Illuminstion: How the Gospel Destroys Theological Pride

Messy Church - 1 Corinthians  •  Sermon  •  Submitted
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A person must receive the Holy Spirit if they are going to understand and believe the gospel.

Notes
Transcript
If you have your Bibles, please open them to 1 Cor 2
Tonight, we are continuing our time in our through one of Paul’s letters to the Corinthian church in our series that I am calling ‘Messy Church’. Now the Corinthian church was arguably the most dysfunctional and messy church that we hear about in the Bible. None the less, the Corinthians were still a part of the family of God who had been redeemed by Jesus’ work on the cross.
You see, the Bible is not shy when it comes to pointing out people’s sin, even when those people are a part of the church. But it’s not just the Corinthian church that gets messy because of sin.
As we go through this series, I want us all to see that every church, including our church, can be quite messy. This is because every church is full of sinners who are being saved by grace. And the sins that we see in the Corinthian church, are often the very same sins that we see happening in the church today.
Last week, we looked at the first of four major problems that Paul addressed in 1 Corinthians - that being division…
As we continue our time tonight in chapter two, we will see how Paul continues to address this divisive problem by getting the root of what is causing division among the Corinthians. What was producing division among the church was a kind of theological pride as they debated who was the wisest and most powerful preacher.
With this in mind, let’s hear how Paul addresses the Corinthian’s theological pride.
As we do, please stand for the reading of God’s word.
1 Corinthians 2:1–5 ESV
1 And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. 2 For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. 3 And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, 4 and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
Let’s pray.

Illumination intro

Illumination is a word that simply means that the lights have been turned on.
We understand, that when we lose something in the dark, we must fist turn on the lights to illuminate what is hidden before we begin searching for that what is lost.
If something, or someone goes missing in the middle of the night out in the woods where there are no lights, we are going to be greatly helped by the illumination of daylight so that we might find that which is missing.
It is the illumination from our headlights on our cars that makes it possible for us to drive in the dark
It is the light on our porch that welcomes people into our home when it is dar so they don’t trip on their way in the house
It is the light in this room that makes it possible for you to see me and for me to see you
But if we were left in the dark, we would left trying to feel around with our hands to make sense of all that is around us. Can you imagine living in utter darkness and trying to make sense of the world? It would be difficult to say the least.
But illumination is also the word we use to describe the work of the Holy Spirit when he reveals the gospel to us!
When the Spirit reveals the gospel, it is like he turns on the light in our darkness so we might rightly see and recognize Jesus for all that he is.
It is the Spirit who transforms our perspective on the message of the cross from that of utter foolishness to that of wisdom, power, and life
Without the work of the Spirit, we would be left in utter darkness trying to make sense of the Bible, and the message of the gospel… Without the Holy Spirit’s work of illumination, we would never believe in Jesus and we would never be saved.
For without the Holy Spirit, our search for God would be as effective as driving on the highway in the dark without any headlights
Without the illuminating work of the Spirit, our ability to delight in the gospel would be like trying to enjoy an art museum in pitch black
Finding a needle in a haystack in absolute darkness would be far more probable than a person loving Jesus apart from the illuminating work of the Holy Spirit.
For without the Spirit, we would never and could never believe in the gospel.
Remember, the Corinthians are divided due to their theological pride, and with this in mind Paul writes:
1 Corinthians 2:1–2 ESV
1 And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. 2 For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.
When Paul speaks of lofty speech or wisdom… he is referring to that which the Corinthians were boasting about back in chapter 1…
Remember, the church was divided over who the best preacher was… be it Paul, Apollos, Peter, and others even using Jesus himself as the greatest preacher with the most power and wisdom…
While division is in the church is what Paul is focusing on, the other problem that is accompanied with this divisiveness is that of pride… pride over who has the most wisdom and insight into the things of God…
Paul counters this theological pride saying, he didn’t come with lofty speech… he didn’t come to wow them with his vast knowledge, or he eloquent style of speaking…
Rather, he said, he came so that they would know Jesus Christ and him crucified! That was all Paul sought to do! He wanted the Corinthians to know Jesus! He wanted them to hear the gospel… he wanted them to be saved… and the means of salvation was not through the best speeches, rather the means of salvation was and has always been by hearing and believing the gospel.
Paul continues in v 3
1 Corinthians 2:3–5 ESV
3 And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, 4 and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
Okay, so Paul didn’t come with wisdom from the world, but was he powerful? Paul says, no! Paul didn’t have some big personality that drew people to himself… he didn’t have the rhetoric or eloquence that the Greeks loved…
Rather, Paul came in unimpressive weakness
Furthermore, as he preached, Paul says his message wasn’t one of plausibility… the deffiniton of the word plausible is that of an argument or statement that seems reasonable or possible…
Paul’s aim in preaching the gospel was not to try to convince them of Jesus’ life death and resurrection by demonstrating the gospel using plausible wisdom… meaning he didn’t try to reason with them using mundane human ideas…
I mean really… can prove to me that Jesus is the Son of God… can you do that?
Prove to me using debates and arguments that Jesus lived a sinless life and died in my place… Can you prove it to me?
Prove to me that faith in Jesus saves me from eternal death… can you convince anyone of such a truth?
Listen, we believe in an eternal God who put on flesh so that he could die in our place only to be raised on the third day… and all who believe in him will have eternal life. These words are not plausible words of wisdom…
But Paul didn’t leave the Corinthians without a kind of proof of that which he preached rather, Paul said, he came in the demonstration of the Spirit and of power…
What does this mean? Well, consider all the powerful miracles that Paul did… Paul is saying this… all those signs and wonders that were not normal or natural in the created world, were given to the Corinthians and to us to demonstrate the power of God to do all thing. The point of these demonstrations was not to focus on Paul’s power or greatness… the point of such signs was to demonstrate the power of God
The function of these signs and wonders, Paul says, was so that our faith would not rest in the wisdom of men, but the power of God.
This is what I want us to see:

1. Gospel proclamation does not need to be accompanied by worldly wisdom or power.

The Corinthians were drawn by wisdom and power…
and they were even divided over this
And the same thing can happen in the church today …
You see,
We love big movements
we are drawn by passionate speakers
We follow those who a head taller than every other person in the room
We love worldly wisdom and power
At my last church, I would take our youth group to large camps and conferences multiple times a year…
and these conferences would hire amazing worship bands to lead the conference in singing, and they would bring in world class speakers to preach…
And the results were often times the same … students would be drawn by the preachers charismatic personalities and powerful stories… and students would worship and sing with more passion than they did all year at church…
but there was a huge problem with the newfound passion that the students recieved from these retreats…
First of all, the increased passion was not from the gospel as often times the preachers never mentioned the name of Jesus let alone preaching Jesus Christ and him crucified
And furthermore, any passion that the students had for Jesus at camp would shortly disappear once we returned back to the regular rhythms of church life back home. Sure they would be exited about church for a short wile, but a week later, or perhaps a month after they came home many of them would return back to their old way of living.
The passion they had was much like the excitement of going to Disneyland
or feeling when you get when you make it to the end of the school year…
or thrill of you might get when your team goes to the Super Bowl…
They were hyped at first, but with time, their passion for Jesus faded into nothing.
Such an emotional experience displayed by any person does not necessarily mean that they have a genuine and saving faith
Hear me out, if your love for Jesus is manufactured by hype and excitement rater than the truth of the gospel… then your faith is one that has been produced by man and not by God. If your faith is produced by a person’s hype, then your faith is resting in the wrong person… for your faith is resting in man, and his ability to whip you into a passionate frenzy. Let this not be so of us. Instead let our faith rest in God, and his power rather than in the power and wisdom of any preacher.
Paul continues in v 6:
1 Corinthians 2:6–7 ESV
6 Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. 7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory.
While Paul has been saying that he did not come with wisdom or power, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t wisdom or power found in the gospel…
The power that Paul spoke of in v4-5 comes from God…
And the wisdom that he preaches, is a hidden wisdom that is not from this world, for it is a wisdom that comes from God.
It is a wisdom that has always been,
for Paul says, God decreed this wisdom before the ages for our glory… meaning, that God had written and fix the events of the gospel to take place before time even began...
But the thing is, this wisdom that is found in the gospel, was hidden for ages, and continues to remain hidden from those who are wise and powerful in the world.
Paul continues:
1 Corinthians 2:8–9 ESV
8 None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 But, as it is written, “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him”—
Paul is saying, those who killed Jesus, did not recognize who he was, and the demonstration of their inability to recognize Jesus was evident when they killed him on the cross.
Then Paul quotes the prophet Isaiah saying
No eye or ear has seen or heard the gospel
Nor could man have ever imagine what God’s plan of salvation would be
No one could have imagined that God would send his only Son to die in the place every sinner who loves him! Who could imagine such a strange and wonderful plan salvation?
What is the point of all of this?

2. The gospel is a hidden wisdom that no person can ever find on their own.

God’s gospel plan has always been…
God didn’t try everything that he could think of to save sinners throughout the OT just to have finally gotten it right when he sent his Son Jesus to die on the cross… rather from the very beginning of time, God had planned the gospel to take place. And when we step back,
we see the gospel woven throughout the entirety of the Old Testament
from the very beginning of creation and even right after the fall, it was God’s plan to send his son to crush Satan’s head
We see foreshadows of the gospel in God’s covenant with a man named Abram who was among the Babylonians who had just sinned against God. It would through this man’s children all the world would be blessed and we see ultimately Jesus would come from Abram’s family
We see the gospel displayed when God delivered Israel from their Egyptian slavery, for they were captive to the most powerful nation and they were utterly helpless. That was, until God delivered them by the strength of his power and all the while Israel did nothing to have earned their deliverance
We see the gospel displayed when God lead Israel into the promised land. For God sustained them for 40 years, and fed them, and blessed them, even though they repeatedly sinned against God.
We see the gospel even when God give Israel judges, prophets and kings… For time and time again, God would correct and punish, and protect Israel from sinning against him.
and even when Israel did sin, we see the gospel displayed in God’s punishment to Israel when he sent them into exile. But God did not leave them there, for he made a promise to deliver them again from their captivity.
Over and over and over again, the OT was always pointing to Jesus Christ and him crucified, but the strange thing is this:
until Jesus lived, died, and rose again, no one could have imagined that God would deliver his people by sending his Son to die in their place.
If you spent your whole life, reading the Bible, and having it taught to you by the very best teachers, it is possible that the wisdom and power of the gospel could remain hidden from you. It is possible for the riches truths to appear to any person to be utter foolishness.
There is no better example of this than what we find with the apostle Paul himself.
Paul was a Pharisee, which meant he spent his whole life studying the OT Scriptures and working to obey God.
How many of you are 12 or older?
Consider this for a moment, Paul, and all the other Pharisees like him, would have memorized first five books of the Bible by the time they were 12 years old.
Paul had a lot of knowledge, and wisdom… he was passionate about the Scriptures, and had a zeal to serve the Lord… and in his zeal, Paul and the other pharisees killed Jesus and persecuted the church, for they did not recognize the beauty of Jesus or the magnificence of the message of the cross.
That was, until God knocked Paul to the ground and revealed himself to Paul as the risen Jesus. In that moment, Paul was made physically blind until God caused something like scales fall from Paul’s eyes so he could see clearly the beauty of Jesus Christ and all that he did to save his people from their sins.
The once persecuting Pharisee was made a preaching apostle… But this didn’t happen because Paul was wise, or because he was powerful or because anyone else debated him into the Christian faith. Rather Paul was saved all because Jesus revealed himself to Paul.
This is the testimony of every person believes in Jesus, for we were once blind, and unable to recognize Jesus. But then God, by his grace, opened our blind eyes so that we could behold the wisdom and power of God that was put on display in the message of the cross.
This is what Paul goes on to say as he continues writing in in v 10
1 Corinthians 2:10–11 ESV
10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.
God revealed the secret things of the gospel to those who believe in him by the work his Spirit.
And Paul illustrates how this works by comparing God’s hidden wisdom to the hidden thoughts of any person…
Play this out for a moment… do you know what I’m thinking right now?
Of course not…
Even my own wife who knows me best likely has no idea what I am thinking about right now…
Just as you can’t know my thoughts, so too you cannot know the thoughts of God. But there is one who does know the thoughts of God, that is the Spirit of God. And when we believe in Jesus… when we recognize the hidden wisdom of God and the power of God that was put on display when Jesus was hung on the cross… when that message becomes to us life, and beauty, and sweeter than honey and richer than all the riches that the world could ever offer us… when that we see Jesus like that, it is owing to the Spirit of God who has revealed the hidden wisdom of God that is found in the gospel.
Paul continues:
1 Corinthians 2:12–13 ESV
12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. 13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.
How to we understand this hidden wisdom…
we hear the preached word…
We here the message of Jesus Christ and him crucified
that’s what Paul means when he says “we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom...”
We understand the hidden wisdom when of God we hear the preached word… but the best preacher does not give spiritual life. For what is needed for you to have life is the Sprit of God to breath on your spiritually dead body so that what was once nothing but a pile of dust might come to new life…
So when the gospel is preached, and word is accompanied with the life giving Spirit of God… then and only then does a person have saving faith.
1 Corinthians 2:14 ESV
14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
What does a person need in order to be saved…
they need to hear the word of the cross… but they also need the Spirit of God!
If the word is preached, but the Spirit does not move… there will be no faith in the gospel and there will be no eternal life
If even now, I speak all that is true and right concerning the gospel, but God does not show up and do a work in your heart or my heart… we will all remain dead in our sins
We can prepare the best sermons
the best defence of the Christian faith
and we can even be motivated by the most genuine love for those who are not saved…
but if God’s Spirit does not move in the hearts of our hearers, they will reject the gospel and remain dead in their sins.
But that’s not what happened to us who love Jesus and believe in the gospel…
1 Corinthians 2:15–16 ESV
15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. 16 “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
What is the point of all of this?

3. We who believe the gospel do so because we have received God’s Spirit.

This is what we call the Spirit’s work of illumination.
Do you understand what I am saying?
Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, who is eternal, having no beginning or ending, who stepped into time and space and took on human form while never giving up his divinity?
Do you know that you have been washed, justified, and made perfect not because of your works, but because of the perfect work of Jesus’ sinless life, his innocent death, and resurrection from the grave?
Do you believe the gospel, not because you have the physical proof of the resurrection, nor because you have felt the wounds of Jesus’ hands and feet, but because you simply have faith to believe without seeing?
If so, your faith is not simply owing to a parent who raised you right
nor your faith the result of a preacher who explained the gospel with great power, and wisdom…
and your faith isn’t simply a means of the gospel message being proven to you in plausible and irrefutable debates
If you believe these things, it is because God, by his Spirit has given you new life, he has opened your eyes, and he has given you second birth. When you realize that your faith is owing to the Holy Spirit’s work of illuminating the message of the gospel so that you might believe, you loose all pride that you might have had in your wisdom or strength to believe.
So what do we have to boast in?
Let it not be in our power, our wisdom, or even our faith… but let it be in the Lord
For he was the one who planned the gospel from be beginning of time
He was the one who lived perfectly, died innocently, and rose victoriously from the grave.
And he is the one who has illuminated the truth of the gospel so we might believe.
To this end, let us pray and ask the Lord to help us to hear these words, to believe them, and trust in him.
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