So 1st Corinthians, sorry, 2nd
Corinthians. Did I say 1st Corinthians? I
apologize if I did. It's 2nd Corinthians, chapter
10. And we'll read from verse one. Now I, Paul, myself beseech you
by the meekness and gentleness of Christ, who in presence and
base among you, but being absent, I'm bold toward you. But I beseech
you that I may not be bold when I am present with that confidence
wherewith I think to be bold against some, which think of
us as if we walked according to the flesh. For though we walk
in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. For the weapons of
our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling
down of strongholds. casting down imaginations and
every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge
of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience
of Christ. And having in our readiness to
revenge all disobedience, when your obedience is fulfilled,
Do you look on things after the outward appearance? If any man
trusts to himself that he is Christ's, let him of himself
think this again, that as he is Christ's, even so are we Christ's. For though I should boast somewhat
more of our authority, which the Lord hath given us for edification,
and not for your destruction, I should not be ashamed, that
I may not seem as if I would terrify you by letters. For his letters, say they, are
weighty and powerful, but his bodily presence is weak and his
speech contemptible. Let such an one think this, that
such as we are in word by letters when we are absent, such will
we be also indeed when we are present. For we dare not make
ourselves of the number or compare ourselves with some that commend
themselves, but they measuring themselves by themselves and
comparing themselves among themselves are not wise. But we will not
boast of things without our measure. but according to the measure
of the rule which God hath distributed to us, a measure to reach even
unto you. For we stretch not ourselves
beyond our measure, as though we reached not unto you. For
we are come as far as to you also in preaching the gospel
of Christ. not boasting of things without
our measure, that is, of other men's labours, but having hope,
when your faith is increased, that we shall be enlarged by
you according to our rule abundantly. To preach the gospel in the regions
beyond you, and not to boast in another man's line of things
made ready to our hand. But he that glorieth, let him
glory in the Lord. For not he that commendeth himself
is approved, but whom the Lord commendeth. Amen. May the Lord
bless to us this reading from his word. One of the perplexities that
every believer encounters is the question about who is a Christian
and who is not. who is saved and who is not. And there are some people who
seem very confident that they can identify who are the Lord's
people, who are the people of Christ. And they give a list
of doctrines they say are essential to a true living faith. The trouble is finding biblical
support for a specified set of doctrines like that. Or even
a bare essential confession of faith in Scripture is not easy
to discover. And usually when we take a direct
statement of Scripture, we find that we have to enlarge upon
it, or we have to break it down, or we have to study it together. Let me give you some examples.
Take a scripture such as Romans chapter 10 verse 9, that if thou
shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe
in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou
shalt be saved. Or another, John chapter 3 verse
36, He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, and
he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath
of God abideth on him. Or again, 1 John chapter 5 verse
12, He that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the
Son of God hath not life. But even when we take those verses,
which probably are all very well known to us, and we've read them
many times, and we've even heard them expounded many times, we're
still confronted with questions like, what does it mean to believe? What does it mean to have the
Son? If thou shalt confess with thy
mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in thine heart that God has raised
him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. So that we frequently
encounter people who tell us that they believe in Jesus and
that they have the Son of God and that they believe that Jesus
rose from the dead. They believe that Jesus is living
in their heart. And so we find ourselves asking
the question again, Well, what is it that they believe? And
what does it mean actually to have Christ? And even if we go
to the statements of the Lord and to the very words of the
Lord Jesus Christ himself, we still have to explain and expand
and expound and interpret what is being said, comparing scripture
with scripture and endeavouring to rightly divide the word of
truth. Every professor claims to believe
in Jesus. The Lord's own words in John
chapter 6, 47 says, verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth
in me hath everlasting life. Does everyone who says, I believe
in Jesus, have everlasting life? What does it mean to believe?
Or Mark 16, 16 says, he that believeth and is baptized shall
be saved. but he that believeth not shall
be damned. Well, that might cause us to
wonder what that reference in there to baptism means. Is baptism
necessary for salvation? It certainly isn't a cause of
salvation, but then again, neither is believing. because Christ
is the procuring cause of salvation and his death and the covenant
purposes of God. So that we see that It's in the
receipt of quickening grace and enabling faith that springs,
as it were, towards Christ that we must find the answer to what
is it to believe. And here's another example, just
to round off the examples that I'm giving you. We might want
to enlarge, for example, upon James' words when he says in
James 2.14, What doth it profit my brethren though a man say
he hath faith and have not works? Can faith save him? Now, my purpose
here is not to undermine anyone's faith or to confuse you or to
cultivate doubts and uncertainties. But the reality is, it is a fact
that there are people who would say, I am not saved. And perhaps you are not saved
because of the doctrines that I believe. And in turn, I have
doubts about the salvation of some who profess Christ because
of the doctrines that they hold. And then there's the whole question
of ignorance and the fact that many who say they believe in
Jesus can hardly be said to be able to always give an answer
for the reason of the hope that is within them. And it seems
as if in this passage in 2 Corinthians chapter 10, that there were some
in Corinth who were asking if Paul himself was really saved,
and if he was called, and if he was authorized to fulfill
his role as a preacher and a teacher and an apostle. And the apostle, Paul is too
generous, he's too polite to make similar denunciations of
them. But he asks the Corinthians in
this letter simply, since they make assertions, these men, since
they make assertions on their own behalf and against Paul based
only on outward appearance and the physical evidence and the
personal profession, then at least, he says to them, grant
me the same courtesy. You say you are Christ's people. I say I am Christ's, but where
has that got us to in this discussion? He says in verse seven, do ye
look on things after the outward appearance? If any man trust
to himself that he is Christ's, let him of himself think this
again, that as he is Christ's, even so are we Christ's. Paul is saying that there's nothing
lacking in his life, the life of the apostle and his friends,
that his opponents would be able to accuse him of. There's no
outward legitimacy for their attacks, because all the criteria,
all the yardsticks that they might use, all the outward rules
and evidences that they use to confirm and measure themselves
and their own spiritual standing, are clearly manifested in the
Apostle Paul's ministry as well. And the Apostle Paul and the
verses that follow in the rest of this chapter 10, reminds the
Corinthians and us by them, that as an apostle, the Lord provided
him with greater authority than others. Now, principally, that
was for the edification of the saints and the building up of
the churches. Though equally, it had also been
used severely for destruction, as he was able to do. And it
had been used, that power, by both Peter and Paul in exposing
hypocrisy, for example, with Ananias and Sapphira, and also
shutting down opposition from Elimas the sorcerer. However
Paul is saying here that he's not going to claim such apostolic
authority or boast of his own accomplishments. It's sufficient
that the Corinthians had obtained the blessings of Paul's ministry. and they knew the accomplishments
of his ministry by the powerful work of the Spirit in their own
soul, through the power of the message that he preached. He
didn't have to, as it were, advance himself when he had a message
that was sufficient to prove the veracity of his ministry. So Paul's enemies were endeavouring
to wean the Corinthians away from the Apostle for their own
gain and for their own benefit. And they accused Paul of hypocrisy,
they accused him of ambition, they accused him of weakness.
And then they compared themselves favourably to Paul's weaknesses,
whether it was of body or the limitations of his speech, and
they tried to boost their own reputation and their own standing
by claiming their own great achievements. They had converts, they had founded
churches, they had great skill when it came to preaching and
teaching and conveying and communicating their message. They had powerful,
charismatic personalities and they had the applause of one
another. Now these things are not unconnected,
I think. This question of these challenges
to the Apostle Paul and the questions that we ask ourselves sometimes
about who are the Lord's people and what is it to be saved? Whether we think of individual
believers in their churches and denominations or their structures,
I say believers there, let me qualify that and say professors.
Whether we think of individual professors, those who profess
to believe in their churches and their denominations or the
structures of their churches with their ministers and their
hierarchy, their preachers and their movements, The question
about who belongs to Christ and what is honoring to Christ and
what is done in the service of Christ, we find often comes down
to fleshy comparisons. And that's what these false teachers
were doing with Paul. They were bringing down questions
of spirituality to these fleshy comparisons of numbers, of attendees,
or the size of a congregation, or the political influence that
a church might have, or their historical pedigree with their
historical confession of faith, or their church traditions, or
even sadly their financial budgets. When the reality of spiritual
life and the genuineness of the professions of faith is predicated
by these people on deeds that they have done, founded on the
good works and the agreeable lifestyles, and fueled with the
praise and admiration of others, and capped with a self-assurance.
Of course we're Christians. We believe in Jesus. We believe
he's risen from the dead. And they're sure that they've
done everything that is necessary to obtain eternal life. They believe, they desire, they
profess, They have a personal conversion experience. They have
ongoing observance of the customs and behaviors of their particular
group. And they have the support of
that group, praising them and encouraging them to believe that
all is well with their souls. Now, I'm not identifying a particular
group. I'm just saying that sometimes
we find it difficult to know who the believers are. But when
it all comes to the end, Paul tells the Corinthians and he
tells us by them, All our hope and confidence and standing and
assurance can't be gotten from such a source as these outward
appearances. They must be gotten from the
Lord alone. Spiritual life must come from
a spiritual source and be the result of a spiritual work. If
we have any glory, It must be what we have obtained from Christ. And we must learn that we have
and are of ourselves nothing except the Lord make us approved
in himself with cleansing blood and a righteousness that is imputed
by God. I cannot look into the heart
of another man and no man can look into my heart. Whether a
person is saved, whether a preacher is called, whether a church has
any legitimacy as a local gathering of the Lord's people is ultimately
due only to the grace of God and the work of Christ. When
the Lord calls a sinner to himself and washes that sinner in blood
and covers that sinner with righteousness, it is the Lord who reveals that
sinner as a trophy of grace and as a partaker of the covenant
blessings, and all the glory is God's alone. Any who commend
themselves to another person as a true follower of Christ,
based on anything except Christ's sacrifice and the gospel doctrines
that explain and inform and warrant our ground of hope, or to use
the phrase we used earlier, the reason of the hope that is in
us, then they are simply commending themselves and their confidence
and certainty is like a house that is built on sand. Approved
by God is the only approval that matters. It is only those who
are commended to the Father through the blood of the perfect sacrifice
who have any justified hope of acceptance with God and of eternal
life. Someday the Lord will stand in
his glory and declare before all angels and all powers and
principalities of men and women, behold I and the children which
God hath given me. And so the Apostle Paul concludes
this little chapter by saying, he that gloryeth let him glory
in the Lord. He that glories, he that is saved,
he that is a professor of these great truths, he that has any
glory at all, not in these outward appearances, not in what we've
done or what we've achieved or what we aspire to, let him glory
in the Lord. For not he that commendeth himself
is approved, but whom the Lord commendeth. Lord commended Paul
by saving his soul in the eternal decrees, by redeeming him on
the cross, by converting him on the Damascus road, and by
making him useful for the good of the souls of men and women,
by fitting him and equipping him to glorify the name of Christ. All the commendation we have
is what Christ gives us and any good that we do is for his glory
alone. Amen. May the Lord bless these
thoughts to us.