First Corinthians 2:7-9 Winsom of God, How do we receive it?

All right, well today's lesson we're going to continue on in chapter 2 and we're going to do verses 7 through 9 which I've labeled God's wisdom, how do we receive it. So let's look at this outline from Macaulay, I just kind of go down to the cut to the chase here as they say. So we're going to be looking at in this section, this is the outline starting from chapter 1.

You know Paul's talking about division in the Corinthian church here. And he's talking about the nature of true wisdom. So we come down to the section here that we've covered the last couple of weeks about the nature of Paul's preaching and the purpose of Paul's preaching. So we kind of covered that down through, we looked through verse six last week. So now we're going to talk about true wisdom. And basically, where is, this is kind of the negative, where is true wisdom not found?

So I want to review first what we talked about last week a little bit, and then we'll look at that. There's actually some very interesting verses here, especially verses that maybe you've taken one way, but I think actually maybe you should be taking a different way. So we'll see that. So here we go. So let me read the first three verses here from last week.

In my message, in my preaching, were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on men's wisdom, but upon the power of God. Yet we do not speak wisdom among those who are mature, a wisdom, however, not of this age, nor of the rulers of this age who are passing away." OK, so this first verse, I'm just going to put the whole chart up here.

This first verse talks about Paul's message. So what was Paul's message? We've talked about this since the beginning of chapter 2 and before that. Paul says, way back in verse 2, "...for I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified." And he says, I'm not going to use this verse. He wasn't going to use persuasive words. He wasn't going to use man's wisdom. He was going to simply use the message of the cross, the gospel message, if you would.

And we see that We're going to study that a little bit more and we get down to verse 13 in chapter 2 where it says, Which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but by those taught by the Spirit. So we're going to talk a lot today about human wisdom and God's wisdom.

And also about the Holy Spirit and how He's involved in that. So, then He talks about, but in demonstration of the Spirit and the power, And so let me just put that all up here. So demonstration is the idea to show forth. So God wants to show forth his truth and the Holy Spirit is intimately involved. So I put this message up here, message, I put this verse up here in John 14, actually one of my favorite verses because it really defines what the Holy Spirit's about. So John 14, 26 says, but the helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you and then if you look in a couple chapters over in John you'll see verse 14 and John 16 says and he speaking of the Holy Spirit will glorify me for he will take of mine and disclose it to you so God's plan is God gives us his word, his written word, the spoken word of God. Well, it's a spoken and written word. It was spoken in some cases and written down, but it's God's word, written down.

But then what's really cool is he doesn't stop there. He's given us the Holy Spirit to help her. And his job is to remind us of what the scriptures say and to guide us. And it says in that verse 14 there, 16-14 says, He will glorify me, the Lord Jesus Christ, for you will take of mine and disclose it to you. The Holy Spirit's job is to magnify Christ, spotlight Christ. And that's where, that's the proper relationship between the Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Son is the one that has accomplished the work on the cross and the Spirit is the spotlight what the Son has done. So let's go on. In verse 5 we saw last week.

So the purpose of all this is that your faith would not rest, your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men. So this word rest is the I-A-M-E. It's a state in which someone or something continuously exists. And interestingly enough here, therefore your faith should not continuously exist or rest upon the wisdom of men.

But with that verb tense, that subjunctive mood, it says, but that may happen. And I think we all maybe have fallen into that trap where we may trust in things, because we were brought up in this world system, we became, we educated in this, we may fall into trusting man's wisdom. But God says, no, I want your faith to be totally trusting, and that's what the last part of the verse says, but your faith should continuously rest in the power of God.

So what we see here is that he's contrasting, and Macaulay just does it wonderfully. He says the contrast involved here is not between the wisdom of men and the wisdom of God. We're going to see that a lot. Wisdom of men, wisdom of God. But rather, the wisdom of men and the power of God. And I like to think of it this way. Men will say a lot of things.

Men in political office will promise you the kitchen sink. I mean, everything possible. And many times they don't deliver. But what God promises, He always delivers. Whatever He promises will be carried out faithfully. And there's just many verses that talk about that. And I kind of reiterating that point again. The point here is that we walk by faith in the truth of God's Word We trust God to carry out what he has promised and that's a demonstration of his power. So here's some wonderful verses that talk about What God's going to do and he will carry it out wonderful verse in John 14 3 if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself and That where I am, there you may be also.

So just look at that. The God of the universe is preparing a place for you. He says, I'll come again and receive you to myself. That where I am, there you may be also. So God makes these promises and he has the ability, he has the power to carry them out. A couple more. John 11, 25. He who believes in me will live even if he dies. And everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?

This is the Lord Jesus talking in the Gospel of John there. Wonderful verses about His promise of eternal life and that we'll never die. This wonderful verse. And then the last one I have in this vein is the idea of the Holy Spirit and His job. For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. So these are wonderful things demonstrating that God has the power to do what He says.

Okay, so let's go on to verse 6. So verse 6 kind of starts this transition, and we're going to see it's going to talk about wisdom about four or five times, and it's going to transition at the very end from wisdom to this thing called things, the things that God has prepared for us. So we're going to talk about God's wisdom, and then we're going to transition to the things that He's prepared for us. So here we go, in this verse, but we speak wisdom among the mature, the enabler says. So let me just go down and put this up here. We speak, we're speaking God's wisdom, which is kind of an amazing thing, and I think you all know how that happens, but Paul's speaking it here, and also it's, we speak wisdom among the mature. I think the idea, he wants to point out that man in and of himself won't realize that that is God's wisdom. He says, well you just, You're just quoting what that church says. They'll put it down. They'll think it's foolishness.

But we're able, a mature person, is able to speak God's word. And actually, I like the thing that Constable said about the third bullet down. He says, all Christians are mature in the sense that they have come to terms with the message of the cross. So they're at least mature in that sense. They aren't mature maybe beyond that, but they're at least mature in that sense. And then I wanted to point out again, we're mature in terms of the message of the cross.

And what's the message of the cross? This will be the third week I've stated this. I don't think you can say it too many times. The message of the cross is a teaching that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died a death wherein the guilt and penalty of man's sins was placed on Him, making it possible for salvation to be extended. to all those who believe in Him. That's the message of the cross. That's the message that it takes to come to know Christ. That's the message that we believe to live with Christ and to walk with Him.

So now, the rest of this verse here talks about His wisdom. Like I said, this is all about wisdom, these verses here. God's wisdom versus the wisdom of this age. So the word in Scripture called age is the idea of the present world with its cares and temptations, its desires. idea of evils involved and Actually in Galatians, which he studied last year. It calls this world within today the present the present evil age and I think the more we live in in this in the 20 20 20s here it It seems like it's getting more evil all the time So we live in a present evil age God but God's wisdom is not of this present evil age God's wisdom is eternal And what what Macaulay says he tries to kind of put parameters on the the wisdom of this age and he defines it this way The wisdom of this age is a sum total of man's learning that difference differs from God's Word But that was good the sum total of man's learning that differs from God's Word and we're called to believe God's Word So we find something that differs from God's Word. It's like a little red flag that goes off No, that's the wisdom of the world And for example, and I did this last week, some examples of wisdom of the world. Evolution. Man says evolution is the way things happen. No, God says I created things. Man says it's mother nature.

No, I'm afraid not. And then the atrocity, man condones abortion. And God says that's awful. It's the killing of a human life. And that's just the beginning. We can list a whole bunch. But that's the wisdom of this world. And God's wisdom is not that wisdom. So a couple more here, just in the interest of time here, just put them out here. This is the final part of the review.

So that God's wisdom is not of the rulers of this present age. And the rulers can be labeled, you know, different dictionaries have them a different way. They're rulers, chief priests, princes. They're the movers and shakers, right? They're the ones who you see that are calling the shots.

And they're assumed by this verse that they're passing away. And by that very declaration, it seems like they do not know Jesus Christ. And this passing away, the third point here, passing away seems like a severe statement, but it's actually the fate of everyone outside of Christ. Passing away is the idea to cease, to be done away with. in his continuous action in the present, they're in a condition of passing away. It's like, because they're outside of Christ, they started on this road to destruction, if you will. Or actually, Weiss has it, whose rulers are in the process of being liquidated. Boy, that's really, really heavy, really hard, a hard thing to grasp. But that's the fate of rulers that are outside of Jesus Christ. Okay, so that's our review here. So now, let's get down to the verses for today.

And before we do that, before I read those verses, notice that I've underlined wisdom in verse 6, where we kind of start with that idea. And it goes down through verse 7. And then when we get to verse 9, he kind of switches gears, if you will, and talks about the things. And we're going to kind of connect the wisdom of God with the things that he's prepared for us. Okay, so starting in verse 7, But we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God prepared before the ages for our glory, the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood, for if they understood it, they would have crucified the Lord of glory. But just as it is written, the things that eye has not seen, ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love him.

Okay, so let's start here. Start here with verse 7. Let me kind of get to the right spot here. Okay. But we speak God's wisdom in a mystery. It's a strong contrast. Many of these buts you'll see are a strong contrast. Allah is an original word. It's a strong contrast.

We speak, we saw that before in an earlier verse, God's wisdom, Sophia, in a mystery. Remember mystery in Scripture? is something that hasn't been previously revealed. It was something that God hadn't previously shown us. So it's an unrevealed truth. And we saw the same thing in verse 6. We just saw a couple charts ago. But we speak wisdom among the mature. So what's cool is the believer in the Lord Jesus Christ is able to speak God's wisdom. And what is God's wisdom? Really simple. God's wisdom is in His word, right? There's no other source of wisdom that man has. But there's a helper in that. And we're going to look about the helper. How does the helper fit in to understanding God's wisdom?

But we had two verses. One said, this verse says, we speak God's wisdom in a mystery, something that hasn't been revealed before. And this verse says, we speak wisdom among the mature. And so now we talk about, he kind of makes a statement here, but we speak wisdom in a mystery. And this is a continuation of that. So God's wisdom is not something, I like this, McCauley kind of points this out, God's wisdom is not some kind of abstract thinking, because Paul says he speaks it. He's able to speak, and we can say that too, we can speak Paul's, what it means is, what we read in scripture, this wisdom comes through the vehicle of human language, You know, we have the original language is the Greek and the Hebrew, a little bit of Aramaic in there too, but primarily the Greek and the Hebrew.

So we study, we focus on the Bible. Historically, believers were called men of the book, and we are truly men and women of the book. We look to the book as being the authority of how God speaks to us. But I have a little story here, and it's a true story, that's kind of sad, that shows what can happen when you get away from the Scriptures, you get away from God's Word.

So this is a story about this woman writer, who was once a Southern Baptist minister's wife, she was a Southern Baptist minister's wife, and Sunday school teacher, but she became interested in contemplative prayer and mysticism. So she got into it really big time, she got into the New Age type of things, They promote this and she actually had books that she wrote about this and endorsed them and they were endorsed by many people I've kind of left her name out talk to me privately.

I'll pass her name along but eventually she totally rejected the authority of the Bible and she listened to the what she called the divine feminine voice And she said in her house. She had an altar adorned with various goddesses Which she worshipped? And amazingly enough, she also had a mirror next to these goddesses. And the mirror was so she could worship herself. A sad case where apparently she was a believer, but you kind of wonder. She went so far down that path, she left Christianity.

Scripture and God's word tells us over and over again we're to be focusing on God's word. That is our anchor. That's what shows us what his wisdom is about. So let's continue on. Hopefully that wasn't too much of a diversion. Hidden wisdom, I think this just kind of emphasizes again this unrevealed wisdom that is now revealed, especially in the New Testament. The gospel says here the message of the cross is a further unfolding of God's plans and purposes beyond what he had revealed and what people had known previously. Okay, so now, the last part of this is about The hidden wisdom. This is God's plan. He is going to hide something. He has a purpose in that.

The last part of this verse says, God predestined it before the ages for our glory. Predestined is to determine beforehand or to decree you know the wonderful thing here's a case use of that word where it says we were predestined as Adoption of the son, so there's many cases in scripture where that word is used to declare something God has done he declared he decided or decreed that the believers would be adopted as sons full adult sons and And when it's used in connection with God, it's a decree. Here's some interesting things, I'll just put them all up here. God's wisdom of the cross was decreed in the eternity past. You think about before the foundation of the world, it talks about we were chosen.

But man thinks it's foolishness. But the last bullet, think about this. God decreed salvation before there was sin. Sin hadn't showed up. Adam and Eve hadn't happened, but He declared an eternity past. Remember the Eternal Covenant in Hebrews 13? The Eternal Covenant says that Christ would lay down His life for man's sin and God would raise Him up again. So God doesn't worry about time. He planned His actions and decreed His actions based upon the need. Okay, so we go to verse 8. The wisdom, still on wisdom, and this is God's wisdom.

The wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood. And I like the interlinear, it kind of flips it around. No one of the rulers of this age has known God's wisdom. And once again, these rulers are the movers and the shakers. Has known is Gnosko, the know of experience. They didn't know him experientially. The rulers of this age did not know God's wisdom.

In the past so the verb tense here is perfect perfect tense the rulers of this age did not know God's wisdom in the past and They continue right now not to know God's wisdom into the present and we see that by the other verse there what their destiny is But here's it here's the amazing thing which is kind of a I'll put most of the thing that the sad thing is If they had known if they had understood They wouldn't have crucified Christ, basically.

That's what the verse is telling us. And I put some verses up here. If they'd understood and they felt it was foolishness. But the rulers of this age, according to Constable, what they understood as political or religious figures, demonstrated their ignorance of divine wisdom when they crucified the Lord of Glory. So man acted in ignorance. But it was God's plan. That's a whole discussion in there right in itself.

In the eternity past, he said, okay, my son, you're going to lay on your life for the sins of the world, and I'm going to raise you up again. Well, it hadn't even happened yet. So, and anyway, it's a marvelous thing. Okay, so now, okay, verse 9. I know you've all been waiting for this. So, you probably use this verse, you probably have, you probably have quoted this verse to people for comfort. I know I have, and not understanding what it meant. It's great to study God's Word. You learn so much. Let me read verse 9. But just as it is written, things which eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love him.

Okay. So my research here, I found this little dialogue here from J. Vernon McGee. This verse surely has been misunderstood. And I can testify to that. I misunderstood it. It has gone to a funeral too many times. I actually hadn't thought about this. And here's what Dr. McGee says.

This is what he's witnessed at funerals. This is how this verse was used at funerals. Here lies dear Mr. So-and-so. His remains are here before us. In his life, he didn't understand too well, but now he's in glory and he's understanding all things. So is that what that verse is saying?

And I'll tell you, I thought, well, this is a comfort. You know, brother or sister, God has all these cool things in heaven. You're going to get this cool thing in heaven. You can't see it, you can't hear it, you can't take in your heart, but you're going to get all these cool things in heaven. Which is absolutely true. But this verse isn't telling us that. So what is this verse telling us? What is this verse telling us? That's from Dr. McGee.

Okay, but just as it is written. Another strong contrast here again. Even it has been written. So it's a past completed action with an aorist tense. Past completed action. It has been written in the past. So what I did here, this is a quotation from Isaiah. So what I did here, I looked up Isaiah, and this actually, there were several quotations from Isaiah, but this is the best one. And this this kind of helps us. I think if I had read this before I read verse 9.

I might have had a different opinion Isaiah 64 4 says from the days of old they have not heard or perceived by ear Nor has he I seen a God beside you Who acts and that word acts means to works and shows in? behalf of the one who waits for him so based upon that I think it says, the ear or the eye were not how they came to know God, but God's spirit or God working on their behalf. They didn't come to know him even though they heard his word. And this is where it made a little paradox, you say here.

Well, obviously, you have to hear God's word, but you need the spirit of God to show you what that means, really, in essence. You can read it, yes, but you need the Spirit of God. Mike's going to cover that in the next weeks. You need the Spirit of God. And let's just kind of walk down that path here with this verse.

So now, let's talk about the things which eye has not seen, ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man. So, things which the eye has not seen. So first of all, the connectivity here, you know, we had wisdom, he talked about God's wisdom, God's wisdom, God's wisdom, and then he switches here. And I kind of think that the things here are referring to the details of God's wisdom. Talk to me afterwards if you have some other ideas, maybe Michael has some other ideas too, but the things are the details of God's wisdom.

So the verb here is, has not seen. It's a past, eris, past point, fact. It's not a future tense. It's not saying these things in the future you'll say. It says things in the past. The I has not seen these things. Has not seen these things. God's true wisdom. Same thing for the ear. The ear has not heard. Has not heard. Past point, fact again, eris tense. Not future. I has not heard these things. And then we have the, which things have not entered the heart of man? Same verb tense, past, point, fact, not future.

These things, God's wisdom has not entered man's heart or man's intellect. The heart is kind of a big term talking about, we talk about believe with your heart. The mind and intellect is involved here. So Macaulay says, true wisdom cannot be found in man's research. God's message of the cross never entered the mind of man. God had to reveal it through his word.

Think about this, and this gets to be a little bit, and thinking about this and talking with Vani, there can be some confusion. And what it's saying here, think about the Tower of Babel. Man on his own wanted to reach God, so he builds this big tower up to God, right?

He, on his own, he didn't seek God, he tried to with his own intellect approach God so this is saying this verse is telling us that man through his own eyes and ears and heart knowledge cannot come to know God man cannot I was thinking about this what if we heard that Congress all of a sudden decided to enact a study program let's have a study program to find out about God we're going to find out about God so we can solve this coronavirus thing We're gonna, and we'll get all the smart people in the world together.

And we're gonna put all their collective wisdom, all the man's, and we're gonna figure out about God. Yeah, we have the Bible, but that's, you know, nobody believes the Bible. It's, you know, but we're going to figure out. That's what he's talking about here, that the eye of man on his own, the ear of man, and what's in man's heart. His research committee cannot figure out God.

God has to reveal himself to us. Remember, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God took the action. God has to reveal himself so man can believe. So hopefully that puts it in context here. So the last part of the verse is, all that God has prepared for those who love him. God prepared the things for the ones loving him. Prepared again is a past point fact. God prepared these things in the past.

These things are part of God's wisdom. Man cannot discover these things through the ear gate, the eye gate, or the ear gate, or his intellect. Man cannot figure God out. God has to show himself to man and have his spirit illumine man for him to understand God. The things can only be known by God revealing them through his spirit.

And that's what Mike is going to start covering next week. Revealing it through his spirit. So I have one last chart here from Lewis Ferry Chafer. And here it is. It is stated in verse 9 that God has prepared certain things for them that love Him. Things which are not gained by the eye, I would say by the natural eye, the natural ear, or the natural heart. This negative declaration concerning the eye, ear, and heart is abundantly sustained in the following verse, verse 10, where it is asserted that these things are revealed unto us by His Spirit.

You know it's always good to read the next verse. I can't tell you how many times I read it and say, what does this mean? We'll read the next verse. And it tells you. This is a classic example. If you stop at verse 9, who knows where you're going to go. But verse 9 says, God revealed it through His Spirit. And that's His desire. God's wisdom needs to be revealed to man through His Spirit.

That doesn't mean you give up on studying your Bible and say, well, God hasn't revealed it to me. Hey, I'm not going to understand this. I haven't got a chance. No. You diligently study His Word and you count upon the Holy Spirit, as I said, to show you the things of Christ, to show you the answers to your questions.

Not that you shouldn't seek answers from other people too, but God's Spirit, His mission is to show us the things of Christ. So let's pray. Dear Father, we thank you for our time today, Lord. Thank you for the wonderful blessing we have of knowing you and the wonderful blessing that your spirit has been given to us to show us the things of Christ. And they are so many and his ministry is so wide and so vast that we thank you for that.