Tough Love - Intro to 2 Corinthians

Sovereign Grace Family Church

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Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.

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My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist.

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Today we're going to be starting a new book in our study.

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As you know, we have been going book by book, chapter by chapter through the New Testament, and we're going in the order that we believe that the books were written.

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Today we're going to be starting on the book of 2nd Corinthians.

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1st Corinthians is a well-beloved and well-known book, and as much as 1st Corinthians is well-beloved, we might say that 2nd Corinthians is just as well-neglected.

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1st Corinthians is often quoted and often remembered, and people cite it all the time, and rarely is there a lot of focus on Paul's second letter to the church in Corinth.

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Oftentimes we quote it, and there are some major quotes that come out of 2nd Corinthians.

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We, becoming a new creation in Christ, all things are passed away, behold all things become new.

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That's 2nd Corinthians 517.

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2nd Corinthians 521 talks about how God made him who knew no sin to become sin for us, that we could become the righteousness of God in him.

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Huge, very important verse about the transaction that happened on the cross.

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2nd Corinthians 1045 talks about how we, or 4 and 5 talk about how we demolish arguments, and that's a passage that's often used by apologists.

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And so it's a book that's often quoted, but honestly not often understood in its larger scope of context.

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And so today I wanted to talk about how it is that we can come to better understand the context of a book when we begin to read it, possibly for the first time, or studying it for the first time.

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And so I brought along with me today some tools that I thought might be helpful for us to consider as we begin in a new book that a lot of people have not studied, and a lot of people don't understand the context.

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The first I brought along, of course, my standard Believer's Bible commentary that I use.

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This is a one-volume commentary, and it has about a page and a half of introductory notes to the book of 2nd Corinthians.

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That is very helpful.

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The second tool that I brought is my ESV study Bible.

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Itself is very big and contains a lot of good and useful information for introducing ourselves to new books.

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And anytime I'm going to be reading a book that I either haven't studied for a while, or I'm looking forward to doing a sermon series on, I'll always begin with the introductory notes, both here and in the commentary, so that I familiarize myself with the context of what has been written.

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But the tool that I brought today that is the most unique is this small little book that I recently came across from Rose Publishing.

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Rose Publishing puts out a lot of very beautiful and colorful charts that you can use for your own personal Bible study and edification.

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And again, they're not sponsoring this or anything, but I would recommend them to you.

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Rose Publishing has been around for a long time, and a lot of their materials are not only solid, but good to look at.

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They're nice and beautiful and colorful and vibrant, and they have several books that are available that take all of their charts and put them into a book.

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So I would encourage you to look up Rose Publishing and look at those books.

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And the one that I'm looking at today is actually simply entitled Bible Overview.

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Bible Overview is, it says, at a glance you'll find the purpose of each book, the theme of each book, author, date, audience, key verses, outline of each book, maps, timelines, archaeological discoveries, and how Jesus can be seen in each book and application for God's people today.

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So that's basically what this is.

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It's basically a miniature version of what we might call a Bible handbook.

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This is a little bit more information than you would get in a study Bible, a little less information that you might get in a commentary.

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And so this sort of meets the middle ground between your study Bible and your commentary.

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And what I want to do for our study of 2 Corinthians is I just want to read the purpose paragraph.

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And you can see in the book how it outlines the purpose, the outline, the background, and the themes.

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I'm just going to read the purpose paragraph for 2 Corinthians as our introduction to this book.

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The letter of 2 Corinthians is one of Paul's most personal works.

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His emotions of anguish, joy, stern anger, and love are clear.

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Much of what Paul writes about involves his ministry and personal relations with the Corinthian believers.

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One of Paul's main purposes in writing this letter was to clarify his first letter.

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The Apostle wanted to reinforce what he had said in his first letter.

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He also wanted to help his readers understand the spirit of anguished, loving concern in which he intended his remarks.

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The collection of money for the relief of the poor in Judea was also a major concern in this letter.

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Judea had undergone a food shortage that had actually been predicted earlier under the reign of Claudius.

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And it has a verse, Acts 11 27 to 30.

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A collection was taken then, but this appears to be another relief collection some ten years later.

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False apostles and their attempts to discredit Paul are addressed in this letter, though their teaching is not.

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Paul offers a passionate defense of his ministry in the face of many attacks.

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Ministry is an important word in the letter.

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Paul explains in a moving and powerful way what it means to be a servant and ambassador of Christ.

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So that is Rose Publishing's writing on the purpose of 2nd Corinthians, and one of the themes that it mentions in this is that Paul is going to be focusing on tough love.

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He has some real issues.

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We know in 1st Corinthians he had some issues with the Corinthians, and apparently some of those issues still remain, especially regarding his own authority as an apostle.

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So we're going to see as we go through this book, Paul offering up some words of tough love to the people of Corinth.

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And so this is how one of the ways in which you can begin a Bible study of a new book.

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Pull out your tools, begin by reading the book, but also while you're reading it, go and use these tools to help you understand the context, the history, and the background so that you can better understand the people who the author is writing to, the purpose for the writing, the time frame of the writing, and what it's all about.

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Because that's what we want to know.

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We want to be able to understand God's Word, and these tools are tools that can help us to better understand what it is saying.

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I hope today has been helpful for you.

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I look forward to starting the book of 2nd Corinthians with you, and in the days to come I look forward to opening up each chapter and looking at a few verses, and to be blessed by the Word of God.

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I pray for you, and I pray that God continues to bless you as we continue to study His Word together.

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Thank you for tuning in to Coffee with a Calvinist.

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Thank you again for watching Coffee with a Calvinist.

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My name is Keith, and I've been your Calvinist.