Henry: Welcome To Immerse: The Daily Bible Reading Experience.
day 25.
immersed in Second Corinthians,
though we aren't sure of the details, the believers in Corinth
were confused and disappointed by the way Paul behaved toward them.
After sending the letter known as First Corinthians, it seems Paul appeared
unexpectedly in Corinth shortly afterward, even though he'd written
that his visit would be sometime later.
And while Paul had planned to stay with them for some time, possibly all winter.
Apparently he left as abruptly as he came.
It is thought that Paul quickly departed because his conflict with
the Corinthians had intensified.
They had promised to contribute to the offering being collected for suffering
believers in Jerusalem, but they hadn't followed up on their plans.
Harsh words had been exchanged.
Then soon after Paul left, the believers received an even harsher letter from him.
No copy of it survives today demanding their support of Paul against his critics.
Things got even worse when the Corinthians discovered from Titus Paul's coworker
who delivered that harsh letter that Paul had gone to Macedonia in northern
Greece to start gathering the offering.
Were they offended because Paul hadn't come back to begin the
collection in Corinth in southern Greece as he said he would.
Had they come to distrust Paul's word in the end, no doubt, influenced by Titus.
Most of the Corinthians gave Paul the benefit of the doubt and
united against the unnamed man who was his most vocal critic,
Titus, headed north into Macedonia.
Met up with Paul there, and reported that the believers in Corinth had done
everything necessary to make things right.
Paul gratefully sent him back with another message that we have
today known as Second Corinthians.
In this letter, Paul tries to clear up the confusion the Corinthians have about him.
In the four main sections of the body of the letter, Paul recalls
all the steps that have led to his present relationship with them.
These four sections all start out by referring to a particular place.
Paul first pictures himself back in Ephesus across the A G N C in
Asia minor, modern day Turkey.
He explains that he and the believers in Ephesus faced
deadly trouble and had to flee.
Alluding to the riot, described an ax.
Paul then describes traveling to Troas where he expected to meet Titus and
get a report, but Titus wasn't there.
Had he been delayed because things were going badly, were the Corinthians
refusing to be reconciled Throughout this letter, Paul was remarkably honest about
his depression, anxiety, and suffering.
Paul was reeling from a sense of loss and uncertainty until he finally met up with
Titus and heard good news from Corinth.
Paul Next addresses his present situation in Macedonia, focusing on
the arrangements being made to collect the offering for the Jerusalem church.
Finally, Paul carries his reflections forward into the future writing
about what he expects to happen when he arrives in Corinth.
In addition to the good report, Titus has briefed him on a
troublesome new development there.
Some people calling themselves super apostles had come to the city
and challenged Paul's authority.
They had already won a following among the believers, seemingly by reinforcing the
Corinthians error that Paul had already addressed in First Corinthians, that being
spiritual means being freed from the body.
So Paul finishes his letter by offering an impassioned defense of his own ministry.
He shows he can match the Super Apostles credential for credential,
but Paul had earlier emphasized an even more important point.
He didn't need any outside endorsements.
The only letter of recommendation we need is you yourselves.
Paul insists that the believers are the fruit of his ministry overall.
Paul's letter reveals that the character of authentic Christian ministry
is like the work of Jesus himself.
It involves taking up our own cross, just as God's covenant faithfulness
was shown in the surprising suffering path the Messiah took.
So it will be with the Messiah's followers.
Although he was crucified in weakness, he now lives by the power of God.
We too are weak just as Christ was, but when we deal with you, we will be alive
with him and will have God's power.
The second letter to the Corinthians,
this letter is from Paul.
Chosen by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus.
And from our brother Timothy.
I am writing to God's church in Corinth and to all of his
holy people throughout Greece.
May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, give you grace and peace,
all praise to God the father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
God is our merciful father and the source of all comfort.
He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others.
When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the
same comfort God has given us.
For the more we suffer for Christ, the more God will shower us
with his comfort through Christ.
Even when we are weighed down with troubles, it is for
your comfort and salvation.
For when we ourselves are comforted, we will certainly comfort you.
Then you can patiently endure the same things we suffer.
We are confident that as you share in our sufferings, you will also
share in the comfort God gives us.
We think you ought to know dear brothers and sisters about the trouble we
went through in the province of Asia.
We were crushed and overwhelmed beyond our ability to endure, and we thought
we would never live through it.
In fact, we expected to die, but as a result, we stopped relying on ourselves
and learned to rely only on God who raises the dead, and he did rescue us from
mortal danger and he will rescue us again.
We have placed our confidence in him and he will continue to rescue us.
And you are helping us by praying for us, then many people will give thanks
because God has graciously answered so many prayers for our safety.
We can say with confidence and a clear conscience that we have lived with
a God-given holiness and sincerity.
In all our dealings, we have depended on God's grace, not on our own human wisdom.
That is how we have conducted ourselves before the world
and especially toward you.
Our letters have been straightforward and there is nothing written between the
lines and nothing you can't understand.
I hope someday you will fully understand us, even if you don't
understand us now, then on the day when the Lord Jesus returns, you
will be proud of us in the same way.
We are proud of you.
Since I was so sure of your understanding and trust, I wanted to give you a
double blessing by visiting you twice.
First on my way to Macedonia, and again, when I returned from Macedonia, then
you could send me on my way to Judea.
You may be asking why I changed my plan.
Do you think I make my plans carelessly?
Do you think I am like people of the world who say yes when they really mean no?
As surely as God is faithful, our word to you does not waiver between yes and no.
For Jesus Christ, the Son of God does not waiver between yes and no.
He is the one whom Silas, Timothy, and I preached to you.
And as God's ultimate, yes, he always does what He says.
For all of God's promises have been fulfilled in Christ with a resounding
yes, and through Christ our amen, which means yes, ascends to God for his glory.
It is God who enables us along with you to stand firm for Christ.
He has commissioned us and he has identified us as his own by placing
the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the first installment that guarantees
everything he has promised us.
Now, I call upon God as my witness that I am telling the truth.
The reason I didn't return to Corinth was to spare you from a severe rebuke.
But that does not mean we want to dominate you by telling you how
to put your faith into practice.
We want to work together with you so you will be full of joy for it is by
your own faith that you stand firm.
So I decided that I would not bring you grief with another painful visit for if
I cause you grief who will make me glad?
Certainly not someone I have grieved.
That is why I wrote to you as I did so that when I do come, I won't
be grieved by the very ones who ought to give me the greatest joy.
Surely you all know that my joy comes from your being joyful.
I wrote that letter in great anguish with a troubled heart and many tears.
I didn't want to grieve you, but I wanted to let you know
how much love I have for you.
I am not overstating it when I say that the man who caused all the trouble
hurt all of you more than he hurt me.
Most of you opposed him, and that was punishment enough.
Now, however, it is time to forgive and comfort him.
Otherwise, he may be overcome by discouragement.
So I urge you now to reaffirm your love for him.
I wrote to you as I did to test you and see if you would fully
comply with my instructions.
When you forgive this man, I forgive him too.
And when I forgive whatever needs to be forgiven, I do so with Christ's
authority for your benefit so that Satan will not outsmart us for we
are familiar with his evil schemes.
When I came to the city of Trez to preach the good news of Christ, The
Lord opened a door of opportunity for me, but I had no peace of mind
because my dear brother Titus hadn't yet arrived with a report from you.
So I said goodbye and went on to Macedonia to find him.
But thank God he has made us his captives and continues to lead us
along in Christ's triumphal procession.
Now he uses us to spread the knowledge of Christ everywhere, like a sweet perfume.
Our lives are a Christ-like fragrance rising up to God.
But this fragrance is perceived differently by those who are being
saved and by those who are perishing.
To those who are perishing.
We are a dreadful smell of death and doom, but to those who are being
saved, we are a life-giving perfume.
And who is adequate for such a task as this?
You see, we are not like the many hucksters who preach for personal profit.
We preach the word of God with sincerity and with Christ's authority
knowing that God is watching us.
Are we beginning to praise ourselves again?
Are we like others who need to bring you letters of recommendation or who ask you
to write such letters on their behalf?
Surely not.
The only letter of recommendation we need is you yourselves.
Your lives are a letter written in our hearts.
Everyone can read it and recognize our good work among you.
Clearly, you are a letter from Christ showing the result
of our ministry among you.
This letter is written not with pen and ink, but with
the spirit of the living God.
It is carved not on tablets of stone, but on human hearts.
We are confident of all this because of our great trust in God through Christ.
It is not that we think we are qualified to do anything on our own.
Our qualification comes from God.
He has enabled us to be ministers of his new covenant.
This is a covenant, not of written laws, but of the spirit.
The old written covenant ends in death, but under the new
covenant, the spirit gives life.
The old way with laws etched in stone led to death.
Though it began with such glory that the people of Israel could not bear to
look at Moses' face for his face shone with the glory of God, even though the
brightness was already fading away.
Shouldn't we expect far greater glory under the new way now that the Holy
Spirit is giving life if the old way, which brings condemnation was glorious.
How much more glorious is the new way, which makes us right with God.
In fact, that first glory was not glorious at all compared with the
overwhelming glory of the new way.
So if the old way, which has been replaced was glorious, how much more glorious
is the new, which remains forever.
Since this new way gives us such confidence we can be very bold.
We are not like Moses who put a veil over his face so the people of
Israel would not see the glory, even though it was destined to fade away.
But the people's minds were hardened.
And to this day, whenever the old covenant is being read, the same veil covers their
minds so they cannot understand the truth.
And this veil can be removed only by believing in Christ.
Yes.
Even today when they read Moses writings, their hearts are covered with
that veil and they do not understand.
But whenever someone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.
For the Lord is the spirit.
And wherever the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.
So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of
the Lord and the Lord who is the spirit.
Makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.
Therefore, since God in his mercy has given us this new way, we never give up.
We reject all shameful deeds and underhanded methods.
We don't try to trick anyone or distort the word of God.
We tell the truth before God and all who are honest.
Know this.
If the good news we preach is hidden behind a veil, it is hidden only
from people who are perishing.
Satan, who is the God of this world, has blinded the minds of those who
don't believe they are unable to see the glorious light of the good news.
They don't understand this message about the glory of Christ who
is the exact likeness of God.
You see, we don't go around preaching about ourselves.
We preach that Jesus Christ is Lord and we ourselves are your servants,
for Jesus' sake, for God who said, let there be light in the darkness has
made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that
is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.
We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile
clay jars containing this great treasure.
This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.
We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed.
We are perplexed, but not driven to despair.
We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God.
We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed through suffering.
Our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus.
So that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies.
Yes, we live under constant danger of death because we serve Jesus
so that the life of Jesus will be evident in our dying bodies.
So we live in the face of death, but this has resulted in eternal life for you.
But we continue to preach because we have the same kind of faith
the Psalmist had when he said.
I believed in God, so I spoke.
We know that God who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus and
present us to himself together with you.
All of this is for your benefit, and as God's grace reaches more and more people,
there will be great Thanksgiving and God will receive more and more glory.
That is why we never give up.
Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day.
For our present troubles are small and won't last very long.
Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs
them and will last forever.
So we don't look at the troubles we can see now.
Rather we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen for the things
we see now will soon be gone.
But the things we cannot see will last forever.
For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down, that
is when we die and leave this earthly body, we will have a house in heaven.
An eternal body made for us by God himself and not by human hands.
We grow weary in our present bodies and we long to put on our
heavenly bodies like new clothing.
For we will put on heavenly bodies.
We will not be spirits without bodies.
While we live in these earthly bodies, we groan and sigh, but it's
not that we want to die and get rid of these bodies that clothe us.
Rather, we want to put on our new bodies so that these dying bodies
will be swallowed up by life.
God himself has prepared us for this, and as a guarantee, he
has given us his Holy Spirit.
So we are always confident, even though we know that as long as we live in these
bodies, we are not at home with the Lord.
For we live by believing and not by seeing.
Yes, we are fully confident and we would rather be away from these earthly bodies
for then we will be at home with the Lord.
So whether we are here in this body or away from this body,
our goal is to please him.
For we must all stand before Christ to be judged.
We will each receive whatever we deserve for the good or evil we
have done in this earthly body.
Because we understand our fearful responsibility to the Lord.
We work hard to persuade others.
God knows we are sincere, and I hope you know this too.
Are we commending ourselves to you again?
No, we are giving you a reason to be proud of us, so you can answer those who
brag about having a spectacular ministry rather than having a sincere heart.
If it seems we are crazy, it is to bring glory to God, and if we are in
our right minds, it is for your benefit.
Either way, Christ's love controls us.
Since we believe that Christ died for all, we also believe that we
have all died to our old life.
He died for everyone, so that those who receive his new life
will no longer live for themselves.
Instead, they will live for Christ who died and was raised for them.
So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view.
At one time, we thought of Christ merely from a human point of
view, how differently we know him.
Now, this means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person.
The old life is gone.
A new life has begun.
And all of this is a gift from God who brought us back to himself through Christ.
And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him.
For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer
counting people's sins against them.
And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.
So we are Christ's ambassadors.
God is making his appeal through us.
We speak for Christ when we plead, come back to God.
For God made Christ who never sinned to be the offering for our sin so
that we could be made right with God through Christ as God's partners.
We beg you not to accept this marvelous gift of God's kindness and then ignore it.
For God says at just the right time.
I heard you on the day of salvation.
I helped you indeed.
The right time is now.
Today is the day of salvation.
We live in such a way that no one will stumble because of us, and no
one will find fault with our ministry.
In everything we do, we show that we are true ministers of God.
We patiently endure troubles and hardships and calamities of every kind.
We have been beaten, been put in prison faced angry mobs, worked
to exhaustion, endured sleepless nights, and gone without food.
We prove ourselves by our purity, our understanding, our patience,
our kindness by the Holy Spirit within us and by our sincere love.
We faithfully preach the truth.
God's power is working in us.
We use the weapons of righteousness in the right hand for attack
and the left hand for defense.
We serve God whether people honor us or despise us, whether
they slander us or praise us.
We are honest, but they call us imposters.
We are ignored even though we are well known.
We live close to death, but we are still alive.
We have been beaten, but we have not been killed.
Our hearts ache, but we always have joy.
We are poor, but we give spiritual riches to others.
We own nothing, and yet we have everything.
Oh, dear Corinthian friends, we have spoken honestly with you
and our hearts are open to you.
There is no lack of love on our part, but you have withheld your love from us.
I am asking you to respond as if you were my own children.
Open your hearts to us.
Don't team up with those who are unbelievers.
How can righteousness be a partner with wickedness?
How can light live with darkness?
What harmony can there be between Christ and the devil?
How can a believer be a partner with an unbeliever?
And what union can there be between God's temple and idols?
For we are the temple of the living God, as God said, I will
live in them and walk among them.
I will be their God and they will be my people.
Therefore, come out from among unbelievers and separate yourselves
from them, says the Lord.
Don't touch their filthy things, and I will welcome you.
And I will be your father and you will be my sons and
daughters, says the Lord Almighty.
Because we have these promises.
Dear friends, let us cleanse ourselves from everything that can defile our
body or spirit, and let us work toward complete holiness because we fear
God, please open your hearts to us.
We have not done wrong to anyone nor led anyone astray.
Nor taken advantage of anyone.
I'm not saying this to condemn you.
I said before that you are in our hearts and we live or die together with you.
I have the highest confidence in you and I take great pride in you.
You have greatly encouraged me and made me happy despite all our troubles.
When we arrived in Macedonia, there was no rest for us.
We faced conflict from every direction with battles on the
outside and fear on the inside.
But God who encourages those who are discouraged, encouraged
us by the arrival of Titus.
His presence was a joy, but so was the news he brought of the encouragement
he received from you when he told us.
How much you long to see me.
And how sorry you are for what happened and how loyal you are to me.
I was filled with joy.
I am not sorry that I sent that severe letter to you, though I was sorry at first
for I know it was painful to you for a little while Now, I am glad I sent it, not
because it hurt you, but because the pain caused you to repent and change your ways.
It was the kind of sorrow God wants his people to have.
So you were not harmed by us in any way for the kind of sorrow God
wants us to experience leads us away from sin and results in salvation.
There's no regret for that kind of sorrow, but worldly sorrow, which lacks
repentance results in spiritual death.
Just see what this Godly sorrow produced in you.
Such earnestness, such concern to clear yourselves, such indignation, such
alarm, such longing to see me, such zeal and such a readiness to punish wrong.
You showed that you have done everything necessary to make things right.
My purpose then was not to write about who did the wrong or who was wronged.
I wrote to you so that in the sight of God, you could see for
yourselves how loyal you are to us.
We have been greatly encouraged by this.
In addition to our own encouragement, we were especially delighted to see how
happy Titus was about the way all of you welcomed him and set his mind at ease.
I had told him how proud I was of you and you didn't disappoint me.
I have always told you the truth.
And now my boasting to Titus has also proved true.
Now he cares for you more than ever when he remembers the way all of
you obeyed him and welcomed him with such fear and deep respect.
I am very happy now because I have complete confidence in you.
This concludes today's immerse reading experience.
Thank you for joining us.