Good Friday [1 Corinthians 1:17-31]~ 20260403 ~ Pastor Rodney Zedicher ~ Ephraim Church of the Bible ~ www.ephraimbible.org

2026 04/03 Good Friday; The Foolishness of the Cross [1 Corinthians 1:17-31]; Audio available at: http://www.ephraimbible.org/Sermons/20260403_good-friday.mp3

--Good Friday Readings--

***Voice 1 [Psalm 88:1-7]

O LORD, God of my salvation; I cry out day and night before you. Let my prayer come before you; incline your ear to my cry! For my soul is full of troubles, and my life draws near to Sheol. I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am a man who has no strength, like one set loose among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand. You have put me in the depths of the pit, in the regions dark and deep. Your wrath lies heavy upon me, and you overwhelm me with all your waves. — Selah

***Voice 2 [Mark 15:12-20]

And Pilate again said to them, “Then what shall I do with the man you call the King of the Jews?” And they cried out again, “Crucify him.” And Pilate said to them, “Why, what evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Crucify him.” So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released for them Barabbas, and having scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor's headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion. And they clothed him in a purple cloak, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. And they began to salute him, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. And they led him out to crucify him.

***Voice 1 [Psalm 88:8-10]

You have caused my companions to shun me; you have made me a horror to them. I am shut in so that I cannot escape; ​my eye grows dim through sorrow. Every day I call upon you, O LORD; I spread out my hands to you. Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the departed rise up to praise you? — Selah

***Voice 2 [Mark 15:22-25]

And they brought him to the place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull). And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. And they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them, to decide what each should take. And it was the third hour when they crucified him.

***Voice 1 [Psalm 88:11-18]

Is your steadfast love declared in the grave, or your faithfulness in Abaddon? Are your wonders known in the darkness, or your righteousness in the land of forgetfulness? But I, O LORD, cry to you; in the morning my prayer comes before you. O LORD, why do you cast my soul away? Why do you hide your face from me? Afflicted and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors; I am helpless. Your wrath has swept over me; your dreadful assaults destroy me. They surround me like a flood all day long; they close in on me together. You have caused my beloved and my friend to shun me; my companions have become darkness.

***Voice 2 [Mark 15:27-34]

And with him they crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, “Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself, and come down from the cross!” So also the chief priests with the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross that we may see and believe.” Those who were crucified with him also reviled him. And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

***Voice 3 [Isaiah 53:11; Galatians 3:13; 2 Corinthians 5:21]

Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”—

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

***Voice 2 [Mark 15:37]

And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. 38 And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.

***Voice 3 [John 3:14-18]

And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. ​Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

***

Good Friday songs:

at the cross (love ran red)

amazing grace /chains are gone

graves into gardens

***message***

all hail king Jesus

worthy of it all

***

--Message; The Foolishness of the Cross [1 Corinthians 1:17-31]

Good Friday? This is foolishness. This is weak. This is offensive. An unjust execution? A rescuer who could not save himself? A crucified King? The one who claimed to be from God, one with his Father, now abandoned by God? Is Good Friday the pinnacle of foolishness?

1 Corinthians 1:17 For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. 18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 19 For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” 20 Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? 21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. 22 For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. 26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. 27 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; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. 30 And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, 31 so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

The gospel, the good news message, is called ‘the word of the cross’. If the cross isn’t the central part of the gospel you believe, you’ve got the wrong gospel. We preach Christ crucified. That is the good news. It might seem stupid, folly, foolishness. Swear allegiance to a crucified king? Trust someone to save you who couldn’t even save himself? Follow someone who invites you to take up your own instrument of execution and follow him?

It might seem foolish, but the foolishness of God is wiser than men. It might seem weak, but the weakness of God is stronger than men.

It seems a move of utter folly for God to become part of the world he spoke into existence. It looks like absurd weakness for the infinite, eternal, all powerful God to be born a helpless human baby, welcomed by unwed parents in a shepherd’s cave. It is unthinkable that he would allow the humans, whose lives he holds in his hand, to betray him, arrest him, spit on him, mock him, torture him, and kill him. It makes no sense that nails formed from substances he created could hold him to a cross of wood formed from a tree he made to grow.

It is unimaginable that the light of the world would allow the prince of darkness to snuff him out. The King of glory humiliated. The one who came to conquer death died.

A good news message about a crucifixion? Herald a crucified Messiah? Is this foolishness? This was no accident; Jesus humbled himself. He came not to be served but to serve. He came to die, to give his life as a ransom for many.

Jesus’ way may seem upside down to us, but he is the only way. His way seems paradoxical, but he conquered death by dying. He broke the power of hell by experiencing hell when the Father turned his face away. The cross seems foolish, but it is the only way. Jesus asked his Father “if it be possible, let this cup pass from me” (Mt.26:39, 42). He prayed “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.” Jesus recoiled with horror from the cup of his Father’s wrath against the sins of mankind. But this is why he came. He came to drink that bitter cup in my place, to experience the full fury of the wrath of God for my sin, so that I could be forgiven, cleansed, welcomed into his presence, into fellowship with him. He died so that I might live, truly live, reconciled to God by the death of his Son (Rom.5:10).

This is the word of the cross. What we proclaim as gospel, good news, the best news for sinners, is the seemingly foolish message of a crucified Messiah. This is a message that saves all those and only those who believe, who look to the cross and recognize ‘that’s what I deserve’. Who look at themselves and recognize, ‘I have no way of rescuing myself; I have no righteousness of my own to present to God, no wisdom to figure out a way, no way to clean myself up. I have nothing but my own sin and what I deserve. So I am letting go of any other hope, looking away from myself, and clinging to Jesus alone, trusting him, who is my wisdom, my righteousness, my sanctification, my redemption.’

And there was a purpose in all of this; there is a method to God’s seeming madness.

1 Corinthians 1:28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. 30 And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, 31 so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

Friend, today is your hope only in Jesus? Is all your wisdom, all your righteousness, all your sanctification, all your redemption Jesus, and Jesus alone? Is your boast no longer in yourself but in him? Have you surrendered? Your pride, your self-sufficiency, your independence, and come to him needy, desperate, broken, helpless, and asked him to save you? He came to seek and to save the lost, to give his life a ransom for you; have you humbled yourself to receive the gift? The gospel? The word of the cross? To receive him?

***

Pastor Rodney Zedicher ~ Ephraim Church of the Bible ~ www.ephraimbible.org