#68 The Heavenly Revealed Wisdom Does Not Harmonize With Their Carnal WisdomWhen these seventy disciples returned with joy and brought Him a report of their work{Luke 10}, that even the devils were subjugated in the name of the Lord Christ, Jesus rejoiced in spirit and burst forth with a joyful heart into this thanksgiving and said, “I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and clever and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight.”
Here Christ calls the Lord His Father, since, according to His divine nature, He was begotten of Him from eternity (Psa. 2:7), wherefore Christ is His only-begotten, only, and most beloved Son (John 3:16). He also calls Him Lord of heaven and earth, since He not only created them and all their host in the beginning by means of His almighty Word, but still to this hour He powerfully preserves and rules them as a mighty Ruler, whose throne is heaven and whose footstool is the earth (Isa. 66:1).
The Lord Christ now gives thanks to this same One, to His heavenly Father and the Lord of all lords, that He has hidden the mystery of the Gospel from the wise and clever but has revealed it to infants. With “wise and clever” are understood the wise of this world; that is, those who are wise according to the flesh, as St. Paul calls them in 1 Corinthians 1:20, who place their worldly wisdom and carnal cleverness ahead of the heavenly wisdom that is revealed to us in the word of the Gospel. “They seek wisdom,” says the Apostle in the passage just cited. That is, they want the heavenly wisdom, set forth to us in the revealed Word, to harmonize with their own carnal wisdom. And when they do not find that such is the case, they would rather allow the heavenly, divine wisdom to depart than to allow their worldly wisdom and reason to be brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ (2 Cor. 10:5), since the wisdom of this world is foolishness to the Lord God (1 Cor. 3:19).
(Sermon for St Matthias-February 24, Postilla Volume 3 by Johann Gerhard, Repristination Press, page 49-50)
