What God Does with Fools

What God Does with Fools

“What God Does with Fools”

(1 Corinthians 1:26-31)

Series: Chaos & Correction (1 Corinthians)

Rev. Todd A. Linn, PhD

Henderson’s First Baptist Church, Henderson

 

  • Take your Bibles and join me in 1 Corinthians, chapter 1 (page 768; YouVersion).

 

We are continuing our study of 1 Corinthians, a verse-by-verse study of this book. This is what we do here: verse-by-verse expository preaching, believing it to be the best way to learn and teach the Bible.

 

Some of you are familiar with apps you can put on your phone to play music. iTunes Radio, Pandora radio, and Spotify is another. I like these apps because they allow you to select music you want and just play the stuff you like. You can customize your preferences and the app will even figure out what you like by the way you customize it and suggest only the music you like to hear. It’s pretty cool. But we should never treat the Bible that way. We dare not “customize” it, creating playlists of only the stuff we like, a verse here, a verse there. Rather, we allow all of the Bible to speak to us. We bow before the entirety of Scripture and allow all of it to speak to us, even the stuff we don’t like. So we study it and preach it verse-by-verse.

 

The first word in verse 26 is the word “for” which indicates that Paul is continuing an argument introduced in the previous section. He has been saying that God has chosen the foolishness of preaching as the very means by which He saves people, the means by which He brings people to Himself. This preaching is decisively cross-centered and therefore Christ-centered, and Gospel-centered. This message of the Gospel is at odds with the world’s notion of wisdom. By worldly standards, the preaching of the cross is considered foolish. But to those who are called by God, to those who are saved, the preaching of the cross means the preaching of Christ, Christ who is the power and wisdom of God.

 

Yet the world regards such things as “foolishness” so Paul argues that the so-called “foolishness of God” is wiser than man’s wisdom and he offers a case in point. He offers evidence of the working out of the foolishness of God in the folks who were gathered in Corinth to hear this letter being read to them.

 

And what Paul does now in verse 26 and following beginning with this small, introductory word, “For,” is to direct his hearers’ attention to themselves. He says, “You guys just look around at one another and you’ll see what I mean about God’s making foolish the wisdom of the world by choosing the least likely folks to save.”

 

So we look now at the folks who responded to God’s call to salvation. What does this church look like? Who comprises the Christian community at Corinth, these who responded to God’s call?

 

  • Please stand in honor of the reading of God’s Word.

 

26 For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called.

27 But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty;

28 and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are,

29 that no flesh should glory in His presence.

30 But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption—

31 that, as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.”

 

  • Pray.

 

Introduction:

 

When I was a freshman at Georgia State University, I pledged a fraternity that had a reputation for being “the fraternity for those who didn’t want to be in a fraternity.” It was an odd group of guys. Unlike the other fraternities known for their particular “brand,”–athletic prowess, social spirit, or academic excellence–our fraternity was like a society of misfits. We weren’t really known for anything. It’s not that we didn’t aspire to greatness or were underachievers or anything. It’s just that we were a group of men who were not particularly impressive or even strikingly popular. I mean, you know, we had one guy who was like “the jock” of our fraternity. So whenever we played intramural sports we always just threw the ball to him. We had another guy who was like “Mr. Social,” he was really popular, had a contagious laugh and spoke easily to everyone. We had another guy or two who were sort of bookish and intellectual. And then there was the rest of us. Most of us were just simple guys with simple backgrounds, nothing particularly impressive about our personality or pedigree.

 

Paul says the church is like that. I mean there are a few who are wise, mighty, and noble. But the vast majority of us are just plain Jane vanilla. We are, as one person described the church, we are nothing more than “a society of sinners who finally admitted it.”

 

With all this talk in Corinth about so-called wisdom and the so-called foolishness of God, this passage of Scripture describes what God does with fools like us. Paul reminds the church of her humble estate. This is important because Corinthian church members had become prideful, arrogant, and divisive. They had split up into cliques and factions. So Paul brings correction to the chaos in Corinth.

 

Here are a few things Paul says that apply not just to Corinthian church members but to Kentuckian church members. Number one:

 

I. Remember Your Former Condition (26)

 

Take a moment and remember who you were before you were saved. Remember your background, your position, your particular situation in life before you were called by God to follow Christ. Verse 26:

 

26 For you see your calling (or, consider your calling), brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh (by worldly standards), not many mighty, not many noble, are called.

 

The church consists of those who are, for the most part, plain ordinary folk with nothing special to offer by way of worldly standards. Paul says just look around at one another.

 

By the way, Paul’s not scoring any points here with the church, is he?! He’s not winning any friends here by telling the Corinthian church members to look around at one another and see how little they have to offer. I mean he wouldn’t be very popular by today’s standards of preaching.

 

He’s like, “You guys really don’t need me to tell you that the church is largely a society of misfits…just look around at each other! Look at you! You’ll note that God doesn’t call many who are wise, mighty, or noble–he calls people like you!”

 

Now, Paul doesn’t say that God does not call any wise, mighty, or noble. Rather, he says that God doesn’t call many wise, mighty, or noble. Don’t miss the tiny letter “m” there. It’s not that God does not call any, it’s that God does not call many. God calls some, some who are super-smart, and some who are great and influential, and some whose family background is weighty and impressive. God calls a few like these, but not many. Why?

 

Why does God call only few to salvation who may be regarded as impressive people by worldly standards? Why? The answer is found down in verse 29, “that no flesh should glory in His presence.” If the church consisted largely of the upper crust, the cream of the crop, the A-Team, the superstars, then God would be less likely to receive glory. The church would be congratulating themselves and patting themselves on the back for their personal achievement and impressive backgrounds.

 

But man is nothing without God. The prophet says in Isaiah 40, “All flesh is grass, and all its loveliness is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, because the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever (Isaiah 40:6-8).”

 

Isaiah is another preacher who wasn’t looking to score any points of favor with those who listened to his preaching! He’s like, “You all may look strong, healthy, beautiful, and attractive, but I’ll tell you what you are–you are grass, you will wither, God will blow upon you and you will wilt.”

 

Yet the American church is always trying to parade superstars before their congregations, spotlighting these few folks who have some notoriety by worldly standards. And they parade them out like they are the poster children for Christianity. But Paul says, “Don’t you get it? Only few by comparison are like that. God delights in using the foolish, the weak, and the common folks. You guys are his poster children!”

 

Jesus said in Luke 16:15, “That which is highly esteemed among men is an abomination in the sight of God.”

 

So when you become prideful and begin to think of yourselves as indispensable and impressive contributors to God’s kingdom, remember your former condition.

 

See the Corinthians were like the Kentuckians. They were like a lot of Christians. God calls Christians out of their former estate of sin and then they begin to learn stuff and grow and mature and then–because they still have that fallen nature–they begin to get a little arrogant and prideful. They’re proud of themselves for cleaning up and getting off drugs or alcohol. They start tithing, they’ve got a brand new Bible with highlighting throughout it, they listen to Christian music, they put Christian bumper stickers on their cars and they’re like, “Man, I’ve really grown! I’m somebody special!”

 

And they look around at others they feel are not nearly as spiritual as they. They look around at others and start criticizing, criticizing others, criticizing the church, criticizing everything. And Paul takes hold of them at the point of their self-exaltation and body-slams them back down to the canvass floor. He says, “You see your calling, brethren, not many wise folks are called, not many mighty and powerful, not many noble.” Remember where you were? Remember your former condition?

 

Later in chapter 4 Paul will ask, “What do you have that you did not receive? And since you received it, what do you boast as if you had not received it (1 Corinthians 4:7)?”

 

So remember that the sharing of the Gospel is often heard as “foolishness” by the world, by worldly standards. That shouldn’t surprise you when you share the Gospel with a friend this week in school or at work. The Gospel is often regarded as foolish by the world’s standards. Many of you used to feel the same way.

 

Remember your former condition. Secondly:

 

II. Reflect on Your Humble Election (27-29)

 

27 But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty;

28 and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are,

29 that no flesh should glory in His presence.

 

Paul is telling the Corinthians to reflect on their humble election.

 

Unfortunately wrong teaching and misunderstanding has caused far too many to nearly fall out of their pews at the very mention of the word election. Yet the doctrine is found throughout the Scriptures and is the natural way to speak of God’s choosing people to salvation. Paul uses the word at least three times in these verses: God has chosen.

 

This word “choose” or “chosen” is the same word Paul uses in Ephesians 1:4-5, where he says God “chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, 5 having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will.”

 

Before we were born God chose us. He saw us in our sin and in our rebellion and by virtue of His grace–and only because of His grace–did He choose us and set His favor upon us. It’s what Paul describes in Romans 11:5, “The election of grace.” God chose us before the foundation of the world.

 

Charles Spurgeon, “I’m so glad that God chose me before the foundation of the world, because he never would have chosen me after I was born!”

 

That’s the right response. That God chooses us before we were born reminds us we contribute nothing to the equation. God’s election of Christians is conditioned upon absolutely nothing they have to offer. He picks us, He chooses us, why? Because He loves us. We didn’t deserve it. We didn’t earn it.

 

It’s like a football coach picking people for his team without their ever once having performed or played. They’ve never thrown, passed, kicked, or run with a ball. They contribute nothing to his picking them. He just picks them. He picks them because he wants to.

 

Why did God choose me? Because He wanted to. It was not because I had something special to offer Him. He simply picked me because He set His favor upon me.

 

God’s choosing the foolish, the weak, the base, and the despised means Christians have no reason to boast. We cannot boast of our pedigree, our ancestry, our accomplishments, our achievements, our even our affiliation with one preacher or another, “I am of Paul, I am of Apollos.” Paul says, “You are of nothing!”

 

God chooses the “things which are not to bring to nothing the things that are.” The whole point of God’s choosing the unlikely and the unimpressive is to preclude any notion of human boasting.

 

Human boasting was hard to avoid in a congregation thoroughly immersed in a self-congratulatory society. The Ancient Greeks loved to boast. Humility was considered weakness. It’s the same today in our American society, especially in what we call the “dog-eat-dog” culture of the successful business model. Embellish your resumé, show off your skills, network your influence. Worldly success appeals to our human pride.

 

It’s particularly unsettling when that kind of behavior creeps into the church. Much of what passes for Christian preaching in our culture appeals to our human pride. Much of what passes for Christian books appeals to our human pride. The focus is on your personal greatness, your inner strength and your special significance.

 

So preaching that tells us to find our inner greatness and to harness the power within sounds really good to us because again, it appeals to our prideful notions of self-achievement and self-attainment. “You can do it!” and so forth.

 

But the Gospel is “Your CAN’T do it.” The Gospel is, “You Don’t Deserve it.” The Gospel is a blow to our self-esteem. The Gospel is, “Come like a child, come with empty hands, come with humility, come humbly.”

 

So the key to Christian preaching and teaching and good Christian books is determined by the object of its focus. Is the focus on the greatness of man or the greatness of the cross?

 

The same is true for churches that gather for worship or gather to carry out the church’s mission. Is the focus on the greatness of the church? “Look everyone at what we have done! Call the newspaper, summon the news anchor, post it on social media for the world to see.” Is the focus on the greatness of the church or is the focus on the greatness of the cross and the God who took on flesh and died there?

 

In the words of Isaac Watts:

 

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,

Save in the death of Christ my God!

All the vain things that charm me most,

I sacrifice them to His blood.

 

Remember your former condition. Reflect on your humble election. Thirdly:

 

III. Rejoice in Your Unearned Position (30-31)

 

30 But of Him you are in Christ Jesus (there is your unearned position: “of Him you are in Christ Jesus), who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption—

31 that, as it is written (in the Old Testament Book of Jeremiah), “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.”

 

The New King James is a bit confusing here. It reads as though Christ were Himself these things–righteousness and sanctification and redemption. But the idea is that Christ is wisdom and because our unearned position is “in Christ Jesus,” because we are “united with Christ” then we also receive the unearned blessings of righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.

 

It is a position wholly undeserved, unmerited, and unearned. If we earned the blessings of righteousness, sanctification, and redemption ourselves then we would boast about it. But in Christ God does for us what we could not do ourselves: In Christ we have righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, so “that,”–verse 31, “that, as it is written, ‘He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.’”

 

God alone receives praise and glory for what He alone can do: give to us righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.

 

In Christ we receive righteousness, freely credited to us to make us fit for heaven, to stand before God with our sins covered. In Christ we have sanctification, growth in this life that frees us from the power of sin, freeing us from the power of addiction, shame, guilt, and ungodliness. And in Christ we have redemption, God’s gift to free us from the penalty of sin. In a word, we have salvation. And it all comes by way of the Christian’s unearned position, to be forever “in Christ Jesus.”

 

Do you know of God’s forgiveness? Are you positionally secure “in Christ Jesus?” He is your only hope to be freed from the penalty of sin, the power of sin, and the presence of sin. To be “in Christ Jesus” is the only way to avoid sin, death, hell, and the grave.

 

Come to Christ today and be saved.

 

  • Stand for prayer.

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