Sue Hammons, from Lubbock, Texas, talks about four-year-old Jason, who was visiting his grandparents. Grandpa was in his study intently reading. Jason walked in carrying a peach, said something Grandpa didn't catch, and handed the peach to him. Thinking his wife had sent him a snack, Grandpa took it and ate it. Just as he swallowed the last bite, Jason, with lip quivering, said, "But, Pap, I didn't want you to eat it. I just wanted you to get the worm out!" (Sue Hammons, Lubbock, Texas, "Lite Fare," Christian Reader).
Ooops! But that’s what happens when you don’t really listen. You can swallow stuff that might make you sick.
That was happening to a group of believers in the First Century. They stopped listening to the Apostle Paul and started swallowing the lies of some false teachers, which made them spiritually sick. So Paul urges them to turn away from those false teachers and turn their hearts back to him. He defends himself against these so-called “super apostles” and in the process, shows us how to benefit from listening to the truth.
Do you want to benefit from listening to today’s message (or any message based on God’s Word)? Then I invite you to turn with me to 2 Corinthians 12, 2 Corinthians 12, where the Apostle Paul urges his readers to listen to him, not the false teachers.
2 Corinthians 12:11 I have been a fool! You forced me to it, for I ought to have been commended by you. For I was not at all inferior to these super-apostles, even though I am nothing (ESV).
The Corinthian believers forced Paul to boast about his credentials, because they gawked at the credentials of the false teachers. It made Paul feel like a fool, because apart from Christ he was nothing. Even so, he will boast, since that is what impresses the Corinthians.
2 Corinthians 12:12 The signs of a true apostle were performed among you with utmost patience, with signs and wonders and mighty works (ESV).
Paul performed the signs of a true apostle when he was with them. He did miracles, which demonstrated his authenticity as one with God’s message.
You see, every time God gave new revelation to the world, He accompanied that new revelation with signs, wonders, and miracles. When God gave the law to Moses, Moses and his successor, Joshua, performed many miracles surrounding their exodus from Egypt and entrance into the Promised Land (Exodus, Joshua). When God gave new revelation to the prophets, Elijah and his successor, Elisha, also performed many miracles as recorded in 1st and 2nd Kings. Then, when God spoke through His Son, Jesus, He and His successors, the Apostles, performed a lot of miracles to demonstrate that their message came from God Himself (Acts 2:22, 43).
Hebrews 2 warns us to pay attention to God’s message, which “was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard (i.e., His apostles), while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles” (Hebrews 2:3-4).
It had been hundreds of years since God spoke, but with the coming of Christ and His apostles, God was speaking again, confirming His Word with “signs and wonders and various miracles.”
Paul was urging his readers to believe him, because he performed the signs of a “true apostle, “ demonstrating that his words were God’s words. And that’s what you must do if you want to benefit from this message, or any message, based on God’s Word.
BELIEVE IT!
Trust what God has said through His servants. Reject the words of the false teachers, and rely on the words of those who teach and preach God’s Word.
Now, I’m not going to perform “signs and wonders” for you today, because God has already confirmed His Word with signs and wonders through Jesus’ apostles in the First Century. However, His Word is no less reliable today than it was then, so trust it with your life. In as much as my words conform to God’s Word, you can depend on those words to change your life for the better. So, if you want to benefit from today’s message, just believe it.
When CBS News featured Jacob Smith three years ago (2022), he was a 15-year-old legally blind freeride skier. Jacob has extreme tunnel vision—and no depth perception on top of that. What he does see is blurry. His visual acuity is rated 20/800, four times the level of legal blindness. Think of the big E on the eye chart. He would need it to be blown up four times in order to see it from 20 feet away.
So how does Jacob ski like this? His family keeps him on course. On competition days, Jacob’s little brother, Preston, patiently helps him hike to the top of the venue. It's so high, the lifts won't take you there. Then his father, Nathan, helps him get down. Jacob has a two-way radio turned up high in his pocket. His dad is on the other end at the base, somehow, calmly, guiding him down.
His father, Nathan Smith, said:
It's on me to make sure I don't let him down. I have to guide him through narrower chutes or not go off a cliff. Jacob is not reckless. He knows his limitations. I think he has the ability to ski anything on the mountain, but he's not gonna go try to do it by himself. Like, he wants to be with somebody who he trusts. He won't ski with people he doesn't trust.
When Jacob was asked how much he trusted his father, he replied, “I mean, enough to turn right when he tells me to” (Sharyn Alfonsi, “The only big fear I have is not succeeding,” CBS News, 3-6-22; www.PreachingToday.com).
That’s the kind of trust you need to put in God’s Word if you want to navigate through life successfully. When it says, “Turn right,” that’s what you do. When it says, “Abstain from sexual immorality,” that’s what you do. When it says, “Love your enemy,” that’s what you do.
If you want to benefit from today’s message, or any message, based on God’s Word, 1st of all, believe it. Then 2nd…
APPRECIATE IT.
Gratefully receive God’s Word. Thankfully welcome it when you hear God’s Word proclaimed.
2 Corinthians 12:13 For in what were you less favored than the rest of the churches, except that I myself did not burden you? Forgive me this wrong! (ESV)
Paul speaks facetiously here when he says, “Forgive me” for not asking for pay like other preachers.
2 Corinthians 12:14-15 Here for the third time I am ready to come to you. And I will not be a burden, for I seek not what is yours but you. For children are not obligated to save up for their parents, but parents for their children. I will most gladly spend and be spent for your souls. If I love you more, am I to be loved less? (ESV)
Paul was getting ready to make a third visit to Corinth—The first visit was to plant the church there. The second visit was a “painful visit” to deal with a problem. In this third visit, he just wants to love on them.
You see, Paul wants them to appreciate the price he paid to bring them God’s Word. He supported himself in ministry, rather than ask them for support. He committed himself fully to them. That is, he loved them (the word is agape) without expecting anything in return, and he spent himself completely on their behalf. Like a parent, Paul sacrificed himself for his spiritual children. The least they could do was appreciate his sacrifice. Instead, they accused him of being “crafty.”
2 Corinthians 12:16-18 But granting that I myself did not burden you, I was crafty, you say, and got the better of you by deceit. Did I take advantage of you through any of those whom I sent to you? I urged Titus to go, and sent the brother with him. Did Titus take advantage of you? Did we not act in the same spirit? Did we not take the same steps? (ESV)
Paul is very clear here. Neither he nor his associates took advantage of the Corinthians. He did not take from them. Instead, he gave himself completely to them. That’s what good preachers do. The least you can do is appreciate their sacrifice.
In his book, Giving It All Away, David Green says some people act like life is an oversized game of Monopoly, where the way to win is to accumulate as many properties as you can, either by purchasing outright or by clever trading with your opponents. Then you keep adding houses and hotels, extracting rent from the others, until you eventually drive them into bankruptcy. You sit back, rub your hands together, and start counting your stacks of cash.
No, life is more like Uno or Crazy Eights, where the point is to run out of cards first. You want to deploy every card you have, knowing that each card left in your hand at the end counts against you. Don't get stuck at the time of your funeral with leftover cards! (David Green, Giving It All Away, Zondervan, 2017, page 151; www.PreachingToday.com).
Every good preacher, worth listening to, is giving it all away. They spend and are being spent in ministry to those they love. If you appreciate their sacrifice, you’re more apt to let their words change your life.
If you want to benefit from today’s message, or any message, based on God’s Word, 1st, believe it. 2nd, appreciate it. And 3rd…
LEARN FROM IT.
Grow in response to God’s Word. Get stronger in your faith under the ministry of God’s Word. That’s what Paul wanted the Corinthian believers to do under his ministry.
2 Corinthians 12:19 Have you been thinking all along that we have been defending ourselves to you? It is in the sight of God that we have been speaking in Christ, and all for your upbuilding, beloved (ESV).
Paul wanted to build them up in their faith, that is, to increase their potential, to strengthen them, making them better able to live for Christ. Instead, Paul fears that they had grown weaker in their faith, regressing to their former behaviors.
2 Corinthians 12:20-21 For I fear that perhaps when I come I may find you not as I wish, and that you may find me not as you wish—that perhaps there may be quarreling, jealousy, anger, hostility, slander, gossip, conceit, and disorder. I fear that when I come again my God may humble me before you, and I may have to mourn over many of those who sinned earlier and have not repented of the impurity, sexual immorality, and sensuality that they have practiced (ESV).
The eight sins in verse 20 lead to the three sins in verse 21. Paul had addressed them all in 1 Corinthians. Now, he fears humiliation, because his long years of ministry may have had no effect. Paul just wants them to grow under the ministry of the Word, to get better, not worse.
Instead, the Corinthian believers had bought into the legalism of the false teachers, thinking that their strict discipline would help them suppress these terrible sins. But it had the opposite effect, because “legalism and immorality are frequent bedfellows” (David Lowery, BKC).
That’s Lisa Brockman’s testimony as a young woman raised in the legalism of the Mormon Church. She writes:
“As a sixth-generation Mormon girl, I believed that the Mormon Church was the one true church of God. I believed Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God. By age six, I was convinced that having a temple marriage and faithfully obeying Mormon laws would qualify me to spend eternity in the highest heaven—the Celestial Kingdom. There, I would exalt into godhood and bear spirit children. This was my greatest dream.
“But there were temptations to resist. Throughout high school, Mormon friends of mine began drifting into the world of partying. Alcohol seemed to release them from the striving and shame that comes with performance-based love. For three years I resisted, feeling like a pressure cooker of unworthiness waiting to explode. As a senior, I gave up resisting, I jumped into the party world with the same passion I brought to the rest of my life, funneling beer without restraint.
“Yet even as I felt liberated from Mormon legalism, I didn’t waver from believing that the Mormon church was God’s true church. During my freshman year at the University of Utah, I met Gary. Gary told me he was a born-again Christian—I’d never heard of one. For the first month of our relationship, we avoided the subject. Then, on a wintry December day, Gary cracked open the door of this conversation.”
Gary asked, “How do you know Mormonism is true?” [After a few more questions, Lisa Brockman says], “Within minutes, my unease turned into terror. What had felt like a firm foundation was dissolving into quicksand.”
[They] agreed to study the Bible together. Lisa says, “It only took one Bible study to send me into a tailspin. I was shocked to find several crucial disparities between biblical and Mormon teachings…
“This was devastating and infuriating,” she says. “At the same time, it opened my mind to the biblical view of my nature—sinful, not divine. It also opened my mind to better understand God’s nature—three persons in one God, the Father being Spirit instead of flesh and bones. The Mormon God was a man who worked his way into godhood. The biblical God had always been God, unchanging. I struggled to wrap my mind around this.
“I saw, too, that God was inviting me to walk into his kingdom through trust in Jesus. Covered in Christ’s righteousness, I would always be worthy of the Father’s delight and presence. But rejecting the faith of my forebears and risking the wrath of my family terrified me. I wanted further assurance that I was right to take this plunge…
“Five months [later], as I sat in bed conflicted, God drew near to me in a vision. I saw a sea of people around Jesus, who sat on a throne. They bowed before him, singing, ‘Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty, Who was, and is, and is to come.’ As they worshiped, I fell to my face and wept. I received Jesus into my heart and walked into his kingdom. I was free of the shame that had suffocated me for 18 years.
“On my 21st birthday, after consuming large quantities of alcohol, I spent the night fending off drunk guys who wanted to take me home. I steadied a friend’s forehead as she vomited into the toilet of a urine-soaked bathroom. I craved a different kind of life.
“That same December night, I returned home and fell face-down before God. With fists clenched and tears streaming, I offered each addiction to him, inviting him to have his way in my heart, my mind, and my body. I asked him to free me to live fully surrendered to Jesus, the One who gives life.
“When I awoke the next morning, I felt born again, as if God had performed a total heart and mind transplant. I was released from my addictions, and peace filled my entire being. The Mormon girl inside me breathed a sigh of relief. Set free from the burden of proving myself worthy, I rested in the arms of the One who had loved me enough to cover me with worthiness all his own (Lisa Brockman, “Leaving the Faith of My Fathers,” Christianity Today, October, 2019, pp. 95-96; www.PreachingToday.com).
Mormon legalism could not keep her from slavery to sin. Trying to prove herself worthy only made things worse, but resting in God’s loving arms changed her life.
It will change your life, as well. Please, stop trying to measure up to God’s standards in your own strength. Instead, trust Christ with your life, the one who loved you enough to cover you with His own worthiness. Trust Christ with your life, the one who loved you enough to pay for all your sins on the cross.
Then grow in your faith as you believe and appreciate every message that comes from God’s Word.
Catherine Booth, who along with her husband founded the Salvation Army, once said, “What a deal there is of going to meetings and getting blessed, and then going away and living just the same, until sometimes we, who are constantly engaged in trying to bring people nearer the heart of God, go away so discouraged that our hearts are almost broken (Catherine Booth. “William and Catherine Booth,” Christian History, no. 26; www.PreachingToday.com).
Please, don’t break your preacher’s heart. Instead, just believe, appreciate, and learn from his preaching of God’s Word.
