1 Corinthians Chapter 1: Man’s “wisdom” and God’s “foolishness”
The first chapter of 1 Corinthians sets the groundwork for a number of issues Paul will tackle in his letter, but right from the beginning, he’s looking to get one thing clear in the minds of the Corinthians. Before he goes into detail about the extent of their divisiveness (chapter 3), or their misuse of spiritual gifts (chapters 12-14), or their sexual immorality (chapter 5), he wants them to know something about the way the Gospel works, because if the Corinthians miss this one foundational aspect of the nature of the Gospel, they’re going to miss the rest of the letter. You’ll see it in verses 17 and 18:
“For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with eloquent words of wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us, who are being saved, it is the power of God.”
Paul works from these categories of “power/ weakness” and “folly/ wisdom” in establishing for the Corinthians this upside-down paradigm God employs in the message of the Gospel. Here is how it works: what the world perceives as power is actually weakness, and what the world perceives as wisdom is actually folly.
Fighting your way to the top, being first, being great, lording power over others, having the means or intellect to compel others to do what you want, these are all the ways in which the world defines power. None of that is power. Jesus says as much in Mark 10, telling the disciples that the greatest among them is going to be whoever serves, while the first among them is going to be the slave of all. He personally demonstrates it in John 13, when knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, he took those hands and washed the disciples feet with them!
Similarly, seizing control, manipulation, clever scheming, stacking the odds in your favor, crushing those who oppose you…that’s not true wisdom. Wisdom is trusting in and fearing the Lord, considering His reality, His presence, His will, and His intentions in any and all situations (Proverbs 1:7; 3:5-6). That’s what wisdom looks like, even though it may lead to some actions considered “foolish” in the eyes of the world….like willingly going to die on a cross for people who hate you when you could have summoned the armies of heaven for deliverance.
See were Paul is going with this? He’s trying to establish for the Corinthians that in order to really understand the Gospel and the implications of the Gospel, they have to understand the DNA of the Gospel, the way God works. All of God is demonstrated in Christ and his finished work on the cross (John 1:18). It is there we get this glimpse into God’s heart and we see that, indeed, His ways are higher than our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts. He who is the very source of wisdom gives His own life for His enemies! He calls His murderers to repent that He might have compassion on them, and that He might abundantly pardon them. (Isaiah 55:7-9) And if that seems like folly to us then we’ve got to redefine our mental conceptions of “wisdom” and “foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:22).
In the same way, we see in the cross the true power of God. Publicly humiliated, beaten, bleeding, and disgraced, we see the power of God working in ransoming humanity to Himself (1 Timothy 2:6), bringing many sons to glory (Hebrews 2:10), reconciling the world to Himself (1 Cor 5:19), and defeating Satan, sin, and death all at once (1 Corinthians 15:56; Genesis 3:15). But again, this is NOT how the world perceives power. Instead they see a defeated and humiliated rabbi who thought he was the Messiah. In other words, the crucifixion looked like weakness, “a stumbling block to the Jews” (1 Corinthians 1:22).
So what’s Paul’s point here? Why is he tearing down the Corinthians’ implicit worldly assumptions of what wisdom and power look like and re-laying that foundation with true wisdom and true power as defined by God in Christ’s work on the cross? It’s because this is the pattern into which our entire Christian lives and ministries will fit, so we shouldn’t be surprised when what we do looks like foolishness and weakness to the world around us!
Take Paul for instance: he didn’t draw upon the popular lecturing fads of the day when presenting the cross to the Corinthians. He didn’t want to detract from the raw power of the Gospel! He didn’t need to speak with “eloquent words of wisdom” because he didn’t want intellectual ascent, nor did he seek emotional response (1 Corinthians 1:17). He plainly presented the “word of the cross” for what it is: “the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Corinthians 1:24).
And then he tells the Corinthians that if they want proof of this, they need look no further than themselves! “For consider your own calling brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful not many were of noble birth. But God chose what was foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong.” (1 Corinthians 1:26-27)
The Corinthians themselves are a living testament to the way God demonstrates true power and wisdom in the Gospel, and all throughout scripture: that true strength is often seen in weakness and true wisdom often seen in those things which look foolish to the world. There’s not space to demonstrate all the times God works this way through scripture, bringing the nation of Israel from the barren womb of Sarah and dying body of Abraham, or victory over the Midianites from a cowardly man leading 300 ill-equipped troops, or appointing a king from the youngest of Jesse’s children, or again most definitively, bringing salvation to the universe through a man dying on a cross. But rest assured, this is in God’s DNA, this is how He works, this is true wisdom, this is true power, and they are both perfectly demonstrated on the cross.
And so in your own life and ministry, don’t grow discouraged if you feel you’re not living up to the standard of Pinterest, or Instagram, or Facebook. Don’t be discouraged if your devotion to the Lord and His priorities look foolish to the world. Don’t be discouraged if your life lived for the Kingdom of God appears weak and ineffective. This is just what God loves; this is the fertile ground from which He makes eternally spectacular things happen. God shows his wisdom in what appears folly and his power in what appears weakness. So remember, along with Paul, that God’s power is made perfect in our weakness, and let us be content in our weakness, knowing that when we are weak, we are strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)
