Chapter 12—The World by Wisdom Knew not God
The truth of God is infinite, capable of measureless expansion,
and the more we contemplate it, the more will its glory appear. The
truth has been opened before us, and yet the words of Paul to the
Galatians are applicable to us. He says: “O foolish Galatians, who
hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose
eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?
This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of
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the law, or by the hearing of faith? are ye so foolish? having begun in
the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh? have ye suffered so
many things in vain? if it be yet in vain.” [
Galatians 3:1-4
.]
“Without me,” Christ says, “ye can do nothing.” [
John 15:5
.] Those
who undertake to carry forward the work in their own strength will
certainly fail. Education alone will not fit a man for a place in the
work, will not enable him to obtain a knowledge of God. Hear what
Paul has say on this matter: “For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to
preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ
should be made of none effect. 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.” [
1
Corinthians 1:17-21
.]
Through successive ages of darkness, in the midnight of hea-
thenism, God permitted men to try the experiment of finding out
God by their own wisdom, not to demonstrate their inability to his
satisfaction, but that men themselves might see that they could not
obtain a knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ his Son, save through
the revelation of his word by the Holy Spirit. When Christ came to
the world, the experiment had been fully tried, and the result made it
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