Powerful Proclamation

Have you heard of social media influencers? There are legitimate “influencers” and then there are not so legitimate influencers. It has become a joke to many because some of these so called influencers reach out to businesses wanting them to give them free stuff so they can promote it on their social media pages to their followers.

But a real influencer has the power to affect the purchasing decisions of others because of his or her authority, knowledge, position or relationship with their audience. This has actually been used for many years with celebrities. In fact, in the early 1900s Mark Twain co-branded pens. It really became big in the 50s, and has continued. It has just evolved now because of the rise of social media.

In the Greek city-states, teachers and speakers were always seeking influence. Rhetoric thus evolved as an important art, one that provided the orator with the forms, means, and strategies for persuading an audience of the correctness of the orator's arguments. Orators like the Sophists were favored by the Greek’s and highly respected.

This pagan Greek influence had crept into the Corinthian church. The people were divided, as we have already seen. Much of this was based on rhetoric. But Paul here reminds the church at Corinth that when he came to establish the church that his manner of preaching and way of life was consistent with the message he preached. He describes his ministry among them as a ministry that exemplified the wisdom of God.

1 Corinthians 2:1–2 CSB

1 When I came to you, brothers and sisters, announcing the mystery of God to you, I did not come with brilliance of speech or wisdom. 2 I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

The Centrality of the Cross

As we have already established in previous sermons, the Corinthians were impressed by great rhetoric, what Paul refers to as high and lofty words of wisdom. When a Sophist Greek speaker was coming into a city to speak, his first question was not about the message he should speak, but about the audience. The speaker wanted to know the people and what the people wanted. The speaker would determine his message based on his audience.

Unfortunately we see this often. People are more concerned with making a name for themselves, gaining power and influence to the extent that they don’t let people know what they really think. I know I have been guilty of this. I don’t want to lose friends by telling them that what they believe is wrong, so I don’t say anything or say something that could be construed as support. But if you don’t stand for something, then what will you fall for?

Pulpits today have been filled with preachers more interested in making a name for themselves than with proclaiming the message that God has given to us to proclaim.

Paul didn’t care what message the people wanted. He has what they needed. He didn’t care about brilliance of speech or using high and lofty words of human wisdom. In 1:17, Paul asserted that God had not sent him to preach with words of wisdom. Here he says that he had fulfilled the divine design. Paul had deliberately rejected tailoring his approach and his message to gain a following or to retain friends. He had rejected seeking to satisfy those that love eloquence and instead chose to stick to the simple message of the cross.

Paul wasn’t controlled by a thirst for influence, but by his message - the message of a crucified savior. The crucifixion as the way of salvation was the most offensive dimension of the gospel, and it opposed the human arrogance of Jews and Gentiles. But it was nevertheless the power of God for salvation. The mystery or testimony of God is this message: Christ died for you. The cross is the wisdom of God that confounds the wisdom of men.

Paul did not oppose intellect. He did not oppose rhetoric as a device to promote the gospel. In fact, Paul often used rhetoric in writing to the churches. But when it came to his evangelism, Paul did not rely upon a formula. He didn’t put his trust in man’s methods. He understood that reliance upon such things empties the cross of its effect.

Paul understood that the message of the Christ is sufficient. He understood that the person and work of Jesus the Messiah comprises the entire gospel. Nothing more is needed. He refused to stoop to polished rhetoric. He didn’t seek his own glory as a renowned speaker, but the glory of God the Father, who in His wisdom turned the wisdom of the world upside down.

Paul’s message was the simple declaration of Jesus and His atoning work on the cross. But we try to complicate this message. We try to make it hard or difficult. We want to use human methods and presentations. We spend time learning a method of evangelism to try to tell others the gospel, but our efforts often result in nothing. We try to complicate the message and it brings it to have no effect. So we just stop sharing the message. And people stop getting saved.

Brothers and Sisters, Paul’s message was simple. If we can recover the simplicity of the message, I believe we will be more likely to share it. If we recover the centrality of the cross, we will share it. That is if we, like Paul, learn to rely on the Spirit. Look at the next couple of verses.

1 Corinthians 2:3–4 CSB

3 I came to you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. 4 My speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of wisdom but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power,

The Strength of the Spirit

These Greek speakers relied on their own power - their wit, their eloquence, their words of humanly wisdom - to move crowds and influence people to do whatever it was that they wanted. Paul understood something about the gospel that the Corinthians, focused as they were on human power, did not understand.

Just as the message is opposite of what the world expects, and just as the people of God are the opposite of what the world expects, so also is the preacher. When Paul came to the Corinthians, he determined not to come in his power. He refers to himself as weak. He came to them weakness and in fear and in trembling .

It wasn’t that Paul couldn’t have come in human power and with eloquence and wisdom, but Paul’s attitude was that of humility. Paul emptied himself of all pride, the sin of the Corinthians. He took his own advice to become like Jesus.

Philippians 2:5–7 CSB

5 Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, 6 who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. 7 Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man,

Paul understood that human power was nothing compared to the power that was available to him.

I want you to imagine with me a moment. Imagine you are at the circus. Somehow you have found yourself backstage, where they keep all of the animals that perform in the circus. You see the monkey in their little pen. You see the birds in their birdcages. You see the seals in their little pools of water preparing to play the horns. Suddenly, you see a man approaching a cage. He is carrying a long stick with a pointed end and a bullwhip. You watch as he goes over to the cage and suddenly shoves the stick into the side of the cage. You hear a roar of pain and you make your way closer. Inside the cage is a lion, big and powerful. You can see the strength of its loins as it makes its way around the cage. You can clearly see the man is torturing the poor animal. What is the best course of action? Do you run up and attack the man, try to wrestle the stick and whip from him? Or would you perhaps be better off to let the lion out of the cage and get out of the way?

What Paul understood is that the Corinthians didn’t understand was that the message of the cross proclaimed in the power of the Spirit accomplishes the work of God. The message is simple, but it is not weak. If you just let the lion out of the cage, it is strong enough to do the work.

Attempting to rely on human devices to proclaim the message is like trying to defend not just a lion, but the Lion of Judah. What you and I need to do is just let the lion out of the cage. We just need to get out of the way and let the Spirit work through us.

By humbling himself and getting out of the way, Paul’s preaching of the gospel was effective for God’s purposes because he was empowered by the Spirit. The haughty Corinthians looked to wisdom and eloquence, but those human devices are not powerful. Paul could not accomplish his work in Corinth from a spirit of self-sufficiency. He was humbly dependent on the power of the indwelling Spirit.

In spite of Paul’s unassuming manner, there was power in his preaching. Whenever he preached, a divine power gripped his hearers and drove them to repentance and faith in Christ Jesus. Yet because his preaching was so simple and unpretentious, the amazing results that were borne from his preaching could only be by the power of the Spirit of God.

Understand, brothers and sisters, that the Spirit of God is powerful enough that you don’t have to use the “right words” or use the “right methodology” to tell someone about Jesus. You don’t have to have a polished and slick presentation of the gospel. You don’t have to carry a Share Jesus Without Fear Bible in your back pocket. You don’t have to keep a tract with you. You don’t have to go door to door like you are peddling some product of the church. You aren’t called to be a slick talking salesman, convincing people with clever words to join the church.

You are called to be an ambassador of Christ. You are to represent Him and speak of Him in love to those around you. And you don’t have to worry about the right words because the Spirit will give you the right words to say. Matthew, Mark and Luke all record this saying of Jesus, but I will give you the reading from Matthew.

Matthew 10:16–20 CSB

16 “Look, I’m sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as serpents and as innocent as doves. 17 Beware of them, because they will hand you over to local courts and flog you in their synagogues. 18 You will even be brought before governors and kings because of me, to bear witness to them and to the Gentiles. 19 But when they hand you over, don’t worry about how or what you are to speak. For you will be given what to say at that hour, 20 because it isn’t you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father is speaking through you.

What you and I need to do is, like Paul and like Jesus, we need to humble ourselves and submit to God’s will. We must not be haughty and proud like the Corinthians, but demonstrate humility.

Keith Brooks said:

Humility does not consist simply in thinking cheaply of oneself, so much as in not thinking of oneself at all—and of Christ more and more.

We must humble ourselves and allow the Spirit of God to work through us to proclaim the message of the cross if we want to see people saved by the power of God.

1 Corinthians 2:5 CSB

5 so that your faith might not be based on human wisdom but on God’s power.

The Foundation of the Faithful

Richard Pratt writes:

Greek culture tended to rely on the worldly wisdom of its philosophers and rhetoricians. At this time, the Corinthian believers had begun to return to this cultural standard by exerting themselves in the church through human wisdom. In response, Paul pointed out that one of his central goals in his earlier preaching had been that they would build their lives on a new foundation, not on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.

Paul understood the difference between the works of the Spirit and the works of the flesh. He understood that works of the flesh did not produce godly disciples, but sought to make a name for oneself. He understood that if someone were swayed by human rhetoric or philosophy or emotional discourse that when someone more entertaining or someone more eloquent or someone more persuasive came along, they could be moved to follow that person or that person’s philosophy.

Preaching that depended on human logic and rhetoric for its effect could only produce a faith that was dependent on the same. Such a faith could vanish quickly. Human wisdom does not last. What is one day viewed to be correct is the next day viewed to be wrong.

I have been watching a documentary over the use of the atomic bomb at the end of WW2. What has been fascinating to me is how public opinion over the use of the bomb changed so dramatically over time. From the 40s and into the late 50s or early 60s, most people praised its use for ending the war. But in the 60s and 70s, many people began questioning its use. Some even asked if it made any difference. This particular documentary asserts that the Japanese didn’t really care about the bomb, but were more concerned with the Soviets entering the war against them. Regardless, today historians are fairly evenly split between its use. The use of the bomb was seen to be right, then wrong, and now we don’t know. Because human wisdom is fickle and incomplete.

But Paul’s argument to the Corinthians is that God’s way is better. Listen to the progression here.

1 Corinthians 1:25 CSB

25 because God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.

1 Corinthians 1:31 CSB

31 —in order that, as it is written: Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.

1 Corinthians 2:5 CSB

5 so that your faith might not be based on human wisdom but on God’s power.

Whereas human’s wisdom fades and changes, God’s wisdom endures forever. Paul’s goal in establishing the church was to give them a strong foundation. He wanted to ground them in the gospel of Christ by the power of God so that they could endure. It is only when you have faith God’s message and God’s power that your faith will continue. The power of the gospel, brought through the ministry of the Holy Spirit, was the foundation of the Corinthians’ Christian faith through Paul’s preaching.

Brothers and sisters, if we are proclaiming anything less than the unfiltered, unadulterated, uncensored gospel of Jesus by any power less than the power of the Spirit of God, we are setting a poor foundation. Listen to what the Apostle Peter said,

1 Peter 2:4–6 CSB

4 As you come to him, a living stone—rejected by people but chosen and honored by God—5 you yourselves, as living stones, a spiritual house, are being built to be a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6 For it stands in Scripture: See, I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and honored cornerstone, and the one who believes in him will never be put to shame.

Acts 4:11–12 CSB

11 This Jesus is the stone rejected by you builders, which has become the cornerstone. 12 There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to people by which we must be saved.”

If you have built your life on any other foundation, you must repent today. Repent and turn to Jesus, the Son of God, who was pierced for our transgressions, crushed because of our iniquities, who bore the punishment for our peace, and healed us by His wounds. Who offers to you the salvation of God for there is salvation in none other than Him.

Brothers and sisters, let us stand up in boldness and proclaim the wisdom of God, the sacrifice of Christ, as the only way to this salvation. Let us tell our families, our coworkers, and our friends the message of Jesus crucified. Let us do so, not by persuasive words of wisdom, not with eloquent speech, but by the Spirit of the Living God who dwells with us.

Let us pray and then we shall have a time of response to the message of the Lord. Would you bow with me?