Thursday,
August 6 –
Today
we continue in 2nd Corinthians.
We will be reading part 2 of what we began yesterday, as Paul makes a
passionate appeal to the Church, and opens our eyes to the world Paul has lived
for twenty years is. Read 2 Corinthians
11:1 – 33. After you have read the passage,
I will invite you to return here so that we can look at it again.
“ I wish you would bear with
me in a little foolishness. Do bear with me!” (11:1 ).
The opening verse is a continuation of what he had been previously
speaking to them about. He began an
appeal to them in chapter 10 to understand what ministering to the church in
Corinth had meant to him. He’s
addressing the false preachers who have tried to sway the hearts and minds of
the Corinthians and call Paul a huckster.
It’s not Paul who is deceptive, it’s the false gospel preachers, and
Paul wants the Corinthians to hear him out.
What he began in chapter 10 will not be finished until tomorrow when we
get to chapter 12. Today, as you well
remember, Paul’s emotional appeal is not something he has enjoyed writing to
them. Chapters 10 – 12 are some of the most
highly emotionally charged, and most difficult things to read because Paul
hated writing them. He feels foolish –
it is beneath his dignity – but what is at stake is the future of the Church and
their faith in the Gospel by which they believed. We need to understand why it is essential to
read.
“For I feel a divine jealousy for
you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to
Christ. But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning,
your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.
For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we
proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or
if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it
readily enough” (11:2-4). There have always been false teachings,
false preaching because there has always been a serpent – Satan – behind
them. The false teachers have a
different gospel – one that is no gospel at all. While they portray themselves charismatically
(11:5-6), nevertheless, their motives are money (11:7-12). In other words, “there’s nothing new under
the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9).
Paul
uses a distinctive word for our translated English word, “another Jesus,” in vs.
4. When we say another, we have a context
that helps determine what we mean. “Would
you like another cup of coffee?” means another cup just like the one you
had. “Would you like to take another
flight instead?” means, a different one.
It is still a flight, but not the same one. The Greek word for “another” is “heteros,”
and while we use context, the Greeks used distinctive words. Heteros means “another of a different
kind” – as in our word “heterosexual.”
It means a human, but not the same gender human. It’s a crucial distinction. Paul is reminding them that the Jesus these
teachers brought to them is not the same Jesus he proclaimed to them. Paul was admittedly not very charismatic
(11:6), but more importantly, he didn’t come to take financial advantage of
them (11:7-9). In contrast, the false
apostles had no inhibitions, and Paul wants them to see through their charade –
“For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves
as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as
an angel of light. So it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise
themselves as servants of righteousness. Their end will correspond to their
deeds” (11:13-15).
The
word choices translated in 11:16-21 are not easy to read. What is Paul getting at? Eugene Peterson paraphrased these verses in “The
Message Bible,” and it helps us make sense of what Paul is writing.
“Let me come back to where I started—and don't hold it against me if I
continue to sound a little foolish. Or if you'd rather, just accept that I am a
fool and let me rant on a little. I didn't learn this kind of talk from
Christ. Oh, no, it's a bad habit I picked up from the three-ring
preachers that are so popular these days. Since you sit there in the
judgment seat observing all these shenanigans, you can afford to humor an
occasional fool who happens along. You have such admirable tolerance for
impostors who rob your freedom, rip you off, steal you blind, put you down—even
slap your face! I shouldn't admit it to you, but our stomachs aren't
strong enough to tolerate that kind of stuff. Since you admire the egomaniacs
of the pulpit so much (remember, this is your old friend, the fool, talking),
let me try my hand at it” (11:16-21).
We can sense Paul’s uncomfortability in writing the words, but we can also sense
how fed up he was with their gullibility.
While Paul feels “foolish” for writing it, he also wants them to see how
foolish they were in accepting the false teachers into their midst.
Every
instructor has credentials that allow him to say; I can teach this. The false teachers had credentials too
(11:22-23). Hebrews? Yes, - so was Paul;
Israelite? Yes – so was Paul; Descendants of Abraham? Yes, - so was Paul;
Servants of Christ? – they say they were, but Paul knows better and has many
different credentials to prove it –
“Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one.
Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was
shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys,
in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger
from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea,
danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a
sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and
exposure. And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me
of my anxiety for all the churches” (11:24-28).
Paul’s history of a life of service was not in five-star accommodations. The
case Paul makes is that his weakness are his credentials! His life, since becoming a Christian, has
been full of hardships, danger, loss, and concern for others. He doesn’t write this to seek pity or seek
applause. He wrote it to make it clear –
he gave up everything for the sake of the Gospel.
“Who is weak, and I am not weak?
Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant? If I must boast, I will
boast of the things that show my weakness” (11:29-30). Weakness, not strength. Gospel, not religion. There’s an old German proverb that says, “Tell
me who/what you are fighting, and I’ll tell you who you are.” Will we be faithful to the message of the Gospel? When the truth is at stake, Paul is willing
to lay it all on the line. Forget the TV
programs that want your money. Realize
the Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, and others are preaching “another different”
Jesus. Be willing to stand and look like
a fool in insisting that the Gospel says Jesus is “the only way, the only
truth, the only life.” Discernment,
doctrine, Gospel integrity, all matter when the souls of people are at
stake. When we remember we are servants
of Christ, we recognize that Christ died for us, and for all who will put their
trust in him. Go back and read 2nd Corinthians 5:14-21, where Paul
powerfully said, “that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to
himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the
message of reconciliation” (5:19).
Fools? To
the world, Christians who cast their singular faith and hope on Jesus Christ
are “foolish.” Yet, Paul reminds us – “The
God and Father of the Lord Jesus, he who is blessed forever, knows that I am
not lying” (11:31). Jim Eliot
committed his life to serve Christ and, along with four other men, went to Ecuador
in 1952 to reach the Quechua (Auca) Indians.
They were all ambushed and killed during an attempt to meet some of the
Indians. His journal entry on October
28, 1949, was written while considering whether or not he should go to the
mission field. He wrote that following
Jesus was more important than his life, and wrote down the words Jesus spoke from
Luke 9:24 – “For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever
will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it." He wrote in his journal, "He is no
fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose." He
followed the journal entry with a citation from Luke 16:9 "that when it
shall fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations."[1]
I pray it is in us – to live our lives
for that singular purpose.
Peace
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