1 Corinthians 2
2
My Message: Jesus Christ on the Cross
1Dear brothers and sisters, when I came to you, I told you the secret truth of God. But I did not use fancy words or great wisdom. 2I decided that while I was with you I would forget about everything except Jesus Christ and his death on the cross. 3When I came to you, I was weak and shook with fear. 4My teaching and my speaking were not with wise words that persuade people. But the proof of my teaching was the power that the Spirit gives. 5I did this so that your faith would be in God’s power, not in human wisdom.
God’s Wisdom
6We teach wisdom to people who are mature, but the wisdom we teach is not from this world. It is not the wisdom of the rulers of this world, who are losing their power. 7But we speak God’s secret wisdom that has been hidden from everyone until now. God planned this wisdom for our glory. He planned it before the world began. 8None of the rulers of this world understood this wisdom. If they had understood it, they would not have killed our great and glorious Lord on a cross. 9But as the Scriptures say,
“No one has ever seen,
no one has ever heard,
no one has ever imagined
what God has prepared for those who love him.” Isaiah 64:4
10But God has shown us these things through the Spirit.
The Spirit knows all things. The Spirit even knows the deep secrets of God. 11It is like this: No one knows the thoughts that another person has. Only the person’s spirit that lives inside knows those thoughts. It is the same with God. No one knows God’s thoughts except God’s Spirit. 12We received the Spirit that is from God, not the spirit of the world. We received God’s Spirit so that we can know all that God has given us.
13When we say this, we don’t use words taught to us by human wisdom. We use words taught to us by the Spirit. We use the Spirit’s words to explain spiritual truths. 14People who do not have God’s Spirit do not accept the things that come from his Spirit. They think these things are foolish. They cannot understand them, because they can only be understood with the Spirit’s help. 15We who have the Spirit are able to make judgments about all these things. But anyone without the Spirit is not able to make proper judgments about us. 16As the Scriptures say,
“Who can know what is on the Lord’s mind?
Who is able to give him advice?” Isaiah 40:13
But we have been given Christ’s way of thinking.
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© 1987, 2004 Bible League International
1 Corinthians 2
2
Proclaiming Christ Crucified
1When I came to you, brothers and sisters,#2.1 Gk brothers I did not come proclaiming the mystery#2.1 Other ancient authorities read testimony of God to you in lofty words or wisdom. 2For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. 3And I came to you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. 4My speech and my proclamation were not with plausible words of wisdom,#2.4 Other ancient authorities read the persuasiveness of wisdom but with a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God.
The True Wisdom of God
6Yet among the mature we do speak wisdom, though it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to perish. 7But we speak God's wisdom, secret and hidden, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. 8None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. 9But, as it is written,
“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
nor the human heart conceived,
what God has prepared for those who love him”—
10these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11For what human being knows what is truly human except the human spirit that is within? So also no one comprehends what is truly God's except the Spirit of God. 12Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit that is from God, so that we may understand the gifts bestowed on us by God. 13And we speak of these things in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual things to those who are spiritual.#2.13 Or interpreting spiritual things in spiritual language, or comparing spiritual things with spiritual
14Those who are unspiritual#2.14 Or natural do not receive the gifts of God's Spirit, for they are foolishness to them, and they are unable to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 15Those who are spiritual discern all things, and they are themselves subject to no one else's scrutiny.
16“For who has known the mind of the Lord
so as to instruct him?”
But we have the mind of Christ.
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New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989 Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. Used by permission. All rights reserved.