"Christian Affections" 2 Corinthians 7:13-16 Sunday Evening Worship Service

Second Corinthians chapter seven.

We're gonna finish our time in Second Corinthians seven tonight.

Let me read our verses.

Verse thirteen down through verse sixteen to the end of the chapter.

Therefore, we are comforted.

And besides our own comfort, we rejoiced still more at the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all.

For whatever boasts I made to him about you, I was put not to shame.

But just as everything we said to you was true, so also our boasting before Titus has proved true.

And his affection for you is even greater, as he remembers the obedience of you all, how you received him with fear and trembling.

I rejoice, because I have perfect confidence in you.

When we began our series in 2 Corinthians 7, I started that evening with the story of one of Jonathan Edwards' more famous sermons, his farewell sermon, how he preached it to his congregation after he was fired by them, and they knocked on his door and said, We need one more sermon.

And it was not the kind of sermon you would have expected.

It was, you know, he preached one more sermon to them and said, Hey, we're gonna rendezvous with the judgment seat of Christ, and then we'll know who is right.

It was a very bold sermon.

I want to conclude our time in 2 Corinthians 7 with the story behind another Jonathan Edwards sermon that became a treatise and ultimately one of his more known, well-known books, Religious Affections.

Often when we think of Jonathan Edwards, we think of sinners in the hands of an angry God.

That was preached in five years before Religious Affections was written, 1741 verse 1746.

Religious affections is when Edwards was writing about how you can tell the difference between true and false conversion.

If you find somebody that says they're converted to Christ, how do you know if the conversion is genuine?

What can you check for?

Of course, sinners in the hands of anger God came at the beginning of the Great Awakening where there was widespread tales of conversion.

This is Whitfield era preaching in marketplaces and fields in front of 10,000, 20,000, 30,000 people, largest crowds ever to gather in America at that point.

And there was mass conversions.

Some people said the conversions were overblown because of Whitfield's uh hysterics or his his tears or his acting, and that produced that produced other signs of affection.

This is the word that Edwards used to people in the congregation or the crowd that would similarly weep or mourn or wail.

And the question arose is Is weeping and mourning and wailing a sure guide to salvation?

And it's actually a more complicated question than you might imagine.

If somebody asked you, how could they tell if they're saved, how would you answer the question?

And it would be very easy, Edwards points out at the beginning of the book, the Religious Affections book in 1746, it would be very easy to say, you can tell if you're saved by your obedience.

Do you have the habit of obeying Christ?

And Edwards points out that that really quickly can become a form of works righteousness.

It very quickly can be if you do these things, then you're saved, and then you're you have a confidence in your salvation.

That's important to have some extra clarity here.

Edwards is not talking about what it takes to be saved, he's talking about how you can know for sure that you are saved.

Do you see the difference?

If your eyes are closed, what does it take to turn on the lights?

Well, you can flip on the light switch, but you don't know the light is on unless you open your eyes.

But opening your eyes doesn't turn the light on.

See the distinction?

And that's where Edwards is going with the religious affections.

You are saved, of course, through placing your faith in Christ and trusting him.

But your confidence in your salvation might be somewhere else.

And Edwards' big concern, what's incredible, this is an incredibly pastoral book, because his biggest concern is that there might be people in his congregation that have had a religious experience but don't have faith.

His congregation on Sunday in Northampton might be filled with believers, but it also might be filled with scores, dozens even, of people who would say they profess Christ, would say that they're believers, and yet they are not actually saved.

And you remember the context of all this was the Halfway Covenant, where they had been allowing people to be members of the church who did not have a religious experience, who did not have faith in Christ, who couldn't give testimony to faith in Christ, but they were allowed to take communion and more importantly to baptize their own children.

They came up with the Halfway Covenant, where if you were a good member of the church, if you had a conversion to Christ, then your grandkids could get baptized and it was kind of getting passed along.

And Edward stopped all that and said, No, baptism and the Lord's Supper is only for those who have made a credible profession of faith in Christ, only those who we think are actually regenerate, real believers.

And so now you have a difficulty on your hands.

How can you tell who is a true believer and who isn't?

Jesus himself says it'll be difficult.

The fields will have have wheat end tares in them.

And Jesus admonishes his apostles and his disciples and us not to go into the field and try to root out the tares because you'll damage the wheat.

If you went on salvation patrol, you would do more harm than good, probably.

You would hurt more people.

There'd be weak believers that you would convince aren't saved.

There's a weak believer, a brand new Christian, weak believer, and they have an experience with you, an encounter with you, a conversation with you, an older and more mature believer, you're so mature, you go to the Sunday night service, it's great.

And here's this weak believer who doesn't even know there's a Sunday night service, and you're talking to them, and you manage to convince them they're not even saved.

So that's a danger.

You run off true believers, but a bigger danger might be people who think that they are saved because they've had a religious experience.

And so Edwards writes religious affections to try to help people think through the authenticity of their salvation.

I want to give you just a very short summary of this book because I think it is very profound and I wish more people were familiar with it.

Edwards points out that the a person is made up of two components, physical and spiritual.

Then he doesn't speak of, you know, soul versus spirit kind of dynamic.

He just means material, your flesh, your human body, and the spiritual side of you, by which I really think Edwards is mostly talking about the mind.

More than the soul or spirit, the word that Edwards likes the most is the mind.

You have your mind and you have your body.

Your mind, Edwards says, is basically made up of two components as well.

Your mind, on the one hand, has what Edwards calls understanding.

How you perceive the world around you.

You understand things are happening.

That's your understanding.

But understanding does not motivate action, Edward says.

Understanding is just how you can see the people around you, and you're taking in data, but it doesn't motivate positive action.

The second component of your mind would be not understanding, but what Edwards calls will.

And that's what motivates action.

So your will is what fuels it.

You're not going to be quizzed on this later.

But I do think it is helpful to understand.

In Edwards' thinking, you have your understanding, how you perceive things, and then you have your will, and that's how you act in the middle of what you understand.

You need understanding in order to channel the will.

If you don't understand that you have two choices.

If you don't see the fork in the road, you can't then choose left or right.

So the first part of the mind is to understand there's a fork in a road.

The second part of the mind is the will, whether you will go left or right.

Now, if you're following so far, you're ready for the key part of this.

Edwards then divides the will into two categories.

And he uses different names for them, but you could describe the first category as inclinations.

Or just preferences would be a more English, you know, a modern English word.

Preferences.

Would you rather go to Subway or McDonald's for lunch?

You know, you have a preference.

So you have the choice, you understand it is lunchtime.

You get it.

You got friends that want to go to lunch with you, you get that.

Now which place do you want to go to?

Now your will enters into it.

I'd rather go to Subway because McDonald's is poisoned.

And so you're inclined to go that way.

But that's not a good guide of conversion.

So there's another category of the will.

One is inclination or preferences, but the other category is that of affections, Edwards says.

And an affection is something that motivates you in a strong way.

It fuels your preferences, even.

Affections are bigger than preferences.

Affections are what define who you are.

That's the real you, Edwards argues, is your affections.

That's the seat of the will.

That's what empowers the will, that's what empowers preferences, that's what's going to end up defining you in relationship to the world and of course in relationship to God.

Now Edwards goes on, and I won't give you all the lists.

Edwards loves lists.

He divides everything up into 12 parts, you know.

There's 12 affections coming.

I'm not going to give you all 12 of the affections.

Because at the end of his list of 12 affections, which takes up a large part of the book, he concludes they're all worthless.

I should have skipped that part and just jumped to the end there.

The reason he says most affections are worthless is because they can be counterfeited.

And this becomes the main guide for Edwards between true and false conversion.

The one sign of a conversion, of a true conversion, is religious affections.

That's his phrase.

That's the title of the book.

Having the right affections for God.

And we don't use the word affections.

We would use the word loves or passions.

Remember, it's in contrast with preferences.

And you understand this when you think of marriage.

You know, your wife says, I love you, and you say, I prefer you too.

You know, given six options, you're the one that is more in line with my my preferences than the other five, and so we're compatible.

Nope, not the right answer.

No, I love you.

It's even stronger.

We don't use the word affection even really in English anymore, but that's the word Edwards used.

But it's in that in that category of love.

No, I have a strong passion for you that defines who I am.

That's what he means by that.

I'm motivated in your direction.

I love you.

I want to pursue you.

You are the object of my passions.

That's an affection.

Now, Edwards talks about religious affections.

There's all kinds of religious affections that can be counterfeited.

And they usually produce works.

And this is why works are not a good judge of the authenticity of salvation.

Somebody who's not a real convert can be baptized.

Somebody who's not a real convert can take communion.

Somebody who's not a real convert can go to night church.

Those are not good guides.

What is a good guide is a category of religious affections that cannot be counterfeited.

And that's where confidence and salvation comes from.

And Edward gives a long list of them and it basically boils down to loving Jesus.

That's the one thing that cannot be counterfeited.

It's the one thing that can't be faked.

An almost Christian can do every other part of the Christian life, but an almost Christian cannot counterfeit a real love for Christ.

That's why do you love Jesus is such a good question.

And of course, a love for Christ will manifest itself in your life in obedience, and it'll manifest yourself itself in your life in all kinds of different ways, but those other ways can all be counterfeited.

We gotta get back to the love.

The heart do you have a love for Jesus?

To the Corinthians, remember what Paul is dealing with here.

The Corinthians were rebelling against Paul, which meant they were rebelling against Jesus.

Jesus himself told his apostles when he sent them into the world, said, Whoever receives you receives me.

Whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.

In other words, Jesus, when he sends the apostles into the world, the 72, he's announcing that when people receive the apostles, they're really receiving God the Father, because God the Father sent Jesus to the world.

Jesus is sending his ambassadors into the world.

So if you have a right relationship with God, you're gonna have a right relationship with the Son, you're gonna have a right relationship with the gospel preachers.

That was the point of that.

And the same thing really is true today.

A person who says, I reject you for preaching the gospel is actually rejecting God who sent you, which means they're rejecting Jesus, who's in the middle there, the mediator between God and man.

And that's what Paul's dealing with the Corinthians.

Paul went to Corinth, he preached the gospel there, he spent a long time there.

It was a flourishing church.

Paul leaves, the church implodes, they go into all kinds of immorality.

Paul sends them a Paul hears, gets a you know a letter from them, sends them a letter back, rebuking them for their sin, sends them Timothy.

Timothy is basically rejected.

Paul sends them a severe letter, which we don't have recorded.

He refers to it as a severe letter, and then he sends Titus to follow up.

Now Titus is coming back now, and Titus has a positive report.

They received the severe letter, they responded, they had put the guy out of the church, the guy in 1 Corinthians, who had been uh they put many people out of the church, but the guy kind of the ringleader of this was put out of the church after receiving 1 Corinthians.

They get the severe letter, and that dude repents, and now the church is eager to let the repentance be known.

We looked at that last week.

The church wants the apostle Paul to know that they really did repent.

They're broken.

They're so sorry, Paul.

So sorry.

We didn't mean it.

They're crushed.

And now Titus is coming back with that message for Paul.

And it's a valid question.

How does Titus, and by extension, Paul, know that their conversion is genuine?

Should Paul celebrate the news that is coming back in the rejoinder to the severe letter?

Should Paul celebrate that the Corinthians have said, We repent?

Does Paul believe this?

When you read 2 Corinthians the first few times, it seems like Paul believes it.

When you read it the next dozen times or so in your Christian life, you start to pick up on some little signs in there that maybe Paul's like, I'm mostly on board with this.

I mean, because he tells them.

He gives them, we looked at this last week, he gives them a way to contrast true and false repentance.

He's like, I'm so glad you've repented.

Now here's a quick checklist to look at to see if it's true repentance or worldly repentance.

I mean, he's going to end the book by saying, examine yourself to see if you're in the faith.

But he doesn't do it as severely as he did in 1 Corinthians.

2 Corinthians.

He ends it with, examine yourself to see if you're in your faith.

Because I do that to me, Paul says, I look at myself to see if I'm in the faith.

So why don't you do that too?

Now, what would they use to examine themselves to see if they're in their faith?

Well, that's the rest of 2 Corinthians.

That's what's leading up to that.

It's all kinds of signs, and most of the signs boil down to not obedience, most of the signs boil down to affections.

Emotions.

We might call them, but emotions is kind of a shallow word in modern English.

Passions.

There's three of them that Paul calls out, and I'll give them to you as an outline tonight.

There's three religious affections that Paul focuses on here.

Three religious affections that are signs of the authenticity of your salvation.

Three religious affections that you can use as you look at your own heart to judge the validity of your own conversion.

The first of those affections is comfort.

Comfort.

We don't often think of comfort as an affection, but it is.

Comfort sounds as almost a soft English word.

But in Greek it's anything but soft.

In Greek, it's down in the uh, you know, it's sometimes rendered compassion, it's down in the the guts, the bowels.

That's where comfort takes place.

It brings over into English.

The only way we stop this in English is comfort foods.

You know, it kind of ministers to the innermost part of you, it takes you home.

That's this word comfort.

It's right, it meets you right in your gut.

Now, comfort is the antithesis of grief.

There's grief, comfort replaces it, comfort swallows it up.

So you're grieving over the loss of a loved one, you're comforted by the knowledge of the resurrection.

That's how comfort and grief are paired.

And it's a theme in 2 Corinthians.

I want you to flip to a few places and see this.

Paul begins this.

Remember, this is a theme.

He's writing to them to help them gauge the validity of their conversion, of their repentance from their sin that he's called them out on in both 1 Corinthians and the severe letter.

Flip over to 1 Corinthians chapter 1.

1 Corinthians 1 · chapter mention

We'll be back in chapter 7 soon enough, so you can leave your finger there.

But look at, I meant 2 Corinthians.

I said 1 Corinthians.

2 Corinthians chapter 1, 2 Corinthians 1, verse 3, Paul begins his letter by saying, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Corinthians 1 · chapter mention 2 Corinthians 1:3

This is verse 3 of 2 Corinthians 1.

The Father of mercies and God of all comfort.

So this is how he's starting his letter.

He's telling them that God is the fountain of comfort.

He's the fountain of mercies.

Mercies come from God.

He's the Father.

When the Bible describes God as the Father, it often means source or principal mover, the first mover, the first cause.

God, the Father.

I mean, he's the Father, not the Son.

That's how He's identified.

Now, Jesus, of course, is compassionate and comforting.

The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Comfort.

Jesus is called the Counselor.

And so Jesus is the comforter, and so is the Holy Spirit.

But he's focusing here on the Father, that's the Father of mercies in the sending of Jesus Christ, and the God of all comfort.

Because he wants you to think about where comfort is coming from.

Comfort has a source in God.

That's important.

Because if you've sinned against God and you're grieved because of your conduct against God, it would be important to receive sympathy from him.

There's different illustrations from our own existence that help make sense.

You know, if one brother hits the other brother, the third brother can't say, I'm so sorry that happened.

The third brother was not involved.

You don't really need comfort from the third brother.

You need comfort from the one who did the hitting.

They're the ones that need to be reconciled, not the third person.

So if you have grief because you've sinned against God, then the fact that comfort comes from God is very encouraging.

And Paul's going to make this point.

Notice just, I'm going to read verses four down through seven.

Look at how many times he uses the word comfort here.

Back in verse three was the first time, the father of all comfort.

Verse 4, who comforts us in all our affliction.

So we're suffering, we're having affliction, but God is comforting us through our affliction.

So we might be able to, and here's a third use, comfort those who are in any affliction.

With the comfort, fourth use, with which we ourselves are comforted, fifth use by God.

So we're going through affliction.

God is showering us with comfort.

Verse 5, we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in, number six, comfort also.

You're suffering as a Christian, so it's very helpful to know that Christ is comforting you.

Just like God was comforting, the Father was comforting Christ.

If we're afflicted, it is for your comfort.

And salvation, verse 6 says.

And if we're comforted, it's for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the sufferings that we suffer.

Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.

That is about, I don't know, nine, ten uses there.

I lost track.

This is how the book begins.

You are going through difficulty.

It's self-inflicted on the Corinthians, by the way.

I'm sure they're persecuted, but some of this is because they rejected Paul, and so they're deprived of the kind, providential care of God because they're in rebellion against God.

There's distance between them and God, which they've created by their own sin.

And now they're saying we want to get back in your good graces, Paul.

And so Paul says, Praise God, because God can give comfort to you.

Now that you're in distress because of your sin, you're in just this is natural consequences, Bill, is what town they're in.

You sinned, you're dealing with the constant.

Your sin has separated you from God, and now you're all weepy about it.

But that can be good if you recognize that God gave Gives you comfort.

And then you would ask, why am I going through afflictions?

Well, you're going through affliction so that you can be comforted.

Well, couldn't we just cut out the middleman?

If I don't have afflictions, I don't need comfort, God.

Can we come to a deal?

I won't ask for comfort.

You think in Revelations when it says he'll wipe away every tear?

And you wonder, well, I mean, why are they crying?

Why the tears?

Can't God just skip the tears so he doesn't have to wipe them away?

And the answer is no, because you are learning about the nature of God as the source and the author of the comfort.

You learn that through afflictions.

Yeah, the world would be nicer if Jesus didn't have to die on a cross.

But then you wouldn't know the glories and kindness of our Lord.

And so, yes, you go through affliction so that you can be comforted, and then your comfort doesn't terminate on you.

You're comforted by God so that you can comfort others.

So you're suffering, God comforts you, not and it doesn't terminate on you.

You have a cup, your cup is drained emotionally empty.

God fills you with comfort, and he doesn't fill you with comfort just so you can keep your cup filled.

He fills you with comfort so you in turn can comfort other people who are going through trials.

So you have sinned, Corinthians, now you're separated from God.

God comforts you, you feel comforted.

An actual emotional change where you feel the kindness of God and you feel the distance from God is eradicated and you're brought close to Him because you're overflowing with comfort.

Now you in turn comfort other people.

And particularly, he's probably talking about the people who are the ringleaders here who had sinned, who had supposedly repented.

They now should receive comfort as well.

And you say, I don't want to comfort that person.

That person caused me grief.

That person hurt me.

That person drove away Paul, and now all we've got all this mess on our hands.

I don't want to comfort that person.

Well, did God comfort you?

Yes.

Then you need to comfort them.

You might be the means God is using to comfort that other person.

God could comfort them directly, but he's using you, he's comforting you so that you can in turn comfort those around you.

You can flip back to, there's other uses of it, by the way, in the book.

We'll skip those.

He's going to end with it towards the end of the book, but also skip those for time's sake.

Back to chapter 7.

Paul says, listen, I'm comforted, verse 13.

I don't want to go through, you know, there's big debates about whether or not verse 13 should be start of the paragraph or the, you know, the next should be wrapped in with the paragraph before it or after it.

It doesn't really matter.

The point is the paragraph before it, he's saying, hey, if your salvation is real, if it's genuine, you have indignation about your sin, you have an eagerness to be reconciled, you want to see justice done, all the things we looked at last week, if all of that is true, then I'm so comforted by that reality.

If your repentance is godly, then I am so comforted by the fact that God broke you.

That brings me comfort.

If you were a stallion and the Lord broke you, that comforts me as a pony.

That's kind of the illustration here.

If you were rebellious against God and God broke you, man, I'm so glad to worship a savior.

So glad to worship a savior that would go after someone like you and save you.

That comforts me.

And so Paul is comforted.

He was so broken by how the Corinthians treated him, but now, remember, he back in chapter two, he said, I wanted to come visit you, but then I didn't want to cry so much anymore.

That's where he was before.

He's having to defend himself from changing his mind from visiting them, and now he just says, you know what, I am actually, after all this, I am comforted by this.

I'm so glad I went through this.

Paul didn't have a child die, he didn't have the conflict of the Corinthians, it's not because his wife died or anything like that.

This is a personal conflict that just, and you, if you've had this kind of conflict with a person in the church, then you can perhaps have some sympathy with what Paul's talking about here.

It doesn't seem exaggerated.

This is an interpersonal relationship where they had run him out, called him a false teacher, said all kinds of lies about him, brought division into the church, wrecked the church that he loved, wrecked the church that he loved.

And you think, how could he ever forgive them for all the damage they did to him and to the church?

These are his people.

He loved them and they broke him.

But then God turned their hearts, probably.

And that's where Paul has to leave it.

He probably turned their hearts.

And that's great news, Paul decides.

That's great news, Sim.

I'm comforted by that news.

I I didn't want the grief.

I mean, he compares it to being shipwrecked.

He compares it to being whipped 39 times.

But he says, you know what, I'm glad, I'm glad it happened.

Because I'm comforted by this.

In addition to his own comfort.

In addition to his own comfort.

Titus is going to be comforted.

Others are going to be comforted.

This leads to the second affection.

Joy.

Joy.

Paul says, I'm comforted.

Besides my comfort, we rejoiced still more at the joy of Titus.

Because his spirit's been refreshed by you all.

So remember, Titus brought the severe letter up to them.

Titus goes up to check in on them to see if they're repenting.

Titus enters the scene.

They don't know how they rejected Timothy earlier, so Paul doesn't know how Titus is going to receive.

They apparently received Titus well.

They told Titus they're repenting.

The ringleader there says he wants back in Paul's good graces.

He wants back into the church.

He wants to be reconciled with Paul.

This fills Titus with joy.

So Titus is coming back, and Titus is sharing his joy with Paul.

So it's repentance brings joy to Titus.

Titus, that's his verse 13 here.

Repentance brings joy to Titus.

Titus spreads that joy to Paul.

We rejoice still more at the joy of Titus.

This kind of Christian joy is contagious from those who love the same people.

They all love the Corinthians here.

And now Titus is rejoicing because of their repentance, and so is Paul.

So much that his spirit has been refreshed, he says.

His spirit has been refreshed.

With both comfort and joy, I hope you're able to reason here from the immediate to the general or the lesser to the greater.

So there was separation between the Corinthians and Paul, that brings Paul grief.

There's comfort in their repentance, that leads to joy.

You don't know a single Corinthian.

None of you know a single Corinthian.

But the principle still applies to you, specifically to your relationship with God.

Are you broken by your sin against God?

Has that grieved you?

If so, you find comfort in Christ.

That comfort is a true sign of saving faith.

If you're actually comforted because of what Jesus did for you by dying for your sins on the cross, by rising from the gave, if that brings you actual comfort that consoles you, that's a true religious affection.

You have to be broken in order to experience comfort.

If you've never grieved over your sin, you can't be comforted by the gospel.

If you've never been broken by your sin, you don't have the capacity to be comforted by Christ in the gospel.

But if you have been broken by your sin and you have experienced, you read the Bible and you feel comfort because of what Jesus did for you, that is a true religious affection.

That is a sign of real conversion that cannot be faked.

That comes from a love for Christ.

A false convert is not going to read the word and have comfort.

False convert's not going to read the Bible and respond with comfort.

Or with joy.

Think of the prodigal son who went away and squandered everything.

And he comes back broken.

I'll be a slave, I'll be a servant, do whatever.

He's received by the father, hugs him, comforts him, the son is comforted, and there's rejoicing, Jesus says.

That leads to rejoicing.

The other brother, who should be broken, he's just angry at the party.

The father goes to him and offers him a hug, only he's not comforted.

That hug means nothing to him.

Nothing to him.

On the outside, he's the obedient son.

On the outside, he's doing his chores.

On the outside, he's being a good boy, staying at home.

On the outside, he goes to church every Sunday.

Excuse the anachronism.

On the outside, he's doing everything proper.

But it's not a good sign of his real faith.

But the other guy is doing everything wrong.

And that really breaks him.

And then he really experiences comfort, which gives forth joy.

That's why they're both powerful signs.

Powerful signs of religious affections.

Titus comes back with joy from his encounter in Corinth.

Now, Paul wasn't there.

Paul's taking Titus's word.

Paul hasn't talked to these people since their so-called repentance, so he doesn't know.

He can only bank on what Titus says.

And what's communicated to us through 2 Corinthians 7 is less about their words.

We don't know what they said.

The most optimistic sign of the reality of their repentance is the joy that Titus has.

So Titus comes back and he's happy about it.

He's stoked.

And so that makes Paul more inclined to also believe it was genuine repentance.

He believes it as well.

Because of Titus's joy, it's now multiplied in Paul.

It was the Puritan Henry Skrugel who said, If the Lord would let me choose anything in the whole world to make my own.

It's the genie scenario, except you only get one wish.

I get anything in the whole world to be mine.

Henry Skrugal says, I would choose a heart filled with joy.

And he goes on.

He goes on to describe why he would choose.

This is in his book, The Life of God and the Soul of Man.

He goes on to describe why he would choose that, because he says he's really, he's a long pages of reasons, and some of them are really cool.

If God gave me a heart filled with joy, then I could take joy in whatever all of my friends were going through.

I would rejoice with them.

Whatever they're going through in their life, I would have joy in it.

I'd be a better friend if I had joy.

He'd be a better Christian if he had joy in everything.

No matter his obstacles, no matter what trials in his life, he'd had joy.

He knows he's supposed to have joy anyway, so it'd be great if God just gave it to him.

This is a real Christian affection.

To have joy.

To have joy.

Early in our marriage, maybe for the first year or two of her marriage, uh, the teacher would always ask me, is there anything I could do better as a wife?

And I always gave her this.

She doesn't ask me this anymore because she knows my answer is always the same and it will be until I'm in glory.

Have joy.

That's the only thing I would tell you to do.

Have joy.

You already are joyful, great.

Have more joy.

You can change anything, have more joy.

That's the that's the only thing.

Everything else in life, forget about it.

Just have joy.

That's what happens with Paul when he encounters the Corinthians.

I just want joy.

Titus has it, I want to catch it.

His spirit, this is what joy and comfort do.

It refreshes your spirit, verse 13.

You're refreshed.

This vindicates a little bit Paul, verse 14.

Whatever boasts I made to Titus about you to the Corinthians, I wasn't put to shame.

So Paul had bragged about the Corinthians to Titus.

And I just wish I could hear that conversation.

Because remember, the Corinthians are in open rebellion against Paul.

The whole reason he sent Titus there is because they wouldn't look at Paul.

But despite that, he's bragging to Titus about the Corinthians.

Oh, these guys are godly.

When they get you the I don't know what he said.

They're so hospitable.

So Titus is on his way.

And Titus comes back and says, Everything, Paul, you told me, was true.

It was true.

And so our boasting before Titus is proved true.

Paul bragged about the Corinthians.

Titus comes back and says, It's all true.

They're a godly bunch.

They repented, Paul.

They want to be restored to you.

His affection, and here's that word again, his affection.

The affection that's in Titus's heart, this is a religious affection for you, is even greater as he remembers the obedience of you all.

How you received him with fear and trembling.

And this leads to the third affection.

First was comfort, second was joy.

The third in this passage is fear.

Fear.

This ends with fear and trembling.

You received him with fear and trembling.

It's a surprising little end to this chapter, isn't it?

The zeal and the love and the zealousness for conversion and repentance.

You received him with love and joy, and that comforted him, and he rejoiced, and I rejoiced, and we're comforted, and we're all rejoicing.

Also the fear and trembling.

Fear here is the shaking.

Trembling is the actual word for shaking.

Hebrews 13 or Hebrews 12, the trumpet blew, everybody shook with fear.

The end of Hebrews 12, the God's going to come back and He's going to judge the earth.

He's going to shake the earth.

Therefore, Paul says, serve the Lord with fear and trembling.

Because our God is a consuming fire.

You think that's the Old Testament God.

Well, Hebrews 12 is pretty New Testament.

Our God is a consuming fire.

And here that same attribute is played out here.

You received him with fear and trembling.

You shook at Titus.

Why were they afraid of Titus?

Well, they weren't afraid of Titus.

They were afraid of God and his wrath because of their sin.

And so they had fear and trembling.

And this is very much a Christian affection.

The most beautiful things on earth are nothing compared to a heart that trembles before the Lord.

Now, even pagans can tremble before God.

That's true.

So this becomes a tricky religious affection to diagnose.

Pagans can tremble.

Remember Belshazzar when the handwriting came on the wall?

He was shaking.

And then he went right on drinking.

Paul preached to Felix in Acts, and Felix was freaking out.

But then he went right on sinning, sending Paul to prison.

James says the demons tremble.

The demons tremble before God.

And they're a step up on the unbelievers.

There's the unbelievers that don't tremble before God.

At least Pharaoh trembled before God.

God sends the plagues, and Pharaoh was scared a little bit.

The firstborn died, and Pharaoh was terrified.

He trembled before Yahweh, and then he sent his army after the Israelites.

So there's no shortage of non-believers that do tremble.

We wish more of them trembled before God.

It's good to tremble before God, but it's not a telltale religious affection, because, as I mentioned, there's all kinds of non-believers that tremble before God.

So you really have to get to the root of what godly trembling is for it to be a helpful diagnostic tool for yourself.

Trembling and fear when it is paired with repentance is a godly affection.

If it's paired with sorrow over your sin and not sorrow over your circumstances.

And we looked at all of this last week.

It's the same.

It's just wrapping up what he said in verses 11 and 12.

Is your sorrow over your sin and how you've grieved God?

In that case, your fear is good.

And it pairs with comfort.

It's not like, yeah, I trembled before in the presence of the Lord and he comforted me, so I'm glad that's over.

It's not, the fear and trembling is not a shot you get one time.

You need boosters of it.

You got a grid for that?

Your life is marked by fear and trembling.

And comfort and joy.

It's all.

You're complex creatures, you are, as a Christian.

You have complex emotions.

The trembling of the wicked is not because of repentance.

There's no grief over sin.

Jeremiah Burroughs wrote, if one penitent tear could purchase heaven, hell could not afford it.

I had to read that sentence so many times to understand to really get what he means by that.

Unbelievers quake all the time when they're afraid of God and being found out in their sin.

But they don't have, they're not penitent.

They're not remorseful over their sin against God.

And so if the cost of heaven was just one single penitent tear, one single godly tear, one couldn't be found in all of hell.

This is so for Burroughs, this would be a religious affection.

It's unfakeable.

The kind of penitent fear and trembling can only be found in a believer.

The wicked might tremble for fear of God's judgment, but the righteous tremble for the overwhelming nature of God's kindness in Christ.

And let me say that one more time.

The wicked might tremble because of the fear of God's judgment, but the righteous tremble because of the overwhelming kindness they see in God through Christ.

Think of the woman with the issue of blood in Mark's gospel who came trembling up to Jesus.

She wasn't afraid of Jesus' wrath, but she was trembling nevertheless.

She was overcome by opportunity and she moved towards the Lord who she thought might have compassion, even though she was trembling.

She went away right away, remember?

She dodged back in the crowd.

She was afraid.

She wasn't afraid of the wrath.

This was a godly, penitent, noble kind of fear and trembling.

I've had people say, no, fear and trembling before the Lord.

I've heard people say this.

I've read blogs that have argued this.

Fear and trembling before the Lord is an Old Testament thing.

If you're a believer in Christ, you shouldn't have fear before the Lord.

Perfect love dries out fear, kind of cross-reference misuse thing.

You shouldn't tremble before God.

If you have confidence in your salvation, you shouldn't tremble before God, they say.

You just tremble about the kindness, the kindness of God.

What you faced without Christ, and then what happens to you.

I'm sure many of you saw the verdict of that kid in Wisconsin when he was found not guilty.

Did you see the video of him when they were reading the verdict?

And he was shaking.

Not guilty, not guilty, not guilty, not guilty.

The fifth not guilty, he collapses into trembling.

Why?

That's the right kind of trembling.

Where you you've had the sentence read.

In Christ, your sin is taken away.

It's gone.

You're not afraid of judgment anymore.

It's gone.

And you're just overcome with the emotions of being in front of those that gave the verdict.

It's a right kind of trembling.

Not because you're going to be found guilty.

Because you are found not guilty.

And then you just look at the Lord and your heart is overcome.

What do you do with that kind of verdict?

When you are declared not guilty.

When the Corinthians are declared not guilty by Paul, he forgives them and they're reconciled.

What do you do now?

Well, it should then produce obedience.

Look at verse 14.

Or verse 15.

He remembers the obedience of you all.

You received him with fear and trembling.

So the obedience grew out of the fear and trembling.

That's what happens here.

It affects your life.

But the obedience is not the telltale sign of a believer.

Because that's externally oriented.

The sign for the believer is the affections in the heart.

It's the affections in the heart.

I said this morning that this is the main, one of the main distinguishing features between Christianity and every other religion in the world.

Other religions don't care about the heart.

You know, you go to the priest and you confess your sins and he gives you penance to do.

The things you're doing to store up righteousness and merit.

Penance is not love Jesus, case dismissed.

Other religions, you have the pillars of Islam.

They're things that you do.

Nothing like that in Christianity.

Love Jesus.

Love Jesus.

You know, in the military, you're you have to obey orders.

In the military, I got passed by a Navy police officer while I was thinking this.

Navy car, I don't know what He's doing Anandale, but he has lights on and everything.

Navy police officer rolling down the street in Anadale.

Sweet.

I thought, why does the Navy have police?

Why doesn't the commanding officer of whatever sailors there are just say, hey, don't sin?

That's an order.

Then all crime would be removed from the Navy immediately.

Because they have to obey orders, right?

Is that how it works?

No.

Because you can't command the heart.

You can't command the heart.

So other religions are focused on the outside because they have no power over the heart.

That's why other religions aren't concerned about the heart, because no matter how many times the priests or the prophets or the monks would tell you to love their God, it'd be ineffectual.

So they just focus on the do this and don't do that.

What a contrast with these few verses here.

There's nothing about doing this and doing that, except as the fruit of the root, and the root is I rejoice.

Look at verse 16.

I rejoice because I have perfect confidence in you.

I rejoice.

Perfect care telly off.

It's mature.

My confidence is grown in you.

I'm rejoicing.

I have affection.

I have comfort in your repentance.

I have joy in my relationship with you.

I have fear and trembling before the Lord who will judge us all.

We'll all stand before the judgment seat of Christ and give an account for the deeds done in the flesh.

All of this joy, all of this comfort, this is real religious affection right here, that you cannot fake.

You cannot fake this.

God does this in the human heart.

When you're broken by your sin, if you're comforted by Christ, that's a sign of your conversion.

When you're comforted by Christ and it gives you joy in the gospel, that's a sign of your conversion.

And when you have joy in the gospel and comfort from Christ, and you still have a fear and trembling before the Lord, that's a sign of conversion.

Those are true religious affections.

If you're here tonight and you've never experienced these in your own life, you have to start at the top.

You have to start with Paul's severe letter.

You have to start with Paul telling you, you're a sinner and you cannot stand before God and you deserve his wrath.

You're separated from him because of your own sin.

You've chosen to rebel against him.

You have no hope in this world.

And then when you're finally grieved and you recognize God is holy and you deserve his judgment, you're grieved.

Then you can find comfort in Christ who took on your sin, who became sin in your place.

So he who knew no sin would be sin in your place, so you could then receive the righteousness of God through Christ.

That's the exchange that happens.

When you place your faith in Christ and his death and resurrection from the grave, you can find comfort for your sin there.

That comfort should produce joy in your life.

You're so thankful you were lost, and now you've been found.

You were blind, but now you see you were on your way to hell, and Jesus rescued you and brings you to heaven.

And you'll stand before the judgment seat of Christ.

It causes you fear.

You don't have to wait to heaven to have these three affections.

You can have them now when you read your Bible.

When you read your Bible, are you comforted?

Do you have joy?

Do you have fear and trembling?

Are there the affections you encounter in the pages of the Word?

Are there religious affections?

Lord, we're thankful that you have given us hearts, not only minds, but affections.

That fuel our life, that are more than preferences, but they're domineering.

They dictate who we are.

So we're thankful for these religious affections.

I pray for anyone here who doesn't know you, I pray that they would experience comfort and grace, joy and kindness, fear and trembling through your gospel tonight.

They would put their faith in you.

I give you thanks for this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

And now for a parting word from Pastor Jesse Johnson.

Thank you for joining us today.

If you're in the Washington, D.C.

area, I would love to see you at Emmanuel Bible Church.

Our service times and church information are on our website at ibc.church.

For more information about the Master Seminary and their Washington, D.C.

location, go to tms.edu.

I hope this resource has been a blessing to you and it helps you seek the Lord daily, serve others around you, and share the gospel of Jesus Christ with boldness.

May the Lord bless you.