Fightings and Fears

I love Paul when he sounds the most like me because it gives me hope that I can do this thing called "The Faith." This is why 2 Cor 7.5 resonates so much with me: "For when we were come into Macedonia, our flesh had no rest, but we were troubled on every side; without were fightings, within were fears" (KJV). Yes, this sounds like me, wrestling with fears on the inside and difficulties on the outside.

Difficulties and fears are a normal part of living out the Christian faith. Indeed, I would argue that God brings difficulties and fears so that we learn to depend on him alone, rather than on our own abilities or strength. They are blessings! Sure they don't seem like it at the time, but neither did Joseph perceive his time in an Egyptian prison as a blessing, until he saw what God was up to. Then his testimony became: "You (his brothers) meant your actions for harm, but God meant them for good."

Paul's Purpose/Our Purpose

Paul had such a clear understanding of his purpose in life. He states it succinctly in 2 Cor 1.9. His purpose was to make known to anyone who would listen that Jesus Christ was the Son of God. To him there was no higher purpose; no higher reason to be alive.

We are not all called to be evangelists like Paul. We are all called to live out our lives in the same way he did, in order to make Christ known as the Son of God to men. We can have no higher purpose.

The Foundation of (Our) Generosity: God's Character

I love, love, love how the NLT puts 2 Cor 9.10: For God is the one who provides seed for the sower and then bread to eat. In the same way, he will provide and increase your resources and then produce a great harvest of generosity in you. This grounds God's provision AND our generosity in God's own character. It all flows from him, which is a reason for both humility and profound gratitude. Humility because I realize that, despite my own opinion, what generosity that can be traced to my character comes from God's blessing me in the first place. Profound gratitude because one of the very reasons for God's generosity to me is so that I might have enough with which to be generous to others.

O Lord God, forgive me for how I often try to steal your glory by attributing generosity to myself rather than to you and to your blessing in my life. I understand that all of what you have given could be (rightfully) taken away in an instant. May I not pursue the things you have given, but the One who has given them. And may I bless others; be radically generous to others because you have been radically generous with me.

For We Know...

Struck by a comment from John Calvin on one of my favorite verses this morning, 2 Cor 5.1. He wrote: Even the heathens had some idea of the immortality of the soul, but there was not one of them, that had assurance of it — not one of them could boast that he spoke of a thing that was known to him. Paul has no question at all that there is a building to come, made by God, which is eternal and will replace our earthly bodies. This is precious food for the soul, especially of a 50 year-old. This old body is a pretty good one, but it shows the marks of death and decay more and more. It will not last forever, but I will last forever. We know this. What great hope to read Paul's confidence in 2 Cor 5.1.

Prayer: Thank you, O Lord God, for the truth Paul states here. That we can know what lies beyond the grave; that it gives strong hope; that we will have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

Crucified in Weakness; Living in Power

So writes Paul in 2 Cor 13.4. The Corinthians—or some of them anyway—appeared to have questioned Paul's authority to "tell them what to do." Paul says that the demonstration of his authority is in the power with which he speaks and writes. It is a power that he firmly establishes in Christ.

His argument goes in this manner. Christ was crucified in weakness, but he lives by the power of God (who raised him from the dead—how is that, O Corinthians, for a demonstration of power?). In the same way, Paul was weak in Christ, and yet the same power that raised Christ from the dead, was available to Paul. Paul lived, preached, and wrote, by that power.

We, also, are weak in Christ, we are no different than Paul. However, the power that raised Christ from the dead and that sustained Paul in his ministry—God's power—is available for us as we do the work that God has called us to do.

Reality Check

We are all going to die and there is nothing that we can do to stop it. This world will come to an end for us, or, as Paul puts it in 2 Cor 4.16, our outer self is wasting away. The gospel (and Paul!) gives us hope despite this harsh fact. Paul doesn't leave us with the fact that the outer self is wasting away. He writes that, if we have come to faith in Christ, then the inner self is being renewed day by day. Where the one version of life on this earth is temporal, for Christians, eternal life not only awaits, but we are being prepared for it day-by-day now! Wrap your brain around that fact!

Sufficient? Me? Nope.

Sometimes when Paul writes (actually when any of those who penned the Scriptures write) they construct things so well, so clearly, so obviously parallel to my own experience that I can feel the truth without even thinking about it. Thus 2 Corinthians 3.5. Am I sufficient to do the things God has called me to do? Am I competent to reach teens for Christ? To love my wife? To help my kids grow in Christ? Answer: (Resoundingly—No). I used to think that I was, but life and experience disabused me of that notion.

This is why it is so comforting to hear Paul say that neither he, nor anyone else, is sufficient (competent) to claim that any of his work spreading the gospel comes from his own sufficiency. It does not. Bingo! I have the exact same testimony. What work for the gospel that gets done in my own life, comes from and is attributable to, God and God alone.

Adam Clarke, commenting on the passage, writes: We do not arrogate to ourselves any power to enlighten the mind or change the heart, we are only instruments in the hand of God.

Just so. Thank you, Lord, that I do not have to be sufficient, or competent, or wise, or smart, or impressive, or perfect. I am content to allow you to be all that, and use me as you see fit.

Ministry of Reconciliation/Message of Reconciliation

Paul says in 2 Cor. 5.18-19 that God gave us both the ministry of reconciliation and the message of reconciliation with the motivation for our own ministry of reconciliation being the pattern of how God reconciled us to himself through Christ. Reconciliation here is the word καταλλάσσω which means to reestablish proper friendly interpersonal relations after these have been disrupted or broken (the componential features of this series of meanings involve (1) disruption of friendly relations because of (2) presumed or real provocation, (3) overt behavior designed to remove hostility, and (4) restoration of original friendly relations) — ‘to reconcile, to make things right with one another (Louw and Nida).
Is our ministry of reconciliation here one of reconciling other people to God, or reconciling other people to ourselves? Judging from the very next verse it would seem that Paul is speaking of the reconciliation between God and man because he calls it the message of reconciliation. So we are to both do (live out) reconciliation and preach reconciliation of God to man through Christ.

The Purpose of Prayer

Reading 2 Cor 1.11, this morning where Paul gives a short lesson in prayer. We are to pray, first so that the one we are praying for gets the help that they need. In this case it was for Paul and his traveling companions to be spared from "deadly peril." However, another purpose in prayer is so that those who pray and see God answer, will glorify God. Pretty cool. We both see God move and are blessed by seeing that he answered our prayers.

Two interesting words in this verse. The beginning of the sentence is συνυπουργούντων, which is a compound word consisting of three words meaning, "with," "under," and "work." So Paul implies that prayer is a working together with, or as Thomas Constable put it, "It paints a picture of laborers bowed down under some heavy burden that they are working hard together to lift." Beautiful imagery.

The second interesting word is one you don't see in the English. Again from Thomas Constable, "“Persons” (Gr. prosopon) is literally “faces.” A literal rendering presents the attractive picture of many faces turned upward toward heaven offering thanks to God for His answers to the united prayers of Paul and his readers." Got to love the Scriptures!