Quote

"...there can be no saving faith that rests on the wisdom of men, because the wisdom of men considers salvation through a crucified Christ to be foolishness, and the reason it does is because, on the one hand, the death of Christ is a severe indictment of our hopeless, sinful condition and utter insufficiency but, on the other hand, the wisdom of the world is devoted 100% to achieving and maintaining its own self-sufficiency and ground for boasting. It should be evident from this that 1) No group of people has a corner on this sort of wisdom: it is the mark of poor and rich, educated and uneducated, old and young and every race. Apart from the work of God's spirit we all (whether consciously or unconsciously) are bent on using our minds to show off or at least to save face - to preserve a semblance of cool self-sufficiency.

2) A second thing that should be evident from this understanding of "the wisdom of men" is that it is not the use of the mind per se that is evil but what the mind is used for, what it comes up with, what it is motivated by. Which means that the alternative to a proud use of the mind should not be no use but rather a humble use. The alternative to proud competence is not incompetence but humble competence."


<John Piper on 1 Cor. 2>