August 8, 2025

Today's Reading: 1 Corinthians 1:26-2:16

Daily Lectionary: 1 Samuel 24:1-22; 1 Corinthians 1:26-2:16

“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 things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.” (1 Corinthians 1:27-29)

In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.

Remember Gideon? God sends him to deliver Israel from the Midianites. He tells twenty-two thousand Israelites to take a hike back home, leaving only ten thousand. Still too many. God tells Gideon’s men to go down to the creek for a drink. The ones who drink like dogs, lapping the water—those are the ones who are staying. All three hundred of them matched up against the hordes of Midianites. And if that isn’t wild enough, they head out to battle with torches and clay jars and not a sword in sight. How weak. How foolish. And yet, the Lord brings victory and delivers Israel. God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.

Remember Elijah? God sends him up to the top of Mt. Carmel to engage in a little prophetic duel with the prophets of Baal. Once again, God’s people are in a jam. Wicked Ahab and the infamous Jezebel are making an idolatrous mess of Israel. So, God does what he does best: he delivers his people, but he does it in a rather strange way. Elijah digs trenches. Baptizes the entire place, soaks the whole thing. Not once. Not twice. Three times. You can imagine the prophets of Baal having a good laugh. Look at Elijah. So weak. Such a fool. And yet, Yahweh sent fire down on the altar, and the prophets of Baal came to a brutal end. And once again, God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.

Remember Jesus’ life? God chooses what is foolish in the world—an unwed, Virgin, a backwater little town, a lowly manger, a life of itinerant preaching, and a ragtag bunch of fishermen, a zealot, and a tax collector—to deliver and declare his salvation. And then, in the greatest of all displays of weakness and foolishness, God in the flesh goes and suffers a shameful death on the cursed tree of the cross. Once again, God delivers, rescues, and saves in the most unlikely way. God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise. Why does God work this way? So that our hope and confidence rest in his outrageous grace and not in our own strength or wisdom.

In the Name + of Jesus. Amen.

Here we have a firm foundation, Here the refuge of the lost: Christ, the Rock of our salvation, Is the name by which we boast; Lamb of God, for sinners wounded, Sacrifice to cancel guilt! None shall ever be confounded Who on Him their hope have built. (LSB 451:4)

Rev. Samuel Schuldheisz, pastor of Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church in Milton, WA.

Audio Reflections Speaker: Pastor Jonathan Lackey is the pastor at Grace Lutheran Church, Vine Grove, KY.

Step back in time to the late Reformation and learn about a divisive yet inspirational figure: Matthias Flacius Illyricus. His contributions to Lutheranism still echo in our teachings today, from the Magdeburg Confession to parts of the Lutheran Confessions. Learning about Flacius’s life will help you understand more intricacies of the Reformation than ever before.