Good Grief
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
We are back in our series, Empty Vessels, working through Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians.
PRAY
Ministry Through Peaks and Valleys
Ministry Through Peaks and Valleys
Make room for us in your hearts. We have wronged no one, corrupted no one, taken advantage of no one. I don’t say this to condemn you, since I have already said that you are in our hearts, to die together and to live together. I am very frank with you; I have great pride in you. I am filled with encouragement; I am overflowing with joy in all our afflictions. In fact, when we came into Macedonia, we had no rest. Instead, we were troubled in every way: conflicts on the outside, fears within. But God, who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the arrival of Titus, and not only by his arrival but also by the comfort he received from you. He told us about your deep longing, your sorrow, and your zeal for me, so that I rejoiced even more.
Paul starts here with this word of encouragement. He says, make room for us in your hearts. In Greek, the passage simply says, hold us, contain us, but I like the translators interpretation here, because it points us back to chapter 6, where Paul says, our heart has been opened wide; we are not withholding our affection to you, but you are withholding yours from us, please, open your heart to us! It seems like for a long time, based on chapter 6, that the church has been led off-road by characters who speak well and have influence but do not follow Jesus, and now as Paul writes, he is pleading with them to see who their true family is. Don’t be yoked together with those who do not believe, but open up your hearts to those who truly love Jesus and who truly love you.
Now Paul gets personal here. He says, I am going to talk straight with you now: Ministry with you has been a struggle, but I see you know, and I am proud of you; I am encouraged by you; I am filled with joy. Paul has been on this journey north to preach Jesus to different communities, and it has not been easy. You can pick up Paul’s story in Acts 20 if you like, but basically, Paul’s whole ministry has been fraught with challenges. Everywhere he goes, Paul speaks the truth in love about Jesus, and many believe, but many are also angered and want him to be silenced. It seems like Paul goes back and forth between new church plant and flogging, miracle and imprisonment, deep friendship and shipwreck. After Macedonia, Paul heads to Jerusalem for one last battle before he is imprisoned for good in Rome. Paul’s ministry life has been tough.
And yet, when you hear him here in 2 Corinthians, it sounds like he wouldn’t trade it for the world.
Ministry, investing in people, inviting them into a relationship with Jesus, being Jesus to the world, comes with some challenges. Like Paul says, there are conflicts on the outside, and fears within. And when I look at Paul’s ministry, and I look at my own experiences, I think it is because ministry is personal. It’s relationship between me and Jesus, between you and me, between you and Jesus. And relationships get messy, because people are messy. I remember joking a long time ago that ministry would be a lot easier if there were no people involved.
In the last 7 years as a pastor/elder of this church (not so much lately, mind you!), I have been threatened, slandered, dismissed, hated on, and judged for just about everything under the sun. I have suffered anxiety attacks, lost income, and at times worried about the safety of my family. Conflicts on the outside, fears from within. But, I have also seen faces light up with a deeper understanding of the gospel. I have seen depression fade, families restored, relationships righted, addictions removed. There are times when I sometimes start to think that ministry is stagnating in the church, and then I hear about the amazing moments happening in our women’s group and in our men’s group. I see a people being transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ. And I am filled with joy. I am so glad that there people involved.
That’s my ministry story. But one of the core values of Creekside is that every member is a minister. Not just the elders, not just pastors. Every member, every personal extension of Creekside Church has a role and purpose to bring others closer to Jesus through love, service, encouragement, teaching, generosity, hospitality. If you are the body of Christ, then Christ goes where you go, and where Christ goes, he loves. You are a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
So be prepared to get personal. Get messy. Probably struggle a bit. And be prepared to be absolutely overjoyed when the Spirit invades and new creation spreads.
Now, Paul is rejoicing here, but why? What does Titus report? He says the church in Corinth has a deep longing for Paul. They are passionate to see him again. And they have great sorrow. Wait, what? And this makes Paul rejoice even more? We’ll see why this is so important, and there’s a really important word we are going to learn as we continue on.
The Great Turn
The Great Turn
For even if I grieved you with my letter, I don’t regret it. And if I regretted it—since I saw that the letter grieved you, yet only for a while—I now rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because your grief led to repentance. For you were grieved as God willed, so that you didn’t experience any loss from us. For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, but worldly grief produces death. For consider how much diligence this very thing—this grieving as God wills—has produced in you: what a desire to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what deep longing, what zeal, what justice! In every way you showed yourselves to be pure in this matter. So even though I wrote to you, it was not because of the one who did wrong, or because of the one who was wronged, but in order that your devotion to us might be made plain to you in the sight of God.
So first I want to direct your attention to the middle section here. Look how Paul raves about the church. Remember, this is crazy Corinth here, the ones who questioned Paul’s authority numerous times, the ones who not only welcomed, but proudly affirmed a man who was sleeping with his step mom. This is the church that pigged out at pagan feasts, questioned the resurrection of Jesus, and turned their worship gatherings into talent shows. Almost all of Paul’s first letter is a lesson in what not to do as a church.
And yet here he is, extolling their virtues. What a desire to clear yourselves! What indignation! What fear! What deep longing! What deep longing! What zeal! What justice!
I don’t know about you, but I look at this list, and I think, these are great characteristics for a church to be known by. But then you read it, and you look at the context and how the church got there, and you realize, this didn’t happen overnight. It’s not the natural bent of the church. Corinth did not get to zeal and justice without a lot of hard truth and a lot of love. It didn’t start with deep longing. It started with grief.
In verse 8, Paul brings up a letter that he sent the church a while back. It’s not first Corinthians. We don’t have a copy of this letter. And I’m guessing the Corinthians are a little relieved for that, because it wasn’t pleasant. In chapter 2, Paul says there was a very painful visit for him that resulting in him writing a letter of tears—his own tears—that communicated major concerns about the arrogance and pride that was causing major divisions and hurts in the church. And this letter of tears apparently cut pretty deep, so much so that Paul was worried he punched a little too hard.
Creekside, not everything in the messy life of God’s family is sunshine and rainbow sparkles. Ask any parent of teenagers who suddenly know everything about everything. (Mark Twain: It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.) We write letters of tears all the time. Sometimes we recite those tearful letters at a high volume. We don’t do it to be mean. We do it out of love, because we don’t want our kids to be malformed, misinformed, miserable adults.
Paul is briefly worried about the severity of his words, but he does not regret them, because their grief, their pain, led to repentance. This is the big word here.
Repentance is the word metanoia, which literally means to change your mind. It is the act of turning your orientation from self to God, from death to life. Metanoia is about transformation.
Richard Neibuhr: Reformation is a permanent movement; metanoia is the continuous demand made upon us in historical life.
Now I have observed that a unique trait of humans is our malleable natures. We can change, adapt, evolve our creature hood. And the interesting phenomenon is that this adaptation comes in communion with others. We become our community, or at least the strongest of that community. That is why the heart of our church is not to just be a nice place to visit, or have nice teaching or music, but to introduce you to the most important person of our community, to invite you into a deep, satisfying, transformational relationship with Jesus. And when it is necessary to confront, to discipline, to rebuke, it is simply to reintroduce you to the one who forms you.
And forming can hurt. Sometimes it means breaking who you are and reshaping you into something new, something different. Sometimes it means being emptied so that you can be filled. Repentance can be scary because a change of mind, heart, and direction means you had it all wrong before. You were going the wrong way. You were headed to destruction. You caused pain and hurt to yourself and to others along the way. And that’s painful. That’s sorrow. That’s grief.
But when you turn to Jesus and find life for you and for others, that’s good grief. That’s godly grief.
Church, Creekside did not get to where we are today without a lot of hard truths and a lot of love. Letters of tears, difficult conversations, and constant deep dives and heart checks have led us to where we are today; a reformed, reframed people, repented and turned toward Jesus.
Hear this, family. You need to listen to hard words, especially from those who have made it clear that their heart is to bring you closer to Jesus. I once heard it said that the adversary loves two things: when we speak love without truth, and when we speak truth without love, because in both cases, he wins. But if a loving brother or sister has courage to speak difficult, wise words to you, listen, and pray, and confess, and turn. Because when you turn, you do not turn toward condemnation. You turn toward hope. You turn toward joy. You turn toward grace.
This is so different from the way of the rest of the rest of the world, and I think it is why we struggle so much with the act of repentance. This is what Paul gets at. Godly grief vs. Worldly grief. In worldly grief, we walk the road of selfishness, anger, greed, abuse, and we cause sorrow, pain, hurt, and yes, grief. And left to our own devices, turning toward the world, we get no grace, we get no hope, we get no joy. We get condemnation, we get punishment, we get cancelled. In other words, we get exactly what we deserve. Worldly grief leads to a loss of identity, a loss of purpose, a loss of meaning, a loss of life. To quote Paul, worldly grief produces death.
The testimony I have for you today is that Jesus, by his love and mercy, does not give you what you deserve. He sees you and he comforts you. He continues to love you. He gives you a new identity, and new purpose, a new meaning, and when you walk with him, you find life.
Now before we wrap up, a word of caution here: just because Paul used a letter of tears to move Corinth to repentance does not mean we should all of a sudden start sending out letters of tears all over the place. Paul didn’t take pride in what we was doing. He didn’t enjoy it. He was in agony over how the relationship between him and Corinth had fallen apart, and he knew he had to speak up, or the church might be lost forever. Hard words need to happen yes, but they don’t come until after a lot of self-reflection and soul searching has taken place first. Always remember that you too are a child of grace. We are not here by our own merit. We love first, and in love, we speak truth.
I’m also reminded of the words of the late missionary to Tanzania, Vincent Donovan:
Vincent Donovan: Do not call people back to where they were (they never were there). Do not call people to where you are, as beautiful as it may seem to you. But travel with them to a place neither of you have been before.
For this reason we have been comforted.
In addition to our own comfort, we rejoiced even more over the joy Titus had, because his spirit was refreshed by all of you. For if I have made any boast to him about you, I have not been disappointed; but as I have spoken everything to you in truth, so our boasting to Titus has also turned out to be the truth. And his affection toward you is even greater as he remembers the obedience of all of you, and how you received him with fear and trembling. I rejoice that I have complete confidence in you.
When we turn, the church experiences:
Refreshed Spirit
Greater Affection
Complete Confidence
As ministers of grace and truth, we get to be like proud parents that see their kids walking out their lives with maturity and wisdom, knowing their hearts have been reoriented toward what is good and right and beautiful. We take pride in their new identity, and own sorrow has turned to joy.
PRAY
