A church reliant on the Holy Spirit

1 Corinthians chapter 2 verse 6 to 16.

1 Corinthians 2:6–16

We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature,

but not the wisdom of this age or the rulers of this age who are coming to nothing.

No, we speak of God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden

and that God destined for our glory before time began.

None of the rulers of this age understood, for if they had,

they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

However, as it is written, no one has seen, no ear has heard,

no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him.

But God has revealed to us by his spirit.

The spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God.

For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man's spirit within him?

In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the spirit of God.

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 truth 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.

The spiritual man makes judgment about the things,

but he himself is not subject to anyone's judgment.

For who has known the mind of the Lord,

that he may instruct him,

but we have the mind of Christ.

Amen.

Thanks, Lucia. That's great. Thank you.

Well, keep that passage open.

We're going to work our way through it together this morning.

And I wonder, as we do that,

if I can ask you to think about what is a successful church?

Have you ever thought about that?

What is a successful church?

We know, don't we, what a successful business is.

So a successful business is one that earns lots of money for its owners.

We know what a successful athlete is, don't we?

Someone who wins lots of games, lots of tournaments.

They get all the cool Nike gear because they get given it as sponsorship.

Maybe you even know what a successful parent looks like.

You know, they have their kids in bed asleep by 7pm

and are sitting in a tidy flat drinking a cup of tea in front of the television.

I wonder whether you've thought about what a successful church looks like.

I guess if we use those same measures that we were talking about for a church,

we might say that a successful church is one that maybe has a lot of people coming along to it.

Maybe they've got a lot of money.

Maybe the church meets in a fancy building.

They have some funky music or a celebrity pastor that everybody knows.

But even when you express it like that, you sort of know, don't you,

that doesn't really kind of sound right for a church, does it?

I mean, there are lots of churches like that, especially in London,

and you wouldn't want to go to any of them, really.

It would be safer not going.

So what then is success for a church?

What is it that we are aiming for?

You know, we're at the start of a journey of church revitalization.

What is it that we're hoping the destination will be?

Well, I want to suggest to you this morning from the passage that we've just read together

that a successful church is not necessarily rich.

It's not necessarily meeting in a fancy building.

It doesn't even have to have funky music.

Instead, what I want us to see together is that successful church is a church that is relying on

and experiencing the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit.

In other words, the church, a successful church, is a place where God is obviously at work,

opening people's eyes and hearts to see the wonder of who he is and what he's done,

and empowering church members to live that life together.

Now, just think about that with me.

If that's right, if that's what a successful church is,

if a successful church is relying on and experiencing the regenerating work of the Spirit,

then here's the central thing about a successful church.

You and I can't make one, can we?

There's nothing that we can do to make church successful,

because the success of a church relies not on us,

but on God, on a movement of the Spirit.

And I want to suggest this morning that that has a profound impact on what church should look like

and what church should feel like for all of us this morning.

Now, if you'll wind back with me a moment and come back to 1 Corinthians chapter 2,

1 Corinthians 2 · chapter mention

which we read together, I want us to see that there,

but we're going to walk through the passage first,

and then I'm going to pull out what I think are three implications for us as a church.

So let's just walk through these verses first.

Let's walk through them.

In verse 6, Paul tells them that although his preaching isn't with conventional wisdom,

that's what we were thinking about last week,

still it is a message of wisdom among the mature, as he calls them.

It's important that we get what the word mature is there.

It doesn't mean people of a mature age.

I'm sorry if you're of a mature age this morning,

but what he's not saying this morning is that once you arrive at a certain age,

you will then understand what he's saying.

So this is for older folks and not for younger folks.

That's not what he's saying this morning.

Really, literally the word there is perfect.

And this is Paul's description of the church.

These are the saints or the sanctified or the holy people,

as he calls them in chapter 1 verse 2,

the saints in Corinth, the mature in Corinth.

Again, that's not because every single church member or any church member is absolutely perfect.

Rather, it's to contrast them with the world.

The world are the perishing, chapter 1 verse 18.

So the mature are really just Christians,

those who more often than not were weak and nothing in the eyes of the world,

but who have now been saved by God and brought into his kingdom,

made holy, mature and perfect.

But really the question is then, where is this wisdom from?

If this wisdom isn't worldly wisdom,

it's not the wisdom of this age from the rulers of this age,

a wisdom that's coming to nothing, as he puts it in verse 6,

then what kind of wisdom is it?

Well, look down at verse 7.

You're told this is God's wisdom.

We declare God's wisdom, he says.

Wisdom that he tells us has been hidden, but has now been revealed.

It's a bit of an aside, but I think it's worth noticing that the wisdom of God has not been hidden

because God was making his mind up about it.

You and I can be like that, can't we?

You know, we wait until the very last minute to make a decision

because we don't want to get a wrong decision.

So someone asks you to do something and you wait for ages and ages and ages

before you decide whether you're going to say yes or no to doing it.

Someone's not very happy with me so far this morning.

Please don't worry about it, it's absolutely fine.

I don't mind a bit of crying.

It's not that here though, is it?

It's not that God can't make up his mind why the wisdom's hidden.

The wisdom has been hidden, but it has been decided.

Look at the end of verse 7.

You notice there that it has been planned for the glory of God's people before time began.

In other words, this message of wisdom for the mature,

although it's been hidden and now revealed, is about the eternal plans of God.

Plans which he established in eternity past and is now working out in history.

But despite the fact that these plans are ancient and have been working out in history,

still, verse 8, none of the rulers of this age understood them.

Why?

Well, because they crucified the Lord of glory,

which had they known and understood and believed the plans of God,

had they been mature, to use Paul's phrase in verse 6,

they would not have wickedly killed God's Son in human flesh.

Again, it's worth seeing the implication of Paul's point here.

The message of wisdom for the mature, founded on the ancient plans of God from before time begun,

focuses where?

This hidden mystery from eternity past has its focus where?

There, on the cross of Jesus Christ,

where the eternal Son in human flesh handed himself over to the wicked intention of his enemies,

who unbeknown to them, while going through with their wicked intentions,

actually accomplish the eternal plan of God to provide a sacrifice of sin so that he might forgive and save.

Now, that plan, we're told, is so glorious we could never have conceived it, verse 9.

He says what?

No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for his people.

But verse 10, that's the message that's now being revealed to Paul by the Spirit,

and it's the message he's now preaching.

Now, we're going to move on just to look at some of the other bits in a moment,

but just think about what this means.

Notice here that God is not frantic.

God is not stressed, is he?

He's not running around trying to accomplish his purposes in the least amount of time possible.

Instead, he's patient.

He is mysteriously patient, isn't he?

He's had a message of salvation decided before time began

and worked it out in thousands of years of history, building up to the cross of Jesus Christ.

A message that was foreshadowed and role-played out in the temple for thousands of years

before God the Son arrives in human flesh.

A plan that was achieved not only despite, but because of the ignorance of those who achieved it

as they drove the nails into Jesus' hands.

And now for thousands of years, he's patiently working out Christ's victory

and giving his spirit to whoever he wills.

God is patient.

I wonder if you notice that's how God works in your life too.

He's not in a rush.

Instead of giving quick answers and fast fixes, he is content, isn't he,

for you just to keep coming to the Lord Jesus in the midst of unanswered prayers and confusion.

But not because he's forgotten you or because he doesn't love you,

but because he's patiently doing by the Spirit through the cross something so wonderful

you wouldn't even understand it if he explained it.

Now, back in 1 Corinthians 2, Paul goes on in verses 11 to 16

to explain how God's Spirit has revealed this message,

how the message of wisdom centered on the cross has come to the church by Paul.

And there are two parts to it, which we saw, didn't we, with Lashire in the family Bible slot.

The first part is about who the Spirit is,

and the second part is about what the Spirit does.

So firstly, verse 11, the Spirit knows the message of wisdom because he is God the Spirit.

Who he is, he is God the Spirit.

This is the doctrine of the Trinity, right?

So although Paul can talk about the Holy Spirit as a separate person from the Father and the Son,

he is distinct from the Father and the Son, yet still he's fully divine.

He's a partaker in the divine essence of God.

So that the Father can't plan anything that the Spirit doesn't know.

The Son can't do anything that the Spirit doesn't empower.

So the Spirit knows what the Father has planned from eternity past,

because he's divine.

And what the Son does, the Spirit then enables,

so that Paul knows, verse 12, the message of wisdom from God,

because the Spirit who is at work in him is not the Spirit of the world,

who knows only things about the world,

but the divine Spirit from God who knows the things of God.

So look down at verse 13.

What does he say?

He says, this is what we speak,

not in words taught by human wisdom,

but in words taught by the Spirit,

explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.

In other words, the first thing to know, says Paul,

when it comes to this revelation of the message,

is that the message comes from a reliable source.

It comes right from the top.

This is right from God himself.

The Spirit is divine.

The second then is what the Spirit does.

So look down at verse 14.

Here you'll see that not only the Spirit has access to the mind of God,

but also the Spirit has been at work in Paul.

So Paul is with the Spirit,

or the Spirit is with Paul.

So he doesn't consider the things to come from God as foolish,

but now as wisdom.

Look down, these I think are important verses.

Look down at verse 15.

The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things,

but such a person is not subject merely to human judgments.

Literally, he doesn't make worldly judgments,

nor can he be judged by human judgments.

He's not here saying,

listen, I'm no longer accountable to the law or to anybody.

He's not saying that.

He's not saying, listen, if I get caught speeding on my camel,

it comes to nothing because I'm above all of that.

That's not what he's saying.

Rather, this is about how Paul now thinks

and how he should be thought about by others.

With the Spirit in his mind,

with the Spirit of God at work in him,

he now thinks God's thoughts

with the mind of Christ, verse 16,

which he couldn't do before.

In other words, human judgments can't explain Paul anymore.

You can't explain who Paul is and what Paul does

simply at a human level

because he has the Spirit

and knows the mind of Christ.

This, I think, is really, really helpful.

You've got to make sure that we get this straight in our minds.

Paul is saying that

understanding the message of the cross

by the Spirit of God dwelling in our hearts

changes everything about how we think and view the world.

It literally becomes the lenses

through which you see everything.

So much so that decisions

that would have made no sense before

now make perfect sense

because you see and understand

what God is doing through the cross of Christ.

There's a famous verse in 1 Corinthians 15,

just a bit later on in the letter,

and Paul talks about

if the resurrection hadn't happened,

he would be to be pitied above all men.

Do you remember that?

If the resurrection is not true,

then Paul's life makes no sense at all.

It's to be pitied.

But of course, the resurrection has happened,

so his life makes perfect sense.

And so it should be for us.

You know, the question for us

if we're a Christian this morning

is if our lives and decisions

make perfect sense

without the gospel being true,

then we're not really living the Christian life

because the message of the cross

is the big truth

through which everything is filtered.

There's another important aside here as well,

which I think I want us to get

before we come on to the implications.

Look again at verse 14.

Let me read the first part of verse 14 to you again.

The person without the Spirit

does not accept the things

that come from the Spirit of God,

but considers them foolishness.

Notice that Paul assumes here

there are two types of people in the world.

There are people without the Spirit

and there are people with the Spirit.

And those without the Spirit

cannot accept the gospel,

but consider it what?

Foolishness.

And by implication,

those with the Spirit

do accept the gospel.

In other words,

and this is important,

Paul doesn't say there are two types

of Christian in the world,

those with the Spirit

and those without the Spirit.

He's saying there are two kinds

of people in the world,

those without the Spirit

who therefore don't trust Christ

and those with the Spirit

are those who do trust Christ.

In other words,

if you love the Lord

and you think the gospel

of Jesus Christ crucified

is the best news ever,

that's because the Spirit

has made you alive,

not because you've worked it out.

No Spirit,

no life.

So let me ask you this morning,

have you experienced that?

I'm not asking if you've had

some kind of weird,

unexplainable experience

of what you think

might be the Holy Spirit.

No, I'm not asking that.

What I'm asking you is,

have you had your eyes open

to the beauty and wonder

of the plan of God?

You and I live in a world

where from eternity past,

God has a plan of salvation

for people like you and me.

Have you seen that your happiness,

your eternal life,

lie not in the fulfillment

of your own dreams and aspiration,

but in the accomplishment

of God's plans?

Have you experienced new life

by the Spirit

so that your eyes and your heart

are open to that,

to love that and trust that?

Because if you haven't,

you need to understand

there's nothing you can do

to kind of generate that

from inside of yourself.

Instead, you need to turn

to the Lord and say,

please God in heaven above,

give me eyes to see

and a heart to trust

the wonder of Christ,

to turn from the horror

of my selfishness

to love and trust you instead.

That's a really quick run through,

1 Corinthians 2.

Let me try and draw out

three implications

for us as a church.

What does it mean

for us as a church

to be relying on the Spirit

and living out these realities?

Let me suggest three things.

The first one is this.

Spirit-powered faith

will trump intelligence.

Spirit-powered faith

will trump intelligence.

I was a student

at Sheffield University

quite a long time ago now,

and I studied geography,

which has turned out

not to be incredibly useful,

but anyway,

I studied geography at university,

and one of the things

that they enabled you to do

was you could pick

a certain number of modules

from any other department

in the university.

So at the beginning of the year,

you go and queue up

to register for your optional modules.

One of my friends decided

to just join the shortest queue

and ended up doing

some weird course

in ancient history.

Most people did

a computer science module

because everybody knows

computer science is easy,

and if you get a good mark,

it boosts your mark

in the degree you're actually doing.

Anyway,

I decided there was

a biblical studies department

at Sheffield University

at the time,

and so I took a module

in New Testament Greek,

so I thought that would be

interesting and helpful.

I hasten to add

I wasn't actually very good at it,

but the striking thing was

in the biblical studies department

at Sheffield University

was some of the brightest people

in the university were there.

They spent their lives

studying the scriptures,

but they hadn't got a clue

what the Bible

or the gospel was about.

It was incredible to me.

Here were men and women

who were spending their lives

reading everything

that was written

about the Bible

and the Bible itself,

but still they didn't

trust Christ

and the whole thing

was foolishness to them.

That's 1 Corinthians 2

in action, isn't it?

Because it's not intelligence,

but it is spirit-powered faith

that counts,

and so it must be

for us as a church.

We must learn

to treasure

not so much

great thoughts about God,

but great faith in Him.

Not because academic learning

isn't important

or because Christians

shouldn't use their brains

when it comes to

understanding the Bible.

No, we must,

and we must train people

to do that.

While the point is

that as a church,

we should be quicker

to listen to a brother

or a sister in Christ

who turns us to God

in the Scriptures,

then we are listening

to the latest expert

on the God channel

who's full of their own

self-importance.

This idea gets expressed

in our church covenant

or constitution

that states we're a church

that's led by elders,

supported by deacons,

but owned collectively

by the church membership.

And the church membership

are all those

who having shown evidence

of new life in Christ

and being baptized,

covenant together

to be a church family,

to look out for one another,

to care for one another,

to take responsibility,

to meet together regularly,

to appoint leaders

who will teach the Scriptures,

celebrate the Lord's Supper

and baptism.

And it doesn't matter

whether you've been

a Christian for a week

or whether you're

a professor of theology

and you've been a Christian

for 40 years.

Membership in the local church

treats you exactly the same

because church is about

spirit-empowered faith,

not human intelligence.

You might have heard

that phrase,

all-member ministry.

We're going to think

about that some more

in a few weeks' time,

but really it's built

on this doctrine.

Every member of the church

is a minister of the gospel

because every member,

by means of their conversion,

has the Spirit of God

at work in them,

enabling them to understand

the things of God

and apply them to others.

Let me try and put it

as provocatively as I can, okay?

If the only person

you ever see up the front

in church is me,

or if I'm the only person

doing ministry

in the life of the church,

we haven't made a kind

of organizational error.

We've made a theological error

because all the members

of the church

are ministers of the church,

not just me.

Likewise,

if you come to church

expecting that there's

no contribution

for you to make,

it's not a laziness problem.

It's a theological problem

because all of God's people

are Spirit-empowered

ministers of the gospel.

Not because we all

have the same gifts

or have the exact

same responsibilities,

but because we all

have the same Spirit.

That's the first implication.

Second one,

praying to God

will trump nagging people.

If what Paul is saying

here is right,

that we can only understand

the wisdom and glory

of the gospel

by a work of the Spirit

in our hearts,

then what we need

to accept is that

you and I

cannot make anybody

a Christian,

can we?

How so?

Well, because you and I

cannot give anybody

the Spirit.

It's not in our gift.

You know,

even with the best explanation

of the gospel

that we can bring,

even with the clearest answers

to the questions,

even with the best literature

and leaflets,

none of us can make a Christian.

Only God can.

Now, of course,

we all know that,

don't we?

I don't think I've told anyone

anything they don't know,

but we do sometimes act

like we can make people Christian.

If you look at your

praying to nagging ratio

with your non-Christian

friends and family,

how does that balance out?

I think especially

with close family,

we find ourselves

nagging with them

to come to church

or to listen to the gospel

more than we find ourselves

pleading with the Lord

that they might turn to Christ.

I think the same applies

to holiness or weakness.

The gift of the Spirit

here in 1 Corinthians 2

doesn't mean that we all

instantly know everything

that we need to know

or that we're all as godly

as we need to be.

We haven't been totally liberated

from the battle with sin,

have we?

The Spirit is fully ours,

but is engaged

in a lifelong battle

with our sinfulness.

So much so that the battle

that we have to be patient

or to be humble

or to be thoughtful

to others

or to be hungry

for more of the Lord,

that battle is won for us

in prayer,

not in nagging.

It means that

when we talk to one another

about those things,

we talk to one another

prayerfully,

knowing that actually

it's the Lord by His Spirit

bringing the gospel

that will change

and transform us,

not my nagging.

The book of James says,

doesn't it,

that your anger

achieves nothing

because it's God

by His Spirit

that achieves things

in our lives.

Final implication then,

and this is the big one

that I want us to see.

God's blessing

is what success looks like.

God's blessing

is what success looks like.

This is where we started,

isn't it?

But hopefully you can see

it a bit more clearly now.

That it is possible,

isn't it,

for us as a church

to have lots of people coming

but still to be

a total failure.

It's possible for us

as a church

to have a youth work

that's bursting at the seams,

a toddler group

that's oversubscribed

and for us still

to be failing as a church.

Why?

Well, because what we really need

as a church

is a work of the Spirit

in the lives of people

bringing them to know

and love and trust Jesus

and empowering them

to live for Him.

And without that,

we can't do anything

worth doing.

See, here's the hard truth

for all of us

and I think it's hard for me

but it's hard for all of us

this morning.

There is nothing

that any of us

in this room can do

to revitalize

the ministry of the gospel

at West Kilburn Baptist Church.

You know,

we might be able

to do a few things

to see more people coming.

We might even see

lots more people coming

and it might not be wrong

to do those things.

They might be good things to do.

Perhaps we should do

some of them

but they won't on their own

revitalize the ministry

of the church

because only a movement

of the Spirit

will do that.

Only a movement

of the Spirit

in the lives of unbelievers

bringing them to faith

in Christ

and in our lives

making us conscious

of our need of the Lord.

Let me say

just really practically

how this lands.

It's why really

the only thing I've changed

other than the big TV

is the Wednesday night

prayer meeting.

I've split the Zoom part

away from the in-person part

as Ray was explaining earlier

with the hope of just trying

to make them both

a little bit better.

Why would I do that?

Well, because I am

absolutely convinced

from 1 Corinthians 2

and from the rest

of the Scriptures

that actually

it's only God's blessing

that can revitalize

the ministry of the church

and we need to ask him for it.

We need to come

and pray

and ask for his blessing.

So my hope is

that if you can come

in person

on a Wednesday night

please come

pray with us.

In-person is best

for all sorts of reasons.

I can explain this

to you later.

The incarnation

happened in person, yeah?

It wasn't live-streamed.

Coming in person

is best.

But if you can't

attend in person

maybe there's all sorts

of reasons for that.

Maybe you're housebound

maybe getting out

in the evening

is too difficult.

Perhaps you're working away.

Then come on Zoom

and pray with us there.

Because success

for us as a church

is this and only this.

Relying on

and experiencing

the regenerating power

of the Spirit

amongst us.

We can't do that

for ourselves

but we can ask God

to do it for us.

And wonderfully

he delights

to answer that prayer.

Let me pray.

Heavenly Father

we come before you

this morning

and ask for your blessing.

Knowing that there's

nothing in us

that deserves it

but knowing that

without it

we can do nothing.

We long Lord

that you might bless us

with the power

of the Spirit

opening eyes

and hearts

to trust in the Lord Jesus

and moving us

to apply the gospel

to our lives

more thoroughly

even in the dark

corners of our hearts

that our lives

would only be

explained

by us living

for the Lord Jesus.

Please do this work

amongst us

for your glory's sake

and help us

in the weeks

months

and years to come

to be faithful

in asking you

for this blessing.

We long

to be successful

as a church

in the genuine

sense of that

to be a place

where

your Spirit

is experienced

in bringing

power

and transformation

to our lives.

And so we ask

for that

in Jesus' name.

Amen.