See the Big Picture. Dig In. Live It Out: A 5-Day Reading Plan in 1 CorinthiansPrimjer

The Big Picture

What identifies the church? Some may assume that massive buildings, recreation halls, church officers, bank accounts, involved members, and educated clergy are the identifying marks. Such organizations can draw a pretty good crowd, create some excitement, distract attention from the cruel heat of life, and put on a very good show. The only problem is they lack the one thing essential for the church—the gospel. 

This problem is not new. At the core of the Corinthian catastrophe was the crisis of the cross. In their admiration of personalities, they neglected the power of God. In response to their division, Paul pointed them to the unity of Christ (1 Cor. 1:13a), the meaning of their baptism (1:13b), and now he directs them to the heart of the gospel of Jesus Christ—the message and meaning of the cross. Only a clear understanding of the gospel can make the church enjoy lasting unity and fulfill its purpose. Even though it may seem foolish to the world that someone’s death two thousand years ago can save anyone today, the church must keep the cross at the heart of its mission, or it will lose the gospel completely.

Digging In    

God alone saves. And he saves through the “word of the cross” (1:18). The mention of the cross in verse 17 introduces a section of strange opposites. Paul pits the foolishness of man against the wisdom of God, a wisdom that cannot be naturally discerned. The power of God is displayed as greater than the weakness of man’s wisdom. The message of the cross divides its audience. Paul contrasts the reaction of the lost and the saved, but not between “foolishness” and, what we would expect, “wisdom,” but rather between “foolishness” and “power.” The factions in the church at Corinth were obsessed with personalities: who is the smartest, the most capable, the most successful? Their great mistake was that they attempted to mix man’s wisdom with God’s revealed message. 

God’s wisdom is revealed primarily in the cross of Christ and, because the human mind is clouded by sin, is not naturally received. Through the cross, God fulfills his promise of Isaiah 29:14: “Therefore, I will again confound these people with wonder after wonder. The wisdom of their wise will vanish, and the perception of their perceptive will be hidden.” Human wisdom leads to the conclusion that salvation is earned. Human intelligence makes people think that they can save themselves. But through the cross, God demonstrates his wrath, his justice, and humanity’s complete inability to appease a God who hates sin. 

God’s plan of salvation establishes human inability. The scheme of salvation that God designed runs contrary to the human intuition and wisdom. People hate to admit either their sinfulness or their complete helplessness, yet the cross of Christ demands that they acknowledge both. 

In his inscrutable wisdom, God designed the plan of salvation. The mind of God conceived a way in which his justice could be satisfied, the debt of sin could be paid, the righteousness of a sinner could be established, a relationship between God and the redeemed could be maintained, and God alone could receive glory. Only the cross meets all of these requirements. The cross is the ultimate representation of God’s wisdom. And since humans, left to their own wisdom, could never understand that scheme, let alone devise it, God decided to save his people through the foolishness of preaching. Through this preaching, both in its activity and content, God saves those who believe.

While God’s wisdom is revealed primarily in the cross, fallen humanity rejects God’s wisdom and believes whatever the culture values (1 Cor. 1:22ff). Inherent in the message of the cross is the admission that human religion and effort is completely useless. Accepting Christ’s cross entails rejecting everything that one has valued and pursued. Consequently, Paul mentions three possible reactions to the gospel message. The Jews considered the cross a scandal. Given their misunderstanding of the Messiah, they could not conceive of a Christ on a cross. A God who dies? A creator who is crucified? They would have expected a king on a throne, not a carpenter on a cross. 

The Greeks, on the other hand, met the message with scorn. They saw no wisdom in the cross. Yet in the face of their scandal and scorn, Paul remains unintimidated and unashamed. Note the triumphant tone of his pen as he calls on the wise, the teacher, and the debater (1:20). To all their objections, Paul has only one reply: “we preach Christ crucified” (1:23). Paul knows that the third response is acceptance. This acceptance, however, is not because they are wise or because they receive a supernatural sign. They can see the power of God in the cross because they are called (1:24). The Spirit’s calling enables and moves them to realize that the thing they have valued is worthless and that the cross is not foolishness, but rather the wisdom of God. The cross is not an obstacle, but rather their only opportunity to have forgiveness and a relationship with their Creator. God’s calling is the only way people can abandon their own limited wisdom. Apart from the gracious intervention and call of God, no one could have hope. 

Paul’s words about the cross also operate on a deeper level, however. When Paul lists the things that the Jews and the Greeks value, he is addressing the Corinthian Christians as well. From the appearance of their factions and their problems with spiritual gifts, they had begun to relapse into their old way of thinking. The divisions indicate that they were focusing on personalities that represented the things their culture craved. Paul, Apollos, and Peter were all viewed with various degrees of human wisdom and even—at least in the apostles’ case—supernatural signs. Paul’s words about the cross’s superiority is as much a rebuke to the Corinthians as theological formulation.

The Corinthian church had moved away from the message of the cross and was facing dire consequences as a result. Christ alone is “the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1:24). Even God’s foolishness—the preaching of the cross—is better and wiser than the wisdom of the world, and God’s weakness—Christ crucified—is stronger than any human effort at achieving a righteousness by works.

Living It Out

In a postmodern world that rejects absolutes, the cross of Christ dares to delineate distinctly between right and wrong, sin and righteousness, heaven and hell. In a world that glorifies pluralism, the cross boldly claims to be the exclusive means of salvation and a relationship with God. In a culture that avoids unpleasantries, the cross unambiguously confronts us with the heinous death and blood sacrifice of God’s Son as the only means to satisfy God’s wrath. The church of the twenty-first century faces the same danger as the church of the first century. We are tempted to pursue personalities rather than truth, to seek acceptance rather than obedience, to seem tolerant rather than convinced. Hearing the cross of Christ disparaged as a slaughter-house religion tempts us to make the death of Christ the church’s dirty little secret. Better to talk about a babe in a manger than the Lamb of God on a tree. Better to portray him as the victim of an oppressive government’s injustice than the object of his Father’s wrath. Better to laud him as a great ethical teacher than to worship him as the sinless Son of God. Yet the instant the church caves into culture and ignores the caveat of Paul, the church forfeits the power of God. The preaching of the cross always divides an audience. It cannot do otherwise. To some it is the odor of life that leads to life; and for others, it is the odor of death that leads to death. To some it is the wisdom of God, but to others it is the foolish imaginations of a human religion. But the cross is the means by which God saves his people, so it must be central not only to the church, but to every Christian. One cannot be saved by the wisdom of God and live by the wisdom of the world. The way of salvation is the way of sanctification, and both are through the cross.