WWUTT 1472 The Wisdom of the World is Folly With God (1 Corinthians 3:19-20)

We might be able to give a clever answer that looks cool in the eyes of the world, but God is not impressed. For as the scripture says, He catches the wise in their craftiness, and the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise that they are futile when we understand the text.

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Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

God’s Temple, God’s Field, and God’s Building in 1 Corinthians 3

Thank you, Becky. We come back to our study in 1 Corinthians 3. We'll begin once again by reading verses 16 -23. The Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Corinth. Do you not know that you are God's temple, and that God's Spirit dwells in you?

If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple. Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool, that he may become wise.

For the wisdom of this world is folly with God, for it is written, He catches the wise in their craftiness, and again, the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise that they are futile. So let no one boast in men, for all things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or the present, or the future.

All are yours, and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's. So here in chapter 3, Paul has said to the church that you are a field. You are God's field, and he's had workers in that field. Apollos is named, Paul mentions himself as another, and though there are various hands that have worked in this field, God is the one who provides the growth.

Likewise, he compares the church to a building, and there are various builders who have helped to construct this building on a foundation that was laid, which is Christ the Lord. It's the only foundation that can be laid.

But although there are different people who have aided in the construction of this spiritual house, it belongs to God. It is God's building, and once again, even with the building, He is the one who provides the growth.

God has decreed what is going to happen from the very beginning of the world. He has determined the end from the beginning. There is nothing that happens that is outside of the will of God. Consider what we read in Lamentations 3, beginning in verse 37.

Who has spoken, and it came to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come? In Ecclesiastes 7 .14 it says, In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider, God has made the one as well as the other, so that man may not find out anything that will be after him.

Isaiah 45 .7, the Lord says, I form light and create darkness. I make well-being and create calamity. I am the Lord who does all these things. Psalm 115 .3 says that the Lord is in the heavens. He does all that He pleases.

And Jesus said in Matthew 5 .45, that God makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. All things that happen have been ordained by God. There is nothing that happens that is outside of His sovereign will.

We must trust in God that He is in control, and He is ultimately working all things together for our good and for His glory. God has not only decreed the end from the beginning, but He has also ordained the means by which He will bring about that which He wills.

So God has meant for workers to be tending His field to accomplish the growth that He is doing. Hence, you have Paul mentioning himself, mentioning Apollos. We are God's workers for your benefit, Paul is saying there to the church in Corinth.

Likewise, with this building, that which is being built up, Paul says, let each one take care how he builds upon it. For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus.

And if anyone builds on the foundation, whether it's with gold, silver, or precious stones, or materials that are not as enduring, like wood, hay, and straw, verse 13 says, each one's work will become manifest, for the day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done.

And all of this to bring about what God has set forth from before the foundation of the world. He's not only ordained the end, but the means to that end. And using people to accomplish that work that he will accomplish.

Jesus said in Matthew 16, 18, I will build my church. And he is using people to help do that work, to call a people to himself, and would be purified for his own possession. So he begins with the apostles, therefore you've got the 12 Cephas being among them.

You've got Paul, who becomes a 13th apostle. But then you also have other men outside the apostles, but still continuing that work of apostolic ministry. They may not be apostles themselves, but they are doing the work of the apostolic ministry that was commissioned by Christ and carried on by those apostles that he had specifically appointed.

So some of those men would include Apollos, not an apostle, but still doing the work of the apostolic ministry. Makes sense? So God is using these people to build, to work his field, to build his building.

And the church is God's temple. God dwells with them, just as he dwelt in the temple in the Old Testament. So he dwells within his church. And God's temple is holy because God dwells there. If anyone destroys God's temple, we considered yesterday in verse 17, God will destroy him.

For God's temple is holy and you are that temple. Now as Paul is setting this on the church, there's something that is both very encouraging and also very convicting in this. So first of all, Paul is saying to the church there in Corinth, you are holy because God is with you.

Once again, though he has some things to rebuke them for, though he calls them fleshly as he did back in verse one of this chapter, that doesn't mean that they are not Christians. In fact, God dwells with them.

And so therefore you're holy, Paul says. Not meaning that they are perfect, but they are set apart. They have been consecrated. They're not part of this world. They've been called out from the world. They are set apart.

The ecclesia, which is the Greek word for church, they are an assembly, a gathered group of people set apart from the world unto the Lord. And since God dwells with them, they are holy. You are that temple, Paul says.

That's quite encouraging. It's also convicting, though, because remember, there's a lot of division that's going on here in this church. There's some factions that have formed because people are going after their own interests, not in the fear of God, but in their own selfish pursuits.

And what will that do if a brick tries to go out and do its own thing? Well, it could cause the other bricks on top of it to topple. Remember, as we're using the illustration here of this spiritual house that's being built unto the Lord.

So Paul says, let no one deceive himself by going after his own thing instead of going after the wisdom of God. Because when you do that, when you go after the passions that you want, the things that you desire, not according to God's desires, but according to your own, then what will happen is you will cause division in the church.

James 4 .1 says, what causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this that your passions are at war within you? So what causes divisions in the church? It's when individual people in the church start going after their fleshly desires instead of going after Christ.

If we're all going after Christ at the same time, we're all going after the same thing. We're unified. There's no division among us. As Paul puts this in the analogy of the body, like a human body in Ephesians chapter four, we are all different parts of that body holding fast to the head who is Christ.

Okay. So think of this even in the construction of a building. There is a top to this building. You think of the steeple. If we look at this as a church, a building that is being built up, a church, there's the steeple on top, the cross that is there.

So think of the cross already being there. Typically, you're going to build a building. You're going to put the cross on top. But in this particular case, you've got the cross that is already there and the building is being built up to that cross.

The foundation is Christ. We're reaching for Christ, Christ, the foundation, Christ at the top, Christ is the beginning of the church. Christ is what we achieve, what we accomplish, who we will be united with forever at the very end.

So he is both the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega. Amen. So as this building is being built up to Christ, the steeple that is right there, then we're all heading toward the same thing and we are unified.

The building is good. It's solid. It's structured well. We're following the blueprint. We're doing all right. But once some of those bricks start to move out of alignment, then it could potentially destroy that building or at least parts of that building that are being built up unto the Lord.

And as Paul says here, God will destroy the one who destroys God's temple. So be careful how you conduct yourself in this church. Paul is saying very convictingly toward these Christians there in Corinth, be careful how you are here in this church.

You're going to cause division, then God is going to destroy you. If you cause division, if you're going after the things of your flesh that causes destruction in the church, then God will destroy him for God's temple is holy and you are that temple.

So let no one deceive himself. Verse 18. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise, let him become a fool. Humble yourself. Know the power of Christ in the cross. Come back to that because that was the beginning of this church there in Corinth that Christ was proclaimed among them.

As we read back in 1 Corinthians 1 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. So you need to go back to that message of the cross.

It's going to be folly to those who are perishing. It is the power of God to those who believe that you may become wise. Verse 19 for the wisdom of this world is folly with God. God is not impressed with your wise ambitions in order to achieve the approval of the world.

God is not impressed with any of that. There are even many Christian leaders who will try to take the gospel or other answers from the Bible and they will tweak those responses that will tweak the truth that we find in God's word to make it more palatable to a worldly people.

They try to be clever with it. They think they're being so terribly smart. And as long as I can walk away without a worldly person calling me a bigot or a hater or something like that, that I've accomplished something as long as I look smart to these worldly people, then I've done well in my handling of God's word.

It's not about pleasing worldly people. It's about pleasing God. We do any and all things to the glory of God's name, not to the glory of man. For as it says here in verse 19, God catches the wise in their craftiness.

And again, verse 20, the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise that they are futile. So let no one boast in men. Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about. Somebody who will take a biblical answer and just kind of tweak it in just such a way so it doesn't sound too offensive to a worldly person.

This is something that's going on currently. This discussion is going on right now, even though the clip I'm going to play you goes back 10 years. But these answers have come back to the surface here in recent days.

This is a discussion between a professor at Columbia University. His name is David Eisenbach and Tim Keller, who is the pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City. Of course, he's an author, authored many Christian books, some of which your church has probably even gone through as well.

So Eisenbach is going to ask Keller some questions about homosexuality and listen to the way Keller answers these questions. I'll play a couple of clips from this interview. The first voice you will hear is Eisenbach's and then the responder is Keller.

This questioner asks, what do so many of the churches have against homosexuals? And what about your church's approach to homosexuality? Is it a sin? Are they going to hell?

Let's talk about my church first, which will be a little easier than trying to answer for all the other churches of the world. But I'll try. I mean, I'm representing all the churches of the world, all right, you know?

But Christianity, I mean, you go to the Bible quite often and there are many evangelicals who will say it is listed as a sin in the Bible and these people are going to hell.

Right. Now, what you first, let's talk about my church again. Let's go back here. What we would say is I think it's unavoidable. I think most Protestant and Catholic and Orthodox Christians over the years have said you read the Bible and the Bible has reservations.

The Bible says homosexuality is not God's original design for homosexuality. OK, there you have it. The Bible also says love your neighbor.

OK, let's just stop there for a moment. So Keller can't give him a straight answer. Is homosexuality sin? Yes, is the answer to that question. And we're getting to this here in First Corinthians, chapter six, verses nine and ten.

Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

So Keller's being clever here. He's giving the answer that he thinks is going to be the most well-received by the audience that he's addressing, which is mostly a secular crowd. Now, he may have good intentions with his answer, but it's still full of problems.

And even the guy that's asking these questions recognizes that Keller is not being consistent. Let's get to a different part of the interview, and you'll kind of catch that in these in this back and forth.

Are committing homosexual acts a sin against God? What do you mean by sin?

The answer is yes. Yes. Now, the reason, see, here's the problem with that. You don't go to hell for being homosexual.

But committing homosexual acts will get you to go to hell? No. Wait a minute. Wait, wait. Right. No, because, you know, some people say, well, it's not the homosexuality or being gay. It's being, doing gay stuff.

That's the problem. No.

No. No. First of all, heterosexuality does not get you to heaven. I happen to know this. Right. So how in the world can homosexuality send you to hell?

Well, because God says so. But that part of the answer right there is the controversy that's being generated at the present. J .D. Greer, the previous president of the Southern Baptist Convention, taught this very thing to his church.

And now Ed Litton, the current president of the Southern Baptist Convention, taught this thing to his church as well. And it is a false teaching that is now spreading to a lot of believers and unbelievers and is potentially damning.

Because what a person hears when they hear Keller say something like this or any other teacher that repeats it is that homosexuality is no more wrong than heterosexuality. Therefore, such behavior is fine as long as you have a connection with Christ.

So you can be gay and do gay things that won't send you to hell as long as you have a connection with Christ. That's what Keller is going to say here next.

And actually, the Bible, listen, this is this is true. Jesus talks about greed 10 times more than he talks about adultery, for example. Now, one of the problems Christians have here is partly, let's be nice to Christians.

You know when you're committing adultery. I mean, you don't say, oh, you're not my wife. I mean, you know you're committing, but almost nobody knows when they're greedy. I mean, nobody thinks they're greedy, you know, because everybody is comparing yourself to other people.

And so it's a frog in the kettle kind of thing. However, the fact of the matter is the Bible is much harder on greed materialism, and it's a horrible sin, terrible sin. Will greed send you to hell? No.

What sends you to hell is self-righteousness, thinking that you can be your own Savior and Lord. What sends you to heaven is getting a connection with Christ because you realize you're a sinner and you need intervention from outside.

That's why it's very misleading actually to say, even to say homosexuality is a sin, because most people, yes, of course homosexuality is a sin, because greed is a sin, because all kinds of things are sins.

But what most Christians mean when they say that, and certainly what non-Christians think they hear when they hear that is, if you're gay, you're going to hell for being gay. It's just not true.

Absolutely not true. So then what's the whole, how is homosexuality a sin. And not, well, almost.

And with that question right there, Eisenbach just upended Keller's entire theology on this subject. Keller says homosexuality is a sin, but it doesn't send you to hell. So then Eisenbach says, then how is it a sin?

Eisenbach is thinking more clearly on this than Keller is. The guy who isn't a Christian sees the problem with this theology better than the Christians who keep repeating it. If homosexuality does not send you to hell, then it's not bad.

And as long as I have a connection with Jesus, was the term that Keller used, whatever that's supposed to look like, then I can go about my homosexual behavior and there won't be any consequences for that at all.

It's a very antinomian answer. Antinomian means anti-law, as if there's no law on this, so you can sin freely and God is just going to forgive you for it. But we come back to 1 Corinthians 6, 8 and 9, or 9 and 10 rather, where it says, do you not know?

Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Same words that Paul uses over here in 1 Corinthians 3, 18. Do not let anyone deceive himself. Do not be deceived, neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

But now verse 11, and such were some of you. You were once these things, doing these things. You were once these sinners who sinned in this way, but you were washed. You were sanctified. You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the spirit of our God.

So let us not devote ourselves to being clever that we may be seen as wise in the eyes of the world as God says here, let him become a fool that he may become wise for the wisdom of this world is folly with God.

It is God whom we should desire to please, not man, for it is written, he catches the wise in their craftiness. And again, the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise that they are futile. So let no one boast in men.

We'll come back to this and finish up this chapter tomorrow. Let our answers come not from our ability to be clever. Let our responses to this dark and dying world be from the word of God. That's what they need to hear.

The loving answer is that which comes from God's word, the Bible, not from our cleverness, our wit, our softening this answer. So I don't offend anybody. Then we're just trying to please man and not trying to please God.

Let us stick with what God has said, delighting in him and his word, not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God for salvation to all who believe Romans one 16. And if somebody does not believe it's because first Corinthians one 18, the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing.

But to those, to those who are being saved, it is the power of God. It is only by the truth of God's word, believing in what he said that a person is saved. Let us not soften that answer. The reason why a person hates it is because they hate God.

Heavenly father, I thank you for what we've read today. And I pray that you give us courage and boldness to shine a light in this dark, crooked and depraved generation that is perishing, going to hell and desperately needs the gospel.

May we not soften that message for any corners we try to cut off of that may be the sharp edge that needed to penetrate the heart for a person to hear and know that they are sinners in need of a savior.

And Christ is that savior. Be with us. Through the Lord Jesus, come quickly. We pray in your name.

Amen. Pastor Gabe keeps a regular blog, sharing personal thoughts, alerting readers to false teachers and offering commentary on the church and social issues. You can find a link to the blog through our website, www .utt .com.

Thank you for listening and join us again tomorrow as we continue our study in God's word when we understand the text.