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Apr 01, 2018

The Foolishness of the Gospel

The Foolishness of the Gospel

Passage: 1 Corinthians 1:18-31

Speaker: Brian Land

Series: Holidays

Category: Grace Brevard

Keywords: cross, easter, foolish, gospel, resurrection, wisdom, wise

We try to bring God down to our level, making him understandable and manageable by either depersonalizing him into an irrelevant spiritual force or rationalizing him into an understandable ruler who likes the things we like and behaves in ways we’d behave. But the great foolishness, the incomprehensible truth, is that this absolutely transcendent (“wholly other”) God became immanent (“fully one of us”) in the person of Jesus as he, the Wisdom of God, became a living, breathing man. Then the utterly impossible happened: the immortal eternal God...died. Spat upon by scoffers. Surrounded by criminals. But he wasn’t done. Out of complete darkness and hopelessness the greatest “foolishness” sprang forth. The thing we couldn’t possibly comprehend: Jesus rose from the dead, breaking the chains of sin, fear and death. He put death to death as he offers us a the greatest Eternal Wisdom, Himself in us.

Worship Order

Call To Worship: Matthew 28:1-6a ESV

Songs:

Because He Lives

Christ the Lord is Risen Today

Grace to Grace

The Wonderful Cross

What a Beautiful Name

Reading: Romans 1:16-17 ESV

Central Text: 1 Corinthians 1:18-31 ESV

18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 19 For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” 20 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? 21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. 22 For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. 26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. 27 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; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. 30 And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, 31 so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

Illustration: Drama - Just Another Andy

Response: Prayer - Crucifixion & Resurrection (adapted from The Valley of Vision)

LEADER: O Lord, we marvel that you would be crucified, buried, and risen the third day.

ALL: The gospel attests it. The witnesses prove it. Our hearts experience it.

LEADER: Give us to die with Thee that we may rise to new life.

ALL: Continually freed from everything contrary to Your Word.

LEADER: Grant us more of the resurrection life. That we may walk in its power.

ALL: Clothed in righteousness. Changed by its influence. Joy in obedience. Proclaiming this good news.

LEADER: He is risen!

ALL: He is risen indeed!

Benediction: Hebrews 13:20-21 NIV

Discussion Questions & Applications:

1) Do you tend more toward

   a) trying to explain and logically understand God or

   b) marginalizing God into an impersonal impotent “force”?

   c) What are the “benefits” of each of these?

   d) How are these ways we try to make God manageable?

2) Explain how believing in the Gospel doesn’t mean that we have to throw out intellect.

3) To begin to understand The Gospel we need to tap into both our logic and our imagination.

a) Explain how the Gospel is logical, but not just logical.

b) What part of Jesus can only be “understood” by imagination, but how do we also need to be logical and informational?

4) How “ok” are you with not understanding or agreeing with God?

5) How is it that Gospel isn’t simply about guidelines or logic but about Christ Crucified, about Christ’s Power and Wisdom (vvs 22-25)?

Docs & Quotes:

  • If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. - Apostle Paul
  • Few sophisticated people today profess a belief in heaven and hell, the literal truth of the Bible, or a God who flouts the laws of physics. . . .To take something on faith means to believe it without good reason, so by definition a faith in the existence of supernatural entities clashes with reason. . . . If we want to make the world a better place we have to figure out how to do it ourselves. . . .If you’re going to count on God to make the world a better place, then you’re probably going to make the world a worse place. - Steven Pinker
  • I love the concept of original sin, the idea that we’re all fundamentally broken and fundamentally incomplete. . . .because it seems to be such a useful starting point. You know, if you imagine a relationship in which two people think they’re great—you know, perfect—that’s going to lead to intolerance and terrible disappointment when they realize that they’re not great, they’re not perfect. Whereas imagine a relationship that begins under the idea that two people are quite broken and therefore they need forgiveness from the other and they need to apply charity to the other and they need to forgive the other, and so that seems a much better starting point. Alain de Botton
  • One has only the choice between God and idolatry,” Weil wrote. “If one denies God ... one is worshiping some things of this world in the belief that one sees them only as such, but in fact, though unknown to oneself imagining the attributes of Divinity in them.”  Darcey Steinke, Easter Everywhere
  • And did you get what you wanted from this life, even so? I did. And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth. - Raymond Carver (Late Fragment)

Sermons:

The Wisdom of the Gospel by Richard Pratt

1 Corinthians 1:18 - 2:5

Christ - The Power and Wisdom of God by Charles H. Spurgeon

1 Corinthians 1:24

On the Third Day (Easter) - Timothy J. Keller

1 Corinthians 15:1-14

Media:

4.01.18 Album