The wisdom the world does not possess and cannot acquire is the “word of the Cross”. The “word of the Cross”, is most bluntly, moronic to the world. Foolishness as it is commonly translated. It is not that the world misunderstands what we have to say about the Cross because it misinterprets the facts. Rather like the Gorilla trying to comprehend the stock market, the world has no shot at figuring out the Cross. Paul calls it the power of God but only to the ones “continually being saved.” For the others, those in a constant state of destruction, it is idiocy.
There are two ways the word of the Cross is power of God for those continually saved. First, it makes stupid every argument held against it. Verse 20 uses a term that describes a transformation; the change from being intelligent to being ridiculously foolish or more literally, moronic. Suppose we were to mix common baking soda and vinegar. The resulting chemical reaction would produce carbon dioxide gas and water. When you place the word of the Cross on the wisdom of the world, and combine the two with faith, the wisdom of the world becomes stupid. It no longer makes sense. I once thought when I was a child that I could as I grew stronger fly on my own power. Of course it hasn’t worked out but the logic of my argument as a four year old made sense then. But now, through the transformation of mental maturity, I realize it was a child’s dream, we are not made to fly that way. I once thought, before the word of the Cross, that there wasn’t enough evidence for God. Now, by the transformation brought on me by the Cross, I cannot imagine life at all without God. The logic is not in my clearer thinking, it is in the supernatural work the Cross does within me. I “see” what I did not see before Jesus made my thinking clear about Him.
As an insider to my mind, I think I came to the conclusion that Jesus Christ is Lord and Master of my life but the truth is I didn’t. The work happened supernaturally. It came by the word of the Cross. Nothing about Jesus and the life He brings makes sense outside this change. We bust our heads against a wall trying to convince people it is logical to belong to Jesus. It cannot be made logical because it is impossible to grasp. The word of the Cross alone has the power not only to persuade but also to make sense of eternal life. The opposite also is true. What seems so logical, the life without Jesus is morphed by the word of the Cross into utter stupidity. The time away from Christ becomes by that Cross a mess of foolishness and vanity. We are not convinced to follow Jesus, we are made by the Cross into followers of Him.
The second way the word of the Cross is the power of God for the ones being saved is that it is what continuously makes you saved. We aren’t saved by something we think or do but rather by the word of the Cross itself. The change has nothing to do with carefully crafted arguments or intelligent considerations. Eternal life comes by the word of the Cross and it alone has the power to make you, as Paul puts it, “continually saved”. No one is “argued into the Kingdom of God and no one convinced of it through logic. There is by the word of the Cross a literal transformation that makes me into something I can never in my own power or through any other power morph out of being. I cannot become a non child of God once I am one because it is not me that does it: it is by the word of the Cross.
Verse 21 is fascinating. It tells us that through the “foolishness of the proclamation” a miracle occurs. The nonsensical, “moronic”, idiotic if you will proclamation brings about the faith transformation. Just saying the “Christ having been crucified” opens wide a door that is completely closed, a door to an eternal life transformation. It is a bit mysterious this process because believing is not given as a means of attaining eternal life, it is the characteristic of the ones having it. It is like saying that all Walkups have big noses. I am not a Walkup because I have a big nose but there is not a Walkup running around without a big nose. Believing or faithing is what every single Christian does. It is the foolishness of the proclamation of Christ having been crucified that takes the soul into continual salvation. It is the power of the change. Believing is what you look like when the Christ crucified proclamation works in you.
Now I understand that the call of the Gospel is to “believe”. We believe though not because we get it or we think it through. We do not turn into Christians on belief. Belief is the response of the soul to the penetration of the message of Christ crucified. The power of it works in me and then I believe. This, the Bible says is grace…a gift. Romans 10:17 is a strange and near shocking twist on popular theology. It states that, “faith comes from hearing the message”. Literally, it reads that faith comes out of the hearing. We do not hear the message because of our faith. The message of Christ crucified delivers the faith into us. It is the power generating faith.
The message itself is a stumbling block to some (the Jews) and moronic to others (the Gentiles). But that doesn’t keep the proclamation of the Gospel from tearing into people and making their old unbelief completely illogical to them. Because the message of Christ crucified is sufficient in itself to make changed lives, we do not have to be skilled messengers. It does not need help from good, satisfying logic. It simply needs to be announced and then it bores in on the one being saved. Here is a scientific chemistry experiment for the church. Go before the Lord and ask Him to point out to you one you can proclaim the Gospel. Take a deep breath and then do it. Pray for God get the words out. Christ died on the Cross to give you eternal life. He rose from the dead and He is the one and only savior of your soul. The pray and step back. The proclamation is not held back by the wisdom of the unbelieving. It is corralled by the silence of the Church. One voice is all the Gospel needs. Why not make it yours.
Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ. Romans 10:17 NIV
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