Ministry Sentence: To secure people’s grounding of their salvation in Christ and to implant the urge to advance to Christian maturity
Introduction What do we mean generally by maturity and how do we measure it? The process of maturity begins at birth and its goal is to reach the full potential of character and service. We observe the process from baby to infant to child to teenager, from young adult to adult, from singleness to marriage and rearing a family to becoming grandparents. We measure maturity by how people, young or old cope with the routine of everyday life, great moments of happiness or great moments of tragedy. If we could use one single word to describe a mature person it would be a wise person. Someone who knows what is right, does what is right and influences others to do likewise.
Christian maturity is similar. In chapter 2 of 1 Corinthians, we are confronted with the two big ideas/ concerns of Christian maturity. The first big idea is that you can’t start being mature at all unless you are born again spiritually through faith in Christ who died for your sins. The second big idea is that once born again you are to meant to embark on the journey of growing spiritually in Christ, receiving increasing dollops of the Word of God and demonstrating that wisdom in the love and power of the Holy Spirit.
In chapter 1 Paul had commended the Corinthians for the beginnings they had made in Christian maturity but then had not progressed – but rather gone backwards in their understanding of the gospel and their relationships with one another.
Where are you and I on the maturity scale? Have you gone through stage 1? Have you been truly born again? How do you know? Have you in your sincerest prayer asked the Lord Jesus into your life, thanked him for dying for you on the cross? Turned your whole life over to His loving Lordship? If you have done that, the Bible says that is the key indicator of the new birth. You will know that is not your own doing but rather the grace of God through the work of the Spirit of God. Let’s look at v 1-5
Wisdom to Know Christ and Him Crucified v 1-5
Imparted by the Holy Spirit through the preaching of Christ.
Paul reminds the Corinthians of their historical experience. He came with no human confidence to this bustling, prosperous, immoral and proud metropolis. He preached the person of Christ as the Son of God and the work of Christ as crucified Saviour yet risen Lord. He called for repentance and faith to Jews who wanted a spectacular sign and to Greeks who were hungry for a new Socrates; to practising adulterers and homosexuals, to pagan idolaters and greedy politicians. The Spirit of God worked wonders, Christ was uplifted, people convicted of the sin and need, seeing the cross not as scandal or foolishness, but the way back to God – the beginning of the wisdom of Christ, the first step along the road to Christian maturity. They repented, they believed, they obeyed. They were born again. They got baptised in the name of Jesus and joined the small, but growing band of Christian brothers and sisters.
Human wisdom or rhetoric could never do that. Never has and never will. Human learning does have its place, but must be purged of its pagan and antichrist assumptions, methods and conclusions. We are indebted to Pythagoras for the foundations of geometry and music theory which enhances our earthly existence, but in no way deal with our sin or get us connected with the living God. We are indebted to Hyprocates for the beginnings of medicine, the Arabs for numeral digits and the Hindus for the zero. But these things don’t save us or get us to heaven.
The Corinthians got saved through the preaching of Christ and Him crucified and that’s the same for you and me. There’s no other way.
(Here must I proclaim that any branch of Christianity or any religion which denies the person of Christ as the Son of God or denies his crucifixion for the sin of the world is a false religion. Let the listener understand – that’s why liberal Christians have no trouble worshipping with Jews, Muslims, Buddhists etc. We can be socially friendly to people of other religions and there is some overlap at the moral or spiritual level, but the can be no fellowship in worship with those liberal Christians who deny the Lordship of Christ or his atoning death. None with Jews because they deny Jesus is the Messiah and Son of God. Muslims, because they deny Jesus as Son of God and that he did not die on the cross and that atonement is not necessary anyway. Buddhists don’t believe in a personal God so the heart of the gospel is irrelevant to them.)
Trusting in Human Wisdom or the Christ of God? Paul wanted the Corinthians to see that human wisdom was a false trail to salvation. It did not save them in the first place and in the second place will not produce Christian maturity. In fact their intoxication with eloquent preachers with little substance of Christ were producing immaturity, stagnation, backsliding, party spirit and division. Sacrificial love was chased out the door and self indulgent pride welcomed back. On what do you trust? On whom do you trust? May it be Jesus Christ, the wisdom and power of God who died and rose again and poured out His Holy Spirit upon those whose confidence is in Him.
Wisdom to Grow to Full maturity in Christ v 6-16
Imparted by the Holy Spirit through the teaching of Christ
This is the second big idea. The Holy Spirit, through the Word of God, unfolds the ever widening concentric circles of the historical and theological message of the cross.
Example of throwing a rock into a still pond. Ripples ie expanding waves of concentric circles radiate out from the point of impact.
But to appreciate this wisdom you must be born again and cultivate the attitude of striving for Christian maturity. This is also is a gift of God’s grace. Phil 2:12, 13, 3:8. This is the meekness Jesus spoke of in Matt 5, the forever young attitude which is always learning, always anticipating the next hurdle in life through which Christ will demonstrate even more grace. It is that grace, which when death is immanent, which can say, like S Paul facing execution, in full confidence of Christ “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith; henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me but to all who have longed for His appearing.” 2 Tim 5:7,8
God’s Missionary Purposes: Paul, here, doesn’t go into detail as to the content of this spiritual wisdom. However I think we can make assumptions such as: it will include implications of this chapter, great slabs of the rest of this letter to the Corinthians. By inference, it will include 2 Corinthians, and the rest of the New Testament and the Old Testament read in the light of the New. This is already an overwhelming mass of verbal material. Nevertheless, we can get the big picture. The mystery hidden for ages and now revealed in Christ by the Spirit, is the whole program of God’s redemption of the world.
We note Jesus’ brief summary of the OT to explain his death and the preaching of forgiveness to all nations in Luke 24. He showed how the Law, the Prophets and the Writings, ie the whole canonical OT, pointed to his the necessity of Messiah’s death and the preaching of repentance forgiveness to all nations. Wouldn’t we love to have had an MP3 to record that conversation and the subsequent teaching of the 40 days between resurrection and Pentecost. In short, the apostles took it all in, remembered it by the power of the Holy Spirit and applied it as required. St Paul, although converted well after Pentecost, would have known the substance of the apostles teaching. In his pre-conversion days, he rejected it, but on his conversion, accepted the basic teaching concerning Christ; his sonship of God, death for sins and resurrection. After the encounter with the ascended Christ, the receiving the Holy Spirit through the prayers of Ananias, he spends three years somewhere in Arabia reflecting on the revelation he had been given. My guess is he would have mulled over the OT whether from memory or from written text, and in that process, the Holy Spirit taught him more and more. He was a fast learner and when he went to meet the apostles in Jerusalem, there was no hint of disagreement. Like the times of evangelical revival in England in the 1740’s. Many clergy studying the scriptures independently came to a lively evangelical understanding of the gospel.
The mystery in v 7 reminds us of Col 1:24-28. In Romans ch 9-11, we have another overview of the gospel going out to the nations. Some see this as the heart of Romans, ch 1-8 are prelude on justification by faith in Christ crucified, ch 12-16, practical implications in church and mission. In ch 9-11, many from – the gentiles, the nations respond to Christ, but the majority of Jews don’t. When there is a sufficiently large response from the nations, the Jews will clearly and finally recognise JESUS as Messiah. The immediate lessons from this are: If you are a converted Jew, don’t be proud, you are one of the few by God’s grace. If you are a converted gentile, don’t be proud, it is also by God’s grace. So there should be harmony in Christ’s church. You should be extending this love by patiently loving the unconverted, whether Jew or Gentile, enhancing the preaching of Christ and looking to the Spirit of God to bring to conversion and maturation.
{If I can pick up some threads from the last two sermons. Andrew quoted someone who said he saw no one get converted through getting a theological degree. I agree that the mere acquisition of theological degrees per se doesn’t guarantee either salvation or spiritual maturity. Many may have wrecked the ship of their soul on the rocks of liberalism or the shifting sands of relativism. But on the other hand, think of Martin Luther, theological lecturer who got converted through lecturing on Psalms and Romans. Think of his many students who were enlightened with the gospel and also got converted. Eg Cranmer.
I couldn’t help but think of my studies at Moore College in the 70’s and later in the 90’s. I enjoyed all my subjects at Moore. But the most exhilarating was systematic theology then biblical theology and particularly the biblical basis for missions or the missions basis of the Bible. In my MA, I intentionally studied the missionary implications of hermeneutics, etc. Of course theory has to be applied in practice and this is the job of a life time. Not all have the opportunity or the call to do tertiary level theological study. For many Christians that would be nice but not necessary. However, every Christian must get into Bible study both individually and in a small group. It needs to be at a level that the individual. Individually and privately, because we need the clearly one-to-one relationship with Christ. Corporately, because we all need encouragement in the body of Christ. We need to hear good sermons, but also to discuss the meaning and application of the sermons in small groups to ensure that we are on track and certainly not off track. Do you want to fast track your Christian maturity? Do you want the Holy Spirit to lead you into wisdom for the mature? }
Don’t fail to get into Bible Study
2 Tim 3:15,16,17 Get wise to salvation and wise to full obedience. Read
Don’t go back to Human Wisdom as your spiritual rock. Human wisdom needs to be screened by the Lordship of Christ and the Word of God. Only then can be seen what is good, and neutral and evil. The good comes from God by way of natural revelation. It doesn’t save you but is helpful and compatible with the gospel. The neutral is part of God’s overall provision in life and gives a degree of freedom and variety in life and culture. The evil comes from the flesh, world and the devil. This needs contradiction, discarding or purging.
Be mature in understanding, repentance and obedience. This involves attitudes. It involves drinking in the milk of the Word, it involves chewing on the meat of the Word. It involves closeness to Christ and openness to his Spirit. By God’s grace, the mind of Christ will become a part of you – there will be deeper repentance, deeper faith more thorough obedience, more fruit of Christian character, more involvement in Christian service, and more faithful in Christian influence.
Conclusion Get converted. Get Mature.