Why Unbelievers Can't Understand the Bible — 1 Corinthians 2 Explained

Welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Let's go right back to where we left off in our last program, and that'll be in I Corinthians chapter 2, and we'll jump right in at verse 14. We may review verse 13 again, but anyway in that area, 13-14. Again for all of you joining us on television, we trust that you realize we're just an informal Bible study. We have no axe to grind, we're not trying to put one group up over another or under another, but we just like to help people study the Bible, enjoy Bible reading, and that's what's so encouraging to us when people write, that for the first time in their life they're enjoying their Bible. Well that's as it should be, and of course I think the number one criteria for understanding the Scriptures is to separate God's dealing with Israel from His dealing with the Gentile body of Christ. Now then, I guess I should announce this time that all our past programs are available on videos. We now have 25, this particular set of programs will be in number 26, and 25 of them have already been transcribed into the little books. Each set of programs is 12 on a 6 hour tape, and then each tape has been transcribed so every little book is also the 12 programs, and it�s word for word just like it comes from here. In fact I had a letter yesterday that said, �Les I can read your book and close my eyes and I can just hear you saying it.� Well that�s the way we want it to be, and so we trust that you can read it in that light. Now let�s go on to verse 14, and remember the whole theme of this chapter 2 especially is comparing the wisdom of men, against the things that are of the wisdom of God. And that�s where we have to understand that this book is a closed book to the unbeliever. He cannot comprehend it, it�s beyond him, it goes over his head. But for even the most infantile of believers, my it just becomes so understandable, and of course we grow in our understanding as we grow in our Christian experience. Verse 13 of I Corinthians 2, which things also we speak, not in the words which man�s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Spirit teacheth, comparing spiritual things with spiritual things. And remember that�s what we put on the board in the last program. How that all the way from Genesis clear into the book of Ephesians we have one continuing premise that man in his natural state is spiritually dead, he�s died by virtue of Adam�s original sin. Now verse 14, there�s our flip side word again. But, even though we as believers can understand the Scriptures, and we can compare Scripture with Scripture, the unsaved person can�t do that. He just can�t see where these things are connected. But the natural man, now that�s what Paul calls the unsaved person, the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God. See that? The book says it. I didn�t, that the unbeliever cannot comprehend the, how shall I put this, maybe they can understand a few of the things, maybe they can understand the story of Bethlehem, and they can understand some of the other things, but when it gets down to the deep doctrinal aspects of the Word of God, it�s a closed book. When it comes to end-time prophecies, they can�t understand it, it�s a closed book. No wonder they believe all this other garbage, because it�s just incomprehensible to them. Uncomprehensible, what is it? I�ve got to watch my English, I�ve got English teachers out there watching every word I say. But the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit, and basically now, why doesn�t he comprehend? He doesn�t want to, and why doesn�t he want to? It�s all foolishness to him. I think you�re all aware of that. You�re unsaved neighbors, they think there�s just something a little bit wrong with you to go to a Bible study on a weeknight. It�s all right if you go to church on Sunday morning, I mean, that�s normal, but go to a Bible study on a weeknight, hey, there�s something wrong with you. That�s foolishness. Well, that�s the unsaved world�s opinion, see? Consequently, since all of this is foolishness to the unbeliever, he cannot know them because these things are spiritually discerned or understood. In other words, it�s just like a layman like me trying to converse with an M .D. Boy, you know, our languages are just not the same. Have you ever been in the midst of two or three M.D.s and tried to comprehend what they�re talking about? Unless it happens to be a fishing trip or something, that�s a little different. But I mean, if they�re talking shop, can you and I get anything out of it? No! They�re talking a language all their own. Of course, I maintain you can bring me in with a bunch of farmers and you try to hear what we�re talking about, and you don�t understand that either usually. But you see, we�re all in that same category. When we talk shop of what we live and breathe, someone from another discipline, they can�t understand what you�re talking about. Well alright, how much that is magnified then when we bring it into the realm of the spiritual versus the natural. Now again, I always have to go back to poor old Paul when he came up in Athens to Mars Hill. I may have mentioned in a previous program, I don�t remember everything I�ve said, most of it I think, but not everything. But you know when Merlin and Titibal and Nyrus and I were at Athens, and we got up to Mars Hill, the first thing that struck me, you don�t see a big bronze plaque with, �This is what Aristotle said ,� �This is what Plato wrote,� �This is the place where Homer held forth.� But who do you suppose the big bronze plaque is dedicated to? The Apostle Paul, the babbler. Isn�t that amazing? Paul the babbler, he is still held in high esteem, and tourists coming to Athens are constantly reminded of this man, not the philosophers of the Greeks. And so Paul is bringing this out, that all the things that he taught, all that he spoke forth was inspired by the Holy Spirit of God, and not the natural, intellectual aspect of men�s thinking. What a difference! And yet you see, it hasn�t changed a bit today. Not one bit, like I alluded to in our first half hour today. You take all the think tanks, all the great intellectual minds, why the media is always expounding on those people, how much do they ever put of the Word of God on national television? None. Why? Because to those moguls this is foolishness. It has nothing to do with everyday man, but if they only knew, it�s the other way around. Once you get an understanding of the Word of God, then you get an understanding of almost everything. Now let�s move on to verse 15, and almost to the end of the chapter. But he says, He that is spiritual, he who has been regenerated by the work and the power of God, as a result of believing the Gospel, he that is spiritual judgeth, now I don�t like to use the word judge as we understand it, but I�m going to use instead the word discerns. And I think maybe some of the new translations may use that word. But he that is spiritual discerneth all things. Now the reason I use that, I�m not a grocery shopper. My little wife takes care of all that. Very seldom I get in a supermarket, but I know that the once or twice in 40 years I have gone with her, as we go down the aisle, we pick and choose. Well, to a certain extent we�re judging, aren�t we? This isn�t what we want, this is. But I prefer the word discern. We have that capability of discerning, and we can compare. Alright, now that�s exactly what Paul is talking about. We have that innate ability as believers to discern. Is this scriptural, or is this something that man has thought up? Now you see, I�ve been warning my classes here in Oklahoma, and most of you have heard me say it over and over again. In Matthew 24, when those 12 disciples approached Jesus and said, �What is the sign of your coming in the end of the age ?� He didn�t say, �Look for globalism, and look for the Antichrist.� What did He say? He said, �Don�t be deceived.� Now just add to that in your own thinking. If Jesus says, �Don�t be deceived,� it follows what is going to come on the world in the closing days. Mass deception. In other words, they�re going to use the Word of God, but they�re going to be deceptive as they use it. And we�re seeing it on every hand. Go back to the little book of Jude. These things I didn�t intend to do, and that�s why I get in such a frustrated state of mind as I prepare for these. And I think I�ve got all my ducks in a row, and then we get here in front of the camera and it doesn�t come out that way. Now we go back to the little book of Jude, and this is exactly, this is exactly how the world�s thinkers operate. And this is why the little book was written, to prepare us to not be deceived by all this good-sounding stuff. And I�ll admit, it sounds so good. In fact, I just finished reading a good book, I don�t suppose a lot of people could wade through it, but I enjoyed it from cover to cover. And it was a gentleman who had little by little got sucked into the whole New Age movement. And he went into very high echelons of it, became a well-known author, and then suddenly the Lord opened his eyes and saved him, and fortunately brought him out of it. But you�d be amazed at how this New Age stuff appeals to seeking minds. In fact we just visited with a couple out in Montana who were watching the program on satellite, and they�d invited us to see them. And so we had an opportunity to spend a little time with them. And he too, not too many years ago, had been looking and searching, and he�d gone into this particular movement, and that one, and finally he ended up in the New Age movement. And he said it just like I�m saying it, it just sucks you in. Now this is what appeals to the human intellect. Here we have it in Jude chapter 10, and speaking of the false teachers, those who are going to be deceptive in the closing days, these speak evil of those things which they know not. Now what�s he talking about here? These people are going to speak evil, they�re going to ridicule and scorn the truth of God�s Word, and they�re going to have their own Bible, so to speak. But what they know naturally, see, from the energy of the flesh, as brute beasts, boy now that�s putting it where it hurts, isn�t it? In other words, their thinking does not go any deeper spiritually than an animal, and that�s why so much of their behavior almost becomes animalistic. So as brute beasts, see, in those things they corrupt themselves. Woe unto them, for they have gone in the way of Cain. Oh, now what was Cain�s major problem? Well, he rationalized from the human side, and as he rationalized, remember, Cain said, �Well, surely God won�t expect me to go and beg or borrow or barter for an animal from my brother Abel. I�ll just bring him what I have grown by the sweat of my brow, and surely God will accept me.� He rationalized. So to these people, listen to them, read some of their stuff, and every bit of it is rationalization from the human side. That�s what it is. It sounds so good. And they ran greedily after the error of Balaam. Now again, those of you who were with me back there in Genesis and Exodus and Numbers, what was old Balaam? Well hey, he was a false prophet, and he was after money. That�s all that motivated him. What�s in it for old Balaam? It�s the same way with these false teachers. They�re motivated by materialism. And then they perished in the gainsaying of Korah, as it�s known in the Old Testament. What happened to Korah? Well, he introduced strange fire into the altar, and what did God do? He brought them up before Moses and Aaron, and the earth opened up, and they�re gone. But what was their premise? They were going to institute something that was foreign to the tabernacle worship, or whatever it was at that time, and the temple wasn�t built yet. It was foreign to what God had instructed. Reading on down, verse 12. These are spots, now he�s talking about false teaching. They�re spots in your feasts, your love feasts, when they feast with you, feeding themselves without fear. Now look at the description of them. They are like clouds without water. Well I don�t like to date myself, but as a young little lad I lived during the 30�s. Those dirty 30�s, when it was hot and dry over the largest part of the Middle West. And even as a kid I can remember my dad almost screaming, seeing a little tiny black cloud appear, hoping that out of it maybe we�d get a drop of rain. Oh, that cloud might grow, and it would grow, and then all of a sudden, poof, it was gone. What was it? It was a cloud without water, and that�s what these false teachers are. My, they get people pumped up, and they think they�re really getting into something, but it never satisfies that inner longing, that inner peace. They are like trees whose fruit withereth, and I�m sure the implication is, before it was ready to eat. It looked so good coming along, and then all of a sudden, it�s not worth eating. Read on. Ephesians 2, verse 13, "...and twice dead, plucked up by the roots, raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame." I�m sure most of you have visited a seashore at one time in your life, and as those waves come breaking in, what does it leave on the sand as it backs out? Foam, nothing pretty about it at all, and that�s exactly what these people do. Wondering stars to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever, well that�s sufficient. That�s just exactly what Paul is referring to. Now if you�ll come back to I Corinthians chapter 2, now verse 16. For who, Paul says, hath known the mind of the LORD? That is of the secular world. How many of the world�s intellectuals and their great philosophers and their great authors and all the rest that you can put in there, how many of them know the mind of God? Almost zero. And then he goes on to say, but again, flip side from those people, he�s bringing you and I back into the picture of what do we have. We have the mind of the Lord. In other words, we think differently. Our whole attitude, our whole mindset is totally different from the unsaved world. Now I�ve always told my classes, I�ve told my own kids, and I tell everybody that I have an opportunity. To become a believer doesn�t make you some kind of an oddball out there in left field with some kind of a silly halo over our heads or wings or anything like that. No, no, the true believer is just the common, ordinary, good parent, the good citizen, the good church member. He is the person who is operating according to God�s precepts. And that doesn�t mean you�re kooky, doesn�t mean you�re some kind of oddball as I just said. We�re just the epitome of normality from all outward appearances, and yet I think our lifestyle is such that the world can recognize us everywhere we go. At least they will sooner or later. Now chapter 3, what little bit of time we have left. I�m going to go on because really in the original there were no chapter headings, there were no divisions, so I�m sure Paul�s pen just kept right on going when he came out of verse 16 and went into verse 1. Now he says, and I brethren could not speak or write unto you as spiritual, but they�re believers. Oh if you don�t believe me, come back to chapter 1, verse 2. Don�t lose sight of this, that�s always a danger. When you bring up a point and make it stick, then they lose sight of what we�ve learned earlier. But come back now to chapter 1, verse 2. Who is he writing to? Unto the assembly, or the Church of God which is at Corinth. Now here it is individually, to them who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, they were called to be what? Saints! That�s who he�s writing to. They�re believers, they�re in the Body of Christ, and even though they�ve got all these hang ups and shortcomings and failures, they�re still Christ, they�re His own. They are in the Body. Now if you don�t believe me, come on over to chapter 12. It�ll be several months before we get there anyway. First Corinthians chapter 12, and remember he�s still talking to the same people in chapter 12 that he talked to in chapter 1. He hasn�t changed the direction of his approach. Now look what he says in chapter 12, verse 13. Corinthians 12, verse 13. For by one Spirit, that one and only Holy Spirit, for by one Spirit are we what? All, every last one, every one of us have been baptized into the Body, whether Jew or Gentile, whether bond or free. Every one of you Paul says have been placed or made to drink into one Spirit. So he�s not picking out just a few of the more spiritual accords, he�s addressing all of them. Now what kind of people were most of them? I�m I brethren could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, or fleshly, even as babes. But where are these babies? In Christ. Don�t you forget that, because it�s awful easy to say, well these people weren�t even believers. Oh yes they were. They were in the Body of Christ, but they�re carnal. They�ve got a long ways to go. Remember when we were in our last taping, I told you the reason that Paul wrote these two letters to the Corinthians? Because the Corinthian people had questions. Number one, how were they to handle the marriage relationship? I�m hoping I could just skip over those, because I�m not a marriage counselor, but I dare not. But nevertheless that was one of their primary questions. What about this marriage relationship? And you know for a pagan that was something totally different as Paul approached it. And then the other big question they evidently had, and we picked that up in chapter 8. How are we going to handle meat that�s been offered to idols? Now these were all hang ups of these people, mostly because they were still so carnal, and that�s why Paul has to address it. Now verse 2 of chapter 3. Ephesians 2.3b "...and I have fed you with milk, and not with meat. For hitherto you were not able to bear it." Well bear what? Strong meat. They couldn�t handle it, no more than an infant can handle solid food. So Paul says, I�ve nurtured you on spiritual milk, yet neither now are you able to bear it. Isn�t that a sad commentary? I mean let�s face reality. We don�t know how long after these people had saved that Paul is writing this letter, but it was a year or two or so, and they haven�t gone any further in their spiritual experience than what they were at the beginning. They are still babes in Christ, and I�m sure it just tore the apostle up. Why can�t these Corinthians begin to grow? But listen, look at us today. How many professing Christians today aren�t in the same state? They have nothing that they can handle of the meat of Scripture. They�re not ready for it. They�re still down there on the milk of the Word, and I think it�s a sad commentary today as it was then. But nevertheless, this is the way it is. He says you�ve not been able to bear it, that is strong meat of the Word or the deeper doctrinal things, and neither are you even able now. And in the next verse, why can�t they? You are still carnal. Now remember the word carnal here is referring to believers who are still controlled by the flesh rather than by the Holy Spirit. In fact I think I shared with our class last night, God through the Word divides the whole human race into three categories. First in two, lost and saved. But the saved He divides into two more categories, giving us a total of three, but the believers are divided into the spiritual and the carnal. So you have spiritual believers, carnal believers, and unbelievers. Those are the three segments of the human race as God sees us. Now the Corinthian believers for the most part were believers, but they were carnal. They were still fleshly. They were not growing as Paul expected them to. How did they show their carnality? It�s something that just rose right up out of the congregation. Well the first thing he deals with, they had divisions. They had their pet people that they wanted to follow, and that�s the first thing he�s going to have to deal with now in chapter 3. The third verse. Ephesians 4, and here�s your number one reason, for there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions. Now we were talking about some of this in our class last night down at Wilberton, and I shared with them this very same thought, divisions. In other words, even though their congregations weren�t up in the hundreds and thousands like we so often times think of churches today, yet I wouldn�t make a guess of over 50, would you? I think about 50 people, because this church met in the house of Chloe. Now I don�t know how rich Chloe was, or how big a home she had, but nevertheless it was small enough in size that they could meet in a home, and yet even in that little small congregation as we think of congregations, there were divisions. And I�ll just give it to you quickly as we close. There were four of them, those who followed Paul, those who followed Apollos, those who followed Peter, and those who followed Jesus Himself. And it just wreaked havoc in the church, because there was no unity. They couldn�t get anything done because of the constant bickering, and their bickering was all centered on an individual man. And how many churches aren�t caught up in that same problem today? Don�t set your eyes on the man, but set your eyes on the Word of God, and set your eyes on the crucified One, the One who died for you and rose from the dead. Thank you for watching Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a weekly Bible study. If you would like more information about the Les Feldick Ministries, a Bible study in your area, or about this program, write to Les Feldick Ministries, Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, OK 74552. That�s Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, OK 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick, is viewer supported, and your gift is appreciated. Thank you, and be sure to tune in next time, for Through the Bible with Les Feldick.