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‘For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.’
1Co_2:2
I. It was not that St. Paul despised learning, or thought there was ‘nought else worth the knowing.’ He was an educated man, as education was understood in his age and country. A student of Gamaliel, versed in rabbinic lore; a soldier; a politician; a great traveller, familiar with the life and customs of the greater portion of the civilised world; a philosopher and a poet. In becoming a Christian he could not annihilate his manifold education or the world of fact with which he had become acquainted. Christianity, whatever it does, does not place a premium upon ignorance or stupidity. But it is a mark of mental greatness and earnestness to single out matters of chief consequence from others less noteworthy, and to concentrate attention upon them. It was this that he meant.
II. For him the central object of Divine revelation was the Cross, and no more splendid homage could he have rendered it than this, that he should behave as if nothing else were worth thinking or speaking about. The Corinthians were vain of their spiritual gifts and their theosophies; he sought to correct their aberrations and to humble them. It is thus the Cross has still to thrust everything else into the background. It is the joy of the Christian’s heart, the theme of his conversation, the glory of his life.
III. The Cross of Christ is of chief consequence in the reconciliation of sinners to God, and therefore it ought to receive the closest and most earnest attention.