When Paul first came to the city of Corinth, it was in the wake of his experience in the illustrious Greek city of Athens. During his stint in Athens, he had marvelously presented the Gospel message, yet his teaching did not produce outstanding results. As Paul left Athens and began traveling toward Corinth — a city rife with demonic activity and wholly given over to idolatry and extreme sexual perversion, he must have pondered his performance in Athens. He probably thought about what he had done right, what he done wrong, and why his results weren’t as outstanding there as they had been in other cities.
However, when you study Paul’s ministry in the cities where he had his most dramatic results, you find that he did something in those places that he did not do in Athens. In Athens, he labored to preach a brilliant, intellectual, culturally relevant message to the Greek judges. But when you look at how he ministered in other cities, you find that in addition to preaching brilliant messages, he also demonstrated the miraculous power of God. That demonstration of God’s power was very important in pagan communities where the occult was pervasive and supernatural manifestations were commonplace.
In Acts 13:6-12, Paul had a face-to-face confrontation with a local sorcerer. The power that Paul demonstrated as he rebuked this sorcerer was so dramatic that city authorities were stunned. Verse 12 tells us, “Then the deputy, when he saw what was done, believed….” This demonstration of God’s power threw open the door for the Gospel in this region.
In Acts 14:8-18, Paul again demonstrated supernatural power. Seeing a crippled man who had never walked in his life, Paul told him, “Stand upright on thy feet. And he leaped and walked” (v. 10). This event had such great impact that verse 11 says, “And when the people saw what Paul had done, they lifted up their voices, saying in the speech of Lycaonia, The gods are come down to us in the likeness of men.” As a consequence of this wonderful miracle, people turned their attention to the Gospel message with outstanding results.
In Acts 16:16-18, Paul encountered “a certain damsel possessed with a spirit of divination.” After this girl harassed Paul and his associates for a number of days, Paul turned to her and addressed the spirit of divination. In verse 18, he said, “…I command thee in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And he [the spirit of divination] came out the same hour.” When the demon exited that damsel, it created such a mighty stir with the local people that the apostolic team was thrown into prison for doing damage to the fortune-telling business of the city.
That night Paul and Silas were praying and singing songs when another act of power occurred. Acts 16:26 says, “And suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken: and immediately all the doors were opened, and every one’s bands were loosed.” This act of power was so colossal in its impact that the keeper of the prison cried out, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” (v. 30). These combined acts of power led to the salvation of this man’s family. History tells us this keeper of the prison eventually became one of the chief leaders in the church of Philippi.
When Paul came into new and dark territories to bring the light of the Gospel, the book of Acts shows us that he repeatedly came with a demonstration of God’s power that had a powerful effect upon his audience.
Is it possible that in Athens Paul was so gripped with the need to present the Gospel in an intellectual, culturally relevant way to the judges that he overlooked the need to accompany his message with a demonstration of the power of God as he had done in so many other cities? Did he become mesmerized by the intellectual tone of the environment and leave the Holy Spirit and the power of God out of the equation of his preaching and teaching?
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Because Athens was a world center of idolatry, it was overflowing with demonic, supernatural activity, and if a demonstration of God’s power was needed anywhere, it was certainly in the city of Athens. Just for a moment, ponder what could have happened if Paul had allowed the gifts of the Spirit to operate in front of those judges so they witnessed phenomenal manifestations of God’s power far superior to anything they had ever seen in their pagan temples? Is it possible that such a demonstration of power may have shaken those listening judges and that the results that day would have been different?
It seems that as Paul approached the city of Corinth, he was reviewing his performance in Athens. By his own testimony in First Corinthians 2:1, he wrote, “And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God.” In Athens, he had brilliantly used “words of man’s wisdom” as he quoted their poets and their Greek philosophers — a message that, no doubt, could be included in the most exceptional messages ever recorded.
But when Paul later recalled his first ministry in the city of Corinth, he said, “And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God” (1 Corinthians 2:4,5).
It is clear from his own testimony that when Paul preached the powerful message of the Gospel to the Corinthians, he had determined to go one step further than simply preaching an intellectually and culturally relevant sermon.
This time he had made up his mind to also come with the “demonstration of the Spirit and of power,” as he had done so many times in other pagan cities where he was the first person to penetrate the darkness with the preaching of the Gospel.
The word “demonstration” is translated from the Greek word apodeixsis, and it means to display, to show off, or to demonstrate. Paul knew that to reach the pagans in Corinth, it would require a demonstration of power so outstanding that it would convince the unbelieving audience that his preaching was more than mere words — it was a message backed up by Almighty God Himself!
He knew it would take an awe-inspiring demonstration of power to get their attention and to persuade them that his Gospel message was true. Thus, Paul started his ministry in Corinth not only with words, but also with a “demonstration of the Spirit and of power.”
The word “power” is dunamis. This Greek word and its various forms are used 119 times in the New Testament, and it denotes the mighty power of God. As used in this verse, the word denotes not merely power, but tremendous power. In fact, the word dunamis is where we get the word dynamite. I believe this is an important fact to point out, for the word dynamite — denoting an explosive power — very well expresses the type of power Paul is describing in this verse. This word dunamis denotes God’s supernatural power, which when released on a human level, is explosive, mighty, and awe-inspiring to those who see it or experience it.
There is no concrete record in the book of Acts about Paul’s earliest preaching in Corinth. But from his own memory recorded in First Corinthians 2:4 and 5, we know that Paul’s objective was to bring such a mighty display of power with his preaching that the unbelieving Corinthians would be taken aback by the power of God and forever changed.
When people are confronted with a bona fide manifestation of God’s power so outstanding that they cannot debate its reality, they are forever impacted and changed by it. We must never forget the importance of preaching the Gospel with a “demonstration of the Spirit and of power.
Sadly, today we see some of us “ministers” of Gospel now accessing “certain powers” whose source is not God to try and mesmerize the unsuspecting congregation.
