English Standard Version ESV
The Message Bible MSG
1 And I, when I came to you, brothers,did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom.
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You'll remember, friends, that when I first came to you to let you in on God's master stroke, I didn't try to impress you with polished speeches and the latest philosophy.
2 For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.
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I deliberately kept it plain and simple: first Jesus and who he is; then Jesus and what he did - Jesus crucified.
3 And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling,
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I was unsure of how to go about this, and felt totally inadequate - I was scared to death, if you want the truth of it -
4 and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power,
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and so nothing I said could have impressed you or anyone else. But the Message came through anyway. God's Spirit and God's power did it,
5 that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
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which made it clear that your life of faith is a response to God's power, not to some fancy mental or emotional footwork by me or anyone else.
6 Yet among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away.
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We, of course, have plenty of wisdom to pass on to you once you get your feet on firm spiritual ground, but it's not popular wisdom, the fashionable wisdom of high-priced experts that will be out-of-date in a year or so.
7 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory.
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God's wisdom is something mysterious that goes deep into the interior of his purposes. You don't find it lying around on the surface. It's not the latest message, but more like the oldest - what God determined as the way to bring out his best in us, long before we ever arrived on the scene.
8 None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
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The experts of our day haven't a clue about what this eternal plan is. If they had, they wouldn't have killed the Master of the God-designed life on a cross.
9 But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him"--
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That's why we have this Scripture text: No one's ever seen or heard anything like this, Never so much as imagined anything quite like it - What God has arranged for those who love him.
10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God.
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But you've seen and heard it because God by his Spirit has brought it all out into the open before you.
11 For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.
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Who ever knows what you're thinking and planning except you yourself? The same with God - except that he not only knows what he's thinking,
12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.
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but he lets us in on it. God offers a full report on the gifts of life and salvation that he is giving us.
13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.
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We don't have to rely on the world's guesses and opinions. We didn't learn this by reading books or going to school; we learned it from God, who taught us person-to-person through Jesus, and we're passing it on to you in the same firsthand, personal way.
14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
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The unspiritual self, just as it is by nature, can't receive the gifts of God's Spirit. There's no capacity for them. They seem like so much silliness. Spirit can be known only by spirit - God's Spirit and our spirits in open communion.
15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one.
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Spiritually alive, we have access to everything God's Spirit is doing, and can't be judged by unspiritual critics.
16 "For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.
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Isaiah's question, "Is there anyone around who knows God's Spirit, anyone who knows what he is doing?" has been answered: Christ knows, and we have Christ's Spirit.
The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.