2 Corinthians 2
Riley2 Corinthians 2:1-17
THE APOSTLE’S DEFENSE 2 Corinthians 1, 2. THE Second Epistle to the Church at Corinth followed shortly the First Epistle. In fact, students commonly believe that it was written in the same year, namely about A.D. 60, and was necessitated by the reception given to its companion Letter. It seems to have been penned from Philippi, shortly following the events of Act 19:23 to Acts 20:3. It will be remembered that the uproar of the silversmiths, under the leadership of Demetrius, in the defense of the Ephesian goddess, Diana, was followed by Paul’s departure into Macedonia. And, certain things, appearing in this Second Epistle, make it pretty certain that he had become familiar with the conduct and generosity of the Macedonian brethren just before the Epistle was penned.The attempt to analyze each Book of the Bible is a very natural and even a defensible one. It is the attempt to clarify and make meaningful, with a view to revealing the objectives, that were in the writer’s mind as he employed his pen.Not every Book of the Bible yields readily to a natural analysis, and II Corinthians is prominent among the exceptions.There are expositors who divide the Book roughly into three parts: Paul’s Self-defense, Chapters 1—7; His Direction Concerning the Collection, Chapters 8,9; and His Emphatic Claims for Apostolic Succession, Chapters 10—13.It is doubtful, however, if Paul was ever conscious of making any natural breaks in this Book. His two-fold object in writing it is to clear up misunderstandings incident to the reading of the First Letter, and to impress his Christian brethren, at Corinth, with his Divinely appointed apostleship.We shall undertake at this time a study of the text found in Chapters 1 and 2.The introduction to the Book is a repetition of the apostolic claim: “Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God”. Comparing this with I Corinthians, we lend weight to the word “repetition”, for there the writer began, “Paul, called to be an Apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God”.
Beyond all question, the apostolate was already recognized in the churches, as surely so as the Diaconate.The Epistle is addressed not only to the church at Corinth, but to “all the saints which are in all Achaia”. The salutation seems to be in a placating spirit, “Grace be to you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ”. The sentence was calculated to remove prejudice, to allay opposition, and to secure an impartial hearing.By this careful approach, Paul proceeds to present certain Divine and desirable considerations, such, for instance, as the Father and Affliction, the Brother and Affection, The Father and Divine Favor.THE FATHER AND “Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God” (2 Corinthians 1:3-4). Herein is the Divine Fatherhood defined. The definition is most engaging, and it should be most illuminating.“God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort”. Whence brings the Apostle such a conception? He had never sat at the feet of Jesus to hear Him speak of God as “My Father”, or define Him as “your Father”. It is very certain that he had never seen Jesus in the flesh, nor heard one word from His lips. It is not in the least likely, that in the vision vouchsafed him when on the way to Damascus, he was smitten to earth, there was any revelation made of the Divine Fatherhood, or reference even to the Divine compassion.
If so, it is certain that no record of such a revelation found its way into the ninth chapter of Acts.Whence, then, could Paul have brought this conception of God? From the Old Testament, the Book with which he was thoroughly familiar?The Modernist would answer, “Nay, verily; the Old Testament presented God as malevolent, not merciful, and as the God of judgment, not the ‘God of all comfort’.” But such an interpretation of the Old Testament God, on the part of the Modernist, is as absolutely a contortion of its content as is the claim of the same Modernist that the Old Testament teaches a flat earth, a firmament or roof, and a six day origin of earth’s existence.The Old Testament does present God as the Father of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
That relationship is the burden of its prophecies. The Old Testament does present God as “the Father of mercies”. One does not get out of Genesis, its first Book, until he hears Lot saying, “Thou hast magnified Thy mercy, which Thou hast shewed unto me in saving my life” (Genesis 19:19). One no sooner comes into Exodus than he discovers that God in His “mercy hast led forth the people” (Exodus 15:13). In the midst of the giving of the tables of the Law, the Lord passed by before Moses and proclaimed, “The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin” (Exodus 34:6-7). The whole Book of Leviticus drips with the blood that spake alike of mercy and pardon.
In Numbers Moses prays for his people in these words, “Pardon, I beseech Thee, the iniquity of this people according unto the greatness of Thy mercy, and as Thou hast forgiven this people, from Egypt even until now” (Numbers 14:19); while Deuteronomy records, “Know therefore that the Lord thy God, He is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love Him and keep His commandments to a thousand generations” (Deuteronomy 7:9).These five Books of the Pentateuch are only an earnest of the Revelation of God’s mercy to be made in the other thirty-four Old Testament volumes. The biggest thing about God, even in the judgment of Old Testament teachers, was “His mercy”.
In fact, there is no essential difference between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New. The Modernists’ attempt to force an evolutionary idea into the representation of the Old Testament God as an embryonic promise of the God of the New Testament, has just about as much fact in its favor as does the claim that man is an evolution from a monkey. The truth is, there’s nothing in nature that argues the last, and nothing in revelation that hints the first.Paul was an intelligent, sincere and competent student of the Old Testament Scriptures, and from them he learned of the God who is “the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God”.This Scripture also declares the fruit of an effectual faith.“For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ. “And whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer: or whether we be comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation. “And our hope of you is stedfast, knowing, that as ye are partakers of the sufferings, so shall ye be also of the consolation” (2 Corinthians 1:5-7). It is good to know that whatever the sufferings of life may be, Christ has endured them in far more abundant measure; and when we ourselves are afflicted, it only fits us to console those who shall come into kindred experience, thereby enabling them to endure, and to console them with “the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted”; for it is a truth, attested in multiplied experiences, that the partakers of sufferings are equally sharers in consolation. It is a fact that we learn how to sympathize by sufferings; and it is equally true that we learn how to provide consolation through sufferings.Aquilla Webb, in his “1001 Illustrations for Pulpit and Platform,” tells how, during the recent war after a German attack, an American boy came back inside the ranks and shortly discovered that his pal, with whom he had gone out, had not returned. Immediately he asked permission to go back over the battlefield, if possible to find him. A superior officer advised against it, saying, “If you find him, it will not be worth while; and you will go at the risk of your life, but if you are determined, you can go.”The boy went immediately, found his friend badly hurt, and carried him back near to the American line, where the wounded soldier died. The rescuer had just straightened himself up and started back with the dead body, when a shot struck him. He dropped the body and dragged his own just over the line.
The officer, seeing him, came out to lend help. Knowing that his life was fast ebbing he said, “I told you, you had better not go—that you might lose your life. Was it worth while?”“Yes, Officer”, replied the dying soldier, “it was worth while; for when I reached him, he said, I knew you would come’; and to hear those words from his lips was worth while.”There are times when the consolation of one’s presence is the greatest consolation possible—when the sense of nearness, the certainty of sympathy, the expression of affection, is the thing valuable above all other things; and there is no one in the world who can make that contribution so well as those who have suffered, and whose sympathy, born of much suffering, becomes more than consolation—it becomes a support of veritable strength, an imparting of spirit, a gift of self.Turning back to our text, we find the Apostle facing death without fear.“For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength; insomuch that we despaired even of life: “But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:8-9). Joseph Fort Newton, formerly pastor of the City Temple, London, writing to an intimate friend concerning his own mother’s death, after having paid many and beautiful tributes to her memory, finally wound up, “What a memory! More precious than all the gold in all the hills. Last summer she spoke of her approaching end as she would have spoken of a journey. She had not the slightest fear of death. As she spoke, there was in her eyes a far look, as of one who looked into the distant future—so serene; and in the depths of my being I know that its vision was fulfilled.”People sometimes speak as if death were not only the last, but the worst of enemies; but not for those who have ceased to trust in themselves, and who place their confidence in the God which raiseth the dead, who delivered us from so great a death as sin, and in whom we trust that He will yet deliver us from the death of the grave and seat us in heavenly places with Himself.It was some such thought that must have stirred the Apostle when he penned the words, “For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:17-18).But this thought of affliction and the Heavenly Father, leads to another and a kindred one, namelyA AND THE BROTHER We recall Solomon’s proverb,“A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity” (Proverbs 17:17). Paul here expresses the preciousness of a brother’s prayer.“Ye also helping together by prayer for us”. The prayer to which the Apostle here refers, was concerning a collection which had been taken, doubtless for the Apostle’s support. It is called “the gift bestowed upon us by the means of many persons”, and for that Paul desired that “thanks may be given by many on our behalf”.There are some of us who count the great prayer fraternity, who hold us constantly before God’s throne, as our fortune. We believe that intercessory prayer is a power; and while we do not attempt to explain it, we bear witness to this fact of experience, namely that when our burdens have been heaviest, our danger most imminent, when the Adversary seemed most determined against us, we have discovered that somehow the Spirit of God, anticipating all of that, had stirred many people to pray; and more than once we have been compelled to assign victory to intercessory prayers.Some years since I was passing through a great trial and I believed at that time that it was the greatest of my life. In the very midst of it, when I was utterly unfitted for any duty, I had to keep an engagement of long standing in Chicago.On reaching that city, I found an old-time friend eager for me to come out to Morgan Park and dine at his home. In answer to his urgent invitation, I went.
His wife and mother were marvelously godly women—women who walked in the Spirit. At the dinner table, imagine my amazement to have the wife say to me, “Dr.
Riley, two nights ago mother and I were led to spend the whole night in prayer for you. We did not know why, but we found it impossible to do else.” The speech astonished me immeasurably, but it also lent me hope in an hour that was otherwise dark, for I knew prayers so prompted by the Spirit would prevail.Years before that, while yet pastor in Chicago, and owing to the financial stringency that began in ‘93, affecting profoundly my little church, I had faced exceedingly perilous problems; and to secure time to pray them through, I had gone to Southern Illinois for a day or two of outing.A man came to me in a hunting field, and handed me a postal card. It was written by the wife of my senior deacon, a great and godly woman. The postal card read, “I know your burden this week, and I want you to know that day and night I am interceding.”It was like a sunburst from behind the blackest cloud; but better yet is another thought, namely, that the brother of all brothers, even our Elder Brother Christ, does not forget us. You remember how that night when He was about to leave the upper room and go to the Garden for His agony and betrayal, Jesus first prayed for His disciples, committing them to the keeping power of God, and pleading that they might be sanctified in the truth, made one in the faith, effective in service, and received at last into Glory. To be sure, in their weakness they slept when He needed them; but even that failure did not keep them from the Father’s blessing, for Christ had prayed for them.We sometimes forget that Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.
The Christ of Peter is your Christ and my Christ; and that even as He said to Peter, “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not” (Luke 22:31-32), so He speaks to us and pleads in our behalf, that we, when we recover, might strengthen our brethren. Yea, that we in response might, like Peter, be ready to say, “Lord, I am ready to go with Thee, both into prison, and to death” (Luke 22:33).But to push a little further into our text, we have an appeal for fellowship in the faith.“For we write none other things unto you, than what ye read or acknowledge; and I trust ye shall acknowledge even to the end; “As also ye have acknowledged us in part, that we are your rejoicing, even as ye also are ours in the day of the Lord Jesus. “And in this confidence I was minded to come unto you before, that ye might have a second benefit” (2 Corinthians 1:13-15). Undoubtedly the discussion over the First Epistle had created doubts as to whether Paul’s views and theirs were one, and as to whether he was a true Apostle of the Christian faith. This is Paul’s declaration that he stood with them for the fundamentals, and Paul’s appeal that they stand with him for the same and join with him in setting forward their common cause.Fellowship in Christ is a spiritual asset, indeed, and the marvel is that we make so little of it. Any careful review by a man or woman who had passed middle years, and who had long been a servant of the King, would show that the church is the world’s greatest and best fraternity—that in spite of occasional bickerings in the same, it does produce a brotherly bond not often found in worldly orders. To be sure there are those who get into the church who never sense this fact, nor lend any meaning to it.I have read but recently of a certain gentleman who, being in a city on Sunday, attended a service. In the pew just in front of him sat an extremely fine-looking man. When the service was over, the man walked out without even a notice of the stranger just back.
A few days afterward this same stranger attended a lodge. On the day following, he was walking along the street and he saw a handsome man plowing across the same, his face radiant, his arm uplifted, his fingers itching for a hearty grasp; and as he came near, he said, “Friend, I saw you at my lodge last night. I want to welcome you.” It was the churchman he had seen on Sunday. While not a secret order man, I have never been a rabid antagonist of the same; but I do say without hesitation that to make more of the fellowship of the world than of the fellowship in the church is to raise the question whether one knows the Christ.Finally, a request for cordial acknowledgment.“But as God is true, our word toward you was not yea and nay. “For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, even by me and Silvanus and Timotheus, was not yea and nay, but in Him was yea. “For all the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him Amen, unto the glory of God by us. “Now He which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God; “Who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. “Moreover I call God for a record upon my soul, that to spare you I came not as yet unto Corinth. “Not for that we have dominion over your faith, but are helpers of your joy: for by faith ye stand” (2 Corinthians 1:18-24). This energetic outburst from the Apostle is an emphatic plea for a cordial recognition of his Apostleship. He claims to be “established in Christ”, “anointed of God”, “sealed”, and given “the earnest of the Spirit”, and to be unselfish, both in his presence among them and his appeals to them.One may wonder why the Apostle was so eager to have his office and authority recognized. But the answer is at hand. Even this early church believed in a Biblical order of the ministry: “Apostles, Prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers”. Now that the Prophet was passing, the Apostle would largely take his place. His word would be accepted seriously, and his statements received as an end of controversy, for the Apostle was, even to the early church, the oracle of God.John Watson, in The Mind of the Master, brings out this fact by saying: “When one studies the Epistles he arrives at two conclusions, and they help to clear up the situation.
It is surely evident that between the Apostolic writings and those of the aftertime, from the Fathers to present-day theologians, there is a gulf fixed. Certain scholars may question, without profanity, the inclusion of the Book of Esther in Holy Scripture; certain others may deny, with less show of reason, any useful function to the Book of Ecclesiastes.
Many value the “Imitation of Christ” next to their Bible, and more might give this place to the Pilgrim’s Progress. But no one in his religious senses, however he may be tempted to undervalue some minor books in the canon, or honor above their value some books of the later time, would seriously propose to add Thos. Ü Kempis and Bunyan to the Epistles. It would be an impossible action, equivalent to alternating Mr. Holman Hunt and Mr. Long with Perugino and Andrea del Sarto.”There was something in the appearance, something in the emphasis, something in the undefineable spirit of Jesus, that led men hearing Him to say, “He speaks as one having authority”. But every Apostle spoke after the same manner, to a large degree, for the simple reason that he spake under the power of the same Spirit, and that power was recognized in the church of God.Finally, the second chapter presentsFAITH AND THE DIVINE FAVOR Faith tends to silence complaints.“But I determined this with myself, that I would not come again to you in heaviness. “For if I make you sorry, who is he then that maketh me glad, but the same which is made sorry by Me?” (2 Corinthians 2:1-2)? Paul’s decision not to visit Corinth in complaining spirit, nor to produce needless sorrow in the hearts of his brethren, rests, he declares, upon the fact that “God giveth gladness rather than sorrow”.There are people who imagine that the sorrows of this world are straight from Heaven, that its afflictions are the weight of the Fathers hand, that its griefs are God’s cat o’ nine tails for correction. It’s not only a strange notion, but an unwarranted one. Satan is back of the world’s sins, the world’s sorrows and the world’s griefs. God is back of the sanctity, the joy, the gladness instead!People, therefore, who are critics, complainers, joy-killers, are neither imitating the Lord, nor exhibiting His spirit. People who insist upon “dwelling in heaviness” and who would fain cast the spell of sorrow over all their fellows, can hardly enjoy the presence of the Holy Spirit, of whom it is written, “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith”, nor yet are they in vital contact with Him, who said, “These things have I spoken unto you, that My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full” (John 15:11).Even under the Old Testament dispensation, when the grace of God was not fully revealed, the Psalmist, by the pen of inspiration, said, “Let all those that put their trust in Thee rejoice: let them ever shout for joy, because Thou defendest them: let them also that love Thy Name be joyful in Thee” (Psalms 5:11).Paul admits having wept over conditions in the Corinthian church, saying, “Out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote unto you with many tears”; but assures them that, when he comes, he will bring his smile, “having confidence in you all, that my joy is the joy of you all” (2 Corinthians 2:3).Beyond all doubt, the note that wins for Christ is the joyful note, and the spirit that sets forward His cause is the spirit of hopeful expectancy, and the face, that wins in His Name, is the one that wears the smile of satisfaction.Faith also inspires the spirit of forgiveness.“But if any have caused grief, he hath not grieved me, but in part: that I may not overcharge you all. “Sufficient to such a man is this punishment, which was inflicted of many. “So that contrariwise ye ought rather to forgive him, and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow. “Wherefore I beseech you that ye would confirm your love toward him. “For to this end also did I write, that I might know the proof of you, whether ye be obedient in all things. “To whom ye forgive any thing, I forgive also: for if I forgave any thing, to whom I forgave it, for your sakes forgave I it in. the person of Christ; “Lest Satan should get an advantage of us” (2 Corinthians 2:5-11) It is a strange fact, when brethren in Christ reveal bitterness and refuse forgiveness. Such a spirit belongs to the world and not in the church. Jesus, Himself, had much to say upon this subject. He taught us to pray, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” (Matthew 6:12). He asserted, “If ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Matthew 6:15). He revealed the open way into God’s favor by saying, “When ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in Heaven may forgive you your trespasses” (Mark 11:25).But, better than precept is His example, since He is a forgiving God. “The Life of Faith” tells the story of the benevolent physician, whose large practice took him often into the hovels of the poor.
When the day’s rounds were done, he dictated to his secretary charges for the same and they were properly entered on his accounts. When he could find a spare moment, every month he ran his accounts over and, on reaching the names of people that were poor, he ran red ink through the charge and wrote, “Forgiven—unable to pay.”When he died, his widow looked his accounts over to see what was collectible.
She found these red marks and comments and knew that the bills had never been settled; so she went into Court and demanded their payment. In evidence of their being due, she presented the books. The Judge scanned the pages, noted the red lines run through and particularly the comment, “Forgiven—unable to pay.” Then he said, “Is this writing in your husband’s hand?” “Certainly,” she answered. “Then,” replied the Court, “no Judge in the world will give you a verdict against those people, whom your husband, with his own hand, forgave, because they were unable to pay.”Therein is the grace of God toward us. Therein is the ground of salvation. Therefrom should be the birth of that better spirit that makes brethren and cements in love the church of God.Finally, faith anticipates triumph against all opposition.“Furthermore, when I came to Troas to preach Christ’s Gospel, and a door was opened unto me of the Lord, “I had no rest in my spirit, because I found not Titus my brother: but taking my leave of them, I went from thence into Macedonia. “Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of His knowledge by us in every place. “For we are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish: “To the one we are the savour of death unto death; and to the other the savour of life unto life. And who is sufficient for these things? “For we are not as many, which corrupt the Word ‘of God: but as of sincerity, but as of God, in the sight of God speak we in Christ’ (2 Corinthians 2:12-17). “Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of His knowledge by us in every place” (2 Corinthians 2:14). We sing sometimes, “Faith Is the Victory”. The entire 11th chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews was written to prove that fact. What marvelous series of illustrations it contains: “By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain”; “by faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death”; “by faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark”; “by faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed”; “through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age”; “by faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac”; “by faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come”; “by faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter”; “by faith the walls of Jericho fell down”“And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of Gedeon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthae; of David also, and Samuel, and of the Prophets; who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong” (Hebrews 11:32-34).Yes, faith is the victory!In the Chronicle of the London Missionary Society is written concerning Robert and Mary Moffat, whose early mission to Bechuanaland was carried on without a ray of encouragement for ten years. No convert was made. The directors at home questioned the wisdom of continuing the mission and advised their return home.Just at that time, a friend from England wrote to Mrs. Moffat, asking what gift she could send out to her and that believing woman wrote back.’ Send us a communion service.
One day it will certainly be needed”! The communion service was purchased and started on its way. Just before its arrival a little group of six new converts made a public confession of their faith and that communion service reached Mrs. Moffat only one day in advance of the time it was employed in the first administration of the Lord’s Supper in Bechuanaland.Faith is the victory!