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1.30.2010

Making biblical and faith language practical


This is a central passage of Scripture, easy to forget:

1Co 1:26 For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:
1Co 1:27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;
1Co 1:28 And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:
1Co 1:29 That no flesh should glory in his presence.
1Co 1:30 But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:
1Co 1:31 That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.


Not many wise-men-wise-after-the-flesh nor mighty men are called (regenerated) by the Word and the Spirit. But the foolish and the weak, and those considered base and those despised are called. This so as to confound the 'wise' and mighty and so that no flesh can glory in anything but the Lord.

It's this language though I was looking for to make a comment:

1Co 1:30 But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption...


This is an example of biblical or faith language that assumes greater knowledge. Otherwise it is very non-practical language in terms of delivering practical meaning.

Christ Jesus is our wisdom. OK. What does that mean? He is also our righteousness and sanctification and redemption.

What these words 'carry' is the whole of the biblical message, the history and mechanics of redemption. This verse is similar:

1Co 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.


What this is saying is once we know all of the history and mechanics of redemption, and we are regenerated, we don't need to know anything else, practically speaking. I mean, in terms of ultimate things.

This can be a clue the Holy Spirit is giving believers about how to arrange things internally to remember what is most important, and always have it to mind. Start with Jesus Christ and how he is our wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. What is behind all that.

How He is our wisdom means not only knowing of the plan of God and what Jesus Christ, the second Adam, accomplished, but what He teaches throughout Scripture.

This is why I harp on Federal Theology and the plan of redemption and the mechanics of it, systematic theology, all that. We need that understanding as background to know all. I was listening to a theoretical physicist today and noticing how his world is disintegrating in terms of old paradigms falling apart (mysterious dark matter replacing atoms as foundational building blocks; knowing things are true that they can't prove; the former, dark matter, being defined, and using the word 'ghostly', in a way to suggest the spiritual world which is real but invisible; the latter echoing faith itself). Then listening to his speculating on all and everything and in my mind seeing how biblical understanding explains it all and really seeing, against that worldly, atheistic science-as-authority, and the silliness of their constantly changing paradigms yet continuous claiming to be authoritative in all they say, etc., how it is the 'wisdom' of the flesh against God's 'foolishness'.

Yet to bring the biblical language into practical focus we need to know the whole and be able to see the parts in relation to the whole. Until then you don't take, for instance, the Paul quote above seriously:

1Co 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.


You say, um, OK. I know it is authoritative, and as a believer I hew to it, but it *is* awfully fuzzy. Well, get the history of redemption and the mechanics of redemption down in understanding (Federal Theology) and you will then know what is referenced in Jesus Christ in that verse.

[This was originally an email.]

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