Let's turn in our Bibles, brethren,
to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. 1 Corinthians 1. And we're going to continue tonight
looking at reasons that God chose to save through the preaching
of Christ crucified. We come to what we're calling
reason number 3 here in verse 22. Because, for, the Jews require
a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom. Seems like an odd reason
for Paul to be called and sent forth to preach the gospel of
Christ, doesn't it? That's what he's saying. For
the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom.
But we preach Christ crucified. unto the Jews a stumbling block,
and unto the Greeks foolishness. But unto them which are called,
both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom
of God." Now, God has chosen by the foolishness of preaching
to do two things. By the preaching of Christ, He
is going to He's going to further condemn some, and He's going
to save others. He's going to make the Gospel
a saver of life unto life to some, and a saver of death unto
death unto others. Paul said that's what happens
every time we preach the Gospel. Now I'll tell you something,
that is a heavy thing to think about. God is condemning some
further every time they hear the Gospel, and He's saving others. Isn't that amazing? He said,
who's sufficient for these things? First of all, let's identify
these three kinds of people listed in our text. Now, the Jews, he
says here, require a sign. The Jews require a sign. And
the Jews represent all self-made religious folks in any generation,
especially in Christianity. It could be in any religion,
but especially in Christianity, they're folks who are trying
to come to God by the law of Moses. And he says here they
require a sign. In order to authenticate the
one that sin of God to minister, or to authenticate the one who's
been converted, they want to see a sign. They want to see
some unusual, outstanding, miraculous thing, change in the person that
they can see. They want to see a sign. They
want to see something carnally with these eyes that will convince
them this is God's work. That's what they want to see.
That's why the self-made religious men are always preaching man's
works. They're always preaching man's
works. They will not simply preach Christ and Him crucified. That's
why you found the scribes and the Sadducees wearing these long
robes. The eye can see that. Oh, there's
a holy man. That's why they memorized these
long passages of Scripture. That's why they would say prayers
to be heard of men. That's why they'd give alms to
be seen of men. These are signs men can look
at and say, now that man, God's done something in that man. This
is what they wanted to look to. The Judaizers were the worst
of all. The Judaizers were like the reformers
of our day. The Judaizers took and preached
the grace of God in Christ, but then they put that right beside
the law of Moses. They brought a man, supposedly
brought a man under grace and brought him under work. And when
you do that, it just ceases to be grace altogether. And they
did it because they wanted to see a sign in people even if
they had to whip it out of them with the law. That's what you
see in our day. And Christ said that the reason
that men seek these outward physical signs is because they don't have
inward spiritual discernment to see the signs that God has
given. You remember they came to Christ
The Sadducees, the Scribes, the Pharisees, they all came to Christ
seeking some other sign other than Christ Himself. And Christ
told them on one occasion, He said, you can look at the sky
in the morning, you can look at the sky in the evening, and
you can discern by the sky what the weather is going to be. And
He said, can you not discern the signs of the times? He was
saying, you don't have any spiritual discernment. And the signs of
the times we're about to see in Scripture that God had given,
and God's still giving today, is Christ and His people. It's Christ and His people. It's
Christ and the works He works in His people. We're going to
see that from the Scriptures. They were religious, they were
outwardly, period, righteous and moral, but they didn't have
spiritual discernment. And then he says here, the Greeks,
verse 2, the Greeks seek after wisdom. The Greeks represent
all men who are fond of worldly wisdom. Men who seek wisdom in
philosophy, or in astronomy, or in politics, or history, or
archeology, or even religion, if it's intellectual. Paul came to preach in Greece,
that's where Corinth was. When Paul came to preach in Greece,
they took Paul, these philosophers and these Epicureans and these
Stoics, worldly wise men, philosophers, and they took him and they said,
he seems to be a setter forth of strange gods. because he was
preaching Christ, the Scripture says, and the resurrection. And
they took him and they brought him to their center of learning
where they all came to debate some new doctrine they'd heard.
And they said, Thou bringest certain strange things to our
ears. You preach new doctrine, they
said. And it says, Therefore, We want to know, therefore, because
it's new, because it's strange, because we've never heard it.
We want to know, therefore, what these things mean. And he gives
us a parenthesis and he says, for, because, all the Athenians
and the strangers spent their time in nothing else but either
to tell or to hear some new thing. Some new thing. We don't have
anything new to tell. Our story is as old as God. Our
story is as old as eternity. We got the same story that's
been told from the beginning. The first sinner ever saved was
saved by the same thing we're telling now, the gospel. And
the last sinner is going to be saved by what we're telling now.
We don't have any new thing. We don't have any new thing.
It may be new to us, but it's in the Word and it's only new
until God shows it to us. These men are ever learning,
never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Then we have here
the third kind of people, and that's God's true church. He
says, but we preach Christ crucified. You know what Paul meant by that?
You got some here that want to see a sign. So they're preaching
man and man's work. And they want to get a sign out
of them. They want to see something out of them. They want to see
some morality. Then you've got men who are preaching wisdom
of men. They want to hear some new thing,
some strange thing. Tell me something that's going
to tickle my ear. Paul said over there in 2 Corinthians 4, we
preach not ourselves. That's what he means here. We
don't preach man's works. We don't preach morality. We
don't preach the law. We don't preach salvation by
works. And we don't preach man's wisdom.
We preach Christ crucified. He said, God forbid that I should
glory save in the cross of Christ by whom the world is crucified
unto me and I unto the world. We don't preach a Christ-centered
gospel. Christ is our gospel. We only
preach Christ. We only preach Christ. The world,
false religion, they have an evangelical message. And by that
message, they mean they're going to give lip service to Christ.
And then they have what they call a practical message. That's
what you hear most. They preach man's works. And
they teach their preachers, you've got to walk a tightrope between
the two. Preach some sometimes, some the
other time, and then you'll be preaching a balanced ministry.
Well, Christ is the preacher speaking here through the Holy
Spirit, through the Apostle Paul, and he says, my preachers only
preach Christ crucified. All the time. All the time. Whether we're preaching in the
epistles or we're preaching in the gospels, we preach Christ
crucified. Whether we're preaching the Old
Testament or we're preaching the New Testament, we're preaching
Christ crucified. Only Christ, we preach Christ.
I determine not to know anything among you, Paul said, but Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. Alright, that's the three kinds
of people we're dealing with. Jews, religious folks, worldly
wise men, and God's true church, His believing people. Now let's
see the three different kinds of effects this gospel has on
these people. He says, and I want you to remember,
this is on purpose. This was God's reason why He
sent us to preach the gospel. Alright, here's the effects on
the self-made religious man. Verse 23, we preach Christ crucified
unto the Jews, a stumbling block. Unto the self-made man, the self-religious
man, this is a stumbling block. Years beforehand, God declared
this was going to be the case. I'm showing you here this is
on purpose. This is on purpose. It's according to God's purpose.
And God declared a long time ago. Go to Isaiah chapter 8.
God declared through the prophet Isaiah that men were going to
do this. Religious folks were going to
stumble and fall and be snared and be taken. They were going
to be further condemned by the refusing Christ and Him crucified. He says in verse 13, "...and
sanctify the Lord of hosts Himself." Let Him be your fear, let Him
be your dread. That means don't worry about
other men, just behold God as He is, high and lifted up, righteous,
holy, and behold your Savior. and know that He's the only one
you've got to have. And He says here, and He should
be for a sanctuary. He'll be a refuge to His people.
But, look what God said through Isaiah, but He's going to be
for a stone of stumbling and for a rock of a fence to both
the houses of Israel. He's going to be for a gin and
for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem. And many among
them shall stumble and fall and be broken and be snared and be
taken. Many shall. But now, Christ calls
His people. And He does it because God sent
Him to. Here's what God is speaking to
Christ and what He sent Christ to do. Verse 16. Bind up the
testimony. Seal the law, the gospel, among
my disciples. And look at this. Here's the
result. This is the result in Christ and this is the result
in His people. Remember, watch this. Now, I
will wait upon the Lord that hideth His face from the house
of Jacob and I'll look for Him. Isn't that what you've been doing
since God called you? Since Christ called you? You've
been waiting on the Lord. You've been looking for Him.
He's hiding His face from a multitude of self-righteous religious will-workers. But He's revealed Himself in
you and you're waiting on Him. You're looking for Him. Now watch
this. Remember those... He said, you
don't discern the signs of the times. That's what He told those
that came to Him. Now watch this. Here's the signs
they didn't recognize. Behold, I and the children whom
the Lord hath given me are for signs and for wonders in Israel
from the Lord of hosts which dwelleth in Mount Sinai." They
were seeking a sign, some other sign, and Christ says, and the
people the Lord has given me. I and these people in whom I've
sealed up the testimony, I and these people whom I've called
out of darkness into light, we are for signs and for wonders
in Israel, in the midst." And they said, we'd see a sign. You'd show us a sign, we'd see
a sign. Christ is the sign. But now, why were they saying
that? Go back to Romans 9 now. Why will a man say something
like that and not believe on Christ? Why will a man go through
the life, hear the Gospel preached, and say, well, I just wish I
had some kind of sign, and then I might believe on Him? Why do
men say that? Here's the problem. Verse 31. Romans 9, 31. which followed after the law
of righteousness have not attained to the law of righteousness.
Wherefore? Why not? Because they sought
it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. There's
the problem. They're trying to come to God
by their works. There's the problem. Look at
this. For they did just what God said they'd do. They stumbled
at that stumbling stone. As it's written, Behold, I lay
in Zion a stumbling stone, a rock of offense, and whosoever believeth
on him shall not be ashamed." They won't be confounded. But
conversely, those that don't believe on Him, those that keep
on trying to come to God in their works, they're going to be further
and further confounded, further and further blinded. And that's
what God does through this gospel. Peter said this, let me read
this to you from 1 Peter chapter 2. He said, To you therefore
which believe he is precious, but to them which be disobedient. Them that have heard the gospel,
but they wouldn't bow to it. Them that wouldn't walk in the
light God gave them. He said, The stone which the
builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner.
And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense, even them
which stumble at the word being disobedient. But now listen to
this. Whereunto also they were appointed. God appointed them
to this. And he said, I'm going to do
it through the gospel. Now, he's showing us why he preaches the
gospel. Any man who's trying to come to God by the works of
the law, he may say he believes Christ, he may not. But if he's
trying to come by the works of the law, this gospel is going
to further blind him and further judge him. Alright, now what
about the preaching on the Greeks, on those that seek worldly wisdom? Verse 23, 1 Corinthians 1.23. Unto the Greeks this is foolishness. It's foolishness. But they're
appointed to this too by God. That's the purpose of this gospel
to them too. Look down at verse 28. Base things
of the world and things which are despised. I don't despise
this, do you? I rejoice in the preaching of
the gospel. Who despises it? Those that seek worldly wisdom.
Those that are trying to come to God by their works. They despise
this message. Look at this. But it says here,
but those are things God has chosen. Why? He's chosen things
which are not to bring to nothing things that are. He did it on
purpose. But why would a person who loves
wisdom, why would he not look at the Gospel and Christ and
say, oh, this is the most profound wisdom, the only wisdom there
is? Why wouldn't he do that? If he really loves wisdom, why
wouldn't he look and say, this is wisdom? Look across the page
at chapter 2 and verse 14. The natural man receiveth not
the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto
him. He's a natural man in their foolishness
unto Him. Neither can He know them because
they're spiritually discerned. But then our text speaks of God's
true church in verse 24. What effect does this have on
them? But unto them which are called. To them which are called. There's the difference. This
is the difference. You see, there's a general call
going out. And everybody, all these three
different kinds of people are hearing it. But to some, They
hate it because they want to see a sign that they can work
up. The others hate it because it's
just utter foolishness to them. This is not the kind of wisdom
we think is wise. But you see to them that God
calls effectually in the heart. That's the difference. He says,
which are called both the Jews and Greeks, both from the self-made
religious world and from the self-ascribed wise world. He
says, to them Christ is the power of God and He's the wisdom of
God. Now brethren, I know it's offensive.
The self-made religious world is offensive. The self-ascribed
wise world is offensive. And I get offended. I just can't
watch the news these days. It just offends me. But as much
as men offend you, try to live peaceably with them and keep
preaching Christ to them if they will let you. Because God's got
some elect. He's going to call out from the
religious world and from the self-described wise world. That's
where He got us. One of those two places is where
He got us. Some of us may have been wrapped up in both. That's
where He got us. And that's what He's going to
do. So let them shut the door. Let them shut the door. As long
as it's open, keep declaring the truth to them. Declare the
truth to them. Now I want to spend the rest
of our time here on these last few verses. I want us to see
how Christ how Christ and how the preaching of Christ crucified
is the wisdom and power of God unto them that are called. First
of all, we know this, Christ personally himself is wisdom
and power. He himself personally is wisdom
and power. We could look at this in so many
ways. We could go back before the world was made, He is the
Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. The works were
finished when God put His people in Christ and this thing was
settled right then and there. We could go back and look at
how everything that was made was made by Christ. He is the
power and wisdom of God. We could look at the miracles
He worked when He walked this earth. He said, If I with the
finger of God cast out devils, then you know the kingdom of
God is upon you. We could look at all those things, but let's
look at Christ coming in human flesh. You remember whenever
the Lord was bearing witness to King Ahaz through Isaiah.
And Ahaz was acting all religious, and, oh, I won't ask a sign of
the Lord. And the Lord said, I'm going to give you a sign.
He said, I'm going to give you a sign. And the sign, the Lord
said, the Lord Himself shall give you a sign. and the Lord
Himself, Christ. God in Christ, the Lord Himself
is the sign. He is the sign. There is no other
sign but Christ, the power and wisdom of God. He is the sign.
And He said this, Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
and shall call his name Immanuel. Now, whenever that virgin conceived,
when a virgin conceived, That was God giving a sign. That was
God declaring that Christ is the seed of woman that He preached
way back there in the garden. The seed of woman. The only woman
that never knew a man. He's showing this is the sign.
This is the seed of woman. This is the power and wisdom
of God to crush the devil's head. And then when Christ was conceived
of the Holy Ghost rather than of a sinful man, This was God
giving a sign. This was God declaring, this
is Christ, the power and wisdom of God, the power and wisdom
of holy human flesh. The only holy man, the last Adam. Adam was holy but he fell. This
is the holy man. that's holy, that's holy, that
will not fall, that will not turn from God. This is the holy
man Christ Jesus, so that He's fit to go to the cross and bear
the sins of His people. And when He said His name should
be called Emmanuel, He was saying also, this is the sign of Him
who is God. He's man and He's God. That's
why He didn't fall. He's the eternal God. the eternal
holy God and eternal holy flesh. That's who He is. So that He
is the wisdom and power of God to come and obtain the redemption
of His people from the curse of the law all by Himself. Isn't
that wisdom? Isn't that power? God sent His
Son to redeem His people from the curse of the law. So that
the law has nothing whatsoever to say to His people again. Then we see Him as a young child.
And there He is in the temple that day. And you got the wisest
men sitting there. You got the scribes and Pharisees.
These men that were always looking for a sign. And there He is asking
them questions. And they're asking him questions
and he's answering them. And they're sitting there and
the Scripture says, all that heard him were astonished at
his understanding and his answers. And then they sent some men out
one time to arrest him. And they came back. And the men
that went out to arrest him, I just pictured them standing
there ready to arrest the Lord. And they're listening to him
preach. And they just dropped their spears and dropped their
swords and whatever they had went back and said, we ain't
ever heard a man preach like this man. Christ, the power and
wisdom of God. Oh, and then look at the cross.
That's where you see Him, especially on the cross. There you see God
declaring His righteousness, the wisdom of God, and the power
of God to declare His righteousness. If you didn't know the Gospel,
and if you just go back to put yourself in a place where you
didn't know the Gospel, you didn't understand the Gospel, Can't
you see how a bloody cross would be foolishness to men? You remember
when it was foolishness to you? Can't you see how that would
be a stumbling block? To know that right there on that
cross, that bloody man hanging there on that cross, where it
looks like men are having their way, doing what they will to
Him, piercing Him and mocking Him and doing all that to Him.
That appears to you and I to be defeat. That's God declaring
His righteousness. There's God declaring that now
He's just. Because He put the sin of His
people on Christ and because Christ bore the wrath of God
in place of His people, God has satisfied justice His own justice. He's upheld it. The soul that
sinneth must die. You've got to die. I've got to
die. Everybody God saves has got to die. Don't you remember
Israel when He brought them out of Egypt? All the firstborn died. The firstborn in the houses of
Israel died too. You know what the difference
was? The firstborn in Israel died in a substitute. They died
in that lamb that was slain. And the difference, all have
got to be slain, all have got to suffer eternal death. The difference is Christ suffered
it for His people. So God's law is established.
It's upheld. His people have no sin. The law
can find no blame in them. And then it declares too, God's
the justifier. There's never been one man that
ever fulfilled the law of God. Christ came to fulfill the law. He did it. There's never been
a man who's ever justified himself. Christ came. God justified His
people in Christ. Christ justified His people when
He laid down His life at Calvary. By Him. By Christ. Not by you,
not by your faith, by Christ. All who believe are justified
from all things from which could not be justified by the law of
Moses. That's what Christ did. That's what Christ did. That's
the power and wisdom of God. But it doesn't stop there. It
doesn't stop there. Then Christ ascended. He came
out of that grave. Look over at Matthew 12 and look
at verse 28. He came out of that grave. Matthew 12, 28. I'm sorry, Matthew 12, 38. Matthew
12, 38. The certain of the scribes and
Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we see a sign from thee. But
he answered and said unto them, An evil, an evil, An adulterous
generation seeketh after a sign." How are they adulterous? Christ
is the only sign. Christ, our husband, is the only
sign. And these folks right here left our husband to seek a sign
somewhere else. That's spiritual adultery. Look
here. He says, "...and there shall
no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonah." What's
that? As Jonah was three days and three
nights in the whale's belly, so shall the Son of Man be three
days and three nights in the heart of the earth. But He came
out, didn't He? Why did He come out? Christ's
resurrection is God giving the sign that Christ is the power
and the wisdom whereby God is completely satisfied toward His
people. That's what He declared coming
out of that grave. That's the sign to you and me that there's,
the law has nothing else to say to us. God will not condemn us
because Christ suffered in place of His people. It says He was
delivered for our offenses. He was raised again for our justification. It was, it doesn't mean that
when He came out of that grave that's when we were justified.
It means He came out of that grave to prove to you and me,
the sign to you and me that justice is satisfied. It's accomplished. It's accomplished. And now where's
Christ? He's in heaven. And all power
in heaven and earth is given to Him. And He's doing whatever
He will in heaven and in earth. And you know what that sign is
to us? That's showing us, brethren, that He's the living power and
wisdom of God. I'm telling you, this is what
the world of religion does not believe. This is what the world
of Christianity today does not believe. It's why they've got
every kind of law and every kind of other law and every kind of
this law and that law to try to keep everybody in the church
in check and everybody trying to keep everybody else in check
because they really don't believe Christ is walking in His church
making His people obedient. But He is. We're going to see
this again on Sunday, Lord willing. He's the preacher. He's the priest
who went in, obtained eternal redemption for us. He's our priest.
He's the prophet who preaches the gospel as His weak, worthless,
earthen vessels are declaring it. It's Christ preaching it
to His people. And He's the King who can carry that gospel to
His people and make it effectual in their heart. And if we deny
Him any of the work, the work on the cross or the work He does
through the preaching of the gospel, we're denying everything
he is and everything he's done. He's the prophet, priest, and
king of his people. He's the wisdom and power of
God. And that leads me to this next point. God chose to save
through the preaching of the gospel to give Christ the glory
of being our wisdom and our power. That's what God the Father promised
His Son before the world was made. That's the glory He wanted
that He had with the Father before the world was made. The glory
of being the power and the wisdom of God to His people. We see
Christ's power and wisdom in this gospel being preached. By
who Christ chooses to preach it and by what He does through
it. Now get what I said, we see Christ is the power and the wisdom.
of the gospel that's being preached by who Christ chose to preach
it and what He does through the preaching. If He'd have went and chose wise
men, learned men, educated men, respected men, men the world
would just naturally follow because they're charismatic and all that,
then you'd have thought, well, maybe they're following them
because of their wisdom and their power. Who'd He choose? uneducated
folks. He chose people that the world
looked down on. He chose folks that this world
would look at and say, you mean he's going to be your preacher?
I guarantee if you talked to a lot of people when you called
me to preach, they'd go, you mean he's going to be your preacher?
But he chose men that he chose that Christ might be the power
and wisdom of God. We don't have any power in us,
it's all of him. He didn't send us forth to fight.
We didn't send us forth with carnal weapons. We're not like
Muhammad's prophets. We're not like ISIS that used
carnal weapons to make folks bow and obey. No, sir. Our weapons are not carnal. We
got something a whole lot more powerful than that. Christ, the
power and wisdom of God. We preach Him and He brings men
into obedience. The world don't believe that.
If they did, this is what I don't get. Explain this to me. You'll
preach an evangelical message. You're going to give some lip
service to Christ and beg sinners to bow to Christ. And then with
that message that you claim that you got folks to bow to Christ
with, you're going to stop preaching that then, and to make them obedient,
you're going to preach works to them? Why not preach Christ
to them? If that's what made them bow
in the first place, keep preaching Christ to them. Won't that make
them obedient the rest of their lives? Sure it will. Men don't
believe that, though, or they'd keep on preaching Christ. They'd
go back to the law. back to the law, back to the
flesh, back to the works. He multiplies, He makes people
repent, He makes people leave their fleshly works and just
live a quiet life, worshiping Him through this gospel. This
foolish means, using these foolish means, shows that Christ is the
wisdom and power to send His gospel and call His elect in
every generation. And that shows us that Christ
is the power and wisdom of God, whom God glorifies by using this
very means. And then consider this. He's
the power and wisdom of God, and we see it through gospel
preaching because of what the gospel promises and yet still
accomplishes. Because of what the gospel promises
and yet still accomplishes. Now you think about this. The
gospel doesn't promise you health, or wealth, or prosperity. That's
what the world's false gospel declares. That's not what our
gospel declares. Christ said, in this world you
shall have tribulation. And Christ said, and when you
believe on me, you're going to have it worse. Because now you're
going to have a warfare between your flesh and your spirit, and
those of your own household are going to hate you. That's what
our message declares. You mean you're going to stand
up and tell people, if you'll believe on Christ, everything's
going to get worse and worse and worse until you flesh? Yeah. And then the gospel doesn't promise
us a freedom from the law and from all those tyrants and all
those wheel workers so that we can just live in sin and run
wild like a bunch of kids let out on the playground. No, the
gospel promises to give you redemption from that curse of the law so
that you can worship and serve God in spirit, not in the oldness
of the letter. And that's not appealing to the
flesh either. The flesh don't have nothing to do with that
either. And yet multitudes leave all their legal works and bow
to Christ in rejoicing His gospel and are made obedient to follow
Christ through this gospel. simply through the preaching
of this Word. How can that be? It's because Christ is the wisdom
and power of God, and He constrains us through the message of Christ
being crucified to obey Him. Isn't that right? That's newness
of spirit, is to be taught of Christ and walk after Christ.
And then Christ shows us He's the power and wisdom of the Gospel,
Because the gospel has continued to be preached in every age,
in every generation. And He's continued to call His
people out wherever they are scattered in the world. Now this
will give you some encouragement. And I think we need some encouragement
because if I'm not mistaken, we see some persecution on the
horizon. But this gives me great comfort.
Think of the persecution Christ's church has faced throughout the
ages. If it was up to me, if it was
up to you, you're going to watch this. You're going to see this
happen. You already see this happening. Men who aren't under
the power and wisdom of Christ, they're already cavilling and
kowtowing. The Catholic Church will be the
first one to fold. Watch it. Watch me. I bet you will be.
I bet they'll be rejoicing in their benevolence to men. Watch. We couldn't have kept up. We
couldn't have stood up under persecution. And then all over
this world, you got men scattered in the far corners. God used
persecution to do that. You think about where Papua New
Guinea is. You think about where the jungles
of Mexico are. That's remote, brethren. We went
a couple of years ago to a village in Mexico, and for the first
time in about 2012 or 2013, these people got water in their
village. Not in their houses, not where
you can just walk over and turn on a faucet, a well in the center
of town where you had to go and pump it. That's remote, brethren. And yet, right there in that
place, Christ sent a preacher with the gospel. Why? He had
a people there. You see, He overrules all the
persecution. He overrules all of the world
splintering His church and sending them forth in the world because
He's spreading His gospel wherever He has a people. And it's like
you break a thermometer and that mercury comes out and you try
to just hit it. It just splinters into... Every
time you hit it, it splinters into pieces. And if it gets close
to one another, it comes back together in one piece. That's
His church. You can't stamp it out because
Christ is the wisdom and the power of it. He's the wisdom
and the power of it. One more thing now. He's the
wisdom and power because through this preaching, He makes Himself
wisdom and power in our heart. In our heart. When Christ is
formed in the heart, that's when we know Christ Himself. He's
the truth. And you know, you can learn doctrine
and you can learn true doctrine, but you don't know the truth
till Christ is formed in your heart. Then you know Christ. Then there'll be all the difference
in the world. Right now, if you don't have
Christ, you just know doctrine. Men could talk about free will
works religion and it don't really offend you too bad. You could
stomach to sit under it. It's alright. They're just a
little off in their doctrine. But when Christ is formed in
you, now they're talking about my Father. Now they are talking
about my Redeemer. And that offends me. Now they
are telling lies on one who loved me and gave himself for me. There
is all the difference. Now you have got the love of
God in your heart. Now you have got Christ in your heart. And
I will tell you something else you have got when you have got
Christ in your heart. You have got the sign. You have got faith
in your heart. And when you have got faith in
your heart, you don't need any other sign. You don't need any
other sign. You see the power now. You don't
need any other wisdom. You see the wisdom now through
faith. You see Christ. That's what happens when He enters.
I don't look to myself, to my flesh to see any wisdom, but
through faith I see Christ my wisdom. I don't look to self
to see any righteousness, to my flesh, but when I look to
Christ through faith I see my righteousness. I don't see holiness
in my flesh. Do you? Far from it. But when I look to Christ through
faith, I see my holiness. And when I look to myself, I
tell you what I see concerning redemption. I see my flesh being
brought into captivity by sin that's in my members. But when
I look to Christ, I see my redemption from the law's curse and from
this flesh. And Christ has made me free indeed.
You see what I'm saying? Faith's the evidence because
you seek Christ. And He's the power and the wisdom
of God. He's the things that the carnal
eye can't see. That's why you quit looking for
a carnal sign and you quit looking for carnal wisdom. You see now
the evidence. Christ, the power and wisdom
of God. Look over there with me at 1 Corinthians 2. As it is written, I hath not
seen, nor a carnal eye, nor a carnal ear heard, neither has entered
into the carnal heart of a man the things which God hath prepared
for them that love him. But God hath revealed them to
us by His Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things, yea, the
deep things of God. Now we have the sign. We don't
need another one, do we? Now we've got Christ who is all,
and we know He's all. We know all. And you know what
else? Because we experience this, because
we experience Christ becoming the wisdom and power of God through
the preaching of the gospel, This is the wisdom and power
of God. This makes us flock together. This makes us make one another
first because it makes the gospel first. We've got to have the
gospel. We've got to have one another to have the gospel. So
it makes you overlook every little piddly thing. And it makes you
quit serving yourself and living for yourself. And it makes you
live for Christ and His people. Because we got to have the gospel.
I need my children to have the gospel. It's so important for
me that they have the gospel. I'm willing to overlook your
shortcomings. And me and you get along so we keep this gospel
in this place. Because I want them to hear the
gospel. And I want your children to hear the gospel. And we want
to send it far and wide for others to hear the gospel. And not only
that, just like we saw here. He makes it a stumbling block
and foolishness to some. He's saving us from our enemies
through this gospel. You know one good thing about
preaching the gospel? You don't have to worry about wheel workers
coming in and messing it up. They don't want to hear it. They won't stay around too long.
They'll come in and aggravate you for a little while, but then
they're gone. They can't stand it. And that's God saving us
through this gospel. I'm telling you, from here on,
through this gospel. Amen. All right, Eric.