Lets jump right in:
1 Corinthians 1:20-25 1 Cor. (ESV website)
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? 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. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
We are the scribes, the debaters and the wise fools of this passage. Our hearts churn out idol after idol (Calvin called the human heart an endless idol factory). These self made gods we create are very ruthless despotic tyrants that demand constant sacrifice: our merit. As we feed our own self made merit god that is never appeased or satisfied we bump into others on the same treadmill of despair. Whenever I fail to tell another about the wonderful free gift of Christ, I, in essence, tell that person, "go on, continue to work your fingers of merit to the bone trying to appease a made up god of your own selfishness that will die with you, unappeased." When I think about it like this it doesn't sound like a very nice thing to do to a person.
The gracious God of the scriptures is nothing like this. We can stop working now, stop trying to appease, stop trying to be pretend we are better than we really are. As we look up at the cross our hammer and chisel of merit should drop to the ground as our open, humble hands of repentance are lifted by Christ Himself to receive grace.
Reminds me of the Romans passage:
ReplyDeleteRom 1:22-25
22 Professing to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonored among them. 25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
NAS
So for me, usually, the self-made god looks like the knucklehead in the mirror. In all his unglory.
But at least I'm not as bad as those stinkin' pagans - I worship myself too often, but I don't worship inanimate objects or animals! I'm WAAAAYYYYY better than those kinds of idolaters! THAT'S gotta make God happy with me...right... :-)
Aaah...the foolishness of the cross comes in interesting packages, doesn't it? I recently had a conversation with a man at the Good Peoples Gym who, in response to my question of what would get him in to heaven, said that nothing but the blood of Christ could pay for all of the sinful actions of his life. (You can only imagine my surprise at that answer!) What an opening for me to explain the foolishness of the cross! Christ's death was just as necessary for those who have striven in vain to attain enough goodness for salvation. We haven't only been saved from our sinful actions, but more importantly, our sinful nature which is in rebellion towards God.
ReplyDeleteThe almost Gospel. I told Byron this morning at the Men's Leadership Summit (thanks Dr. Ledie Steck) that his messages are making me almost share the gospel with people in my life. I bring many conversations now to the edge of the cliff and instead of jumping off I spit and watch it fall or as he said you kick a few stones off the edge. Yep, that's about it. O Lord, make my heart burn with Your passion for the lost that takes me past my silly vanity and man pleasing.
ReplyDeleteSmitty,
ReplyDeleteSprint off that cliff. Lose your life for His sake.