The Gospel of the Crucified Christ: Revealed & Apprehended by the Spirit (1 Corinthians 1:1-2:16; 16:1-24)

Translation: 'Alexamenos worshipping God' or 'Alexamenos worships [his] God'.

The message of the cross isn't so controversial for us who follow Jesus, to us who are being saved. But we're a minority in our society. The reality is that the message of the cross is as offensive and hard to swallow today as it was back then.

For some, the message of the cross is a sick form of cosmic child abuse. They see nothing more than a vengeful Father punishing his innocent Son for other people’s crimes.

Even today, Muslims deny that Jesus was crucified at all. They view it as too offensive for a prophet of God to be humiliated and killed on the cross.

Even in our Churches, embarrassment of the cross can subtly creep in. Christian ministers are increasingly finding it more palatable to talk about God's amorphous love and general benevolence and good will, than to present the horrendous and bloody death of Christ as bearing the wrath of God in the place of sinners. Penal substitutionary atonement, that Jesus Christ bore our penalty in our place to remove God’s anger towards us, is seen as primitive, vengeful, unjust, and unworthy of God. But the cross is God’s wisdom, and what God achieved on the cross is a wonderful victory and our only boast. So penal substitution is the wisdom of God. He who knew no sin became sin for us. This wonderful exchange is our only hope. In the words of a second century Christian, in the letter to Diognetus:

“and having made it manifest that in ourselves we were unable to enter into the kingdom of God, we might through the power of God be made able. But when our wickedness had reached its height and it had been clearly shown that its reward, punishment and death, was impending over us, and when the time had come which God had before appointed for manifesting His own kindness and power, how the love of God, through exceeding regard for men, did not regard us with hatred, nor thrust us away, nor remember our iniquity against us, but showed great long-suffering, and bore with us, He himself took on Him the burden of our iniquities, He gave his own Son as a ransom for us, the holy one for transgressors, the blameless one for the wicked, the righteous One for the unrighteous, the incorruptible One for the corruptible, the immortal One for them that are mortal. For what other thing was capable of covering our sins than His righteousness? By what other one was it possible that we, the wicked and ungodly, could be justified, than by the only Son of God? O sweet exchange! O unsearchable operation? O benefits surpassing all expectations! That the wickedness of many should be hid in a single righteous One, and that the righteousness of One should justify many transgressors’ (The Epistle to Diognetius Ch 8, in Ante-Nicene Fathers, 1:28)

Are you ready to take your stand behind the message of the cross in a world that sees the message as foolish and offensive? There'll be plenty of pressure to leave the message of the cross behind. There will be looks of pity, shakes of the head or even outright hostility toward not only our message, but to us also, for us believing in it. Even so, we need to stand firm. We must not move from the message of the cross, remembering verse 24, that…

... to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. (1 Corinthians 1:24 NIV)

Christ God's Wisdom: Righteousness, Holiness and Redemption (1 Corinthians 1:30)

In verse 30, Paul goes on to discuss God's wisdom for us in more detail.

It is because of him [God the Father] that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God-- that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. (1 Corinthians 1:30 NIV)

The message of Christ crucified is the wisdom of God because Jesus Christ himself is our wisdom from God. Jesus Christ has become for us ‘wisdom from God’.

It sounds a little odd to say that a person has become wisdom for us. But Paul explains what this means in verse 30. Jesus Christ has become our righteousness, holiness and redemption.

God's wisdom for us is to know that Jesus Christ was crucified for our righteousness, holiness and redemption. God's wisdom for us is salvation through Christ crucified.

These three terms aren't really talking about three stages of salvation, but rather, they talk about the salvation won for us by Christ from three different angles.

Jesus Christ crucified on the cross is our Righteousness. We need righteousness because our sins make us unrighteous before God. Our sins make us guilty before God. We need someone else's righteousness so that we will be declared not guilty before God and righteous in his sight. We need Jesus as our Righteousness. We need Jesus who lived the perfect, righteous life. We need Jesus who died on the cross in our place for our sins. On the cross, and by his death, Jesus offered himself once and for all, and satisfied God’s just anger against our sins. We need Jesus who rose for our justification, and who himself was justified by his resurrection. And we need Jesus now, the Righteous One, who speaks to the Father in our defence. On the basis of Jesus’ righteous life, sin bearing death, and justifying resurrection, and glorious intercession, we are reconciled and made right with God.

Do you see Christ as wisdom of God for you? Do you see the divine wisdom in Christ being your righteousness, a righteousness which you do not have in and of yourself?

But Jesus Christ is also Holiness from God for us. Scripture declares, ‘Holy Holy Holy is the Lord God Almighty’. God is set apart from us. God is holy, we are not. To be frank, without holiness, there's no way we could enjoy fellowship with the Holy God. As unholy people, as unclean, sinful people, we have no hope of dwelling with God.

In the Old Testament, the sacrificial system was put in place to allow God's people to know that they were not holy, and they needed to be sanctified or made holy to fellowship with God.

Jesus Christ is our holiness. Jesus' life was holy and set apart from sinners (Hebrews 7:26; 4:15). And he was holy for us. Through the blood that Christ shed on the cross, we have been washed clean. We are now sanctified and holy in God’s sight. ‘We have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all’ (Hebrews 10:10 NIV). 'By one sacrifice he has made perfect for ever those who are being made holy'. (Hebrews 10:14 NIV) Now, because of Christ making us holy, we can enjoy fellowship with the Holy God. We fellowship with the Holy God through the Holy Spirit who lives in us, and in the future when we will see the Holy God face to face.

Do you see in the crucified Christ God's wisdom for us, in that Christ was crucified for our holiness?

Jesus Christ crucified on the cross is our righteousness and holiness. And finally, Jesus Christ crucified on the cross is our redemption.

Redemption is the language of slavery and ransom. We're slaves to sin and slaves to the devil. To be redeemed from our slavery means to be bought back at a cost. Jesus Christ crucified on the cross is the payment for our redemption. The blood Christ shed on the cross paid our ransom so we might be redeemed.

Is the message of Christ crucified on the cross foolishness to you? Or in the crucified Christ, do you see God's wisdom for us, Christ crucified to redeem us from the penalty of sin?

If you understand God's wisdom, if you see the message of Christ crucified as the wisdom and power of God to save. Then you need to do two things.

First, you need to repent. To repent simply means that you admitting you are a sinner in need of the righteousness, holiness and redemption that you do not have, and that only Christ can provide you the righteousness, holiness and redemption you need. By his sinless life, sinbearing death, and sin destroying resurrection, we now have a righteousness, holiness and redemption, that is not our own, but that comes to us through faith in Jesus Christ. And so, you need to ask God to forgive you because of what Christ has done on the cross.

Jesus is now Lord, and he needs to be your Lord. You need to turn away from your old life and live for Jesus as your Lord and King.

By repenting and trusting in Jesus as your king, you are transferred from those who are perishing in the dominion of darkness, and you are brought into the Kingdom of the Son God loves (Colossians 1:13-14), you are numbered among those who are being saved, who have received redemption through the blood of Christ, and forgiveness of sin.

And second, you need to boast in God, not in yourself. The message of Christ crucified tells us that in and of ourselves, we have nothing to boast in.

Remember, the Corinthians were forming factions and divisions because they were boasting in some leaders over others. And worse, they were choosing their leaders based on a worldly standard. Their standard was how eloquent or influential their leader was or how well he could speak.

However, Paul reminds them such that boasting is a complete contradiction to the message of the cross. The message of Christ crucified teaches us that any boasting can only be a boast in God's and what he's graciously done to save us through his Son crucified on the cross.

If we understand God's wisdom for us, that Christ is our righteousness, holiness and redemption, then what are we by ourselves? Nothing. Christ is our everything? Apart from Him, we have nothing to boast in.

On the day of judgement before God, we'll have nothing to boast in except Christ and what he's done for us on the cross. That is justification by faith.

We'll have nothing to boast in ourselves on that day. So what makes us think that we can boast over each other now?

If we find ourselves comparing ourselves to each other and thinking we're better than each other, looking down on others, then we've misunderstood the message of Christ crucified. In the church, all we are is sinners relying on Christ for our righteousness, holiness and redemption. I'm no better than you. You're no better than me. We're no better than each other.

Only Understand the Cross through the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:12-14)

And we certainly can't boast because we understand God's wisdom for us. Look at what verses 12 to 14 of chapter 2 tell us. Please flick over the page with me.

We have not received the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. (1 Corinthians 2:12-14 NIV)

Why do some people see the message of Christ crucified as foolishness? It's because the wisdom of God is a spiritual truth that can only be understood by one who has God's Holy Spirit.

If we understand God's wisdom for us, it's not because we're smarter than the next person, or we somehow figured it out for ourselves. No, God has revealed this spiritual truth to us through his Holy Spirit.

There's no room for us to boast because we've come to understand God's wisdom for us.

But not all boasting is bad. It's wrong to boast in ourselves. But it's right to boast in God.

It's right to boast in God because of what he's done for us. Boldly praise God in song, thank God in prayer and confidently live out our whole lives with Jesus as our King.

Conclusion

At the beginning, I said that God speaks his own wisdom to us. His wisdom for us is to know and experience salvation through Christ crucified.

There's so much wisdom out there, but God's wisdom for us is the single most important piece of wisdom you'll ever need to live a wise life.

The wise life is the life that's shaped by the message of Christ crucified for our salvation.

So a wise life is a life of repentance at the foot of the cross. We need the wisdom that tells us how to be in a right relationship with the God of the universe who we'll all stand before to face judgement.

A wise life is a life shaped by the values we see at the cross. This is a hard life to live in the world. The cross-shaped life is one that values humility and service, not power and self-glory. Humility and service looks foolish in the eyes of the world, although it will also be strangely attractive, as it is a Christ-shaped life.

As we give up successful careers and financial security for the sake of following Jesus, we'll look foolish in the eyes of the world.

As we speak up against legalising gay marriage we'll look foolish in the eyes of the world.

But if we understand that Christ was crucified for our salvation, this isn't foolishness. It's God's wisdom to live the wise life.

There was once a man who was considered to be the town idiot. The members of the town used to play a trick on him. They'd get someone to approach the man with a $20 note in one hand and a $5 dollar note in the other. To their amusement, the town idiot always chose the $5 note over the $20. One day, one of the townspeople asked him "why do you always go for the $5 note? Don't you know that the $20 is worth much more money?". To which the town idiot replied: "Yes, but you see if I start taking the $20 note, then they'd stop playing the game with me".

We're a bit like the town idiot aren't we? Foolish in the world's eyes, but we know better than the wise in this world. We know that living the life that's shaped by the crucified Christ is the truly wise life.

Prayer

Thank for revealing to us your Son Jesus who died on the cross for our righteous, holiness and redemption. Thank you that on the cross, Jesus bore the punishment we deserved. Please help us in a world that looks down on us and your message of salvation as foolishness to keep going as Christians and to confidently keep proclaiming the crucified Christ. Please open up the hearts and minds of others through your Holy Spirit to know your wisdom, the salvation that we know.

Amen.