II Corinthians 6:14-7:16. A Call for Holy Living

Transcription

1 II Corinthians 6:14-7:16 A Call for Holy Living

2 Corinth a city full of idols p Pausanias (2 nd century):.. in addition to the temples of Apollo and Aphrodite, some twenty images in the open, six other temples of the Greek gods and five precincts for the lords of the mysteries. p Small dining rooms, accommodating a dozen or so people, formed part of these temple complexes. p It was customary for hosts to invite friends to a meal in the name of a god. Prayers to the god would then occur during the banquet. (Barnett)

3 II Corinthians 6: 14 p Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?.. p You shall not plow with an ox and donkey together. Deut 22:10 p it is the specific and technical association with temple worship which the apostle forbids. (Barlett)

4 p Another commentator states:..already in the earlier epistle there are indications of some of the things he must have had in mind, namely, marriages between Christians and non-christians (I Cor 7:12-15), eating meat that had been offered to idols in the home of an unbeliever (10:27), speaking in tongues when unbelievers were present at the service (14:24), and instituting legal proceedings against a Christian brother before unbelievers (6:5). (Hughes)

5 p do not go on becoming unequally yoked with unbelievers, as you are already doing.. (Hughes) p Stop being joined as with a yoke to unbelievers in a common state or endeavor which latter are of a character different from and diametrically opposed to the state of a child of God.. (Wuest)

6 p..he means simply this, that we should have no fellowship with them in their pollutions. (Calvin)

7 II Corinthians 6:16-18 therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty. (Paul draws from Isa 52:11; Ezek 20:34; 2 Sam 7:14; Isa 43:6) (ESV commentary). 7:1..let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God.

8 p Paul turns from exhorting the Corinthians and now also includes himself in the appeal let us purify ourselves perfecting holiness. The church as the temple of God, in which he lives, is to be cleansed from any contact with the worship of other gods, nevertheless to engage in the pagan meals is to share in the worship of demons (I Cor 10:20). (Bartlett)

9 II Corinthians 7:2-4 p Make room in your hearts for us. We have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have taken advantage of no one.you are in our hearts, to die together and to live together I have great pride in you; I am filled with comfort. In all our affliction, I am overflowing with joy.

10 p Chrysostom, Herveius and others, however, understand Paul to be referring here not so much to accusations made against himself as to the malpractices of the false apostles, who, coming into their midst, had been the cause of injury, corruptions, and impoverishment to the members of the Corinthian church. (Hughes) p Bartlett in contrast feels these are accusations being made against Paul.

11 II Corinthians 7:5-9 p For even when we came into Macedonia our bodies had no rest, but we were afflicted at every turn fighting without and fear within. But God who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the coming of Titus p For even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you, though only for a while you were grieved into repenting.

12 (v10) For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death...a most profitable doctrine may be inferred namely, that the more we are afflicted, so much the greater is the consolation prepared for us by God. (Calvin)

13 p (Ch 1:3) Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction. p Isaiah 49:13 Sing for joy, O heavens, and exult, O earth; break forth, O mountains, into singing! For the Lord has comforted his people and will have compassion on his afflicted.

14 p The impulse of the natural man upon receiving such a letter would have been to indulge in hypocritical self vindication, and even in embittered recrimination; but the Corinthians, contentious though they had shown themselves to be in the past, had not responded in man s way: their sorrow had displayed itself in God s way, which is the more excellent way of love (I Cor 12:31, 13:1) without unkindness, self-vaunting, unseemliness, or readiness to be provoked. (Hughes)

15 p..the apostle is not commending repentance as though it were the ground of salvation which would amount to a most un-pauline doctrine of justification by works. Paul s concern here is not with the ground of salvation, which is pure grace of God in Christ, but with the commendation of repentance, itself a sign of the grace of God in operation, because of the fruit which it produces. (Calvin)

16 II Corinthians 7:11-16 p And besides our own comfort, we rejoiced still more at the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all and his affection for you is even greater, as he remembers the obedience of you all, how you received him with fear and trembling. p that is with respect for him who was their Apostles representative, in contrast to the contempt for Paul which the troublemakers in their midst had been seeking to plant in their minds.. (Hughes)

17 p For Paul himself had originally come to these same Corinthians in fear and in much trembling (I Cor 2:3) conscious, that is, of the awful magnitude of the task which had been entrusted to him by God.. (Hughes) p (v16) I rejoice that in everything I am of good courage concerning you. p It is the delicate pin around which the whole of the epistle pivots. (Hughes)