Everlasting October 29, 2025 Devotional

1 CORINTHIANS 1:20-21 | ²⁰ Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scholar? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? ²¹ For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of the proclamation, to save those who believe.

Paul is here referencing a brutal reality: the wise of his day misunderstood and were continuing to misunderstand the truth about Jesus. The Jewish scribes failed to identify Him as their long awaited Messiah and rejected His ministry, leading to His execution. Greeks saw death, humiliation, and suffering as incompatible with the divine nature, rather than a revelation of it.

Both groups were hobbled by narrow perspectives about how God would or could act. Today, many gifted intellectuals can be similarly deluded. They specialize in narrow disciplines and lack a broader view; they acquiesce in tribal and group thinking, and they follow intellectual fashions. They also underestimate the limitations we discussed earlier in the week.

Whom do you identify as wise?

Gracious God,

Grant me common sense. Demystify for me, the intellectual fads of today. Grant me a critical view of current wisdom.

Amen.