As many of you may know, I grew up in New York City. It was a fascinating place, filled with interesting sights and sounds. But watching the people in Manhattan was particularly interesting. Busy people, rushing to work or to shop or to meet or to eat. Everything was done in a hurry. And there were the characters on the street. Some stood on soapboxes and expounded their ideas. Other people ,dressed up in some regalia, decorated the street corners. One man I’d see often was the Viking, all dressed in the clothing and armor of a Viking warrior. He’d just stand there, expressionless, never saying a word. But the most vivid sidewalk encounter from my days as a youth in the city, was the man wearing a “sandwich board,” a form of advertising that was common at the time. There were two boards, one in front and one in back, joined by straps over the shoulder. The front would have the name of some establishment, a store or restaurant. The back might have a menu, or information about a sale. But this man’s board contained a different message. On the front it said, “I am a fool for Christ.” And on the back it said, “Whose fool are you?”

I saw this man and his sign on September 1st, 1957, the day after I had received the gift of salvation in Christ and publicly confessed that faith. That sign challenged me that day, and challenges me yet today. You see, if I had any thoughts about the elevation of my worldly status, or public approval, or glory because of my new-found faith, that sign demolished such thought. I was then, and I am now, a fool in the eyes of the world because of Christ.

1 Corinthians 1:18 reads: “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.” There are three things in this verse that we will consider. What is the word of the Cross? Why is this word folly to those who are perishing? And why is it the power of God to those who are being saved?

The word of the Cross: From the very beginning of history, the sins of the world were too great for God to forgive. When our ancestors in the Garden of Eden sinned, God cursed the very ground of the earth and pronounced the penalty of death on Adam and Eve, “To dust you shall return.” The creation that God had said was “very good,” was now corrupted to the core, afflicted, diseased, and bound for decay and death. What was once perfect and good and beautiful was now marred and disfigured. And from then on all people became helpless to help themselves. Nothing they did could restore things to the way they were before. But God made a promise. He made a promise to defeat evil, to destroy satan and restore order. He sealed that covenant by clothing Adam and Eve in skins from slain animals, to cover their nakedness and their sin.

From then on God worked through human history to bring the world to the moment when those animal-skin garments would be replaced by the pure righteous cloak of the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus, on the cross at Calvary. In the Old Testament, we read how God, through prophets, priests and kings, was bringing the world to that moment. On wilderness altars, in the tabernacle, and in the temples, the blood of untold multitudes of animals was poured out in anticipation of this one all-sufficient sacrifice, the blood of Jesus.

That is why the Apostle Paul was laser-focused on the cross as he says in verse 17: For Christ didn’t send me to baptize, but to preach the Good News—and not with clever speech, for fear that the cross of Christ would lose its power. It’s all about the Cross. It’s all about Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. 

Folly to the perishing: Why do people continue to ignore, and even mock the whole notion of the cross? Those who are perishing see no need for the cross because they can’t see their sin. And if they do admit that something is wrong with them, or that something is dreadfully wrong with the world around them, they believe they can deal with it. Some seek to escape by chasing after pleasure; they entertain themselves endlessly. Looking for relief, they anesthetize themselves with alcohol, drugs, and sex. Or else they believe they can fix things themselves. Get more education, be more kind and tolerant, elect the right leaders who promise to fix things, or “work for peace” (A peace which is impossible apart from Christ,). They put their faith in knowledge, wealth, influence, science, and power. They believe it is within their human capability to make themselves better. There is an arrogance in humanity that says that there is no greater truth than the one we make up for ourselves, that there is nothing on earth that can’t be fixed if we just try harder. But all these human endeavors ultimately fail. The leaders in whom they trust disappoint. The nations founded in glory eventually decay and fall into shame. The greatest minds have not been able to change the self-destructive path of human history.

The last century, began with great hope that the enlightenment of humanity would lead to world peace. It did not. The twentieth century was one of the bloodiest in all of history. One popular philosophy of the day was called Eugenics. It proposed that the solution to the world’s problems lay in improving the human race through selective breeding.

The Encyclopedia Britannica introduces the topic in this way : “Eugenics, the selection of desired heritable characteristics in order to improve future generations, … The term eugenics was coined in 1883 by British explorer and natural scientist Francis Galton, who, influenced by Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection, advocated a system that would allow “the more suitable races or strains of blood a better chance of prevailing speedily over the less suitable.” Social Darwinism, the popular theory in the late 19th century that life for humans in society was ruled by “survival of the fittest,” helped advance eugenics into serious scientific study in the early 1900s. By World War I, many scientific authorities and political leaders supported eugenics. However, it ultimately failed as a science in the 1930s and ’40s, when the assumptions of eugenicists became heavily criticized and the Nazis used eugenics to support the extermination of entire races.”

“Darwin had concluded his explanations of evolution by arguing that … humans, through selective reproduction, had the ability to control their own future evolution.”

Politicians, educators and scientists, all those who were “wise,” supported this philosophy. And millions of people were slaughtered in the horror of the holocaust as a result of this notion. When humans try to conquer sin with human devised sinful ideas, it can only lead to death and destruction.

Paul says the Jews sought signs; they were looking for a conquering king. The Greeks believed in the elevation of the human mind. And both groups thought the message of the cross was rubbish. The same thinking prevails today. “Jesus was a good man.” they might say. “He taught good things like love and peace.” they might agree. “

“But you say he died; on a cross. That’s gross. What kind of a God would do that? No, it’s ridiculous. And the resurrection? That, of course, is impossible.” Such is their mindset, totally opposed to the need for salvation; oblivious to the power of the cross.

I could go on. I could talk about the increasingly open defiance toward God in this country, the vicious hatred of the very idea that there is any heavenly authority. The loud proclamations that everything is about me, and no one can tell me what to do. I can kill and pervert and mock because it’s my life, my body, my mind, and there is no authority over me that can say any different.

All this is evidence that the original sin of Adam and Eve is still at work today. Their defiance of God’s sovereign right to rule over them led to their disobedience and led to the curse that God pronounced on them and on us. And those who are perishing are powerless to reverse the curse or to save themselves.

The power of God to salvation: “But to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” The creating God who pronounced the curse is the only one who can pronounce the blessing that saves. God had every right to condemn his disobedient children, His perfect righteousness demanded it. But in His love for His creatures, God devised a way to erase the sin with a perfect sacrifice. That sacrifice was His only Son, who took on human flesh and fulfilled every requirement of righteousness, and then took on Himself the penalty for every violation of God’s law; every disobedient act committed by each and every member of the human race. God’s power over all things was most vividly displayed when the shedding of the blood of one Man undid all the evil that ever was; when in that one Man’s resurrection, death was defeated forever.

This great good news was not first announced to the high and mighty of this world, to kings and priests. Instead, God revealed this truth to a simple Jewish carpenter and his teen-age bride, to shepherds, to fishermen, to the weak and the powerless and the poor. Afterward, twelve ordinary men traveled about the known world, proclaiming the gospel of the cross to the people, to philosophers, and to kings. And to us God announces it, in the written record of the Bible, in the testimony of eyewitnesses, in the historically reliable writings, to us has been delivered the glad gospel of the Cross: Salvation is by God’s grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

But head knowledge of these things is not enough. Intellectual assent is not enough. It is only by the power of God, the Holy spirit, that we can understand the gospel and embrace it to our salvation.  A note in the Reformation Study Bible says this, “Christian’s knowledge of divine things is more than a knowledge of biblical words and theological ideas. It is an understanding of the reality and relevance of the works of God testified to by the scripture.The ‘natural person’ does not have the Spirit…….(and) lacks this deeper understanding …The work of the Spirit in imparting this understanding is called ‘illumination,’ or enlightening. It is not a giving of new revelation, but a work within us that enables us to grasp and to affirm the revelation of the Bible as it is read, preached and taught.” This is the true enlightenment that saves.

So, for those of us who are being saved, we trust in the power of God demonstrated in the Cross. As we live out our lives in the church, and live out our faith in the community in the days ahead, the scripture urges that we never lose sight of the Cross. As we study how to bring the gospel to the world and to our perishing neighbor, we can preach nothing other than the cross. Apart from the cross there is no salvation. Apart from the cross there can be no life-giving change in the people we meet every day. 

Will you be challenged, as I have been, to daily consider being a fool for Christ? Are you willing, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to be saved by grace, through faith in Christ and the Cross alone? Are you willing to bring that good news to someone you know? Let me close by reading Paul’s final words in 1 Corinthians 1:

“And because of him (God) you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.’”

Let this word live in our hearts and minds in all the days ahead. Amen