1 Corinthians chapter 2 verse 6 to 16.
We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature,
but not the wisdom of this age or the rulers of this age who are coming to nothing.
No, we speak of God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden
and that God destined for our glory before time began.
None of the rulers of this age understood, for if they had,
they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
However, as it is written, no one has seen, no ear has heard,
no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him.
But God has revealed to us by his spirit.
The spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God.
For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the man's spirit within him?
In the same way, no one knows the thoughts of God except the spirit of God.
We have not received the spirit of the world, but the spirit who is from God,
that we may understand what God has freely given us.
This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom,
but in words taught by the spirit, expressing spiritual truth in spiritual words.
The man without the spirit does not accept the things that come from the spirit of God,
for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them,
because they are spiritually discerned.
The spiritual man makes judgment about the things,
but he himself is not subject to anyone's judgment.
For who has known the mind of the Lord,
that he may instruct him,
but we have the mind of Christ.
Amen.
Thanks, Lucia. That's great. Thank you.
Well, keep that passage open.
We're going to work our way through it together this morning.
And I wonder, as we do that,
if I can ask you to think about what is a successful church?
Have you ever thought about that?
What is a successful church?
We know, don't we, what a successful business is.
So a successful business is one that earns lots of money for its owners.
We know what a successful athlete is, don't we?
Someone who wins lots of games, lots of tournaments.
They get all the cool Nike gear because they get given it as sponsorship.
Maybe you even know what a successful parent looks like.
You know, they have their kids in bed asleep by 7pm
and are sitting in a tidy flat drinking a cup of tea in front of the television.
I wonder whether you've thought about what a successful church looks like.
I guess if we use those same measures that we were talking about for a church,
we might say that a successful church is one that maybe has a lot of people coming along to it.
Maybe they've got a lot of money.
Maybe the church meets in a fancy building.
They have some funky music or a celebrity pastor that everybody knows.
But even when you express it like that, you sort of know, don't you,
that doesn't really kind of sound right for a church, does it?
I mean, there are lots of churches like that, especially in London,
and you wouldn't want to go to any of them, really.
It would be safer not going.
So what then is success for a church?
What is it that we are aiming for?
You know, we're at the start of a journey of church revitalization.
What is it that we're hoping the destination will be?
Well, I want to suggest to you this morning from the passage that we've just read together
that a successful church is not necessarily rich.
It's not necessarily meeting in a fancy building.
It doesn't even have to have funky music.
Instead, what I want us to see together is that successful church is a church that is relying on
and experiencing the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit.
In other words, the church, a successful church, is a place where God is obviously at work,
opening people's eyes and hearts to see the wonder of who he is and what he's done,
and empowering church members to live that life together.
Now, just think about that with me.
If that's right, if that's what a successful church is,
if a successful church is relying on and experiencing the regenerating work of the Spirit,
then here's the central thing about a successful church.
You and I can't make one, can we?
There's nothing that we can do to make church successful,
because the success of a church relies not on us,
but on God, on a movement of the Spirit.
And I want to suggest this morning that that has a profound impact on what church should look like
and what church should feel like for all of us this morning.
Now, if you'll wind back with me a moment and come back to 1 Corinthians chapter 2,
which we read together, I want us to see that there,
but we're going to walk through the passage first,
and then I'm going to pull out what I think are three implications for us as a church.
So let's just walk through these verses first.
Let's walk through them.
In verse 6, Paul tells them that although his preaching isn't with conventional wisdom,
that's what we were thinking about last week,
still it is a message of wisdom among the mature, as he calls them.
It's important that we get what the word mature is there.
It doesn't mean people of a mature age.
I'm sorry if you're of a mature age this morning,
but what he's not saying this morning is that once you arrive at a certain age,
you will then understand what he's saying.
So this is for older folks and not for younger folks.
That's not what he's saying this morning.
Really, literally the word there is perfect.
And this is Paul's description of the church.
These are the saints or the sanctified or the holy people,
as he calls them in chapter 1 verse 2,
the saints in Corinth, the mature in Corinth.
Again, that's not because every single church member or any church member is absolutely perfect.
Rather, it's to contrast them with the world.
The world are the perishing, chapter 1 verse 18.
So the mature are really just Christians,
those who more often than not were weak and nothing in the eyes of the world,
but who have now been saved by God and brought into his kingdom,
made holy, mature and perfect.
But really the question is then, where is this wisdom from?
If this wisdom isn't worldly wisdom,
it's not the wisdom of this age from the rulers of this age,
a wisdom that's coming to nothing, as he puts it in verse 6,
then what kind of wisdom is it?
Well, look down at verse 7.
You're told this is God's wisdom.
We declare God's wisdom, he says.
Wisdom that he tells us has been hidden, but has now been revealed.
It's a bit of an aside, but I think it's worth noticing that the wisdom of God has not been hidden
because God was making his mind up about it.
You and I can be like that, can't we?
You know, we wait until the very last minute to make a decision
because we don't want to get a wrong decision.
So someone asks you to do something and you wait for ages and ages and ages
before you decide whether you're going to say yes or no to doing it.
Someone's not very happy with me so far this morning.
Please don't worry about it, it's absolutely fine.
I don't mind a bit of crying.
It's not that here though, is it?
It's not that God can't make up his mind why the wisdom's hidden.
The wisdom has been hidden, but it has been decided.
Look at the end of verse 7.
You notice there that it has been planned for the glory of God's people before time began.
In other words, this message of wisdom for the mature,
although it's been hidden and now revealed, is about the eternal plans of God.
Plans which he established in eternity past and is now working out in history.
But despite the fact that these plans are ancient and have been working out in history,
still, verse 8, none of the rulers of this age understood them.
Why?
Well, because they crucified the Lord of glory,
which had they known and understood and believed the plans of God,
had they been mature, to use Paul's phrase in verse 6,
they would not have wickedly killed God's Son in human flesh.
Again, it's worth seeing the implication of Paul's point here.
The message of wisdom for the mature, founded on the ancient plans of God from before time begun,
focuses where?
This hidden mystery from eternity past has its focus where?
There, on the cross of Jesus Christ,
where the eternal Son in human flesh handed himself over to the wicked intention of his enemies,
who unbeknown to them, while going through with their wicked intentions,
actually accomplish the eternal plan of God to provide a sacrifice of sin so that he might forgive and save.
Now, that plan, we're told, is so glorious we could never have conceived it, verse 9.
He says what?
No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for his people.
But verse 10, that's the message that's now being revealed to Paul by the Spirit,
and it's the message he's now preaching.
Now, we're going to move on just to look at some of the other bits in a moment,
but just think about what this means.
Notice here that God is not frantic.
God is not stressed, is he?
He's not running around trying to accomplish his purposes in the least amount of time possible.
Instead, he's patient.
He is mysteriously patient, isn't he?
He's had a message of salvation decided before time began
and worked it out in thousands of years of history, building up to the cross of Jesus Christ.
A message that was foreshadowed and role-played out in the temple for thousands of years
before God the Son arrives in human flesh.
A plan that was achieved not only despite, but because of the ignorance of those who achieved it
as they drove the nails into Jesus' hands.
And now for thousands of years, he's patiently working out Christ's victory
and giving his spirit to whoever he wills.
God is patient.
I wonder if you notice that's how God works in your life too.
He's not in a rush.
Instead of giving quick answers and fast fixes, he is content, isn't he,
for you just to keep coming to the Lord Jesus in the midst of unanswered prayers and confusion.
But not because he's forgotten you or because he doesn't love you,
but because he's patiently doing by the Spirit through the cross something so wonderful
you wouldn't even understand it if he explained it.
Now, back in 1 Corinthians 2, Paul goes on in verses 11 to 16
to explain how God's Spirit has revealed this message,
how the message of wisdom centered on the cross has come to the church by Paul.
And there are two parts to it, which we saw, didn't we, with Lashire in the family Bible slot.
The first part is about who the Spirit is,
and the second part is about what the Spirit does.
So firstly, verse 11, the Spirit knows the message of wisdom because he is God the Spirit.
Who he is, he is God the Spirit.
This is the doctrine of the Trinity, right?
So although Paul can talk about the Holy Spirit as a separate person from the Father and the Son,
he is distinct from the Father and the Son, yet still he's fully divine.
He's a partaker in the divine essence of God.
So that the Father can't plan anything that the Spirit doesn't know.
The Son can't do anything that the Spirit doesn't empower.
So the Spirit knows what the Father has planned from eternity past,
because he's divine.
And what the Son does, the Spirit then enables,
so that Paul knows, verse 12, the message of wisdom from God,
because the Spirit who is at work in him is not the Spirit of the world,
who knows only things about the world,
but the divine Spirit from God who knows the things of God.
So look down at verse 13.
What does he say?
He says, this is what we speak,
not in words taught by human wisdom,
but in words taught by the Spirit,
explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words.
In other words, the first thing to know, says Paul,
when it comes to this revelation of the message,
is that the message comes from a reliable source.
It comes right from the top.
This is right from God himself.
The Spirit is divine.
The second then is what the Spirit does.
So look down at verse 14.
Here you'll see that not only the Spirit has access to the mind of God,
but also the Spirit has been at work in Paul.
So Paul is with the Spirit,
or the Spirit is with Paul.
So he doesn't consider the things to come from God as foolish,
but now as wisdom.
Look down, these I think are important verses.
Look down at verse 15.
The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things,
but such a person is not subject merely to human judgments.
Literally, he doesn't make worldly judgments,
nor can he be judged by human judgments.
He's not here saying,
listen, I'm no longer accountable to the law or to anybody.
He's not saying that.
He's not saying, listen, if I get caught speeding on my camel,
it comes to nothing because I'm above all of that.
That's not what he's saying.
Rather, this is about how Paul now thinks
and how he should be thought about by others.
With the Spirit in his mind,
with the Spirit of God at work in him,
he now thinks God's thoughts
with the mind of Christ, verse 16,
which he couldn't do before.
In other words, human judgments can't explain Paul anymore.
You can't explain who Paul is and what Paul does
simply at a human level
because he has the Spirit
and knows the mind of Christ.
This, I think, is really, really helpful.
You've got to make sure that we get this straight in our minds.
Paul is saying that
understanding the message of the cross
by the Spirit of God dwelling in our hearts
changes everything about how we think and view the world.
It literally becomes the lenses
through which you see everything.
So much so that decisions
that would have made no sense before
now make perfect sense
because you see and understand
what God is doing through the cross of Christ.
There's a famous verse in 1 Corinthians 15,
just a bit later on in the letter,
and Paul talks about
if the resurrection hadn't happened,
he would be to be pitied above all men.
Do you remember that?
If the resurrection is not true,
then Paul's life makes no sense at all.
It's to be pitied.
But of course, the resurrection has happened,
so his life makes perfect sense.
And so it should be for us.
You know, the question for us
if we're a Christian this morning
is if our lives and decisions
make perfect sense
without the gospel being true,
then we're not really living the Christian life
because the message of the cross
is the big truth
through which everything is filtered.
There's another important aside here as well,
which I think I want us to get
before we come on to the implications.
Look again at verse 14.
Let me read the first part of verse 14 to you again.
The person without the Spirit
does not accept the things
that come from the Spirit of God,
but considers them foolishness.
Notice that Paul assumes here
there are two types of people in the world.
There are people without the Spirit
and there are people with the Spirit.
And those without the Spirit
cannot accept the gospel,
but consider it what?
Foolishness.
And by implication,
those with the Spirit
do accept the gospel.
In other words,
and this is important,
Paul doesn't say there are two types
of Christian in the world,
those with the Spirit
and those without the Spirit.
He's saying there are two kinds
of people in the world,
those without the Spirit
who therefore don't trust Christ
and those with the Spirit
are those who do trust Christ.
In other words,
if you love the Lord
and you think the gospel
of Jesus Christ crucified
is the best news ever,
that's because the Spirit
has made you alive,
not because you've worked it out.
No Spirit,
no life.
So let me ask you this morning,
have you experienced that?
I'm not asking if you've had
some kind of weird,
unexplainable experience
of what you think
might be the Holy Spirit.
No, I'm not asking that.
What I'm asking you is,
have you had your eyes open
to the beauty and wonder
of the plan of God?
You and I live in a world
where from eternity past,
God has a plan of salvation
for people like you and me.
Have you seen that your happiness,
your eternal life,
lie not in the fulfillment
of your own dreams and aspiration,
but in the accomplishment
of God's plans?
Have you experienced new life
by the Spirit
so that your eyes and your heart
are open to that,
to love that and trust that?
Because if you haven't,
you need to understand
there's nothing you can do
to kind of generate that
from inside of yourself.
Instead, you need to turn
to the Lord and say,
please God in heaven above,
give me eyes to see
and a heart to trust
the wonder of Christ,
to turn from the horror
of my selfishness
to love and trust you instead.
That's a really quick run through,
1 Corinthians 2.
Let me try and draw out
three implications
for us as a church.
What does it mean
for us as a church
to be relying on the Spirit
and living out these realities?
Let me suggest three things.
The first one is this.
Spirit-powered faith
will trump intelligence.
Spirit-powered faith
will trump intelligence.
I was a student
at Sheffield University
quite a long time ago now,
and I studied geography,
which has turned out
not to be incredibly useful,
but anyway,
I studied geography at university,
and one of the things
that they enabled you to do
was you could pick
a certain number of modules
from any other department
in the university.
So at the beginning of the year,
you go and queue up
to register for your optional modules.
One of my friends decided
to just join the shortest queue
and ended up doing
some weird course
in ancient history.
Most people did
a computer science module
because everybody knows
computer science is easy,
and if you get a good mark,
it boosts your mark
in the degree you're actually doing.
Anyway,
I decided there was
a biblical studies department
at Sheffield University
at the time,
and so I took a module
in New Testament Greek,
so I thought that would be
interesting and helpful.
I hasten to add
I wasn't actually very good at it,
but the striking thing was
in the biblical studies department
at Sheffield University
was some of the brightest people
in the university were there.
They spent their lives
studying the scriptures,
but they hadn't got a clue
what the Bible
or the gospel was about.
It was incredible to me.
Here were men and women
who were spending their lives
reading everything
that was written
about the Bible
and the Bible itself,
but still they didn't
trust Christ
and the whole thing
was foolishness to them.
That's 1 Corinthians 2
in action, isn't it?
Because it's not intelligence,
but it is spirit-powered faith
that counts,
and so it must be
for us as a church.
We must learn
to treasure
not so much
great thoughts about God,
but great faith in Him.
Not because academic learning
isn't important
or because Christians
shouldn't use their brains
when it comes to
understanding the Bible.
No, we must,
and we must train people
to do that.
While the point is
that as a church,
we should be quicker
to listen to a brother
or a sister in Christ
who turns us to God
in the Scriptures,
then we are listening
to the latest expert
on the God channel
who's full of their own
self-importance.
This idea gets expressed
in our church covenant
or constitution
that states we're a church
that's led by elders,
supported by deacons,
but owned collectively
by the church membership.
And the church membership
are all those
who having shown evidence
of new life in Christ
and being baptized,
covenant together
to be a church family,
to look out for one another,
to care for one another,
to take responsibility,
to meet together regularly,
to appoint leaders
who will teach the Scriptures,
celebrate the Lord's Supper
and baptism.
And it doesn't matter
whether you've been
a Christian for a week
or whether you're
a professor of theology
and you've been a Christian
for 40 years.
Membership in the local church
treats you exactly the same
because church is about
spirit-empowered faith,
not human intelligence.
You might have heard
that phrase,
all-member ministry.
We're going to think
about that some more
in a few weeks' time,
but really it's built
on this doctrine.
Every member of the church
is a minister of the gospel
because every member,
by means of their conversion,
has the Spirit of God
at work in them,
enabling them to understand
the things of God
and apply them to others.
Let me try and put it
as provocatively as I can, okay?
If the only person
you ever see up the front
in church is me,
or if I'm the only person
doing ministry
in the life of the church,
we haven't made a kind
of organizational error.
We've made a theological error
because all the members
of the church
are ministers of the church,
not just me.
Likewise,
if you come to church
expecting that there's
no contribution
for you to make,
it's not a laziness problem.
It's a theological problem
because all of God's people
are Spirit-empowered
ministers of the gospel.
Not because we all
have the same gifts
or have the exact
same responsibilities,
but because we all
have the same Spirit.
That's the first implication.
Second one,
praying to God
will trump nagging people.
If what Paul is saying
here is right,
that we can only understand
the wisdom and glory
of the gospel
by a work of the Spirit
in our hearts,
then what we need
to accept is that
you and I
cannot make anybody
a Christian,
can we?
How so?
Well, because you and I
cannot give anybody
the Spirit.
It's not in our gift.
You know,
even with the best explanation
of the gospel
that we can bring,
even with the clearest answers
to the questions,
even with the best literature
and leaflets,
none of us can make a Christian.
Only God can.
Now, of course,
we all know that,
don't we?
I don't think I've told anyone
anything they don't know,
but we do sometimes act
like we can make people Christian.
If you look at your
praying to nagging ratio
with your non-Christian
friends and family,
how does that balance out?
I think especially
with close family,
we find ourselves
nagging with them
to come to church
or to listen to the gospel
more than we find ourselves
pleading with the Lord
that they might turn to Christ.
I think the same applies
to holiness or weakness.
The gift of the Spirit
here in 1 Corinthians 2
doesn't mean that we all
instantly know everything
that we need to know
or that we're all as godly
as we need to be.
We haven't been totally liberated
from the battle with sin,
have we?
The Spirit is fully ours,
but is engaged
in a lifelong battle
with our sinfulness.
So much so that the battle
that we have to be patient
or to be humble
or to be thoughtful
to others
or to be hungry
for more of the Lord,
that battle is won for us
in prayer,
not in nagging.
It means that
when we talk to one another
about those things,
we talk to one another
prayerfully,
knowing that actually
it's the Lord by His Spirit
bringing the gospel
that will change
and transform us,
not my nagging.
The book of James says,
doesn't it,
that your anger
achieves nothing
because it's God
by His Spirit
that achieves things
in our lives.
Final implication then,
and this is the big one
that I want us to see.
God's blessing
is what success looks like.
God's blessing
is what success looks like.
This is where we started,
isn't it?
But hopefully you can see
it a bit more clearly now.
That it is possible,
isn't it,
for us as a church
to have lots of people coming
but still to be
a total failure.
It's possible for us
as a church
to have a youth work
that's bursting at the seams,
a toddler group
that's oversubscribed
and for us still
to be failing as a church.
Why?
Well, because what we really need
as a church
is a work of the Spirit
in the lives of people
bringing them to know
and love and trust Jesus
and empowering them
to live for Him.
And without that,
we can't do anything
worth doing.
See, here's the hard truth
for all of us
and I think it's hard for me
but it's hard for all of us
this morning.
There is nothing
that any of us
in this room can do
to revitalize
the ministry of the gospel
at West Kilburn Baptist Church.
You know,
we might be able
to do a few things
to see more people coming.
We might even see
lots more people coming
and it might not be wrong
to do those things.
They might be good things to do.
Perhaps we should do
some of them
but they won't on their own
revitalize the ministry
of the church
because only a movement
of the Spirit
will do that.
Only a movement
of the Spirit
in the lives of unbelievers
bringing them to faith
in Christ
and in our lives
making us conscious
of our need of the Lord.
Let me say
just really practically
how this lands.
It's why really
the only thing I've changed
other than the big TV
is the Wednesday night
prayer meeting.
I've split the Zoom part
away from the in-person part
as Ray was explaining earlier
with the hope of just trying
to make them both
a little bit better.
Why would I do that?
Well, because I am
absolutely convinced
from 1 Corinthians 2
and from the rest
of the Scriptures
that actually
it's only God's blessing
that can revitalize
the ministry of the church
and we need to ask him for it.
We need to come
and pray
and ask for his blessing.
So my hope is
that if you can come
in person
on a Wednesday night
please come
pray with us.
In-person is best
for all sorts of reasons.
I can explain this
to you later.
The incarnation
happened in person, yeah?
It wasn't live-streamed.
Coming in person
is best.
But if you can't
attend in person
maybe there's all sorts
of reasons for that.
Maybe you're housebound
maybe getting out
in the evening
is too difficult.
Perhaps you're working away.
Then come on Zoom
and pray with us there.
Because success
for us as a church
is this and only this.
Relying on
and experiencing
the regenerating power
of the Spirit
amongst us.
We can't do that
for ourselves
but we can ask God
to do it for us.
And wonderfully
he delights
to answer that prayer.
Let me pray.
Heavenly Father
we come before you
this morning
and ask for your blessing.
Knowing that there's
nothing in us
that deserves it
but knowing that
without it
we can do nothing.
We long Lord
that you might bless us
with the power
of the Spirit
opening eyes
and hearts
to trust in the Lord Jesus
and moving us
to apply the gospel
to our lives
more thoroughly
even in the dark
corners of our hearts
that our lives
would only be
explained
by us living
for the Lord Jesus.
Please do this work
amongst us
for your glory's sake
and help us
in the weeks
months
and years to come
to be faithful
in asking you
for this blessing.
We long
to be successful
as a church
in the genuine
sense of that
to be a place
where
your Spirit
is experienced
in bringing
power
and transformation
to our lives.
And so we ask
for that
in Jesus' name.
Amen.