The Wisdom of Men and the Power of God

Basing ministry on the true foundation of faith

"In coming to you brothers and sisters, I come proclaiming to you the testimony of God, not according to excellence of word or of wisdom. For I decided not to know anything among you but Jesus Christ and this one crucified. I come to you in weakness and in much fear and trembling. My word and proclamation are not in persuasive words of human wisdom but by the demonstration of the Spirit and power, so that your faith might not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God!" (1 Cor. 2:1-5)

Under the authority of the Word
W.A. Criswell, the pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, was asked one time by a man who had a business across the street: "Dr. Criswell, I thought you were the pastor of a Baptist church. How come all your people carry prayer books to church on Sunday?" Criswell smiled and said, "Sir, we are Baptists and those are Bibles, not prayer books."

Baptists the world over have a reputation of urging every man and woman to read the Bible for themselves, and I want to preserve that great tradition. If I could choose a symbolic sound that Bethlehem Baptist Church would come to be known for, you know what it would be? The swish of the pages of 500 Bibles turning simultaneously to the morning and evening texts.

The reason is this: the source of my authority in this pulpit is not my wisdom, nor is it a private revelation granted to me beyond the revelation of Scripture. My words have authority only insofar as they are the repetition, unfolding, and proper application of the words of Scripture. I have authority only when I stand under authority. And our corporate symbol of that truth is the sound of your Bibles opening to the text. My deep conviction about preaching is that a pastor must show people that what he is saying was already said or im-plied in the Bible. If that cannot be shown, it has no special authority. My heart aches for the pastor who increases his own burden by trying to come up with ideas to preach to his people. As for me, I have nothing of abiding worth to say to you. But God does, and of that word I hope and pray that I never tire of speaking. The life of the church depends on it. Dr. Criswell gives an admonition to pastors which I think is right on the money, and I take it as a great challenge. He says: "When a man goes to church he often hears a preacher in the pulpit rehash everything that he has read in the editorials, the newspapers, and the magazines. On the TV commentaries he hears that same stuff over again, yawns, and goes out and plays golf on Sunday. When a man comes to church, actually what he is saying to you is this, 'Preacher, I know what the TV commentator has to say; I hear him every day. I know what the editorial writer has to say; I read it every day. I know what the magazines have to say; I read them every week. Preacher, what I want to know is, does God have anything to say? If God has anything to say, tell us what it is.'" 

The aim of Paul's ministry: faith in the power of God
So let's look at 1 Corinthians 2:1-5. Paul had spent about 18 months in Corinth on his first visit there. Now he writes his first letter to warn the believers against basing their faith on the wisdom of men instead of on God's power. One of the ways he does this is to remind them of what his aim was in first coming to them and how he came. First we'll talk about the aim of Paul's (and our) ministry. Verse 5: Paul's aim—his purpose—was that "your faith might not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God." Paul stated it again and again: "I was given the grace of apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations" (Rom. 1:5). The aim of Paul's life is the aim of mine. And it should be the aim of every pastor, every seminary intern, every Sunday School teacher, and every believer who speaks to another person: to beget and build faith.

But it was possible in Paul's day and I believe it is rampant in our day—in churches and TV and radio—to try to build faith by calling attention to the wrong things. This has a devastating effect on the mission of Christ and the church, as I think we can see by looking more closely at verse 5. Why is it so crucial that our faith not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God? Does it really matter what our faith is based on as long as Christ is the object of our faith? For Paul it made a great difference what a preacher offers as the basis of faith. Why?

The reason can be found in chapter 1: if you try to base saving faith on the "wisdom of men," it ceases to be saving faith, because the content of that faith is regarded as foolishness by the world's wisdom. The genuineness of faith, and with it eternal life, is at stake in the basis we offer for faith. It is possible to offer a basis for faith which ruins faith. There is a kind of foundation which will destroy the superstructure of faith. That's why it is so crucial for our faith not to rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God—because if it rests in the wisdom of men it is a mirage, a bogus faith.

The wisdom of men
What is it about the wisdom of men which makes it destructive to faith? In verses 1 and 2 there is a contrast between trying to deliver a testimony of God with superior words of wisdom on the one hand, and preaching Jesus Christ as crucified on the other. Would it not be right, then, to say that for Paul, the "wisdom of men" is, at least, a use of the human mind which comes up with ideas contrary to the meaning of Christ's death? To put it another way, if we are following the dictates of merely human wisdom, the claim that the King and Creator of the world was executed like a criminal because we are such horrible sinners will simply be regarded as intolerable foolishness.

First Corinthians 1:18 offers a confirmation of this. What is it about the wisdom of men that makes it so destructive when we try to make it a basis for faith? Verse 18 says: "The word of the Cross is folly (or foolishness) to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the cleverness of the clever I will thwart. Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?" The way God made foolish the "wisdom of the world" (which is the same as the "wisdom of men" in 1 Corinthians 2:5) is by planning a way of salvation which would be offensive to the wisdom of the world: namely, salvation through the ignominious execution of a lowly Jewish carpenter's son turned preacher, who happened to be the Son of God. The word of the Cross is foolishness to the wisdom of this world. That's why the wisdom of men is destructive to faith and why Paul was, and we should be, very eager that no one turn to the wisdom of men as the basis of faith but that all turn to the power of God.

So the wisdom of men is destructive to faith because it regards the word of the Cross as foolishness. But why does it? What is there about human wisdom which causes it to regard Christ crucified as folly? Paul gives us the answer, I think, in chapter 1, verses 26 and following: "Consider your call brothers: not many of you were wise according to the flesh (i.e., worldly standards), not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth; but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise." Now drop down to his purpose in verse 29: "so that no human being might boast in the presence of God." God has set himself against the wisdom of the world so that no one might boast before God. The clear implication is that at the root and core of what Paul calls the "wisdom of men" is pride. From all these verses, then, I suggest this definition of the "wisdom of the world": it is the use of the human mind to achieve and maintain a ground for boasting before God and man. Now it begins to become really clear why merely human wisdom regards the Cross of Christ as foolishness. The death of Christ on the cross is such a radical indictment of the hideousness of our sinfulness that human wisdom has to mount all its biggest guns to destroy the Cross, lest it lose its ground for boasting.

There are two possible responses to the death of Christ for our sin: we can regard it as foolish and so maintain our self-sufficiency and pride, or we can regard it as wisdom and so die with Christ. There is only one way that leads to life. Here's how Paul expresses it in Galatians 6:14: "Far be it from me to boast except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." If we put our trust in the crucified Christ for salvation, we die to the world, which means we give up every ground for boasting that the world, including our own minds, can offer. But since the "wisdom of men" is devoted 100 percent to maintaining its ground for boasting, it will always reject Christ crucified and attempt to defuse his power by calling him foolish.

So, here is what we've seen so far: First, the goal of Paul's ministry and mine and, I hope, yours is to win and to strengthen faith. But, secondly, it is possible to try to win faith by calling attention to the wrong things and giving a faulty basis, in this case the wisdom of men rather than the power of God. It's destructive to faith if we try to base it on merely human wisdom. The reason that this is so, thirdly, is that the wisdom of the world regards the word of the Cross as foolishness and so leads men away from the Cross. Fourthly, the reason the wisdom of men regards the Cross as folly is that human wisdom is the use of the mind to achieve and maintain pride, but faith in the crucified Christ is death to pride and the giving up of all grounds for boasting, except one: Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord!

By John Piper

[To be continued on next issue. On July 13, 1980, John Piper preached the following installation sermon at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis.]