The Tools Of Restoration Series

The Tools of Restoration (2 Corinthians 2:5-11)

Author and Canadian Theologian, Randall Rauser, tells the story of a boy, whose parents had promised him a beautiful car to drive when he turned 16. He dreamed about it all his life, planning to park it in the family’s barn where it could stay warm and dry. However, his dad would have to get rid of that old car sitting under a tarp in the barn. The boy couldn't wait for his dad to haul it off to the dump to make way for his dream car.

Then one evening, after many years, he heard strange sounds coming from that old barn. It sounded like power tools… a drill… a hammer. He stepped out into the warm summer night and noticed a light on in the barn. He walked down the dirt path and poked his head into the barn door.

He saw the tarp, rolled up and left against the door, and thought, “Dad is finally getting rid of that junky old car.” Then he looked and saw one of the most incredible cars in automotive history. It was a Corvette, but not just any Corvette. It was a beautiful, powerful 1963 Corvette 327 V8 with a split window, aluminum knock-off wheels, painted candy apple red.

So that was the car underneath the tarp all those years. He stood there stunned. It was always there, just getting ready for his father's masterful work of restoration. At that moment his father looked up, his hands deep in the engine bay, and handed his son a socket wrench. With a broad smile, he said, “Come on, son. Grab a tool and let's get this car ready” (Randall Rauser, What on Earth Do We Know about Heaven? Baker Books, 2013, pp. 157-158; www.PreachingToday.com).

Sometimes, people are too quick to throw out the old for something new, but God is about restoring people the world discards. And God looks to the church and says, “Grab a tool and let’s get this person ready to serve.”

3So, how do we as a church do that? How do we restore broken people to useful service again? How do we work with our Heavenly Father to make people whole again? Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to 2 Corinthains 2, 2 Corinthians 2, where God shows us the tools of restoration He has made available to every church.

2 Corinthians 2:5 Now if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me, but in some measure—not to put it too severely—to all of you (ESV).

Somebody in the church at Corinth had caused a lot of “pain” to the apostle Paul and to the church itself. He was the reason Paul had to make a “painful visit” (vs.1) and write a letter with “much affliction and anguish of heart” (vs.4).

One commentator suggests that this man “had been a ringleader to the opposition, [who] had… personally insulted Paul… The majority of the Corinthians had come to see that his conduct had not only hurt Paul but had injured the good name of the whole Corinthian church (Barclay).

Whatever this man said or did had caused a lot of emotional pain. His sin had hurt those around him, and that’s the first tool God gives the church for restoration. When a believer deliberately and continuously chooses to sin, first of all…

GRAB THE TOOL OF PAIN.

Feel the grief of the offense without minimizing it. Acknowledge the hurt. Don’t ignore it.

In one of my previous churches, members were well aware of a leader in the church, who had been emotionally abusing his wife for years. However, instead of dealing with the abuse, the church chose to ignore it, even voting to elect this man as an elder before I became their pastor. After I had been there a while, I asked people in the church about the problem, and their constant reply was, “It is what it is.” In other words, they tried to minimize the pain and “sweep it under the rug.” But there was no hope of helping this man until the church acknowledged the pain he caused not only to his wife, but to the whole church. On top of that, problems that are “swept under the rug” have a way of multiplying and creating even worse problems later on.

So don’t minimize the pain a sinning believer causes the church. Acknowledge it not only for the sinner’s sake, but for the church’s sake, as well. To restore a sinning believer, grab the tool of pain. Then…

GRAB THE TOOL OF PUNISHMENT.

Discipline the sinning believer. Confront his or her sin and expel them if they refuse to repent. That’s what the church at Corinth had done upon Paul’s direction.