Slices
Prepare
What do you know now about God that you did not know five years ago, ten years ago? How did you discover that aspect of God – through his Word, through life experiences, through a specific word or picture...?
Bible passage
God’s wisdom revealed by the Spirit
6 We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. 7 No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. 8 None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9 However, as it is written:
‘What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived’ –
the things God has prepared for those who love him –
10 these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.
The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. 11 For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. 13 This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. 14 The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. 15 The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, 16 for,
‘Who has known the mind of the Lord
so as to instruct him?’
Explore
The Ancient Greeks placed high value on wisdom, believing that humanity could be advanced by greater reasoning and understanding. In contrast, God’s wisdom is a mystery which can only be revealed to us by the Spirit. Intellect in itself is not enough – the greatest leaders of the time did not understand what God was doing and so were responsible for the execution of the Lord of Glory (v 8).
However, we have a huge privilege. The Spirit of God himself explains the things of God to us (v 10). Things that are a complete mystery to those who do not know God are freely given to those who believe.
I once knew a young man who had very limited intellectual capacities – he would never achieve even the lowest academic qualifications. Yet he knew with absolute certainty that God loved him, he knew he could pray and that God would listen, he knew that he was accepted in the fellowship of believers. He had the mind of Christ (v 16)!
Respond
In John 16:13, Jesus says, ‘But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth.’ Thank God for his Spirit who enables us to understand more of the things of God.
Deeper Bible study
Help us, O God, to see the world as you see it and to love the world as you love it, in Jesus’ name.
Is the world good or evil? The church has always struggled to work out how to relate to creation. Is the world something from which we must escape? Throughout the history of the church, there have always been those who considered the world totally corrupt or deficient, so irreparably damaged by sin, that salvation is seen as extricating believers from the world’s irredeemable chaos.
In today’s reading, Paul uses the idea of the world as a metaphor for human society. Thus Paul easily shifts between the ‘wisdom of this age’ (v 6) and the ‘spirit of the world’ (v 12). Paul here is talking about the values, ethics and self-centred ungodliness of human society. These indeed we must reject: ‘Do not love the world or anything in the world.’1 However, we are not called to withdraw from the world, not even the human world – quite the opposite. Paul will shortly agree that we are inextricably part of the human society.2 How can we be the ‘salt of the earth’3 if we must withdraw from it?
Furthermore, we do not, we must not, reject the created world, that which aeons ago God made, looked upon and called ‘very good’.4 Paul knows that the world has been corrupted by human sinfulness5 but also that God’s ultimate purpose is, through Christ, to restore all creation to its former perfection and glory – and this includes us and our bodies as well.6 The ‘world’ of human society is corrupt and we must turn from it, but the church has received the Spirit from God (v 12). Open to the Spirit’s guidance, we must make good and godly choices about the created world, including our own bodies. Then we will truly have ‘the mind of Christ’ (v 16).
‘O Lord of every shining constellation / that wheels in splendour through the midnight sky, / grant us your Spirit’s true illumination / to read the secrets of your work on high.’7
1 1 John 2:15 2 1 Cor 5:9,10 3 Matt 5:13 4 Gen 1:31 5 Eg Rom 1:18–32 6 Rom 12:1 7 Albert Bayly, 1901–84
Bible in a year
Read the Bible in a year: Proverbs 7,8; Colossians 2
Pray for Scripture Union
Port St Mary Beach Mission is 120 years old this year. Thank God for the way the mission has grown and adapted to reach children and families from across the Isle of Man and pray for those stepping into new roles this summer due to the uncertainties of travel to the island as a result of Covid.
