The First Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians

⭑ Unlocked Dynamic Bible :: World English Bible Catholic ⭑

- Chapter 2 -

When I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not make beautiful speeches, nor did I repeat to you the things that wise men said. I told you the hidden truths about God.

I decided not to talk to you about anything other than Jesus Christ and his death on the cross.

You know how weak I was when I was with you. You know that fear filled my heart, and that you saw me trembling in terror.

But you heard my message, and you know that when I spoke to you I did not give carefully planned speeches. Instead, the Spirit of God showed you that I was speaking the truth because of the power of the miracles he did through me.

I taught this way so you might trust in God because of his power, and not because of anything having to do with human wisdom.

Spiritual Wisdom

(Ephesians 1:15–23)

Now it is to those who trust fully in Messiah that we speak. You now have wisdom, and that wisdom has nothing to do with the kings and governors in this life, all of whom will soon pass away.

No, we proclaim wisdom that God has kept hidden until now; that wisdom is the wise things God decided to do before he created the world, and he decided to do those things so that he and other beings would someday honor us.

None of those who rule this world knew about God’s wise plans. If they had understood them, they never would have nailed the Lord, the one who is so very great, to the cross.

But in the scriptures it says: “The things that no one has seen, that no one has heard, and that no one could imagine, these are what God has prepared for those who love him.”

These are the very things that God has shown us by the Spirit. For the Spirit sees everything and he knows everything. He even knows the deepest and hidden secrets that only God knows about himself.

No one except the spirit of the person knows what he is thinking. So it is that no one knows the hidden things of God except the Spirit of God.

The Spirit that God gave us is not a spirit that comes from this world. We received the Spirit who comes from God. This Spirit helps us understand all the gifts God freely gives to us.

We teach these lessons that people schooled in the wisdom of this world cannot understand. These lessons are taught only by the Spirit of God. He helps us understand what these lessons mean.

The one who does not know God cannot accept these spiritual lessons. To him they sound like the lessons of fools. Even if he wanted to accept them, he would be unable to, because only people who have the wisdom that comes from God can understand these things.

The one who knows God evaluates all matters, but God will not accept their evaluation of him.

As one of our prophets wrote: “It is impossible for anyone to know all that is in the mind of the Lord. No one is able to teach God.” But we can know the very thoughts of Messiah.

When I came to you, brothers, I didn’t come with excellence of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God.

For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling.

My speech and my preaching were not in persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power,

that your faith wouldn’t stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

Spiritual Wisdom

(Ephesians 1:15–23)

We speak wisdom, however, among those who are full grown, yet a wisdom not of this world nor of the rulers of this world who are coming to nothing.

But we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the wisdom that has been hidden, which God foreordained before the worlds for our glory,

which none of the rulers of this world has known. For had they known it, they wouldn’t have crucified the Lord of glory.

But as it is written, “Things which an eye didn’t see, and an ear didn’t hear, which didn’t enter into the heart of man, these God has prepared for those who love him.”(a)

But to us, God revealed them through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.

For who among men knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so, no one knows the things of God except God’s Spirit.

But we received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is from God, that we might know the things that were freely given to us by God.

We also speak these things, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual things.

Now the natural man doesn’t receive the things of God’s Spirit, for they are foolishness to him; and he can’t know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

But he who is spiritual discerns all things, and he himself is to be judged by no one.

“For who has known the mind of the Lord that he should instruct him?” (b) But we have Christ’s mind.

Footnotes

(a)2:9 ℘ Isaiah 64:4

(b)2:16 ℘ Isaiah 40:13