With these words, Paul ends a discussion that has been based all along on Isaiah 29:14. In 1 Corinthians 1:19 he had applied Isaiah’s prophecy to the gospel ministry of the apostles, through which God was destroying the wisdom of the wise. Then he went on to offer three arguments in support of this understanding of Isaiah’s prophecy:
The
wise
people of the time, both Jewish and Greek, were unable to accept God’s wisdom (1 Corinthians 1:20–25).The Corinthian church consisted mostly of people who were of no importance in the eyes of the world, yet they were the ones whom God has called (1 Corinthians 1:26–31).
When Paul had preached the gospel to the Corinthians, he had done so not with human wisdom, but with proof of God’s Spirit and power (1 Corinthians 2:1–5).
5 so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.