Here is the revelation that is shaping my life today – the deception of perceived wisdom leads many towards destruction.
1 Corinthians 1:18,30-31 NLT
[18] The message of the cross is foolish to those who are headed for destruction! But we who are being saved know it is the very power of God. [30] God has united you with Christ Jesus. For our benefit God made him to be wisdom itself. Christ made us right with God; he made us pure and holy, and he freed us from sin. [31] Therefore, as the Scriptures say, “If you want to boast, boast only about the LORD.”
Observation
In the wisdom of the world, we earn our rights either through intelligence, power, or position. In the world, we accomplish and succeed, or we lose and fail. This creates competition and comparison for some must fail for others to succeed. So we live in a fragile world, for my success must be defended daily, where I live isolated as I am postured to compete. Or I live defeated, lost, and alone. I know what it is to have succeeded and found my identity and life in success, I have also felt the crushing of defeat, for when you live in the world this is the way of the world, so we all know this in our lives.
Then along comes Jesus. Success, being right with God, is made complete in the gift of righteousness that Jesus offers everyone. Utter foolishness. No need to earn deserve, compete or compare, just freely offered right standing for all. Then he purifies my sin, not by my goodness but by his goodness being attributed to me. Then he frees me from sin ever having the power of disqualification and death over my life, by silencing sin as a defining instrument of judgment. And then he separates me into God’s family, he makes me holy. And I did nothing. Foolishness! This is the message of the cross and the world cries out – utter foolishness and heads off into its compete and compare, earn and deserve cycle, where destruction is the only destination.
The cross is in the past, it is a completed work in history. It stands in time and space and cannot be removed. God has done everything in Christ Jesus. The work is done. We don’t come and add something to the completed work. We don’t finish off what Jesus began. “God has united you with Christ Jesus.” It’s past tense and completed. The only question is – ‘will I lay down the wisdom of the world and trust the foolishness of the cross?’ Will, I lay down all claims to personal boasting that somehow I brought some measure of enabling to my salvation, and “boast only about the LORD.” Is the message of the cross the power of salvation in your life?
Application
I will live my life from the foolishness of the cross. I will listen, I will become aware of when I allow the systems and wisdom of the world to start to shape my life, and I will renew my mind and walk my life to a new beat of foolishness in the Kingdom of God. I will boast in Christ and not allow my performance, good or bad, to have any shaping story in my right standing, in my being pure, holy, and free before my God.
Response
Thank you for the cross. Thank you that this is the way of salvation and not the fragile, wide, well-trodden track of success and earn. I love your foolishness.
Meditation
Meditation truth – “God has united you with Christ Jesus.”
Consider:
How often do you shape your intimacy and walk with God in the ways of the world?
In your failure do you celebrate and rejoice in the foolishness of the cross?
JOURNEY DEEPER
