Wisdom, Folly, and Truth

If you have ever attempted to give testimony of the gospel to a lost person you have probably heard something like the following response, “Well, that may be true for you but I have my own beliefs and they are true for me.” This kind of response comes from a post-modern worldview; which tells us that any non-testable truth claim is subjective and, therefore, cannot be applied to every person universally.

In some ways this way of thinking is a good thing. Every time we see or experience the rotten fruit of Islamic fundamentalism we should be glad that America allows the freedom to adhere to any truth as long as it doesn’t break certain moral laws. The belief in relative truth has its own way of encouraging some humility in the public square where ideas are shared.

On the other hand, this view of truth mostly comes straight out of secularism which says that God does not exist (or at least we cannot know that He exists) and man is the authority for judging truth and falsity. It is a view that comes straight out of Romans 1:21 by which man suppresses the truth about God by claiming ignorance on the most important matters.

What I want to do here is spend a little time looking at one example in Scripture of the interplay between subjective and objective truth. Perhaps I do have my own truth and you have yours but what I want us to see is the truth that really matters. I also want us to see how we might apply that truth to our evangelistic ministry.

“For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (1 Cor. 1:18 ESV)

Notice how Paul addresses things throughout this chapter and especially in this particular verse. There are wise people and there are fools. The strange thing about these two types of people is that they are exactly the opposite of what one would expect to read. The bad guys with whom Paul completely disagrees are called wise. The good guys who have given up everything to follow Christ are called fools. Why is that?

The reason is because Paul is looking at these two kinds of people from the perspective of the lost. They are wise in their own eyes and have, according to Romans 1:22, become fools. So subjectively Paul is able to say that the message of the cross is folly in the eyes of the one group.

On the other side we have the fools. Why are they fools? From the standpoint of the lost it is because they have given up their lives in service to this mysterious God of the low and despised. From another perspective we can say that they are fools because that is what they are apart from Christ who chose them in order to shame the wise (see 1 Corinthians 1:27). To these foolish people the message of the cross is the power of God to save them.

So here we have two groups with opposing truth claims. They are completely at odds and there appears to be no way of reconciling their worldviews. However, we can consider that someone is writing this story. There is one who is telling us about these two groups and how they think. In the same breath by which Paul tells us what the wise man says and what the foolish man says he tells us what is really happening to them…objectively! The truth is that the wise man is in reality the perishing man and the fool is the one being saved.

Unfortunately in our day we will do almost anything to convince the wise man of the truth of the gospel by using his own “wisdom.” Some appeal to scientific evidence while others try philosophical arguments. Others just do whatever they can to get you in the doors of a church so they can show you how much better Jesus is for your emotional well-being. But verse 17 says “Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.”

The power of the cross is its ability to save. If we try to take the form of a fellow truth-suppressor we will only convert them to a slightly different form of rebellion against God. We might have more theistic heathens but in the end there won’t be anymore knees bowing to Jesus (unless God is so kind as to convert them despite an unbiblical presentation of the gospel).

My encouragement to you is to remember as you do apologetics and try to reach out to people that you don’t try to do it in a cunning persuasive way. Show people you care about them, show them that the Bible answers the questions they have (even the deep ones), but in the end let them accept or reject the truth of the cross. It isn’t up to you to convert souls, it is up to you to speak the truth of the gospel. The rest is up to God.

Grace and Peace,
Stephen