The Path to Spiritual Growth 2 Cor 6:14-7:16
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Introduction
Introduction
There are no shortcuts to Spiritual Growth. The pandemic season in the past little over a year has exposed how shortsighted, impatient and self-centred we can be as human beings. While some of us in North America maybe beginning to heave a sigh of relief with things getting better, let us not forget there is still immense suffering in other parts of the world. Let us also not forget that God is at work in the midst of the crisis in bringing about His good purposes. What is God doing in and through the small and large crises we face in life? Is God only there to give us what we want and when we want it OR is God doing something in our lives and in the world which can only come about as we rely completely on Him and trust His good purposes? In 2 Cor we have been looking at how Paul responds to a personal crisis - a crisis in his relationship with the Corinthian church. Paul’s letter shows that even the most unpleasant experiences of life, the ones that bring grief and distress, are used by God to nurture us in spiritual growth. This is a life-long journey with no shortcuts. My title has the word spiritual which can mean many things in our world today as in people interested in spiritual things - but for us as Christians, I take specifically as the work of God’s Holy Spirit in sanctifying us in making us Holy. J.I Packer writes:
“Holiness, which means being near God, like God, given to God, and pleasing God, is something believers want more than anything else in this world.”
Holiness is God’s will for us
Holiness is God’s will for us
1 Thessalonians 4:3 (NRSV)
3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification:
Holiness is God’s command to us.
Holiness is God’s command to us.
15 Instead, as he who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in all your conduct; 16 for it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
(Lev 11:44,55).
Holiness is God’s gift to us.
Holiness is God’s gift to us.
23 May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24 The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this.
So this morning in talking about Spiritual Growth I am talking about the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives to make us holy as God is holy and forming in us Christlike character. God’s beauty is His holiness and that’s the kind of beauty He wants for all His children.
I will repeat the phrase I opened the sermon with -
There are no shortcuts to Spritual Growth.
There are no shortcuts to Spritual Growth.
Paul’s letter to the 2 Corinthians really challenges our “bumper sticker” Christianity with trite cliches or our self-help “3 steps to spiritual growth” kind of approach. I’m not saying don’t put Christian bumper stickers but just make sure you are the best driver in town.
Paul sets us on the long yet rewarding journey towards growth with a vision of nothing less that being transformed into the image of Christ.
1. The temple of the Living God:
1. The temple of the Living God:
Even as Paul in this letter defends his apostleship and seeks to reconcile with the church in Corinth, he himself is on this journey of being transformed into the image of Christ. This helps me to read the call to holiness in 2 Cor 6:14 - 7:1 not as something out of place with the surrounding sections as many commentators think. It fits perfectly because when we have to work through relational issues in church it all comes down to how we see ourselves and others - in other words it comes down to identity.
For Christ followers, identity is not just a question of “who I am” but rather “whose I am?” - it is a question of belonging. To belong implies both a connection to that to which we belong and a disconnection from that to which we cannot belong.
Hence Paul begins in vs 14 with a call to separation and ends this section in 7:1 with a call to holiness. They are one and the same because to be holy is also to be separate or set-apart. In between these two verses Paul gives us the reasons why this separation is a must. Let’s look at this a bit more carefully.
2 Corinthians 6:14 (NRSV)
14 Do not be mismatched with unbelievers...
— the NIV translates this as “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers.”
The gr word ἑτεροζυγοῦντες“heterozygountes” means unequally yoked and has this word picture of two different species of animals put under the same yoke. The yoke is meant to create a synergy but if the animals are of different species, size and strength, it will only become a hindrance. To make his point clearer Paul presents 5 rhetorical questions - meaning questions with an obvious answer- to show that certain things are incompatible with the Christian life.
A. What partnership is there between righteousness and lawlessness?
B What fellowship is there between light and darkness?
C. What agreement does Christ have with Beliar?
D. What does a believer share with an unbeliever?
E. What agreement has the temple of God with idols?
Certain things just cannot mix. One of the key words in these verses is “fellowship” - Koinonia - Paul will use it again in his benediction when he will mention the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
People often apply this passage only to marriage between a believer and unbeliever but Paul’s intention seems to be wider than just that narrow application.
Back to what I said earlier - there is a new identity for anyone in Christ. To be in Christ is to be a new creation. In fact just like creation was intended to be God’s temple, now believers, the church collectively as well as the individual believer is the temple of the living God. For a Christian to flirt around pagan temples, to allow false teachings, to compromise with the domninant culture and condone things that are contrary to God’s revealed will — alounts to idolatry - to bring idols into the temple of the living God is to defile the temple like Israel did in the OT which led them into exile.
To be God’s temple and to be part of God’s family is the privilege of every believer. This was what God had promised through the prophets:
16 What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will live in them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
(quoted from Lev 26:11-12)
17 Therefore come out from them, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch nothing unclean; then I will welcome you,
(quoted from Is 52:11)
18 and I will be your father, and you shall be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”
(quoted from 2 Sam 7:14)
God has kept his promise in making the believers His temple by sending His Spirit and also by His Spirit He has made us His sons and daughters. This means we belong to Him and therefore we cannot belong to anything that defiles our relationship with God.
Hence
1 Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and of spirit, making holiness perfect in the fear of God.
Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, making holiness perfect in the fear of God.
It’s important to understand that Paul is not saying do not relate with those outside of the church because the New Testament clearly tells us to love our neighbors regardless of who they are. Even in 1 Cor 5:9-11 Paul clarifies an early prophition he had made to not associate with sexually immoral people:
10 not at all meaning the immoral of this world, or the greedy and robbers, or idolaters, since you would then need to go out of the world. 11 But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother or sister who is sexually immoral or greedy, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or robber. Do not even eat with such a one.
From this I understand that Paul means that such behaviour is incompatible with the Christian life and therefore we cannot bring it into the church and think that inclusivity means allow lifestyles and beliefs that are contrary to God’s word.
Remember there are no shortcuts to spiritual growth. God will continue to reveal and deal with our idols in purifying this temple for His inhabitation.
The sinful influence of the world with which the Corinthians had yoked themselves had affected their actions and attitudes and thereby had a negative impact on their exercise of godly behavior in God's church. In like manner, the sinful influence that results from being yoked to the world in this or any age can so affect a believer's or a church's actions and attitudes that it keeps them from living in the manner God desires within His church.
2. Open hearts:
2. Open hearts:
Just when we begin to think Paul seems to harsh on these believers, we discover that Paul has a very tender heart towards them. In 2 Cor 7:2 Paul comes back to what he was saying before he talked about holiness -
2 Make room in your hearts for us; we have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have taken advantage of no one.
Just God has made room for the believers and He has also taken up residence in the believer making them His temple - now believers need to make room in their hearts for each other. Paul cannot conceive of a “solo” kind of Christian. If we belong to Christ then we belong to His body, the church. Paul is therefore not afraid to bear his heart before the church even to those who have misunderstood him
A few verses back we read in
11 We have spoken frankly to you Corinthians; our heart is wide open to you. 12 There is no restriction in our affections, but only in yours. 13 In return—I speak as to children—open wide your hearts also.
If we were to ask Paul why he bothered to keep communicating he would say that he cared deeply for this church. He knew that confronting them would cost him much but not confronting them would be more costly for them. Scott Hafeman in his commentary quotes two other scholars Hauerwas and Willimon -
Not to confront lies and deceit, greed and self-service … would be the death of this church. (Hafeman loc 5870)
Paul has held nothing back in order to help the church turn from sin and error.
There is no shortcut to spiritual growth. Paul knows it and he is willing to reveal his heart so that the Corinthian church can also come to the place of openness and honesty.
It takes a lot of courage to reveal ourselves to others especially when there has been relational strife and conflict.
Ever since the fall in the garden, the default response of human beings is to hide. We hide what is going on in our hearts and lives but we only end up self-sabotaging our growth in the life of faith.
When done in love and out of care, honest communication is the only right path for the Christian. Not only in interpersonal relationships but even as the church community, to bring about correction and discipline (which is what Paul did through his letters) does not indicate disunity but rather the path towards a healthy community.
Over the years my own picture of what unity looks like has changed. There was a time when unity was like a beautiful flower garden, everyone is nice to one another and walking around admiring everything — but now when I think of unity — the picture is more of an operation theatre — it gets bloody and messy — and sometimes even radical surgery is required to save the body from what is causing ill-health.
Let me read again Paul’s very honest words in
2 Make room in your hearts for us; we have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have taken advantage of no one. 3 I do not say this to condemn you, for I said before that you are in our hearts, to die together and to live together.
You would only say that phrase “to die together and to live together” to someone you have deep affection for. I remember one of my profs at Regent saying during a course called the Soul of Ministry — Love is the most difficult thing you will do.
Paul is willing to take that difficult road of loving those who are actually quite difficult to love and we all have such folks in our lives and maybe we ourselves are such people - difficult to love - and yet, we are called to “make room in our hearts for one another” — There is no other shortcut to spiritual growth. There is no other shortcut for healing and wholeness, yes even holiness in relationships.
3. Godly Sorrow:
3. Godly Sorrow:
Even though there are no shortcuts to spiritual growth, the journey is rewarding and filled with joy even in the midst of pain. This is what we see when Paul reflects on the report from the Corinthian church that is brought by Titus. 2 Corinthian 7:5-16 connects all the way back to chapter 2 when Paul talks about his change in itinerary, his not wanting to make another painful visit to the church, but instead he had written a letter which had caused further grief and before writing this letter he was waiting with deep concern to hear how the church had responded. The letter Paul had written had taken an emotional and mental toll. When we have to speak truth to people we love and care about, it is never easy.
Similar words from ch 1 and 2 are repeated in this section as Paul mentions affliction, comfort and grief. While Paul initially had some regrets in writing a strong letter, he had them no more because the church had responded to his letter with what he calls godly sorrow - In verse 10 he writes:
For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation and brings no regrets, but worldly grief produces death.
The word translated grief or sorrow in Gr is Lupheo - which means to be sad. This idea of mourning, sadness, grieving is repeated about 7 times in this passage and also the words for consolation consoled are repeated 7 times. They go together in this passage. Why does Paul feel consolared because the Corinthians are sad? He explains it as godly or grief according to God.
We do not always associate grief or sorrow with something good - but in this case Paul does.
I think Paul has deep insight into human emotions and psyche.
He recognizes this as a kind of good grief. While the Holy Spirit is not mentioned here, we can assume that what the Corinthians have experienced is the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus told his dsiciples in John 16 that when the Holy Spirit comes He will convict the world of sin —
In Acts 2:37 we read that when the crowds in Jerusalem heard Peter preach under the power of the Holy Spirit, they were cut to the heart.
The Corinthian believers had come under such conviction which is described in vs 11
This deep sorrow over the wrong they have done was redemptive only because it led them to repentance.
Just showing remorse or an exhiibition of emotion doesn’t necessarily mean a person has godly grief — Often we can confuse godly grief and repentance with remorse without a change of direction.
The main difference is the result that Paul mentions in vs 10. One leads to repentance and salvation and the other to death.
We must be clear that Paul is not saying we are saved by our repentance. We are saved by grace through faith alone and it is all because of Christ’s work on the Cross.
However, the work of sanctification, the working out of our salvation in transforming us - spiritual growth — comes as a result of our ongoing yielding to the conviction of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Spiritual growth distinguishes godly sorrow from psychological guilt.
I read a fascinating study done by a few scholars in analysing the difference between godly sorrow and psychological guilt. As they researched students on a Christian liberal arts College campus, they found out that the more mature students could tell the difference between godly sorrow and pscyhological guilt. Godly sorrow led to transformative change.
A false guilt mixed with shame and remorse can be harmful as it becomes self-punitive - rather than accepting God’s grace and dealing with our sin, we end up punishing ourselves. We see this in scripture with the difference in Peter’s sorrow over betraying Jesus and Judas’ remorse - one led to restoration of relationship and the other to death.
One of the things pointed out in the paper I mentioned is that pyschological guilt was self-absorbed whereas godly sorrow is always God-focussed.
An english word which we don’t often use “Compunction” which captures this idea of godly sorrow - compunction means pain and anguish over sin that has caused alienation with God and with others.
When is the last time you felt such compunction?
When is the last time you felt pain and anguish over things that God revealed in your heart that were not compatible with His truth?
There are no shortcuts to spiritual growth. We must go through this process of godly sorrow over our sinful tendencies.
Many times we are unable to overcome our sin because, if we are honest, we like it - maybe even love it.
We need the Holy Spirit to expose the true nature of those things that defile the temple of the living God, the thoughts, the attitudes, the habits, which we often tolerate but in the end become our undoing.
Conclusion:
There are no shortcuts to spiritual growth.
Where have you placed your identity? Do you know that you are the temple of the living God and part of His family? What is God calling you today to separate from? What are the idols in your heart? What is blocking light into this temple?
How open is your heart? I don’t mean a naive or exhibitionist kind of exposing ourselves without discretion and care — what I mean is do you allow people to get to know you or are you afraid of what people will see if you allow them to get too close? It takes a lot of energy to maintain a secretive lifestyle - it is freeing when we walk in the light of God and allow others to get to know us.
Repentance is refreshing - it brings freedom and joy both to the individual as well as to the community. When is the last time you felt broken over sin and felt a zeal for God’s holiness?
Holiness is God’s will, God’s command and God’s gift — do you desire holiness in your life?
How has this pandemic season brought you closer to God and His people? Or has it driven you away from God and His people?
Have you opened yourself to the work of God’s Holy Spirit?