The God of All Comfort

2 Corinthians 1:1-11

Welcome! Today we begin a new series lasting about 5 months – a series on the entire book of 2 Corinthians. Over time, 2 Corinthians has become one of my favorite New Testament books, although it didn’t start out that way. When I first read it, I was struck by all the personal information Paul shared, by how his emotions were very apparent in what he wrote, and I thought, “Why is this book part of the Bible?” I was also confused by several parts of the book, and just didn’t understand it. But over the years I have grown to really love and appreciate this book, in large part because it is so personal. Paul is quite literally an open book in this letter, and through his example we learn what it means to really live as a servant of Christ, to really love God with all of your mind as well as all of your heart.

Today’s message has two parts. In the first part, I want to give some background about the time and circumstances that led to the writing of this letter. And in the second part, I want to look at these first eleven verses as they help set some of the themes of the entire book. So first, the background:

The city of Corinth was in the province of Achaia, in today what is the southern part of Greece. The Apostle Paul first visited Corinth during his second missionary journey, described in Acts beginning in the end of Acts 15, which records that Paul and Silas took this journey to strengthen the believers in the places they had seen fruit with Paul’s first missionary journey. Acts 16 records that Paul and Silas went through Derbe, and then Lystra, where they met a young man named Timothy and were sufficiently impressed with his faith and willingness to labor for the gospel that they took him along with them. After traveling in Phrygia and Galatia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit did not allow them to. So they went down to Troas, and there Paul had a vision of a man from Macedonia calling him. From there they went by sea, eventually arriving in Philipi, a city on the edge of Macedonia.

In Philipi they had a number of adventures including casting out a demon of a fortune-telling slave girl. The owners, angry over the loss of their source of income, riled up a mob. Paul and Silas were severely beaten and then thrown in prison. After an earthquake and sharing the gospel with the jailor and his family, they were expelled from Philipi the next day.

Acts 17 explains that they went on to Thessalonica. After proclaiming Christ in the synagogue there for several weeks, the Jews formed a mob and started a riot. That night, the local believers helped them sneak out of the city, and from there they went to Berea, where, after a little while, the same Jews came and stirred up more trouble. Paul left right away; Silas and Timothy followed after Paul some time later.

Paul went to the ancient city of Athens, alone, and there he spoke to the philosophers and thinkers of God and Christ, starting with his observation of their altar to an unknown god. Now we come to Acts 18. Rather than continue to summarize events, I will read directly from this chapter.

After this, Paul left Athens and went to Corinth. There he met a Jew named Aquila, a native of Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. Paul went to see them, and because he was a tentmaker as they were, he stayed and worked with them. Every Sabbath he reasoned in the synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks. – Acts 18:1-4

Now what was Corinth like? It helps to know some history. Corinth was conquered by Rome around 200 BC. About 50 years later, the Corinthians rebelled, and the Romans made an example out of Corinth and utterly destroyed them. The town lay mostly uninhabited and in ruins for one hundred years until in about 50 BC, it was rebuilt by Julius Caesar. About 25 years later (and about 75 years before Paul visits), it had grown sufficiently large so as to become the capital of the province of Achaia. Compared to the ancient city of Athens, the rebuilt Corinth seemed all-new.

Why did Caesar rebuild it? Because Corinth was a tremendous shortcut for trade. The large piece of land below Corinth is called the Peloponnesus, and to go around the Peloponnesus by ship was to go 250 miles through unpredictable and treacherous waters known to have claimed many ships. It was much easier to unload goods on one side of the seaport and carry them across Corinth, loading them up on another ship on the other side. If a ship was small enough, the entire ship could be transported across Corinth. There were specially-made large rolling carts used for this purpose, along with a specially-made paved road called the dialkos (which means “to carry across”). The road goes back to the time of the Phoenicians, around 600 BC. Today there is actually a canal that goes across the Corinthian isthmus. When it was built, they uncovered sections of the original Phoenician road.

Because of its important location, Corinth grew rapidly, and at the time of Paul there were around a half of a million residents. The picture shown is of a famous fountain near the main agora, or marketplace, in Corinth. Corinth became a major center of trade, and many Corinthians became incredibly wealthy. Perhaps because of this wealth, Corinth became known as a center of sinful activity and corruption. The fact that Corinth was a recreation place for large numbers of sailors only added to the problem. In Greek there came to be a verb to corinthianize which meant to be sexually immoral and a drunk.

Towering 2000 ft over Corinth was the acrocorinth, a mountain which included the temple of Aprhodite, goddess of love. Little is left of this temple, but the foundations show that the size of the temple was immense. The picture shows the acrocorinth in the background; in the foreground are the ruins of a temple of Apollo. In the temple of Aphrodite lived about 1000 temple prostitutes who each evening would come down into the city to offer their services. This sin-indulging behavior was done under the auspices of a religious service to the “fine people of Corinth” – for the proper fee, of course. Corinth was a dark place, a wicked place. It was known throughout the entire Roman world for all kinds of sexual excesses and deviations, for stealing, for swindling, for corruption, and for drunkenness. Understanding how the rest of the Roman world was, this is quite a statement.

Corinth was a major center of trade, and it attracted people of all nationalities. There were many Jews there, and it was to the Jews that Paul originally came to share the gospel. Continuing on with the account in Acts:

When Silas and Timothy came from Macedonia, Paul devoted himself exclusively to preaching, testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ. But when the Jews opposed Paul and became abusive, he shook out his clothes in protest and said to them, "Your blood be on your own heads! I am clear of my responsibility. From now on I will go to the Gentiles." – Acts 18:5-6

Then Paul left the synagogue and went next door to the house of Titius Justus, a worshiper of God. Crispus, the synagogue ruler, and his entire household believed in the Lord; and many of the Corinthians who heard him believed and were baptized. – Acts 18:7-8

I love this! Whenever I read this I am reminded of the two restaurants with the same name next door to each other in Greenville. What was it like for the Jews to hear Paul say, “That’s it! I leave!” Did they have grand smiles on their faces, only to lose those smiles when they saw Paul not leave the city, not even go a mile down the road, but only go next door to Justus’ house! And I love how the synagogue ruler and his household became believers. How do you think that went over next door? And so in Corinth, the church began to take root and grow. But as it had happened in other cities, so did the unrest; so did the threats of persecution; so did the risks. Paul may have thought it was time to leave and move on to yet another city, but something happened.

One night the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision: "Do not be afraid; keep on speaking, do not be silent. For I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city." So Paul stayed for a year and a half, teaching them the word of God. – Acts 18:9-11

And so, unlike the other locations on this missionary journey, Paul spent a great deal of time in Corinth. During this time the church grew and grew. Paul and company eventually moved on to Ephesus and then back to the Caesarea/Jerusalem area.

Unfortunately, the spiritual and moral darkness of the city of Corinth began to have an effect even on the church. The church began to become overrun with factions, people saying they followed one person or another person. The church began to succumb to worldly philosophies, philosophies not unlike those of the lost multitudes in Corinth. There were those in the church being flagrantly immoral, sexually and otherwise, so much so that it was even likely noticed by those outside the church. There were lawsuits between Christians. There were offenses by believers against other believers, and even lawsuits against one another. There was confusion over the resurrection. There was completely inappropriate behavior at the Lord’s table. And in came false teachers. Since Paul had lived in Corinth for more than one and a half years, Paul was seen as the founding authority of the church – and thus, the false teachers attacked Paul’s teachings, his character, his personality, anything they could so as to get people to reject his teachings and accept their own authority.

When Paul learned of these things, it had to be heartbreaking for him. This was not a place he had spent just a few days or weeks in; he had invested so much time and effort in Corinth! So at some point Paul wrote a letter to the Corinthians. Was this letter what we call I Corinthians? I do not think so; I think this letter is mentioned in I Corinthians.

I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat. – I Corinthians 5:9-11

Looking at the Greek verb tenses, it seems that this is really referring to an earlier letter, not an earlier part of this letter. Plus, this isn’t said in an earlier part of this letter! We don’t know much about this earlier letter other than this little reference, but some time later, probably around 53 or 54 AD, 3 or 4 years after Paul had been in Corinth, he wrote the letter we call I Corinthians. He wrote it, inspired by the Holy Spirit, after hearing of the many terrible problems I have just described to you. He learned of these problems several ways – from the family of Chloe, according to I Corinthians 1:11, from Apollos, according to I Corinthians 16:12, and also from the main Corinthian church themselves, according to I Corinthians 7:1. Most likely this letter was brought to him by Stephanas, Fortunatas, and Achaicus as described in I Corinthians 16 and 17. I share these details to show that these clues are here in the Scripture and also to help you understand the situation – many people saw that the church was falling apart; and they were all concerned, so concerned that they were going back to the one who started it all for them, Paul. They were crying out for help!

Paul read these things and was certainly moved and grieved. Led and inspired by the Holy Spirit, he penned I Corinthians in response. The leading of the Holy Spirit and orchestration of the events at this time led to a letter that is Scripture; that is, like all Scripture, it is God-breathed and of tremendous value for all Christians to read and learn from, not just those at that time in Corinth. I Corinthians dealt with the many problems I have just described to you. When Paul wrote this letter, he was on his way to Corinth as part of his third missionary journey, in Macedonia at the time. The picture here shows the likely path of this journey.

In all likelihood there was a third letter, also lost. We will talk about this as we get further into II Corinthians. This letter was delivered by Titus, and apparently it was rather severe, from the clues we have in II Corinthians. At some point Paul received a report from Titus as to how it was received, and this led to the writing of the letter we will study, II Corinthians.

For now, this is as far as I want to go with regards to history and background. Some things will best explain themselves as we read the beginning of the letter this week and more of the letter in the coming weeks, so let’s get right into it. II Corinthians begins with this:

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, to the church of God in Corinth, together with all the saints throughout Achaia: Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. – 2 Corinthians 1:1-2

Timothy was included in the greeting because Timothy had been with Paul during his long stay in Corinth; they knew Timothy like they knew Paul. I like how Paul describes himself; yes an apostle, but not by his own declaration or even desire, but by the will of God. Paul did not take pride in being an apostle, unlike some of the false teachers who most certainly took pride in their position. At the same time, Paul was not apologizing or hiding what God had done in his life; he was in fact an apostle. Note that Timothy was described as a brother, not as an apostle, for Timothy wasn’t an apostle. And my understanding of that word, apostle, is that it was not just an elder, but someone who had personally been directly called and taught by Jesus. Paul was kind of the odd man out in that his apostleship was not like the original twelve, but Jesus had in fact personally called him on that road – He blinded him, asked him why he was persecuting Him, and gave him a calling to the Gentiles.

“Grace and peace” is a common greeting that Paul uses in his letters. It is actually very clever; he was combining a common Greek greeting among believers, Charis, meaning grace, with a common Hebrew greeting, even today, Shalom (in the Hebrew), meaning peace. How appropriate for a man who had been used by God to bring together Jew and Gentile under the lordship of Christ!

After the opening greetings, Paul gets right to the meat of things – and he begins with a strong, strong statement:

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles… – 2 Corinthians 1:3

I’ve stopped here, mid-sentence, because I want us to take this in. We need to drink this in! Paul has had a hard life – this will be a major theme in this book. Paul was certainly thinking of his troubles as he wrote this, but he was also thinking of the troubles of the Corinthians. How hard it had to have been to endure in that church! Despite the attention that had been given, there had been no sudden cure – some things had gotten better, but there were still serious problems with this church. Paul was writing to them because he knew how hard it had been and still was. And in addition to the internal problems, there was still persecution. Persecution didn’t just suddenly disappear when Paul left a city – the persecution persisted, no longer directed towards Paul, but towards those who remained. There was a lot going on in Corinth, problems from without as well as within.

But as the Holy Spirit directed Paul in writing this letter, He (the Holy Spirit) was not just thinking of Paul or of the Corinthians – He was also thinking of us. This letter is also written to us. To us, God says, praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles. Listen, this letter is for you.

Now look closely at what it says: God does not promise to take away our troubles! In fact, He promises that we will have trouble, as Jesus says in the book of John. What kinds of troubles? All kinds! At various times in our lives, we have physical troubles, emotional troubles, financial troubles, interpersonal troubles, spiritual troubles; we are deceiving ourselves if we think that, because we are Christians, we don’t have troubles. Troubles are part of life!

If you are young, you may have never gone through any really hard things – but I am sorry to inform you, you will. Even for those of us who are older and have gone through some hard things, it is likely that at some point we will go through harder things. My goal is not to depress you – in fact, it is quite the opposite, but denying reality is not the way we should try to feel better.

What does this passage say? It says that our God is a god of compassion. That means that He cares. God cares about your troubles, your struggles, your challenges. I think that perhaps Satan’s greatest blasphemy, his greatest heresy, his greatest lie, is when he whispers to you that God doesn’t care. God loves you, intensely, tenderly, and He cares about all that you have to go through. If you remember nothing else from this message, I pray that you will remember this – God cares about you! He cares more than anyone on this earth ever has cared, more than your parents, and He cares more than anyone on this earth ever will care, more than your spouse or future spouse.

But God doesn’t stop with caring; that is like how we might care about the hurting people in Haiti, for example, but we don’t do anything. That is not what God does – it says that He is the God of all comfort, that He comforts us in all our troubles.

How does that work? Well, I can tell you that it will only happen if you let Him comfort you. He won’t force Himself on you; God doesn’t do that. And unfortunately, that word, comfort, has a bit of a damaged association in our culture. Comfortable for us is such a relative term. For example, a doctor may say that we can keep our clothes on until he comes in to examine us, so that we feel more comfortable. Well, I’m sorry, but that is not comfort. The God of all comfort means that He is available to help us feel better, to be with us, to be our comforting companion in our troubles.

Get the doctor image out of your mind and instead picture a loving mom picking up a toddler who is crying because he or she has fallen. Picture the mom holding the child, pouring out love into the child, until there is no more crying, not even sadness, and she lets the child down and off the child goes as if nothing ever happened. That is a far better picture than that of the doctor.

Of course for us, our troubles don’t go away quite as easily as that of a toddler. But all that means is that that comfort is available all the time. We were never meant to go through the challenges of life in our own strength – this was a major theme of our series on the Holy Spirit; the Holy Spirit is there for us to experience that comfort. But the comfort is not automatic. We need to come to God to experience that comfort.

Actually, the mom image also falls short – the word here for comfort is the same word we saw in our Holy Spirit series – paraklesis. We talked about in the past series how the word has a very specific connotation of someone who helps you navigate through a legal proceeding. The mom image falls short because although our moms may be able to hold us and make us feel better, typically as we become older and our problems become more complicated, many of us feel as if our moms are not able to really provide good practical advice for our particular situations. That may or may not be true, but that is often what people feel. But the comfort spoken of here is not just making-you-feel-better type comfort, it is also providing wisdom, and courage. Even in English, this word, comfort, is based on the Latin cum fort, which means, with strength. Maybe we need a second image, especially for us guys – that of a father who perhaps is in the same career we are in, who has experienced everything we will ever experience, who has the benefit of a lifetime of wisdom gained, who helps fill us with courage and strength to face hard things – take these two images together, of mother and father, and maybe then we are starting to get at what this verse is saying.

I think now you are ready to hear the rest of this sentence.

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. – 2 Corinthians 1:3-4

Do you understand? God’s comfort does not just come from God in prayer; no, that is not God’s plan. It also comes from God through us – we become God’s instrument of comfort to one another. I can just imagine the broken and hurting Corinthian church gasping when they really began to comprehend these words. The church should not only be avoiding factions and arguments and envy and all the rest; it should be providing the comfort of God to one another, in the fullness of what that means – both the mother-like and father-like aspects. And so should we.

For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort. – II Corinthians 1:5-7

This is so profound! How can I explain this? We are stewards of comfort. God’s comfort given to us is not just for us. God promises, through Christ, to overflow our supply of comfort. And when we pass on that comfort to others, it will overflow in their lives as well. It’s like the widow and the oil, or Jesus feeding the five thousand. Imagine if someone just held onto that basket of bread and fish and didn’t pass it on!

If you have received comfort from Christ in some area of your life, for example, overcoming lust, or anger, or grief from the loss of a loved one, or physical pain or infirmity, or overcoming the scars of a childhood filled with abuse – whatever it is, if you have received comfort, cum fort, emotional comfort, healing, wisdom, and all that this entails, from Christ, you are called – I cannot think of a better word – you are called to pass it on. The comfort you have received from Christ is not just for you; it is for someone else, and if you withhold it, that person will miss out because of you.

There is simply no place for pride, or embarrassment, or stoicism, or even “a healthy emotional distance” in the Christian life. Yes, there is a place for proper boundaries, but that is not what we are talking about. Most of the time, most of us live life alone. We struggle alone, and when we do find help in Christ, we do that alone too. But that is not how it is supposed to be! You are called to pass it on. You are only a steward of comfort.

We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and He will deliver us. On Him we have set our hope that He will continue to deliver us, as you help us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many. – 2 Corinthians 1:8-11

Why is Paul speaking of his own hardships? Why is he speaking of despair? Doesn’t he know that this isn’t going to make him look good? I mean, come on! Even elders shouldn’t despair; certainly apostles shouldn’t! Doesn’t he know this is just going to provide fuel for those false teachers in Corinth who have tried to discredit Paul? What is going on?

Paul is practicing what he has just written – He is saying, look, I know about being comforted; I know about the comfort of Christ, because I have experienced it. In the deepest depths of my despair, I have experienced the overflow of comfort in Christ. And in it all, I have learned once again not to rely on myself, but on God. And if God can do this for me, He certainly can do this for you.

I have three more things to say about this passage. All of them are hard. They are really hard. But they are here, and I need to say them.

The first is that God may permit you to suffer so that you can comfort those who are suffering. If you don’t like the book of Job, you won’t like this. It says in this passage that these horrible things that happened to Paul (and the details of what they are don’t really matter – but we will talk about some of them as we go through this series), these horrible things happened to grow Paul spiritually; specifically, they happened so that he would no longer rely on himself, but on God. Why was that important to God? Because God wanted to use Paul as an instrument to His people. God can’t use instruments that rely on themselves or resist Him. And the same is true for you. If you are a Christian, God desires to use us as an instrument for His purposes. And if you resist Him, He will do what it takes to grow you in faith, in spiritual maturity, in humility, in whatever is needed so that He can use you. And one of His tools for doing that is suffering. So there it is.

The second is kind of the flip side of this coin. If you want to be used by God, if you want to affect eternity, you need to be willing to suffer. Most of Paul’s suffering happened because he was living his life for the gospel. If he had played it safe in Jerusalem, ignoring God’s calling on his life, he wouldn’t have experienced the shipwrecks, beatings, etc. etc. that he experienced. Serving God isn’t safe. Ultimately it is safe, if you have an eternal perspective; but if your perspective is about avoiding suffering, there are no guarantees when you serve God. There’s not even a guarantee that God won’t choose you to be a martyr for His name. And not all pain, all suffering is physical. I have experienced some very hard emotional things as pastor, things that have left scars, things that still hurt. But I have received comfort from Christ. So this is the second hard thing; suffering comes with serving. Of course, if you want use some “gallows” humor, avoiding serving him also brings suffering. That was my first hard point. So either way, you are going to suffer! You might as well suffer while serving Him!

The third hard thing is in that part about prayer. Now there is a wonderful thing here too – so let me say that first. On Him we have set our hope that He will continue to deliver us, as you help us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many. The wonderful thing is that God uses prayer like He uses comforting – it leads to the building up of others. It is good for many of us to pray together for something, because when God answers those prayers, we all give thanks to God, glorifying Him, and it is always a good thing when God is glorified. There is a creed that says that this is part of our purpose in existence, to glorify Him. But the hard thing is in that phrase, as you help us by your prayers. The hard thing is that if prayers help people, then not praying… doesn’t. Now we can argue semantics about whether hurting is really the same thing as not helping, but I would rather not do it. The point here is that prayers matter. They help. They make a difference. You may say that doesn’t seem fair, that God should do things that He wants to do regardless of what we do, but, well, tough. Prayers help. Just as this passage says that we have an obligation to pass on the comfort that God gives us, we have an obligation to pray for one another. When you pray, it is true that it helps you grow, but that is not all it is for. We are a we. Every church is a we. We are no longer just our own, but we belong to each other. Not praying for one another is just like not using your gifts in the body – the whole body suffers, whether you like it or not.

I hope I haven’t made you all feel depressed. But if I have, we can comfort one another with the comfort God gives us! Seriously, I hope you do not lose sight of the start of all this – our God is a god of compassion and comfort. Compassion and comfort. He loves you! None of these “hard things” are really that hard when we truly grasp the height and breadth and depth of the love God has for us.