Personal Correspondence

2 Corinthians 2:1-11

If no one has shared with you to be very careful in your personal correspondence let me do so, and especially when you are very upset, or very passionate about the matter you are addressing.  To my shame I have a folder titled letters I should not have written, for the written word is often misunderstood.  Too many of us send e-mails without giving serious thought as to how our words will be received. 

When you address someone to their face they have the ability to see and understand what is being said, not so in a letter or e-mail, you might want to let someone else read it before sending it on, especially when emotions are involved.  Paul must have had a very short visit to Corinth to address the false teaching that was happening after his first visit, and it had not gone well is a vast understatement.  When he returned back to Ephesus Paul wrote a letter to the churches at Corinth that was stern and I’m sure both extremely unpleasant to write or to read. 

We have this account in 2 Corinthians 7:5-9, of how the letter not only brought great pain to those who received it but also to the writer of the letter.  Paul’s desire was not to bring them sorrow unless the sorrow brought about repentance, and still those letters should not be done without the leadership of the Holy Spirit.

It seems almost out of context in verses 5-7, but this is a good message for each of us that the flesh is weak and when one gets to focus on anything and takes their eyes off of Jesus they will have a mess, they will make a mess of their testimony.  And Paul is telling us to be very careful and to guide them back to a fellowship with the Lord and for the body of believers to forgive and comfort them, to do everything to restore them, but they must have a repentant heart, not just be sorry they got caught.  Verse ten gives insight that forgiveness is a process and yet it also implies that forgiveness can be completed. (Thoughts taken from page1992 note on verse ten from the HCSB study Bible)

Verse eleven is so key for us who follow Christ, for I’ve set in the adult class at church and heard people voice how mad they were at God for some act that He could have stopped.  I’ve yet to hear someone say, I’m so angry with Satan for the hate and deception he is causing in this world.  We need to ponder on what is being said in verse 11, “so that we would not be outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs.”  But I tell you, we are outwitted by Satan, and it is because we are ignorant of what Scripture teaches, for God is love, but John 10:10 is clear that the devil’s only goal is to steal, kill, and destroy.  Only a really messed-up person would blame God who loves them, instead of the one who desires to only harm them.

From the Bach Porch,

Bob Rice