Through the Bible - 2 Corinthians - Part 2 — Zac Poonen

The Inner Life and Ambition of Paul

Let's turn this evening to 2 Corinthians and continue where we left off in the morning. We look at chapter 5. We saw that 2 Corinthians describes the inner life of the man of God whom God can use to do his work on earth.

There are a number of things we see here which we can consider. I believe if you are serious about serving God as He wants us to. The Lord has given us the Apostle Paul as an example. An example that we can follow because he said, follow me as I follow Christ.

Jesus is our example. But sometimes we wonder how to deal with the practical situations which we face. For example, we don't see Jesus establishing churches and appointing elders and things like that.

And there we have an example in the Apostle Paul. And a man who went through a lot of persecution in his life and he reveals to us the inner secret of his life in 2 Corinthians more than any other letter.

In verse 9 he speaks about his ambition. See all young people have ambitions. The world is full of young people who have ambitions. The problem is they've got the wrong ambitions. A lot of people their ambition today is to make money or become great or famous or do research and get a name for themselves.

So many things. Paul also had an ambition when he was converted. He says our ambition we have as our ambition whether at home or absent. That means whether we are in heaven or absent from heaven. In the previous context he says our home is in heaven.

And whether we are there or here it doesn't make a difference. Whether we are at home with the Lord like it says in verse 8 or absent from the body or it doesn't make a difference whether I'm there or here.

My ambition is to please Him. In other words when I get to heaven, listen to this carefully, my ambition and goal is not going to change. Can you honestly say that? That when you get to heaven your ambition and goal is not going to change.

A lot of believers whose ambition on earth is something else think that once they die they get to heaven ok then we'll have an ambition to please God. No he says whether at home or absent, whether I'm here or there it makes no difference.

My ambition is going to be exactly the same. And that is the man who is in tune with God because he's in tune with heaven's values. And he will be the most effective servant of God on earth because he's in tune with heaven.

The trouble with a lot of Christian workers today is they are not in tune with God or heaven. And then he says in verse 11 he speaks about the fear of the Lord. In the King James Version it says the terror of the Lord.

And knowing the fear of the Lord we persuade men. In what context is he saying that? He's saying that in verse 10 we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. That everyone may be rewarded in his body for the things that he has done whether good or bad.

So he says I know that one day I'm going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ and I'm going to be evaluated for every single thing that I ever did in my whole life. Whether it's good or bad, the words, the thoughts, the motives, what I did with my body.

It's all going to be evaluated and I'm going to be rewarded accordingly or I'm going to lose the reward. See this judgment seat of Christ is different from the judgment, the great white throne judgment of God which is only for unbelievers.

This is a judgment seat only for believers. Believers are going to be judged and rewarded according to their faithfulness and he says since that is true, we know the fear of the Lord, we are accountable.

It's something like supposing you're working for a company and they give you 500 ,000 rupees in cash and say please get on the train here and take this to our headquarters in Delhi. I don't think you'll get much sleep on that train in the three nights you spend in it because you can't afford to lose this and I don't think you'll take any of that money and live lavishly on the journey all along because when you reach the other end and you present this to the headquarters of your company, you'll have to account for every rupee in that packet they gave you and you'd be so careful.

You would not leave the compartment leaving that package alone there. Now Paul realized that life is like that. The number of days God gives me 365 days a year, many opportunities he gives me, he gives me time, he gives me money, he's given me intelligence, he's given me many many things in this body and when I reach the other end of the journey, I'm going to be evaluated for every single day of my life on earth and so the same care that this man has who's going in the train with that money, Paul had with his life.

He says, I know the fear of the Lord and therefore I persuade men. And then he goes on to say, it is the love of Christ that controls us. There are two things that should motivate us in our life. One is the reverence and fear of the Lord mentioned in verse 11 and the other is the love of Christ.

The love of Christ controls me, he says. He was motivated by love in everything he did and that was the secret of his life. And then he tells us in verse 15, we've already considered in Romans 6 this great truth that Paul kept on speaking about in the last part of verse 14, if one died, all died with him.

He speaks about it in Romans, he speaks about it in Corinthians, he speaks about it in Galatians, I'm crucified with Christ. One died, all died. This is one of the unique revelations that God gave Paul.

We don't see Peter and John and James writing about it, but they all know about the forgiveness of sins, but one of the unique revelations that God gave Paul was that when Jesus died in God's eyes, we all died with him.

And so he says, if we all died and we rose again with him, this is one of Paul's great themes, verse 15, that now that we live, we should no longer live for ourselves, but for him who died and rose again for us.

Now I've often said, if you ask people, why did Christ die? The answer that most people give is from 1 Corinthians 15, Christ died for our sins. Correct. But that's only one part of the answer. The other part of the answer is here, verse 15, Christ died, read it, it's in your Bible, Christ died that we should never again live for ourselves, but for him.

How many of you know that Christ died for that purpose? See that's the other side of the coin. One side of the coin says Christ died for our sins. The other side is Christ died that I might never again live for myself.

So if you are living for yourself, you are frustrating the purpose with which Christ died. Did you understand that? For example, if you keep on living in sin, you are taking advantage of the fact that Christ died for our sins.

You are taking advantage of the grace of God. And anyone, any believer who lives for himself, we have to say, has not really understood the full purpose with which Christ died. The aim of the devil is to blind our eyes to the full truth of God.

If he can help us to make us see just a little bit of it, then he succeeded. Either he tries to prevent us from seeing anything, and if we see something, he makes sure that we don't see the full thing.

He says, okay, you've seen Christ died for our sins, I'm going to make sure you don't see any more. But Christ died that we might never again live for ourselves. He died to deliver us from a self-centered life.

And then we discover when we put these two verses together, 1 Corinthians 15, 3, and this verse, that the root of all sin is self-centeredness. That a man lives in sin because he lives for himself. And as long as you live for yourself, you will never have victory over sin.

It's like keeping the root of a tree still there, and every time something comes out from that, you're chopping it off, cutting it off, cutting it off, cutting it off. It'll keep on coming. The only solution is pull out the root, and then you won't have to keep on using your scissors to keep cutting off that plant that keeps coming up from that root.

Now many people, they've got rid of sin on the surface, but the root is still there. The root of living for oneself. Now I want to say to all of you, my brothers and sisters, that you'll never get victory over sin as long as you live for yourself.

That's impossible. Because the root is there, and you can pray and cry and fast, you say, Lord, deal with this root. Help me to die once and for all, to decide in my life that from this day onwards, I will never make a decision with me as the center of my life.

I will never make a decision in terms of how will this benefit me. Do you know the number of people who make decisions in Christian work by this question, how will this benefit me? How will this benefit my family?

Well, you keep making decisions like that, that's how every unconverted, godless sinner in the world also makes decisions. How do they make their decisions? How will this benefit me and my family? And you do Christian work, and you also ask the same question, how will this benefit me and my family?

You are no different from him, except that he's probably an atheist and you go to church. Inside, you're just the same. Jesus died to deliver us from that, so that never again in our life do we make a decision by how will this benefit me, but we make a decision by will this glorify God?

How will this benefit God and His kingdom and His purpose? If I can find people here who are determined to live like that from today, how will my life benefit God? How can this decision I take benefit God?

How will my going and living in this place benefit God and His kingdom and His purpose? How will my choosing to settle down in this place benefit God and His purpose? How will my working with this group or that church of this organization benefit God and His purpose?

I tell you, you get a hundred people like that, we can turn India upside down. It's very difficult. The vast majority of people in Christian work, I tell you, I've seen it for 41 years, seek their own.

They've never understood this verse, that we are not supposed to live for ourselves anymore. They skip verses like that and go to verses like verse 17, old things are passed away and all things are become new.

We have become a new creation. Let me ask you, even if you go to verse 17, what are the old things that have passed away? That should have passed away. That is living for myself. Has it passed away? Everything become new?

Ambassadors of Jesus Christ

Has my ambition become new? Have my goals become new? Okay, verse 20, we are ambassadors for Christ and we are entreating you. That's a tremendous calling to be an ambassador for Jesus Christ. And that is why there's a dignity about us.

Let me ask you a question. Even the ambassador of some very poor country in India will have a certain dignity about him. And then the bigger the country and the more powerful the country, the more the dignity in an ambassador.

Now, we live in a world where we have one superpower, the United States of America. Think of the ambassador of the United States of America in India, can you imagine the dignity with which he conducts himself?

Because he knows that he is representing the one superpower in the world, okay? He won't do anything cheap or undignified. He won't go like a beggar, asking people for money. And he won't do anything which dishonors the name of his country.

No, can you imagine the ambassador of the United States of America coming to your house and say, can you please give us some money to help our country? Can you imagine that? If such a white man comes with a suit and tie and says, I'm an ambassador of America, we want some money because our country is having a tough time, even 10 rupees will do.

You will say you're a liar. You're not the ambassador of the United States. I cannot believe that the ambassador of the United States behave like that. But if another man comes in and says, I'm an ambassador of the Lord Jesus Christ, can you please give 10 rupees for our work?

We say, yeah, sure. Why do we believe the other person? Because we believe the ambassador of America is way up there and the ambassador of the Lord Jesus Christ is way down here, a beggar. Do you know that there is one superpower in the universe?

Not the world. The world superpower we know. I'm talking about the superpower in the universe. Which is that? That's God. It's the kingdom of God. It's Jesus Christ. And if that chap may be the ambassador of the greatest superpower in the world, but with all humility, I can say that I'm an ambassador of the superpower in the world of the universe, not just the world.

And that's what you are. That's at least that's what you say you are. But do you conduct yourself with the dignity of an ambassador of the one superpower in the whole universe? I tell you, the thing that has grieved my heart and made me so sad is when I see the name of Jesus Christ dishonored by the undignified, cheap way in which people go around begging and say they are ambassadors for Jesus Christ.

Very, very sad. You know, there's a verse in Psalm 50 which says the Lord says, if I were hungry, I wouldn't tell you. I own the cattle on a thousand hills, God says. And that's what a servant of God says, if I were hungry, I wouldn't tell you.

I tell my master in heaven, if you're in touch with him, he'll listen to you. You see, an ambassador in a country has to always be in touch with his home country. He cannot afford to be out of touch with his home country even for a single day.

This is how we are called to live. I long with all my heart to see the day in India when we shall have servants of God. They may be very poor, they may not be able to afford anything more than a bicycle.

Maybe they cannot even afford a scooter. But I want to see men and women who've got a dignity, even if they are poor and they wear very simple clothes and they can only wear chapels and ride a cycle and live in some village, but with a dignity of an ambassador of the greatest superpower in the universe.

Is that the impression we get of Christian workers? No, India has got a picture of Christian workers who are beggars. They are just dignified beggars, always asking for money, always running after rich people.

What a tragedy. That's not an ambassador of Jesus Christ. Always remember, my brother, sister, if you are a servant of God, you are an ambassador of Jesus Christ wherever you go. When you travel in a train, remember you are an ambassador of Jesus Christ.

When you travel in a bus, you are an ambassador of Jesus Christ. Wherever you go, you are an ambassador of Jesus Christ. Chapter 6. He speaks here in verses 3 to 10 about the way he conducts himself as a servant of God.

He says, in nothing I want the ministry, giving no offense, verse 3, to anyone, so that the ministry does not get a bad name. As an ambassador, he doesn't want to do anything that will bring a bad name on the ministry.

And so in everything, this is a wonderful verse, in everything, verse 4, I want to commend myself as a servant of God in endurance, in affliction, in everything, in hardships, in distress, in beatings, imprisonments, labor, sleeplessness, hunger, purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, and so on.

Sometimes verse 8, glory, sometimes dishonor. People appreciate us. People condemn us. Evil report, good report. People say good things about us. People say bad things about us. But we are the same servants of God in good report, bad report.

When people slander us, people say good things. Some people call us deceivers. Some people call us true servants of God. To both, we manifest ourselves as servants of God. To the world, we are unknown.

But among God's people, we are well known, verse 9. As dying, but yet we live. We go through so many sufferings, but we don't die till God's time comes. We live. And as punished, verse 9, or disciplined by God, but not put to death.

Sorrowful, but yet rejoicing. Sorrowful because we are concerned about so many people lost in sin. Concerned because so many believers are carnal. That's the sorrow. Not sorrow because of people hurting me.

Sorrowful because of the sorrows of other people. And yet always rejoicing because I join the Lord. As poor, yet making many people rich spiritually. Having nothing, yet possessing all things. I possess all of heaven and earth.

It's at my disposal. Whatever I need, God provides me. But in actual terms, the bank account may be low. And we may be living at times from day to day. God takes care of us. This is how Paul lived. He did not believe in a prosperity gospel at all.

A Wide Heart Toward Other Believers

And then he says about his heart towards these Corinthians. The Corinthians were very narrow-hearted towards Paul. And Paul said, our heart is wide open to you. I believe that's very important in our service to other people.

That our hearts must always be wide open towards them. Even if they are, verse 12, narrow-hearted towards us. You are restrained in your own affections. You are narrow-hearted towards me. But I'm wide-hearted towards you.

There's a little poem I read once which said something like this. They drew a circle that pushed me out. They called me a heretic and various names like that. And drew a circle which only included their own people.

But love and wisdom told me how to win the victory. I drew a circle that took them also inside. That's God's way. Let the other people draw a circle which does not include you. Say, we are the only ones.

If you love and you have wisdom, you'll draw a bigger circle and take them in. That's how Paul was. His heart was large. You cannot serve God if your heart is narrow just towards people in your denomination or people who agree with you in everything.

People who see everything exactly like you. Many people are like that. But your own service for God will be limited unless your heart is large towards all of God's people. Then we have this wonderful verse about working together with unbelievers, verse 14.

Separation, Holiness, and Unequal Yokes

Do not be bound together with unbelievers. Do not be yoked together. There was an Old Testament law that you must not yoke an ox and a donkey together. You must not be yoked in partnership with unbelievers in business, for example, because in business they may want to do some cheating and unrighteous practices which you don't agree with.

In Christian work, you cannot. It's not just with unbelievers. With people who don't have your sense of values, that is an unequal yoke. See, your standards are so high and his standards are so low. Can you imagine putting a yoke between two bullocks, one whose height is this much and one whose height is this much?

It'll be difficult for them to plow together. Unequal. You may say he's a believer, but look at his sense of values. He allows a lot of things which you will not allow. So that's an unequal yoke. In marriage, if you marry someone who does not have your sense of values and your goal and your vision, that's an unequal yoke.

Don't be unequally yoked together with unbelievers because what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness and light with darkness? So here it speaks about calling us to be separate, verse 17. Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate.

Don't mingle with people who don't know the Lord in work. I'm not saying in your office or in your neighborhood or your relatives. We have to mingle with unbelievers in the world. But when you work, for example, I want to speak very plainly here and well, I hope you don't get offended with the truth.

But I find there are people who are believers in some denominational churches and in those denominations, the leaders of those churches are unconverted. I mean, they themselves will say, our bishop is unconverted.

I say, then what in the world are you doing in a church where your leader is unconverted? The leader doesn't know God. If he's not born again, the Bible says he's a child of the devil. And it doesn't make a difference whether he's an archbishop or a bishop or anything.

If he's not born again, God's not going to see whether he's got a cross around his neck or wears a purple dress or a white dress. Is he born again? I'm really amazed at people who say, I'm born again, but my bishop, my leader is not born again.

What are you doing sitting in that group then? You should be getting out of there. How can you follow a leader who's a child of the devil? Or don't you believe that there are only two categories of people in the world, according to 1 John 3 10, those who are children of God and children of the devil.

That's what it says. I believe a lot of believers don't believe that. They think somehow because God sees a cross around the neck, he'll take him to heaven. I'm sorry to say he won't. He sees the heart.

Don't be fooled. There's a lot of compromise in the lives of many believers. And it's not only people who are unconverted. There are people who know that their pastor is a crook. He's just out to make money.

I say, what in the world are you doing following such a pastor? Your leader is a crook and you're following him sitting in that church. Sad. Jesus said, the blind leaders lead the blind people. They both fall into the ditch.

If you want to avoid the ditch, don't follow these blind leaders. That's true. Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. Come out and be separate and touch not the unclean thing. And I will be a father to you.

I have never in my life regretted obeying that command. And when you obey that command, chapter seven, verse one, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

If you want a perfect holiness in your life, you have to cleanse yourself from all filthiness of flesh and spirit. These external filthinesses of associations that defile you, the internal filthinesses of motive, attitude, cleanse yourself and perfect holiness.

God's will is, are you holy? You must perfect your holiness and you can only do it in the fear of God. If you're afraid of men, you're afraid what will that person say? What will that person say? What will my relatives say?

What will my uncle say? What will my auntie say? I want to tell you, you'll never perfect holiness in your whole life. You've got a perfect holiness in the fear of God. You've got to fear only one person, God.

That's all. But God has sent in his word, stand for that. And then Paul says in verse two again, I've got a lot of room in my heart for you. Please make some room in your heart for me. Have I taken advantage of you?

No. Have I wronged any of you? Have I corrupted any of you? No. Then why don't you receive me? In chapter seven, we read of, you know, when Paul wrote that very verse 11, we read of that very strong rebuke that he gave to the church in Corinth in the first letter, telling them, you put that man out of your midst.

You're allowing that man to live there and you're corrupting your church. And when they got that letter, they really took it seriously. And it says, I caused you sorrow, verse eight, by my letter. Sometimes when God's servants write to us or speak to us, they have to speak very hard or write a letter which is very strong and it causes sorrow.

And he says, but it caused you sorrow only for a while. And I don't regret it, verse eight, because the sorrow, verse 10, which is according to the will of God, produces a repentance that leads to salvation.

Giving to the Poor and Rejecting Prosperity Teaching

And what earnestness that repentance brought, godly sorrow, vindication of yourself, what fear, longing, zeal. They took Paul's letter seriously. And this is how true repentance is. In chapter eight and chapter nine, Paul writes to them to collect money to give to the poor saints in Jerusalem.

Now, notice very carefully, he was not telling them to collect money for his ministry. Now, some people use this passage, chapter eight and chapter nine, say Paul wrote to people to collect money. We also tell people to collect money.

But Paul was not telling people to collect money for his ministry. He was not even going to touch one paisa of that money himself. We have every right to ask rich believers to give money to help poor believers if we don't touch it ourselves.

That's the example of the apostle Paul. He never touched one paisa of that himself. He trusted God for his needs. When he could not get enough, he stitched tents and earned something. And sometimes he just went without food, but he would not lower his standards because he was an ambassador of the world's greatest universe's greatest superpower.

And if he was hungry, he was not going to tell anyone except God. So here he urged them to collect money. He said, you fellows have got a lot of money. And there in Jerusalem, there are poor believers.

Please provide for them. I believe it's good and a good example here for every servant of God to have his eyes open to see where believers under his responsibility are poor and urge rich believers to help them.

Very good example. Because those rich believers may not know about these poor believers. And so it's good to tell them, here's someone who can be profited by your money. In fact, in the New Testament, we never read a single example of any apostle or any servant of God asking people to give money for their ministry.

Never. They only told God. You'll never find an example like that anywhere in scripture, but they did many times urge that they should give money to the poor. And so that's what we see in chapter eight.

And we read there of the churches in Philippi who gladly gave even though they were very poor. And then he gives the example of Jesus in verse nine. He says, you know, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, though he was rich, yet for your sake, he became poor, that you through his poverty might become rich.

He says, think of what Jesus did. He had everything in heaven and he came down to earth and became poor. And he hung on the cross stripped of everything so that we can become rich. So what is he saying therefore?

Is he saying that therefore you should just enjoy your riches? No, he says, follow the example of Jesus. Now, some people take that verse and say Jesus became poor so that I can be rich. Now I'm rich.

That's not what he's saying. He says, look at the example of Jesus who gave up everything for the sake of others. You also be willing to give up everything for the sake of others. He's not telling you to be rich.

He says, if you become rich, help those people who are poor like Jesus, who was rich and came down and became poor. You see how you can take a verse of scripture and misunderstand it, misquote it for your own benefit.

You want to justify all the money you make and that you hoard up for yourselves. And you say, well, Jesus became poor that I might be rich. But that's not the meaning of that verse. It's so clear in the context that that verse means you follow the example of Jesus who helped others who were poor and you must help others who are poor.

That's the context of the whole chapter. If you take a verse out of context, you can teach almost anything you like and then you'll build a cult like this prosperity cult today. And verse 20 and 21. He says, in distributing this money, we are very careful that nobody should discredit us because we have a great regard that we must do what is honorable, not only in the sight of the Lord, but also in the sight of men.

Paul was very careful in the collecting of this money that nobody should say that somebody is swiping some of this money for himself. So Paul said, he himself would not take that money or transport it.

But we have sent Titus, verse 18, Titus and we have sent along with Titus, verse 18, another brother and these two brothers, he would never send one person to transport money. Always two people who have a good testimony and they will take that money and give it to the church in Jerusalem.

It's very important to be very clear in the matter of money. Now, chapter nine, he says, and verse six, again, he's talking about the subject of giving. He says, if you are very miserly in your giving, you will reap also like that.

That means if you sow a little bit of seed, you'll get a little bit of a harvest. If you sow plenty of seed, you'll get a bigger harvest. Now, many people use this verse to urge you to give money to them.

Particularly television evangelists. They'll say, you must put seed. Put that seed into our ministry and here's our address and send money here and you'll get a big harvest. These are hucksters and hoaxes who are out to deceive simple believers.

Paul was not saying, put a seed into my ministry. You know, I'm serving the Lord, I'm doing all these things. Send some money to me and you'll get a harvest. This is how people misquote the scripture.

Was Paul saying that you should give money to him? No. He says, go and give it to other people. Do you remember what Jesus told the rich young ruler who came to him? Beautiful words. Go, sell what you have, give it to the poor.

He didn't say, sell what you have and come and give the money here because we've got a lot of needs. We've got to support all these people and their families. No. He said, you give your money to the poor and you come.

I want you without your money. Where in the world do you find servants of the Lord like that who can tell a rich person, brother, I don't want your money. I want you. Go and give your money to any Christian group or organization.

You come to our church and let me build you up into the likeness of Jesus Christ. We're not one bit interested in your money. That's how Jesus was. But it's almost impossible to find a pastor like that who will tell a rich person in his church, give your money somewhere else and you come here and listen to the word of God.

I do it all the time. We're not interested in your money. We're interested that you become like Christ in your life. And if you want to give to the Lord, there are so many places you can give. There are poor people there.

There are poor people there. Paul says, give it to them. I'm an ambassador of the world's, universe's greatest superpower. So you take care of these other people. That is the dignity of a man of God. Please remember that.

In chapter nine, he goes on to say, God loves, verse seven, a cheerful giver. In the Old Testament, the emphasis was on how much you give. In the New Testament, the emphasis is on how you give, cheerfully or reluctantly.

It's not a question of percentage. It's not quantity, but quality. You notice that throughout the New Testament, you find this emphasis on quality, your service, quality, the type of church you build, quality, even your giving, not quantity, 10%, but quality.

Whatever you give, give cheerfully. But remember, if you give stingily, you'll reap stingily. I believe there are many, many believers who are poor because they have given stingily to God. And therefore, they don't have a ministry in their life.

They are miserly in their giving. Be large-hearted in your giving to God. Be rich towards God. Many people have gotten to a lot of financial difficulty because they have not learned to give to God generously.

In my single days, when I was single and I didn't have much expense, what God gave me, I could give freely. And through the years, when I got married and got into a lot of need financially, I can say today, I never had to get into debt.