1 Corinthians 2:6-11

Paul begins the body of 1 Corinthians by discussing the problem of sectarianism. The church was splitting up into parties rallying around individual preachers, be it Paul, Peter, or Apollos. Paul rebuked that attitude with the general point that we are all saved in Christ, not in Paul or in Peter. He expanded on this idea in the ending part of Chapter 1 and the beginning of Chapter 2--he shows how God's way is different from man's way. God has chosen the strange and shameful gospel of crucifixion and resurrection. That is the basis of our faith, not the strength or skill of the minister. Paul himself made sure not to rely on his own skill; instead, he led people to Christ as the true foundation of their faith. That was why this sectarian attitude was so wrong—arguing about which preacher was better misses the point because the skill of the individual preacher is irrelevant. And the fact that the Corinthians were so insistent on that point reveals a more fundamental problem within the church. Their attitude on this issue revealed that there was a deeper problem. This section begins to examine that deeper problem

In chapter 1, Paul describes how the gospel was rejected as foolishness by the world, which sought wisdom. The story of the cross is not the story anybody expected or wanted. Paul had, in a sense, granted this objection—his argument that God can use strange and even shameful things to accomplish his will. God can do more with weakness than anyone else can with strength.

However, here he returns to this point. He spoke before of the foolishness of preaching, but here, he explains that preaching the gospel does contain wisdom. The world's desire to find wisdom wasn't wrong; they were just wrong about where and how to find it. The gospel story may have seemed strange and repellent to the philosophers of Macedonia, but it really did lead to wisdom. It wasn't the wisdom of the world but the wisdom of God. That is the theme of this passage—this contrast between man's wisdom and true wisdom.

There is true wisdom found within Christianity, and this passage shows us several things about it. 

(1) First, this true wisdom is eternal. Note verse 6: Paul says that this wisdom is “not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princess of this world, that come to nought.” The NET Bible translates this: “not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are perishing.” And I'd written out several paragraphs talking about how God's plan is eternal and our wisdom is temporal and transitory because it is based on a temporal perspective, but that's a point we've talked about several times before and after looking at the passage again, I don't think that's exactly what Paul is saying here.

The point is rather this: would you take financial advice from a man who had just gone bankrupt? Would you take marriage advice from someone going through a divorce? Would you take tactical advice from a general who had just lost a war? No, except in so far as they could tell you what not to do. If a man's wisdom (in whatever walk of life) has led to failure, it probably wasn't all that wise.

This age and the rulers of this age are perishing. Their wisdom will not save them in eternity or even (most of the time) preserve them in time. We see a good example of this in the gospels. At the end of Jesus' ministry, the Jewish leaders were discussing him and their fears regarding him. “If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him: and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation.” (John 11:48) That was their excuse for putting him to death—that otherwise, the Romans would destroy Israel. Well, a few years later, Rome did destroy Israel. Their plans and conspiracy did not save them. Their wisdom perished with them.

But the wisdom of God, the mystery of God, the secret plan of God—it was ordained before the world and it will last to the end. God's wisdom is eternal because it works. God's way doesn't need to be changed or corrected because it is already the right way. 

The wisdom of God—the gospel and the doctrine that flows from it—is based on a firm foundation. It is something that God has been working out successfully throughout the entire course of history. Therefore it can be counted and relied upon. It is eternal

(2) Secondly, this true wisdom is glorious. In verse 8, Paul refers to Jesus as “the Lord of glory.” This is important. We talked about this in chapter 1. The gospel of the cross was, to many (especially among the Jews), a stumbling block. The idea of a divine figure dying such a shameful death was difficult to swallow. There, Paul had embraced this idea, saying that God used shameful and weak things to accomplish His will. But here, he makes sure to show the other side. This is nothing morbid or masochist; no delight in shame or disgrace for its own sake. Christ is the Lord of Glory. The writer of Hebrews describes the glory of Jesus: “[God] Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.” (Hebrews 1:2-3) Here, Jesus is pictured as sharing fully in the glory of the Father and being the controlling force in the universe. We see the past, present, and future in this verse (past, present, and future from our perspective). In the past, Jesus was the means of creation; all things were made by him. In the present, he controls the world. And though He was humbled in the incarnation, now He is sitting at the right hand of the Father. And in the future, He will inherit all things.

Jesus is the Lord of Glory, but it isn't just that He possesses this glory. Look at verse 7 again; the wisdom and mystery of God were ordained throughout time “unto our glory.” God's plan is for His people to share in that glory. Adam Clarke comments on verse 8 that Jesus is “the glorious Lord, infinitely transcending all the rulers of the universe; whose is eternal glory; who gave that glorious Gospel in which his followers may glory, as it affords them such cause of triumph as the heathens had not, who gloried in their philosophers.  Here is a teacher who is come from God; who has taught the most glorious truths which it is possible for the soul of man to conceive; and has promised to lead all the followers of his crucified Master to that state of glory which is ineffable and eternal.”

And here we see the connection between this point and the first one. The wisdom of this world may seem more attractive than the gospel; it may seem more glorious, and the gospel, by comparison, may seem shameful and weak. But the wisdom of the world will not endure, and neither will its glory. But the gospel will last forever, and so will those who believe it, and they will share in its glory. “And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.” (1 John 2:17)

(3) All of this leads us to the third point: true wisdom is supernatural. We've talked throughout this about a contrast between this true wisdom and the wisdom of man. And that contrast is not accidental. This wisdom is not something man can find on his own; this is not something that can arise naturally out of human reason and human observation. 

This is shown in verse 7, where Paul describes it as a 'mystery'--throughout his writing, Paul uses this word with the idea of something secret which is now revealed. It is something you can only know by being told. Paul continues this idea in verse 8, where he says that none of the princes of this world knew God's plan, or they would not have crucified Jesus. The fact of the crucifixion proves just how ignorant the people of the world were of God's plan and who Jesus was.

Obviously, this refers specifically to the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem and Pontius Pilate, but the phrasing makes me think that Paul is using them as types of all the leaders of this present world—none of them knew or understood and it doesn't take much to realize that Jesus would have suffered the same fate if had come to some other city besides Jerusalem. The way His followers were treated afterward points to this. The world killed Christ, and it persecuted Christians because they did not know God; they did not understand who God is or what He is doing. They did not have true wisdom because true wisdom is supernatural—it comes only from God.

Paul expands on this in verse 9: “Eye hath  not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” God is at work in the world, but mankind cannot, through the use of their own senses or abilities, understand that plan; they cannot know what God is doing. We can stand all around God's workshop, trying to listen at the window or look through the keyhole, and yet we will never be able to figure out what He is doing. Paul loosely references Isaiah 64:6. There, the emphasis is slightly different—the emphasis is on the fact that no one else can do what God does. We can look and listen and search and never find someone else to take God's place. Both ideas come out to the same thing. We do not and cannot know God's work and God's plan. We do not have His wisdom.

At least, we do not have it intrinsically; we do not have it as a result of nature. But see verse 10: “God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit.” We do have at least some knowledge of God's plan; we can see God's work in this world, we can know what God is doing—because He has told us. This is His revelation. This is the true wisdom which is possessed by the Christian.

This is the difference. Man's wisdom starts from man and his perspective and tries to build from there. There may be some truth in it, but it is always going to be very limited—like a man standing outside a house and trying to sketch the floorplan just by observing the walls and the windows. The wisdom Paul is speaking of comes from revelation—it comes from listening to the architect.

In passing, we should note this: verse 9 is usually quoted in reference to the future state. It is usually taken to mean that the reward God has for His people in the Resurrection is something more glorious than anything we can now see, hear, or imagine. And while, in context, that's not what Paul is talking about, there is a sense in which it is true. Human observation and human reason cannot tell us anything definitive about life after death, let alone the Resurrection or the New Heavens and the New Earth. Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man. But we do know at least something about this future state, and the reason we do is because God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit, through the scriptures.

I said that this true wisdom is supernatural—because it comes only from God; it is given, not found. However, I want to add another word here—one that will become very important in the rest of the chapter: this wisdom is spiritual. Spiritual is a word with a wide variety of meanings depending on context; often, people use it with no meaning at all. However, for the moment, the main thing to note is that spiritual has a connection to the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God. This wisdom is spiritual because it is revealed specifically by God's Spirit.

In verse 11, Paul uses an analogy. We do not know everything about one another. We don't know what another man is thinking or feeling. Only the individual knows what is going on in his own mind. A man's own spirit or mind (or whatever word you want to use) is the only one who really knows what is happening beneath the surface. And that is a very loose analogy for this—we do not know what God is thinking or planning, but His Spirit does; God's Spirit knows everything that is within the mind of God and He has revealed some of that to us. This largely refers to the fact that the Spirit reveals God through the scriptures. However there is more.

Now, we need to go back and look at something Paul said in verse 6: “We speak wisdom among them that are perfect.” The Greek word for perfect doesn't necessarily mean freedom from every fault or flaw, though it can. The main idea is having reached a certain goal, measuring up to a standard, or being fit for a certain purpose. Here it seems, at the very least, those who have already become Christians, those who have been established in the basics of the gospel.

In a sense, this wisdom was not for everyone. This true wisdom seems to be something beyond the gospel itself--it is a deeper understanding of God's plan. And this can only be understood and received by those who have already become Christians. You have to learn basic math before you can start studying algebra.

Yes, this true wisdom is found in the Bible, and in a sense, anyone can pick it up and read it. But the wisdom doesn't come from the Bible, but from the Spirit who inspired the Bible. And so there is at least some sense in which only someone who is properly attuned to the Spirit can understand it. And if the Corinthians in their life and thinking were so far away from this true wisdom, it was probably because they were not where they should have been spiritually. Paul will develop this thought in the next section.