For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise, according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. (27) But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; (28) and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, (29) that no flesh should glory in His presence. (30) But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God – and righteousness and sanctification and redemption – (31) that, as is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.”

The first letter to the Corinthians was written by the apostle Paul. In our verses today Paul is directing the Corinthians to look at the facts regarding their own call to Christianity; that most, (not all), called were not of high birth and education. Ancient Christians for the greater part were slaves and those of humble rank. By choosing the weak God had the greater opportunity to manifest His own power; all glory belongs to Him. Paul did not preach the wisdom of the world because God had determined to save men by Christ crucified. God acted as to take away all merit from human wisdom and power and glory – to put to shame the wise and noble. We are nothing previous to our being called even though we might be in the eyes of men; our reality is in the eyes of God.

Christ Jesus in His incarnation became to us God’s revelation of Himself which surpasses any wisdom we could have derived from nature. Men take pride in their philosophies and reasoning powers but no philosophy in the world would ever have reasoned the need for the cross – that in the death of Christ only could men be saved. Men try to work out a way of salvation through systems and rituals. The Spirit of God is far above the power of man to discover.

I’m going back to C.S.Lewis to close: “Reality, in fact, is usually something you couldn’t have guessed. That is one of the reasons I believe in Christianity. It is a religion you could not have guessed. If it offered us just the kind of universe we had always expected, I should feel we were making it up. But, in fact, it is not the sort of thing anyone would have made up. It has just that queer twist about it that real things have.”

Paul, called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother. (2) To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all who in every place call on the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours. (3) Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

The apostle Paul wrote the first letter to the Corinthians. This was an occasional letter to the faithful, written because of problems in the church at Corinth and in in defense of his apostolic calling. Paul was an apostle by the will of God – An apostle was one who had seen the Lord and proclaimed His message and Paul had seen Christ on the road to Damascus. The Will of God had made him God’s chosen vessel. Also, The Corinthians would know the name of Sosthenes as he was the former powerful and respected head of the synagogue in Corinth who became a believer in Christ and had continued on with Paul when he left Corinth for Ephesus.

The church in Corinth was founded by Paul on his second missionary journey; his ministry there began in the synagogue where as a Rabbi he was invited to speak and preached the fulfillment of the Old Testament promises and prophesies in the Messiah, Jesus Christ. Most of the Jews resisted the gospel and Paul declared that he was parting from the Jews and the synagogue and would in the future be known as the apostle to the Gentiles. The time had come to give clear testimony.

Corinth was a pagan culture and many believers were unwilling to divorce themselves from their old selfish immoral ways. It became necessary for Paul to write to correct this. It is believed that there was an earlier corrective letter which has been lost. In 1st Corinthians Paul teaches on many doctrines that directly relate to matters of sin and righteousness. Wrong living stems from wrong beliefs. In the moment of trust in Jesus Christ, God separated the faithful and sets them/us unto Himself in Christ. That moment we were sanctified and that sanctification is a perfect one.

If indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given me for you, (3) how by that revelation He made known to me the mystery (as I have briefly written already),….(5) which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to His holy apostles and prophets: (6) that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel,

The letter to the Ephesians was written by the apostle Paul. Paul received the office of apostleship by direct revelation from Jesus Christ (not by hearsay) concerning the purpose of redemption. It was not attainable by human reason. The special mystery was the union of Jews and Gentiles as joint partakers of the promise of redemption. This union was frequently predicted by the ancient prophets but was not revealed so fully or clearly as under the gospel.

The mystery of the new dispensation that Gentiles are fellow heirs with the Jews, formerly thought the calling of Gentiles in the Old Testament led to the general impression that they were to partake by becoming Jews merged into the old theocracy which was to remain in all its peculiarities. But in the Day of Pentecost it was revealed that the old theocracy itself was to be abolished and a new form introduced designed and adapted for all mankind. There was no more distinction between Jews and Gentiles who now have the same rights to inheritance – all benefits of the covenant of grace, knowledge of truth, justification, adoption, sanctification; indwelling of the Spirit and life everlasting.

Christ Himself is the great mystery of godliness – God manifested in the flesh. He is the revelation of the secret purpose of God which had been hid. The whole plan of salvation designated the mystery of Christ includes far more than the Gentiles were fellow citizens of saints. The only essential and indispensable condition of participation in the benefits of redemption is union with Christ. This union is brought about by the gospel ; not by birth, outward rite, union with an external body but the gospel received and appropriated by faith that we are united to Christ and thus made heirs of God. Wow.

But when fulness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, (5) to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive adoption as sons. (6) And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out “Abba, Father!” (8) Therefore you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.

The letter to the Galatians was written by the apostle Paul. The Galatians had fallen back from a spiritual system to a material system; from faith in the promise to the law – from freedom to constraint. Freedom is treated directly in the first seven verses of chapter 4. At a time predetermined by God His Son was sent forth; Born of woman and born under the Law – true God and true man – born into a state where all was subject to the law and He was destined to put an end to the Law. He was born to redeem, at the price of His death, both Jew and Gentile from condemnation under the Law and also from bondage and constraint which it’s severe discipline involved that we might receive adoption as sons/daughters. As children of God we have access to God – it is not us who speaks but the Spirit in us by virtue of our adoption. By this redemption, adoption and gift of the Spirit the old state of servitude and minority is past. The Christian is admitted as an heir within – not by any merits of his/her own but by the redemption and adoption by God.

Christ did not come into the world for the purpose of teaching the law but His coming was the abolition of the Law, of sin and death. That God adopted us is due to the merit of Jesus Christ, Son of God, who redeemed us. Early on the visible outpourings of the Spirit were necessary as were miracles but spiritual renewal may not be conspicuous today but be seen by our better judgment and unashamed confession of Christ. The Gospel commands us to look away from our own good works to the promises of God in Christ for our salvation. We are not heirs by accomplishment but by virtue of new birth, in faith in Christ. We are mere recipients. Man cannot know God by his own efforts. God of His grace revealed Himself to man.

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, (2)has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom He also made the worlds; (3) who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, (4) having become so much better than the angels, as He has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. (5) For to which of the angels did He ever say: “You are My Son, Today I have begotten You”? And again: “I will be to Him a Father And He shall be to Me a Son”? (6) But when He again brings the firstborn into the world, He says: “Let all the angels of God worship Him”.

The author to the the Hebrews is unknown. It has a strongly Jewish character and was written to strengthen the faith of wavering believers. It is a book about the person of Jesus Christ – Son of God, Son of Man – who by His blood has brought us into God’s presence. Our verses pull together the teaching of the Old Testament and the New Testament. This letter has an abrupt beginning; no words of introduction or thanksgiving or praise. It begins with doctrinal foundation upon which all rests; the old ways not complete nor final but here God is the speaker of His Son the Messiah – as such is His relationship as eternally the Son of God taking on the form of man, making purification for our sins. Christ Jesus is the first begotten by His resurrection from the dead. He is the heir to all things as He created all things – all things in heaven and earth are His, by Him and for Him. Christ Jesus makes the invisible god visible.

From Adam to the incarnation God has been speaking to man. But now, in the fullness of God’s time God has spoken to us, not through human agency, but in the Person of the Son. The Son is one with the Father and with the Spirit. All are co-equal and co-eternal. When the Son became incarnated He had been from eternity but He took humanity into union with deity. Jesus was not a Jewish man, He is God Himself come into space and time – He came into the world in flesh reconciling the world to Himself. In Christianity alone do we learn God became Man and this for redemption. This is the message of Christmas.

it is easy to get caught up in matters not important in the light of eternity- procrastination can be eternally fatal. We are either drifting with regard to our salvation because of neglect or we are GROWING because of our deliberate effort or attention. Nobody grows by accident. Salvation is the one thing every person needs more than anything else. Outside of Christ Jesus every sinner (all of us) is under God’s condemnation. Salvation comes to us from the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. He is God’s final word to us.