No fallen human being would’ve invented the Christian faith.
Historic, orthodox Christianity runs deeply counterintuitive to the conventional thinking of the children of Adam. A crucified Savior who rose from the dead, a Savior who was born of a virgin, a Savior who was prophesied to come for millennia, truths so central to our faith, do not lodge comfortably in the minds of unbelievers. Not to mention the fact that all this has been communicated to us in an ancient book written by God through a few men and handed down to us.
No, Christianity to the unregenerate mind is, at best, too akin to Tolkien or Lewis or Grimm’s Fairy Tales.
And if we’re honest, without the power of the Holy Spirit illuminating our hearts to delight in these sublime truths, they would be difficult for us to swallow, too. The way God has chosen to do things, for me, is one convincing proof that the Bible is true and Christ is who He claimed to be.
But the wisdom of God runs completely against the grain to the so-called wisdom of the world — the two simply do not sync up. Two inspired passages spotlight this reality:
For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men” (v. 25), and “But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even the things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God (vv. 27–29).
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts (Isa. 55:8–9).
Those passages cut right to the heart of how God works — and the way He typically works is opposite to the way the world does its bidding. This is seen clearly in the way God works in redemption and, really, throughout the Bible and in the lives of His people.
In his excellent 2019 book Redemptive Reversals and the Ironic Overturning of Human Wisdom (Crossway), New Testament scholar Greg Beale unpacks the important biblical truth that God’s ways are not our ways and that in God’s economy, things are not always as they seem. This truth is vital in properly interpreting both Scripture and God’s ways with His people in everyday life.
Here are three major ways we see those biblical contrasts in action:
1. The contrast looms large in Scripture’s redemptive reversals.
Irony is the saying or doing of something that implies its opposite. What is said or done really indicates the reverse of the saying or act. God deals with humans in primarily ironic ways. Beale cites two kinds of irony in Scripture:
- Retributive irony, whereby God punishes people by means of their own sin.
- Redemptive irony, a second type, unfolds for God’s faithful when they appear to be cursed, but as they persevere in the faith, they are really in the midst of being blessed. Job, the Old Testament’s paradigmatic sufferer, is an important example.
In God’s economy, sin often comes with its own judgment — like Wile E. Coyote in the old Road Runner cartoon, sinners build the trap with their godless lifestyle that will ultimately lead to their downfall. A longtime alcoholic dies of liver disease. Sexual promiscuity leads to the participant contracting AIDS. Embezzling money leads to the embezzler’s firing.
Mordecai and Haman in the OT book of Esther are vivid examples of the two types of biblical irony. It appears innocent Mordecai will be unjustly hanged at the hands of anti-Semite, Haman, the No. 2 man in Persia. However, Mordecai, a Jew, winds up being venerated and exalted to the No. 2 position in place of Haman, who suffered the indignity of capital punishment that was planned for Mordecai. Haman built the very gallows on which he was hung. Mordecai is venerated and eventually ascends to the No. 2 leadership office in Persia.
The ultimate expression of redemptive irony is found in the cross of Jesus Christ: The world rejected Him and hanged Him on a tree, which led to salvation for the world. We call this the wisdom of the cross. The sinless Savior rescued sinful man. We would never write the story of redemption this way.
2.The contrast is seen in God’s activity in Scripture.
- God chose Abraham, who was probably a polytheist, to head up the nation composed of His people.
- God chose Israel — not Egypt, Assyria, or Babylon, the “strong” nations. Israel was new, small, relatively weak — unlike ancient Egypt, a military juggernaut.
- God chose David over his more physically impressive brothers to be king of Israel. God does not see as man sees (1 Sam. 16:7).
- God ordained that His Son would be born in a stable, not in a luxurious castle.
- Jesus, King of kings, rode into Jerusalem on a lowly donkey’s colt and not on a war horse.
- Christ died at Calvary to bring eternal life to God’s people.
3. The contrast in the “two wisdoms” is seen practically in the Christian life.
- If a person would live, he must die daily to self (Matt. 16:24–26).
- The meek, not the military conqueror, will inherit the earth (Matt. 5:5).
- Power is perfected in the powerless, not in the politically or socially powerful. Paul said as much in the account of his thorn: “When I am weak, then I am strong … for (Christ’s) power is made manifest in my weakness” (2 Cor. 12:7–10). Paul’s entire life and ministry is a testimony to this truth, as the former blasphemer and enemy of Christ becomes the greatest church planter, evangelist, theologian, and writer the world has known.
- If your love for family doesn’t look like hate when measured against your love for Christ, you cannot be His disciple (Luke 14:26-33).
- Christ calls us to love our enemies and give to those who cannot return the favor.
- The road to eternal life is narrow and hard, the path to destruction is broad and easy (Matt. 7:13–14).
- Suffering and adversity, not prosperity and ease, makes a believer grow in holiness and spiritual maturity. God uses affliction for the believer’s good and for His glory (Rom. 8:28).
Suffering as the Path to Glory
The 21st century secularist often struggles with this last idea more than others, viewing the so-called “problem of evil” as the major stumbling block for the truthfulness, goodness, and utility of the Christian faith.
“What may appear for the unbeliever as a positive upturn in life is sometimes really, from God’s view and plan, the beginning of a downturn in judgment,” writes Beale. “And what appears to be a downturn in the believer’s life is really an upturn in blessing.”
The cross of Christ is, of course, the centerpiece of redemptive suffering, and the Christian’s calling is to walk in His steps (1 Pet. 2:21).
The story of Joseph illustrates this truth beautifully. The protagonist is sold into Egyptian slavery by his jealous brothers. Once in Egypt, Joseph is jailed but finds favor with Pharaoh and later ascends to second in command for the entire nation. God uses Joseph to squirrel away food for a coming seven-year famine that provides sustenance for all and preserves Joseph’s own family, the bloodline through which the Redeemer is to come. In Genesis 50:20, Joseph forgives his brothers and provides the thesis of the story — and, really, a thesis for all of Scripture: “What you intended for evil, God intended for good.”
God’s wisdom cuts against the grain of human knowhow, but, as Beale points out, the reversal may leave humans baffled; God always calculates it for His people’s ultimate flourishing.
“Christians need to be aware of the ironic nature of life in order that they may not become discouraged at bad events in their lives … . In fact … the ironic nature of Christian living is necessary in order that faith be given opportunity to grow.”
Even a Wretch Like Me
Maybe my clearest experiential proof that God draws straight lines with crooked sticks, that His ways are not our ways, lies in His saving of a wretch like me, then calling me to serve His kingdom as my life’s work. I would never have chosen an ordinary man from an ordinary family from an ordinary hillbilly town in Georgia as a soldier or leader in my army. His qualifications would be far too weak.
Knowing that, I lean daily on this: “God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are.”