09/07/06 It’s tough being an apostle 2 Corinthians 12.1-15
1. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. Do you agree?
Sometimes maybe. I remember when Pam went to university how much I enjoyed writing and receiving letters from her, looked forward to seeing her at a weekend. Maybe in some situations that sort of absence can encourage us to want to know more about another person and in someway can help us to be closer.
But in many situations I would suggest that this saying is not true. In fact it seems to me that absence can be a real threat to a relationship. Often when a relationship goes wrong in a marriage it is not usually because a couple are spending too much time together in a way which they both find constructive and satisfying. It is often because they are so busy, so involved in work, or in coping with the demands of looking after children, or so busy pursuing separate interests that in fact they spend far too little time with each other. Although they may live together, they are actually absent from each other for far too much of the time.
Absence makes the heart grow fonder.. doesn’t make much sense either if you apply it say to a relationship with God. Someone who rarely meets with other Christians, spends little time in worship, little time with God in prayer, little time listening out for his voice as they read the Bible... someone like that is not likely to be living in a close relationship with God. Prolonged absence like that makes it very difficult to build up a strong relationship.
And in the case of a relationship with God.. people who are apart from God for a long time often develop all sorts of wrong understandings of what he is like. So that for instance they say things like,
I know that Adultery is supposed to be wrong but when it feels so right I’m sure that God is guiding me in this relationship. Or maybe people are so absent from God that they misunderstand his character so much that they find themselves saying.. “God could never forgive me… now after what I’ve done.”
2. So absence can weaken a relationship, and absence can give rise to misunderstanding.
Paul had been away from the church for a while. He had lived in Corinth for three years, caring for new believers, teaching them, establishing leaders in the church… and then he moved on and continued his church planting ministry. When this letter was written he was part way through what is usually referred to as his third missionary journey. And it seems that Paul’s absence from the church that he had planted in Corinth had a negative effect upon his relationship with the Christians there.
If you read through the second letter to the Corinthians… you can see that maybe some people were not just losing touch with Paul, they were in danger of losing touch with God as well.
3. People in the church had been saying things about Paul. Look at one of the things that they said about him. Paul refers to it at the beginning of chapter 10, read vs.1. some of you say I am bold in my letters but timid in person. The same complaint is mentioned later on.. read vs.10. His letters are demanding and forceful, but in person he is weak, and his speeches are really bad!
Paul is timid.
Paul was the one who had walked into this major city of Corinth, unknown, and had started preaching about Jesus. He had been bold enough to speak in the synagogue. The Holy Spirit had been at work in his speaking to open the minds and hearts of some members of that synagogue so that they became the first members of the church in Corinth.
And when he had been barred from the synagogue he had been courageous enough to simply move to the house right next door, and he continued to preach and teach and hold meetings for another year and a half. Even when he was taken to court in Corinth he still carried on.
And now the people who were part of the congregation in that city, said that he was lacking in boldness! That he was a poor speaker. They had seen others who had impressed them more and now Paul just didn’t match up.
Had Paul changed... I don’t think so... for after the time this letter was written we find him facing up to riots in Ephesus... facing up to arrest in Jerusalem, standing trial in Rome and courageously living though a time of imprisonment before dying a martyrs death.
But their attitude to him, had changed. He wasn’t impressive enough for them any more.
You would have thought that no one would have been able to forget just how God worked through Paul to establish that church in Corinth.. but it seems that they were - able to forget.
They forgot how God had touched their lives through Paul… and now they were running after some new celebrity Christian leaders and listening to them instead.
“Super- apostles” is the slightly sarcastic way that Paul describes them. Some of these people had been teaching things which were contrary to the gospel. They were false teachers. But they were very eloquent speakers who had come to the church in Corinth. They impressed the people in the congregation, their oratory, their descriptions of their amazing revelations and spiritual experiences. It seemed to people in the church there that these people had a lot more going for them than Paul.
At the start of the passage we read this morning Paul says you are impressed by revelations… well I have had them too. I’ll boast about them shall I? Will that impress you?
Actually Paul doesn’t boast about his visions he says whatever I saw I can’t describe. But he wants the people in Corinth to see that they are being impressed by the wrong things.
It is so easy to be impressed by the wrong things.
In our culture Christians can be caught up in the obsession with wealth and status and image.
We can start to compare Christian leaders one with another… their church is bigger than my church so God must be more at work there.
Or that speaker is so passionate… he must be more full of the Holy Spirit than that one over there.
We need to ask for wisdom and discernment. Just because someone speaks loudly passionately and eloquently it doesn’t mean they are speaking God’s truth. The “super-apostles” in the church in Corinth weren’t.
And just because someone is impressive and successful in gaining followers it doesn’t mean that they are a servant of the Lord Jesus.
Jesus has warned us that on the day of judgement he will say to some who claimed to be working in his name.. depart from me I never knew you. (Matthew 7:23)
It’s tough being an apostle. That was the thought that stuck with me when I looked at this passage a few months ago.
Perhaps when we are looking for signs of authentic Christian leadership… we should be especially wary of leaders who promise prosperity and comfort, who say that there is no need to endure sickness or face hardship. Because when Paul wants to teach the Christians in Corinth how to discern whether or not God is at work in his life… he says
What I will do, is boast about my weaknesses.
He has spoken in the previous chapter of his weaknesses and difficulties, his hardships, the times he’s been imprisoned, the times he’s been flogged, the times he has been shipwrecked, the times he has been starving, the times he had to escape from robbers,
the times he has been in danger crossing rivers, the times he has been tired, gone without sleep, the times he has been cold and naked.
It’s not the sort of celebrity lifestyle that many people aim for is it?
I can say the words of a prayer…
Lord, please help me to become a servant of the Lord Jesus, like Paul was a servant of the Lord Jesus.
That is not an easy prayer to pray.
The lifestyle of St. Paul is probably not the sort of lifestyle that many Christian leaders would particularly want to follow. And it is a long way away from the lifestyle of so many famous Christian leaders in this media driven, affluent Western world.
What do you want. To be more like a “Super-apostle” full of yourself and your spiritual experiences and admired by everyone because of them…
or do you want to be more like a “real apostle” ?
It’s the opposite of boasting that Paul is doing.
It’s the opposite of building himself up.
The opposite of saying look at how impressive I am.
He says time and again I have been so helpless so unable to cope… only God has enabled me to keep going.
And then he speaks of another weakness. Something that is very personal to him. His “Thorn in the flesh” Whatever it is whether it is a physical condition, or some other condition of situation or struggle that he had… It is something that three times he had begged God to take it away… and he had received from God the promise and assurance…
My gracious favour is all you need.
My power works best in your - weakness.(vs. 9)
Maybe we need to pray especially hard for Christian leaders who are in positions where they can so easily be treated like a celebrity. The folk that we sometimes see on the TV screens in big auditoriums. Pray that they will keep close to God and never be seduced by the admiration and adulation that so many people are willing to give them.
Paul had to learn as he said…
to be content with my weaknesses
and with insults,
hardships,
persecutions,
and calamities.
In THAT kind of life… the power of God is to be seen.
For when I am weak, said Paul,
then I am strong.