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Denial

By Phillip Ross

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Published: 28May2009
Word count: 866
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Would you go to a non-Christian to learn about Christianity? Of course not. And why not? As Paul said, "the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Corinthians 3:14). Show me someone who thinks that Christianity is foolish, and I'll show you a worldly person. The reason that they think Christianity is foolish is that they cannot perceive the reality of God.

And why can't they perceive the reality of God? Because they "suppress the truth in unrighteousness" (Romans 1:18). God's truth is available to them, as it is available to every creature. They can't suppress it if they don't already have it. It is in their possession, but they hold it down. They keep it below their conscious awareness. They don't want to see it. They don't want to acknowledge it. And so they ignore it or deny it.

Avoidance is a well-known psychological phenomenon. What are they avoiding? When Paul says that they suppress the truth in unrighteousness, he means that their commitment to unrighteousness will not allow them to admit the possibility of righteousness. There are several ways they rationalize the denial of righteousness.

Sometimes the acknowledgment of the reality and extent of sin keeps people from righteousness by suggesting that human sinfulness excludes the possibility of human righteousness. They (correctly) acknowledge that sin is our natural condition, and that its extent is all-encompassing, but fail to acknowledge the reality and power of Jesus Christ to overcome it. These people deny the power of God to overcome sin, and believe that the best we can do is to learn to live with our sinfulness, to accept it as normal.

Sometimes people deny that we (people) have access to any objective knowledge, that all knowledge is necessarily subjective and completely determined by personal perspective and preferences. They think that all human knowledge and experience are necessarily subjective. And they are right, except for the fact that God's knowledge and experience are objective, or at least a lot more objective than any human knowledge and experience. In denying the reality of God, or the possibility of God communicating with or through people, they deny the possibility of ever having anything other than subjective human knowledge. These people deny the power of the Holy Spirit, and His ability to transform lives.

Sometimes people deny the authenticity and/or veracity of Scripture. They believe that all religious stories are essentially equal. And since some stories seem to contradict others at various points, they dismiss them as being no more than historical embellishments intended to explain the unexplainable, or to otherwise help people cope with life's difficulties. They consider all religious stories to be essentially fictitious.

It is easy for us to misunderstand 1 Corinthians 3:15, "The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one." Judgmentalism is a hot topic in today's politically correct world, but that is not what Paul is talking about.

The spiritual person is a born again person -- a saved by the blood of Christ and into the fellowship of believers person -- who has submitted to the power and presence of the Holy Spirit in his life. He is a person who does not live on the basis of his own desires or preferences. Rather, he lives on the basis of God's desires and preferences for him. This is exactly what Paul means: the spiritual person considers or evaluates everything on the basis of Scripture. The spirituality of such a person effects everything that they think, say and do. Such a person applies the categories of Scripture to everything, and, first and foremost, the wisdom of Scripture is applied to his own life.

The second phrase of 1 Corinthians 3:15 is another way of saying the same thing. Because the categories of Scripture (or the realm of the Spirit) subsume the categories of the world. This means that the things of the world can be explained by the Spirit, but the things of the Spirit cannot be explained by the things of the world. Spirituality cannot be explained or properly evaluated by worldliness. If you think this sounds like I'm saying that spirituality is somehow superior to worldliness, you're right. It is. But I'm not saying it. I'm just clarifying it. Paul is saying it. And he is saying it because Jesus teaches it.

However, we must remember that God's values are the inversion of human values. For instance, "Jesus called them to him and said, 'You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many'" (Matthew 20:25-28). In the kingdom of God the servant is in a superior position to the master. All Christians are servants to the one Master, who was Himself a servant to all.

Phillip A. Ross, author of many Christian books, has been a pastor for over 25 years. Loaded with information about historic Christianity, Ross founded http://www.Pilgrim-Platform.org in 1998. His exposition of First Corinthians in 2008 demonstrates the Apostle Paul's fierce opposition to worldly Christianity. His book, Arsy Varsy -- Reclaiming the Gospel in First Corinthians, shows how Paul turned the world upside down.

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