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

Find Rest

Since the beginning of March, I’ve been to 3 funerals and a wake or visitation for a fourth. The ages of the deceased were 86, 63, 44, and 15 years old. One died of old age. One died in a tragic accident. Another died suddenly and unexpectedly from a heart attack. And one was murdered. Only one of the four was expected to be near death. The other three were shocking and completely unexpected.

In one of the funerals, the pastor said a phrase in passing that really caught my attention. He said, “This is too real.” And so death appears to be when it comes unexpected. It is real because everyone dies. But it seems too real because we’re not prepared.

I share that because it is very important to consider the state of your soul today, right now. How much time any one of us has on this Earth is known only to God. If you were to die today, what would you say to God? If you were standing there before the Lord this very afternoon, and He asked you, “Why should I let you in to my heaven?” What would you say?

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.

...And He Rose

Christ is risen!

Praise God! What a beautiful and glorious day it is. Isn’t it interesting that for so many, Easter comes in spring? (A quick check on Wikipedia shows 90% of the world’s population lives in the northern hemisphere.) Do you wonder sometimes why God made the world just the way it is? Why do we even have seasons? I know that it’s because of the tilt of the earth. But isn’t it interesting that we get to experience this cycle of rebirth every year. Through creation, we are reminded that there is new life. In winter, trees are cold and grey. With some plants, the foliage dies completely above the ground. I’ve shown a picture of the bloom of a bleeding heart before. I'm including it again below.

He Died...

Remember He did not come to Jerusalem to be made King but to die!

Jesus predicts his suffering and death:

Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things which are written through the prophets about the Son of Man will be accomplished. 'For He will be handed over to the Gentiles, and will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon, and after they have scourged Him, they will kill Him; and the third day He will rise again.'”--Luke 18:31-33

Q. Why does death exist?

A. The Fall

In the Garden of Eden, God commanded Adam, from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it, you shall surely die.--Genesis 2:17

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.