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Evaluating Your Effectiveness
2 Corinthians 6
Pastor Tom Fuller
How do you evaluate your success in life? At work we do performance evaluations. At school we get grades. In business we either have sales or don’t. When we exercise or diet we can see results and gauge the effectiveness of our diet or exercise program.
But when it comes to serving God – how do you know if you’re doing a good job? Many times we use the same sorts of gauges as the world – money, numbers, reactions – sort of spiritual performance evaluations.
Often times those kinds of gauges don’t give us an accurate picture of life serving God and can actually give us a false sense of doing well, and a false sense that we are failing. That’s what the Apostle Paul has been dealing with in Corinth. The Corinthians thought they were pretty special – that they knew so much that they could glom on to some “new” teachers that had come on the scene – teachers that preached a different gospel than Paul, and teachers that said Paul couldn’t be a “real” apostle – just look at the mess his life and ministry was in.
In chapter 5 Paul says essentially – “we want you to take pride in the changes going on in the heart, not on what you see outwardly.” He continues this thought in chapter 6:
As God’s fellow workers we urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. 2 For he says,
"In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you."
This reference is from Isaiah 49:8. Paul is telling the Corinthians that by rejecting him, they are really rejecting the gospel of God’s grace. “Did receiving the gospel mean nothing to you?” might be another way to put it.
You see – you can believe anything you want. I can believe that men gain eternal life by standing on their heads while holding a can of Spam and singing “Spam Spam Spam Spam …” But it doesn’t mean it will actually do anything. I can turn the ignition of my car all I want, but if there is no gas in the tank I’m not going anywhere.
There is only one way that really works – that’s not vain or empty – that’s the way of Jesus Christ who became sin for us, died – then came back – proving that His sacrifice on our behalf took.
God directly told Paul the Apostle to bring that message – that God has heard and that the day of salvation is here now with the gospel he preached.
I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.
The people in Isaiah’s time looked forward to the day of salvation. Paul is saying “that day is here now so grab ahold of it and don’t let go just because someone is telling you otherwise.”
For us now is the time of God’s favor through Jesus. You can try all the systems of belief, all the legalistic righteousness you want – but God’s favor comes only through Jesus and its today and it’s the gospel that Paul preached.
So often we try to come up with something new, something for today. That’s a dangerous thing. That’s how so many cults get started. In reality, the gospel Paul preached 2,000 years ago is for today – it is just as relevant.
People were watching Paul’s life – and the character of his ministry and judging whether to receive that gospel based on what they saw so Paul next talks a lot about how he went about leading his life in a way that was honest and straightforward – and it becomes a lesson for us as well.
3 We put no stumbling block in anyone’s path, so that our ministry will not be discredited.
Paul realized that if he was not sincere, it could effect whether people believed in Jesus. Notice I didn’t say that Paul worried about being perfect – that’s a mistake we often make. We think that if we represent Jesus it means we’ve got to be perfect and then people will see that perfection and be drawn to the Lord.
It doesn’t work that way. What people need to see is that we are sinners saved by grace, transformed as we relate to Jesus in the power of His Spirit, not our own abilities. No, it is sincerity, and dedication to the work, not perfection that Paul emphasizes.
Now look carefully at this list – it is really about one thing that Paul explains using three lists – the hardships of ministry, the character in ministry, and the reactions to ministry for the Lord.
4 Rather, as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; 5 in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger; 6 in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; 7 in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left; 8 through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; 9 known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; 10 sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything.
Scott Hafemann says: “The greatest display of God’s power is not in the absence of pain or the presence of a miracle, but Paul’s faithful endurance in the midst of adversity.”
Endurance – humpomonay in the Greek. It means “cheerful constancy” and comes from a root that means “to stay under.” “Stick-to-itiveness” might be another way to say it.
That’s the quality of character that Paul says proves his authority over them and his credentials as an apostle.
The list of circumstances he lists would probably not be found on most pastor’s resumes. Most of time we would say “our church grew to 2,000 people in the space of two years” or “we now have a worldwide radio ministry” or “we take in $50,000 a month” – all of course by God’s grace and mercy. And there’s nothing wrong with doing well – but anyone can “stick it out” when everything is going great – the question is, what happens when things go wrong – terribly wrong.
The Corinthians and the false apostles said trouble meant you were not who you said you were Paul – if you were really sent by God then you would have the Midas Ministry Touch – everything you encountered would turn to gold. That didn’t happen. Paul often found nothing but trouble in his ministry – the Corinthian divisions not the least of them.
But through it all – whether external circumstances were good or bad – Paul’s internal character and methods of sincerely bringing God’s truth to anyone who would listen – bore fruit. Sometimes people didn’t listen – but Paul kept at it even if he was dishonored, or spoken badly of, or accused of not being the genuine article, or suffered the ill affects of ministry: sorrow, poverty, attack.
Paul says: this is my character – but what has been your response?
11 We have spoken freely to you, Corinthians, and opened wide our hearts to you. 12 We are not withholding our affection from you, but you are withholding yours from us. 13 As a fair exchange-I speak as to my children-open wide your hearts also.
Have you closed your heart to another person in the body of Christ? It can happen subtly. The Corinthians thought they were so self righteous and mature in kind of distancing themselves from Paul – like shrinking away from the guilty party. As a result they cut themselves off from fellowship – and in this case from the true gospel and became ripe for false teaching and false doctrine.
Paul says its only fair – I’ve given myself freely for you – you should at the least open up your selves to me once again.
Now he talks directly to them about what their rejection of the gospel and acceptance of false teaching has meant:
14 Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? 15 What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? 16 What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: "I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people."
The Corinthians were doing just that – wowed by the great show put on by the false apostles, who preached a gospel other than Paul’s. They were “yoking” themselves to unbelievers. We can do that to – and we should take this as warning. It can happen in a marriage, a business partnership, or other arrangement that requires values and morals in order to make decisions.
It doesn’t mean we shun unbelievers – but it does mean that we don’t get into a relationship where decisions to be and act like God will cause problems.
When you are “yoked” it means the moves by one will affect the other. If you are in a job where you are persecuted for your beliefs, you can quit and move on if the Lord leads in that way. But if you are in a partnership and one partner wants to steal and cheat in order to make money – you have fewer ways to stop it.
Its especially true in marriage – how many problems would be solved if Christians would just realize that marrying an unbeliever is a recipe for trouble.
17 "Therefore come out from them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you." 18 "I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty."
These two references are to Isaiah 52:11 and Ezekiel 20:33-34.
When we come into Jesus’ family we leave the family of the world. In fact the word “saint” means “called out ones.” It’s like the person who needs to get on board the ship but just can’t let go of the people sending them off. You have to let go to get on board – we have to let go of the world to get on board with Jesus.
The main point of the chapter is this: “You have been reconciled to God through His grace – but if you then reject my gospel you are putting that grace to no effect in your life. I have been sincere and genuine with you, opening up myself to all kinds of problems for your benefit – but now you are withholding yourself from me and taking on the worldly views of those who are not part of your family – views that are contrary to the very grace that saved you when God separated you out of the world system to be different.”
But more than that, it gives us also a blue-print for ministry.
1. Its all about God’s grace (not our effort)
2. Be sincere about preaching the gospel (watch your motives)
3. Be open to those you are ministering to (don’t close off)
4. There will always be trouble in ministry (a fact, not a judgment)
5. Not everyone is going to like you (it doesn’t mean God can’t work through you)
6. No matter how hard the pressure, don’t let the world join in the ministry (it’ll pull you away from the pure gospel)
7. No matter how good or bad the outcome of ministry is, as long as you are true to the gospel, you are okay.
So what are God’s success factors for ministry?
First we must realize that they are different than ours. Ours involves external outcomes, His involve internal motives. Ours are measured by how much we do, His are measured by how much we trust.
Isaiah 55:9 "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
God’s successes may actually be what we would think are failures. In Paul’s case, here is what the Lord told him about his own struggles in ministry and the attacks of the enemy:
2 Corinthians 12:7-9 To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
So be open, sincere, dependent, even weak – so that God may have His successes through us – producing endurance in our ministry.
• The presence of pain does not indicate the absence of blessing or success
And one final thing: look back at verse 10. It says “sorrowful and yet always rejoicing.”
It’s okay to be sorrowful when you are attacked. Its okay to be human in that respect – just know that deep down the Lord is at work both in you and in those you are ministering to.
