For Christ did not send me to baptize but to proclaim the
gospel, and not with eloquent wisdom, so that the cross of Christ might not be
emptied of its power. For the message about the cross is foolishness to those
who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it
is written, ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the
discerning I will thwart.’
Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is
the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For
since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God
decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who
believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ
crucified, a stumbling-block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those
who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the
wisdom of God. For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s
weakness is stronger than human strength.
Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of
you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of
noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God
chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and
despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that
are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God. He is the source of
your life in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness
and sanctification and redemption, in order that, as it is written, ‘Let the
one who boasts, boast in the Lord.’
I often struggle with the idea that someone, namely Jesus,
had to die so that I might have life. That a benevolent creator would require a
blood sacrifice of the creation. I’m sure I’m not alone. I’m sure that when
Paul wrote to the Corinthians, he faced similar push-back from the people he spoke with. He went to proclaim
the good news of Christ and Christ crucified for the sins of everyone and was
ignored by the ones who thought it was absurd or foolish. This was usually the people,
who in a Hellenistic world, were quick to judge things as rational and
irrational based on reason.
In today’s reading, I love the phrase, “For the message about
the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being
saved it is the power of God.” Corinth was a port city and a cultural melting
pot in this world. So, I’m sure that Paul was bombarded from all sides when he
tried to present the idea that Jesus came into the world to die for the sins of
anyone who would repent and believe. It’s an absurdity.
To make his case, Paul points out that God takes what is foolish
in this world and makes it meaningful. God rights the wrongs and makes the weak
strong. God raises up the low and brings down that which the world has raised
up. The whole understanding of the socio-economic system and everything
rational in society according to the world is turned on end when viewed through
the lens of the Good News. God’s news of love and reconciliation and truth
revealed in Jesus Christ.
People through the ages have thought about over and over again, trying to wrap their heads around the things of God. It’s not easy,
nor is it very complicated. What I am trying to say is, if we continue to contemplate the
creator through the lens of the creation and the created order, the deeper and
more complex it becomes. However, if we fully accept and return the love so
freely displayed for us by God in the person of Jesus, then it makes the
complicated and complex start to fall away. What is left is love. Love is what connects
us to our creator. To know we are loved and to know our life has meaning is
what I think it’s all about. God loved us so much that God gave of himself that
we might be reunited with God and dwell in the presence of the creator forever.
It remains the only perfect sacrifice.
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