All right, thank you, man. Let's
go back to 1 Corinthians chapter one. Actually, I want to ask you a
question. And it's a very simple question,
but a very vital question. And it is this, are you in Christ? Are you in Christ? Can't answer for anybody else.
And you shouldn't be thinking about, well, I wonder if so and
so is. You best be thinking about yourself. That is, are you in Christ? This is what the scripture says.
Let me read this again. Verse 30. Here's what Paul says. But of God, of God are you in
Christ Jesus. It's of God. If you're in Christ
Jesus, that's a place of safety. Now that's a place of salvation.
Just as sure as Noah and his family were safe in the ark,
though the judgment of God fell on the ark, they were preserved. No harm came to them. The judgment
of God didn't touch them. It touched that vessel in which
they were found. Even so, if God has put us in
Christ Jesus, judgment's not going to touch us. It's already
been fully satisfied by the ark of our salvation, Christ Jesus. Judgment fell on Him. So the
issue is, are you in Christ Jesus? And there is an evidence that
you are, and that is faith in Him. Faith in the Son of God. Now I want to give you sort of
an overview of most of this chapter. I'm not going to deal very much
with the first several verses, but mainly Oh, about two-thirds
of the chapter. I really believe this is one
of the most, well, I'll call it the most comprehensive portions
of Scripture about and regarding Bible doctrine in all of the
Word of God. You'd do well to listen to it.
You'd do well to read it. I read it again this afternoon.
And then I brought up on my computer a man by the name of Alexander
Scorby, and I listened to him read the scriptures. And then
I was getting ready to go, and I asked my wife, I said, would
you do me a favor? And she said, what's that? I
said, would you read 1 Corinthians 1 for me? And she read it. And now Matt has read it. I have
been blessed four times today in just listening to, first of
all reading myself, but then in listening to others read this
passage of Scripture. And it is so full of the grace
of God. And there is no room for anybody
to boast of their salvation if they have read this portion of
Scripture carefully, accurately, and with spiritual understanding. I'm going to give you several
things, and I'm going to have to move along as I go through
these. Number one, there are several
things Paul establishes in this. Number one, he establishes the
reason God sends forth His preachers. Look at verse 17. the first part
of it first. Verse 17, he says, for Christ
sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel. Now, baptism
is important. It's one of two ordinances that
the Lord Jesus left to his church. Baptism is a public confession
of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. The Savior in Mark chapter 16
commanded His disciples to go forth. He said, he that believeth
and is baptized shall be saved. Believing is critical. Everything
rests on believing Christ Jesus and those who believe Him are
to be baptized. And we know baptism doesn't have
anything to do with washing away of sins because the next part
of the verse says, and he that believeth not is damned. Being baptized is vital, it is
important. It's a public confession of faith
in Christ, and it pictures the death, the burial, and the resurrection
of our Savior. And when a person goes into the
baptismal waters, having believed the gospel of grace, the gospel
of the Lord Jesus Christ, they are identifying with this Savior. And they are saying that when
He died, I died in Him. When He was buried, I was buried
in Him. When He was raised again, I was
raised again in Him. In Christ. Baptism is important. It is by commandment. But listen,
there is no salvation in baptism. There is no salvation in baptism. In fact, you'll search throughout
the New Testament. You'll never find anybody who
ever baptized anyone who did not believe the gospel of the
grace of God. Baptism is not for unbelievers. It's for believers. And it is
immersion. Picture in the death, burial,
and resurrection of Christ. I know some folks who, they think
baptism is sprinkling a little water on somebody's head. That doesn't picture death. That
doesn't picture death at all. When a person goes under the
water, that pictures death and burial. They're buried in the
waters. And then the preacher, me or
whoever baptized, brings them up out of the water. That's resurrection
by God. Picture resurrection by God.
Baptism doesn't put away sin. Baptism is not salvation. You
know, the scripture says this about our Lord Jesus. And you
can finish these verses, I'm sure. If I start to quote them,
you can finish them. Thou shalt call His name Jesus,
for, what's the rest of it? He shall save His people from
their sins, right? In Luke 19, verse number 10,
the Lord Jesus said, For the Son of Man is come to do what? To seek and to save those that
are lost. 1 Timothy chapter 1. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation. That, what's the rest of it say?
That Christ Jesus came into the world, what's this? To save sinners,
he says. Of whom I'm chief. That's why
Christ came. He came to save. Now hold that
thought. and hold this portion of Scripture
and go with me to John chapter 4. Why did Christ come into the
world? He came to save. He came to save. He is Himself salvation. He's
the door to salvation. He's the way of salvation. He
is salvation. Once you get there, I'll refer
to another passage of Scripture in Luke chapter 2. You don't
have to turn to this, but remember when Simeon saw Mary and Joseph
bringing the Lord Jesus, just an infant, into the temple. And
then Simeon took Him up in His arms. He said, Mine eyes have
seen, what did He say? Thy salvation. That's what He
said. I'm looking into the face of
God's salvation. Alright. Look here in John chapter
4 and verse 1. When therefore the Lord knew
how the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more
disciples than John, and now John, that is the Holy Spirit,
gives us a vital piece of information. Though Jesus himself baptized
not, But his disciples, in other words, he told his disciples
to baptize the believers. Now we know his mission in coming
into the world is to save sinners. But he didn't baptize anybody. So baptism is not the way of
salvation. If baptism is how you wash your
sins away, if baptism gives you acceptance with a holy God, then
our Lord Jesus would have been baptized by everybody who professed
faith in Him. But He didn't baptize anybody.
To me, that makes a very loud statement to anybody who bothers
to think. If He didn't baptize anybody,
and yet He came to save sinners, then it's not by baptism that
people are saved. It's not by baptism that sins
are washed away. It's not by baptism that we're
made accepted in the Beloved. We're only accepted in Christ
Jesus. Is that clear? Surely nobody's
going to misunderstand that. Our Lord didn't baptize anybody.
Well, that speaks volumes to me. And it tells me salvation
is not by baptism. And the Apostle Paul, back over
here in our text now, in 1 Corinthians 1, he says, the Lord didn't send
me to baptize. And he has mentioned, and Matt
read to us, he said, I baptized a few. He said, I can't even
remember if I baptized anybody else or not. But there were a
lot of people who converted under his ministry. God the Spirit
used him to establish churches in various locations. He went
out on one, two, three missionary journeys. And the Spirit of God
blessed the preaching of the gospel of the grace of God in
Christ Jesus. Here's the apostle. He goes out
preaching. He's a preacher of the gospel.
That is what God sends His preachers to do. Now we baptize those who
believe, but it's only those who believe. I just finished
writing another Sunday school lesson that we'll get to in,
I don't know, four, five, six weeks. It's Philip in the Ethiopian
eunuch. Philip preached about Christ
Jesus from Isaiah chapter 53, because that's where the eunuch
was reading from, Isaiah 53. Philip said, you understand what
you're reading? He said, no. How can I except somebody guide
me? I need somebody to guide me.
Guide me into the Word of God. Guide me into the Gospel. Guide
me into true understanding of what this passage is about and
who the prophet of God is speaking of. And Philip began at the same
portion of Scripture and preached unto Him Jesus. And no doubt,
who Jesus is, what Jesus came to do, why Jesus came to do it,
that Jesus did what He came to do, and that the Lord Jesus has
gone back to glory and He's exalted and He's coming again. And as
they're riding along in the chariot, the eunuch sees a body of water. They come up evidently upon an
oasis. And he says to Philip, here's
water. What doth hinder me to be baptized? And Philip said, if you believe, if you believe on the Son of
God, thou mayest. He said, I believe He is the
Son of God. I believe He is who He said He
was. And Philip baptized Him. The man confessed his faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Here's the vital thing that Philip
did. He preached unto him the Lord
Jesus. And that's what the Apostle Paul
says is the responsibility of every, every preacher of the
gospel, to preach. that which God has already done
for sinners in, through, and by Christ Jesus. The gospel is
not... it does... it affects sinners,
and it's for sinners, but it's not about what sinners have got
to do for God, because that wouldn't be good news at all. The good news in the word gospel
means good news, glad tidings. The glad tidings, the good news,
the gospel is everything a holy God demanded of His people to
make them holy and righteous and accepted in His sight, Jesus
Christ has done to the satisfaction of God Himself. He put away all
the sins of His people. He satisfied the law of God that
we had broken. He's made things right with God.
He is the peacemaker between us and God, having washed us
from our sins in His own blood. Why does God send preachers?
To preach the gospel. We're not politicians. We're
not to get involved in all these things that so many preachers
get involved with and they get sidetracked from the gospel.
I tell you, in the days of the Apostle Paul, slavery was an
issue. It was a big issue. He didn't
get into that. And there were other issues as
well, politically. I mean, Israel was in bondage
to Rome. Caesar was cruel. He didn't talk
about the unfairness of Caesar's rule. That's not why I was here. I'm not going to get involved
in all these things, Republican, Democrat, in the middle, progressive,
liberal, conservative. That's not my business. That's
not my message. I was telling somebody the other
night, telling some of the men, that there was a preacher down
in Florida, years ago, down in Florida, wrote a really good
book, Trues That Transform. But he got all wrapped up in
politics, and then he got to hobnobbing with presidents, and off he goes. Paul says, Christ sent me to preach the
gospel. That's a preacher's job. So he
establishes, he establishes the reason God sends forth his preachers.
Number two, he establishes universal sinfulness. He talked about the wisdom of
this world and he says it's foolishness. It's foolishness. Have you ever
seen, in your lifetime, have you ever seen so many so-called
educated, wise people who are absolutely fools? They're fools. They deny creation, they deny
the Word of God, and they profess to be wise. They're educated,
got all kinds of doctors' degrees and so forth and so on, and deny
that the Word of God is inspired. And you've got seminaries. There
are seminaries that used to be halfway decent, but now they
deny the inspiration of the Scriptures. Here's what Paul does. He establishes
the universal sinfulness of everybody. The wisdom of the world is really
foolishness. And it doesn't matter how wise
you are in the ways of the world, you are and I am by nature ignorant
and foolish when it comes to the things of God. The best thing we could ever
do, short of believing the Gospel, is to come before the Lord and
say, I don't know. I don't understand. I can't see
this. Oh Lord, teach me. Like the eunuch
said to Philip, how can I understand except somebody guide me? Lord,
guide me. Lord, teach me. You see, it's
foolishness to many people to even think that Christ had to
die. They're ignorant of the holiness
of God, the wisdom of God, the justice of God, that God must
punish sin. They're ignorant of that. They
don't know how bad sin is. And really, none of us comprehend
the awfulness of sin. Sin would have taken God right
off the throne. Sin would have raped His glory. It's an awful thing. Sin would kill God if it could. Terrible thing. And when the Jews heard the gospel
preached, they stumbled over it. They stumbled over it. Salvation by the substitutionary
sacrifice of Christ Jesus in order to put away sin. So we
don't believe that. All you gotta do is keep God's
law. They denied his person, they denied his work, and the
Greeks considered the message of redeeming grace to be sheer
nonsense. It's foolishness. They said it doesn't make sense
that he had to die. And there are many people who
do not see the wisdom of God in the death of Christ Jesus.
I tell you what, if he hadn't died, he wouldn't have seen the
Spirit. And because there'd be no need for the Holy Spirit,
if Christ didn't die, there'd be no blood redemption to reveal. There'd be no salvation to make
known. There'd be no forgiveness of
sins to be proclaimed. All those things that the Holy
Spirit does, there'd be no need for the Holy Spirit to come if
Christ hadn't died. Now you get this. All of you
know this, surely, and those who are watching as well. There's
only one way God could save sinners in a just way, in a way that
would honor all of his attributes. That was through the substitutionary
sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. No other way. Well, you sound
pretty dogmatic on that, Jim. I am dogmatic because God's dogmatic
about that. If you say God could have saved
sinners some other way, you charge God foolishly. You charge God
with the death of his own son. And what you're saying is, God,
you didn't have to kill your own son if you saved us some
other way. There was no other way. God's
law had been broken. Justice demanded satisfaction. Justice cried out for death.
There's got to be death. Christ came and died. It's only a foolish person, an
ignorant person, who says he didn't have to die. Oh, yes,
he did. Yes, he did. Here's what Paul
does, he establishes universal sinfulness. Number three, he
establishes the gospel message. Look at verse 23. For we preach Christ crucified. See, that's the good news, Christ
crucified. Preaching the gospel is not using
the name of God lots of times. You ought to use the name of
God, but just using the name of God isn't preaching the gospel. Preaching the gospel is not using
the name of Jesus or Jesus Christ many, many times. That's not
preaching the gospel either. You say, well, he mentions Christ
a lot of times. Well, Christ what? That'd be Christ crucified. I tell you what, the living Christ,
without his death, there's no salvation. It's by his death. It's the work
that he did to honor God and save his people. Now that's the
good news, that's the gospel. He establishes this, we preach
Christ crucified. That's why Paul says in Galatians
chapter 6 and verse 14, I glory in the cross of Christ Jesus. What does he mean? That wooden
beam upon which Christ hung? That's not what he's talking
about. He's talking about I glory in the substitutionary sacrifice
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's all my glory. Christ is
Christ crucified. That's all my salvation. That's
who and what He did to honor God. That's what satisfied God.
That's what put my sins away. Why do you all the time preach
about this preacher? Because Christ is all and all
to me and I see by His bloody sacrifice that's how He saved
me. There's no salvation any other
way. That's why I got a guitar one
string on it. I just keep on strumming that
one string of the gospel. What God has done for us already
in Christ Jesus. Blood redemption, therein is
forgiveness Righteousness established. Here's the fourth thing. Paul
establishes that Christ Jesus, he is the power of God and the
wisdom of God. He says this down here. Go look
down in verse 24. But of them which are called,
I know to the world, to the Jews, it's a stumbling block. to the
Greeks the gospel in Christ is foolishness, but unto them which
are called, both Jews and Gentiles or Greeks, Christ the power of
God. He is the power of God. The Holy
Spirit points to Jesus Christ and says, there's the power of
God right there in creation. in providence. Had somebody wrote
me last week, asked me a really good question. Said, what is
providence? What is providence? That's a
good question. I thanked him for the question. It's God moving
all things along, directing all things to the end that He Himself
ordained. And the one who's doing that
is Christ Jesus our Lord. He is the power of God. And He
is the power of God in grace. Who else? Who else could have
satisfied God's justice? Who else could put our sins away? Who else could bring in for us
everlasting righteousness? A righteousness with which God
Himself cannot find any fault. Who else could do that? But Christ
who is the power of God. And Christ who is the wisdom
of God. Oh, what wisdom, what wisdom
is behind this salvation. In the eternal council chambers
of the holy God, they convened and this was established. The
way by which men and women will be redeemed and justified, sins
put away and declared righteous. is by the Son of God being made
flesh, and dwelling among men, and bearing the sins of all of
his people, the justice of God, the sword of God's justice, God's
gonna pull out the sword, thrust it into his soul. And that's
how God is a just God and a Savior. He's the wisdom of God and the
Spirit of God points to Jesus Christ and He says to all of
us, Jesus Christ, He is the power of God. Jesus Christ, He is the
wisdom of God. So He establishes Christ as the
power and the wisdom of God. And then number five, Paul establishes
the character of the people that God, that Christ came to save.
Are we described in here? Oh yeah, look down at verse 27. But God has chosen foolish things. That's us. That's us. We're just foolish things. Didn't
even say foolish people. We're foolish things. We lack
spiritual understanding. We're ignorant. We have no ability,
no ability to know anything about eternal matters except God teaches. We're foolish. And then he says
this, And he did that to confound the wise. And then, and God had
chosen the weak things. Weak, that's us too. No ability to help ourselves.
We're in a mess. Don't have any power to get us
out of the mess. Don't even know we're in a mess.
We're foolish and weak. And then we're based things which
are despised. We're low down. of people who are scarcely regarded
by the world. We're people who are, as he says
in the next verse, base things of the world, things which are
despised hath God chosen, and things which are not. We're just
nobodies. You think you're somebody? You're
not anybody. You're nothing. Nobody. Not in yourself. You're just
a sinner. You're like another wiggling
maggot on the earth. That's what you are. Me too.
We're worms of the dust. I didn't know you used to get
all bloated with arrogance and pride. Boy, I am somebody. No,
you're not anybody. You're nothing. He says here,
He came to save things which are not. You just barely have an existence.
And you're only in this world for brief existence, then you're
gone. James says your life is like
a vapor. This world has been going on
6,000 years. You're just a vapor. That's all you are. That's all
I am. Just here for a little bit. But these are the people that
Christ came to save, nobodies. And I'm preaching to a bunch
of nobodies, telling nobodies about somebody who can save anybody. He can save anybody. And he gets
the glory when he shows us we're nobody. And he's the somebody. And then Paul establishes salvation
by God's sovereign election of grace. 27 and 28, he talks about
chosen, chosen. Look at verse 27 again. And 28,
God hath chosen, he's chosen the foolish things of the world
to confound the wise. God hath chosen the weak things.
Look at verse 28, and base things of the world and things which
you despise hath God chosen. Go all the way back up to the
second verse. He writes to the church of God
which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ
Jesus. What does sanctified mean? Set
apart. When did God set us apart for
Himself, for His glory? Eternally. Eternally. He chose us. He establishes salvation
by God's sovereign election of grace and he stresses here, not
only chosen but our calling. He who chose us has redeemed
us and he calls us. Fetching grace. Like when David
says, anybody left of the household of Saul? And somebody said, well,
Jonathan's got a boy. He's named Mephibosheth, but
he's lame on both feet. He can't come, king. He can't
come to the castle. He said, go get him. Fetch him. And that's our condition by nature. We're lame on both feet. We can't
come to the king. So the king says to the Spirit
of God, go fetch him. Bring Him to me. If you are saved
by the grace of God, that's what He did to you. That's fetching
grace. He called us. And then Paul 7
establishes that true salvation will give no glory, no credit,
no honor to those who are saved. Verse 29. Verse 29. That no flesh should glory in
His presence. Don't you figure on getting any
recognition when you get to heaven. Don't you figure on getting any
glory. If you have any idea that some
credit, some glory is due to you, you're on the broad road
that leads to destruction. I tell you, the Lord said, I
am the Lord. That's my name. And my glory,
I'm not going to give to another. He's not going to give it to
you. And you go around bragging on how, hey, I made the difference. I exercised my will. Others wouldn't,
but I did. Well, you need to figure on making
it to glory. You got too much arrogance. The
Lord's going to have to take that out of you. He establishes salvation by grace. He establishes that no glory,
no flesh will glory in his presence. And number eight, Paul establishes
this fact, salvation is to be in Christ. That's what it is.
In Christ. Are you in Christ? Well, how
do we come to be in Christ? Well, first of all, by God's
eternal election. God put a people in Christ before
the foundation of the world. Listen, we were saved then. God's always viewed us in Christ
Jesus. We're in Him by sovereign grace. We were in Him when He died.
And when the Spirit of God brings us to believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, He gifts us with faith, then we come to the Savior willingly
and lovingly in full belief with the assurance that He's the only
Savior there is. And we're in Him. We're chosen
in Him, accepted in Him, blessed in Him. In Him. And then number nine,
Paul establishes this fact It's God who put us in Christ. You
didn't do that yourself. Look there in verse 30, but of
him, of him are you in Christ Jesus. Not of you, but of him
are you in Christ. In spite of what we were and
what we are in Adam. And notwithstanding our foolishness,
our weakness, our baseness, and our nothingness, God put us in
Christ. A baptism doesn't put anybody
in Christ. Raising your hand doesn't put
anybody in Christ. Walking an aisle and making the
decision to let Jesus come into your heart, that doesn't put
anybody in Christ. It's God who puts us in Christ. And then here's the last thing.
Paul establishes who and what Christ is to his people. Here
are four things. I'll give them to you quickly.
Beloved Him are ye in Christ Jesus. Who of God is made unto
us? Watch it, four things. Wisdom
and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. Here's the first
one, wisdom. Wisdom. Remember what we are
by nature. See, this is all connected. We're
foolish. Christ is our wisdom. And the
Spirit of God It's like He calls us all together and He says,
you want to see wisdom? There He is, Christ Jesus. He's your wisdom. He is that
prophet of God who teaches. He's all wise. And He, using
His Word, makes us wise unto salvation. And He's righteousness. Remember what we are by nature.
We're weak. We're not only foolish, but we're
weak. We have no ability to produce any righteousness of our own.
Isaiah 64 says, our righteousness is as filthy rags. What does
God demand? Righteousness. And the Spirit
of God pulls us aside and says, you want to see righteousness?
Right there He is. There He is. Christ Jesus is
our righteousness. And isn't that what Jeremiah
says of who Christ is? He's the Lord, our, what's the
word? Righteousness. And also in Jeremiah,
that's the name he gives to his church. We're the Lord, our righteousness. How good has a person got to
be to be accepted by God? As good as God in Christ I am. That's a pretty bold statement,
Jim. It is, and I wouldn't make it if I didn't have the Word
of God back me up. He is my righteousness. Everything's all right, everything
is right between this sinful man, this foolish, weak, abased,
sinful creature. Everything's all right between
me and a holy God because Christ is my righteousness. That's all
it needs. And then He's our sanctification.
Now what are we by nature? Base and despised. Low down, polluted, but the Spirit
of God pulls us aside and says, you see Him? He's your holiness. He's your holiness. Righteousness has to do with
our standing. Holiness has to do with our character.
I've got a perfect standing before God. And I got a perfect character
before God because Christ is my righteousness and He's my
holiness. He's my sanctification. He and
His wisdom as the great prophet gives me wisdom. He as my high
priest, as my high priest, He gives me righteousness and sanctification. And as the royal king, He's my
redemption. And the Spirit of God pulls us
aside and says, this same one who is your wisdom and righteousness
and sanctification, He's your redemption. He's everything. That's what
the Spirit of God is saying to us. He's everything. He bought us with His blood. What are we by nature? Things
that are not. A bunch of nobodies. But I'll tell you what, He bought
us. And we're precious in His sight. And we have everything in Christ
Jesus. Now, are you in Him? Are you
in Christ Jesus? And the only way you can know
that you're in Christ Jesus, that God put you in Christ Jesus,
is that He's your only hope of glory. And you look at Him and you say,
He's my wisdom. And He's my righteousness. And He's my sanctification. He's
my holiness. I don't have any holiness. You
know what the Bible says in Hebrews 12? Follow peace with all men
and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. We're
not talking about you getting better and better. We're talking
about you gotta have perfect character before God. I have
a perfect character before God because Christ is my holiness.
And he's my redemption. And here's the result of all
of it. He that glorieth, let him glory
in the Lord. The glory is due to Christ Jesus. Isn't that a magnificent portion
of scripture? And I mean, I've just scratched
the surface of it. I know I hadn't done justice
to it, but at least I've kicked up a little dust along the way. And tried to magnify our Lord
and Savior, Jesus Christ. Get your black folder out again.