For Christ did not send me to baptize but
to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of
Christ be emptied of its power. For the word of the cross is folly to those who
are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God… For the
foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than
men…
Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom,
although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are
doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God
decreed before the ages for our glory…
1 Corinthians 1:17-2:8
To resume
last weekend’s theme, Babylon has influenced all of history: as the first major
world empire influencing the thinking of all the empires that followed and as a system, symbolised by a prostitute,
that dominates nations. I illustrated the second way with reference to Dr Who:
over 50 years, the Doctor has been played by many actors who have looked very
different to each other and behaved differently but they have all been the same
person. Similarly, Babylon has appeared in history in different guises but is
essentially the same system. (Click here to link to the sermon about this that I mentioned last week.)
In his
first letter, St Peter refers to Babylon and many think is a coded reference to
Rome, which it may well have been, but it could just as well have been a reference
to many other cities at the time. One of these cities was Corinth.
Corinth
was one of the largest cities in the Roman Empire, a major Greek port on an
important trade route. It had a reputation for intellectualism, sexual
immorality and financial corruption. The people were known for their wealth and
extravagance. There was a saying in the Empire, ‘Do it like a Corinthian!’, which
meant that the people there knew how to enjoy themselves to excess.
When St
Paul arrived at Corinth in about 53 AD, he founded a church and stayed for 18
months or so. Four or five years later, Paul heard about the spiritual decline
among the Christians. He asked Apollos to visit and he returned with the news
that the situation was as bad as reported. The two letters that Paul wrote to
the church, that are included in the New Testament, deal with a range of practical
issues about daily living.
The root
of the problems was that the church, influenced by Corinthian society, was
reasoning more like Greek philosophers than Christian theologians. Paul therefore
begins by explaining how we can know what is true and right – and it is not by human
wisdom! As Paul states in the extract at the start of today’s Reflection, the
wisdom of God is far higher than human wisdom, and even seems folly to ‘wise’
humans. This is because the way of life in ‘Babylon’ is very different to how
it ought to be in the world created by God.
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Scripture
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