True Wisdom

1 Corinthians 2:1-12 (13-16)

We live in the Information Age, also called the Computer age or the Digital Age. We are living during the biggest shift in human history since the Industrial Revolution. We have more information at our fingertips than any other generation in the history of the world. We do not need to consult experts or encyclopedias any longer. We just Google it. We don’t even have to go to a computer. We can google it on smartphones and tablets. Yet with all of this vast information, it seems to me that people know less than ever before.

Jay Leno just finished hosting the Tonight Show this week, so I will use an example from his show. He had a segment on the Tonight Show called Jaywalking. Comedian Jay Leno interviewed people on the street, asking them simple questions. It is amazing what people do not know these days.  In November he asked some questions about Thanksgiving, like when the first Thanksgiving was. Answers were 1966 and 1492. Where did the first pilgrims land? Hawaii, Rhode Island or Virginia. The episode in January reviewed current events for the year 2013. No one could identify the Vice President by name or face, nor the new pope Francis. I am not just saying that they did not know the new pope’s name; they could not identify his photograph in his white robes as a pope. But they knew Miley Cyrus. On another episode people could not answer the questions "What color is the White House?" or “What country is the Panama Canal located in?” It makes us question the quality of public education in our nation. We might have more and more information available to us, but it seems the average person knows less and less.

There is knowledge and then there is wisdom. Long before computers or the internet, T. S. Eliot wrote “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?” Knowledge and wisdom are different. Some people are very smart and knowledgeable, but they are not very wise. They can make pretty stupid choices. And there are different types of wisdom. There is the common sense of living – street smarts. One does not have to be religious to have this type of wisdom. There is even wisdom in children. Children can say some wise things I ran across these examples of Words of Wisdom from Children

Never trust a dog to watch your food. - Patrick, age 10 

When your dad is mad and asks you, “Do I look stupid?” don't answer him. - Michael, 14 

Never tell your mom her diet's not working. - Michael, 14 

Stay away from prunes. - Randy, 9 

Never allow your three-year old brother in the same room as your school assignment. - Traci, 14 

Puppies still have bad breath, even after eating a tic tac. - Andrew, 9 

Never hold a dust buster and a cat at the same time. - Kyoyo, 9 

You can't hide a piece of broccoli in a glass of milk. - Armir, 9 

Felt markers are not good to use as lipstick. - Lauren, 9

Don't pick on your sister when she's holding a baseball bat. - Joel, 10 

Never try to baptize a cat. - Eileen, 8

Good advice. But today I want to talk about spiritual wisdom. Spiritual wisdom is different than religious knowledge or even common human wisdom. You can have a very intelligent highly educated minister who may not be very wise at all. And you can have a person with no formal education at all who is very wise spiritually. Unfortunately most denominations have strict requirements for ordination with include college and seminary training with lots of knowledge, but there are no requirements when it comes to wisdom. Some churches learn that difference too late. 

That is what our Epistle lesson is about. When the apostle Paul went on his missionary journeys he would come in contact with highly intelligent and educated people who were considered wise. This was especially true in Greece. One time Paul addressed the Greek philosophers who had gathered on Mars Hill in Athens, right below the Parthenon.  They listened carefully to his words until he started talking about Jesus’ resurrection. Then they mocked him. Paul did not appear wise in their eyes. Our epistle lesson is addressed to the church in Corinth which was about 50 miles west of Athens. They also saw themselves as educated, sophisticated and wise. To this audience, Paul described the difference between human wisdom and spiritual wisdom – wisdom that comes from us and our own experience and knowledge and wisdom that comes from God.

I. First let’s see briefly what he says about human wisdom. He says in the first verse, “And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom….” He says in verse 4 “And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom.” In other words he says that human wisdom sounds great, but it is not all it is cracked up to be. Let me say right now that there is nothing wrong with human wisdom in its own realm. It is not that human wisdom is bad and spiritual wisdom is good. It is that human wisdom only goes so far. It is limited by the fact that it is from human beings and subject to our human limitations. In verse 6 he talks about human wisdom as “the wisdom of this age.“ Human wisdom is culturally conditioned by the time in which we live and the place we live. What seems obvious to us will seem like foolishness to future generations.

It is like hair styles. What looks good today will look silly to the next generation. Did you watch any of the Grammy Awards? We watched a little of it. I could not stand to watch too much. That is not music in my opinion. And did you see the hairstyles. There is this new pompadour thing going on now that looks ridiculous to me. This Justin Beiber, Mylie Cyrus look. So many of the singers were sporting these silly-looking things on their heads. They think they look great now. But they are going to look back on photos and videos of this years later and say, “What was I thinking?” That is the way human wisdom is. It is wisdom of this age, which will look silly in the next age.

II. Paul compares human wisdom and God’s wisdom. In verses 6-7 he calls God’s wisdom a mystery: “However, we speak wisdom among those who are mature, yet not the wisdom of this age, nor of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages for our glory.” “We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery.” Human wisdom can be understood. We hear someone speak it and we say “Isn’t that profound?” The wisdom of God is spoken in a mystery, according to the apostle Paul. Mystery refers to something that cannot be understood. He goes on to describe it in verse 9 in these words:

“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,

Nor have entered into the heart of man

The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”

God’s wisdom cannot be seen or heard or thought. It has to do with personally and directly knowing God. It is not about being experienced in the ways of the world. That is human wisdom, and it is fine as far as it goes. It just does not go very far and is subject to human pride. We always have to watch out for those who are wise in their own eyes. The prophet Isaiah said, “Woe unto them that are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!” Proverbs says, “If you have seen a man that is wise in his own eyes, a fool is more useful than he.” That is why meekness and humility always accompanies spiritual wisdom. Those who think they are wise are not, and those who are do not think they are. We all can think of people in both categories. God’s wisdom is not something that can be captured and owned by a human being. It is God’s alone and he communicates it to us in mystery.

He goes on in our passage: “10 But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. 11 For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.”

Here Paul speaks of the source of spiritual wisdom, which is the Spirit of God. In fact there are other passages that describe the Holy Spirit himself as the Wisdom of God. This is important. Spiritual wisdom is God. God is Wisdom. You cannot know wisdom without God. Remember I am speaking of spiritual wisdom now, not human wisdom. There are people who do not believe in God who are wise in a human sense. They can have profound thoughts and speak profound words. That is the wisdom of human philosophy; that was the wisdom of the Athenian philosophers. What Paul is talking about as spiritual wisdom is very different. It is wisdom that comes only with knowing God.

It is revealed wisdom. Verse 10 “But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.” Spiritual wisdom is a gift. It is not earned or achieved through years of experience and practice. It is not gained through effort and time. It is revealed by the Spirit of God to our spirit. That is what the next verse says, “For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God.”

I know this is starting to sound a bit esoteric, and I apologize for that. But we are talking about spiritual things here. Spiritual wisdom is revealed wisdom communicated by the Spirit of God to our spirit. He talks more about that in the next verse 13 “These things we also speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.” A better translation says: “speaking spiritual truths in spiritual words.” I love that phrase. What are spiritual words? They are not written words or spoken words. They are not human words. Paul is saying that the Spirit has his own language. It is the language of conscience and intuition and communion with God. Human words cannot convey the spiritual truths communicated by the Spirit of God to our spirits.

Because of this spiritual wisdom appears foolish to many people. Paul says in the next verse: “14 But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” We are talking about discernment here. A blind person cannot discern colors, no matter how much you describe the colors in words. The natural mind cannot discern spiritual wisdom, no matter how much you describe it in words. We are talking about something beyond words. Something communicated directly from the Holy Spirit to our spirit, which is the inmost essence of ourselves.

Paul goes on in verse 15 “But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one.” This means that spiritual wisdom is self-authenticating. People can judge us and say this is a bunch of nonsense. And it certainly sounds that way, but it is real. Then he makes the most extravagant claim of all in verse 16 “For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ.” This is an amazing statement: We have the mind of Christ. It sounds like megalomania. Who would ever claim to have the mind of Christ? Paul does! And he says it is not unique to him but that we all have the mind of Christ. For wisdom we need to look no further than Christ, who dwells within us.

There is one important aspect of spiritual wisdom which I have not mentioned yet, even though it was mentioned first in our passage. I saved the best until last. It is literally crucial to spiritual wisdom. (The word crucial refers to the cross.)  It is found in the opening words of our passage. “And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom declaring to you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” The cross of Christ is spiritual wisdom. A few verses before our passage Paul wrote: “22 For Jews request a sign, and Greeks seek after wisdom; 23 but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks[b] foolishness, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”

In the Cross of Christ the wisdom of God is displayed. In this historical event is a spiritual symbol which communicates the power of God and the wisdom of God. The Cross is what makes us Christians. A lot of people can talk about spiritual wisdom in mysterious and vague language which makes it all sound very profound. But without the Cross is just a subjective experience. The Cross grounds the wisdom of God in history. It grounds it in human suffering. It grounds it in human flesh, so it is not just some lofty philosophy. The Wisdom of God is grounded in the Cross of Christ which was literally stuck into the ground and Christ’s hands and feet literally pinned to that wood.

In the Cross of Christ is the wisdom of God. That is why it is so offensive to human wisdom. The resurrection of Christ is the wisdom of God. That appears foolish to human wisdom. That is why the Greek philosophers of Athens heckled Paul off the floor of the Areopagus when he preached the death and resurrection of Christ. It does not fit the standards of human wisdom of the philosophies of the age. But God in his divine wisdom became a human being, who taught, and ministered and healed, and was crucified and rose again. Through our identification with Christ – ourselves being spiritually crucified and risen with him – we share in the Divine life of God. Through the Spirit of Christ given to us we have the mind of Christ, through which we can share in his Divine Wisdom. That is true wisdom.