Today’s Reading: 1 Cor. 2:1-16
Daily Lectionary: Job 4:1-21, John 2:1-12
Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. (1 Cor. 2:6)
In the Name + of Jesus. Amen. Would you like to level up your Christianity? What would you say if I told you there was some “secret and hidden wisdom from God”? All you have to do is buy my book and I’ll show you how to unlock this hidden potential! Maybe Simon Magus, who thought he could buy the Holy Spirit from the Apostles (Acts 8:18-24) had thoughts of writing a book like this. But the fact that books like this sell should tell us something.
We crave to have power over our lives. Anxieties and manic behavior plague us, especially in our age which promises ultimate knowledge, ultimate mastery over disease and the body. This desire for some control also seeps into the spiritual realm, driving some to dabble in astrology or numerology, and perhaps even witchcraft.
That is not the message which the servants of God, like St. Paul, preach. Contrast Paul to a peddler of spiritual ’truth’: “I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom.” So much for Paul selling them on his winning smile and charisma! No, the wisdom and power are of God.
The wisdom from God is given as a gift, not unlocked by the wise of this world. “These things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.” There is real, ultimate power there! The power to know the mind of God! But what is God thinking about? How He condescends to us, lowly and sinful though we are. “What is man that you are mindful of him and the son of man that you care for him?” (Ps. 8:4)
God the Holy Spirit reveals what we could never find ourselves—what we would never even think to ask! That God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit would redeem His fallen creation through self-giving, suffering and that He would powerfully call people back to Himself by lowly-appearing means: words, water, bread and wine. This truly is the “foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God [which] is stronger than men” (1 Cor. 1:25). Thanks be to God! In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.
Creator Spirit, by whose aid, The world’s foundations first were laid, Come, visit every humble mind;
Come, pour Your joys on humankind; From sin and sorrow set us free; May we Your living temples be. Amen. (LSB 500:1)
-Pastor Michael A. Miller is Pastor at Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Lebanon, OR.,
Audio Reflections Speaker: Patrick Sturdivant, Development and Marketing Executive at Higher Things.
Study Christ’s words on the cross to see how you can show more Christlike grace in your life. Perfect for group or individual study, each chapter has a Q&A at the end, and the back of the book includes a leader guide. Available now from Concordia Publishing House.
