His Thoughts - C. R. Oliver (summer reading list TXT) 📗

"Blessed be the name of God forever and ever,
For wisdom and might are His. 
21 And He changes the times and the seasons;
He removes kings and raises up kings;
He gives wisdom to the wise 
And knowledge to those who have understanding.
22 He reveals deep and secret things;
He knows what is in the darkness,
And light dwells with Him. 

23 "I thank You and praise You,
O God of my fathers;
You have given me wisdom and might,
And have now made known to me what we asked of You,
For You have made known to us the king's demand." 
                                                  Daniel 2:20-23

(Notice "us" in the last verse. He
Considered every Hebrew in captivity
To have received this gift.)

In Stephen's sermon, he cited Joseph's use of the gift wisdom of God, which would balance out his own gift of wisdom before the rulers.

Acts 7:9-11
But God was with him and delivered him out of all his troubles, and gave him favor and wisdom in the presence of Pharaoh, king of Egypt; and he made him governor over Egypt and all his house.

Relying, in faith , Stephen stood on the promise of "not worrying about what one will say before kings and magistrates. " His oration is still a masterful work of art, as well as, a carefully planned judgment upon those to whom it was directed.

And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the Spirit by which he spoke. 11 Then they secretly induced men to say, "We have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God." 12 And they stirred up the people, the elders, and the scribes; and they came upon him, seized him, and brought him to the council.
                                                   Acts 6:10-12

The Lord of Hosts will not withhold His thoughts and ways from His people. He gives abundantly to those who ask. Notice below the gifts brought by the Spirit for edification of His people.

1 Corinthians 12:8
8 for to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, to another the word of knowledge through the same Spirit,

Notice these are "special" gifts and are enumerated differently. However, no saint is exempt from entering freely into the grace throne room and seeking them. There is also no such thing as a "weak baptism" in the Spirit. One does not receive 8/9ths of the gifts. 

As the Spirit of the Lord rested upon Jesus, so do the three elements of the Spirit highlighted below. This is a prophetic word given about Jesus. In whom Jesus resides, should be evidence of these elements. (In these verses it is plain there are elements of wisdom that have been ignored by the church at large.)

Isaiah 11:1-5
There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse,
And a Branch shall grow out of his roots. 
2 The Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him,
The Spirit of wisdom and understanding,
The Spirit of counsel and might,
The Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD.

3 His delight is in the fear of the LORD,
And He shall not judge by the sight of His eyes,
Nor decide by the hearing of His ears; 
4 But with righteousness He shall judge the poor,
And decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth,
And with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked.

Those who are filled with the Spirit ought also to attain to the fullness of the stature of Christ. We, too, should exhibit the three strong Spirit attributes spoken about Jesus. The "Christ in us" does not function apart from them. (The shallowness of Sunday mornings would be drowned in the power of these attributes.)

1 Corinthians 1:23-25
23 but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, 24 but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. 25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

Through the strength of such anointing, nothing should be usual or mundane. Review the last two verses of Isaiah 11:4, for in them is what our world needs most-from us! These verses are really the culmination of verses 1-3. 

Innately in man is a desire for wisdom. This desire was the tool used by satan in the temptation and fall of God's first humans. This is also the wisdom dispensed by universities and found in experience, but it is not the "Sophia" of the New Testament nor is it "wisdom" spoken of in the Old Testament.

Genesis 3:6
...and a tree desirable to make one wise.
(the word for " wise" in this case means cunning or worldly wise; it is a different word than is used for wisdom in the O.T).

Wise: Sakal: OT:7919 consider, expert, instruct, prosper, (deal) prudent (-ly), (give) skill (-ful), have good success, teach, (have, make to) understand (-ing), wisdom, (be, behaveself, consider, make) wise (-ly), guide wittingly.

Wisdom flowing from the heart of God is part and parcel of the "spirit of Discernment," for such wisdom is companion to the mandate to "Clarify and Declare." It sees through the muddle of the issues; it confronts and defines them to their root and then declares the thinking of God upon them and calls for them to obey.

Wisdom: OT:2451 chokmah (khok-maw'); from OT:2449; wisdom (in a good sense): KJV - skilful, wisdom, wisely, wit.

1 Corinthians 2:4-5
4 And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5 that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. 

1 Corinthians 3:18-20
Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you seems to be wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, "He catches the wise in their own craftiness"; 20 and again, "The LORD knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile." 

2 Corinthians 1:12
we conducted ourselves in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, and more abundantly toward you.

Paul had a deep understanding of his gift of wisdom and power. He refused to fall into the trap of relying on his doctorate in Theology from Gamaliel University. He knew the consequences of following a corrupted ideology and that it leads to corrupted conclusions.

Acts 22:2-4
Then Paul said: 3 "I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. Under Gamaliel I was thoroughly trained in the law of our fathers and was just as zealous for God as any of you are today. 4 I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death."

If the church continues in its current faulty theology, it too will conclude that a call for the death of the saints will be doing God a favor. It did in Paul's day, and many other times, in church history as was chronicled in Fox's Book of Martyrs. Selah! 

The Lord said, "Come Up and think like Me!"

2 Corinthians 10:5
...bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ

Dr. C. R. Oliver, PhD 

Publication Date: 05-01-2013

All Rights Reserved

Dedication:
Thanks to C. R. Oliver and the Newsletter Division from Zadok Publishing for allowing us to use his newsletters for this book.