back to index2015-05-14 1 Corinthians Bible Study Week 4
00:00:00.000 |
So if you turn in your Bibles to chapter 1 and then we look at verse 10, this is where 00:00:15.720 |
And he said, "Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that 00:00:19.280 |
you all agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you may be complete in 00:00:29.480 |
And the next section in verse 18, he said, "For the word of the cross is foolishness 00:00:34.320 |
to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God." 00:00:41.160 |
And I made the case to you last week that Apostle Paul is presenting an argument saying 00:00:46.400 |
the gospel that we have is superior, it's greater, it's profound. 00:00:52.380 |
And in so doing, you realize he is exhorting them to be united because the gospel already 00:01:01.200 |
The gospel has already divided all of mankind into two categories, those who are perishing 00:01:07.720 |
And so we are those who are being saved, bound together by this gospel truth, this wisdom 00:01:15.720 |
We can't have this kind of division amongst us. 00:01:18.920 |
And in so doing, he started to mention that perhaps you guys are divided, and this is 00:01:24.240 |
the case I made last time was, you guys are divided because underneath this, "Hey, I'm 00:01:29.240 |
of Paulus, I'm of Paul, I'm of Jesus only," that kind of thing, underneath all this is 00:01:38.740 |
So he desires to attack and challenge their worldview, their scheme of how they value 00:01:47.200 |
So in review of last time, the very first, I guess, section that I want to read is verse 00:01:58.360 |
So after he says this, "For it is written, 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and 00:02:03.320 |
the cleverness of the clever I will set aside.' 00:02:10.600 |
Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?" 00:02:14.600 |
And I made the first point, which is, the wisdom of God is permanent. 00:02:19.480 |
From that verse, you recognize he's saying, "Where are all these wise people? 00:02:32.340 |
Number two, in the next section, I'm not going to read it for us, but Apostle Paul says, 00:02:38.960 |
As a matter of fact, I used the adjective limitless. 00:02:48.240 |
And the flip side of that is, those who are of worldly philosophy, those who are of worldly 00:02:57.560 |
They are powerless in the wisdom that they offer. 00:03:00.920 |
Because their wisdom truly, it's contradictory. 00:03:06.780 |
Their wisdom is sometimes disconnected all of its own. 00:03:10.360 |
And so he says, "The cross, the gospel of Jesus, overcomes all human wisdom." 00:03:16.320 |
Now, the train of thought that I wanted to rehearse with you in going through this was 00:03:26.520 |
They're fighting obviously because they're trying to one up each other in pride. 00:03:41.680 |
They're trying to one up each other with their pride and arrogance, and that always causes 00:03:48.320 |
And in so thinking, Paul presents the gospel and says, "You need to be gospel-minded. 00:03:51.960 |
You need to be having the worldview that God wants you to have in addressing this situation." 00:03:59.880 |
But in so doing, the connection between the previous verses that we're reading and then 00:04:04.960 |
the connection between the passage that we just read and you guys talked about is this. 00:04:10.840 |
Apostle Paul uses the church as an example of God's wisdom, and he uses the example of 00:04:18.720 |
God's calling, God's salvation calling of them. 00:04:22.360 |
So let's read it again, because I always benefit in reading something multiple times. 00:04:28.280 |
In verse 26 through 31, it says, "For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not 00:04:35.400 |
many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, but God has chosen 00:04:40.120 |
the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of 00:04:44.560 |
the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world, and the 00:04:49.560 |
despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that he may nullify the things that 00:04:54.400 |
are, so that no man may boast before God, but by his doing you are in Christ Jesus, 00:04:59.960 |
who became to us wisdom from God and righteousness, sanctification and redemption, so that just 00:05:05.720 |
as it is written, 'Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.'" 00:05:12.400 |
So as we begin this section, I would like for us to start jotting down some of the things 00:05:19.760 |
He calls the church to consider their calling, and really if you think about their calling, 00:05:26.720 |
it's their calling as his general salvation, the call of God, you know? 00:05:32.320 |
And as he asks them to think about it, he doesn't necessarily ask them just to think 00:05:36.600 |
about the calling itself, he's gonna ask them to think about that a little later. 00:05:39.960 |
He asks them to think about themselves, when they were called, their personal circumstance. 00:05:48.360 |
So letter A is just consider yourself when you were called, and this is also for us in 00:05:53.560 |
our Bible study, consider yourself when you were called, right? 00:05:58.200 |
Letter B, what's the first description that you see? 00:06:11.000 |
Sorry, I laughed 'cause I heard, "Stupid, stupid." 00:06:19.160 |
That they were not wise, and he is talking about actual education. 00:06:23.880 |
Education was not like today where, yeah, if you wanna get a job, you get educated, 00:06:27.400 |
so everybody who wants a job is gonna get educated. 00:06:33.680 |
To have a mentor, to have a disciple, to have a educator above you, that must have meant 00:06:58.680 |
And that's really talking about the idea of influential, like you have no sway on people. 00:07:04.760 |
You have no power in the sense that you have no control over anybody. 00:07:17.120 |
And that one, he's talking about birth order, actually. 00:07:22.960 |
There is a sense in which, obviously, in our day and age, here and now, we don't have this 00:07:28.120 |
kind of culture, but if you've seen any of the TV shows or movies from the past, a vast 00:07:34.060 |
majority of history functioned where you were born into a certain class. 00:07:39.340 |
As a matter of fact, if you're Korean, and you know of the Korean culture, even back 00:07:43.100 |
50 years ago, there were the noblemen and then there were your peasant people. 00:07:59.740 |
And so, Paul's looking at them, saying, "So, how many of you guys are like, noblemen?" 00:08:06.860 |
There were some people who were higher class, so to speak, or more powerful. 00:08:09.900 |
Remember, I talked about there was a gentleman who got saved earlier on, Stephanus? 00:08:14.380 |
He's the one who was kind of leader of the synagogue in Corinth, okay? 00:08:18.700 |
So there were people who were reputable, people who were powerful, but the vast majority, 00:08:23.660 |
he says, "You guys really weren't that impressive." 00:08:26.460 |
Now, I ask this question, "Would you have been offended by this?" 00:08:33.220 |
And the reason why I ask this question is because, did you notice how earlier, he was 00:08:38.700 |
talking about doctrinally, how important the gospel is? 00:08:43.700 |
But as soon as we begin this section, what changes? 00:08:53.180 |
He's not talking about the unimpressedness of the gospel. 00:08:56.420 |
He's talking about the unimpressedness of the people. 00:09:04.860 |
What you find is, he's actually having them think about themselves in light of the gospel, 00:09:11.860 |
but more specifically, when God called them, when God drew them, what was their condition? 00:09:19.060 |
If they are, as we began, in this battle to see who can outdo one another in honor, reputation, 00:09:26.300 |
respect, if they can outdo each other in kind of the accolades, or even just the name dropping 00:09:31.140 |
of the association that they have, he's getting a bit personal and says, "Look at you. 00:09:40.100 |
And Apostle Paul does that, and there's a sense in which, I guess, if you were reading 00:09:45.380 |
this, you could potentially get really offended. 00:09:47.980 |
Just call me, like he's a stupid, you know, weak, and just all around unimpressive." 00:09:55.660 |
And I want, you know, we have to think about that for a little bit, because there's a sense 00:09:59.380 |
in which, let's say some of us in here are not that, as in, you're really smart, and 00:10:05.820 |
you have a lot of power because maybe you're like a higher up in your company, and you 00:10:09.860 |
have a lot of possessions, and people just find you quite noble and respectable, and 00:10:14.780 |
The fact of the matter is, as a Christian, you either recognize that you're in that position 00:10:24.620 |
before, or you know very well that as a Christian, as you're adopted into Christ's household, 00:10:32.140 |
that's how you're going to look to the rest of the world. 00:10:34.980 |
So it's not just the doctrines that are unimpressive to the world, it's the people, right? 00:10:43.740 |
Moving forward, though, in the next section, he gives a contrast, and he says, "So you 00:10:49.700 |
guys think you are like this, because you guys obviously are trying to fight for positions, 00:10:55.180 |
or fight for reputation, but the fact of the matter is," he says in verse 27, "that God 00:11:00.860 |
has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the 00:11:04.540 |
weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the 00:11:08.780 |
world, and the despised God has chosen the things that are not, so that he may nullify 00:11:14.980 |
the things that are, so that no man may boast before God." 00:11:20.780 |
What I'd like you guys to do for a moment is, there on your papers, please try to underline 00:11:27.220 |
as many purpose statements that you can find. 00:11:30.700 |
I count four, or actually I wrote it in there, sorry. 00:11:33.540 |
Please underline the four purpose statements in verses 27 through 29. 00:11:38.220 |
And if you're done with that, please circle the descriptions of the kinds of people he 00:12:02.580 |
So purpose statement, purpose statement is stuff when you see like, "so that," "in 00:12:08.140 |
order to," sometimes they leave out the "in order" and you find just the preposition 00:12:14.820 |
So you find, "this is what he did," and you ask why, and he reveals to you what he 00:12:19.620 |
was aiming at, and there you have your purpose statement. 00:12:26.300 |
And there's a specific reason why I ask first why, before having you identify what. 00:13:02.260 |
Okay, so table to my left with Isaac, John, and John. 00:13:18.260 |
First purpose statement is, "to shame the wise." 00:13:29.500 |
Second one is, "shame the strong," right in front of me with Chris and Andy. 00:13:38.500 |
The third one is, "to nullify the things that are," and the third one, this table 00:13:53.060 |
So you see what he's doing, and sometimes stuff like this really is kind of surprising 00:14:00.500 |
to me, I guess, because you know, we typically have a notion of God as like, he's always 00:14:04.860 |
wanting to relent, which is true, but then you realize he's doing things, this is the 00:14:10.420 |
way he functions, like this is the way he operates as God. 00:14:15.300 |
He is shaming people, he is nullifying the things that are, and he's making sure people 00:14:23.460 |
And remember, at the very beginning of this study, I said, I found it really kind of shocking 00:14:28.460 |
and a bit like, again, enlightening, when God said from the Old Testament, ever since 00:14:33.940 |
then, that he is not only going to, you know, not regard the wisdom of man, but what was 00:14:44.780 |
And so, one can legitimately ask the question, why would God go to this extent to shame people? 00:14:55.380 |
And just put them down so that they never, like, you know, is God that kind of fearful 00:14:59.100 |
God where he's like, don't you dare toot your little horn in front of me, and he gets all 00:15:03.340 |
angry and he's like, bam, and he always squashes people? 00:15:05.340 |
I mean, is that the kind of picture of God we want to have because of these verses? 00:15:13.700 |
Well, we noticed, as you guys circle, we noticed the people of the world who thought 00:15:27.140 |
They thought they were, that they're something. 00:15:31.020 |
And scripture even says it in the almost verbatim, stop thinking you're something when you're 00:15:39.420 |
And what I find really interesting about the way God operates is he always gives just desserts. 00:15:50.260 |
And letter B, I write, the principle of God on how he works, he gives just desserts. 00:15:56.060 |
And this is something that I've noticed from Genesis. 00:16:02.340 |
This is something that I noticed through the kings, something I noticed through even the 00:16:06.460 |
New Testament, and something that I noticed even in the end times. 00:16:11.460 |
Right now it's kind of interesting because I've been studying Genesis and Revelation 00:16:14.340 |
at the same time and I see this principle working. 00:16:17.440 |
God is not a God who irrationally reacts to stuff. 00:16:22.660 |
Sometimes for us, we go overboard, somebody does something like make fun of a body part 00:16:28.420 |
on you, people tend to make fun of my hands a lot, and then you overreact. 00:16:35.500 |
Never talking to you again, all that kind of stuff. 00:16:38.180 |
Well God is not a God who just overreacts because he's temperamental. 00:16:42.860 |
God is not a God who says, "Oh no, no, no, don't you dare be proud in front of me," and 00:16:46.500 |
just squashes it because he's that kind of angry God. 00:16:54.060 |
For example, a lot of the punishment that God gives to people matches their sin. 00:17:08.180 |
You know, Eve, it says that God said that Eve is going to have this desire for her husband 00:17:16.100 |
But then the punishment that he gave Eve right after he says that is what? 00:17:26.260 |
And even to the man, there's a sense in which both man and woman together, and mankind, 00:17:40.060 |
"Let me remind you, you're going back to the dust." 00:17:44.260 |
There's this kind of just desserts that happens throughout scripture all the time. 00:17:48.460 |
When people are prideful and they want to boast about all they've done, what does God 00:17:57.380 |
There are people who think, "I am more than what I really am." 00:18:04.620 |
Nullify in the Greek literally means to make nothing. 00:18:10.140 |
So the way that that part in the Greek reads is like those that are something are going 00:18:15.540 |
And so what happens is God is a God who functions in this way where he always gives just desserts. 00:18:26.180 |
He says, "I'm going to shame and bring you down to nothing." 00:18:29.180 |
So for this, I feel like there's a point for us to take home. 00:18:41.380 |
Because we realize truly if we are tempted to go toot our horn, if we are tempted more 00:18:48.860 |
practically and more relevantly to this passage, to compare ourselves with other people in 00:18:53.180 |
our church and start playing this comparison game. 00:18:59.220 |
Where if you name drop, then I'm going to name drop. 00:19:01.620 |
If you talk about how much Bible you know, then I'm going to talk about how much Bible 00:19:05.820 |
Or whatever it may be in the church that we sometimes struggle with. 00:19:10.820 |
Realize that the way God operates is he is going to do the opposite of what you're trying 00:19:15.580 |
Here you are trying to accomplish a name and reputation for yourself. 00:19:25.020 |
Still you realize, I mean, when it comes to the issue of pride in our hearts, we truly 00:19:33.340 |
I put that application, we recognize that God operates in this way which challenges 00:19:45.500 |
This is where I would like to have you guys just do one of those self-evaluating moments. 00:19:51.980 |
Are there ways in me where I wish I was something more, when as a matter of fact, God is blessing 00:20:01.460 |
What I mean by that is, there are many times when I think I wish I was more. 00:20:05.180 |
I think and I daydream and I fantasize that I wish I was more. 00:20:09.580 |
I've shared this with you guys multiple times, so this is an old example. 00:20:18.740 |
Pastor Aaron came over to my house one time and we were reading together. 00:20:22.540 |
He finished a small book about this size, this typical reading book like that in about 00:20:33.260 |
He leaned over and he was kind of like, he didn't say anything. 00:20:36.620 |
Then another time I was reading with James Hong and he noticed how slow I was reading 00:20:40.380 |
and he was kind of like, "You got to move on, brother. 00:20:46.900 |
I actually took a reading class where I learned how to use a pen, like a marker thing, and 00:20:50.740 |
then go underneath the lines and how to maximize your time by holding the page with your finger 00:20:57.580 |
already by the time you get to the bottom of the page so you can quickly turn and move 00:21:03.220 |
I've been learning all this stuff, but there are a lot of times when I just sit there and 00:21:09.300 |
The reason why I share that with you is because the problem isn't the smarts. 00:21:16.620 |
Being smart, obviously, is not what God requires as a criteria for being a good follower of 00:21:25.220 |
And being dumb necessarily is not what he is saying that he is going to bless. 00:21:31.780 |
Yes, I'm going to make a point of that really quickly. 00:21:34.820 |
But the fact of the matter is, whether really slow in reading or fast in reading or really, 00:21:47.380 |
But the person who sits there thinking that is going to make him more than he is, there 00:21:53.740 |
The person who sits there making much of smarts because he thinks that's his answer, there 00:22:01.660 |
The person who thinks, "I wish I was a little taller, baller," all that stuff, the person 00:22:08.340 |
who's making a lot of that, that's the problem. 00:22:12.180 |
God is not saying, "Try to be dumb, ignoble, and all that, then I'm going to bless you." 00:22:20.220 |
God is saying, "The problem is you think those things are the criteria that make you better 00:22:30.300 |
And so for us, we're just reminded of this fact. 00:22:34.740 |
Ephesians chapter two, we don't have to turn there, but I want to ask you a question. 00:22:39.940 |
What kind of people did he choose according to Ephesians chapter two? 00:22:54.620 |
In chapter two later he says you were foreigners, you were strangers, completely like exiled 00:23:05.540 |
So even if you think, "Oh, I'm low," you're not thinking low enough. 00:23:13.420 |
There's a sense in which the people of the time had to empty themselves of their own 00:23:18.180 |
wisdom and self-worth in order to truly gain the wisdom of God and the worth that God was 00:23:26.100 |
There had to be a renouncing of their own wisdom, their own accolade and smarts and 00:23:31.580 |
And so the passage I have there, this Jeremiah one is really cool and I think we should, 00:23:37.020 |
if you guys can devote to memorizing that one, that's a good one. 00:23:40.460 |
Jeremiah chapter nine verse 24, "But let him who boasts, boast of this, that he understands 00:23:46.860 |
and knows me, that I am the Lord who exercises loving kindness, justice and righteousness 00:23:51.700 |
on earth, for I delight in these things, declares the Lord." 00:23:57.300 |
And right before this in Jeremiah he says, "Let not the mighty man boast in his might. 00:24:15.940 |
And he says, "The way God is operating is giving just desserts, but know that God has 00:24:22.220 |
designed it so no one is going to boast before God. 00:24:26.460 |
No one is going to blow his horn in front of God. 00:24:30.260 |
Every single instrument is going to be for the worship of God. 00:24:32.620 |
In the presence of the Lord, no man is going to have pride." 00:24:39.700 |
"But," okay, so there's a huge contrast here with this word, "but." 00:24:45.180 |
"By his doing, you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God and righteousness 00:24:56.180 |
I have a question for you, interpretive question. 00:25:04.340 |
Are you the subject that is in righteousness, sanctification, and redemption? 00:25:12.340 |
Or she would read this more like, "By his doing, you are in Jesus Christ, who became," 00:25:20.780 |
Wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption. 00:25:24.140 |
And the follow-up question is, does it matter however you translate the two? 00:25:29.980 |
If you guys have different versions, try to read it. 00:25:32.860 |
If you guys, I think most of you, how many of you guys have NASB? 00:25:42.900 |
They actually read pretty different, each translation. 00:25:44.860 |
So read it a little bit and try to figure that out for a moment. 00:25:49.180 |
Who is the subject of those descriptions, righteousness, or those nouns, righteousness, 00:25:56.900 |
And I think in ESV it says righteousness, holiness, and redemption. 00:26:00.780 |
So are you in those things, or have Jesus become those things? 00:30:41.620 |
OK, so it sounds like you guys are having some real good discussions. 00:30:45.620 |
This is good. What are some of the things that you guys kind of concluded to? 00:30:51.620 |
Again, to tell you honestly, there's like not only those two views, but there's three more views. 00:30:58.620 |
But I didn't want to confuse you guys with the three more. 00:31:05.620 |
[ERIC] Well, after you skipped the ESL, I could be wrong. 00:31:11.620 |
[ERIC] But the comma who refers to what's before, so that's Jesus. 00:51:25.440 |
To abandon what we think is right in our own eyes. 00:51:30.500 |
And to learn and receive the wisdom you have for us.