You are called to stop relying on human wisdom and start walking by the Spirit in your daily life. Embrace the mystery that Christ lives in you, for this identity is the true meat of the gospel meant for every believer. As you remain in His truth, you will find the freedom and power He promised.
You know what? I'm gonna do a couple of these. These old dad jokes. And and you know why? I realized why I wanna do it.
It's because I get so intense and serious when I'm preaching. I mean, there's joy in the lord and I don't want you to just think that that church should be intense and serious, you know? I mean, we're, man, there's just peace and joy in the holy spirit. It's a beautiful thing and so sometimes I forget to bring that back in the message. So, I just start with this.
So, I'm good, you know. Feel like I checked it off my list. It was a joke. Did you hear about the circus fire? No.
It was intense. No. What do you call a lonely cheese? Provolone. My my son told me 1.
Everybody sends me dad jokes now that I started doing this. My son told me 1. He said, on the way to church this morning, he was riding with me in the truck which I love by the way. Trip in Salem, worry and he said, he said, I I got 1 for you, dad. I said, what?
He said, did you know that we can see through walls now? They they created a way to see through walls. I said, really? What is it? He said, windows.
Man, chip off the old block there. Alright, let's pray. Oh god, we thank you for who you are. We thank you for your goodness. We thank you for your love.
And we thank you that you're here. Holy Spirit, we ask you to to to break in to the rest of this service in an even more powerful way than you already have. We ask you to reveal yourself, Reveal your kingdom. Let us see you clearly. Lord god, we will be forced by your miraculous power into the valley of decision.
Every person under the sound of my voice will be placed there where they have to choose to believe or not to. We're gonna not pray they choose to believe. I ask you to speak today. Oh god, that this would be what you have destined for these people to hear, to walk away being encouraged and built up in love. Encouraged and built up in you.
To encounter truth. Oh god, in such a way that forces the *lies* to be confronted. So that we can all experience deeper freedom. You know, amen. You you know, to Just a reminder, as we go through this message today and as we dive into continue to dive into Corinthians.
The truth sets you free. That's true. That's not the whole truth and I've told you before but I'm I'm telling the rest of you that haven't heard that yet and reminding you. It's Jesus said, if you're my disciples, then then you'll remain in the truth. Then, you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.
So, so you're gonna hear truth today from the word that may cause you to feel a little uncomfortable because you're used to living a certain way and being a certain way and you may accept that truth initially which is great but then there will be tests. The enemy will try to steal the seed of the word which is truth. And your response in the name of Jesus is to remain in the truth regardless of what the enemy brings to try to snatch the seed of his word. Because when you remain in it through the trial, then you will know it, not here, but by your life. And when you know the truth like that, then you experience freedom.
Just the initial hearing is great, And it's it's the beginning of being free but then there comes a time where you have to remain. Remain. Everybody say remain. Remain. Amen.
Alright. You guys ready? Let's continue with first Corinthians. We are in we finally made it to chapter 2. We've been in this series 4 weeks.
Fifth week, we're in chapter 2. Praise the Lord. And we'll go as far as as we we can today. In verse 1, it says, and so it was with me, brothers and sisters. Remember Paul's writing.
He's writing to the church in Corinth. Which is the culture of the church in Corinth was like a mixture of Las Vegas and New York City New Orleans all in 1. If you wanna know more about that, go back to our podcast and listen to part 1 and part 2 and part 3 and part 4. He said, I did not come to you with eloquence. When I came to you, I did not come to you with eloquence or with human wisdom as I proclaim the testimony about god.
Now, that's there's an implication here that in proclaiming the testimony about about god, it should not, the main thing shouldn't be with eloquence or human wisdom and we'll go like, we'll go into what that means. But apparently, someone can come and try to proclaim the testimony about god with whatever he means by elegance, eloquence, and human wisdom and it's not the power of the gospel. The word eloquence in other translations, it a lot of times it's translated as high and lofty. Original word is like superiority. So, it'd be as if I'm proclaiming to you something.
I'm up here high and mighty and you guys are just minimal little lay people. You can't even attain to this. Just listen to this high and mighty word and then go on and come back for more of what I have to give you. You can't experience this this in your daily life. That's what he's talking about when he says, I didn't come to you in eloquence.
No. That's that's not the case. Right? The same Holy Spirit is in me. It was poured out so that you can experience the power and the knowledge and the wisdom of that same Holy Spirit and you might have a different role to play than I have but man, we're brothers and sisters in Christ and we can push to each other forward in him in humility, honoring each other above ourselves.
Amen. Human wisdom. You remember from last week, we talked about, you know, the the wisdom of the world. Paul defined what human wisdom was and and Jesus did too. It was in 2 different camps.
The leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod. And and just to to break it down real quick, it was the way of thinking of the religious mindset. This is human wisdom. The the the way of thinking of the religious mind that puts that pretends that God's at the center and pretends like they they care about all of these promises, all this stuff. But when it the the rubber meets the road, when we really get down to it, they don't believe that the promise of promises of God can really impact their material world.
Don't believe that the promises of God really can change things in their life. So they say a prayer and do a couple things and then go about their business in the way that the rest of the world does. Just religion and hypocrisy. It's 1 aspect of human wisdom. The other aspect of human wisdom was the philosophy of the day.
Like, for them, it was the Greek philosophy, Roman philosophy. For us, the thinking of the American culture that that says it's okay for you to to believe in god. That's fine. It's your truth. It's good for you.
Not a not a big deal. Just make sure you keep em in your back pocket and don't bring em out at work. Make sure you keep em in your back pocket and don't really talk about it to your neighbors and to other things. Don't don't bring em into the the important aspects of of your life because it's a personal religion. It's not a public relationship.
It's the philosophy of the day. That's what he's talking about human wisdom. When we know, we give our life to Jesus, he becomes the center of every aspect of who we are in every aspect of our life and he impacts the way that we do our work at our job. He impacts the way that we treat our families. He impacts the conversations that we have with our neighbors in every other area of our life because he has become the center.
Amen? Amen. So, Paul came to them not with this high and lofty mindset, not with just the wisdom of the world to sound good as he proclaimed to them the testimony of god. In verse 2, he says, for I resolve to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. It's good.
Let's put a pin in that because this is like a major part of the message and I gotta get to verse 3 because I I never really understood verse 3 and I'll I'll give my best explanation to you and then we'll we'll dive in to verse 2. Verse 3 says, I came to you in weakness and with great fear and trembling. Why would Paul say that? Other than he's being transparent and open. He's not being high and lofty just like he just said, right?
And you remember in part 1, we went back into *Acts-18* where Paul went into Corinth and he first went to the synagogue and they became violent and begin to kick him out of the synagogue, right? And then he went to the building right next to it and and he had a dream and and Jesus told him in the dream, don't be afraid which would imply he was tempted to be afraid. Or maybe he was struggling with it. Well, here, he confesses. Even though I came to you in weakness and fear and trembling.
Man, even a a great mighty man of god can be tempted to be afraid and has to choose to stand in faith. When you feel, you initially feel fear in your life and and what's happening, don't get condemned and think that, you know, something is wrong. No. Let it be an alarm bell. Wait a second.
The enemy's attacking. I don't have to receive the spirit of fear, But I can stand knowing that God has given me the spirit of love, of power, and a sound mind, and he's gonna lead me through whatever this is causing me be afraid. I'm gonna take steps of courage following his word no matter what I'm going through. That's what Paul did. Amen?
Amen. Okay. So, when he came to them, verse 2, for I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. He's saying that for a reason. Verse 4, my message and my preaching were were not with wise and persuasive words but with the demonstration of the spirit's power.
Everybody say, demonstration. Of the spirit's power. So that your faith may not rest on human wisdom but on god's power. Verse 6, we do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature but not the wisdom of this age or the rulers of the age who are coming to nothing. No, we declare god's wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that god destined for our glory before time again.
The title of this message, I would say, if I had to call it anything, would be "milk and meat". Milk and meat Paul and just stick with me here, okay? For a little bit. Paul, when he came, he resolved in himself to know nothing but **Christ crucified** and a demonstration of power. Right?
Paul reserved to know nothing but Christ crucified and a demonstration of power. And then it says, but we do however speak a message of wisdom among the mature. Actually in verse chapter 3 verse 1 it says, I could not address you as people who live by the spirit but as people who are still worldly, mere infants in Christ. I gave you milk, not solid food. And what did he give him?
Christ crucified, Jesus Christ, and him crucified, and a demonstration of power. So what is the milk of the gospel? What is the milk of this? It's Christ crucified and a demonstration of power. That's milk.
A lot of people are going after the demonstrations of power thinking that it's meat. It's not. It's milk. It's great. But it's milk.
It's beautiful. You know why the demonstration of power is important? Because it proves that what Christ did matters, and it breaks into people's lives. What what is the message of Christ crucified? We talked about it a little bit last week.
It's "foolishness to the world". But Christ crucified, half of it is this, that the father loved the world so much. He loved you so much right where you are. That he sent his 1 and only son, that whoever would believe in him would not perish, would not die separated from God for eternity, but would have **eternal life** because of Jesus coming. Like Jesus, God's son, God in the flesh, became a man, lived a perfect sinless life, and then died on a cross in order to save us from ourselves and to restore our created value, to wash us clean so that we could walk in right relationship with God and experience the power and the presence of the Holy Spirit inside of us day in and day out.
That's amazing. That's half of the message of the cross. You know what the other half is? Not only was Christ crucified but when you confess Jesus as lord, you died with him. No longer you who live but Christ who lives in you.
It's the other half. That's the that's part of the foolishness of the world. 1, there's a god and that he would die for us, for little lust. The other part of the foolishness of the world is the world says, self help, build self up. Christianity says "death to self".
We died with him. It's no longer about us. We're not the center of the universe anymore. Jesus is, and we lay our life down to follow him as Lord of my life because that's the way he created me. So that's the only way that I'm gonna be fulfilled and live a life full of peace and joy is living out the purpose that he has put for me, which is to live not for myself, but to live for him.
Message of the cross, foolishness to the world but the power to us. And then there's a demonstration. There's demonstrations of power that goes along with it to show you that the cross is not just some idea that happened 2000 years ago, and it's awesome to believe and then sit in a church service and then Monday through Saturday going about your business. No. The message of the cross impacts every aspect and every area of our life every single day.
It's a it's a Jesus came in the natural and died on a natural *cross* which was amazing and wonderful but that caused spiritual realities that we receive spiritually and now that breaks into every aspect of our life emotionally and physically today. You guys follow me so far? It's the milk of the gospel. We're gonna get into some meat, but this is just milk. A lot of people say, I don't want milk.
I want meat. Shut up. First Peter. Just let me throw some Bible at you. *1 Peter-2:1* says, therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.
Like newborn babies crave spiritual milk so that by it, you may grow up in your salvation. Now that you have tasted that the lord is good. Rest of our lives in humility like newborn babies, we are to crave spiritual milk. Like new, the the message of the *cross* and the demonstration of power should never get old and we should there's no end to the depth of the milk of the gospel. And if there ever is a end to that depth of the milk of the gospel in our heart, we're becoming prideful and full of ourselves.
We should go back and crave spiritual milk like newborn babies. The power of the gospel You know, If you're ever in a place that preaches the power, that that preaches the gospel and there's not a demonstration of power with the gospel, you should probably go somewhere else. Now, hold on. Just because you haven't necessarily perceived something in that place doesn't mean it's not necessarily there. *Genesis-28*, we see Jacob and he's in a field and he goes to sleep and he lays his head on the rock and there's nothing there.
And in his dream, he sees heaven open and angels ascending or he sees heavens open and angels descending and ascending from heaven impacting the earth and he wakes up and here's what he says. Surely, god is in this place and I didn't know it which means god can be moving in a place and you not recognize it and you not perceive it. It's when you're in a service or a small group, people, and there's 1 person that is experiencing the power and the love of Jesus. Maybe there's tears, there's there's joy, or there's peace, or or maybe they were healed, or or it's just you know that they're experiencing the power of Jesus. It's not an act.
It's not a show. It's just very real. And then the person right beside them is thinking, man, I can't wait till this is over. So, I can go to lunch. What is that?
Like, just because you're not the first 1 to experience something in a room or you're not experiencing what other people are in the room, don't count yourself out and don't think that it's not real and judge it by your own lack of experience. Isn't that pride? Shouldn't we instead honor, acknowledge the other person's experience of the lord, and honor their experience because you're more likely to experience the same thing if you do. Watch this. It's like hunting dogs.
Hunting dogs when they're in a pack and they're on the hunt, when 1 catches the scent, He makes he makes the noise, the howler, and he points to where the scent is. The rest of them haven't caught the scent yet but they are trained to "honor the point". So, they see the 1 who made the signal and they turn to mimic the 1 who caught the scent. And they point their snouts in the same direction and begin to move in the same direction. And by honoring the point, eventually they catch the same scent.
Make sense? We're so individualistic in our American society that we say if it wasn't me, if I didn't experience it, if it wasn't myself, then then it wasn't real. Instead of honoring what God's doing in the community around us and honoring and acknowledging their experience and then, you know, following them. Maybe God's moving in them and wants to move in me too, and I gotta be humble enough to recognize that. Jesus rebuked the disciples in the last chapter of Mark because they did not believe the testimony of those who saw him before they did.
Jesus rebuked the disciples. I don't wanna be 1 of the his disciples that in a moment doesn't believe somebody else that sees him in that moment before I do. Amen? Amen. I wanna have the humility to acknowledge and to honor.
I wanna lead lean first to trusting. God will grow your discernment. Yeah? The power demonstration of the spirit's power Whenever you encounter the miraculous *supernatural* power of god, whenever it breaks into your world, you're responsible. The power of god forces you to respond You will either respond with belief or unbelief.
To ignore, is responding in unbelief. You're responsible and I wanna always respond with belief because unbelief hardens my own heart and lesses the chances that I'll see and experience his *kingdom* when he moves in that same way in the next time. Or a similar way. But belief opens my heart to what's god god is doing. And humility and says, lord, I wanna I wanna see you in that way and grow even more.
We live in an American cultures, western culture, American culture that for the most part, is materialistic in its worldview. Worldview meaning how it perceives the world. A materialist rules out spiritual reality and replaces it with physical material the physical material realm as reality. So, when something *supernatural* and spiritual, when a supernatural, spiritual god breaks into a material world to impact the people to show his radical love, the materialist doesn't have a box to put spiritual things. So instead, explains it away or ignores it as something that didn't really happen.
For example, my wife, 13, 14 years ago ish, diagnosed with narcolepsy, incurable on paper by 1 of the top sleep doctors in the world diagnosed with narcolepsy, Struggled with it for a lot of her life. 5 years ago, we're moving here. She's supernaturally and miraculously healed and now enters into restorative sleep and lives a normal life. Doesn't have to cope with those things anymore. But I'm giving you an example of of that **materialist mindset** when talking to a doctor about it, the doctor said, nuh-uh.
You you obviously didn't really have narcolepsy. Doesn't have a box to put the supernatural, miraculous, amazing works of god because views it. Now, that materialist view has impacted and infiltrated the Christian church in American culture. And because of it, we're crippled. A lot of the church is crippled in its ability to read scripture and not just think that it's for the sweet by and by but realize that every aspect of this book is telling me who I am in Christ Jesus and who Christ Jesus is so that I can submit my life to it and see the supernatural power of this book break into not only my life but through my life and impact the culture around.
Amen. Yeah. Amen. You clap. That's a good thing.
Praise the lord. *John-3:3*. You guys follow me so far? You getting stuff? Okay.
*John-3:3*. You've heard me say this a lot. Jesus said, unless you've been born again, you cannot see the kingdom of heaven. Okay? To see that word for to see is an original word is which doesn't matter.
It means to stare at, to discern the the physical or mental reality of. Like, it's not just to to take a glimpse of, but it's it's to behold. It's to stare at. It's to discern the the physical or mental reality of. So you cannot behold the kingdom of God in your daily life.
Stare at, gaze at the kingdom of God in your daily life unless you've been born again. Now he comes in and impacts the world. I've seen people be healed before they're born again. Seen people experience super the supernatural power of the kingdom of God in their life. They get a glimpse of it, and it draws them into relationship, or they explain it away in in unbelief and harden their own hearts to it.
Drawing them into, God's trying to draw them into being born again so that they can walk with him and experience the kingdom of God in every aspect of their life. You guys follow me? Once you've been born again, you're responsible for **training your senses** to see, behold the kingdom of God in every aspect of your life. I'm a say it again. Once you've been born again, you are responsible for training your senses to behold or to stare at, to discern the kingdom of God in every aspect of your life.
We talked about milk and meat, right? Milk is Christ crucified. We're crucified with him. It's no longer about ourselves so that we can get away with or or do away with the envy and the slander and the gossip and the malice and and all of the things that are unrighteous realizing we're the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. That's who we are.
Praise the Lord. And we see the supernatural demonstrations of his power that move us forward in faith, it's a wonderful, beautiful thing. That's all milk, and we're supposed to desire it and know it. But as we come to be born again, we're responsible for growing mature. *Hebrews-5*.
Verse 13 says, anyone who lives on milk being still an infant is not acquainted with the teaching of righteousness. You guys know that. I say that. I've said that a lot. Verse 14, but solid food, everybody solid food?
Solid food. Is for the mature who by constant use have trained themselves or trained their senses to distinguish good from evil. The Holy Spirit wants to always train your senses, but it takes partnership. It takes you listening. *Faith* comes by hearing you, hearing him speak, believing it, and then *obeying* constant use, putting into practice what he's telling you to do.
And as you constantly use, as we constantly obey day in and day out, you are training your senses to hear his spirit. Watch this. When I'm talking about the kingdom of God, a lot for a lot of people, it's just vague thing. In Romans-14:17-18, it says, the kingdom of God is not meat or drink, meaning it's not physical. The kingdom of God is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.
You guys following me so far? Okay. So it's take that little phrase in the Holy Spirit and put it at every now and there. It's righteousness in the Holy Spirit, peace in the Holy Spirit, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Therefore, the kingdom of God is in the Holy Spirit.
You're not gonna recognize the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus in you unless you've been convicted by the Holy Spirit that you're the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Right? You're not gonna experience His peace in the midst of every situation unless you have the the Holy Spirit who is the spirit of peace. It's his peace in you. You're not gonna experience the joy of God unless you're walking in the joy of the Holy Spirit.
The kingdom of God is found in the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in our daily life. It's learning to walk by the spirit day in and day out. You can't walk by the spirit if your life is all about yourself. So that's why milk of the gospel is Christ crucified and me crucified with him. So life's not all about me.
You're my Lord. Now when the Holy Spirit leads me, I can say, yes, Lord, and put that into use and grow a little more mature because I'm learning how the Holy Spirit speaks to me day in and day out. What is the message of wisdom for the mature? *1 Corinthians-2:7* says, no, we declare god's wisdom a mystery that has been hidden and god destined for our glory before time began. The message of wisdom is a myth.
It's a mystery. But it's not a mystery that we pay money to order to find out. Like Scientologists do. It's not a mystery that like a a lot of gnostics and others are are looking and searching for this mystery. It's a mystery that's been revealed.
And it's in scripture. I wanna I wanna show you what the mystery is. It's very clear. Let me tell you the meat. A lot of people have rejected the meat of the word as something that's not worth anything.
And they go looking for other meat of the word, and they get led into all kinds of crazy doctrines and and all kinds of crazy stuff because of it. No. Let me let me tell you what the meat of the word is. Go to Colossians. It's the mystery.
*Colossians-1:26-27*. The mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations but is now disclosed to the lord's people. To them, god has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery. What's the mystery? **"Christ in you"**, the hope of glory.
That's the mystery, guys. That's the meat. Guess what? The message of I, your identity in Christ is the meat of the gospel. There is no end to understanding the depth of who Christ is and who he is in you.
He is enough. Never count as worthless what God says is the meat of the mystery, the message of wisdom for the mature. I the more day in and day out, I understand who he is and who I am in him, the more I'm able to reflect his power and his glory and his goodness and become the demonstration of power to the world around me. Become the example of Christ crucified in my daily life, and then become that demonstration of power so that my life is used in order to be the supernatural encounter with God to the people around me. But that's not just for me.
This is not some super high and lofty thing that's only for the pastor. Guess what? You are all ministers of the gospel. God has made you the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. He put his spirit in you so that when you believe it and you understand that life's no longer about you, but it's about him, you begin to day in and day out obey the Holy Spirit and grow in maturity and become the example of the demonstration of power to the world around you, to your husband, to your wife, to your kids, to your job, to everywhere.
And next thing you know, are saying, give me the milk of the gospel. The demonstration of power. I wanna I wanna show you I want you to participate in this next part. And acknowledge how god has moved and honor it if if you've given as a part of real church, if you've if you've been born again, if you've given your life to Jesus, I want you to stand up and raise your hand. Yeah.
Only if you've been born again at real church. Only only if you've been born again at real church. So so if you've been born again before real church, sit back down. Okay. Kevin's like, I wanna stand.
Alright. Put your hands down. But you stay stay stay standing, If you've been born again at real church. Everybody who's been born again. Alright, good.
Wonderful. If you've experienced a physical healing whether it's on Sunday morning or in small group or through the ministry of Real Church, if you've experienced a physical healing, I want you to stand up and if you're already standing, raise your hand high. If you're standing, raise your hand. Come on. Good.
Okay. Those that those that that have experienced physical healing. If you've experienced, put your hands down. So, for each new 1, by the way, the the people raising their hand, standing and raising their hand are the ones that experienced it. If you've experienced emotional healing where god has delivered you from emotional strongholds in your life and you've been healed in that way, whether it's depression or despair or unforgiveness or, you know, whatever it was.
If you've experienced that, if you're already standing, raise your hand. If you're not standing, stand up and raise your hand. Keep it high. Keep it raised. Just so people can look around.
You're you're being a testimony of the power and demonstration of the power of the gospel. Wonderful. Alright, put your hands down. Just keep standing though. If Come on.
If if as somebody is speaking, whether it's at your small group or at church, whether it's me or 1 of the others people that we've had speak on the platform or the many amazing mighty men and women of god we have. If as somebody was speaking, you felt that god was speaking directly to your heart, cutting away stuff, or encouraging you in things that nobody could have known. It's like 1 of those, how could they have known that and you know beyond a shout, god was speaking you in that way which is the power of the gospel. Nobody can persuade that. I want you to stand up and if you're already standing, raise your hand.
If you're standing up, raise your hand. Look around. Amen? Alright, I wanna invite. If everybody would put their hands on, I wanna invite everybody to stand.
Robert and Dolores, if you guys could Oh god, we just thank you for your goodness For those of you that stood and had been standing, those of you that hadn't been standing too, all of you I beg of you, don't discount somebody else's experience in the lord but honor it, acknowledge it, because he wants to move in your lives in the same way. The power of the gospel, the power of Christ crucified, has not just spiritual results but also physical and emotional. It impacts every aspect of our lives.