One of my best and most trusted friends, who I will call Chase, emailed me this morning with an excellent question.
Chase wrote this,
“Can you explain this statement to me, ‘Faith does not come by intellectual ascension but by the Word and Spirit of God’. I’m not sure if I have heard this before, but I dreamt it over and over last night. Thanks.”
This is one of the most powerful truths of the Gospel. This statement (that we will trust comes from the Holy Spirit as it is theologically sound, and I fully trust my friend’s intimacy with Jesus) means that the truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ transcends human thought. In other words, it’s higher than our ways! It is so complex, true, and perfect that the human mind could never arrive at it on its own.
Paul talks about this a few places in his epistles. The first place he talks about it is in 1 Corinthians 1:18 where he says, “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.” Paul is pointing out that it seems ludicrous that through the greatest act of injustice in the history of the world, God brings justice to the world. How could it possibly be that the great symbol of eternal redemption and deliverance is an electric chair? How is it that in order to live we must die? According to human logic it doesn’t make sense!
Because the Gospel transcends human reason, we can only understand it when the Holy Spirit whispers it to our hearts. This song is too complex for any human to perform. The preaching of the Gospel of the Christ ultimately begins and end in the Holy Spirit. It is not by the words of man that people are convicted, repent, and are saved. It is only by the Spirit of God that conviction comes. It is by no fanciful human rhetoric that individuals are transferred from darkness to light. It is by the powerful grace of God alone.
A second place that Paul talks about this is in Galatians. Paul is upset with the believers in Galatia because they have been taught another gospel and they have believed it. Paul, in his rage, corrects their thinking by telling them that the Gospel that he preached to them did not come from human lips, but from heaven itself. Listen to Paul’s words: “For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation from Jesus Christ” (Gal 1:11–12).
Note that Paul says that he was not “taught” the Gospel, but that he “received” it. This day, many are those who have sought to understand the Gospel but simply refuse to receive it. It is only something that can be received as a gift.
