Wisdom & Authority For Life In 2016

There must always be a basis of authority for making wise decisions in life. God’s Word was given to us to reveal God to us and to give us a true basis for life decisions.

2 Timothy 3:16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.

In the last fifty years the church has moved from a focus on the Word of God to a preoccupation with the people of God.

The question is no longer what God’s Word says, but how does it affect us? Does it offend us, or make us feel good about ourselves? For the most part, people are no longer interested in what the Bible means. Their interest is how will it help them have more comfort in their lives. To varying degrees, we all wrestle with this.

Much of the Christian life today is depicted as a desire for thrilling feelings rather than of working faith, and supernatural interruptions, rather than rational righteousness. Too often, we dwell on joy, peace, happiness, sanctification and rest of the soul with no balancing reference to the fight of faith or any of the burdens of responsibility to be obedient as a child of God.

 Wisdom Comes From The Authority Of God’s Word

1 Corinthians 2:7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world for our glory.

The truth of the Word of God provides for the things of God to get deep in our hearts. As we walk in the Spirit, those things become living realities. The Holy Spirit uses the Word in our hearts to draw its truth into action in our lives.

We take for granted the necessity of the presence of the Holy Spirit to help us understand the revealed truth in God’s Word. It is the Spirit who convinces us that the Word is true and He activates the Word in each of our lives, to produce obedience.

Godly Wisdom Is The Basis For Decision Making

The wisdom of God and the wisdom of the world are mutually exclusive. Therefore, the church has always had the difficulty of protecting itself from the wisdom of man. Without a deep understanding of the Word of God, that discernment is impossible. If we do not understand and discern the principles of revealed truth in God’s Word, we will not be able to evaluate human wisdom, and we will be misled by it.

Worldly Wisdom Is All About Man

1 Corinthians 2:6 However, we speak wisdom among those who are perfect, yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, who are coming to nothing.

When we become Christians, we receive the capability to understand the gospel, and the truth that God has revealed. We have a wisdom that is different from non believers. Although all ‘true truth’ is God’s truth, true wisdom is not humanly discovered; it is divinely revealed. Man cannot discover it on his own.

The leaders or princes in verse six are the philosophers, the teachers, the writers, the lecturers, the world’s leading lights of that era. They have observation and experience, but do not have any other timeless, unchangeable source for truth.

Man’s wisdom has been viewed often through philosophy. The new philosophy of the day is psychology. It also is often a world view. This field is called psychology, not philosophy, because it focuses on man. Because we live in a totally individualistic and man-centered culture, the useful tenets of psychology are often distorted and used to replace God.

Some Of The Main Psychology Views

Freud says man is selfish and one ought first to know it, but then also to accept it as okay.

Karl Rogers denies any inner badness and teaches that man is filled with only goodness, and should therefore let all that goodness hang out.

B.F. Skinner contends that man is neither good nor bad. He is a complicated mass of responses, which has no intrinsic value.

Existentialism does not know if man is bad like Freud said, or if man is good like Rogers said, or if man is neither good or bad. It just says maybe some experience will fill your void.

None of these ideas come close to divine truth. Unless we understand how contrary to divine truth it is, we get ourselves in a sort of Corinthian confusion where we’re trying to marry the philosophy of the time with the revealed Word of God.

God’s Wisdom Revealed

1 Corinthians 2:7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world for our glory.

Mystery is a technical term for truth, which man has never known, but is now revealed. The plan of the eternal God predestined before there was time, to be revealed to bring us to eternal glory, does not need the help of the leaders of this age, whose ideas will fail and pass away.

It is evident that the church often does not think anymore. “For the past half generation, evangelical churches have gravitated toward the experiential and even the emotional, at the expense of the intellectual. We cannot sell an experiential Christianity. We must take our stand that God has spoken. That’s why we teach the Word.” ~Carl Henry