Book of 1 Corinthians - Ch. 1, Vs. 11-26 (10/08/2000)

Park Meadows Church

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In the book of John, the 19th chapter, while you're turning, let me ask how many of you fulfilled your assignment for this week?

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Two, three. How many did not? And I wonder what the rest of you did.

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Now, there's going to have to be a new rule made, and I'm not going to apologize for it because it's necessary.

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I've asked you before to raise your hand before you speak. It's getting mandatory now because I cannot recognize voices, and neither can

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I see you very well. So when you want to say something, any time, simply raise your hand and I'll recognize you.

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That way I'll know who's speaking. And then whoever is speaking, everybody else keep quiet.

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Only one at a time. It'll help me tremendously, if you will. Now, who knows how many disciples of the original twelve now were at the cross to see

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Jesus crucified? Greg? Zero. One for sure.

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Richard? One. Joy? One. One.

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One. One. One. Anyone else?

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Greg, I hate to discourage you, but you're outvoted by one.

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In the book of John, the 19th chapter, let me read beginning with the verse 25.

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Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother and his mother's sister Mary, the wife of Cleophas and Mary Magdalene.

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When Jesus therefore saw his mother and the disciples standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother,

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Woman, behold thy son. Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother.

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And from that hour that disciple took her into his own home. So John was the only one that we have absolute proof of that he was there.

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But this brings up another question. When, in the 26th verse, he said unto his mother,

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Woman, behold thy son. To whom does the son refer? Jesus?

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John? All right. Now, come to 1

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Corinthians, the first chapter, and the 11th verse, I think is where we stopped last time.

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For it hath been declared unto me of you. Paul is writing to the church at Corinth.

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The church has a problem, and it's not unlike problems today in our churches.

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So he is ultimately talking to this church. For it hath been declared unto me of you, my brethren, that them which are of the house of Cleo, that there are contentions among you.

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In other words, he says, I have learned from very reliable sources that there are some of you that are in competition, discord, and arguments.

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This Cleo was a

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Christian woman in the church at Corinth. Paul understood from very good witnesses that there were many factions among this church.

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In addition to that, he declares the cause of dissensions because some depend on one teacher, some on another.

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Some were so addicted to themselves that they neglected all teachers and learned men, calling themselves the disciples of Christ alone, completely ignoring the teachers.

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Now this I say, that every one of you saith,

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I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, I am of Cephas, I am of Christ.

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What does he mean, Bill, when he says, I am of? The followers of Apollo.

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The followers of the teachers on that particular teaching. They were listening to a certain man and his interpretation.

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Now, is that wrong? Not if you reject all other arguments.

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Now, while I have you speaking, Bill, how is a

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Christian to know whether they are listening to the right one? Well, they should pray about it, and they should study it.

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God will reveal to them what his message is, and that will be the problem. Well, there's also anyone who's saying other than that, it's not spiritual.

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I think a good thing to think about is, any message that exalts the believer of the message is a danger of being a false message.

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And any message that exalts and has all been glory on our Lord and Savior is more accurate and more possible to prove.

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That's a good point. Joy? I think it's very important to check it out with the

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Word. And that's why we have so many following different ones today. Because they're not into the

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Word, so they don't know. And we can know for sure if we're following the right one.

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Absolutely. But it takes work. David? I was a brother of parents in the early 1980s.

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Our church, the founding pastor of our church, followed a big preacher in the country that had supposedly the largest church in the world in the

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Chicago area. We went down and heard him preach a lot. So we heard him preach a lot over 30 years.

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Many sermons, maybe three or four times a day for a whole week for three or four different years.

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And he seemed like a great preacher. He was a great volunteer.

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But reflected with hindsight, there were an awful lot of things that he said that we shouldn't have known about.

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For instance, we found out that he took his shoes off and walked through the woods in prayer.

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We found out that he would put blindfolds on his eyes and his ears every week.

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He would pray a certain number of hours a day. All these little things were just subtly thrown out in the sermons, but you didn't notice it.

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But with hindsight, looking back, all that it was, he would have had to have 48 hours a day at least to do everything that parents make a good point.

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Those things are so subtle, you normally don't, any time you wouldn't notice them. But he was doing a lot of preaching about his own ministry, about his own life, and not really glorifying the

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Lord. That's so right, and any orator will get caught up in that if he doesn't fight it.

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But we're here to study the Lord Jesus, not any individual at all.

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In verse 13, he asks the question, is Christ divided? Now, after David just said what he did,

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I want to give you a personal example. A good friend of mine, he is no longer alive.

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He was Church of Christ. But I'm convinced he was saved, but of course

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I don't know. But it really bothered him that Bea and I could be so strong and so sure, so positive in our belief and doctrine, and he was in his, and he says,

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Otis, we can't both be right. Well, you can't.

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That's looking at man. Look at the word, always.

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Christ is not divided. He's only one and will remain one.

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The truth is one. Many, many untruths. Is Christ divided?

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Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?

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So he's beginning now to give reasons for the divisions.

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And he said the, not only the division should be avoided, but all of the reasons that would bring it about.

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He said that by watching and listening to you, it seems that Christ would be divided.

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Torn to pieces. He cannot be the head of two different disagreeing bodies.

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He's only one. Now, these men in this church allowed one and the very same gospel being uttered by another man, and they would loathe the one and adhere to the other.

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And it's the same gospel. Try the best you can to not let personalities enter into it.

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I thank God that I baptized none of you but Crispus and Gaius.

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Now, do you begin to see how Jesus keeps us from future problems, even though we're not aware of it at the time?

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Here, Paul had baptized only two. Well, he tells us of another one. But by the very fact that he had not entered into a wholesale baptizing, he avoided the very same problem.

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Well, he does us the same way. And we may never know it, but just trust him that he does.

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There's many, many things that could have happened to each one of us if he had not prevented some little incident someplace.

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Fifteen, lest any should say that I had baptized in my own name. How many times have you heard the preachers on a

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Monday morning talk about to other preachers, especially, how many they baptized yesterday, how many they got to join the church yesterday, how many have heard a preacher say, that's my church.

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I built that church. Look at what I did. Sorry to say there are quite a few.

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Sixteen, and I baptized also the household of Stephanus besides. And I know not whether I baptized any other or not.

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This tells us a great deal. Paul didn't keep track of everything.

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If you'd ask him to give you the number of converts that had been won under his teaching, he couldn't do it.

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I don't think that's the business of a church or of a minister or of anyone else, because we really have nothing to do with it.

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And when we begin to keep total, then we're beginning to do something. And we think that we're doing part of it.

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No. They're not ours. They belong to Christ.

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Yes, sir. Thank you. Would you agree with that, that we can't change the deal? Absolutely.

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Absolutely. The morning note

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I sent out today said that... Did any of you read it?

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What did it say? You don't remember. That's it.

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When you get your feelings heard, it's a form of pride. Think about it. Christ sent me not to baptize.

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Now, Bill, that tells me that we best know why we're here, or at least why we're not here, if we're not here.

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He sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel. Preach the gospel. Who's that sitting back there?

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Dennis, what's the word preach mean? Proclaim.

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What's the gospel mean? Truth. Proclaim the truth.

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It actually means to whisper the truth. Have you ever noticed how you can get everybody's attention?

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If Bill would start whispering to Joy, everybody would stop and try to listen.

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Gospel actually means to whisper the truth. Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel.

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Nothing else. Just the gospel, yes. Isn't that a family member or something in the

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Church of Christ? Because they include water baptism. Paul says,

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I didn't come to baptize, but to preach the gospel. It clearly shows he let that out.

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That was not part of the gospel. Absolutely. Thank you, that's a good point.

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So once again, we see that it's by the blood of Christ only.

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But to preach the gospel, and that not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.

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Not with the wisdom of words. Verge, what do you think he means, wisdom of words?

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I don't know, brother, I just thought that were people could understand it.

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All right. John, what do you think? I'm glad you're here. All right.

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Wisdom of words. I have something here that I want to pass out to you. Or have someone pass out,

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Greg. And believe it or not, it has a tremendous lesson in it.

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All right? I think also, at that time, the

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Greeks, or the Gentiles, had the tendency to take philosophical wisdom, study it, and meditate on it, and look for it.

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They got a joy out of wisdom. And they're relying on their own self, their own wisdom.

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Whereas the Jews always wanted a sign, they wanted to see what they had. So I really think, in addition to what

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I've already been saying, is he's telling us that just from trying to rely on yourself in the study of the words of foolishness, and all that, without revelation from God, it's not going to happen.

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That's right. The wisdom of words borders on embellishment.

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Now while those are being passed out, let me give you an example. We've all heard the saying, people who live in glass houses should not throw stones.

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Well, if I was to embellish that, I'd say something like this. Wisdom of words.

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Individuals residing in crystalline domicides should seldom promiscuously project geological specimens.

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It says the same thing, only it draws attention to the one speaking.

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Now, the picture you have is just one that I copied out of a country magazine.

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You know, it said, not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.

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And we get to looking at the oratory, we get to listening to the man.

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I remember one lady in Pecan Heights made the statement to Brother Barney's wife that she couldn't hear a thing he was saying because he was so handsome.

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He was a handsome man. So we too easily were drawn to the wrong thing.

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Now, beauty is fine. The picture is beautiful. I'm glad they printed it. I'm sorry we could not copy it in color.

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But for fear of being drawn into the unnecessary things, in this picture lies

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Jesus Christ. And I want you to study it, not now.

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I want you to study it this week and find Christ in it.

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Now, it'll not be philosophical. In fact, find Jesus in it.

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It will not be a picture of a man, but it'll be Jesus. So you take it home with you and when you have time and think of it, get it out and study it and see if you can find

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Jesus. Now, I don't want anybody shouting out right now that they found it.

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But it's there.

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He says, I have been sent by our Lord not to baptize, but to only preach and teach the

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Holy Gospel and that without words, with words of easy understanding.

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So that the very words I speak will not detract from the blessed cross of our

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Lord Jesus. Brother Barney taught me lots of things.

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One of them was, when you speak or teach or preach, do it in such a way that the youngest member in the audience can understand what you're saying.

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That's pretty good advice. Because if the youngest one understands, the rest have no excuse whatsoever.

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These people in this church gathered disciples to themselves and not to Christ. They did this in order to brag, especially about numbers.

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Eighteen. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.

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Now John, what does he mean the preaching of the cross unto those that perish is foolishness?

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People that don't understand are never going to and it's just foolishness to them.

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They can't see it. Hmm. Were any of you ever in that position?

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Oh, come on now. At one time.

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There's an honest man. I dare say we all were.

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If we're old enough to recognize salvation, then we're old enough at one time to not want to be saved.

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So to those that are not saved, it's foolishness.

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But to us that are saved, it's the very power of God. The preaching of the cross.

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The very power of God. Brothers, if you just look at rationality and try to figure out, and you look at what

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Jesus went through on the cross. And you try to say, now how is that event going to be the saving event that saves the world?

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It seems like it's the very opposite. It seems like it is the sign that he lost, not the sign that he won.

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And if we sit back and just look at, rationally, at what he lost, our conclusion will be that it was a foolish thing to do.

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And the very foolishness of it being the cause of our salvation, the world's salvation, is the way it happens.

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That's an indicator that it was God's doing and not ours. That's right.

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And why would we not think of doing it that way? He's speaking of himself.

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But from what does that rationale spring? The rationality that we have, that will lead us to believe that the cross was not the key.

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We have the rationality of the wisdom of men, the wisdom of the earth, the wisdom revealed by God.

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And it's all springing from the sinful nature with which we're born.

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There's something else on this. Alright. Like you said before, that is, for those who understand it before you can believe it.

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That's right. The carnal world does. But we that are saved have to believe it before we can understand it.

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So it's just backwards. Everything is just the opposite. The sanctification of we that are saved is of God Almighty.

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But to those that are the seed of Satan, we appear as fools. It's a waste of time and thought to them that do not believe.

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This is the way it should be. For the wicked are predestined to their own works.

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So be not angry at those that perish. You're not going to change a thing.

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All you'll do is hurt yourself and the cause of Christ. 19.

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For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.

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David, what does the word prudent mean? Kind of a curious tone of wisdom.

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It's with being carnal. Alright. He says it has been well documented in the

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Old Testament that God will destroy the wise wisdom of the world and bring to nothing those that seem to be so worldly intelligent.

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Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world?

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Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? There are no wise.

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There are no scribes of the word of God.

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He says, show me the wise man of this world. Show me the bookkeeper of this world.

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God has made them all foolish in the wisdom of the world. They have the wisdom of the world in us.

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They think they know, but they don't.

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You take a worldly person, one that is not saved, he can be the most loving, the most kind, the most sociable man in the world.

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Can love his family, I'm sorry to say, seemingly more than some of we.

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But this unsaved person perhaps knows more about what we should do than we do.

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And he loves his family and he would fight to the death for his family. But he does not really love his family like he will if he's saved.

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It's impossible because he's loving with the world he loves. Even though to him it's the ultimate, but to us it isn't.

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And you cannot explain that. It has to be revealed. In Romans 11, 33.

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Jesse, would you read that to me please? How unsearchable.

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Greg, that's a mouthful. Unsearchable. No need even beginning to try to find out.

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Unsearchable are his judgments. And his ways are past finding out.

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Now go to Ecclesiastes the 8th chapter please. Richard, would you read the 17th verse for us?

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Then upheld all work. For by the law of nature, the dead shall not die.

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If he gave further, the law of life would come to know him. The dead shall not be able to die. Genome.

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Is that right, Bill? Can you tell us in a few words what that is?

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That's the DNA code that describes. Alright.

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They are now able to extract something of that.

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I'm not going to try to explain what because I don't know. All I can remember is the final result of it.

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If you have a neighbor you do not like and you want to eliminate him.

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Of course this is not for you. But there is on the market substance that you can purchase.

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You can go to the internet and find out how to concoct it. You can put it in an aerosol can and spray it either in your neighbor's house or toward his house.

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Everyone perhaps will get the sniffles except one person. The one that you're after and he'd be dead in 10 minutes.

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Now you're talking about science and technology and the awfulness of it.

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Just think what you could do. You can single out one individual and by spraying a short burst of whatever this is kill him and nobody else.

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That's scary to me. Alright.

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Ezekiel tells us that God's ways are past finding out. You cannot find out. You can spend all of the money in the world.

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You can go to all the schools. You can get the highest worldly brains possible.

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Marianne, there's no way that they can discover God. It's because he made it that way.

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21. For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God. It pleased

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God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. Now please remember he controls who believes and who does not.

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For that after the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God. For after they have gained all of the wisdom of this world they still could not find out

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God. It is by the seemingly stupidity of preaching that God has chosen all that believe with a belief that has been given to them to be saved.

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It's totally God that does it. Total. How do you know you're here today because this was

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God's will? How many of you know that? Do you think you're here by accident?

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Do you really know that? Then why do we question so many other things?

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For the Jews require a sign. They've always required a sign and we too act like Jews sometimes.

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And the Greeks seek after wisdom. But we preach

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Christ crucified unto the Jews a stumbling block and unto the Greeks foolishness.

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We preach the crucifixion of Jesus the Christ that it was real. And it has become to the

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Jew a holy thing over which they stumble. And to the Greeks it is a thing of pure foolishness.

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But unto them which are called. Greg, unto them which are called means what?

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People of God. Alright. Are they all called at the same time?

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No. Does he call two at the same time? That's not what

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I asked. I don't know of any two. It's an individual thing.

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He may call two different people at the same time but it would be an individual call.

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Personal. Individual. All of his people are that way. There's no shotgun type salvation.

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But unto them which are called both Jews and Greeks. Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

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Jesus the Christ is the wisdom of God. Now tell me

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Dennis, how is it that the disciples were able to make the statement that they had seen and handled eternal life?

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What? Alright. Does he give you eternal life? How? Well he got it on the cross.

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He gave it to Christ. What is eternal life? What? Joy.

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Joy. Alright.

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Diane? Eternal life is life in Christ. Eternal life is what?

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Life in Christ. That's almost right. That would pass.

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What is eternal life?

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It's just like a ring. There's no end to a ring. It's still going around and around.

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That's the way it is in eternal life. I didn't want to ask you this next question.

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I think it was two statements that Christ lives in me and I live in Christ.

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And Christ living in me is eternal life. But what is eternal life?

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I think there's no beginning and no end.

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What you're saying is true. But I want you to understand the basic principle of eternal life is

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Jesus Christ. He is eternal life.

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He himself is eternal life. 1 John 5 says he that hath a son.

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That's right. So everything you've said is fine. It's he and us and we and him.

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It's never ending. It's forever. It's everything that you said. But I wanted you to get down to where he himself personally is eternal life.

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This is why the disciples can say we've handled him. We've touched him. We've been with him.

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We've talked with him. Eternal life is Jesus Christ. It is not something he gives you on a platter outside of himself.

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It is he himself. Small point but very important,

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I think. It is Christ Jesus himself. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men and weakness of God is stronger than men.

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Because and on account of the nonsense of God is far wiser than man's wisdom.

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And God, if he could be weak, would still be stronger than the strongest of men.

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For you see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called.

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Now, Virge, what's he mean by that statement, that 26th verse? I don't know, brother.

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It has to do with we've got to humble ourselves before God and get rid of him.

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We can't be mightier than anybody else and accept him just the way he accepts us just the way we are.

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All right, because we are the way he made us. But do we come to him in our nobility?

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Do we come to him, Diane, in our strength and might? No matter.

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Absolutely. Now, does this mean that a wise man cannot be saved? That a rich man can't?

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Do you have to be poor? You said.

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Powerful man. Brightful man. No. Right.

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Let me ask you a related question. Can a well -known artist, say a singer, worldwide known, can they bring that talent to Christ?

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Why? We bring nothing.

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We cannot come in our nobility or in our might. He says they're just not that way.

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We come, everybody is saved exactly the same way and on exactly the same footing.

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Exactly. Now, if you gain notoriety afterwards in the work of the

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Lord, that's fine. But you cannot bring your riches and think you're going to benefit

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God. I think this is important. I mean to say that in the nobility you have to have more than you can say.

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Exactly. Any questions on that? Brother Otis, that's kind of like the time when they were building the

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Hoover Dam. The country were out there working on it.

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When they finished it, somebody said, just look what God would have done if he'd had the money.

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Yes, yes. That shows you how far out they've come. That's how intelligent man is.

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Could we go back around the world and say, because you came in, the world didn't come in as the king or noble or rich.

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You came in as a partner, as a, he was a humble person when he was on earth.

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He didn't have all the stuff we're talking about here. He set the example how he walked on earth.

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He wasn't like the singers, the notoriety and all that.

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He was a person that may have been easier to accept for a lot of people. He didn't come as a king, but he came as a common man.

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That's right. He was born in an outhouse. Right. He lived on this earth without ever owning anything.

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Pearl? There is a song. The title of it says, in my hand, no price

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I bring, simply to the cross I cling. And the way of the cross is known.

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And there's no way one can be saved. And going by the cross is given to us.

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David, do you want to say something? I was going to. One of the tax gatherers, thank you,

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God save you. Thank you. He had a lot of money.

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If he was the tax gatherer, they knew how to confiscate some of that for their own purposes,

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I'm sure. But as soon as he got saved and Jesus came walking by and followed him, he just started giving money away.

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And so he didn't try to gain money for himself any longer.

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He didn't mean anything to him. What meant something to him was the relationship he had with Jesus Christ.

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That's right. And Jesus himself said, when he said what he did about rich people, the apostle said, well then how can any rich man be saved?

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And Jesus said, with man it would be utterly impossible, but with God all things are possible.

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That's right. This verse points out about the noble, the wise, and it's almost like you have here philosophers, you've got military people are kings, people who run governments, noble people would be people that own lands, wealthy people.

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Not many of those are in the church. And that's exactly what it refers to. It doesn't say none, but very few.

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And the ones that do come in, they don't obsess over those things anymore.