|
Listen to sermons at FreeGraceRadio.com
|
Christ Our Wisdom 1 Corinthians 1:20
Christ is Wisdom. Christ is Understanding. He gives wisdom and understanding; but the Holy Ghost tells us much more than that. He tells us that the Mediator-man Christ Jesus is Wisdom and is Understanding (Proverbs 8:12-14). If Christ is Wisdom and Understanding, as he asserts, then there is no wisdom and no understanding anywhere except in him. Furthermore, if Christ is Wisdom and Understanding, then all who are in him and have him possess wisdom and understanding.
In Christ Jesus All who are born of God are “in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us Wisdom” (1 Corinthians 1:30). We are in Christ by the rich, free grace and goodness of God the Father, who put us in him in sovereign election before the world began. In him we were and are preserved and blessed from everlasting. That secret, everlasting union with Christ was made manifest in time, when God the Holy Spirit gave us life and faith in Christ, by the operation of his mighty grace; but the union is from everlasting.
God’s Work Our being in Christ is altogether God’s work. Our conversion, our saving union with Christ is not the result of something we have done. We are not in Christ because we are wiser, or better, or have made a better choice than others. We are in Christ because God put us in Christ. — “Salvation is of the Lord!” It is the purpose of God to make this apparent, and to force all men to acknowledge it. He dispenses his grace in such a way that he makes men see with regard to others, and to acknowledge with regard to themselves, that salvation is his work alone.
Our Wisdom Though we are foolish creatures by nature, by virtue of our union with him, Christ is made of God unto us Wisdom. He is the one who gives us wisdom and understanding in all things spiritual. He is the shining light that dispels darkness in our souls. Christ is our Wisdom objectively, too. I mean by that that our highest wisdom is knowing him. Under the personification of Wisdom, our Savior says, “He that findeth me findeth life, and shall obtain the favour of the Lord” (Proverbs 8:35). Christ is the Head of his body the church; and as all the wisdom of the body is in its head, so all our wisdom is in him. The Lord Jesus acted for us as our Wisdom representatively, speaking for us in the everlasting covenant of grace and peace; and he is our Advocate with the Father, still pleading our cause and interceding for us in heaven. It is by Christ Jesus that the triune God is made known and revealed to man. He is the embodiment of God, the embodiment of Wisdom, the Word, the Revealer of God. As all the fulness of the Godhead dwells in him, so all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are his. By him alone, they are made known to men. — “No man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him” (Luke 10:22).
Truly Wise And this union with Christ makes the heaven-born soul truly wise, because when Christ is formed within, we are given the mind of Christ and know all things (1 Corinthians 2:14-16). All true spiritual knowledge is derived from Christ; and it is only those who are taught of him who are made wise unto salvation. Christ is our Wisdom within to direct our paths, guide us in his way, and order our steps day by day.
Don Fortner
|
Pastor Fortner’s
|