This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Philippians” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, February 28, 1993.
This morning we are reading, first of all, from 1 Corinthians. This is 1 Corinthians chapter 1, and we begin at verse 18. Let us hear the Word of God. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.
For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God.
It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness. But unto them which are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God.
Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For ye see, your calling, brethren, that how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty. And the base things of the world, and things which are despised, God hath chosen yea, and the things which are not. to bring to naught things that are, that no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, that according as it is written, he that gloryeth Let him more.
And then from Philippians chapter four. Verses ten through thirteen. But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly. But now at the last. Your care for me hath flourished again, wherein ye were also careful, but ye lacked opportunity. Not that I speak in respect of that, for I have learned, in whatever state I am, therewith to be content. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound everywhere, and in all things I am instructed, both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Our God. We know of the greatness of your word. Surely the greatness of Christ, the living word, convinces us of this. What a power.
What a protection. your children in various places in this world, then turning to your word and receiving in that word incomparable blessing. People in Eastern Africa, people in Eastern Europe, peoples throughout Asia, where the stand for the gospel is costly and where some have even given their lives for the sake of Christ. The truth of your word is more important to your people than anything else. Some of your people then have been constrained to live with the threat of terror day by day and the awesome threat of terrorism. Now, Lord, may well be that our own land will be struck not just once but repeatedly by such terrorist attacks. As far as we are concerned, may we stand with our brothers and sisters throughout the world upon the word of God, having settled the matter of our own future. Though there is the fear, may there also be the confidence that your people are secure. May this fact dawn upon many that they may turn from their sin, and embrace Jesus Christ. We ask it in Jesus’ name. Amen.
In the 5th century BC, About the time that Malachi the prophet was ministering in Jerusalem to the West, the glorious golden vision of Greek culture had suffered incredible and devastating reversal. Now that incredible and devastating reversal came as a result of a 30-year war, the so-called Peloponnesian War, the struggles that took place between the great Greek city-states, first Athens and Sparta, but then later on Thebes brought into the fray. Now, out of the ashes of that conflict, there arose the attempt to revive the old order, the glory days.
The philosopher Plato, in the next century, the fourth century B.C., became the master architect for the rebuilding of the Republic. That, in fact, was the title of one of his works. Plato used as his model the teachings of his enigmatic master, Socrates. Socrates and Plato were those who had been overtaken by, then, the destruction of a world which they had revered.
Their hope was, with respect to corporate life, the life of the people in community, one with another. But at the same time, Ironically, Socrates and those who came after him put in motion the modern world. And particularly, they put in motion the modern world through the discovery of the individual.
Now, regardless of the content of Socrates’ philosophy, a subject about which there continues to be speculation and intense debate, this much is certain. He had isolated the thinking personality and saw this isolation as the necessary and reasonable conclusion to the search for virtue. After all, virtue itself is knowledge. That is, knowledge personally, individually held, arrived at by way of careful individual and personal definition.
Plato, Socrates’ student, may well have worked hard for the revival of the Greek city-state. However, at the same time, he deepened the individualism of his teacher and mentor. Above all, Plato expressed his unswerving faith in the capacity of the individual human mind to attain to absolute truth, and to use that truth for the reasonable direction of all human life and affairs. Now, after Plato, there came Aristotle. Plato’s pupil. And he would press the insights and the conclusions of Plato further.
He would do so in the interests of the demands of rigorous logic and the scientific method. A method which he boasted capable of granting the individual a comprehensive knowledge of all the affairs of life. Now, of course, at the center of things, there was this individualism, but In all honesty, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle each believed their positions to be in line with society’s best ambitions and finest aspirations. But not all of those who followed along this trail from these great philosophers were so positive about the certainties into which philosophy could lead the individual thinking personality. Nor were they especially high on the value of community life, as if it were then a sort of conglomeration of fine and inspired individual thinking personalities, all reputable to be sure.
The skeptics essentially said this, get serious. How do you know what’s true and right? Who do you think you are, anyway? I don’t care if your name is Property. And with that attitude, they basically dropped out. But you will note that the skeptics assumed the arguments of those that they were attempting to refute. Since they were perfectly confident and sure that there could be no confidence and certainty. There were also the cynics. They were led by Diogenes. In response to the classic philosophers, they took it upon themselves to re-educate the world to the glories of barbarism. The story is told about Diogenes. He was eating one day and observed a fellow eating with his hands. Diogenes, however, was eating with a fork. decided then and there that he was a slave of custom and threw his fork away.
Why should I let propriety, custom, and convention determine for me what’s right and wrong? These, however, also assume the basic point that had been established by the great philosophers human personality individually was at the center. They concluded, though, that this human individual personality has no authority outside of itself whatsoever, and was bound then to express itself, if it were to be true to itself, according to its own nature. and therefore convention and the restrictions of society must be cast to the wind. Truly, the virtuous life was that life lived independent of all factors and events external to the human personality. Now, this rather raw approach to life, you can see, had to be countered. had to be tamed down if it was going to sell in the marketplace. And that task was left to the stillers.
They too were disillusioned by the collapse of the former Greek city-states. They too believed in the autonomy of the human personality and with the skeptics and the cynics declared their independence from all external factors and events. But their interest was not in a resignation before what they determined to be the unknowable, as was the case of the skeptics, nor was their response a militant assault upon the standards of society. as we see in the cynics, rather their interest as expressed in their leader, a fellow by the name of Zeno, was personal happiness that could be attained only by way of rigorous self-discipline through which the individual could gain mastery over his passions and emotions and become oblivious to external events and factors. your personal world may be crumbling. In fact, the entire world may be going to hell. No mind, all is well inside in your world of placid tranquility.
Well, as you know, the hopes of the philosophers were not realized, the Greek glories were not revived, although the influence of Greek culture was spread far and wide, strangely, by a barbarian named Alexander. This meant then that the insights of the Greeks, the commitments of the Greeks, would survive the Greeks themselves. Beyond Alexander’s empire and its collapse, there would rise the Roman Colossus. And interestingly, in that context, the power of the philosophers continued. Oh yes! for the greater good. Nevertheless, always from the foundation of the independent, autonomous human personality, which had the right inherently to define everything, means then that the power of the philosophers persisted. And specifically, the powers of the Stoics continue.
For the Stoical philosophy had a particular champion among the Romans, a figure no less than Cicero. Because of Cicero then admired throughout the empire, and particularly in the world of the first century, The century in which our Savior lived, the century in which Paul presently writes, admired throughout the empire was the individual ability to stand unperturbed and aloof in the face of all crisis. Essentially unaffected by events and factors. be it the collapse of your city, or the destruction of the empire, or even death itself.
Now, on a casual look, it might appear as if the apostle himself had drunk deeply of the wine of stoicism. On the surface of things, it may appear as if, well, here is one individual who has definitely mastered the Grimm and Barrett philosophy of Zeno and Cicero. After all, here’s one by his own testimony who seemed to be oblivious to the unfortunate things that were overtaking him. He was in chains, he was in bonds, he was in prison presently. Here is one who seemed to be implacable in the face of death.
Here is one who said, in fact, Using apparently stoic vocabulary to say it, I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.” As if he had lifted it right out of a text from Zena, or Sister Rose. He expands on it a bit in the following verse. We are here in Philippians 4, 11 and 12. language is a bit expanded in the twelfth verse and includes something more than just stoical impressions, but he states, there I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry simultaneously.
Was Paul then stoical? Had Paul been in some sense embrace the spirit of his age? Had he taken in, breath by breath, the atmosphere that permeated the Roman world at that time? Had he mastered, even maybe better than the philosophers themselves, their philosophy? Was he better at their game than they were? All the Stoics?
No. In fact, in these very verses, we are face-to-face with a masterful reputation of that very philosophy. Now, recognize that that philosophy had understandably gained ground in the Roman Empire as the empire began to show signs of age and of unraveling, crumbling even. In addition to that, and as far as the Christians at Philippi were concerned, this philosophy with its individualism and its inwardness was beginning to look more and more attractive to them, especially in light of the hostility that they were presently experiencing at the hands of the Empire.
How am I going to protect myself? psychologically, emotionally. How am I going to protect myself? I need a philosopher. So why not Sisley? Christianity is fine as far as it goes. I mean, I really enjoy the message of the cross. Forgiveness of sins to be found there, the promise of resurrection and eternal life. But I need something presently that will help me cope. Paul is indeed calm and serene. He is a man who can say with all integrity that he knows the peace of God, verse seven of that fourth chapter, and that he also knows the God of peace, verse nine of that chapter.
But Paul is anything but a self-centered, self-assured stoic, advertising his personal self-sufficient imperturbability. That doesn’t happen to be the content. As a matter of fact, this man isn’t even implacable. He seems visibly moved and expressive. His emotion seemingly without restraint, he says in the tenth verse of that fourth chapter, he rejoices greatly. That’s not the language of the story. They don’t do such things.
Not only that, he calls the Philippians repeatedly to do the same. Rejoice in the Lord always and again, I say. And what we do with the sarcasm we find in the next two verses, verses eleven and twelve. Paul goes after the Philippians because he wants to goad them. They attempted to think more of their gift to him than they ought to. But his sarcasm in those verses is hardly the kind of thing that would appeal to Stoics. because it both expresses and invites too much emotion. And finally, and most importantly, that thirteenth verse. Above all, Paul’s sufficiency is in no sense in himself.
Instead, it is in Him. That is, it is in Christ. The King James Version at this point does us the favor of supplying the word Christ. Our modern translations don’t carry that through. That that is in fact the one who is in you. But as well as the King James does with regard to that, in supplying for us the word Christ, it doesn’t quite go far enough. We might misunderstand the preposition. The preposition through. The actual preposition in the Greek is in. You see what the Apostle then is saying. He is saying that he can do all things in Christ, that is, in vital union with Christ, who strengthens him.
In other words, what the Apostle is saying before these Philippians, tempted though they may be by the stoicism of the Roman world, as the answer to their problems. What the Apostle is actually setting before these Philippians is just the opposite of that philosophy. He has not then one turned in upon himself in order that he might find a haven in which he would ever be protected from all those threatening events and factors of life. Rather, Paul is turned out.
He is finding the foundation for all definition, for all meaning outside of himself. He is turning out toward Christ for the sake of union with this One. And note this one to whom he is turned. He is turned to the one who is himself turned out for Paul. For union with him and all who would, in fact, confess a similar confession. unto the end of a consummate, glorious world of heavenly order.
It is now that we begin to understand that the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is revealing for us a full range of effectiveness and application. Oh yes, it will deal with those Judaistic aspects that come and flatten the Church, dragging the Church back into a world of external form and ritualistic performance. A world that then imposes carnal works upon the conscience of God’s people with a message of salvation by works. But it won’t be merely for the sake of addressing those Jewish aspects. No, there is the comprehensiveness to the message of the gospel. It will also deal with the self-satisfied philosophers and their philosophies, who turn in upon themselves and make themselves the source and the foundation of all predication. Not just Jewish religionists, but Greek philosophers. Those Greek philosophers, in the end, so turning inward that the very existence of God becomes a moot point, and hardly relevant.
Who needs them? We are told repeatedly then by the Apostle Paul in his writings that these philosophers and their philosophies then will have nothing but outward contempt. Nothing but contempt rather for the outward turn that is evident in Jesus Christ who died for sins. Here is the height of foolishness. And this foolishness is compounded immeasurably by the life of those who would follow after this Jesus, who would themselves give up their lives, turning outward in self-sacrifice for the sake of others.
The philosophers say, Along with the Stoics, I can do all things in and through myself, I being the source of my own strength. We said, with the Apostle Paul, I can do all things through and in vital union with Christ, who strengthens me. If there is to be boast for us, O Lord, may we boast in you. If there is to be that quest for the foundation of all definition and meaning, may we hold fast to our Savior, that we would have truly a Christian philosophy grounded in Jesus Christ, who is the theoretical wisdom of God. Oh Lord, how your wisdom is made plain in this one who died for us, and was raised for our justification on the third day. May we stand with Him, but more, may we stand in Him. Amen.
The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.