Paul was smart. Brilliant. The Einstein of his day. Probably the most learned man in all Judea. That was his undoing. He was too smart. His mind couldn’t handle all that learning. He was starting to talk nonsense, gibberish. That was what Governor Festus thought.
The Foolishness of Preaching
Paul was pleading his defense before King Agrippa. He had just finished telling how Jesus had appeared to him on the Damascus Road. He told how Jesus had sent him to turn the Jews and Gentiles from “darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God himself, so that they may know forgiveness of their sins and take their place with all those who are made holy by their faith in Jesus.”
That was all Festus could take. Festus suddenly shouted, “Paul, you are insane. Your long studying has broken your mind.” In a way, Festus was right. The Gospel doesn’t make sense. The Bible doesn’t make sense. It is illogical, irrational, and its claims are indefensible.
It would be easy to agree with Festus. When we examine the vast amount of scientific knowledge we have, it makes the story of creation look silly. None of it gives even the slightest suggestion of the existence of a creator God. There certainly is no scientific evidence to suggest that someone could or did rise from the dead.
A Modern Festus
We are a modern people, shaped by visions of a fantastic future with unlimited possibilities. Consequently, some of the things Paul writes in his letter to the Christians at Corinth don’t make a lot of sense to us. “The preaching of the cross is,” he writes, “nonsense to those who are involved in this dying world, but to us who are being saved from death it is nothing less than the power of God.”
Some alarmists might say this is a dying world. But anyone looking at the advances we have made since Paul’s day would say this world is very much alive. We’ve put men on the moon. We are eradicating the most serious diseases. Our inventions have made life much more exciting and enjoyable. We are about to conquer space and send out manned spaceships to explore other worlds.
If there is anything that looks foolish, isn’t it Paul’s words when he says that “God made the wisdom of this world look foolish?” It would appear that the wisdom of this world has done quite well for itself. Why, in view of all our achievements, would the world have any interest in “knowing God”?
What Is Real Wisdom?
Paul goes on to make his point that “it was after the world in its wisdom had failed to know God, that he in his wisdom chose to save all who would believe by the simple-mindedness’ of the Gospel message. For God’s “foolishness” is Wiser than men, and his weakness is stronger than men.
It sounds like Paul is way out of touch with how things are, especially things in 1995. If there is anything foolish, isn’t it the words: “God has chosen what the world calls foolish to shame the wise; he has chosen what the world calls weak to shame the strong. He has chosen things of little strength and small repute, yes, and even things which have no real existence to explode the pretensions of the things that are – that no man may boast in the presence of God.”
It would be easy to dismiss Paul’s Words if it weren’t for one little problem. One little problem. There is one little problem that flies in the face of all our wisdom and learning, our scientific and technological advances, our accumulated wisdom. What is that problem? The Word works!
Modern Miracles
When anyone takes the Bible seriously, when anyone dares to believe what it says, and act on it, it actually works! People get healed emotionally and physically. Something that matches the description of demons gets cast out. Lives are dramatically changed. World events are altered. Things that can’t be explained by our technology and accumulated scientific wisdom happen.
That’s the problem. When people begin to believe what the Bible says, literally, and act on it, it works! The editors at Tyndale House Publishers had heard that God was working miracles in Indonesia. They wondered about this and sent a trained reporter, Don Crawford, to search out the answers.
In his gospel, John records Jesus’s Words: “In solemn truth I tell you, anyone believing in me shall do the same miracles I have done, and even greater ones” (14:12). Generally, people don’t think Jesus meant this literally. It was just a figure of speech.
The Indonesian people hadn’t been exposed to all our modern wisdom and brainwashing. They took Jesus’ words. They literally believed Jesus meant what he said and said what He meant. Because they believed in Him, they expected the same miracles to happen. And they did! According to Marion Allen of the Christian and Missionary Alliance, almost every type of New Testament miracle had been repeated in the Soe area.
“One evangelistic team, for example, had gotten to their destination by walking across a flooded mountain stream. At first, they had dismissed the feeling that they should walk on the water, even though it had come to the team leader after prayer about the problem. After three successive prayer sessions, with the same apparent answer, the leader took a tentative barefoot step into the water. When he did not sink, the others followed–to the amazement of stranded travelers who witnessed the strange event from both sides of the stream.
“Another team, desiring to celebrate the Lord’s Supper but having no wine, were in a similar fashion instructed to use water from a nearby spring. As at the wedding Christ attended in Cana, the water, when drunk for the communion celebration, had become wine.
“Mr. Allen had talked to both of the major participants in another drama. An elderly woman among the mourners at the funeral of a young boy felt a strong impression to pray for the lad’s life. At first, she resisted the impulse. The boy had been dead several hours, and in that climate, it was imperative that an un-embalmed body be buried soon after death. But her feelings persisted. When it came time to put the lid of the wooden coffin in place, she felt compelled to act. She asked if she could offer a prayer. The ceremony was stopped to humor the old woman. While she was praying, the boy stirred, then rose up.”
Did these things really happen, or are they wild stories from the fertile minds of the Indonesians? The observers and participants all say they really happened. But more importantly, hundreds have come to Christ because of those miracles. People involved in witchcraft burned their books and equipment. Families were restored. Men gave up drinking wine and became responsible husbands and fathers. Thousands of lives were dramatically changed for the better.
Modern wisdom tries to explain what happened. But it can’t. It concludes that the miracles are stories someone made up. And the changed lives? The result of emotional frenzy. They’ll revert back to their old lives once the emotional frenzy wears off. Well, they didn’t go back to their old lives. The change was permanent.
God’s Amazing Promises
The Bible is full of promises. Each promise has a provision that must be met to activate the promise. But when that promise is activated, amazing things result. That’s the problem that won’t go away. The Word stubbornly keeps on working regardless of how we try to explain it away.
Richard Scott of Chicago had been moved by a desire to help Rev. Morris Cerullo print the Book of Daniel in Israel for the salvation of Israel, He gave a substantial sum from his savings. A few days later, as he was on his way home from work, he had a very strange and wonderful experience.
For over 15 years, Richard Scott had lived in the same neighborhood. At one time it had been a proud and beautiful area; but over the years, some landlords had allowed their property to deteriorate, and urban renewal programs had been instituted in the city.
Drug addicts and drifters had begun to “hang out” in some of the abandoned and dilapidated buildings. Because of the arthritis in his feet, Richard took the shortest route home evenings, which took him through this area. While walking past these buildings, a teenage boy jumped out of a doorway in front of him and shouted: “Hold it right there and don’t come any further!
At first Richard thought he was joking and kept walking. But suddenly, he realized the boy was trying to rob him when he saw the pistol pointed at his head. “Stop or I’ll blow your brains out!” he commanded.
Richard felt very calm and confident and continued walking toward the boy. At that moment, another boy came up behind him, threw his arms around Richard’s neck and tried to throw him to the ground. There seemed to be no way of escape. He knew that teenage drug addicts kill to obtain money for their habits.
As the boys were struggling with Richard, suddenly, for no apparent reason, they both jumped away from him. When Richard saw the terrified expression on their faces, he wondered what had happened. Apparently, they could see something that Richard was unaware of…something had filled them with awe and terror.
Simultaneously, they both began running down the street, stopping about a hundred feet away, and they looked back again. Their faces registering fear and amazement, they turned and continued running down the street as fast as they could.
“It seems they saw something in me, or about me, but perhaps it isn’t for me to know what they saw. I could tell by the way they began running that they were terrified,” Richard stated.
Richard was puzzled over what happened until he suddenly remembered at the time he made the commitment to help Israel., Rev. Cerullo gave him a promise from the Bible, Deuteronomy 28:7, “The Lord shall cause your enemies that rise up against you to be stricken before your face.”
Coincidence? Then how do you explain the strong behavior of the two teens? And why is it that it’s always when someone applies a Bible promise that these strange things happen?
The Power of the Gospel Is Beyond Our Natural Understanding
Things like this don’t make sense. Even we who call ourselves Christians fall into the trap of looking for logical explanations to explain them. When we can’t explain them, we refuse to believe them. Worse still, by refusing to believe them we are also refusing to glorify God.
“He has chosen,” Paul writes, “things of little strength and small repute, yes and even things which have no real existence to explode the pretensions of the things that are–that no man may boast in the presence of God. Yet from this same God you have received your standing in Jesus Christ, and he has become for us the true wisdom, in practice, of being made righteous and holy, in fact, of being redeemed. And this makes us see the truth of the scripture: He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.”
The cross of Christ is much more than a celebration of victory over death. It is a celebration of the foolishness of God, and the Wisdom of God. It is a celebration of the promises of God and a rejoicing and glorying in God who has done great things for us.
Now is the time to renounce the wisdom of this world and to commit ourselves to be believers of and doers of the whole word of God. It is a time to do as Joshua did and begin meditating on the Word of God, day and night, so that we will be able to obey them, and in so doing make our way prosperous and have good success.
The Word works when we work the Word, when we begin believing God through our lives and actions. Prosperity and success are the birthright of those who embrace God’s wisdom and do it.
Now is the time to lift up the Name of Jesus. Jesus has been given a name that is above every name, a name before which all things must bow on earth and under the earth and in the heavens. Now is the time to celebrate the authority that has been given to us to use that name in power.
A Testimony of God’s Delivering Power
A friend of my wife and I in Correctionville, Iowa shared a story told to her by her hospital roommate. The roommate was in her home taking a shower when a man broke into her home and began to disrobe with the intention to rape her.
She called on the name of Jesus. She commanded the man to stop in the name of Jesus. Using that Name, she commanded the man back into his clothes. Finally, he repaired the broken screen as he waited for the police to come. For those who are willing to believe and act, there is power and authority in the Name of Jesus.
Easter challenges us to saturate ourselves with godly wisdom so that we will make our way prosperous and be successful in all that we do. Easter challenges us to cast aside the worldly wisdom that robs us of our birthright. Let’s celebrate the crucifixion and the resurrection by believing and doing the Word of God.
