ordinary christianity for the world.
Corinth, A Church Divided, 1 Corinthians 4:1-6
Poetic Praise
Wisdom and Foolishness
1 Corinthians 4:1-6
The context of these verses is Paul's distinction between the wisdom of God and the foolishness of the world. Paul has set these two things in complete opposition, without any middle ground. This opposition is easy to describe and easy to understand. Understanding it doesn't require any academic degrees, special instruction or special intelligence. However, its full extent — the pervasiveness of its application — is seldom realized, understood or spoken of because it is so different from what we have all been taught from our earliest childhood.
Cornelius Van Til, a Reformed scholar at Westminster Seminary until his death in 1987 spent a lifetime working out the philosophical and theological implications of the differences between the wisdom of God and the foolishness of the world. Van Til's work can be easily summed up in the phrase, "There is no neutrality." It means that no one can be neutral or objective about anything, much less the gospel of Jesus Christ. Why? Because everyone has a particular perspective. Jesus said the same thing, "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters" (Matthew 12:30).
Conversely, no one has a multiple perspective. To be an individual is to have a unique perspective. While we all need to be considerate of others, and attempt to "walk a mile in the shoes of another" no one walks in quite the same way. If you walk a mile in my shoes you will have a very different experience than I do when I walk a mile in them. The point is that every individual has a unique — and different — perspective.
What is more, the matter of God's existence provides a veritable watershed for human consciousness and understanding, dividing the human perspective into two separate categories. Those categories are 1) those who believe in God, and 2) those who don't. This divide that Paul has spent the previous three chapters discussing is so basic, so fundamental, so all-pervasive that it effects everything about every human being ever born. It essentially divides humanity into two categories or two cultures. These two cultures can be — and have been — variously labeled as believers and unbelievers, or the saved and the lost, or covenant keepers and covenant breakers. Thinking that the difference between them had to do with race and nationality, the ancient Israelites called them Israel and Gentiles. But the difference is not national or racial, it is cultural.
Is there such a thing as common sense or a universal human perspective that all people share? Not according to Scripture. Of course, you and I share many things in common and the foundation of our shared perspective is our faith in Jesus Christ. But those who do not share that faith have a radically different perspective. So different, said Van Til that virtually nothing is understood in the same way. Even when we do math or hoe the garden we do it very differently than those who do not believe in God. Believers do whatever they do in service to God, unbelievers do not. In other words, God is both the first and the final referent in all that believers think, say and do. Apart from that foundation people think, say and do very different things. Even when it appears that they are doing the same things, they are not because faith in God fundamentally changes everything.
Paul teaches that there is no significant common ground between these two groups of people. Paul will speak more fully of this division in his second letter to the Corinthians. "What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, "I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty" (2 Corinthians 6:15-18). Such is the difference between the wisdom of God and the foolishness of the world.
Of course, the sun shines on the good and the evil, and the rain falls on the just and the unjust (Matthew 5:45). But the sun also shines and rain falls on spiders and algae. All of God's creatures have many common experiences — rain and sunshine, food and shelter, death and taxes. (Well, spiders and algae don't pay taxes — yet!) But believers and unbelievers do not have the same kind of experience of anything. The reason that we do not have a common sense is that faith in Christ makes a real difference in our lives. If the difference that Christ makes is insignificant or trivial, then we might say that our experience and perspective is not much different from that of unbelievers. But if Christ makes a significant difference, a real difference, then Paul is telling the truth. Because we don't see things in the same light, we don't know or experience things in the same way. We don't do things for the same purposes.
Paul's ability to discern this important difference, which is a function of the power and presence of the Holy Spirit in his life, gives him great wisdom, real wisdom. Paul is a wise man of God, and as such we accord him honor and respect.
This forth chapter of Corinthians provides a part of Paul's instructions about how to treat him, how to treat the apostles. Why is this an issue? Because some people wanted to treat him and the other apostles as gods. Remember how the apostles were treated at Lystra. "And when the crowds saw what Paul had done, they lifted up their voices, saying in Lycaonian, "The gods have come down to us in the likeness of men!" Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul, Hermes, because he was the chief speaker. And the priest of Zeus, whose temple was at the entrance to the city, brought oxen and garlands to the gates and wanted to offer sacrifice with the crowds. But when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard of it, they tore their garments and rushed out into the crowd, crying out, "Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men, of like nature with you, and we bring you good news, that you should turn from these vain things to a living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them." (Acts 14:11-15).
And so Paul begins chapter four by saying, "This is how one should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God." He acknowledges that he and the apostles did indeed know the mysteries of God, that they did really know the wisdom of God. Part of that wisdom was knowing that they were not themselves God or gods, and this knowledge is very important. It is very significant because it reveals that Paul and the apostles were not caught in the error that beguiled Eve in the Garden. There Satan told Adam and Eve that they could "be like God, knowing good and evil" (Genesis 3:5). And, of course, this is the most basic and most prevalent sin known to man. This sin is the foolishness of the world.
Paul tells us that "it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy" (v. 2). Most versions read faithful. The Greek word is pistos, which is usually translated as belief or faith, but trustworthy is fine. A steward must be worthy of trust and full of faith. But how can we know if someone is trustworthy? Upon what should we base our trust of anybody? Let me ask it this way: Do we trust people because they have the ability to be just, truthful, honorable or faithful? Do we trust that they are good enough or strong enough or smart enough to prove themselves faithful? What about sin? Is anyone above sin? No, which brings us to option two. The option is to trust Jesus Christ to both change a person for the better and to maintain that change over time. Do we trust that Jesus Christ is good enough and strong enough to accomplish what He said he would do? Do we trust that Jesus Christ is just, truthful, honorable and faithful? Do we trust the power of regeneration in Christ?
If we put our trust in people we will ultimately be disappointed because no one is above sin. But to trust Jesus Christ is another matter. When Jesus Christ enters the picture everything changes. To trust a Christian is to trust the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. Our trust in fellow Christians is stronger because of the shared perspective or common experience that Christians have. Jesus teaches His people about faithfulness, so we all understand faithfulness in the same way. And the Holy Spirit provides the power to be faithful to Jesus Christ. Trusting a Christian means trusting the Holy Spirit to accomplish His work of regeneration and sanctification.
In contrast, we cannot trust unbelievers (also known as covenant breakers) in the same way that we can trust Christians because we know that unbelievers are in rebellion against truth itself. So, when Paul tells us that stewards are to be trustworthy he means that they are to be Christian. Because Christ is the most trustworthy, those who believe in Christ are more trustworthy than those who don't.
What about dishonest, untrustworthy Christians? There are many people who claim to be Christian who are no more trustworthy than anyone else. How can we account for this? In Romans 9:6 Paul said that not all Israel is Israel. Similarly, not all those who claim to be Christian are actually Christian. There can be no other explanation. Jesus said the same thing in Matthew 7:21, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven."
The next few verses are difficult to understand. The key phrase comes in verse 4, and we turn to the MKJV to read it because it makes the point clear. Paul said, "for I know nothing by myself" (v. 4). Here is the context, "But to me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you, or by a man's day; but I do not judge my own self, for I know nothing by myself. Yet I have not been justified by this, but He who judges me is the Lord" (v. 3-4). Other translations of the Bible read "of myself" or "against myself." But there is no such Greek word in the text. The preposition has been added. There is an implied sense of the knowledge that Paul speaks of in the verse as being against or apart from himself. Nonetheless, the literal Greek reads, For I know nothing myself.
Back up for a moment and look at the phrase, "or by a man's day" (v. 3). The Greek word translated as by (hupo) is also translated as of, but literally means under. "Man's day" is a literal translation, but it is an unusual phrase. So unusual that I want to suggest that it is an idiom that suggests the light of Man or the light of humanity. The phrase we are looking at literally means under the light of humanity. Putting this all together we could read the verse, "But to me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you, or judged under the light of humanity" (v. 3 — my translation). In other words, Paul is saying that human reason or human experience or human discernment (the light of humanity) is not sufficient to evaluate God or the works of God. Human wisdom is inadequate to judge or understand Paul because his conversion and regeneration are a work of God.
There are many layers of meaning in these few verses. We know that Paul was defending himself against accusations made against him by others in the church. The nature of those accusations is unclear. But we can surmise that they stem in part from his opposition to the worldly wisdom (the Greek perspective) that was common among Corinthian believers. He put himself and the heart of Christianity in opposition to the common sense and practices — the common culture — of the day. He said that the wisdom of Christ is contrary to human wisdom, that the culture of the church (believers) is contrary to the culture of the world (unbelievers). Those who supported the superiority of human wisdom accused Paul of foolishness among other things.
So, following the basic themes of First Corinthians to this point, we understand that Paul's comment in verse 4 was an expression of the crux of his argument against worldly wisdom. The story of the Serpent in the Garden and the temptation and Fall of Adam and Eve tells us that the Serpent provided a way to know the world apart from God. Satan convinced Eve that truth was not dependent upon God, that truth could stand alone, apart from any reference to God. From this perspective, God and Man (humanity) could both use reason to understand and discern truth because truth was thought to exist independently of God and Man. And furthermore, said the Serpent, God knows that if you employ reason as the primary tool for understanding the world, "your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as God, knowing good and evil" (Genesis 3:5).
When Paul said "for I know nothing ... myself" (v. 4) he meant that genuine knowledge of the world required a reference or anchor point beyond himself, beyond his own ability to know and understand. He meant that human knowledge required a point of reference that was eternally fixed and stable through history in order to overcome the self-deceptions that are inherent in a self-contained perspective. If human knowledge is limited to human experience, then all knowledge is relative. You have your experience and I have mine, and who's to say that one is better or more right than another. If there is no dependable reference point outside of human experience and knowledge, then all knowledge is relative.
But if all knowledge is relative, if all knowledge is simply a matter of perspective, then nothing is truly or objectively knowable. In such a case knowledge does not reveal truth, but only perspective. If all knowledge is relative then everything depends on how you look at it. In such a system truth has no place. In such a system truth cannot have a consistent meaning.
And this is exactly where our contemporary world is at. Relativism is the reigning doctrine that is taught in public schools and universities. People are taught today in these institutions that knowledge that is devoid of any reference to God or Scripture is the only knowledge that is reliable. Religion is understood today to be a matter of personal opinion, which means that objective knowledge must be purged of religion because personal opinion distorts objective knowledge. Thus, public schools and universities today pride themselves on the fact that they teach knowledge of the world without reference to God or Scripture. They think that they are teaching objective truth, that truth itself stands apart from God or apart from any reference to God or to Scripture.
What they don't recognize is that they have elevated human knowledge, human reason, human perspective and/or human experience to the status or function of a god. Reference to God in the pursuit of knowledge is like reference to the North Star for purposes of navigation, of knowing where you are. Once you know the position of the North Star, the positions of the other stars indicate your position on the earth. If there was no North Star in the sky, no star whose position is stable year round, navigation would not be possible. In a similar way, God and His Word serve as the objective, stable perspective from which all other human knowledge has any significant meaning.
And we all know this at some level. Paul quoted popular Greek poetry to the Greeks at Mars Hill. A popular poet was quoted as saying, "In him we live and move and have our being" (Acts 17:28). Paul was pointing out that the Greek pagans understood the importance of an objective, stable point of reference regarding life and the pursuit of knowledge. This Pagan Greek poet was right to suggest that all human knowledge and experience are dependent upon God.
Paul goes on to say that it is "the Lord who judges" (v. 4) him. Again, he offers a contrast between the judgment of the world and the judgment of God. His point in part is that it is not his own limited knowledge that has reached out to know (discern or evaluate) the Lord, but rather that it is the unlimited knowledge of God that has reached down to know him. And through being known by God Paul then knows his place in the world. It is not through knowledge of the world that we come to know God's place in the world. But rather it is by being known by God that we come to know our place in the world. The difference involves a seismic shift in perspective. It is a matter of coming to see things from God's perspective, not our own. It is a matter of regeneration in Christ.
The gist of these verses is that human beings must take care not to issue judgment or discern things apart from reference to God. The word judgment is to be understood in its widest meaning here. It means making decisions, evaluations. And it incorporates the ability to discern meaning. Van Til goes on to say that all meaning issues from God, and apart from God all meaning vanishes. The only way that unbelievers can make sense of the world is to borrow meaning from God, while at the same time deny His very existence.
Paul explains in Romans 1:19-20, "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse." They suppress the truth in unrighteousness. They deny the truth and justify what is not right, not true, according to God's Word.
In verse 5 Paul tells us that we cannot properly pronounce judgment, we cannot correctly discern or understand anything under the light of humanity — from our limited human perspectives. So, we must wait for the coming of the Lord, for the power of regeneration in Christ, which will "bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart" (v. 5). In Christ, through regeneration everything changes. Nothing is the same. In the light of Christ, the North Star of human history, we come to know our place in the world. Conversely, those who are not regenerated in Christ, who do not see in the light of Christ, who do not have the North Star as a stable point of reference, do not and cannot know where they are at. They are lost.
Such is the difference between the wisdom of God and the foolishness of the world.
