Wisdom - Chapters 1-2 - #1
INTRODUCTION: The first theme of 1 Corinthians that I would like us to address is Wisdom.
Give insights from man out in Arizona.
PROPOSITION:
TRANSITION: This morning I want us to ask look at three questions.
A. Does everyone share the same definition for Wisdom? The Answer is NO!
1. Lets look at some decisions made in history that others thought were good and wise.
· Islam teaches that the way to reform a thief is to cut off his hand.
· Hinduism encourages prostitution and says that a persons value is based on ones caste.
· England thought debtor prisons were a very wise way of dealing with those who could not pay their debts.
· Many people in history thought that slavery was an excellent idea.
· Hitler and many Germans thought it wise to murder millions of Jews and to eliminate the undesirables.
· Our prison systems are filled with thousands who thought that stealing was a good solution to their wants & needs.
· Alkida thought it was very reasonable & wise to fly planes into the world trade center and kill thousands of people.
· Sudaam Hussain & his sons thought that brutality, rape and self indulgence were an acceptable way of life.
· The Oil for Food scandal within the UN says that the abuse of power and the pursuit of personal enrichment is wise
and of greater value than justice or providing for the needy and impoverished.
· In Iraq, some people right now think it is very wise and reasonable kill Americans and disrupt the establishment of
democracy.
2. God recognizes that everyone does not have the same definition of wisdom.
· There a many who claim or are acclaimed to be wise who do not see the wisdom of God’s actions. 1 Cor. 1:18-25
· God has established His own standard for Wisdom. 1 Cor. 1:26-31 (Unpack this passage)
B. The Next Question is this – “What definition of Wisdom are you using?”
1. Our nation is struggling with some of this very question. In recently history the US has been using the wrong definition.
· Read Zell Miller’s speech read from the floor of the senate on 12/15/04
à America is at a critical crossroad and we need to pray that she will embrace God’s wisdom.
· Zell Miller was calling our nation back to a Judeo / Christian Value system
2. God’s wisdom is at a different level than the Judeo / Christian Value system. (A value system is not a wisdom system.)
· The Judeo/Christian value system seeks to identify and value those things God values. (The product of Wisdom).
· A Wisdom System seeks to know the who, how, why, what, where of God’s values. (A relationship with wisdom.)
3. God’s wisdom system flows out of a relationship with Him.
Job 12:13; Job 28:28; Psalm 111:10; Proverbs 1:7, & 9:10
C. The Last Question is – “God’s wisdom is wrapped up in Jesus so… What will you do with Jesus?” 1 Cor. 2:1-5
1. If you want to see God’s wisdom, you do not need an expanded vocabulary, you just need a new perspective on truth.
2. If you want to know God’s Wisdom, embrace Jesus. God’s wisdom is seen and experienced through Jesus.
CONCLUSION:
1 Corinthians 1:18-25 (NIV)
18 For 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. 19 For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.” 20 Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? 21 For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. 22 Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, 24 but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.
1 Corinthians 1:26-31 (NIV)
26 Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28 He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, 29 so that no one may boast before him. 30 It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. 31 Therefore, as it is written: “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.”
Job 12:13 (NIV)
To God belong wisdom and power; counsel and understanding are his.
Job 28:28 (NIV)
And he said to man, ‘The fear of the Lord—that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding.’
Psalm 111:10 (NIV)
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding.
To him belongs eternal praise.
Proverbs 1:7 (NIV)
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge…
Proverbs 9:10 (NIV)
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.”
1 Corinthians 2:1-5 (NIV)
1 When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. 2 For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. 3 I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. 4 My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, 5 so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.
WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Zell Miller (D-GA) today delivered the following statement on the floor of the United States Senate addressing several social issues facing the country: "The Old Testament prophet Amos was a sheep herder who lived back in the Judean hills, away from the larger cities of Bethlehem and Jerusalem.
Compared to the intellectual urbanites like Isaiah and Jeremiah, he was just an unsophisticated country hick.
"But Amos had a unique grasp of political and social issues and his poetic literary skill was among the best of all the prophets. That familiar quote of Martin Luther King, Jr. about 'Justice will rush down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream' are Amos's words.
"Amos was the first to propose the concept of a universal God and not just some tribal deity. He also wrote that God demanded moral purity, not rituals and sacrifices. This blunt speaking moral conscience of his time warns in Chapter 8, verse 11 of The Book of Amos, as if he were speaking to us today:
That 'the days will come, sayeth the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land. Not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the word of the Lord. 'And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east. They shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Lord, and shall not find it.'
'A famine in the land'. Has anyone more accurately described the situation we face in America today? 'A famine of hearing the words of the Lord.' "But some will say, Amos was just an Old Testament prophet - a minor one at that - who lived 700 years before Christ. That is true, so how about one of the most influential historians of modern times? "Arnold Toynbee who wrote the acclaimed 12 volume A Study of History, once declared, 'Of the 22 civilizations that have appeared in history, 19 of them collapsed when they reached the moral state America is in today.' "Toynbee died in 1975, before seeing the worst that was yet to come. Yes, Arnold Toynbee saw the famine. The 'famine of hearing the words of the Lord.' Whether it is removing a display of the Ten Commandments from a Courthouse or the Nativity Scene from a city square. Whether it is eliminating prayer in schools or eliminating 'under God' in the Pledge of Allegiance. Whether it is making a mockery of the sacred institution of marriage between a man and woman or, yes, telecasting around the world made-in-the-USA filth masquerading as entertainment.
"The Culture of Far Left America was displayed in a startling way during the Super Bowl's now infamous half-time show. A show brought to us courtesy of Value-Les Moonves and the pagan temple of Viacom-Babylon.
"I asked the question yesterday, how many of you have ever run over a skunk with your car? I have many times and I can tell you, the stink stays around for a long time. You can take the car through a car wash and it's still there. So the scent of this event will long linger in the nostrils of America. "I'm not talking just about an exposed mammary gland with a pull-tab attached to it. Really no one should have been too surprised at that.
Wouldn't one expect a bumping, humping, trashy routine entitled 'I'm going to get you naked' to end that way.
"Does any responsible adult ever listen to the words of this rap-crap? I'd quote you some of it, but the Sergeant of Arms would throw me out of here, as well he should. And then there was that prancing, dancing, strutting, rutting guy evidently suffering from jock itch because he kept yelling and grabbing his crotch. But then, maybe there's a crotch grabbing culture I've unaware of.
"But as bad as all this was, the thing that yanked my chain the hardest was seeing that ignoramus with his pointed head stuck up through a hole he had cut in the flag of the United States of America, screaming about having 'a bottle of scotch and watching lots of crotch.' Think about that.
"This is the same flag that we pledge allegiance to. This is the flag that is draped over coffins of dead young uniformed warriors killed while protecting Kid Crock's bony butt. He should be tarred and feathered, and ridden out of this country on a rail. Talk about a good reality show, there's one for you.
"The desire and will of this Congress to meaningfully do anything about any of these so-called social issues is non existent and embarrassingly disgraceful. The American people are waiting and growing impatient with us.
They want something done.
"I am pleased to be a co-sponsor of S.J. Res. 26 along with Senator Allard and others, proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States relating to marriage. And S.1558, the Liberties Restoration Act, which declares religious liberty rights in several ways, including the Pledge of Allegiance and the display of the Ten Commandments. And today I join Senator Shelby and others with the Constitution Restoration Act of 2004 that limits the jurisdiction of federal courts in certain ways.
"In doing so, I stand shoulder to shoulder not only with my Senate co-sponsors and Chief Justice Roy Moore of Alabama but, more importantly, with our Founding Fathers in the conception of religious liberty and the terribly wrong direction our modern judiciary has taken us in.
"Everyone today seems to think that the U.S. Constitution expressly provides for separation of church and state. Ask any ten people if that's not so. And I'll bet you most of them will say 'Well, sure..' And some will point out, 'it's in the First Amendment.'
"Wrong! Read it! It says, 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.' Where is the word 'separate'? Where are the words 'church' or 'state.'
"They are not there. Never have been. Never intended to be. Read the Congressional Records during that four-month period in 1789 when the amendment was being framed in Congress. Clearly their intent was to prohibit a single denomination in exclusion of all others, whether it was Anglican or Catholic or some other.
"I highly recommend a great book entitled Original Intent by David Barton.
It really gets into how the actual members of Congress, who drafted the First Amendment, expected basic Biblical principles and values to be present throughout public life and society, not separate from it.
"It was Alexander Hamilton who pointed out that 'judges should be bound down by strict rules and precedents, which serve to define and point out their duty.' Bound down! That is exactly what is needed to be done. There was not a single precedent cited when school prayer was struck down in 1962.
"These judges who legislate instead of adjudicate, do it without being responsible to one single solitary voter for their actions. Among the signers of the Declaration of Independence was a brilliant young physician from Pennsylvania named Benjamin Rush.
"When Rush was elected to that First Continental Congress, his close friend Benjamin Franklin told him 'We need you. . . we have a great task before us, assigned to us by Providence.' Today, 228 years later there is still a great task before us assigned to us by Providence. Our Founding Fathers did not shirk their duty and we can do no less.
"By the way, Benjamin Rush was once asked a question that has long interested this Senator from Georgia in particular. Dr. Rush was asked, are you a democrat or an aristocrat? And the good doctor answered, 'I am neither '. 'I am a Christocrat. I believe He, alone, who created and redeemed man is qualified to govern him.' That reply of Benjamin Rush is just as true today in the year of our Lord 2004 as it was in the year of our Lord 1776.
"So, if I am asked why - with all the pressing problems this nation faces today - why am I pushing these social issues and taking the Senate's valuable time? I will answer: Because, it is of the highest importance. Yes, there's a deficit to be concerned about in this country, a deficit of decency.
"So, as the sand empties through my hourglass at warp speed - and with my time running out in this Senate and on this earth, I feel compelled to speak out. For I truly believe that at times like this, silence is not golden. It is yellow."