All right, let's take our Bibles
and turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 10. In these 10 verses, Paul defends his ministry and
defends his calling against the accusations of those who despised
him and who put a question mark concerning his office and authority. And what's interesting about
it is he does not defend himself by public ridicule of his enemies,
but rather by pointing out what God had to say about his ambassadors
and how God commends his own servants. 2 Corinthians chapter 10, let's
begin here in verse 8. 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." Paul
was an apostle. That's the highest office in
the New Testament church, an apostle. We don't have any apostles
today. Roman Catholics believed the
Pope to be an apostle or to sit in an office equal to an apostle. But we don't have any apostles
today. He was taught by Christ himself,
which the Pope is not. And his ministry as an apostle
was confirmed by miracles which no man of himself could do. This is an apostle. One who could
raise the dead. You know anybody today that can
raise the dead? I've never met one. Who could,
a leper, he could cleanse a leper. You remember Peter came up to
that church and there was a man lame, been lame, I guess from
his birth. And they'd bring him up and sit
him there on a little blanket out in front of the temple. And
people coming into the temple to worship would give him alms. And he asked alms of Peter. And Peter said, silver and gold
have I none, but such as I have, give I unto thee, rise up and
walk. I don't know anybody today can
do that. It was confirmed by miracles
and wonders and signs. And for the sake of our children
here this morning, I'd like for you to turn with me to Hebrews
chapter 2. Every office to which God calls
ambassadors, servants, He confirms. And Paul was called to be an
apostle. This man's words would be divinely
inspired and be incorporated in the canon of scripture. What
we're reading this morning, what we're studying this morning is
the words written by the Apostle Paul, divinely inspired, what
we call our Bible. And to exercise this office,
it would demand more than just somebody's recommendation, a
letter of recommendation. And that's what Paul told him
when he came to him. He said, I don't need letters for you,
and I don't need letters from you. God's confirmed my office. Now
look here in Hebrews chapter 2, verse 2. For if the word spoken by angels
was steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just
recompensive reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great
salvation which at first began to be spoken by the Lord and
was confirmed unto us by them that heard him? Now watch this. God also bearing them witness,
both with signs and wonders and diverse miracles, and gifts of
the Holy Ghost according to His own will. Now, there's four offices
given to the church by our ascended Lord. When He ascended up to
heaven, He gave gifts unto men. And He tells you what those gifts
are. He gave some prophets, some apostles,
some evangelists, and some pastor-teachers. And of these four offices, only
two remain. evangelists, and pastor-teachers. An evangelist is one whose ministry
goes beyond the assembly of the local church. His ministry extends
out into foreign lands. It can extend out into parts
of this nation where there are no assemblies. That man is an
evangelist, and his calling can be to foreign lands or his calling
can be to places in this country. Pastor teachers, on the other
hand, are those whose calling in ministry is over a local assembly. And while he might do the work
of an evangelist, his primary duties are to that assembly.
That's where God's called. And both of these offices have
certain evidences by which God confirms their calling. The first
evidence is his gifts and ability to preach and exercise a gracious,
rule over the church of God. That's the first thing God does
to confirm this to be. He doesn't call people, and those
people don't have a clue how to oversee a church. They don't
have a clue how to present the gospel. They don't have a clue
as to what the doctrines are. I've heard people say that. You
know, I don't know what you're talking about, but one thing
I know, God's called me to this office. Well, if you don't know
what I'm talking about, there's no way God called you to an office. Because I'm about as simple as
any man in this country in my presentation of the gospel. So that's the first thing. He
gives some ability to preach and to exercise a gracious rule
over the house of God. And then the second evidence
is the hearts of the people. God's servants are given the
heart of the people he preaches to. If God calls a pastor to
oversee a church, the whole church can't hate that man. He'll never
pastor that church. He'll never exercise any rule
over that church. Their hearts have to be given
to him, and he can't cause you to do it. Only God can cause
that to happen. That's the second evidence. The
third evidence is God's providence. Somebody asked me one time, why
are you so sure God called you to pastor that church down there?
And I said, well, there's a little phrase you run onto in the Bible
all the time, and it came to pass. That's why. It came to pass. I've known some who sincerely
seek to be ministers, ministers of God, yet they've never been
given an open door to do it. Never have. The fourth evidence
is his preservation of that man through trial. Paul said, we're
persecuted, but not forsaken. And we're cast down, but we're
not destroyed. Well, who makes him to stand?
To his own master, he standeth or he falleth. God preserves
that man. God called Paul to preach. They
did everything to that man. They publicly lambasted that
man. They tried to tear his reputation
down. They had him put in prison. They
hired people to beat him up. They did everything in the world
to stop that man from preaching the gospel. And it didn't matter
what they did, it was just an open door for him to do more. And God preserved him through
all of those things as his witness. He went down to the prison. Paul
said, that's an open door now for me to come in here and preach
to the jailers and preach to the king and preach to his court. I'm brought right up into the
court of the king. And Paul preached to the king.
He did it because he was a prisoner. This is the preservation I'm
talking about. And what Paul's saying here in
verse 8 is that he could, if he thought it necessary, outboast
the boasters. But then he'd be climbing onto
the same platform that they're standing on, and he didn't want
to do that. The real difference between God's servants and Satan's
servants is in their hearts, in their motives, and in their
goals. When God calls a man to represent
him in a church, it's to edify. It's to unify and not to destroy
or divide. These men were trying to divide
the church. They were trying to split the
church. They were trying to cause harm
to the church. Paul wasn't. He wasn't. If there be a division, and there
will be, there will be, somewhere down the road, There's a division
and there will be. Let it be over the gospel of
Christ and not our personalities and attitudes. Let's just leave
those things out. Let's fight against those things.
Try to keep those things down. And let the gospel be the issue.
If there's going to be a division, let it be over that. Now, the
full success of our ministry rests in God and not in us. He said, we have this treasure,
this gospel treasure in earthen vessels. Why? That the excellency
of the power may be of God and not of us. All right. Look here at verse 9, 2 Corinthians
10. Let's read verses 9 and 10 both. That I may not seem as if I would
terrify you by letters. For his letters, say they, that
is his accusers, are weighty and powerful, but his bodily
presence is weak and his speech contemptible. That was the enemy's
charge against Paul. They said from a distance he
writes weighty letters and exercises a grand authority. But when he
gets here, he's a small, skinny, frail old man And what he knows
about English, a 10-year-old might know. That was their accusations
against him. His speech is common, it's unimpressive,
and it lacks what's needful to impress those who are looking
for a man to worship and adore. And what they thought to be an
insult to God's preacher, Paul uses as a strong argument and
proof of his own cause. God's messengers are just tools
which He uses to accomplish His work. That's how a preacher ought
to think about himself. That's how you ought to think
about yourself. You're just a tool. You're a tool. Now, I'm going
to tell you something about tools. My tools are in my shed right
now. Now, they did a lot up here because they got in somebody's
hands. And somebody used them and knew
what they were doing, and they did things and accomplished things.
But they ain't accomplishing anything down in my shed. They're
just tools. They just lay there till somebody
with some skill and some power can pick them up, knows what
they're doing, and use them. One of the boys I used to live
next door to, we would just live. One day, he'd come to my house,
and we'd play, and I'd go to his house, and we'd play. And
one day, we was over at the house, and we was out in this old log
barn. We was out on the farm, and we found daddy's old crosscut
saw hanging up on the wall of that barn. And we decided we
was going to be lumberjacks. And we got that big old crosscut
down. It was about eight foot long,
had two big tall handles on it. And we wore ourselves out with
that thing, trying to cut one piece of wood off a log. Wasn't a thing wrong with the
saw. It's whose hands it was in was
the problem. That's what preachers are. Preachers
are tools. They're tools. But they're of
no use whatsoever. except God be in it. If God don't
use it, it's not going to do anything. God makes His messengers
able ministers of the New Testament by the Spirit of the living God.
Now the vessels best suited, Paul said, are earthen vessels.
The ministers best suited are humble, meek, and of low esteem
in their own eyes. Paul said, least of the apostles,
and I'm not mean to be called an apostle." He said, I'm less
than the least of all the saints. Looked at himself in the mirror
and cried, oh, wretched man that I am. He was a humble man. He was a great man. He wrote
half the New Testament, but he was a humble man. and a meek
man. Moses was the meekest of men. Did you know that? That's what
God said about him. Meekest of men, Moses. But myself, what
God accomplished through Moses. We're never intended to be impressed
with or obsessed with preachers. We're to love them, to recognize
who sent them, to listen to them, and be led by them to worship
the God who sent them. All right, 2 Corinthians 10 verse
11. Let such a one think this, that
such as we are in word by letters when we're absent, such we will
be also indeed when we're present. Now, there comes a time in our
ministry. Paul wanted this church to be
unified. Paul wanted this church to love
one another. He wanted them to worship God
and walk with God. He was concerned for them. He
had a genuine burden for this church. Prayed for them constantly.
Wrote them two letters, both of them inspired by God. And
yet, you read here what Paul's saying here. There comes a time in our ministries
to deal forcefully with rebellion. and forcefully with disobedience. When men have overstepped their
bounds, I was talking with a man here who attends another church,
and he just lives a little ways from here, but he's an elder,
a sitting elder over at Texarkana Reformed. And he knows at his
age it's not going to be long before he can't drive all the
way over there, and he came over to talk to us talked to me here,
and we spent about 45 minutes or an hour back there talking.
And he goes to a Reformed church, and I think he wanted to know
how I would feel about him coming here to worship God. And I told
him, I said, well, I'm tolerant of a lot of things. I won't compromise on them. When
I come to where they're dealt with in the scriptures, I'm going
to deal with them. But I tolerate things in this church that I
don't actually believe that the Bible teaches. But I
said I won't tolerate anything when it comes to the basic doctrines
of grace. We're not going to tolerate that.
And I'm not going to tolerate the things that I don't teach.
It's okay for you to come in here and sit and listen and believe
what you want to. But don't start teaching it to
the other members of the church. If you do, we're going to have
a problem. And this is what Paul said. When I get there, he said,
you'll see what kind of authority I have. You'll see. I don't have
to brag on it. I don't have to do anything.
But when I come there, I'm going to do exactly what I told you
I was going to do in this letter. And there comes a time in our
ministries when men overstep their boundaries
and they go against the plain declarations of scripture or
by deed or accusation attempt to divide the church. They've
got to be dealt with, and they've got to be dealt with quickly.
Those things are best dealt with quickly. I remember Brother Mahan
telling me one time I was going through a horrible time in my
life dealing with spiritual things. And he told me this. He said,
my mama gave me some good advice when I was little. He said, if
the pill's bitter, just swallow it. You don't want to chew on
it. It's worse when you start chewing
on it. Just swallow it. And when God has chastised you,
just swallow it. Don't chew on it. It's not pleasant. Believe me, some of these children
here know what it is. They know what a switch is. It's
not pleasant. But just swallow it. Just take
it and go on. You know, when it comes to the
sweet things of the Word of God, chew on them. Chew on them. Chew on them blessings. But these
other things, just swallow them down. Verse 12, 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. Now here's a warning
to those who try to justify their calling by comparing themselves
with others of like mind or even by self-commendation. Every false
prophet justifies his authority and position by these means. He said, you are they. That's
what Christ told those Pharisees. They were exerting their authority
even on the disciples. They were intimidating in their
power and authority and their dress. And the Lord looked at
them, and they were bucking what he was teaching. And he looked
at them, and he said, you are they who justify themselves before
God. Now, Paul said, this is not wise.
Isaiah tells us that at our best state, we're altogether vanity.
Altogether vanity. In Luke 16, 15, our Lord said
to those who held those offices, you are they that justify yourselves
before men, but God knows your heart, for that which is highly
esteemed among men is an abomination to God. And talking about the ministers
of Christ in 1 Corinthians 4, Paul asked this question, who
maketh thee to differ from another? What has thou gotten that thou
hast received? And if you received it, why do
you act like you didn't? I hate to walk in a preacher's
office and see all these letters hanging on wall, diplomas, all
that type of thing, degrees. There's no other reason to put
those things there than to impress someone who sees them. And I
can say this without fear of controversy, God's not impressed. He's not impressed. I believe I can truthfully say
with Paul, I am what I am by the grace of God. He'll justify
my calling or he'll expose it for what it is. He'll enable
me to fulfill my calling or expose my pretense to it. He'll use
me as His ambassador or He'll lead me in the power of my flesh.
That's just so. All of these things depend on
God. You see what Paul is doing? He's coming from a whole different
direction than what these other men are. A whole different direction. And he wants these Corinthians
to understand that. Verse 13, 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." Now, I believe this is important. There were among
the Corinthians, as there is in our churches today, those
who boasted beyond their gifts and calling. It really doesn't
matter how much approval I have or how great a multitude I can
convince to stand with me. If God's not in it, I'll be swallowed
up and all those who lined up behind me are going to get swallowed
up. If you want to see that in the Scripture, you can find it
back there where Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, they just sat around
in the tent one night and said, Old Moses was just too big for
his britches, you know that? He took too much on himself.
And look at this small tooth. You can see the campfires. It
goes clear out of sight. There's millions here. He couldn't possibly accomplish
this work by himself. And here's what we need to do.
Poor old fella, he's just brain dead. He can't figure it out.
So here's what we're going to do. We're going to do it for
him. And we're going to look among ourselves, and we're going
to pick us out some rulers, and we're going to take this amount
for this guy, and this amount for that guy, and this amount
for that guy. And we'll let Moses have his little group. And we'll
spread this thing out. And he went tent to tent trying
to convince. That's what these false teachers
do, house to house. Pretend like they come here to
eat cake with you, and then they start. They lined up out there. Moses
heard for the first time what was going on. He said, everybody
on the Lord's side line up right here. Everybody that's on their
side, line up behind them. And they did. And God took them
to hell with their shoes on. Swallowed the whole outfit up.
And that's basically what Paul's saying here in this verse. This
thing by which we measure ourselves, if we're measuring ourselves
by our own rule, we tend to fudge a little. You know, I'm not 5'2". I remember I had to be so high
before I could ride certain rides there, and I'd get measured up
there and measure it, and I'd want to move that mark up a little
bit, you know, so I could get on that ride and ride it. God does the measuring. But Paul
had a better way than all this rallying supporters and all this
fleshly stuff. He had a better way. He refused
to boast in any gifts. He refused to boast in any graces
or authority other than those which God had obviously given
him and confirmed in him. And I hope you'll take that to
heart. Every member of the body of Christ
has a place and a service to perform. Learn what it is. Whatever it is, learn what it
is. And then be satisfied and not envious of one another. Just
find out what it is. Whatever it is, it's honorable.
It's a position that has to be built. And He put you there on
purpose. Verse 15. not boasting of things
without our measure, that is, of men's labors, but having hope
when your faith is increased that we shall be enlarged by
you according to our rule abundantly. These false teachers came and
found this church already established and then just claimed it for
their own, claimed it for themselves. And they belittled the man whom
God used to form that church. These members were just members
to these false prophets, but to Paul, they were his children. He said, I have begotten you
through the gospel. He said, you've got many instructors,
but you've just got one father. And he said, I have begotten
you through the gospel. They were his children. They
were his converts. And they were established under
his ministry. And Paul's hope concerning this church was that
a real work of grace had begun in them, and being grounded in
the truth and grown in the Spirit, they'd recognize his authority,
and that authority would be enlarged in their hearts. Paul's true
ministry is the gathering out of God's elect, and he believed
both he and they would be used to this end. Verses 17 and 18. But he that glorieth, let him
glory in the Lord. For not he that commendeth himself
is approved, but whom the Lord commendeth. Solomon said this,
let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth, a stranger,
and not thine own lips. That's what Paul's telling us.
I titled the message today, Commending or Being Commended. And that's
what Paul said. Every man who claims to be a
servant of the true and living God fits into one of these two
categories. He's commending himself or he's
being commended of God.