Chapter 2

Chapter 2:1-8, the answer to the third question: Where is the debater of this age? This refers to the Greek professional debater who uses various types of techniques to belittle doctrine and to obscure the gospel. But the gospel constitutes absolute truth and therefore cannot be refuted by debater’s technique. The nest eight verses are to explain the principle of the gospel, that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation, that the gospel needs no debating defense, that the gospel cannot be refuted by debater’s technique because the gospel represents an absolute. The gospel is dogma and the debater’s technique deals with the relative. So the eloquence and the persuasiveness of their logic and their technique is shattered by the dogma of the gospel.

In verses 1 & 2 Paul begins by saying you cannot argue with the gospel. The debater argues with the gospel, or attempts to.

Verse 1, the presentation of the gospel does not depend upon human ability. Paul uses himself as an illustration because when he came to Corinth he came without human ability. It is not the speaking ability of the debater but the ability of Christ on the cross which counts in the gospel. The emphasis in the gospel is not on the mechanics of speaking but on clarifying the content of the gospel.

“And I, brethren,” when he says ‘brethren’ he is talking to his own converts. Paul led many of the to the Lord; “when I came to you,” they were unbelievers when Paul came, now they are saved; “I came not with excellency of speech,’ the word ‘with’ is ‘according to the standard [of superior rhetoric].’

“or of wisdom,” reference to the debater’s technique of building a principle upon a principle; “declaring unto the testimony of God,” the gospel, the operation of phase one. He didn’t come that way and yet they responded. You do not have to be eloquent to present the gospel. You are not selling a product, you are making an issue clear.

Verse 2, an illustration. “For I determined not to know anything among you” is not exactly what the Greek says. The Greek says, “I did not decide to know anything among you.” The negative goes with ‘decide.’ It means, in effect, ‘I was not intimidated by who and what you were, I came with the gospel.’ You have to understand the gospel to talk to anyone about it; you do not have to understand their beliefs. E.g. you do not have to understand a cult or a religion to give them the gospel. You just fire in the gospel in a simple way. The gospel is the power of God unto salvation.

“save” means ‘except’; “Jesus Christ and him crucified,” in other words, when he made first contact he did not determine that he would reach them on an intellectual level but he determined to talk about one thing. When he walked into Corinth there was not a saved person. When he left hundreds of people were born again and a great church was begun.

The doctrine of positional sanctification

1. The mechanics of positional sanctification is the baptism of the Spirit, 1 Corinthians 12:13. It is one of the ministries of the Holy Spirit at the moment of salvation whereby He takes every believer and enters him into union with Christ.

2. The declaration of positional sanctification, 1 Corinthians 1:2,30.

3. Positional sanctification protects the believer from divine judgment in eternity, Romans 8:1.

4. Positional sanctification results in eternal life and imputed righteousness, 1 John 5:11,12; 2 Corinthians 5:21. Eternal life is resident in Jesus Christ. We are given God’s righteousness “in Him,” union with Christ.

5. Positional sanctification defines both election and predestination, Ephesians 1:3-6. The believer is in union with Christ and shares His destiny; the believer is in union with Christ and shares His election.

6. Positional sanctification produces a new creature on the earth, 2 Corinthians 5:17.

7. Positional sanctification confirms eternal security, Romans 8:38,39.

8. Six characteristics of positional sanctification:

a) It is not an experience, neither emotion nor ecstatics. It is something you can know but not something you can feel or experience.

b) It is not progressive. Positional truth can never be improved, it is perfect at the moment of salvation.

c) Positional sanctification is not related to human merit, it does not involve human works in any way, it does not involve the operation of the energy of the flesh.

d) Positional truth is eternal in nature, it cannot be changed by God or by man.

e) Positional truth is known only by the Word of God and only from the Word of God. The Word of God is the absolute criterion and the only place where positional truth is declared is in the Word.

f) It is obtained totally at the moment of salvation.

In verses 3,4: you can’t argue with the Holy Spirit. In verses 1,2: you can’t argue with the gospel.

Verse 3, Paul approached Corinth in fear because Corinth was loaded with Greeks. Paul was afraid of Greek culture. He came in “weakness.” That is, he lacked physical health. One thing about being an orator was that you had to be physically strong. Paul wasn’t even physically strong. Fear is Paul’s mental attitude facing unbelievers in Corinth, facing these Greeks with all their culture and their philosophy. He had just been to Athens where he left in rather bad shape after a terrible experience. Paul’s fear was a physiologically-induced fear, not a faithlessness fear.

“much trembling” means that the fear overflowed into his body so that he couldn’t even control his body properly in speaking even if he wanted to be a good speaker.

Verse 4, “And my speech,” communication, the content of speech here; “and my preaching,” his delivery of the content.

“were not with enticing words of men’s wisdom,” i.e. debater’s technique; “but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power.” To the Corinthians it wasn’t so much what you said, it was how you said it. If you said it in an eloquent way with an excellent vocabulary it was very acceptable. The word ‘demonstration’ here is a noun in the dative case meaning a powerful manifestation here to the advantage of the hearers; “of the Spirit,” the filling of the Spirit, the ministry of the Spirit in evangelism; “and of power” is literally, “even of power.” Principle: All human ability and power in the world cannot persuade one sinner to trust in Christ as saviour. Only the power of the Holy Spirit can break through into the human soul causing an unbeliever to believe in Christ. The Holy Spirit only works through the gospel.

Some negative principles

a) Human public ability and eloquence will not bring a sinner to Christ.

b) Human popularity or success will not bring a sinner to Christ.

c) Human attractiveness will not bring a sinner to Christ.

d) It is not necessary to be intelligent or an intellectual to reach intellectuals.

e) You do not have to learn the unbeliever’s philosophy or viewpoint to win him. You do have to know the gospel.

f) You do not have to cultivate people before you can witness to them.

If faith in Christ is founded on logic it can be refuted by logic. All it takes is a greater debater, a smarter person using logic. Human logic can be refuted by human logic. The objective of witnessing is not to win a debate, not to present a logical platform subject to debate, but it is to present an absolute: the gospel. The Holy Spirit does the rest.

Verse 5, you cannot argue with the power of God.

“That” introduces a purpose clause. It is God’s plan that the faith of the individual does not stand on human power. Faith which stands on human power can be overthrown by greater human power. The gospel is the power of God in salvation. Faith which stands in divine power cannot be defeated by human power, no matter how great that human power is.

Principles of evangelism

1. Knowledge of salvation is necessary for witnessing. You cannot witness for Christ unless you know the gospel, 2 Corinthians 5:17-21. The believer must understand the doctrine of reconciliation which is epitomised in Ephesians 2:14-17.

2. Witnessing for Christ is the responsibility of every believer, Acts 1:8; 2 Timothy 4:5.

3. The effectiveness and clarity of the believer’s witness depends upon his understanding of the last judgment, Revelation 20:12-15.

4. Witnessing is impossible apart from the ministry of the Holy Spirit, John 16:8-11.

5. Pertinent content of the Bible is the believer’s weapon in witnessing, 1 Corinthians 1:18; Ephesians 6:17.

6. The dynamics of witnessing depend upon the believer’s mental attitude, Romans 1:14-16.

7. There are two areas of witnessing: a) the witness of the life, 2 Corinthians 3:3; b) the witness of the lips, 2 Corinthians 5:14-21.

8. There is a special reward for witnessing, 1 Corinthians 3:11-16.

Verse 6, “Howbeit” is in view of the previous doctrine. This is a particle in the Greek which indicates ‘in view of the things which we have previously studied.’ In this verse we have: ‘You cannot argue with the wisdom of God.’ “Wisdom” in this verse is in the empathic position in the Greek and it receives all the emphasis of the passage. Wisdom is divine thought applied to man’s situation which means, of course, God’s plan for the human race. Wisdom here will speak sometimes for the entire plan and sometimes for a part of the plan.

“we speak,” present active indicative, present tense, linear aktionsart, ‘we keep on speaking.’ We make it a lifetime habit to speak in this way. The word means to use the faculty of speech to express what is in the frontal lobe. In other words, words are formed in the mind. This is the vocalisation of your thought pattern. The thought pattern which Paul has in his frontal lobe and which he declares through the vehicle of speech is the wisdom of God, operation grace, the plan of God.

“[the] wisdom,” divine thought applied to man’s situation, God’s plan for the human race. The emphatic position of the phrase “the wisdom” indicates that divine wisdom is the subject of the rest of the chapter. This is the transitional verse. Only part of the chapter will be used to answer the question, Where is the debater of this age? Then there will be an epilogue which will complete the first segment of 1 Corinthians. Paul stuck to his guns, he didn’t move away from the gospel. He did not deviate because of legalism, because of religiosity or because of anything else. The importance of sticking with the gospel: Romans 1:6, The “gospel … is the power of God unto salvation.”

“among them that are perfect,” the Greek says literally, “among the mature.” “Among them that are perfect” is translated like a verb, but there is no verb and there is no participle here. We have a noun. “We speak the wisdom among the mature.” The mature refers to the believer who has grown up experientially. By “mature” Paul means that the more the believer grows the more effective he becomes in witnessing for Christ. This phrase, ‘among the mature,’ argues for the effective witnessing based on growth.

Principles in the technique of evangelism

1. Give the unbeliever information pertinent to salvation. Stay on the subject. Avoid false issues such as legalism, salvation by change of behaviour pattern, feeling sorry for sins, joining the church, etc.

2. Never put the cart before the horse. Do not try to get the unbeliever to live the Christian way life until he believes in Christ as saviour. The issue is not living the Christian life, the issue is “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved,” Acts 16:31; John 3:36.

3. Be sure to declare the good news [the gospel], and in the good news do not confuse it with bad news. The issue of sin has been removed. The only thing between man and God today is “What think ye of Christ.” Be sure to emphasise what Christ did. The work of Christ is important to emphasise.

4. Do not add to the gospel. Nothing is accomplished toward salvation by getting a person to give up his sins, to improve his behaviour pattern, feel sorry for his sins, join a church, even walking down an aisle. You are saved by believing in Christ.

5. Provide information and do not get in the way of the Holy Spirit with regard to the decision of faith. You can’t force the volition of any member of the human race; even God can’t do that. All the pressure much come from the Holy Spirit. Never ask an unbeliever for money, this creates a false issue. Avoid any kind of a gimmick that would confuse the issue. Do not make a fool of the unbeliever and create psychological problems by asking him come forward or to stand up. No one has ever been saved by public confession of Christ.

6. Witnessing cannot be accomplished in the energy of the flesh, Acts 1:8. You cannot divorce witnessing and evangelism from the filling of the Holy Spirit.

Pitfalls in our personal witnessing (occupational hazards)

1. Avoid argumentation. You are not trying to win a debate, you are trying to win a soul to Jesus Christ. Hence, your job is to disseminate information rather than to argue over its validity.

2. Do not be sidetracked by false issues such as: Is the Bible the Word of God? Whether the Bible is the Word of God or not is not an issue to the unbeliever. Use the Word of God, don’t argue as to whether the Bible is valid or not. The issue as to whether the Bible is the Word of God or not is an issue for the believer but not for the unbeliever.

3. Deal with the individual alone wherever possible. If you are really going to communicate the gospel you are going to have to isolate individuals. Often people will give you a hearing but they will not do so in the presence of others who might ridicule them. Do not embarrass people by going up to a person standing around with his friends and saying ‘Brother are you saved?’ and that type of thing.

4. Avoid getting into a rut and handling every situation the same way.

5. Avoid the concept that you must speak to a certain number of individuals each day or you are not spiritual. This is a pressure system. The means of spirituality is rebound. The result of spirituality in this case is witnessing. We must not confuse means and result.

6. Avoid bragging about witnessing.

7. Avoid judging other believers for their apparent failure to witness. This is putting your nose into the affairs of other people.

“yet not the wisdom of this world,” man’s solutions and ideas cannot solve world problems. This verse clearly declares there is no place for the social gospel — brotherhood, all created equal — or socialism, or internationalism. Regeneration is the answer, emphasis on the gospel. The greatest changes in the world are wrought through regeneration. No two people are created equal. Man tries to make all people equal, and when he does he reduces everyone to the lowest common denominator. That means a strong central government doing one thousand things for each person. But look what the gospel will do in one moment of time. A person believes in Jesus Christ, and the minute he does he enters into union with Christ and in Christ all men [mankind] are equal.

“nor the princes of this world,” Paul is never sponsored by some form of human leadership. People often use Christianity to grind their axe or to keep what they have. People have their own program and they try to use Christianity to secure their program. Paul remained independent of all these people who wanted to use Christianity to grind their axe. He is not only free from false systems but He is free from the organisations of this world which would use Christianity for their ends.

“which come to nought,” present passive participle. It means to come to nothing, to become nothing. All human solutions are constantly in the process of coming to nothing. All of the plans that man has concocted cannot give one person eternal life but the plan of God will give any person eternal life.

Verse 7, the previous verse is amplified. He now says that this plan existed before man. This is an allusion to the doctrine of divine decrees, the plan devised in eternity past.

“But we speak” is again the Greek verb using the faculty of speech to express what is in the mind. The present tense is linear aktionsart which means this is what he keeps on speaking, the wisdom of God.

“the wisdom of God” here is the divine plan for the human race in general. Part of the divine plan was revealed at the time of Adam’s fall, and Adam responded. But part of the divine plan was not revealed in the Old Testament at all, yet in the Old Testament salvation was clearly revealed. In the Church Age we have certain things that are peculiar to the Church Age that were not revealed to the Old Testament people at all. They have to do with operation phase two and its modus operandi.

“in a mystery,” the word is a technical word for information known only to those who are in the fraternity. The fraternity here is the Church. The mystery refers to doctrine which is pertinent only to the Church and which was hidden from the past. The phrase should be translated, “the wisdom of God in a mystery which has been hidden,” perfect passive participle. The perfect tense: it was hidden in the past so that no Old Testament prophet knew it, and it was not revealed in the Old Testament.

“which God ordained before the world unto our glory” — ‘God’ is a reference to the Father who is the planner in the Trinity; ‘ordained’ is an aorist active indicative. This is a timeless aorist which goes back to eternity past. God ordained or planned this in eternity past before time began. The active voice indicates the subject producing the action of the verb. The subject is God the Father; He did the planning. Since the Father is perfect the plan is perfect. This means there is no place for man’s cooperation, therefore entrance into the plan is on a non-meritorious basis and the only non-meritorious operation in mankind is a system of perception known as faith. All of the merit is transferred from the subject to the object. The object of faith in salvation is Jesus Christ, the merit lies in the work of Christ. Entrance into the plan for all members of the human race: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved,” Acts 16:31.

“before the world” is literally, “before the ages.” Ages refer to time broken down into dispensational components. Time is organised.

“unto our glory,” this is a result clause. The result of God’s plan is our glory. Our glory comes from union with Christ who is the glory. Positional truth is our glory, the glory of man whereby through regeneration all members of the human race become equal. We cannot be equal through the first birth, it takes the second birth to be that. The glorification of Jesus Christ is developed from several principles. First of all, Jesus Christ is God — this is His essence.

Verse 8, “Which none of the princes of this world knew.” ‘None of the princes’ refers to world rulers at the time of the crucifixion. It refers to the Roman empire represented by the governor of the Roman province of Judea, Pontius Pilate. It represents the Jewish political leaders, represented by Herod, and the Jewish religious leaders represented by the Sanhedrin.

“for had they known they would not have crucified the Lord of glory,” ‘the Lord of glory’ is a reference to the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. Glory is used to indicate the deity of the Father in Ephesians 1:17; the deity of the Sin in 1 Corinthians 2:8; the deity of the Holy Spirit in 1 Peter 4:14.

This answers “What about the debaters of this age?” Give him the gospel. Fire in the gospel and let the Spirit have His ministry. Just make a clear issue out of the gospel.

Verse 9-16 deal with the impossibility of the unbeliever understanding God’s plan, the possibility of the believer understanding it and under what conditions he can understand it. It is impossible for a believer to understand the Word of God when he approaches on the basis of rationalism or empiricism.

Verse 9, the failure of empiricism to understand spiritual phenomena. “As it is written” is a perfect passive indicative. The word ‘written’ means that we now have quotations from the Old Testament. Isaiah 64:4. Perfect tense, it is written in the past with the result that it stands written forever. The passive voice: this is received from God. Man did not dream it up or cook it up but God revealed it to human authors. The indicative mood: the reality of the existence of the canon of scripture, the reality of God’s Word in writing.

Now we have two words “eye” and “ear.” They refer to the system of empiricism as a system of perception. In perception the objective is to get phenomena which is on the outside into the mind. The only way to get human phenomena into the mind is through one of three systems: a) Faith, the way we begin to learn everything. This is the non-meritorious system of perception which is active in every normal member of the human race; b) Rationalism. This says that what is reality is anything that you think; c) Empiricism is the scientific method. You draw conclusions with regard to things in this life by observation, by hearing, by smelling, by tasting, by touching. You develop categories from this and arrive at conclusions. Empiricism is mentioned first because it has always been a common system for perception. The eye and the ear were two systems of perception under the principle of empiricism.

“eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,” in other words, empiricism is not way to learn spiritual phenomena. We have here two aorist active indicatives with regard to the system of empiricism. The aorist tense is the point of time when some human phenomena or phenomenon is being examined. When this is being examined there may be some conclusions drawn through empiricism. But when you take a Bible doctrine or some spiritual truth you cannot examine it and learn it through empiricism. The indicative mood is the reality of the fact that the human system of empiricism cannot take in spiritual truth. It is absolutely impossible and why philosophy can never handle Christianity.

“neither have entered into the heart of man,” the heart is the frontal lobe. Spiritual truth does not enter the frontal lobe of man. This is the aorist active indicative. The aorist tense is the point at which one is trying to understand or get some spiritual truth.

”the things,” the word ‘things’ refers to the plan of God in its overall scope; “that God” refers to the Father; “hath prepared,” aorist active indicative, but this aorist tense is in contrast to the previous aorist. This aorist tense refers to a point in eternity when the plan was developed.

“for them that love him,” dative present active participle. Dative of advantage: it is to the advantage of the human race to have the things that God has prepared for them. The unbeliever can never understand this (nor can the carnal believer) because the unbeliever is ruled by empiricism and with empiricism you have to see it, smell it, taste it, hear it. The divine plan can only be understood by a divine system of perception. There must be a way to understand what God has given and what God has prepared, and we get our first hint in verse 10.

Verse 10, “But” is a conjunction of contrast. In contrast to empiricism which can’t understand spiritual phenomena we have a system which can understand. We now have a contrast between the failure of empiricism and the success of the teaching ministry of the Spirit. Anticipating what we will have several times in this passage, the unbeliever first has an old sin nature and he has a human soul. The soulish mind cannot understand spiritual phenomena, but when a person accepts Christ as saviour he has his soul still which can understand human phenomena (it operates in faith, empiricism, and rationalism), but he also has the human spirit which understands spiritual phenomena because the Holy Spirit teaches through the Word. “The Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.” We still have the old sin nature and when we are out of fellowship this ministry is cut off, the whole system is short-circuited so that we can’t understand the Word.

“what God,” this refers to God the Father who is the author of the divine plan. We have now the principle of the plan; “hath revealed,” aorist active indicative. The aorist tense refers to gathering together everything that God has put in writing. In other words, it takes in the whole canon of scripture, everything from Genesis to Revelation. Active voice: God through His Word does the producing here and that means God does the revealing. The indicative mood is the reality of the canon of scripture. Notice what is left out: dreams, visions, voices in the night, sitting around and waiting for a beautiful thought — all of this is excluded. In the Old Testament before the canon was completed this was bona fide but with the completion of the canon of scripture God reveals Himself through the Word and only through the Word. The aorist tense has another concept, the point of time when the believer looks at the Word, studies the Word, concentrates on the Word, thinks about the Word, or listens to the teaching of the Word. The indicative mood, then, is the reality of believers learning spiritual phenomena through the study of the Word.

“unto us,” dative of advantage. It is to our advantage to have the Word; “by his Spirit,” dia plus the genitive means “through the instrumentality of his Spirit.” God the Holy Spirit is absolutely necessary in the mechanics of understanding spiritual phenomena.

“for the Spirit,” the third person of the Trinity, “searcheth,” which means to explore; “all things,” refers to the plan of God, phases one, two, and three; “yea, the deep things,” have to do with eternity, the future; “of God.” So in verse 9 empiricism fails; in verse 10 where a human and meritorious system of perception fails a non-meritorious system of perception of spiritual phenomena is successful. The Spirit teaches the human spirit.

Verse 11 goes back to human perception again, this time rationalism. We have the failure of rationalism. Verse 9: the failure of empiricism; verse 10: the success of God’s system; verse 11: the failure of rationalism. Rationalism fails. The word spirit is used two ways here, for the Holy Spirit and for a system of perception. The word “spirit” is used five ways in this passage. First, we have the word ‘spirit’ used in this verse in the sense of human perception, the ability of the frontal lobe to understand through rationalism. That is the spirit of man which is in him — rationalism.

“For what man knoweth,” this means to have actual understanding or perception’ “the things of man, save [except] the spirit of man.” The spirit of man does not refer to the human spirit, does not refer to the Holy Spirit, so there is another use of the word ‘spirit.’ Sometimes the word ‘spirit’ is used for life and sometimes it is used as a system of perception. The spirit of man in him is rationalism, a meritorious system of perception. And the reason that the word ‘spirit’ is used here for perception is to be in contrast to the Holy Spirit. In other words, there is more than one way of perception and they are in opposition to each other when it comes to spiritual phenomena.

“even so the things of God,” divine phenomena, “knoweth no man except the Spirit of God.” The Holy Spirit here refers to the previous verse where everything we learn of a spiritual nature we learn by the Holy Spirit teaching the human spirit of the believer. Rationalism fails; empiricism fails.

Verse 12, regeneration, the new birth, provides new equipment for understanding spiritual phenomena.

“Now,” the believer in time needs to understand doctrine and he needs to know what God has prepared for him; “we” refers to the believer in the Lord Jesus Christ; “have received not the spirit of the world.” The spirit of the world is rationalism. We have not received as our way of understanding spiritual phenomenon, rationalism.

“but the spirit which is from God” refers to the human spirit which can understand what the Holy Spirit teaches.

“that” introduces a purpose clause; “we might know the things freely given to us by God.” Here is the purpose for giving us a new system of perception; “we might know” — we have a change in tense here which is quite startling in the Greek. We have the perfect active subjunctive. All of these three are very important to know. The perfect tense means that we might understand these doctrines, these principles that God has provided for us, the things that God has freely given us, so that we can apply them and have the peace and the power and the blessing and the impact which God intends for every believer and every ambassador to possess. The perfect tense is something that happens in the past with results that go on forever. And first of all you have to know what God has freely given you, what God has prepared for you, before you can use it. The active voice means that the believer must learn doctrine, it means exposing yourself to those who have the gift of teaching and who also study. Eventually, as you begin to grow you will be able to learn more on your own. But you need doctrine, you need the categories, and this is dependent upon the spiritual gift which exists in every generation, the gift of pastor-teacher. This is the primary reason for having a church. The active voice means that you have to be aggressive and in study, in listening, in exposing yourself to the teaching of the Word. The subjunctive mood: this is potential. Whether a believer learns doctrine or not depends on the attitude toward the Word and his spiritual status — whether he is carnal or spiritual. So the subjunctive mood is thrown in to indicate first of all that whether you learn anything or not depends on whether the Spirit controls your life or the old sin nature, and secondly it depends on your attitude, your aggressiveness in the realm of your own volition — whether you want to or not.

“the things,” what God has provided; “that are freely given,” an aorist passive participle. The aorist participle precedes the action of the main verb. The main verb is “that we might know.” These things are given to us first and then we have to know them. The aorist tense: they were given in a point of time, and that point of time was not a point of time but a point in eternity past when the divine decrees, the plan of God was developed. The passive voice: the subject receives the action of the verb, we do not earn or deserve. These things are freely given to us not on the basis of who and what we are, but on who and what God is. The participle says that this action goes first. So these things were freely given before we know them. Here God has given to every believer divine operating assets, these fantastic and marvelous things but if you don’t know about them you can’t use them. You can only use what you know.

“to us” is dative of advantage, it is to our advantage to have these things; “of God” is literally, “under the authority of God,” under the plan of God.

Verse 13, the mechanics of perception of spiritual phenomena. “Which things,” divine wisdom, the provision of the grace of God, phases one, two, and three’ “we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth.” Man’s wisdom refers to rationalism and empiricism and systems of perception. “We speak” means we pass these things on; “in the words,” a frame of reference or category. “Not in categories taught by human wisdom.” This goes back to verse four: “enticing words.”

“but which the Holy Spirit” should be “but that which is taught by the Holy Spirit.” The word “taught” is a verbal adjective, it is not a verb; “by the Holy Spirit” is called a verbal adjective followed by an ablative of source. The Holy Spirit is the source.

“comparing spiritual things with spiritual,” should be “explaining spiritual phenomena to spirit-filled persons.”

Corrected translation: “Which things we speak not in categories taught by human wisdom, but that taught by the Holy Spirit; explaining spiritual phenomena to spirit-filled persons.”

Verse 14, explains why this system of mechanics is used, because of the unbeliever’s perception handicap. “But” is a conjunction of contrast; “the natural man.” The word ‘natural’ is the Greek word yuxikoj which means ‘soulish.’ The word for ‘man’ here is not man in his noble sense but it is a generic term. In other words, the yuxikoj is the soulish member of the human race. What is the soulish man? He has an old sin nature, a human soul. He does not have a human spirit and he does not have the indwelling Holy Spirit. In other words, the unbeliever only has a soulish mind, therefore he can only understand human phenomena. It is literally, “the soulish man” or “soulish mankind” actually.

“But soulish mankind receives not the things of the Spirit,” the Holy Spirit teaching spiritual phenomena to spirit-filled persons; “for they are foolishness unto him,” why? Because he has only human wisdom, human categories, and therefore to him spiritual phenomena appears foolish.

“neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned,” literally, “discerned by the spirit.” That means the human spirit. He doesn’t have a human spirit. His human spirit is dormant.

Verse 15, the perceptive ability of the spiritual believer. “But he that is spiritual,” this refers to any believer who is controlled by the Spirit, which is as easy as rebound. No one can teach the Corinthians because they are carnal, they are out of fellowship.

“judgeth,” this means to discern or to learn; “all things” is literally, ‘the all things,’ referring to spiritual phenomena, what God has provided — doctrine.

“yet he himself is judged of no man” and this time the word ‘judged’ means that he cannot be legitimately criticised by anyone, he is controlled by the Spirit.

Verse 16, the textbook of spiritual phenomena. The first part of this verse is a quotation from Isaiah 40:13. “For who hath known the mind of the Lord.” The mind of the Lord is the Bible, called “the mind of Christ” also in this verse. Who knows the Bible? Who can understand the Bible? The word “who” is an interrogative pronoun and in answer to the question only the believer is qualified to know the mind of the Lord. “Who hath known” means to know from the experience of study, to know from the experience of listening, to know from the experience of concentrating. The mind of the Lord is the Old Testament scripture, the Old Testament canon.

“that he may instruct him,” but the word ‘that’ is really who: “who may instruct him [God].”

“But we have the mind of Christ,” the mind of Christ is the New Testament as well. Present linear aktionsart, “we keep on having.”