Correction not Coercion

A husband and wife were in an intense argument. They were having a hard time coming to an agreement on something. The husband desperately wanted to get his wife to come to his understanding and agree with him. In a desperate move, he went for the jugular and said, “You know, honey, I don’t know why God made you so beautiful and so stupid. I just don’t get it.”

         To which his wife responded, “That’s easy. God made me beautiful so you would fall in love with me. He made me stupid so that I would fall in love with you!

Recap Maintaining a Clean Conscience

We continue in our sermon series on the early church. We have now moved into Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians. This letter was written to explain why Paul had not been able to make it back to Corinth. He has a desire to get back to them, but he has been set back every time he has tried to come.

Paul has a level of heartbreak in his words. He knows that he has failed in this mission. However, he knows there is nothing he could have done to get there. At ever step, he was stopped from being able to head out and get there. Sometimes, try as we might, we are going to run into problems. Sometimes, we are going to set out on a course and we are going to fail. However, if we have tried our best and if something got in our way from completing said task, then we can have a clean conscience about that failure to meet the mission. It will do us no good to dwell on any of that. There is a big difference between failing because of apathy and failing because of affliction. Unfortunately, that is sometimes hard for us to understand. Just the other week, Reagan and the rest of the team had a great game, despite the loss. Reagan did great, he got out there and he did his job. The other players rose to the occasion, there were some setbacks, but ultimately, they were trying their hardest. At one point, I looked at Reagan and said, “Hey, buddy, on the brighter side of things, you guys are looking completely different than you were last year. That game was worth watching because it was so close.” He simply responded like anyone would, “Yeah, but the stats don’t show that we are looking better than we were last year. A loss is still a loss.” It’s natural, even when we have given it our all, it is hard to shake that feeling.

However, Paul has serious concern because he is worried that the people will accuse him of double speak. The concern is not so much that the people will lose their faith in Paul. We know that we are not supposed to have our faith in other people. At the end of the day, it is not other people that are sending us into heaven. When it comes to the judgment seat of Christ, we are not going to be judged by other people. Instead, we are going to be judged by Christ. He is the One that bought our way into heaven. Our faith and hope rests in Him. Unfortunately, Paul is concerned that the people will think Paul is trying to say both yes and no at the same time. Life does not work like that. We cannot have it both ways. We have to make a choice. God is not One that can lie. He is perfect. He is unchanging. What is amazing is that everything in this world is subject to change. Everything goes through some kind of change. Kingdoms rise and kingdoms fall, babies are born, they grow up, and eventually die. Buildings are built and then modifications are made. Everything in this world is subject to change. However, everything is not subject to chance. God is sovereign. He is in control. He does not change and we can put all our hope and trust in Him because He is unchanging. His standards remain the same. God is the same today as He was yesterday as He was at the very beginning. He will remain the same forever and ever.

In all this struggle, Paul is somewhat happy that he did not make it to see the Corinthians. This happiness is based on the fact that his last letter was incredibly harsh toward them. If he had shown up, there might have still been some ill will toward him.

Before we get started, I wanted to ask these questions.

Do we respond better to correction or coercion?

There is a fine line between the two. We are not called to coerce people into following a moral code. At the same time, we must be careful in how we correct people. If you have your Bibles, please turn them to 2 Corinthians 2:1-11

In fact, I made up my mind about this: I would not come to you on another painful visit. For if I cause you pain, then who will cheer me other than the one being hurt by me? I wrote this very thing so that when I came I wouldn’t have pain from those who ought to give me joy, because I am confident about all of you that my joy will also be yours. For I wrote to you with many tears out of an extremely troubled and anguished heart—not to cause you pain, but that you should know the abundant love I have for you.

If anyone has caused pain, he has caused pain not so much to me but to some degree—not to exaggerate—to all of you. This punishment by the majority is sufficient for that person. As a result, you should instead forgive and comfort him. Otherwise, he may be overwhelmed by excessive grief. Therefore I urge you to reaffirm your love to him. I wrote for this purpose: to test your character to see if you are obedient in everything. Anyone you forgive, I do too. For what I have forgiven—if I have forgiven anything—it is for your benefit in the presence of Christ, so that we may not be taken advantage of by Satan. For we are not ignorant of his schemes.

Paul sees this change of plans as a mutually beneficial decision. He wants to spare them pain. He worries that another visit would cause them to feel even worse, so it is better for him not to come along. The old adage is that time heals all wounds. In these instances, sometimes it is better to give time and distance when someone is hurt, then later on there can be a level of reconciliation.

There is also a benefit to Paul here. He knows that if he gone there, he would have caused them more pain and there would be no one to console him and cheer him up. There is strength in numbers. Sometimes, people need to complain just to get things off their chest. I saw this a lot in my last career. A bad decision comes down the line and when it makes it to the crew, there is a lot of bitter ranting and complaining. The tendency there is to shoot the messenger. So we had certain safeguards when we gave bad news. I would deliver it to my squids, they would complain and yell at me about it. That’s rather ironic, because it’s not like I had any ability to change the situation. A line I used to give regularly is that “I cannot stop stupid, I can just slow it down.” Anyway, they would complain and moan, which never makes anyone feel good. So, in turn, I would go to the Mess, where we would have our own area to commiserate with one another and cheer one another up. Paul realizes that he would not have anyone to give him counsel and help him. Would these people really look at Paul and say, “Oh, you know what, this guy is having trouble, let’s give him comfort.”

When we are hurting, the last person we want is consolation from the one who hurt us. And vice versa. Paul would have gone out there and there was a good possibility they would have ganged up on him since he would have been the one in the minority.

The delay is beneficial for both parties. Getting correction is never fun. I don’t know about you, but I am not a fan of it. I have yet to meet anyone that enjoys being corrected. However, correction is necessary in the life of a believer. Just as we were talking about last week with the need to check our conscience to make sure we are right with God, it is good to have people in our lives that will help guide us through problems, that will identify an issue where we might not see the problem. Proverbs 9:9 “Instruct the wise, and he will be wiser still; teach the righteous, and he will learn more.” A wise person will listen to the counsel of another wise person rather than dismiss it.

We correct out of love.

Loving someone does not mean that we will always just let them do whatever they want. There is some silliness floating around these days that basically says, “Love means never having to say you are sorry.” I don’t know about you, but I don’t buy it. I find that I spend a lot of time apologizing to the God I love and the people I love. Love also means that we will do the hard work of correcting someone. When a parents love their children, they discipline them. They raise them up in the right way. Proverbs 22:6 “Start a youth out on his way; even when he grows old he will not depart from it.” I know, we have a lot of Proverbs being thrown out there today. One thing I love about the Proverbs is that it was written by one of the smartest men in the entire world. It is great for instruction! Parents are going to discipline their children, not because they want to discipline their children, but because they want what is best for them. Dania and I were remarking just the other day to Lucy that we always hated how our parents would say “this hurts me more than it hurts you.” when giving out punishment. I used to hate that when I was being punished. However, as I became a parent, I realized how much wisdom there was. Since I have been a parent, I have come to the conclusion that it is a lot easier to just let a kid misbehave than it is to correct them. It takes me way less time to just ignore behavior than it does for me to stop what I am doing and have that talk about how the behavior is wrong.

It would have been easier for Paul to have just let the behavior slide. However, he would definitely not have that clean conscience. He loves these people and he knows that he must give them correction, not because it benefits him, but for their benefit. He also knows that when he got to Corinth, if the behavior had not been corrected, he was going to have to handle it. It was better to send this out so that they could fix the problem before he got there and they could have a happy visit.

When we correct, it should be for the other person’s benefit, not our own.

To put it another way, when we see someone doing wrong, do we get mad at them or do we get mad for them. Odds are, if someone is openly antagonizing us, we will surely get mad at them. I’m not talking about things like that. I’m talking about people that involved in sins that have no effect on our lives whatsoever. When we see that happen, how do we respond. Do we get mad at them or do we get mad for them? Are we upset at them or are we upset for them? There is a difference. I don’t know about you, but in teenage and early adult years, I heard this phrase pop up a lot, “I raised you better than that” when it came to poor behavior. (I know, it’s hard to believe that I was ever misbehaved). Sadly, I used this line on some of my kids as well. As I have matured in life, I realize that this statement is wrong. It is wrong because it imputes my feelings about the behavior onto the person. That phrase indicates I am more worried about my reputation as a parent than I am worried about what the kid is actually doing. In the case of “I raised you better than that” it indicates that the person’s behavior is bringing discredit on us and ignores the effect it has on them. I have seen it happen where a person’s adult children head out and make terrible mistakes and life choices. I have seen it go either way where a parent will say the line, “we raised them better than this.” However, the more appropriate response is “I want what is best for you and this is not it.” It’s hard to watch people head down the road to destruction. Paul did not write them from the perspective of “you all have embarrassed me with your behavior.” Instead, he is approaching them from the perspective of, “You are selling yourself short.”

Still, a lot can be said about how we go about correcting someone is of utmost importance. A lot of the time it truly is not a matter of what you say, but how you say it. Proverbs 15:1 “A gentle answer turns away anger, but a harsh word stirs up wrath.”

At our church in Illinois, we had what was called the men’s breakfast. On a long enough timeline, the manly men group will probably start something like that. We would choose a place and meet up for food. Well, one day it wound up just being the pastor and me. We sat there and had some pleasantries, but then, out of nowhere, he gave me strong words of admonition. He was upset that I had not been attending Sunday School. As far as he was concerned, it was my duty to be at Sunday School and be a good leader for my family. He understood that given the nature of my job, Sunday mornings were the only days that I could sleep in, but that didn’t matter, I needed to be there. It was less than gentle. For the most part, he was gentle guy. This time his rebuke felt a lot more harsh. As you can imagine, it was an awkward rest of breakfast.

However, he was right. So I had an option. I could either respond with the whole “Who does that guy think he is” or I could listen to his counsel, harsh as it may have been. I will say this before on, though. Typically, I will only ever receive criticism from people that I would go to for advice. I find that works best. If I wouldn’t go to someone for advice, I probably won’t care so much about their criticism.

I cared about his opinion and had gone to him for advice a lot. So, unless we were out of town or something else was going on, we didn’t miss Sunday School after that.

When we are given wise correction, we should not be mad at the messenger.

When we are given correction, who are we upset at? Are we upset at the person giving us the correction or are we mad at ourselves for engaging in the behavior? Facts are facts that we cannot necessarily get upset about. If we are speeding and we get pulled over, who are we mad at? Ourselves for getting caught, ourselves for speeding, or the police officer for pulling us over? I mean, the police officer could have been lenient and just let us go, right?

Okay, how about something that is impartial. What about a tool? A scale is something we purchase so we can keep an eye on our weight. What happens when we get on the scale and it says something we don’t like? Who do we blame? Do we blame the scale or do we blame ourselves? Certainly, we might seek a second opinion. That is certainly fine, we know that certain equipment will fall out of calibration from time to time, so if we don’t like what one scale says, then we might find another just to do a side by side comparison. If that second one reads like the first, it’s not a problem with the scale, it’s a problem with self.

When we are corrected, the best possible thing we can do is take it onboard and seek to correct the behavior. If someone is taking the time to come in a loving and gentle way to address a problem in our lives, the best thing we can do is heed that advice and correction if it is legitimate. Proverbs 13:1 “A wise son responds to his father’s discipline, but a mocker doesn’t listen to rebuke.”

The fact is, when we fall into sin, when we are doing things that go against God’s word, we have no one to blame but ourselves. We are the ones that own it, no one else does. However, our nature as humans is to try to blame someone else. One of the best examples of that is there in the account of the fall of man. God asks Adam and Eve if they have disobeyed him and ate from the tree. Adam answers first, but I wanted to bring up Eve’s response first. Eve says that she was deceived by the serpent. She was trying to put that blame on the devil. Adam takes it a step further. He doesn’t even bring the devil into it, instead he takes it to a whole new level. Genesis 3:12 “The man replied, “The woman you gave to be with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate.”” So at least Eve put the onus on the enemy for eating from the tree. Adam puts the blame on Eve, but she would not have even been there if God had not put her there, so it’s technically God’s fault. That’s how depraved Adam’s mind had already become. His sin was everyone else’s fault but his own. James 1:13 “No one undergoing a trial should say, “I am being tempted by God,” since God is not tempted by evil, and he himself doesn’t tempt anyone.” God is never going to tempt us to do something evil. That is going to come from the evil one. However, the evil one cannot make us sin, he can only tempt us to sin. At the end of the day, we are the ones that commit that sin. The example of Adam and Eve are a far bit different than what we see out of David. The Wednesday night crowd knows where I’m going with this. David gets called out by Nathan for his sin. God sends Nathan to David. Nathan tells David a story. By the time the story is over, David is super mad and pronounces judgment on the bad guy. The story is that a rich man had a lot of lambs and cattle. Meanwhile, there was a poor man who had one little lamb. He loved that lamb like one of his own children. A visitor came to see the rich man and the rich man, rather than give up one of his lambs or cows for the feast, takes the lamb of the poor man and uses it instead. David pronounces the guy should die and that he should pay back four lambs. Then he says, “Who is this guy?” Nathan responds, “YOU ARE THE MAN!”

At that moment, David does not try to justify his sin. He does not try to explain it away. Instead, he simply says in

Thankfully, God knows of our sinful nature. From the very beginning, He knew that we were going to mess it up. God knew all that and despite our sinfulness, He still made us. What’s more is that because God loves us so much, He sent His Son Jesus so that we could be forgiven of our sins. God knew that we were not going to be able to follow His law and uphold His statutes, so He made a way so that we could be saved. Jesus Christ came to earth, He condescended His throne, and came here and lived as a mortal man. He was tempted, He was tried, but He always did the will of the Father. He lived a perfect and sinless life. Though He was perfect, He was taken prisoner and cruelly executed. When He went to the cross, He took our sins with Him. He went and He paid our debt that day on Golgotha. Through His work on the cross, we are forgiven. Though we are sinful, God forgives us. If you are here this day and do not know this forgiveness, come to Jesus today and learn what it is to be forgiven. Those of us that are forgiven, our goal is to go and live lives that are quick to show forgiveness. We will get into that next week. We have been forgiven much, so we too should be forgiving.

David responded to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.”