Controversy at Corinth

Good morning. My name is Jason. I'm also one of the pastors here. Good to see you here. Welcome back to me. Thanks for the week away last week. It was a different experience in church for us last week. We were down in Bloomington, Indiana, visiting our second eldest child who's

in school there. And we went to a church and it was really quite a place. It's a warehouse. Get this, 220,000 square feet, the warehouse. 220,000 square feet. Now, we didn't use it all.

And this church has a really unique story. It's only about five years old. It was planted kind of through some college ministry. And so we were there with what, maybe 700, we guessed, 700 people. And 550, I'm going to guess, were undergrad students. So I felt really old.

You guys know what that's like? You know, you get picked out because you got a little bit of gray in your beard or no hair or whatever it is. We felt really old, but it was a great experience. We really enjoyed that. They brought the word. And that's what I get to do for you

this morning. My thanks to Matt for doing it for me last week. You guys were in Exodus. Today we have the opportunity to start a new series. You excited? New series. And if you are new with us and you don't know this, we have these scripture journals in the back.

We're in 2 Corinthians today. Please pick one up. Every so often, one of you will drop a little donation and cover the charge. You know, it's like five bucks a journal. So if you want to do that, that'd be great. Then we can say they're free. But if we don't get that, then maybe drop us a few

dollars for the journal. And we'll keep you posted on that. But we want everybody to have something so that you can take some notes. And if you want to find 2 Corinthians chapter 1, we'll get to it here in just a moment. But before we do, I want to talk about controversy. Who here likes controversy?

2 Corinthians 1 · chapter mention

Nobody raises their hand. Well, one did. Controversy. I have seen a little bit of controversy in my days. You probably have too. And one thing, the only thing that's harder than navigating controversy

is trying to navigate it from afar. You know what I'm talking about? When you're away or at a distance, whether it's because you're away from home on a business trip, or maybe at a conference, or maybe

just off with your family for a vacation, something controversial erupts. It's harder to deal with it when you're away. And it's especially hard when communication is limited. I'll tell you a story a

couple years back. We had a denominational controversy. I won't get into the details, but it had developed into a bit of an ongoing saga. And right in the thick of it, of course, our family had scheduled a

vacation. And so there I was. We were down in Tennessee against this beautiful picturesque backdrop. Of mountains. And we wanted to go do fun things. My family wanted me to go do things. And there I was

out on the porch trying to get a good signal for a Zoom call. Because we had a meeting, and it was a headache of a meeting that I didn't really want to be in, but we had no choice because there was

controversy. Handling controversy when you're away is just not very fun. And if you're an ocean away, and if you're separated not by a day or two, but by weeks of travel,

with no phones, no email, no Zoom, no internet, I can only imagine how difficult that would be. And that's pretty much the Apostle Paul's situation, his predicament, with what would become

a very hotly controversial situation in the Greek city of Corinth. Let me ask you to look at 2 Corinthians chapter 1, the first chapter. We're going to just scratch the surface today. I'm actually only going

2 Corinthians 1 · chapter mention

to read the first two verses, and then we'll dig in. So here I go. 2 Corinthians chapter 1. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother, to the church of God

2 Corinthians 1 · chapter mention

that is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia. Grace to you, and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Will you pray with me once more? Father, bless this time as we

look into your word. Father, as we learn about the situation, cues and clues that we put together from these letters that we have in our Bibles about what this apostle of yours was facing, about what some of the problems were. Will you, Lord, teach us today? Will you prepare us in the weeks ahead

as we march further through this letter? And we will give you all the glory. We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen. Now, today's really more of an introduction to things. This whole Corinthian mess,

this messy situation, I want to give you some background behind that, because to properly understand why Paul writes the way he does, to appreciate why Paul focuses on the themes that we're going to come

across in this letter, we need some background. We need to know, what is this place, this city of Corinth? What's it like? How did a church ever get started here, and by whom? What's so controversial?

What's been happening? And why, think about it, why do we have in our Bibles not just one, but two letters to these Corinthians? What prompted Paul to write them, and particularly, what prompted him to write the second letter? So that's where we're going to go today, and we'll finish with a quick look at

these first two verses we just read. So if you are a note-taker, if you're in note-taking mode, which we always encourage around here, and you've got one of those journals, I'm going to ask you to find like a blank page somewhere. Please don't start on the first page where the scripture is, because then you'll get

mad at me next week when there's not room for that sermon's notes. So find a blank page in the beginning, or maybe at the end, or a blank piece of paper that you staple in there. I don't care, but let's get going. To start things off, we've got the city of Corinth itself. Yes, it is a Greek city. It's in

Greece. It's got a lengthy history, BC, before Christ, but by Paul's day, scholars tell us that it actually had more of a Roman feel to it, and this is because the Romans, you know, they had this tenuous relationships with people like the Greeks, and they fought a lot of wars against them, and at some

point, a couple hundred years earlier, they had completely sacked and destroyed the city of Corinth. But as the Romans often did, they decided to rebuild it. So they rebuilt it under Julius Caesar, and by Paul's day, Corinth had become a major city. It was a very, very important city, several times

bigger than Athens. That's not true today. If you go to Greece today, Athens is the major city. Corinth isn't much, but it was reverse in the ancient world. It was the capital of the province of Achaia. Achaia is basically, if you look on the map, the southern half of Greece. Macedonia to the

north, Achaia is the southern half. People wonder, well, how big of a city was Corinth? Population estimates are all over the map. I've heard everything from 80,000 to 800,000. I am guessing probably somewhere

in the neighborhood of 100,000 to maybe 200,000, which is absolutely huge for an ancient city. And that's mainly because Corinth, you see, had the unique advantage of just bustling with trade.

Trade. They had the benefit of not just one, but two seaports. Let me explain why this is significant. You had a port on the northwest. If you can look at that map, I got like a smaller one zooming in. A port on the northwest, and then you had like this narrow four-mile-wide isthmus,

this sort of strip of land. And on the south side, the southeast side of that, was another port called Sencri. And the deal was, for ships and sailors traversing the Mediterranean, if you needed to

cross under the southern edge of the Achaean Peninsula, apparently it was really kind of dangerous. Ships didn't want to do it. And quite frankly, a lot of sailors would rather put into the port at Corinth and then actually have their big boats pulled out of the dock and transported by land

those four miles and then relaunched at Sencri. And coming the other direction would be the same thing. And every time a ship came through, of course, you had fees and tariffs. Fees to port

and tariffs on all the goods. And so this is going to make Corinth a very, very wealthy place. So Corinth is the stop for everybody. Traveling the Mediterranean, at some point you are most likely going to port at

Corinth. And like any bustling seaport, it just grew. And recently, by the time Paul shows up, the population group that had really mushroomed lately were all of these newly freed slaves.

And you can imagine what it's like with all the business and commerce going on, all the trade opportunities, with all the freed slaves coming into Corinth looking for an opportunity to get started, to kind of make their station, elevate their station in life. Not to mention, they say the area's got

great natural resources. All of this made Corinth not just very wealthy, but also a very upwardly mobile place to be. You could travel to Corinth and really jump your station. Systems like patronage were alive

and well here, where a wealthy patron would have their clients, remember, clients on their payroll. They would run around the town and tell everybody what a great person their patron was.

And the city itself was really, really impressive. I wish we had actual pictures. We don't. It's too long ago, 2,000 years ago. But they say most of the city was built out of this bluish white marble.

Temples, fountains everywhere, gymnasiums, bathhouses. Get this, a 15,000 seat auditorium, like a theater, outdoor theater. But most impressive, the most impressive part of the city

was when you looked up and you saw this 2,000 foot mountain all around you and what was up at the top of the mountain just glistening in the sun. This was called the Acrocorinth. The Acrocorinth was where

all the temples of all the Greek Roman gods of the Pantheon had places of worship. They had temples built up there. And of course, everybody knew the most impressive temple up there was the temple of

the mighty goddess Aphrodite. All these gods and temples so big in your city. What that meant was, of course, a lot of festivals because every god has a festival to them. And so you basically had festivals going on all the time, all over this city. On top of that, you also had the biannual

Isman Games, a precursor to the Olympics. In Corinth, everyone was obsessed with the games, with the festivals, with visitors, with tourists. You could really think of it like a Los Angeles

meets San Francisco meets New York City. It was really that bustling. Everybody in the city was obsessed with material things, having fun, getting ahead in life, moving up and trying to take advantage

of every opportunity you could to increase your social standing. And the reason I share all that with you is that sadly, this is going to have a significant impact on the church. And how did this church here in Corinth even get started? Well, that's a story that's all about God's work through

one man, Paul. Acts chapter 17 and 18, the story of how Paul, finishing his ministry in Macedonia to the North in the year 50 AD, 50 AD, he comes south and he first visits Athens, has a few conversations with

Acts 17 · chapter mention

the philosophers, and then we're told that he makes his way over to Corinth. Paul knows this is a very strategic location to establish the gospel, both for ministry purposes, but also practically.

Remember, Paul's a tent maker by trade. And with all these parties and festivals and games and tourists buzzing in and out of the city, tent making was a huge business. Temporary shelters for people

visiting, awnings for people to watch the games. So when Paul came here to share the gospel, that's what he did. He plied his trade as a tent maker by day and then shared the gospel with people by night.

And soon a church was born. Paul ends up staying here in Corinth, not for a few days, not for a few months. He stays a year and a half. He meets a couple called Priscilla and Aquila.

We're told in the book of Acts that other important people get saved in this city. You've got Crispus, the synagogue ruler, a Jew who gets saved. Phoebe, a wealthy businesswoman in town. A guy named Erastus, who was like a city politician, the director of public works. Paul's ministry was so fruitful that the

local Jews got really mad, as they often did, and they tried to run him off. What they did is they went to the highest governing official in the province, a man named Gallio, and they filed charges against Paul. But it all backfired, case dismissed, and the gospel work only continued. And this

blossoming congregation took root. Many house churches across the city and in the surrounding countryside. And as Paul eventually moved on to do further work across the sea in Ephesus,

the situation back at Corinth got complicated. The Corinthians reached out to Paul. They had some questions. They shared some concerns of things that were happening in the congregation. And so Paul

wrote them a letter. It's what scholars now call the lost letter because we don't have it. It's not 1 Corinthians. You could, I guess, call it 0.5 Corinthians. We don't have it. But in 1 Corinthians,

we get these cues and clues and allusions to the first letter. And we know that both the letters kind of had overlapping themes. Paul addressed some things the first time. He heard some more reports back in Ephesus. And then he wrote 1 Corinthians. And so we wonder, what were some of those issues that were

causing controversy in the church? Well, we don't have to guess. We can read 1 Corinthians. We have 15 chapters. And in that letter, we learn about one of the issues was sexual immorality still going on with a lot of Christians still engaged in it. Lawsuits among believers. Legal troubles was an issue.

Questions about being a single person. Questions about marriage and divorce. The gospel was shaping and touching and reaching into all aspects of married and single life. Challenges with the philosophical

elites. Issues with idolatry, with authority in marriage. Selfishness, social elitism that was manifesting in the way they took the Lord's Supper. There was the abuse of spiritual gifts happening.

There were even doubts about the resurrection. All kinds of problems and issues that Paul wrote and addressed in 1 Corinthians. But what was worse, topping it all off, was what was going on a little later.

Because a little later, you had certain individuals in the church popping up and now questioning the apostle Paul himself. They were saying things like, I don't know about this guy, Paul. It's been a while since he's been gone. Why does he get to say what's what? You know, Paul, he's really tough when he's

writing a letter. Tough talking. But frankly, I've seen him in person and he's not really all that intimidating. I'll tell you, he's not much of a rhetorician. He doesn't have the Greek training that some of us do. We're really good with argument and public speech. And they were challenging Paul.

They were trying to undercut his authority. They were saying things like, you know, we had this better guy, Apollos, come here a while back. And he was quite impressive. We liked the way he spoke.

Much better preacher than Paul. And they even had a visit from the apostle Peter. And we imagine there were some that were saying, man, Peter, the rock, he's everything that I heard. What a powerful, impressive guy he was. This Paul guy, I don't know. In 1 Corinthians chapter 1, we learned that what had happened is

1 Corinthians 1 · chapter mention

there's some members of a household, a woman named Chloe, her household, that traveled all the way to Ephesus and then brought some reports to Paul. They told him about some of these problems. They talked about the part where some of these shady characters had kind of moved into the church. They were trying

to fill the leadership vacuum that Paul had left. The very same kind of situation that had prompted Paul earlier to write things like this. Here's what he wrote originally in 1 Corinthians chapter 4.

1 Corinthians 4 · chapter mention

1 Corinthians 4 verse 18. He writes this, Some are arrogant as though I were not coming to you, but I will come to you soon if the Lord wills.

1 Corinthians 4:18

And I will find out not the talk of these arrogant people, but their power. In other words, it'll be more about what they say. I'll see what they can do. And so after sending them this first letter, 1 Corinthians, we learned that Paul did just that. He actually did pay them an emergency visit.

Scholars now have a name for this. They call this his painful visit. I've got a timeline here on this. Yeah, good. The painful visit that Paul made sometime in late 54 AD. He came to deal with these specific

issues. He came to deal with certain people, with unrepentant people, with rebellious people who were trying to undercut his apostolic authority. You say, well, did it go well? Actually, kind of mixed.

Turned out it was a painful visit, as Paul would describe it. It was painful for the troublemakers in the church. Turned out to be painful for Paul himself, because what happened is he was expecting the church to back him to have his back. And they waffled on his leadership. They waffled in their

support. And so Paul left after the painful visit with a lot of things honestly still unresolved. And he was disappointed. This led him to go on to write another letter. And again, we don't have this one either. This one's called the severe letter. So if you're keeping track, that's letter number three,

or I guess we could call it 1.5 Corinthians. And in this severe letter, he would reflect and he would look back on it later in actually 2 Corinthians. And this is what he would say about that letter.

2 Corinthians chapter 2, verses 3 and 4. And I wrote as I did. He's not referring to 1 Corinthians. He's referring to the severe letter. So that when I came, I might not suffer pain from those who should

2 Corinthians 2:3

have made me rejoice. Get this. For I felt sure of all of you that my joy would be the joy of you all. For I wrote to you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain,

but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you. Paul will actually go on in the official second letter to the Corinthians. And he will describe what appear to be some emerging new opponents.

He'll give them a nickname. He actually dubs them the quote-unquote super apostles. And by super apostles, it's tongue-in-cheek. These are rivals to Paul who are now in his absence presenting themselves as

more spiritual, much more eloquent, and thanks to their slick rhetorical skills, actually more compelling. These men embodied the secular leadership values and behaviors of the city of Corinth that were very

much the opposite of Paul's Christ-like suffering and humility. They were winners, not losers like Paul. Losers suffer. Losers are humble. We're winners. And they appeared to have capitalized on this already strained

relationship that Paul had with the Corinthian church. Through their flattery, through their wit and rhetorical flourish, the true Corinthian spirit of progress, right? They had advanced themselves to basically becoming kind of

large and in charge in the church. They were better at argumentation. Certainly better than Paul, who wasn't around. You know, it's a funny thing. It's always easier to beat someone in an argument when they're not around.

I don't know about you, but I have won a lot of arguments with people when they're not around. That's how they felt. They were questioning Paul and his training.

I mean, stop and think about that. That's absurd. Can you imagine? Paul's not some uneducated fisherman. He's a highly trained rabbi, studied under the great Gamaliel. But to the Greeks, they didn't care about that. That was the wrong school kind of thing. They were challenging his authority. They challenged his

commitment to this church. They challenged his toughness. They were calling into question, really, Paul's entire calling as an apostle. You know, maybe we're the real apostles, Paul, and you're the fake

one. Besides, some of us are able to do these cool signs and wonders. What have you done lately, Paul? And you know, we super apostles are so cool, we're so smart, so connected, that we don't have to work

with our hands. We've got independent wealth, or we've got benefactors, patrons who take care of us. This guy, every time he comes to town, he refuses patronage. He says he's not going to be anybody's

client but God's. And he works with his own fingers. He works them to the bone, making tents to support himself. How earthy, how quaint, how lowly. What kind of an apostle does manual labor?

These were all the ways that Paul's rivals in this church were coming at him. And so even after his painful visit, even after his two, three previous letters, even after his severe letter, problems were still persisting, unresolved in the church. And so now,

here in the year 55 AD, we have Paul writing 2 Corinthians. He's writing 2 Corinthians even as he is preparing to make another visit to Corinth. In fact, a lot of scholars believe Paul was either

in preparation to make this visit, or maybe, maybe already en route to Corinth. This would explain the sometimes abrupt changes in the letter of 2 Corinthians. Paul's tone sometimes changes from one chapter to the next. You say, well, why would that be? Well, if he is in fact en route,

this is not a trip that's going to be a three-hour flight. It's going to be like three weeks by boat across the ocean, or a month by land if he goes up around Macedonia. It's going to be a lengthy trip.

And it stands to reason he may have received some fresh reports while he was en route. Did he maybe receive some updates about what was going on in the church? And did that influence his letter as he wrote? Very likely, yes. So at times in this letter, Paul is going to sound very optimistic,

and very encouraged about things. And then in other places, he will make it sound like there's still a lot of work to do, and a lot of opposition to overcome. He'll spend time defending himself,

and his calling in this letter. And he will also challenge his opponents. He'll lay out the gospel, and the way of Christ, which is a way of suffering and humility. And he will remind them that he himself

has intentionally, intentionally embraced this path of humility and suffering, because that's what his Savior did, and that's what his Savior calls for. He is not here in this world to advance himself and his

own name. He's here to pour out his life advancing the gospel and making the name of Jesus great.

So that's our introduction. Now I want to take a minute with you. Let's just dip our toes into this letter and take a look at these first couple of verses, because I want you to hear how Paul starts off by introducing himself, because it's significant. Look at what he says, verse 1.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God. We'll stop right there. This is Paul, he says, and I write to you as an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God. Yeah, Paul follows a normal

pattern here. We've seen it before in many New Testament epistles. If you've read the New Testament, identifies himself by doing what they usually did in the ancient world, which was give you their position or their rank. And in this case, for him, it's apostle. Legitimate apostle, literally sent one,

sent by Christ Jesus himself. You know, it's easy to throw that around and say, I'm sent by Jesus. Paul literally was. Some of us might remember how he was personally selected by the risen Christ

on the road to Damascus. Him still being a persecutor of the church, Acts chapter 9. And when the other Christians around him were scared to death of him because they didn't believe his conversion, even this guy Ananias, whom the Lord said, you need to go to Paul. Ananias was like, I'm scared.

Acts 9 · chapter mention

Here's what the Lord told Ananias in Acts chapter 9, verse 15. But the Lord said to him, go for he, Paul, is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and the kings and

Acts 9:15

the children of Israel. The chosen instrument of the Lord himself. So if the rival Corinthian super apostles are all about credentials, Paul's got some pretty good credentials, doesn't he?

Paul's CV, you know, in the section on the references, he gets Jesus. Jesus literally picked me and will vouch for me. And more than just the son, there's also the father. God picked me too.

That's what he actually says. God the father, the will of God. What he means is, this was not my choice. In fact, if you don't know the story, Paul did not have a ton of free will when this happened. I mean,

maybe he did. You get knocked off your horse, though, and get blinded by the roadside. I mean, how much choice do you have? Paul did not nominate himself. Paul did not self-select to be an apostle.

He didn't pop his hand up. I'll do it. God called him. And once Paul accepted it, all the other premier leaders, the other apostles in the church at Jerusalem, they simply recognized it.

Paul actually makes this point very clear when he's writing to the Galatians. Galatians chapter 1, chapter 2, he tells the readers that he was actually set apart before I was born. I wonder if that's something that the Lord told Paul later. Like, you know, you think I picked you on the Damascus road

Galatians 1 · chapter mention

in your 40s or whatever you were? I actually picked you before you were born. He goes on in Galatians to say that when God called him, he did not, quote, immediately consult with anyone. I didn't run

to Jerusalem to talk to Peter or James, the leader of the Jerusalem church, or John, the famous John the apostle. These other premier leaders in the church, they did not appoint me, Paul says. They simply

recognize God's appointment of me. You know, in a lot of ways, it's similar to what happened after the first century in the early church with the canon of Scripture. The canon meaning the rule

or measure, the 66 books of the Bible, specifically the 27 books of the New Testament. You see, early on, you had these lists that were kind of popping up in different clusters of churches. Lists of books of the Bible

recognized as Scripture were emerging. And what began to happen as the church grew and the years went on is they began comparing the lists. Oh, oh, I see. You guys recognize the four Gospels? Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John?

You see that as inspired Scripture? We do too. The church, please understand, did not get together to pick and vote on and decide the canon of Scripture. The 27 books of your New Testament came to be recognized

as Scripture as God's inspired Word, as unique and as authoritative, not by any pope, not by any church council that declared it. God alone declared it, and the church simply recognized it. And that's how it was

with Paul's apostleship. His fellow apostles did not bestow it. They simply recognized it. And because God had bestowed it, it was God's calling. And in many ways, you know, even for ministry leaders like

today, in our world right now, we still want this, right? We still seek this, and really, we still need this. We need God to call people to ministry. If that's not something that you're praying for, even in our

own local church, you should add that to your prayer list, that God will call people to ministry, and not for someone to simply self-select. Self-selection is dangerous. I know, even in my own

life, I did not simply wake up one day and say, you know, I think I'd like to be a pastor. I did not think to myself, I think I'd like to go to South Bend, Indiana, and I think I'd like to take the reins at this church called Redeemer. No. I, and the other leaders among us at that time,

believed that God was calling me to this role. You say, well, did they take a vote? We did. But that vote was simply to affirm, to recognize what we thought God was doing.

Well, Paul goes on. Immediately tells us that he's not writing alone. He goes on to say that he has a companion by his side, vouching for him, standing for him. It's Timothy, our brother.

Now, the church here at Corinth actually knew Timothy. Timothy being that younger protege that Paul met in the city of Lystra on his second missionary journey, this young man that Paul recognized as gifted and

as someone that he could train and pour into for ministry, and he did that to the point where he could refer to Timothy, as he does in other places, as a devoted son, as a trusted co-worker. He calls him

at one point, my true son in the faith. Timothy would go on to serve as Paul's representative, and honestly, a lot of dicey situations. And he'd actually done that right here in Corinth too.

Most scholars believe that Paul had actually sent Timothy along with Titus to carry the first letter to the Corinthian church. So what that means is that this church, they all knew Timothy, and they all loved Timothy. And having his letter attached, or his name attached to this letter meant something.

And then he gets to the recipients, end of verse 1. Who's the letter to? It's to the church of God that is at Corinth. And look at that, boom, right off the bat. Paul reminding the church who they

ultimately belong to. He's reminding them, you're not my church. It's not mine. It's certainly not a church that belongs to any apostle, let alone those super apostles as they want to be seen.

This is God's own possession, what you have. Your church, your ecclesia, your gathering of people, you belong to God. But then notice at the very end of the verse, Paul throws in,

all who are in the whole of Achaia, the province of Achaia. We wonder, well, why would Paul mention them? The controversies in Corinth, not necessarily out in the countryside. These Christians from the rest of the province, they're outside the immediate vicinity of Corinth. Do they even know what's going

on? Well, it might be to remind the Corinthians, first of all, the world doesn't revolve around just you. You ever been around people and you think to yourself, they need reminded of that. You get so wrapped up in your own things and your own problems, you begin to think the world revolves around you.

It's almost like Paul's telling the Corinthian church, it's not all about you Corinth folks. You might be rich, some of you. You might think you're big time. You might consider yourselves like the cool cats of Corinth or whatever. But there are other spiritual family members all across Achaia

in the smaller, less significant towns, in the villages, in the countryside. We have good reason to believe that the gospel had made inroads far and wide by this point. So Paul might be writing

with an eye toward, number one, this letter being circulated. He doesn't say that directly, but it could very well be that he intends for it to be circulated around the region. And number two, he's also got an eye

eye on the big influence that Corinth would have on the other places. We ask ourselves, were these other smaller town believers in Achaia watching? Were they watching as events unfolded in this big apostolic

controversy in the big city? Paul versus the super apostles? Who's going to win? Who's in the right? Who's in the wrong? Were they watching to see how this thing was going to unfold? Had the problems

of Corinth spread beyond the city? Probably they had. And surely this letter will be a teachable moment for many people, for the people involved in Corinth, and also for the people simply watching

from afar. And you know, really, even though people like you and I are many, many miles away, and many, many years removed, it is still very much true today that you and I now are watching and learning from this letter that Paul wrote in this situation. So after the introductions,

after the introduction of the sender and the recipients, the addressees, now Paul gets to the last part of his greeting. And what is it? It's a blessing in verse 2. Take a look.

Grace to you. And peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Wow. What a way to start a letter like this. What a gracious heart Paul has. Here's what he's doing.

Right out of the gate, he is speaking a blessing of peace, of grace, reminding them of God's peace that they have through Jesus. And I don't know about you, but if I had to write a letter like this,

I would probably come storming out of the gate. You ever write that email, the first draft? Dear troublemaker. I don't know why you're... That's not what Paul does. It's grace to you.

We're all believers here, is what he's saying. We're all recipients of the rich and undeserved grace that's been given to us. We're all beneficiaries of the ultimate and cosmic peace

won for us, bought for us at the cross by Jesus. Because he went to the cross to make enemies of God his friends, to make strangers and aliens by his substitutionary death and atonement,

now sons and daughters of the kingdom. Yeah, right from the start, right from the opening line, Paul is reminding this troubled church, mired in controversy as they are, of the very foundation,

the very foundation of their existence as fellow believers. What he's doing is he's graciously giving them the two key elements of that famous blessing from Aaron in the book of Numbers.

The Lord be gracious to you. And what's he say at the end? And the Lord give you his peace. And grace is what they're going to need, Paul knows. And peace among themselves and with their

true and rightful apostle is what they will also need. Next week we'll have a chance to really jump into this letter and I'm excited to do that with you. But for this morning, as we prepare to

close with a song, we're going to invite the team, they can go ahead and come up right now. As we get ready to have this ministry fair that I hope you'll stay for, I hope you go down and see maybe some ways you can get involved and serve here at our church. I just want to ask you if you would stand with me.

Stand with us now. And let me ask you to bow your head as we pray.

Heavenly Father, we are excited for what's ahead to learn from your word. It is timely. It is trusted. It is true. It is clear. And it comes to us with authority. And so Lord, guide me as I prepare.

Guide us as we all prepare our hearts. Help us to be ready to receive the teaching. Father, we want to see our church like the ancient church. We want to see the modern church today.

We want to see Redeemer walk in the steps that you set before us. We want to be faithful. We want to be true. We want to be the beautiful bride that you have made us to be by your son.

And we pray in his name. We thank you for the gift of life that we have as a church. We are called out of death into life because of the death and life of Jesus.

And we pray this in his holy name. Amen.