scripture

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Today's Pathway: I Corinthians 1:23-28 But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness; But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:

Yesterday we saw Paul describe what the unsaved world was looking for: signs and human wisdom. Today Paul tells us that he was not interested in giving the world what they wanted, but was going to give them what they needed. As an aside, this is still true today. The world wants its "churches" to be entertaining and inoffensive. They want the music and lifestyle to mirror the world. They want to be taught how to have better lives, but they aren't interested in hearing Bible truth about sin and the Savior. Unfortunately, many contemporary churches have been willing to give these people what they want in order to have a large congregation, rather than giving people what they need in order to be in a right relationship with God.

Paul said "We preach Christ crucified". That is the message that the unsaved need to hear. He knew that many people would reject that message, because he writes that the Jews would stumble over it and the Gentiles would find it to be foolish. The Jews stumbled over it because they expected the Messiah to come as a strong military leader who would free Israel from the Gentiles. In their minds there was no way that the Christ could be crucified. Warren Wiersbe wrote, "Because the Jews were looking for power and great glory, they stumbled at the weakness of the cross. How could anybody put faith in an unemployed carpenter from Nazareth who died the shameful death of a common criminal?" To the Gentiles, Paul's message was completely irrational. Yet Paul preached it anyway, because Christ, crucified, risen, and coming again, IS the power of God and the wisdom of God. The crucifixion of Christ is not weakness; it is power. It is the power of salvation. It is the power of the believer's future resurrection. It is the power to live a life committed to the Lord. It is the wisdom of God because it provides salvation to mankind in the only way possible. It appeases the wrath of a holy God against sinful men by providing a perfect Substitute to pay the necessary price for man's redemption. It is the only way that guilty humans can be declared not guilty by a perfect Judge. The unbeliever doesn't understand this, but the believer certainly does!

In verse 25 Paul makes an interesting statement. Men, in their human wisdom, think that God is foolish and weak. Yet the truth is that if God had any foolishness about Him, His foolishness would be wiser than the best that man could think, and if God had any weakness about Him that weakness would still be stronger than anything man could do. Then Paul tells the Corinthian church that if they want proof of this principle, they need look no further than their own congregation. When they looked around at their fellow Christians they saw average, ordinary people. This is not to say that there could not be wealthy people or "pillars of the community" in the church. But most of the people were not. Verses 27 and 28 say that God has chosen to use the foolish and the weak and the despised to confound those who see themselves as important. The word "confound" means "to put to shame". Warren Wiersbe also wrote, "God chose the foolish, the weak, the base (low born), and the despised to show the proud world their need and His grace. The lost world admires birth, social status, financial success, power, and recognition. But none of these things can guarantee eternal life. The message and miracle of God’s grace in Jesus Christ utterly confounds the high and mighty people of this world. The wise of this world cannot understand how God changes sinners into saints, and the mighty of this world are helpless to duplicate the miracle."

We truly serve an amazing and wonderful God!