My Commentary On 2 Corinthians

Introduction

This commentary is based on the New International Version of the Bible, 1994 edition. The Section titles of this commentary correspond to the section titles of the NIV to make for easier comparison.

1 Corinthians was most likely written around 55 AD. Therefore 2 Corinthians was written some time after that, within a couple of years.

Some think that second Corinthians is actually letters number two and three of Paul’s letters that have been combined into one larger letter. Some believe that there was another letter between first and second Corinthians that we don’t have.

Paul’s first letter was delivered to the church from Ephesus. When a messenger returned from Corinth with news that Paul was pleased with (the repentance of the church), he sent another letter back to them that was delivered by Titus. Paul met Titus at Macedonia where he most likely wrote this letter that we call 2 Corinthians.

Soon after this Paul did get to visit this church at Corinth and most likely never returned. There does not seem to be a visit by Paul to Corinth between the two letters we have in our Bible.

Opening Remarks (ch. 1:1 - 2)

As it is with most all of Paul’s letters, he opens by stating his name and that he is “an apostle of Jesus Christ, by the will of God”. In the first chapter of Galatians we see that Paul defends his calling, that it is from God and not from man. Many of us may like to make the same claim, but does the fruit of our calling prove its authenticity?

Paul also includes Timothy in his introductory statement. Therefore this letter, although written by Paul, or at least dictated by Paul, was from Timothy as well.

This letter was written “to the church of God at Corinth”, but not for them alone. Paul includes all the saints throughout the region of Achaia. It is clear that Paul was dealing with specific matters relating to a specific church in his letters, yet what he has to say and teach is good for others as well, including us today.

Paul was an apostle. The word "apostle" simply means "a sent one". Paul said that God sent him and this sending was His will. We know it was God's will. It certainly wasn't Paul's will. Paul was going in the opposite direction when God interrupted his life to call him to Himself and to ministry.

In verse 2 he says, “grace and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ”. This phraseology is also common to Paul’s writings. He differentiates between God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul includes the two titles given to Jesus, and that is Lord and Christ. He is Lord of all things and He is Christ or Saviour for all who believe and trust in Him.

The God Of All Comfort (ch. 1:3 - 11)

In verse 3 Paul says, “praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”. This is important to the core of the gospel, and Paul never forgets this truth. The truth is that the God we serve is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the God of Christians, and we cannot forget this in our day when this truth is being challenged.

Paul continues by saying that this God “is the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all of our troubles”. This verse alone should tell us that Christians do experience trouble. We are not alienated from trouble and hardship just because we are Christians. Paul’s life is certainly an example of this. He experienced more trouble than most and the trouble he went through was due to the fact that he was a Christian.

Yet there is a reason why Paul says that God comforts us. The reason is that we can extend this same comfort to others who need it. So not only Paul went through trouble and needed comfort. Others did as well, including you and I.

Paul says an interesting thing in verse 5. He says that “the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives”. Picture yourself pouring a cup of tea into your cup. You pour until you reach the brim of the cup, but you keep pouring and so the tea begins to spill over on to the table. Paul is saying that there was suffering poured out on Jesus. Yet the suffering did not stop with Jesus. God kept on pouring this suffering. After Jesus experienced all the suffering He could, the residue of the suffering is now being poured out on Paul and others. Paul understood suffering to be a part of the Christian life.

Paul understood that because Jesus suffered, he would suffer as well. This was the thinking of all the apostles and the early church. It is not necessarily our thinking today. Maybe we do not suffer as those in the first century church because we do not live the life of a Christian with the same intensity as they did. They also had a hostile government and religious system to contend with that we may not have today, or not as yet. I do believe the western church will see more suffering as our western nations move away from their Christian and Jewish foundations. Other Christians, as in China have experienced this suffering for years. Our turn is coming.

Paul also says in the same verse that not only the sufferings of Christ have overflowed to us, but His comfort has overflowed to us as well. Jesus will comfort us through the hard times. He expects us to comfort our brothers in the Lord as well, when they go through hard times.

In verse 6 Paul says that if “he is distressed”, which at times he was, “it was for their comfort and salvation”. Paul went through a lot of distress to bring salvation and subsequent comfort to these Christians.

On the other hand he says that if indeed “he was comforted”, this would lead to their comfort as well. So know matter what state Paul would find himself in, it was all for the good of God’s people. That was Paul's life as a Christian. The one who once persecuted Christians dedicated every fiber of his being to helping them.

The comfort that these Christians would receive, both from God and from Paul would produce “endurance” in them, something they definitely needed, because they suffered as Christians as well.

Paul speaks of the Corinthians “sharing in his sufferings”. The sufferings that were poured out on Jesus overflowed to Paul and kept on overflowing to those he ministered to. They were all in the same boat, sharing in the suffering of Christ. They were also in the same boat, sharing in the comfort that God gives in the midst of such suffering.

In verse 8 Paul says that “he does not want them to be uninformed…” These are also common words that you see throughout Paul’s writings. He is a teacher. He is a dispenser of truth and information. The things he wants them to be informed about in this instance is the fact that he has suffered greatly for the sake of the gospel.

Paul says another interesting thing in verse 8. He says that we “were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life”. These words are from the mouth of one of the greatest men of God in history. For those who think that Christians should be happy all the time, they should look closely at what Paul says here. Paul and his company, at times despaired of life. They felt like dying. They wished that they were dead. These hardships were “beyond their ability to endure”. That is how bad it got for Paul and his fellow workers. If not for Jesus, in their own human strength they would have killed themselves. That's how rough things got in those days for Paul and others.

In Paul’s letter to the Philippians (chapter 1:20 - 24) Paul basically said that if he had a choice between living and dying, he would rather be dead and be with Christ. The only reason why he would choose to stay alive would be to help the God's people. This tells you how Paul viewed his existence on earth. This also shows you that Paul did not have an easy life. At times it was so hard that he preferred to be dead. Was Paul depressed? Maybe he was. Did he give up? He certainly did not.

In verse 9 Paul felt like they had “the sentence of death”, meaning, a judicial decision. They felt like a courtroom judge had pronounced them to death. Yet all this was to help Paul and the others “to rely on God and not themselves”, as he says in the same verse. They had to rely on God and Him alone, Him “who raises the dead”. So even if they did experience death, they knew that God would raise them into a new and better life. Yet even at death’s door, Paul would trust fully in His Lord, and nothing else.

Yet Paul continues by saying that they are still alive. God has delivered them and will deliver them”. He says, that “on Him we have set our hope”. Like the old hymn says, “my hope is built on nothing less…” Paul’s only hope was in the God and Father of his Lord Jesus Christ

Biblical hope is different than our modern day idea of hope. We say, “I hope I win…” This means that we have no assurance of winning, we are simply “hoping to win”. Biblical hope is having an assurance that because of Jesus something that He says will happen at a future date will happen. Hope implies that the thing we hope for is in the future and has not come to pass as yet, but it will, if Jesus says it will. That is why Paul has a great hope in the resurrection at the end of the age. Faith differs from hope in that faith is trusting for present realities. We place our trust in Jesus for salvation, which we have to some extent already. There may be a future element to faith, but it is not all futuristic like hope.

Paul says that all this will happen as a result of the Corinthian’s prayers, and as their prayers are answered in the life of Paul and his company, “many will give thanks for the gracious favour granted” by God.

Paul’s Change Of Plans (ch. 1:12 – 2:4)

Paul uses the word boast sometimes in relationship to his work in the Lord. He is usually quick to point out that his boasting is really based on God’s grace alone. Here in verse 12 he boasts that he “has conducted himself with all holiness and sincerity”, both in the world and to them. He and his company have conducted themselves and their ministry in a blameless fashion. Although Paul got lots of criticism, it was not based on any type of misconduct on his part. He could stand before the Corinthians with a clean conscience and make this statement. The same should be true with us, yet we often are criticized, not for the gospel we believe in, but for the way we behave. That should not be. The gospel should be the offense, not us.

Paul says that he has not conducted himself “according to worldly wisdom, but according to God’s grace”. So you can see that though he boasts, his boasting rests on the grace of God and nothing else.

Worldly wisdom is what I believe the church is battling with today. We are allowing worldly wisdom to influence us, and that should not be.

Verses 13 to 14 seems to suggest that there is mistrust in the relationship between Paul and the Corinthian church. Not that Paul mistrusts them, because he says “he will be able to boast of them in the day of the Lord”. Yet he is hoping that they can do the same on that day. He says that at the present moment their understanding of himself and his companions is “in part”. Once they know all about Paul and his ministry, they should be able to boast in him and he will boast in them at a future date. I am not sure that Paul could boast about the Corinthians at the present moment, but he has great hope that he will be able to boast about these people in the future. He only wishes that the reverse would be true as well.

Paul’s original travel plans were to go to Macedonia. He would go to Macedonia via Corinth. Once at Macedonia, after staying a while, he would head to Judea with the gift of money for the poor saints. He would drop into Corinth on this trip, thus visiting them twice.

Paul, in verse 18 asks, “did I plan this lightly”? He is saying that in making these plans he gave great consideration to what he was doing. Paul never made his plans in a “worldly manner”. By using the words, “yes yes, and no, no”, he is telling the Corinthians that he doesn’t say these two words “in the same breath”, meaning, “maybe he will come to visit”, leaving some doubt. Either he will come, or he won’t come. He will not leave any doubt in their minds.

Paul was probably a decisive man by nature, but that being said, I think such decisiveness is part of a godly character. I believe we all should be like Paul in this respect. We should not be wishy washy. When we say "yes", we should follow up on our "yes" with actions. When we have to say "no", we should act accordingly as well.

In verse 18 Paul continues his discourse concerning the words’ “yes and no”. He wants them to know for sure that the good news preached to them by himself; “Silas and Timothy” was “yes” only. There is no maybe about the gospel. God is faithful, as he puts it, and so is the gospel. If the Lord says something, then you can rely on what He says.

Paul says that all the promises of God are “in Christ” and they are “yes”. We need to understand that what God promises can only be fulfilled in Jesus. Outside of Jesus, none of God’s promises can be realized. As a result Paul says “that the “amen” is spoken by us”. By this Paul means that he agrees with all of the promises God has proclaimed in Jesus. His “amen” is an affirmation of God’s word.

In verse 21 and 22 Paul says that it is “God who makes both you and us stand firm in Christ”. Notice again, that we as Christians stand firm not only in God, but in Christ. How does this happen? Paul says that God has “anointed us, set His seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come”.

Paul speaks of three things here. He says we are anointed. This means as someone would be anointed with oil, that is, oil poured over their heads as a symbolic gesture, so the Holy Spirit comes over us and is poured out on us to give us the ability to do what God wants us to do.

Paul also says that “God’s seal of ownership” is on us. Elsewhere in Paul’s writings we see that the Holy Spirit’s entrance into our lives is like a lawyer’s seal on a document to prove its authenticity. So the Holy Spirit is the seal. This idea of seal here is important. This seal is not like glue that seals something up. It is a seal, a mark that validates something.

Thirdly Paul says that we have indeed received the Holy Spirit “as a deposit of things to come”. The Holy Spirit in our lives is a down payment of better things. When you buy something with a down payment, this means that you have not yet paid the full price. You will pay it later. We have not yet received all there is to receive from God. The Holy Spirit is only a down payment, a deposit towards the future, and what a deposit He is.

From verse 25 to chapter 2:4 Paul explains why he did not come to visit the Corinthians after the last letter. He realized that the letter that was sent to them was fairly harsh and disturbing. He did not want to come and make “another painful trip”. (ch. 1:25) Sometimes Christian leadership has to use harsh words that are spoken from a spirit of love. This too is something that is often missing in our day.

In explaining his situation, Paul says that he does not want “to lord it over them”. Christian leaders are not dictators that “lord it over others” as if they are some powerful person. Christian leaders should be servants. The harsh things that Paul wrote these people should be viewed as him “working with these people for their joy”. Paul should not be viewed as if Paul was the Emperor of the church.

Paul also says that “it is by faith that you stand firm”. It is by our trust in Jesus alone that causes us to stand firm. Submission to a man can never cause us to stand firm. We need to have strong individual faith before God. Attempts over the centuries have been made to have people submit to their leaders, and this submission was viewed as Christian maturity. Paul says that this thinking is wrong, and that this is not what he is trying to do.

In chapter 2 verse 1 Paul admits that his letter caused the Corinthians to “grieve”. If he had come to them and saw them grieving, then there would be no one there to bring joy to his life, since all were grieving. Paul did not want this situation when he came to visit. He didn't want to grieve himself as a result of their grieving, although Paul was grieving over them anyway, just not in their presence.

Verse 3 says, “I wrote as I did so that when I came I should not be distressed by those who ought to make me rejoice.” You see how Paul felt here. He had great emotion for the work of the Lord and to those he ministered to. He was hoping and praying that his letter would bring change into their lives so that when he arrived in their city, they could rejoice in the Lord with him.

Paul says that he wrote his letter “out of great distress and anguish of heart and with many tears”. Paul put his whole heart into his work. This was not merely a job or a career choice that he made. You can see by these words that he gave his whole life to these men and women. His hard words were not meant to be spoken from a dictator, but a servant who loved them and wanted the best for them.

His intent in writing his previous letter was not merely to “grieve them”, or make them feel bad. In love, he wanted to point out the error of their ways in order for them to rectify this situation, thus bringing maturity and joy to their lives, and his.

This shows you the importance of repentance. It also shows you that repentance is not only for the sinner, but for the saint as well. We all need to repent of something from time to time.

Next Section - Chapters 2 and 3

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