The Power of the Spirit | 1 Corinthians 2:1-5

Well, last week I started the message by talking

about Greek culture in the first century. And

the point was to continue to paint a picture

for you of what Paul was faced with when he first

came to the city of Corinth. And I want to continue

that theme this morning by just sharing with

you as an appetizer this morning, two snapshots

of Greco -Roman life. that further illustrate

for us Paul's mindset at this time in his life.

The first snapshot is of this particular guy.

His name is Philostratus of Athens. Whoop, there

it is. Philostratus of Athens. He lived in the

late 2nd and early 3rd century A .D. He was a

man who came from a long line of sophists, what

we call philosophers. And he spent much of his

career moving in elite circles in Greece, sometimes

even imperial circles during the reign of Marcus

Aurelius and some of his successors. And in addition

to teaching and being a sophist himself, he was

also a biographer of the people that ran in his

circles in that day. One of his biographical

works has come down to us. You see the title

there. It's called The Lives of the Sophists.

I'll just give you one example of many of the

type of men that he spoke of in this particular

work. He speaks of a philosopher by the name

of Skopelian. Now Skopelian was a Greek thinker

that was from the East in Asia Minor. And listen

to the verbiage that he uses as he describes

the philosophy of this man. He writes, he was

clever and quick -witted, skilled in flashy dramatic

tricks and epigrammatic turns. fond of witty

paradoxes, striking figures of speech, and smart

wordplay. That's all. He writes about how this

Scopelian had enormous drawing power. He was

able to bring big crowds as a teacher and debater

in the city of Smyrna, attracting catechumens

from all over Greece and Asia Minor. He talks

about one famous episode where Scopelian came

to a small city and refused. refused to speak

there, calling it, ready, quote, a cage in which

a nightingale like him could not be expected

to sing, whereas Smyrna was a proper grove for

such a bird. Wow. Philostratus even described

the way Scopalian would ascend to the stage in

front of his audiences, saying, not with the

bearing of a timid speaker. but as befitting

one who was to win glory for himself and was

confident that he could not fail. It's ridiculous,

isn't it? It's all ridiculous. I share that with

you because it helps us to understand just how

taken the Corinthian people were by the power

of public speakers in that day, how important

philosophy and rhetoric was, the tricks and the

gimmicks, the flourishing of rhetoric, the self

-glorifying nature. of the culture. As Paul was

walking into Corinth for the first time, that's

what he was competing with. Now, the other snapshot

I want to provide this morning is a little more

sobering, but it takes place in the exact same

timeframe as the life of Philostratus. On the

Palatine Hill in the city of Rome, somewhere

around the year 200, an unknown student carved

graffiti. what we would call graffiti, into the

plaster walls of his schoolhouse. And little

did he know as he was scrawling this into the

wall that what he was drawing would become one

of the most important archaeological findings

of the 19th century. It's a simple sketch. I'm

going to put it on the screen. It's going to

be a little bit hard to see. It's a simple sketch

that has a few mocking words attached to it.

Here's what's important about this. This graffiti

is the oldest artistic depiction we have of Jesus

on the cross. Sadly, it was drawn in order to

make fun of Christianity, which was, again, normal

in Roman society at that time. And if you look

at that picture, what you see is a man is standing

on the left side, and in the image, he's got

one hand that is raised towards the central figure.

And that central figure is a man, apparently

on a cross, but with a donkey's head. And scratched

below it is written in classical Greek, which

translated means, Christ being pictured as a

donkey. It's appalling to us today, but back

then, that is what Greeks and that is what Romans

thought about the whole idea of a Jewish savior

dying on a cross for you and me. Even kids in

that day would mock the cross. So on the one

hand, you see what's impressive in Greek culture,

sophistry and rhetoric. On the other, you see

there is no respect whatsoever for the word of

the cross and the gospel of Jesus Christ. So

again, if you're Paul, how do you approach this

culture? Grab your Bibles, and we're going to

see some of the things that he says today in

1 Corinthians 2. Raise your hand if you've seen

that image before. A picture of that. Okay, you

might have been taught something about that.

It's really an interesting archaeological find.

All right, as you're turning there, I'm going

to do something this morning I usually try not

to do. We're going to take a little sneak peek

ahead in Paul's letter because there's something

in chapter 4 that has a bearing on what he says

here in chapter 2. When we get to chapter 4,

and I looked at the schedule, we will be there

late May, early June. Lord willing, we'll get

there. But when he comes to chapter 4, Paul is

going to rebuke the Corinthians using something.

Paul has a gift of sarcasm in his writing, in

case you didn't know that. It comes out in both

1 and 2 Corinthians quite strongly. Listen to

what he says in 1 Corinthians chapter 4. I'll

1 Corinthians 4 · chapter mention

put it on the screen. He says, you, Corinthians,

are already filled. You've already become rich.

You become kings without us, meaning the apostles.

You become kings without us. We, the apostles,

are fools for Christ's sake, but you, you are

prudent in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong.

You are distinguished, but we are without honor.

And what we're going to see is that the Corinthian

believers were somehow under the impression that

the word of the cross that they'd received was

just like this elementary principle of their

faith, and now they wanted more advanced things.

In other words, with this pesky problem about

sin dealt with, they thought, well, look, we're

filled now. We're rich and prudent and strong

and distinguished. In fact, we've become like

kings. And so they were like, well, what's next,

Paul? Give us something interesting. We want

something more advanced. They're still thinking

like classical Greeks and not Christians. And

so the idea of the weakness of the cross and

the foolishness of the cross, the humiliation

of the cross. seems to have drifted from their

hearts and minds. So what Paul's going to have

to do here is correct them and rebuke them. They

are baby Christians, and yet here they are asking

for advanced things. So he's going to have to

deal with their pride and their focus on earthly

things, their self -reliance, their boasting,

so many things he's going to have to deal with.

And it's going to become obvious as we get further

into the letter that many members of the Corinthian

church were not all that pleased with Paul. Didn't

think much of him. Found him to be a little too

basic, a little too simple. He was lacking in

the charisma and the charm that they love to

see and hear in their favorite public speakers.

So with all that background, let's look at the

first five verses of 1 Corinthians 2. It says

this. When I came to you, brethren. Now he's

talking about his first visit, which would have

been. more than 18 months earlier. When I first

came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority

of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the

testimony of God, for I determined to know nothing

among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

I was with you in weakness and in fear and much

trembling, and my message and my preaching were

not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration

of the Spirit. So just five verses, but all kinds

of practical principles that impact the way we

operate in the church today, the way we preach,

the way we teach, the way we listen to sermons,

the way we prepare to go out and share our faith

with others who need to hear the good news. All

kinds of interesting stuff in here. So let's

work our way through it. Let's go back up to

verse one, where it says, when I came to you,

brethren, I did not come with superiority of

speech. Now, I know the ESV says, I did not come

with lofty speech. And I actually like that better.

The Greek word here refers to something that

is elevated. It's higher than normal. So this

idea of lofty speech. And basically what it means

is that Paul didn't come with the typical sophistry

in his speech that the Greeks were sort of used

to. He didn't come with lofty wisdom, he says.

Instead, what did he come with? He says, I came

as a witness. Nothing more, nothing less. A witness

to what? The testimony of God. So what Paul's

doing here is correcting the mindset of the Corinthian

believers who think, well, when this guy first

came, he wasn't all that impressive in his communication.

And he's telling them here, that was my intentional

posture when I first arrived in Corinth years

ago. And by the way, in case you'd forgotten,

it was that humble posture and the very straightforward

message about Christ that led to your salvation.

Do you remember that? When you got transformed

from being a pagan to a redeemed saint. But it's

interesting they'd sort of forgotten about that,

right? And how wonderful that was. See, Paul

realized that when he first arrived in Corinth,

he was going to have to challenge everything

that that culture valued. And the vast majority

of his listeners would just hear him briefly

and say, that's foolishness. And they would walk

away. And not many were saved. Scholars have

looked at this and tried to estimate how many

converts were made in the city of Corinth through

Paul's ministry. We can't know for sure, but

based on the population of that city in that

day, it wasn't that many. Scholars have guessed

anywhere between a few dozen to maybe 200 at

the most. So victories were hard to come by,

but still Paul understood that God would draw

those that he had marked out to be saved. So

he wasn't going to change the message. And he

wasn't going to try to depend on his own cleverness

and communication for the sake of maximizing

results. And that's an important principle that

applies even today. Not going to change the message,

not going to depend on clever communication techniques

in order to maximize results. He understood that

his task was to simply confront this people with

the message and a message they didn't want to

hear. and then leave the response of the people

up to God and be able to move on and say, look,

I've done my job. I've been faithful to the gospel.

and then leave it in God's hands. Now, we know

from reading Paul's letters that he was a very

deep thinker, right? He was capable of making

strong, logical arguments. He was capable of

using language in powerful ways, right? We know

from his background, he was a man of intellect

and wisdom, and he could have used all kinds

of philosophical arguments in order to sell the

gospel. And there are many people in the church

today who would say, Paul could have done a better

job of this. Honestly, you could read people,

you could see people actually writing that. Well,

you know, he could have used this technique or

done this or done that in order to maximize results

to sell the gospel. But Paul understood where

the true power lies. And he knows the difference

between winning disciples to Jesus versus winning

followers to himself. So he comes to this Greek

city, this notorious... for its love of philosophy,

knowing that if he just employs all of his strong

rhetorical skills, he could become a really popular

teacher. He could draw really big crowds. And

we see this happening all the time in the church

today, right? Preachers and teachers with strong

communication skills, with charisma and personality,

and they're carefully choosing topics to preach

on, carefully crafting talks. Not necessarily

sermons, but talks that move the emotions and

create experiences for the audience. And we know

that kind of high -level skill does draw crowds.

We see it all the time. It can very easily build

a big, prominent church if that's the goal. And

for too many Christian leaders, that is the goal.

And that's a sad thing. But then when that happens,

when it's built on that model, who gets the attention?

And who gets the glory? Is it the man in the

pulpit or is it God himself? Paul says, look,

I've only come as a witness to the testimony

of God. I'm a herald and an ambassador. I'm not

a salesman. All that matters to a herald is that

he takes a message and passes it along. All an

ambassador does is represent the message that

the one who sent him gives to him. Nothing more,

nothing less. But for the sophist of that day,

the focus was always on impressing the audience.

And that means the message could be tweaked a

little bit here and there. It could be changed

and adapted in order to generate the right response

and the big result. But that's not true of the

gospel, is it? Now, it's true that a good evangelist

will approach his audience in a unique way based

on who he's talking to, the culture and traditions,

because he wants to be sensitive to his hearers

so that the message of the gospel can penetrate

the heart. But the content of the gospel message

does not and cannot change. It does not and cannot

change. So here in verse 1, Paul is simply reminding

the Corinthians, look, when I came, I wasn't

trying to impress you. If you're discouraged

with me, you don't think I'm all that impressive,

I didn't come to impress you. I didn't come to

bring you my spin on the message given to me.

I only came to give you the testimony of God.

Simple and straightforward. Now, good time to

ask the acorns. Acorns, are you out there? What

is the gospel? Who remembers? Okay, that works.

The good news of Jesus Christ. Say it again.

What is the gospel? Well done, well done. Okay,

so what is the gospel? What is the testimony

of God? What is Paul a witness to? Look at verse

two. He says, I determined to know nothing except

this one thing, which is what? Jesus Christ and

him crucified. In spite of the temptation that

he must have felt, because he's a human being,

right? He's fallible. to roll into town and to

try to compete with the skilled philosophers

of the day, Paul was not going to engage in their

bag of tricks. He wasn't going to use flattery.

He wasn't going to emotionally manipulate people.

He wasn't going to try to produce applause or

create a big following. In fact, Paul didn't

mind coming across as unimpressive. He didn't

mind coming across as weak. He knew exactly what

the Corinthians wanted to hear, but he was not

going to give it to them. Now that is not seeker

sensitive, is it? That goes against everything

the rule book says about doing church. I know

what you want to hear. I'm not giving it to you.

Because what you want will not transform you.

It will not change your heart. So I won't give

it to you. I'm not going to stoop that low. So

he made up his mind before he arrived about how

he would communicate. The word there in verse

2, he determined his method. That's krino in

the Greek. And it has a wide range of meaning,

but it's often rendered as to judge or to pronounce

an opinion. So Paul judged beforehand, before

he arrived, that he would know nothing in their

midst except Jesus and the cross. And here's

the key. That simple message didn't produce results

because the results aren't up to us. Did you

know that? The results of preaching are not up

to the guy in the pulpit or to you when you're

sharing your faith. The result is not up to you.

That's too heavy of a burden for us, right? That's

the work of God alone. Okay, speaking of the

cross, acorns, acorns. What did Jesus show us

on the cross? His love for us. Well done. Excellent.

Good. Now, understand the language here in verse

2. Don't take it too literally. Paul's not saying

that, okay, well, the cross was the only thing

I ever mentioned to anyone during 18 months with

you. Okay, that would be silly. Paul believed

that there were many things that needed to be

addressed in the church. In fact, this letter.

is proof of that, right? He's going to go on

to talk about all kinds of things. What he's

doing here is speaking comprehensively, meaning

in everything he taught, and there's all these

topics in this letter, in everything, he would

always come back to gospel basics. That's an

important principle. Coming back to the idea

of sin, coming back to our need for forgiveness.

coming back to the mercy of God and the love

of God, coming back to the atonement for sin

that was purchased on the cross, and so on. So

for Paul to preach Christ crucified is to constantly

speak of his identity, right, as God incarnate,

and to speak of the work that he did on our behalf,

the person and work of Christ. By the way, that's

still the model and the goal of preaching and

teaching in the church today, right? Even if

we go out and we explore a variety of themes

in scripture, or if we focus on applying certain

biblical principles to modern day situations,

we must never lose sight of Christ crucified.

Never lose sight of the basics and the essentials

of the gospel. And listen, I realize, and I've

heard this before, people are like, I kind of

feel tired of hearing the same thing all the

time. You know, it's always about sin and Jesus

and the cross and as if that message could ever

become tiresome. But that is the model that we

see in preaching in the New Testament. And we

should acknowledge that if Christianity ever

loses that focus, the centrality of the cross,

then we put ourselves in serious danger. Serious

danger. And by the way, history tells that story.

You can go out there and pick from any number

of... in the world today who still call themselves

Christian, air quotes, Christian, everything

from United Methodist Church to the Mennonites

to Episcopalian to AME churches, and you will

find an interesting history. You will find a

time when people in those churches believed the

gospel, that it was central to what they believed,

right? Christ crucified, Christ raised from the

dead. But in the next generation, What happened

after that is those gospel essentials began to

be mixed with things like social work and cultural

issues and political positions. And the theology

of Christ crucified began to take a little bit

of a backseat to activism. To activism. Based

on things that Paul would call human wisdom.

And then in the next generation, guess what happens

after that? Folks begin to equate Christianity

and life in the church. only with those cultural

and social issues and yeah there might be a smattering

here or there that sort of remember their original

creed or confession but for the most part people

in those churches in the third or fourth generation

they don't know what the theology is they don't

even care most of them don't believe it And that

can happen, guys. When you lose sight of the

essentials and you start focusing on peripheral

issues, it's only a matter of time before those

peripheral issues become the central issues.

And what should be essential gets lost in the

pages of history. So we have to be careful with

this. So Paul says here, look, all I did was

I zeroed in on Jesus and the cross and I stayed

there. I stayed there. And if Paul could walk

in the door and we could ask him a question,

I think he'd say this as well. He said, look,

I did talk about other things, but when other

issues came up or questions came up about how

do I apply Christian principles, I was happy

to address all of those things. But eventually,

I always came back to the gospel, back to the

cross. That is our home base. That's where we

have to sit and stay. Does that make sense? And

look, there's a reason for this. It's obvious.

Without the cross, without a savior being sent

to us, without his atoning death, without the

father's gracious drawing, not one of us would

be here this morning. None of us would be here.

We'd all be sons and daughters of disobedience

like everybody else. We would still be in our

sins. We would be living and dying under the

wrath of God Almighty. So when people say, I

don't understand why we keep saying the same

thing. Guys, it's because without that, there

is no Christianity and there is no church. Acorns,

one last question. Speaking of the cross, why

did Jesus have to die? Do you remember? So our

sins can be forgiven. Well done. So we love the

cross, don't we? I said it a couple Sundays ago.

I'll say it again. We love to read about the

cross. We like to talk about the cross. We love

to teach about the cross. We love to pray in

fellowship in light of the cross. And we even

love to sing hymns about the cross because that's

where God's wrath was satisfied for us, right?

That's where peace was established between us

and our creator. That's where the righteousness

of Christ was imputed, given, reckoned to our

spiritual accounts. So the cross is our delight

and our joy and our hope. It is everything to

us. And it grieves us when we look around our

world and we see all these people. Remember Paul

said they're perishing. Sometimes family and

friends, they're perishing apart from the cross

every single day. And that's got to be our urgency.

It's the same urgency that Paul had when he came

to Corinth to share the testimony of God, to

speak of Christ crucified with everybody that

God puts in our path. Amen? So let's take a look

at verses 3 and 4 now. Paul says, hey, Corinthians,

I was with you in weakness and in fear and much

trembling, and my message and my preaching were

not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration

of the Spirit and of power. And more simply,

in demonstration of the Spirit's power. Now,

we talked about Paul's state of mind when he

first came to Corinth back in our introductory

sermon in this series. The backdrop of his entry

into Corinth comes from Acts chapter 18. And

Acts 18 · chapter mention

do you remember what happened before he came

to Corinth? Well, let's see, he was in Philippi

and he got run out of town there, his life under

threat. And then he went to Thessalonica and

the same thing happened there. And then he went

down to Berea, but some people from Thessalonia,

they tracked him down in Berea and they chased

him out of that city. So his life has been threatened.

Everywhere he's gone, he decides to leave Macedonia

completely, travel south into Achaia. He goes

to Athens. We covered that a couple weeks ago.

He has no positive response there. And then he

hustles off to Corinth. Now, with that backdrop,

put yourself in Paul's sandals for a moment.

See if you can feel what he would have been feeling.

His life is under threat. He is having to look

over his shoulder. look around every corner expecting

to be jumped, expecting to be attacked. And now

he comes to the city of Corinth. And this was

the big city in that day. And he's alone. He

is alone. That's something that often gets overlooked.

He's alone at that time. And there's no doubt

he's feeling very discouraged. You'd be like

you or I having a really hard time in ministry.

We've been evangelizing. We're finding no success.

And we suddenly have to go to Chicago or New

York City. right? The big city. And we look around

and we can feel the pulse of the wickedness of

the city. And it's just overwhelming to think

I've got to speak up in the midst of this environment.

So Paul says in verse three, look, friends, you

remember what I was like when I first came to

your city. He says, I came in weakness and in

fear and with much trembling. So there's no swagger

in Paul. There's no overconfidence in him as

he begins to share the gospel there. He intentionally

chooses to preach in a way that is opposite of

all the other traveling sophists, not in persuasive

words of wisdom. Now, this is an important distinction.

That doesn't mean that he lacked confidence in

the message. Paul himself was feeling shaky.

He was feeling fearful. But he still knew that

the content of the message would be effectual.

How do you know that? Remember we talked about

this weeks ago. The Lord appeared to him in a

dream. The Lord appeared to Paul in a dream and

said, do not be afraid any longer. Do not be

afraid. Go on speaking. Do not be silent, for

I am with you. How reassuring would that have

been? I am with you, and no man will attack you

in order to harm you. Look, for I have many people

in this city. I have marked out many to be saved.

And so the Lord brought him comfort in this moment

of need. And by the way, we should note as well,

not only did he get a vision from the Lord, this

dream, but then he also was given friends, Christian

friends, Aquila and Priscilla, right? That he

lived with and made tents with. And that's important.

Then Silas and Timothy come as well. And all

this is such an important principle. Listen,

you ready? Even the greatest of Christian servants

can't do it alone. We need fellow believers.

We need backup, right, to encourage us. When

things get hard, we need fellow believers who

will exhort us to keep going. And God provided

for that, first in the dream, but then through

these friends that came and strengthened him.

In his commentary on 1 Corinthians, Calvin writes

this, and I think it's so insightful because

it speaks to the human aspect of Paul's ministry.

We sometimes think of him as some kind of superhero,

but he's a man. And so Calvin says, the servants

of the Lord are not so dull as to not see threatening

dangers. Okay? We don't live in a bubble thinking

everything's going to be just fine. No, we do

see the dangers out there. Nor so insensitive

as not to be affected by them. Again, we're human

beings. It's going to affect us. And in fact,

they must be seriously apprehensive for two main

reasons. First, that humbled in their own eyes.

they might learn to lean and rest completely

on God alone. So even in the threats, even in

the dangers, God has a purpose, doesn't he? To

cause his servants to lean into him. Next one.

And second, that they might be trained in true

self -denial, denying self. Paul, therefore,

was not without a sense of anxiety, but he controlled

it, such that he continued to be undaunted in

the midst of crises. So Calvin notes, Paul's

weakness, you ready, is actually good news. It's

actually good news. It causes him to have to

trust in God alone. And to trust in the promises

he got in that dream. Hey, I'm with you. I have

many in the city. Keep going. And we know that

God delights in working through men and women

who are in weakness, who trust him, who have

to trust him. But the most important thing Paul

has going for him is shown here in verse 4. In

spite of his fears, he knows that the Spirit

of God is in him and with him. And he knows,

if I'm just faithful to the message as a herald,

that the Spirit is going to take my preaching

and draw the hearts of those that God has marked

out for salvation. Friends, that is the beauty

of trusting in God's sovereignty. It guarantees

success in evangelism. Did you know that? God's

sovereignty guarantees success in evangelism

because if God has chosen that person and if

he's actively drawing them, he can use your very

feeble words, even your really poor presentation

of the gospel, he can use that as a tool to save

somebody that he's marked out. It doesn't depend

on us. We just have to be faithful to get out

there and talk about it, right? Beautiful. So

this is Paul's superpower, if we could use that

term. that the Holy Spirit is in him and is with

him and is active in his preaching and teaching

ministry. And this is what he desires more than

anything else. It's right there in the verse,

that his words will come with a demonstration

of the Spirit's power. Remember our call to worship

passage from earlier, what Paul wrote to the

Thessalonian church. Our gospel came to you Thessalonians,

not only in word. Not only in word, because words

won't get us to where we need to get to, right?

Not only in word, but also in power and the Holy

Spirit and with full conviction. That is what

Paul is trusting in. Listen, apart from the Spirit's

work, nothing eternal happens. I can talk to

somebody at Starbucks about all kinds of topics.

Look, I can even talk about the gospel. I can

talk about the cross. If the Spirit isn't active

in drawing that person, nothing eternal is going

on. It might be a good discussion. It might be

the first step in a longer discussion, but nothing

eternal is happening if the Spirit of God isn't

operating to draw that person to salvation. But

when the Spirit does move, using our witness,

using the word, the message of the cross, that

is when true power is unleashed. That is when

it's unleashed and when miraculous things begin

to happen. And listen, I don't know if you've

ever thought about this before, but maybe we

should. Our faith is built on the supernatural

and the miraculous. Did you know that? I know

in our sort of tribe of Christianity, that makes

us a little uncomfortable because we're so intellectual

at times about our faith. But our faith is built

on the supernatural and the miraculous. The scriptures

are clear about this. Every time a sinner hears

the gospel and repents and puts his faith or

her faith in Christ, it is a miracle. Do we believe

that? Or are we in the person that we just talk

people into the kingdom with our rhetoric and

with our logic? No, it's a miracle that that

happens. It's a supernatural move of the Holy

Spirit that honestly we can't explain. All we

can do is point to the Word and say, well, this

is what the Word says about it. But I don't have

a tangible understanding of how the Spirit brought

me to salvation. I just know He did. It's wild,

isn't it? If you take the supernatural power

of God out of life in the church, what do you

actually have left? Remove the supernatural,

remove the spirit. What do you have left? A gathering

of men and women going through the motions of

religion and trying to be good people in the

eyes of the world. Maybe you enjoy hanging out

together, but all that is is rearranging the

deck chairs on the Titanic, right? Without the

supernatural. So for us, yes, we want to stay

balanced. We don't want to fall into emotionalism.

We don't want to gin up our experiences. But

listen, we should not be afraid to glorify the

work of the Spirit among us. We should look forward

to that. We should all long to be filled with

the Spirit and led by the Spirit and sanctified

by the Spirit and worship and pray in the Spirit

and be taught by the Spirit and to bear fruit

by the Spirit, to preach, teach, and listen in

the power of the Spirit. Not be afraid of that.

Because if Paul needed it to empower his ministry,

why would we be any different? I can see the

wheels turning in your guys' faces. It's important.

Okay, last verse, verse five. And this builds

off verse four, caps it off, so to speak. In

demonstration of the Spirit's power, verse five,

so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom

of men, but on the power of God. So look, when

we preach the gospel or we share our faith, If

we are trusting in our own methodologies and

gimmicks, or if we're relying upon our own personality

and our logic to win souls, then we are depending

on the flesh. And again, the wisdom of the flesh

cannot change a human art. We have to reject

that. Spurgeon once said this. He said, the power

that in the gospel does not lie in the eloquence

of the preacher. Otherwise, men would be the

converters of soul. May it never be. Right? If

the power of the gospel lies in the eloquence

of the preacher, men would be converters of souls.

We might preach, he says, until our tongues rotted,

until we would exhaust our lungs and die, but

never a soul would be converted. There are churches

all over this world that don't believe that,

by the way. They believe the power is in the

communication. The power is in talking people

into faith. But that's not what scripture tells

us. If any man's faith rests solely upon the

persuasive words of men, it is destined to fail

at some point. It's destined to fail. It's just

a matter of time. And here's why. If an evangelist

like Paul can talk somebody into making a decision

for Christ through his style, through his lofty

speech, what happens when somebody rolls into

town who's a better preacher than Paul and has

a better argument than Paul? Well, I'm abandoning

what Paul says now. I'm going to get talked into

this new thing over here, the false gospel, right?

There's always a better preacher. There's always

a better communicator. So if it rests on what

the man does, it's destined to fail because somebody

better is coming along. Leon Morris, who's a

New Testament scholar. says this, a faith that

depends on clever reasoning may be demolished

by a more clever argument, but the faith which

is produced by the power of God can never be

overthrown. Do you see the difference? Do you

see it? It's a big difference. So Paul says,

look, I don't want your faith to rest on my words.

There's no power there. Let it rest in the power

of the Spirit. Not only can the Spirit transform

you, He can keep you. And that's important, right?

So unlike many preachers and evangelists of today,

Paul refused to play the Holy Spirit in the lives

of his audience because it would empty the cross

of its power. He wants people to run to Christ,

not to him. Okay, great passage, right? Lots

in there for us. Let's talk about some application

here. What does this specifically tell us about

our preaching and our teaching today? What does

it tell you about how you should approach lost

people in your lives, whether that's at work

or at school or whatever? How do you do that?

Well, let's start with an important observation.

Because we are fallible human beings, we are

always under the temptation to play around with

the message that we're given. We're easily distracted,

easily fooled, and so we start manipulating the

message. And by the way, this temptation hits

church leaders. and it hits those of you doing

personal evangelism. We tend to think if I just

package the message in this way or that way,

if I make it a little bit less offensive and

dress it up to make it a little more attractive

or maybe strategize on how I can get my presentation

just right, then people will respond. We've all

been through that. It's okay to nod and go, yeah,

I've thought that before. I did. I get it. But

that is not what scripture tells us. Jesus himself

was really clear about this, right? In John chapter

six, he said, no one can come to me unless the

message is packaged just right. Red flag, right?

The uneasy laugh there was great. No, he said,

no one can come to me unless the father who sent

me draws him, right? So that's what we rely upon

in preaching, teaching, evangelism, the drawing

and regenerating power of God. So how does this

impact church? We'll get practical. First of

all, it impacts everybody who stands in this

pulpit at Oak Hill to make sure that we have

the right mindset about our preaching. And boy,

whether it's Adam or Jeff Steele or myself or

anybody, I can tell you that we take this really

seriously. And we know the power is not in our

words. We're not that good. We know that God

has to move for any change to happen, whether

that's bringing somebody to salvation or growing

in sanctification and maturity. The power is

not in what I say up here. The power is with

the spirit moving. So it impacts those of us

who preach and teach, but also impacts those

of you listening. How do you listen to a sermon?

Do you listen from this perspective? We know

from scripture that the natural man wants only

to have his ears tickled. He wants. sermons that

he enjoys, sermons that make him feel good. So

what he'll do is he'll go from place to place

and look for some guy who's gonna preach what

he wants to hear and the way he wants to hear

it. Or maybe he'll gather other people who are

like -minded and they'll say, let's find a preacher

who will. preach what we want to hear, and preach

it in the way we want it. And there's always

some willing pastor dude out there who says,

ooh, I see a need, and I see a possibility of

success, and he will go to those people, and

he will change the message, and he will adapt

it in a way that meets the needs of the audience.

And that ministry ends up being based on what?

The preacher's style? The preacher's philosophy?

possibly on his charisma, his personality, maybe

his good looks, his communication skills, his

ability to project confidence and success. And

you know what? That church may grow really, really

big. Because again, that stuff will draw a crowd.

On the outside, it's going to look big and successful,

but on the inside where it matters, it is a church

built on the foolishness of human wisdom and

human cleverness. And those churches are... more

common than you think. We literally have a test

case for this. Raise your hand if you've heard

of Willow Creek Church. Some of you have. The

younger generation, maybe not yet. Willow Creek

Church is still around, located in the suburbs

of Chicago. If you've never heard of it, you

should look it up. It's an interesting story.

Back in 1985, 1985, Willow Creek became the groundbreaking

model of what we call the seeker -sensitive movement,

and it swept through megachurches all over the

country. And I will spare you all the ugly details,

but this church was literally built on every

single thing that Paul warns us about in this

passage. All of it. Shapeshifting every message,

shapeshifting every aspect of ministry based

on what? The wants and desires of the audience.

Based on the wants and desires of unbelievers.

I kid you not. In fact, their whole ministry

for, I don't know, 40 years was built on doing

surveys among people who were unbelievers. And

the question was asked, why don't you go to church?

And they took the survey results and they said,

well, here's the top 10 reasons people don't

go to church. Well, and they said, well, let's

adapt the church message to those things. That

should shock you. And it was wildly successful

because it was appealing to the flesh in every

way. That's what people wanted. And to make matters

worse, every single pastor in pastoring a church

of 100 people and struggling looked at that and

said, I guess I need to do that too. And this

was a disastrous trend in the so -called seeker

-sensitive evangelical church for some 40 years.

Now here's how the story ends. The leadership

of this movement has now admitted after 40 years

that the whole model was flawed from the beginning.

They've come out and they've had to admit it.

Just recently, the former senior pastor, Bill

Hybels, came out and said the whole thing was

flawed. It was built on human innovation, not

on the word of God, not on the cross. And because

it wasn't built on the power of God, you know

what? So many people who went into this building

and thought they were saved later on fell away

from the faith. They actually never had faith,

but they completely walked away for obvious reasons.

It wasn't built on the power of God. Quite a

few members of the senior leadership of this

church have deconstructed, walked away from Christianity.

Some of them were literally prosecuted for misconduct.

It's an absolute mess. It's a disgrace. But it's

completely predictable based on the passage we're

reading this morning. Predictable. Because the

essential gospel message, the testimony of God,

was completely missing from that place. It was

a hollowed out church with no life in the spirit.

But boy, did it look good on the outside. Man,

25 ,000 people a weekend at this church. Satan

rejoices. when we do this, when we leave the

Holy Spirit and the power of God out of the equation.

He would love for us to believe that it's our

models and our strategies that can transform

lives. When we do stuff like this, we're helping

Satan devour people. So here's the thing, friends.

We have to think about these things. Whether

you're at Oak Hill or someday you move out of

the area, you're looking for another church,

this matters. The question of our motives, why

do we do what we do, is unavoidable in this issue,

both in church life and in the way we do evangelism.

We have to ask ourselves the hard questions.

What are we really after? What's the goal? And

to be honest with ourselves, what is the goal?

Are we trying to get worldly success or are we

seeking to please God according to his word?

Do we truly care about the souls of people, or

are we just manipulating things so that we can

boast about numbers? Are we willing to risk offending

with the truth in order to preach the truth of

the gospel, or are we just people -pleasing?

Ultimately, are we seeking our glory or God's

glory, His praise, or ours? We have to ask those

questions. Now, one final caveat, and I promise

I'll be done. Because if we're not careful, we

can get out of balance with this. The principles

are true, but let's look at the balance. It is

true that we don't want to put our trust in human

wisdom, but at the same time, we shouldn't ignore

the role that wisdom can play in effective ministry.

And this is a touchy thing, right? So what does

it mean to employ wisdom and to think strategically

while at the same time embracing the offensiveness

of the gospel and trusting only in the power

of the Spirit to transform lives? We have to

be able to answer that question. Paul didn't

preach to entertain people or to get applause,

but there's no question that he preached to persuade

people, right? So he had a strategy to persuade.

He says that in 2 Corinthians 5 .11. He says,

we seek to persuade men. So here's what I'm saying

about this. The passage for this morning does

not give us a rationale to just preach boring

sermons, right? It doesn't give us a reason to

be lazy in our preparation. or to not think about

how we can approach somebody who needs to hear

the gospel. We should always strive to give God

our best and to work hard at these things and

to think carefully about how to approach the

work that God has given to us. So I have to think

every week about how do I lay out a sermon in

a way that is not going to mess with the content,

but is going to be delivered in a way that draws

your attention to the cross. And if you're evangelizing,

you need to think and pray about how can I best

approach that person at work that now seems open

to the gospel. It's not bad to strategize is

what I'm saying. But we don't mess with the message,

right? The content remains fixed and the strategy

is personalized. Above all else, always, always,

always, we remember what the determining factor

of our effectiveness is. Right? It's not going

to be our method. It's not going to be our approach.

It is a demonstration of the power of the Spirit,

period. Period. We faithfully preach, we teach,

we witness, and we trust Him completely for the

results. We trust that He is going to use us

and move according to His sovereign will so that

anybody who ever comes to saving faith through

our ministry or through our evangelism, that

his or her faith rests on one thing and one thing

only, on the power of God and not on us. Amen?

If you have any questions about this or you're

confused, if I've confused you this morning or

you want to bring up a scenario to me, that practical

scenario, please find me after the service. I'd

love to talk some more. Let's bow our heads.

Father, thank you for the challenge of this text.

I praise you for Paul and for his discipline

in the way that he approached this difficult

issue which is so tempting for fallible men and

women because we want applause and we want to

please people and we want to see results in the

things that we do. And it's so tempting, Lord,

to mess with what you've given us. Thank you

for Paul's discipline. Thank you for the promises

that you gave him. And Lord, I ask now for us

here at Oak Hill, as you work in and among us

in this local body, that you would give us that

same discipline to understand what it is that

brings about true effectiveness in the ministry,

true, true effectiveness in our evangelism. that

we would constantly be looking to your spirit,

that we would not trust in ourselves or our methods,

but we would give that to you and say, Lord,

your will be done. And we praise you that you're

sovereign in salvation, that we can just strive

to be faithful and know that you will work. Lord,

don't let these things slip from our minds and

hearts as it was already slipping from the Corinthians

in the first century. Keep us focused on the

essentials. Christ crucified. And Lord, we pray

that you'll keep glorifying yourself through

us as we strive to be faithful. Thank you for

our time this morning. We praise you in the name

of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.