The Message of the Cross

“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: ‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, And bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.’” (1 Corinthians 1:18-19 NKJV)

What is the condition of the world? The world is in complete darkness and confusion to the knowledge of man though it says exactly the opposite. It seems that the world knows a lot about humanity through the study of the arts and science and technology. Imagine the volume of library in the world, it’s mind-blowing. Just think about your hard disk how many documents stored in it. There are much progress and achievements made in sciences and technologies. There is no doubt about it.

However, there is zero progress in the morality of human. Wars, fights, genocide, sectarian violence, gang cruelty, suicides, rapes, murders, abductions, human trafficking, prostitutes, adulteries, fornications, pornography, poverty, vandalism, class collisions, discriminations, abuses, drug addictions, alcohol problems, prejudices are still rampant in every countries and societies. If it were not called the mess and chaos, what would it be? 

Humans are lost and fallen from the beginning. No matter how hard the world intelligence tries to fix it, it is not avail. Why? It’s because the way to fix the human problem is the way of the cross which is foolishness to the eyes of the perishing. The message of the cross is the death of Christ with blood. To the intellectual minds of the world it is the total defeat and failure. The world expected Christ to conquer the enemies and build a kingdom of the earth with the military might and power. 

But the enemies of humans are not other humans. The enemy is the devil, the fallen angelic being, who rebelled against God from the beginning. He is the murderer and the father of lie, the mastermind of deception. The message of the cross is to destroy the lie of the devil. Christ became the ransom sacrifice for the price of sin, the deep entrenched enemy in humans. 

The message of the cross directly denounces the lie that humans can solve the problem of humans by themselves. It’s the power of God to those who are being saved. Prophet Isaiah prophesied, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, And bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.” 

The message of the cross is the wisdom of God because the resurrection follows after the cross. The enemy of humans is put to death on the cross. Pride and selfishness are put to death on the cross. Then a new life comes into our hearts, eternal life out of the throne of grace. Happy is the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.