Spiritual Restoration
When we confront sin
in the life of a fellow Christian,
our primary goal should always be
repentance and restoration.
Here's Gene:
To understand clearly what Paul says next,
we really need to see the bigger picture.
And what I'm going to share with you
is that Paul actually wrote four letters
to the Corinthians.
And let me just share that with you
by referring first of all to letter 1.
While in Ephesus, Paul wrote an initial letter
to the Corinthians--often called the "lost letter"--
and addressed a serious moral issue
in the church.
For example, he referred to this lost letter.
Here we have it:
I wrote to you in a letter
not to associate with sexually immoral people.
And if you know anything about Corinth,
it was horribly permeated with immorality.
And so Paul is writing to the Corinthians
a letter dealing with immorality.
And he wrote this before
he wrote 1st Corinthians.
So there's letter 1--that's not 1st Corinthians--
it's this lost letter.
Letter 2--Paul next wrote 1st Corinthians
and answered a number of questions
they had asked him in a return letter.
And here you have 1st Corinthians 7:1:
Now in response to the matters
you wrote about: ...
You see, they wrote him a letter
as a result of the lost letter.
And one of their questions related
to sexuality, particularly immorality.
And so Paul says:
...Now in response to the matters
you wrote about:
"It is good for a man not to use
a woman for sex."
In other words, he's dealing with
prostitution and all the horrible things
that existed in Corinth.
Now that letter is 1st Corinthians.
It's the 2nd letter but it's 1st Corinthians.
And it's helpful to understand that when you
proceed then to see the next letters.
Letter 3--Paul then wrote the 3rd letter
to the Corinthians, often called
the "painful letter"--which is also lost.
And in 2nd Corinthians, he addresses that:
For I wrote to you with many tears
out of an extremely troubled
and anguished heart. . . .
And that's when he decided not to go back to Corinth.
But to go on to Troas.
This map here will help you
to understand that.
You notice he went to Corinth.
Said: I'll be back.
He went back to Ephesus but did not return.
Changed his mind. And wrote this painful letter.
And then went on to Troas.
Interestingly, most of your traditional maps
on the 3rd journey does not include this digression.
It'll simply take Paul from Ephesus to Troas,
and then on into Macedonia.
But it's very important to understand
that in understanding 2nd Corinthians.
And then we have letter 4.
Finally, Paul wrote 2nd Corinthians,
the letter we're looking at, after he had
received a report from Titus.
And so with this background we
can understand more clearly this Principle,
which I've called Spiritual Restoration:
When we confront sin
in the life of a fellow Christian,
our primary goal should always be
repentance and restoration.
And here is where we have a clue
as to what was in that painful letter
that he wrote.
Look at 2nd Corinthians chapter 2,
verses 5 through 8:
If anyone has caused pain,
he has caused pain not so much to me
but to some degree--
not to exaggerate--to all of you.
This punishment by the majority
is sufficient for that person.
As a result, you should instead
forgive and comfort him.
Otherwise, he may be overwhelmed
by excessive grief.
Therefore I urge you to reaffirm
your love for him.
Now Paul, as we'll see, has received
a report from Titus.
And in that report, he said:
Paul, they followed up in your
instructions in that painful letter.
And they dealt with this individual.
In fact, this individual is so broken and so hurt
that we need to do something about it.
And so Paul, in 2nd Corinthians,
writes back and says: Forgive him.
If you forgive him, I forgive him.
So that then opens up the
purpose behind what Paul is saying here
in 2nd Corinthians.
Now he had a secondary purpose
and he shares this as well. He said:
I wrote for this purpose: ...
Now he's referring to that painful letter.
...I wrote for this purpose:
to test your character to see
if you are obedient in everything.
Anyone you forgive, I do too.
For what I have forgiven--
if I have forgiven anything--
it is for your benefit in the presence of Christ,
so that we may not be taken
advantage of by Satan.
For we are not ignorant of his schemes.
In other words, Paul now is writing
2nd Corinthians to encourage them
to restore this individual
that they had disciplined severely,
according to his instructions
in that painful letter.
And this man, then of course,
was restored to fellowship.
So this leads to a Reflection
and Response question. And that is:
Why is forgiveness so important
in a Christian's life?
A lot of evidence, even beyond Scripture,
that if we do not forgive,
we'll suffer the consequences
in our lives personally.
Now Paul set a very high standard
when he wrote to the Ephesians
and he said: We're all to forgive
as Christ has forgiven us.
Regardless of what someone
has done to us.
Repentance is not a requirement
for us to forgive.
When an arsonist struck our church
and destroyed our pastors' offices.
Destroyed my library.
Destroyed 17 pastors' libraries.
As far as I know, that man
never asked forgiveness.
But right from the start,
what God said to me is I'm to forgive him.
And to pray for him.
Even to pray for my enemies.
And I had to lead the whole church
through that experience.
But forgiveness is a command of God.
To forgive as God has forgiven us.
Now when it comes to forgiveness,
I think we need to understand what it is not.
I read a very interesting article written
by a lady named Laura Petherbridge.
She made several statements
about what forgiveness is not.
Forgiveness is not a feeling.
See that's where we get confused.
When I forgave that man, I was still angry.
I think righteously so.
Forgiveness is not a feeling.
Forgiveness is not pretending you were not hurt.
That's not forgiveness.
Forgiveness is not condoning
what the person did.
When I forgave that man,
I didn't condone what he did.
In fact, I prayed for justice.
But we can pray for justice
even though we forgive.
Forgiveness is not trusting the offender.
You forgive somebody,
doesn't mean you're going to
turn around and trust him.
Forgiveness is not relieving the person of responsibility.
And certainly, in the illustration I use,
we prayed for justice.
That's the right thing, even for that individual--
would be to come to justice.
Forgiveness is an act of the will.
Where we're not going to take vengeance.
We're going to forgive.
It's interesting, I saw a statement
from Mayo Clinic--secular situation:
Forgiveness and letting go of grudges
can lead you down a path of healing.
See, even the secular world medical science
has discovered that people
who will not forgive, deteriorate
emotionally, mentally, with bitterness.
But to forgive can lead to healing.
And that's certainly what is being
taught here in Scripture.
In this case, Paul said:
Forgive him. Restore him.
And that's the whole purpose
of restoring and helping a person
who turns from their sin.
So let me read that Principle once again:
When we confront sin
in the life of a fellow Christian,
our primary goal should always be
repentance and restoration.
And that's exactly what
Paul demonstrates and illustrates here
when he wrote 2nd Corinthians.