What Will God Find?

2 Cor. 12:11-13:14Welcome! Today we come to the end of our series on 2 Corinthians. We started way back in March, and I thought it would be good today to split the message into two halves. In the first half, we will simply review some of the themes we have seen in this book. This list is by no means comprehensive, by no means complete. In fact, it is very biased – it is a list of some of the things that have struck me the most as we have progressed through the book. In the second half of the message, we will look at today’s passage and see how Paul, guided by the Holy Spirit, wraps up this powerful letter to the Corinthians. And so, here are the twelve things that have most struck me in this letter. I would encourage you to write these down, and to put a star beside any that seem to really speak to you at this point in your life. Our past messages are online, so if you want more details about one of these, or you were out of town for some of them, know that they are available.

The Upside-Down Boast

2 Corinthians 11:22-12:10

Welcome! We are coming down to the last few weeks of our series on Second Corinthians. As we get into today’s passage, I want you to think about resumes. Maybe you’ve never made a resume, or it’s been a long time since you needed one. Or maybe you’ve needed one quite recently or are sending it out to people now.

In America, because we live in a “secular” culture, we usually limit what we put on resumes to things that relate directly to the job we wish to apply for. We are so used to this that we don’t think it at all strange. We even have a “don’t ask, don’t tell policy” when it comes to job interviews. We are not supposed to reveal anything about our personal lives, and we are really not supposed to ask anything, if we are the interviewer. In fact, you can get in a heap of trouble if you do.

False Teachers in Your Life

2 Corinthians 11:1-21
Welcome. I cannot think of a better introduction for my message than to start with the Apostle Paul’s first sentence in 2 Corinthians 11: “I hope you will put up with a little of my foolishness.” My first thought in reading this is to think, well, if Paul was foolish, what does that make me? I don’t think the English language has words that will do justice to the comparison.

But I actually want to start today by having you think back on a favorite teacher, you have had, whether in school, or college, or in music or art or athletics. Do you have a favorite teacher? Looking back, I can think of several. Frankly, the ones that come first to my mind are the ones who were the most entertaining, who did the most outrageous things to keep my attention. Just thinking back on them makes me smile. But is that necessarily a good measure of what makes a good teacher? I don’t think so. Certainly a teacher shouldn’t be so boring that it makes you fall asleep in you chair in five minutes, but there has to be more to it than that.

God's Measuring Stick

2 Corinthians 10:1-18
As you can see, today’s title is “God’s Measuring Stick.” What is a measuring stick? It is a stick of a standardized length by which other lengths, other distances, can be compared. But how does one define the standardized length? Today, one of the themes of our passage, Chapter 10 of Second Corinthians, is the idea of a standardized measure of goodness, of righteousness.

But to start, I thought it would be interesting to talk briefly about measuring sticks. We all know the yardstick, the yard. We know it is 3 feet. But do you know how many spans it is? (Four.) Do you know how many fingers it is? (Eight.) Do you know how many nails it is? (Sixteen.) But do these identities help us to know how long a yardstick is? No. They are all relative. And their names may imply certain lengths (feet, spans, fingers, and nails), but these vary from person to person, and are not very accurate at all. 

Abounding Grace

2 Corinthians 9:1-15Welcome! Today we continue our series on 2 Corinthians, looking deeply into some powerful, powerful verses in Chapter 9. Today’s passage, like that of last week, deals with giving, but it also applies in many other areas of life. Now, it may help to briefly recap what we saw last week, in Chapter 8. The chapter begins with Paul talking about the generosity of the Macedonian churches, those in the northern part of Greece, including the churches at Philippi, Thessalonica, and Berea. These people were eager to give to a collection Paul was taking for the Jerusalem church even though they themselves were experiencing extreme poverty and trials and persecution. Paul exhorted the Corinthians likewise to be generous. In I Corinthians, Paul had instructed them to take weekly collections for this purpose, and they had responded by doing so. Now, about a year or so later, Paul instructed them to continue and in fact complete the collection so that when Paul and his companions came to Corinth, they would be ready to give them the funds.

The Grace of Giving

2 Corinthians 8:1-24Welcome! Today we will continue our study of 2 Corinthians, focusing in on Chapter 8. Both Chapter 8 and Chapter 9 deal with the topic of giving. I have a lot of ground to cover today, so let me get right to the passage.

And now, brothers, we want you to know about the grace that God has given the Macedonian churches. Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity. For I testify that they gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability. Entirely on their own, they urgently pleaded with us for the privilege of sharing in this service to the saints. – 2 Corinthians 8:1-4

Godly Sorrow

II Corinthians 7:2-16

Good morning. Before we get into today’s message, I want to take a moment and pray that God would speak to us today.

Lord God, You are sovereign. You have authority over all things. And, “You have exalted above all things your name and your word.” (Ps 138:2b) I pray that your spirit would stir in our hearts. I pray that I would speak Your words, and I pray that our hearts would receive them and live them out. Thank You for giving us your Word both in Jesus Christ as the Word made flesh and the Bible that we can read every day. Amen.

Okay, so we’re in chapter 7 of II Corinthians. Today’s message will bring us to the end of the first section of this letter. Through the first 7 chapters, Paul wrote to the Corinthians with an apologetic focus. He has been explaining his conduct, his ministry, and his heart.

In today’s passage, Paul is going to make some reference to his travel plans as well as a trip by Titus. So, I’d like to take some time to make an overview of who’s going where when and who’s writing what when and from where. Got it?

Right and Wrong Yokes

2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1

Good morning! Today we continue our series on 2 Corinthians by looking at what may be the most well-known passage from the entire book. Unfortunately, I also believe this passage has been misused, used to mean something than other what was intended, more than perhaps any passage in this book as well. So today I want to look at it carefully and discern the context and the correct Biblical meaning of this passage, and then we will talk about how it applies to our lives. So here is the first part of the passage, the portion that is so frequently quoted:

Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? – 2 Corinthians 6:14-16a

Who is Paul talking to? He is talking to Christian believers; the book of 2 Corinthians begins with Paul saying after introducing himself and Timothy, “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.” He is speaking to believers.

Open Wide Your Hearts

2 Corinthians 6:1-13Well, if you have looked in your program today for the messenger, I guess you’re a little surprised at this point. Yes, the program does say that Carl is the messenger. But no, I am not Carl. And if you don’t already know me, my name is John. Unfortunately, Carl came down with a cold this week, and it has given him a terrible cough. And that is not so good if you have to deliver a message.

Also, if you weren’t aware, we have three pastors here at Clemson Community Church: Carl Baum, Fred Custer, and me, John Farmer.

So, today is one kind of example of why it is good to have a plurality of leadership. Instead of Carl having to come in here sick, he can rest and I can serve him by giving the message today. It brings to mind Ecclesiastes 4 where it says that two are better than one because they have a good return for their work. The same passage also points out that a cord of three strands is not easily broken.

Reconciliation

2 Corinthians 5:6-21

Last week we learned from Carl (in II Corinthians 5:1-5):

For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For indeed in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven, inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked. For indeed while we are in this tent, we groan, being burdened, because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life. Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the Spirit as a pledge.--II Corinthians 5:1-5

(Note this is not "the force" in Star Wars or Eywa in Avatar.) This week we are going to continue on with verses 6-21.

Eternal Dwelling

2 Corinthians 4:13-5:5

Welcome! Today we return to our series in 2 Corinthians. Let me briefly remind you a bit of where we have been. Three weeks ago we looked at chapter 3 and learned how there is the very glory of God in us, through His Spirit. We saw this glory compared to the glory of God made visible through the glowing face of Moses. After Moses spent time with God, the result was that his face would glow. After telling the Israelites what God had told him, Moses would cover his face with a veil, because the glow was distracting, if not blinding. Over time, however, the glow would fade until which time Moses came back into the presence of the Lord. Our earlier passage in 2 Corinthians explained that the glory that is now in us, as believers in Christ, sealed with the Holy Spirit, is so much greater than that glory that it is not even worth comparing the two. So that is part of what we learned about three weeks ago.

Two weeks ago we looked at the first part of Chapter 4, which described us as “jars of clay.”

But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. – 2 Corinthians 4:7

Jars of Clay

2 Corinthians 4:1-12Welcome! This is a special Sunday – following our time here we are going to have a picnic at Twelve-Mile Beach and also have a number of baptisms. I love baptisms. But you know, baptisms are kind of funny things. To children they are simple – they understand that it is simply something you do after you have come to have your own personal faith in Christ; they understand that you do it because Jesus said to do it, and of course you want to do what Jesus says to do. But for many adults they are more complicated; some people have been baptized as infants, before they had faith, and so they don’t quite know what to do when they come to faith.

Competence from God

2 Corinthians 3:1-18

Welcome! Today we are going to resume our series on 2 Corinthians, looking at Chapter 3. We are going week by week, line by line, through this entire letter. Since we took two weeks off, appropriately focusing in on the death and resurrection of Christ, I thought it would be good to give you a very quick overview of some of the things we have talked about.

This letter was written by Paul to the Corinthian church, a church that Paul had spent a year and a half founding and building into, a body of believers that Paul had come to love with a special love. After he left Corinth to continue on with his missionary journey, introducing other cities to Christ, the Corinthian church began to develop a number of problems. There were problems with immorality, and even in boasting in that immorality. There were problems with their meetings – people coming just for the food, people dominating the meetings, people being disrespectful with regards to speaking out of turn and then saying that the Spirit made them do it. And there were problems with false teachers and with factions. The people divided themselves, some saying they followed one person and others another.

Forgiving Those Who Disappoint

II Corinthians 2:5-17

Welcome! Today we continue our series in 2 Corinthians. After this we will take a two-week break from this series to focus on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, in keeping with Easter. Following the break, we will resume this series.

Our passage today speaks of disappointment and of forgiveness. It is helpful, when looking at this passage, to be reminded of the context in which this letter was written. As we shared several weeks ago, and as explained in the Book of Acts, the Apostle Paul spent 18 months in Corinth as part of one of his missionary journeys. Unlike his previous stops which were short--sometimes only days or weeks--he spent a year and a half of his life pouring his life into the people, and then church, of Corinth. Later, after leaving, he heard of many serious problems facing the church. There were factions, extremely inappropriate behavior at the communion feasts, misuse of spiritual gifts, severe personal sin that was not being dealt with, and in addition to this there were false teachers who were attacking Paul – his teachings, his character, anything they could attack – so as to gain a following of their own. These issues were tearing apart and destroying God’s work, the Corinthian church.

About Pain

2 Corinthians 1:12-2:4

Welcome! I thank you for coming. It takes courage to come to a message entitled “About Pain.” We are continuing on in our new series on 2 Corinthians. The title I have chosen is neither light nor pleasant-sounding, but I think it fits our passage. There are multiple kinds of pain, and we will see several of them in our passage today. At the same time, we will find much in this passage that is encouraging and building.

Last week, we looked at some background on the setting--the time and place of the writing of 2 Corinthians--and then we looked at the first 11 verses. Following a greeting in which Paul wished his listeners grace and peace, he went on to explain that God is the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all of our troubles. Led to pen this letter word by word by the Spirit, he talked about how the comfort God gives us is an overflowing comfort, and how, with that overflow, we are to comfort our fellow believers who are suffering. I shared how God’s ever-overflowing comfort reminds me of Jesus’ feeding of the five thousand; as people took some bread and fish and passed on the basket, there was miraculously enough for all, with more left over than what existed in total when they started.

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: