1067. Courageous Christian Ministry

Welcome to The Daily Platform from Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina. Today on The Daily Platform, we're continuing a study series called Ministry According to Second Corinthians. Today's speaker is seminary professor, Dr. Eric Newton. The title of his message is Courageous Christian Ministry from Second Corinthians 5, 6 through 10. As you can see from our banner that we're talking about Ministry According to Paul in Second Corinthians and specifically today, a consideration from these five verses of Courageous Christian Ministry. Let's read verses 6 through 10. Therefore, being always of good courage and knowing that while we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.

Therefore, we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad. I think it'd be helpful just to scan our eyes over chapters 4 and 5 and notice a feature that is fairly typical of Paul's letters but that I think particularly stands out in this section of Second Corinthians and those are connecting words, conjunctions.

He gives us an ongoing series of reasons and consequences and inferences and logical connections between the statements that he's making. So, we'll just look at 4 and 5, although it's true of the passage before then as well. Chapter 4, verse 1, he says, therefore, linking back to chapter 3, in verse 5 of chapter 4, 4, we do not preach. Verse 6, for God who said, light shall shine out of darkness. Verse 11, for we who live. Verse 12, so death works in us but life in you.

Verse 15, for all things are for your sakes. And verse 16, therefore, and we see it continuing here into chapter 5. Verse 1, for we know. Verse 2, for indeed in this house we groan. Verse 4, for indeed while we are in this tent. And we see this feature a couple of more times in the verses we just read, starting with that first word in our English text here in verse 6, therefore. So Paul is giving us sort of a stair-step series of reasons and implications for the God-breathed words that he's writing out. It's been a while, I guess, perhaps five months or so since Dr. Talbert preached our first message in this series, kind of giving us an overview of the letter itself and of this passage in particular.

And he taught us, showed us how that in chapters 2 through 7, really what we're looking at is an authentication of true ministers. We are authenticating ourselves as true ministers of a glorious gospel in the face of suffering. There's an adversity, there's a pressure, there's a context for this. Pressures as we know, we know this intellectually, we're coming to know it experientially, pressures refine us, right? Are you facing any pressure?

Are you facing any adversity right now? Some of you literally are suffering. You know people that are dear to you who are suffering.

We heard the powerful testimony two weeks ago of someone who between his wife and him had lost three parents that had a stroke all in the last 18 months. There's a suffering, there's an adversity physically and otherwise that we often experience. Well, those pressures seem like obstacles. Have you ever had that thought?

Have you had that thought this morning already? Like if it weren't for A and B, then I could really have a successful day, all right? And perhaps when you think of obstacles and pressures, like people's faces like mine come to mind. Like if it were only to dispense with Dr. Newton or whomever and the assignments he's giving, then life would be a little easier. Seriously, we think of pressures as obstacles. We look at the scaffolding around our lives and we want to get rid of that scaffolding as quickly as possible.

It doesn't look nice, it gets in the way, it's unpleasant. But we realize, biblically speaking, that though we want to have good riddance with these pressures, they actually are the divine master plan to authenticate weak but sincere messengers of the gospel. It's what we are. We have this treasure but it's in earthen vessels, it's in clay pots. We are weak, we're but dust.

And perhaps one of the takeaways of the last 12 months is that we realize that we're dustier than we knew before. It's the divine master plan to authenticate weak but sincere messengers of the gospel, of the only good news there is, of the best news there could possibly be. So when Paul is speaking here of the we, and he's connecting it by that word therefore to the preceding context when he was talking about groaning in this body, longing to be clothed, longing to be resurrected, longing to have a perfection as a creature saved by God's grace in His presence forever. What he says in these next few verses certainly is true of all Christians. The we applies to all of us. We are of good courage. We all must appear before the judgment seat of Christ.

We'll come back to that. But in this context he is speaking as a minister of the gospel and so it seems that it is helpful to understand the application of this to apply to everybody but to be specifically related to ministers. Ministers, I'm using that term today in a broad sense, not just pastors, not just men, but anyone who's ministering the truth to others, we are representative of all other believers and that is we need courage. We need to have confidence. We need to embrace this kind of outlook in our ministry.

So notice what he says. He says therefore being always of good courage. Have you ever been in a situation and you're thinking you know what I really want to help this guy but I'm really glad I'm not him and I'm really glad that I can say something nice and get on to whatever is in store for me, whatever is next in my calendar. So you kind of wish him well.

Hey good luck with that. Well it's one thing to wish somebody well. It's one thing to say to somebody else hey it's going to be okay.

Be encouraged. That's another thing of course to be in that seat yourself and to endure by God's grace, to stick out the situation courageously. You know courage, confidence is a recurring theme. It's something that God speaks of frequently in his word. In fact the phrase be strong and courageous shows up at several key points in Israel's history in the Old Testament. Moses exhorts Israel this way in anticipation of their entering Canaan, Deuteronomy 31. The Lord reiterates this exhortation to Joshua several times in Joshua 1. In fact if the people say this they respond and repeat this exhortation to Joshua later in that chapter. David uses these words to charge Solomon as he builds the temple and Hezekiah encourages the people of Jerusalem with these words as they face the siege of Sennacherib and his Assyrian army. It's no secret ministry requires courage.

A certainty that that fortifies your resolution and purpose. A firmness in the face of opposition and that's what Paul testifies twice in these verses. He says being always of good courage and then he kind of trails off with a thought and then spirit brings him back and he says verse 8, we are of good courage I say.

Back to the point at hand. This term is translated twice be of good courage or being of good courage in the Septuagint often is paired with an imperative, don't fear. It's an exhortation like in Exodus 14 13 when Moses says to the people of Israel who were sandwiched between the Egyptian army and the Red Sea he says don't fear.

That's this word family group. So what's the reason for this courage? Why can Paul say we are always of good courage? Am I always, I have courage sometimes he says being always of good courage.

Where does that come from? Well Paul and his apostolic cohorts and his missionary team they had confidence and he speaks of this confidence in several ways in these opening chapters. We won't take time to look at that but if you go back it's a variety of words not all the same Greek word but he emphasizes confidence in various ways in these first four chapters. Here he's just coming off of this explanation of why he is longing for and expectant of the resurrection of being clothed forever and the down payment of that the surety of that is that the Holy Spirit has resurrected us to new life spiritually and he indwells us and that will become full in the eschaton and so there is this confidence I think that comes specifically here at this stage of Paul's letter from the resurrection itself. Remember this is the congregation to whom Paul wrote previously in what we know as 1st Corinthians this quintessential theology of the resurrection 1st Corinthians 15 in fact it if our chronology a typical conservative chronology is correct in terms of dating the letters it's really the first record historically that we have in our canon of the Lord's resurrected appearances so you could put it this way true gospel ministry looks a lot like the sacrifice of the cross and it thinks a lot about the certainty of the resurrection. So this is our first of four points ministers have confidence in the Lord's resurrection. We don't look for courage internally. Do you ever kind of talk to yourself and we actually talk to ourselves all the time some people do it audibly and we think they're weird but actually they're just doing out loud what's going on in everyone's mind and you sort of have this okay you know you prepare yourself mentally step up to the plate for a difficult conversation or whatever the situation might be but we're not looking within for assurance we're looking away we're looking ahead we're looking to the certainty of the resurrection and there are a lot of unknowns like okay so I'm gonna die but Christ hasn't come back yet so what's that intermediate state or whatever you want to call it what what's that gonna what's that gonna be like we have we have those kinds of questions those kinds of uncertainties but but Paul is here focusing not on what we don't know those might be legitimate questions but he's not focusing on them what he's focusing on is what we do know he's supremely confident in the resurrection so while being at home in our physical bodies which is where we are right now on earth it's where we live we are simultaneously absent from where we rightfully belong with the Lord with the glorified Lord so what lies ahead even in that period in between someone's death and the Lord's return even that period where we don't yet have a resurrected body that is a closer communion with the Lord so when I am having confidence in the Lord's resurrection that's that's shaping my outlook right now and it's driving what I what I long for it's a closer experience of fellowship than is possible now in this life and frail body we're at a distant from distance from the Lord now he's quick to add this and in I'm reading the New American Standard this morning and it's like this parenthetical statement that's inserted for we walk by faith not by sight and that is by far the most familiar section out of these five verses that statement we walk by faith not by sight I think with this well-known statement Paul is explaining that Christ is present as we currently walk in the realm of faith for him to say in verse 7 we're at home in the body we're absent from the Lord is is not to say that there is no fellowship right now with the Lord that we're just sort of pining away that that we have we have no actual experience of the Lord's presence no he's quick to qualify yes we're not walking by sight but what but we are walking by faith and and we do have the presence of the Lord with us by faith we are you could say it this way as one commentator does we are absent from the Lord but we're not separated from the Lord our life in the spirit is the guarantee of this day in the future when we will enjoy perfect unhindered fellowship with Christ we see the unseen namely Christ by faith so we have confidence in the Lord's resurrection but what about today well that confidence actually is going to cultivate this longing for the Lord's presence a longing for the Lord's presence in other words to be at home in the body is to be a pilgrim in a foreign land but it's a pilgrimage of faith in fellowship with Christ Paul doesn't want to be unclothed he told us that a few verses earlier he doesn't want to be unclothed I mean I mean who would be but he does want to be with the Lord and death is the next step in growing communion with the Lord for Paul death was in one person's words neither welcomed nor feared and so he says we walk by faith not by sight there's a major contrast here I mean think of the Corinthians think of the issues that Paul deals with in these Corinthian letters the Corinthians were known for walking by sight they tended tended to live by what they could see whether it was in relationship to significant Christian leaders who they align themselves with or thought they were or the prevailing philosophy of their day or contemporary cultural morals or pagan religious context or the impressiveness of sign gift or supernatural apostolic claims all of those things resonate with you if you're investing in what you can see and that's what's determinative for you so as Paul states early in first Corinthians this way of Christianity is is carnal it's it's natural it's it's not the way that people operate who are in Christ who have the spirit and who are walking in that spirit I don't know about you I don't impugn you here this morning I'll just testify of myself that that I so often walk according to what I can see that's what's determinative for me and I would say this that in 2021 with the technology with the access to information with the immediacy I mean I can I'm a book person that might surprise you I'm a book person and I can order a book and get it in a couple of days for free the next day for a few dollars immediately if if I want it on Kindle there's an immediacy to our lives that I think draws us into this thinking that what I see is pretty much everything or at least it's the most important thing even though we know we live by faith now not everything will be clear to us in this life right I mean we don't have omniscience and as creatures actually we never will will be perfected creatures but still creatures even in even in glory as Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 13 12 right now we see dimly as in a mirror it requires faith to see these sublime realities in the midst of challenging circumstances but when we recall that we have evidence for things not seen we have a resurrected Lord we have the record of this resurrected Lord that actually when you look into it and you think about it long enough and and and dependently enough on the Holy Spirit it actually changes you that's what for 2 Corinthians 3 18 says we covered that a few months ago then you realize that for Paul to say you know what I I would prefer I long to be in the presence of Christ that's not a death wish that's not escapism that's not thinking so much of heaven that you're of no earthly good that's that's the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ radiating in your soul it's your longing it's a yearning ministers long for the Lord's presence and we have it now by faith and we'll have it in a greater measure in death when we're with the Lord truly and we'll have it forever with resurrected body someday it's easy for me to say I want to be centered on Christ I'm all about Jesus Christ he's that's easy for me to sing he's everything to me but Paul could actually say it imperfectly but sincerely and this is really the longing of a courageous minister so Paul's confidence in Lord's resurrection cultivates this longing for his presence and this longing then fuels an ambition notice verse 9 he says therefore another connecting explanation here therefore we also have as our ambition whether at home or absent to be pleasing to him because Paul would have joy by being in God's presence and because he was walking by faith and experiencing the presence of Christ right now in that sense he wanted to bring pleasure to God he established this as his ambition this was his aim this was his honor ministers thirdly strive for the Lord's pleasure it's our ambition it's our goal this theme of being motivated to please the Lord recurs several times in Paul's letters these are verses that that you recognize Colossians 1 10 where he says that he's praying for these believers to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord to please him in all respects that would be a good prayer for one another in this seminary community Ephesians 5 10 Paul describes walking as children of light in this way in terms of discerning what is pleasing to the Lord it takes discernment it takes the application of scripture it takes walking in the spirit it takes one another it's not a solitary mission and he describes the fruit of his teaching in Thessalonica as the pleasure of the Lord living a life that's pleasing to him so if someone were to say even sincerely let's give him benefit of the doubt even sincerely that we as Christians are too sinful to please the Lord and I've thought that I felt that perhaps we've said that Paul would have been shocked by that now he might have heard us out and tried to come to understand why we were saying that but he would have counseled us from scripture that that actually this is what the Christian life is about and it is possible in Christ actually God will accomplish it we have be curious about what this intermediate time is and and how you know what it's gonna be like to be with the Lord before he returns and raptures his own but we do have clear direction about what life is right now and what it means to please the Lord that's the focus the pleasure of God is our holy ambition it's the only pursuit that really makes sense anything else would be idolatrous after all God acts according to his own pleasure Psalm 135 6 says whatever the Lord pleases he does in heaven and earth in the seas and all the depths so if it is supremely good for our holy God to do as he pleases then it is our high calling to do what pleases him to and how crucial this is in ministry we're frail people with flesh living in an antagonistic world and that was true before March of 2020 okay this is not something new that has something to do with the pandemic or politics this is the world we live in this is the flesh we live with and so our tendency in this present age masterminded by a devilish ruler is going to be to view success in terms of numbers and profit and popularity we want to be the best to the glory of God with these God breathed words Paul calls us to this example to a singular ambition of God's pleasure that has to drive us that has to calibrate us when we think things are going well and when we think things are not going so well when we think you know what that that was that sermon turned out pretty well and when we realize which is usually my experience we get down and we say you know what that that didn't turn out that didn't seem to turn out that way the pleasure is not in terms of the seeming success the pleasure isn't in terms of how many people are sitting in the pew the success is actually in the pleasure of God and and this is driven home by a final point of explanation this paragraph he says in verse 10 for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ these are sobering words it was a scene that Paul could envision because he actually appeared before the Bema seat and he did it in Corinth according to Acts 18 12 and so finally we see that ministers anticipate the Lord's appraisal this fixates our gaze on the significance of what we do day by day it matters to walk by faith is to aim at the Lord's pleasure and the judgment that's entailed I remember conversation I was a 14 year old I was in between my eighth and ninth grade year and the boss of the painting crew several guys from my church were on it he he raised this question one day sometimes we had like a 30 40 minute commute he raised this question about how can we as believers who are justified and are under no condemnation how can there be a there be a judgment how can there be any evaluation of us I don't know that that man actually knew the Lord in retrospect and I know that I didn't know the Lord as a 14 year old so I was in a real good position to evaluate that but there's an important quality in ministry that I'm trying to learn honestly and that is a faithful willingness to hold scriptural truths even when they seem to be in theological tension there are many errant resolutions of this some that even redefine justification some of you are studying those in some of your classes we are justified by God's grace through faith in Christ alone and we will also give an account for how we built our lives on the Lord Jesus Christ this passage does not convey terror he's not paralyzed by this but there's neither indifference we're mindful of this future appraisal and by fearing the Lord we're in a position to persuade others as it goes on to talk about in the next section in verse 11 how do we do this well just one thought this is from Thomas Watson he said set up a judgment seat in your own souls be as much afraid of a painted holiness as you would be afraid of going to a painted heaven don't think yourselves good because others think so let the word be the touchstone by which you try your hearts let the word be the looking glass by which you judge the complexion of your souls for one of this self-searching many live known to others and die unknown to themselves Paul's focus is not on the particulars of what's ahead that's not something we can control but he is focused on the Lord Jesus Christ his presence makes all the difference and so that's the assurance we have that's what drives us to want to please Christ and we do that in a personal way this isn't just the judgment of somebody whom we don't know and who's at a great distance all right according to some impersonal law this is our Savior this is our Lord this is the one who died for us and has been raised in newness of life we will give an account to him and it shapes our motivation it reminds us as Ephesians 2 10 says that there are works prepared beforehand in the sovereign will of God for us to walk in today by his grace we're saved to this and so we walk by faith with appropriate confidence and we start with the end in view and we walk back and say okay Lord I want to please you today I want to live by faith in your presence today I don't want to walk by sight I don't want to get caught up in the world's estimation of what is success ultimately I want to glorify you and when Christ is this is the center of this it doesn't become moralistic it doesn't become the kind of thing that we sort of are wary of when we we hear words like this about a future evaluation even for justified believers so brothers and sisters you're not looking at a courageous person what Paul is talking about here has nothing to do with natural characteristics that's actually how the Corinthians lived and how they viewed things he's talking about a risen Lord he's talking about a confidence in his resurrection he's talking about living by faith in him and longing for his full presence and he's talking about the kind of ambition that makes his pleasure everything for us and welcomes the chance to lay on the foundation of Jesus Christ things that that will matter for eternity taking the little pieces of time that God gives us today and investing them for the sake of our Savior for all eternity you've been listening to a message preached in seminary chapel by dr eric newton which was part of the series ministry according to second corinthians join us again tomorrow as we continue this series on The Daily Platform.