1.
Please
pray with me. May the words of my mouth
and meditation of our hearts be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock, and
our Redeemer. Amen. The message from God’s Word this 5th
Sunday after Epiphany is taken from 1 Cor. 2:1-12, it’s entitled, “Knowing Nothing, But Christ Crucified,” dear
brothers and sisters in Christ.
2.
The event today is about someone
important and something significant. Super Bowl 51 (LI) will be played at
Reliant Stadium in Houston, Texas. We’ve already heard plenty about the Atlanta
Falcons and the New England Patriots. There have been plenty of
words. There has been an abundance of “lofty speech” and “wisdom” from players
and coaches, from fans and commentators, in print and on TV and on countless
sports talk shows. But, in a week of media blitz, with thousands of reporters
grabbing and grasping for any kind of story, most of it has really been saying
a lot about nothing. And the game will settle it all. Someone will do something
spectacular. Or something will happen to someone that’s unexpected and either
awesome or awful.
3.
All that is the complete opposite
of how Paul addresses the Church at Corinth in 1 Corinthians 2. Paul says he didn’t
come to them with lofty speech and wisdom. He didn’t, in fact, have a
lot to say—at least not about a lot of different things. Certainly, he didn’t
say a lot about nothing. So here’s what is
before us in today’s text, the Apostle Paul tells us today that, “Nothing”
Means Everything, because we know nothing, but Christ crucified for the
forgiveness of our sins.
4.
What do we want to see and
hear? What do we need to see and hear? What do the redeemed people of
God need to hear? What does the fallen world need to hear? This is what Paul
addresses when he says to the Corinthians in our text from 1 Cor. 2:2: “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.”
5.
The Gospel doesn’t rest on and isn’t revealed by the wisdom of men,
but in the power of God. For Paul didn’t
come proclaiming with lofty speech or wisdom.
1 Cor. 2:1 says, “I, when I came
to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with
lofty speech or wisdom.” In fact,
Paul says in 1 Cor. 2:9, “eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and . . . have not entered the heart of man, all
that God has prepared for those who love Him” (v 9, NASB). But, Epiphany
light has revealed the promised Savior to a blinded world still trapped in the
darkness since our fall into sin. So
many people in the world today are impressed by human wisdom and maybe even discount the things of God
when they don’t seem impressive, such as being persuaded by claims of science
that are contrary to Scripture or, most textually, despising preaching and the
Sacraments as seemingly weak and ordinary.
6.
Paul says in 1 Cor. 2:6 & 12
that it’s, “not a wisdom of this age” through which the Gospel is
learned (v 6), but it’s only when God works his revelation, for “we have
received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God,
that we might understand the things freely given us by God” (v 12). Indeed, Paul’s speech and message “were not
in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of
power” “the power of God” (1 Cor. 2:4 & 5).
7.
Because the Holy Spirit “calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies
the whole Christian Church” (Small Catechism), “no one comprehends
the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God,” as 1 Cor. 2:11 says in our text
today. “None of the rulers of this age understood” God’s “secret and hidden wisdom”
(vv 8, 7), and, in ignorance, they crucified the Lord of glory. They did
not—they could not—understand that God’s wisdom was greater and that it had
been in place “before the ages” (1 Cor. 2:7-8). They didn’t understand—and,
without the Spirit’s work, neither do we—what God prepared and what the Spirit
made known.
8.
Truly, no one can grasp
God’s eternal plan, from first promise to final fulfillment and future glory. No
one can grasp how God thinks and how he acts—that he acts not in judgment
and condemnation, but in mercy and grace, in kindness and love. No one
can discover the Good News of salvation. We try to figure God out, but we fail. There are numerous ways that we try to rely
on our own understanding, such
as doubting God when life is difficult or ignoring God’s clear word when we
have “better ideas” about moral decisions or the direction of our own future. Our struggles can and should turn
us from our attempts at spiritual knowledge and insight to looking at the Word.
But we continue to look up or look inside—both are theologies of glory—rather
than to look down at the written and revealed Scriptures.
9.
We really know nothing! In the 1840s, strong anti-immigrant and
anti-Catholic sentiment arose among certain native-born Protestant Americans
who saw foreigners and Catholics as a threat to their economic and political
security. In 1849, the secret Order of the Star Spangled Banner was
formed in New York City. Soon after, similar lodges formed in many other
American cities. Members, when asked about their exclusionary, nativist organization,
were supposed to say they knew nothing, hence the name the “Know-Nothing Party.” The movement grew, so that in the 1850s the
group shed its clandestine nature and took the name American Party.
Their stands included restrictions on immigration, the exclusion of the
foreign-born from voting or holding public office, and a 21year residency
requirement for US citizenship. When Congress assembled on December 3, 1855,
forty-three representatives were avowed members of the Know-Nothing Party.
A later manifestation in California in the 1880s called for the exclusion of
Chinese and other Asians from industrial employment.
10.
Paul’s words to the Corinthians are
even stronger than the claims of this long-forgotten American political
movement. He states what was always true for him—and what is always true for
the Church and her pastors: “I decided to
know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor 2:2) But this text reveals the heart of Paul’s missionary efforts. More than
that, it reveals the living heart of the Church, of the Church’s life and
identity, and of the Church’s mission and preaching: “For I decided to know nothing
among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (v 2). This is the truth. This
is the message. This is the task. This wasn’t just for Paul to get right as he
wrote to the Corinthian Christians. This is for the Church of all times and all
places.
11.
This isn’t simply repeating the
Reformation mantra “solus Christus” (Christ alone) throughout this 500th
anniversary year of the Reformation. And this isn’t just talking about Jesus a
great deal—which, we pray, most preachers and churches do without fail. Well, yes, you must talk about Jesus Sunday
after Sunday, but Paul doesn’t tell us—tell you—to do this just any old way.
Instead he says, “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ
and him crucified.” For the
cross must be at the center of our preaching, because this is how Jesus Christ
is made known. And nothing else matters . . .or else our sin still matters. And
guilt still matters. And shame still matters. And separation from the holy God
still matters. And eternal damnation still matters. But because of Jesus’
death, as both our substitute and our sacrifice, now forgiveness matters.
Redemption matters. Freedom matters. Restoration matters.
12.
This is why we can and should sing
these words: “When I behold Jesus Christ, True God who died for me, I wonder much at
His love As He hung on the tree. What kind of love is this? What kind of love
is this? You showed Your love, Jesus, there To me on Calvary.” (LSB 542:1)
13.
The commercials before and during
and after today’s Super Bowl want us to notice and know a lot of things. Advertisers
are betting millions on it! But the contrast today is this: the cross
alone—just the one message of Christ crucified—is the never-ending truth that
the Church proclaims, that the Christian affirms, and that the Holy Spirit uses
to redeem and rescue and restore sinners. With the Apostle Paul we say
today: “I decided to know nothing among
you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment