As human beings, am I correct to say that if we are going to believe in something we want to have a certain amount of confidence that it is true? Would you agree? Have you ever believed something whole-heartedly only to later find out that it was completely untrue? That happens all the time, right? My organizational style quite often is that when I go to put something away, I put it in the place that I believe will be an easy place for me to find it the next time I am looking for it. And, let me tell you, I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve hunted for an item for a long time, all the while thinking, “I know I put it away somewhere I thought would be easy to find. But where is it?” Now, that’s a pretty silly example. But we do a similar thing with our more hardcore beliefs: politics, religion, money, relationships. And sometimes we even go a step further. We believe in something despite very strong evidence of its truth or even sometimes in the face of proof of falsehood.

So then, where would faith in Christ lie for you on that spectrum? Are you fully confident of the truth of Christ’s life, death on a cross, and resurrection from the dead? Could you imagine learning something that would shake that faith for you? We are in the midst of a sermon series on the “Great Ends of the Church,” which are 6 statements about what the Presbyterian Church believes are important points of faith in the church. And we are on number 4 this week, which is “the preservation of the truth.” It is important that we cling to what is true. The Apostle Paul talks to the Corinthians about those who doubt his faith in Christ, particularly his belief that salvation came through Jesus’ death on the cross. And he makes it clear that the cross is central to his faith. He calls it the “power of God.” But he also says something interesting about a belief in God’s work on the cross. He says, “For Jews ask for signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to gentiles.” The center of the Christian faith looks to others like a stumbling block and foolishness. As we think about “the preservation of the truth,” I want to dig a little deeper into these words of Paul.

In particular, I want to look at two words that Paul uses in these verses. First, I want to consider for a moment the word Paul uses that is translated for us as “stumbling block.” The word in Greek is skandalon, which is the word from which we get our word “scandal.” Now, you know what a scandal is, right? How would you define the word scandal? Webster’s Dictionary defines scandal as “a circumstance or action that offends propriety or established moral conceptions or disgraces those associated with it.” So, the Jews are offended by what Paul and the other Christians are saying about the crucifixion of Jesus. They don’t like it. They view it as scandalous. Now, for us, this is the center of our faith, so maybe we don’t understand why someone would view it as scandalous. But let’s take a moment and try to consider this from the perspective of a first century Jew.

The Jews believed that a Messiah, a savior, was coming to conquer the foreign nation that was oppressing them and making them into strangers in their own land. They longed for the “good ole days” of King David’s reign, when Israel as a nation was strong and thriving. The Messiah, they believed, was coming to return them to that position of power. So then, this Jesus who came and died on a cross like a common criminal was the farthest thing from what they believed a Messiah should be. A Messiah was supposed to be strong and regal and triumphant. And being crucified by Rome did not look like any of those things. So for Christians to then claim Jesus as the Messiah and to proclaim that his death on the cross was in fact all of those things (strong and regal and triumphant)? Well, I think you can see how the Jews might have seen those claims as quite scandalous. In fact, the Apostle Paul himself, prior to his encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus, believed so strongly that the claims about Jesus were scandalous that he was killing those who proclaimed those things. The cross of Christ and the belief that Jesus’ death saves us was most definitely a scandal to the Jews…and is to this day.

Which brings us to the second word Paul uses that I wanted to point out. That is the word that we have in our translation as “foolishness.” This is the Greek moria, the root of which is moros, from which we get our word “moron.” A moron is defined by Merriam-Webster as a “foolish or stupid person.” So, Paul is saying that to the Gentiles, Christians looked like foolish or stupid people for their beliefs regarding Jesus and his crucifixion. Now, why would the Gentiles feel that way? Well, the Gentiles were all the folks who weren’t Jews. That encompassed a wide variety of people. But most of the ones Paul encountered would probably have been Romans or those living in the Roman Empire and thus abiding mostly by Roman rule. In the Roman Empire, the emperor was Lord. And here was Jesus who was a Jew, and who some even claimed to be a Jewish king, but he was crucified as a criminal by Rome. And here these Christians are worshiping him. To the Romans, it had to look ridiculous…worshiping a dead criminal. That would have made no sense to the Romans or anyone else outside of Judaism.

So the Jews viewed Christians as scandalous and the Gentiles viewed Christians as moronic. Yet this is the faith that has been passed down to us. We still believe in the salvation of humanity by Christ through his death on the cross. We still proclaim him to be king and worship him. We lift him up as strong and regal and triumphant. We still proclaim the same gospel that Paul did, nearly 2000 years later. And there are still those today who see what we believe as scandalous and moronic. Specifically the belief that Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead to save us. And we can argue that it’s in fact NOT scandalous and NOT foolish. Or we can embrace the fact that we believe something that is a bit dubious and enigmatic. That is not to say that it is not also true. But as we talked about at the beginning of this sermon, we sometimes believe things that are mysterious and lacking solid evidence. And perhaps it is the mystery of it that makes it all the more true.

If we believe only in a God that we can understand fully, then we are believing in a God who is less than us. Let me explain what I mean by that. If we look around at the world and we look for things that we fully understand. What might they be? A speck of dust? A rock? Maybe a well-studied animal? I don’t know about you, but I certainly don’t fully understand other people. I don’t even fully understand myself. So, if God can be fully understood and explained, then God must be something less than us. Is that a God we would want to believe in? Is that a God who could save us? I don’t really think so. So, we want a God that is bigger than us, more than us. And that sort of God would be mysterious, difficult to understand. And that God would do things that are beyond our comprehension, things that we might look at and see them as scandalous or foolish. But that is simply because God is bigger than us and does things we can’t comprehend. But isn’t that the sort of God we want? A big God who can do for us what we can’t do for ourselves? We need a God who is mysterious. We need a God who does big things for us, things that may look scandalous and foolish, but are for our benefit.

That is the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is scandalous and foolish, but it is also beyond amazing and for our benefit. We shouldn’t worry about defending it, but rather embrace the mystery of it. For in that mystery is a big God who is strong and regal and triumphant. And that is a God worth celebrating and worshiping. That is a God who can save us. And that is a God that I for one would want to put my faith in. And I believe that that is the God and Father of Jesus Christ, who died on a cross for us and rose from the grave to give us eternal life. It may be scandalous and foolish, but it is also amazing and wonderful! Praise God for this amazing truth!