2 Corinthians 12:14-13:14, Have You Been Tested?

The Church Is Not a Test-Free Zone

2 Corinthians 12, starting in verse 14, to chapter 13, verse 14, to the end of the letter.

Hear the word of the Lord.

Here for the third time I am ready to come to you, and I will not be a burden, for I seek not what is yours, but you. For children are not obligated to save up for their parents, but parents for their children.

I will most gladly spend and be spent for your souls. If I love you more, am I to be loved less? But granting that I myself did not burden you, I was crafty, you say, and got the better of you by deceit.

Did I take advantage of you through any of those whom I sent to you? I urged Titus to go and sent a brother with him. Did Titus take advantage of you? Did we not act in the same spirit? Did we not take the same steps?

Have you been thinking all along that we have been defending ourselves to you? It is in the sight of God that we have been speaking in Christ, and all for your upbuilding, beloved. For I fear that perhaps when I come I may find you not as I wish, and that you may find me not as you wish, and perhaps there may be quarreling, jealousy, anger, hostility, slander, gossip, conceit, and disorder.

I fear that when I come again, my God may humble me before you, and I may have to mourn over many of those who sinned earlier, and have not repented of the impurity, sexual immorality, and sensuality that they have practiced.

This is the third time I am coming to you. Every charge must be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. I warned those who sinned before, and all the others, and I warn them now, while absent, as I did when present on my second visit, that if I come again, I will not spare them.

Since you seek proof that Christ is speaking in me, He is not weak in dealing with you, but is powerful among you. For He was crucified in weakness, but lives by the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, but in dealing with you, we will live with Him by the power of God.

Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves? That Jesus Christ is in you, unless indeed you fail to meet the test. I hope you will find out that we have not failed the test, but we pray to God that you may not do wrong, not that we may appear to have met the test, but that you may do what is right, though we may seem to have failed.

For we cannot do anything against the truth, but only for the truth. For we are glad when we are weak and you are strong. Your restoration is what we pray for. For this reason, I write these things while I am away from you, that when I come, I may not have to be severe in my use of the authority that the Lord has given me for building up, and not for tearing down.

Authentic Ministry Versus Cynical Suspicion

Finally, brothers, rejoice. Aim for restoration. Comfort one another. Agree with one another. Live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you. Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the saints greet you.

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. May the Lord add his blessings to the reading of his holy word. Well, taking any tests lately?

You may think, well, I'm out of school. I don't have to take tests again. Well, tests are a part of life. In school, of course, you have to take a lot of tests. Almost every class or course, I should say, ends with a test.

At some point, if you want to go to college, you'll probably have to take the SAT or the ACT. College courses usually end with a test, an exam. If you want to go to graduate school after college, you'll likely have to take the GRE, the Graduate Record Exam.

But tests don't end with school. You might have to take an IQ test. Or to get a driver's license, you have to take a driving test and an eye test. To start some jobs, you may have to take a health test or a drug test.

If you're just out of school and don't know what to do, you can take a career test. If you want to fine-tune your marriage, you can take a relationship test. If you run a restaurant, I understand, well, of course, you'll occasionally get inspected, which is a kind of test, an inspection, how healthy your place is.

They'll come in and test you, make sure everything is at the right temperatures. I believe you've got to take tests and know, you know, how cold some things to be, how hot has some things have to be, right?

So bacteria, does it grow? That kind of test. Recently, we've heard a lot about medical tests, particularly testing for COVID. Medical tests are the only tests that you don't want to be positive. At least not most of the time.

Well, maybe except for pregnancy. A lot of time, people may want a pregnancy test to come out positive. But most of the time, they want their medical test to come out negative. But if you test positive for COVID, that's not a good thing.

Many people like to so learn about themselves that they will take tests just for fun. It's kind of weird that in school, students hate tests, but then people get out of school, then they'll just take tests all the time just to find out about themselves.

Personality test, a love test, movie trivia test, sports test. There's even a nerd test to determine your level of nerdiness, if you like that kind of thing. Some games like Trivial Pursuit are really just competitive tests that people will pay hard-earned money so they can take tests for fun.

Some people like competitive sports like basketball simply because they get to test themselves over against other players. So the guys who come here later this evening will want to play games, keep score, compete against each other with teams, not just shoot around.

You say, well, they come here for the basketball, but yeah, but they don't just stand there and shoot baskets. They want to play games with each other because they want to test themselves against each other.

They want the experience of being tested. But there's one place where people normally don't expect tests.

The church.

Many believe the church is a test-free zone. All the assumptions that go behind tests. Think of what's assumed in tests. Well, there's some kind of authority that can implement the test. Then there are some criteria that you have to meet, and there's the possibility that you could fail.

If you can't fail the test, it's just a waste of time. You're not interested in that. But all those assumptions, like some kind of authority, there's a criteria to be met and that you could fail. Many people assume that that's the opposite of what the church is about.

That there's no authority. There's no really anything you have to understand or live, and there's no way you could possibly fail. They think that's what the church is. It's like that. And that's a major reason, I think, that many, particularly men, and particularly young men, find the church so boring.

The church, in their mind, is sort of the opposite of the basketball game. There's no rules. There's no authorities. There's no way to lose or even win. So it's just about sitting around and hearing the same old things.

You don't have to learn, and you don't have to live by, so it makes no difference. And you just feel good about yourself, you hope. And that's just so boring. Who wants that? And so no wonder that they would be bored with the church, if that's what we really are.

But here the apostle Paul shows us as he concludes his second letter, the second letter actually that we have to the Corinthians. He probably wrote at least one other. Here he concludes that that is not at all what the church is about.

That there are tests, and we see that here in three parts. First, tested for authenticity in chapter 12, verses 14 to 18. And then second, testing audacity in chapter 12, verse 19 to chapter 13, verse 4.

And finally, test yourselves from an authority. So we have authenticity, audacity, and authority. First, Paul's authenticity has been tested. He's coming to them for the third time. He says, starting in chapter 12, verse 14, they've seen his life now up close for years.

He has been tested, and he resolves that he will not be a burden to them. He says that he's not going to be another rent-a-preacher. He's not an entertainer in their culture of oratory. He just makes his money off of that like an entertainer.

He's not going to be a burden on them. For, because, he explains, I seek not what is yours, but you. That's a great line, by the way. This is a great, in culture of oratory, that's a great rhetorical line.

I seek not what is yours, meaning I don't seek your money, your cars, your houses, your stuff. I don't seek what's yours, I seek you. I don't want your things, your cash. I want you, your souls, your hearts, your lives.

And he regards them as his children, and so he'll spend and be spent for their souls. Literally, of course, practically, he would have to spend money to minister to them, but he would spend the money from other churches, from Macedonia, in order to minister to them.

But the fact that he wasn't taking money from them, but from others, and yet still nurturing them, still caring for them, providing for them, like a parent provides for a child, even if the child can't pay them back, that fact that they've seen in his two previous visits, they've seen in his life, is a test of his authenticity.

He was the real thing. But, despite that, it should be obvious to them, they should have seen his life, he's authentic, but in a culture so full of frauds, of hooksters coming through, selling themselves, really just trying to make money, just saying whatever they can say, performing, so many people available to entertain them with oratory, super apostles competing with Paul for their attention and admiration.

It's easy to become cynical, to assume that, you know, since everyone else is in it for the money, so too must Paul be. He must be in it for the money somehow. Even after he's been tested and he's proven otherwise.

He loved them more, as proven by his life, but he was loved less. He says in verse 15, doesn't that sound horrible? I loved you more, but I was loved less. I think he means loved less than you love those super apostles.

I loved you more than they loved you. And I got love less from you. Because you love their swagger. That's because sometimes true love doesn't immediately please the one being loved. True love means doing for someone what they need, what is good for them.

Which may not always be what they want. Sometimes those loving things that people need, which are good for them, sometimes they're pleasing, certainly. Sometimes they're not. Sometimes the most loving thing you can do for someone is not what they want.

A drug addict may love for you to help provide him or her drugs, but it's not the loving thing to do. A drunk may love for you to ignore their sin, just to live with it comfortably, kind of enable it by challenging it, by not challenging it, I should say.

You know, by not exposing it, not telling them to stop getting drunk, but it's not the loving thing to do. An abusive person may love for you to keep putting up with the abuse, but it's not the loving thing to do.

People lost in their sins, trapped by some cult or in false doctrine, or just deluded by a false sense of security because they're moral, they're religious, they made some decision years ago that they're convinced they're okay with God, even though the test of their life doesn't show it.

Such people will want you to play along. They'll want you to say, yeah, okay, you're Christian, you're fine, you're saved, you're going to heaven. To not rock the boat, to let them go on presuming that everything is fine.

You'll make them happier in the short run by doing that, but it's not the loving thing to do. Here, Paul loved them. The authenticity of that love was proved by his willingness to sacrifice, that is to spend and be spent for them.

But like many people, they'd rather be entertained than loved. And in a culture full of frauds, it's easy to be cynical, where nearly everyone is inauthentic, everyone is in it for what they can get out of it, for the money.

You don't recognize authenticity when you see it. As in verse 16, where Paul echoes the criticism of some that Paul's refusal to take money from them must have been some kind of angle. Everyone has an angle, a ploy, a self-serving strategy.

So too must this clever Paul. He's like the company that advertises their software as a free download. And you find out, yeah, okay, I can download it for free, but I can't use it unless I pay. So it's all a gimmick.

You learn when doing business that there's always an angle, there's always a gimmick, that nothing comes for free, that every company that's offering something, what they say is for free, has a way somehow to take advantage of you, a strategy to separate you from your money.

So the Corinthians assume Paul must be like that too. That's the way the super apostles were. They would come, they would sound so good. They would always have a way of getting something out of it for themselves, profiting for themselves.

They've been looking for, when does the hook come in from Paul? They haven't found it yet, but they're just assuming it's coming sooner or later. Maybe if he didn't take money yet, he's just setting them up for that big haul sometime later.

Maybe when he's supposed to take all that money to Jerusalem, maybe then he'll take a lot of it for himself. Maybe he's just very crafty.

He's deceived them.

They're cynical people to whom you can never really prove yourself. No matter how many tests you pass, they'll always suspect there's something inauthentic about you. There are people like that. It doesn't matter how many tests you pass.

They'll just always suspect you. You can't earn the respect of disrespectful people. We have a similar culture here. Our culture of inauthenticity, where the people often put forward for leadership, especially in the church, are often put forward like these super apostles, not because necessarily that they're spiritual or mature or biblical, but maybe they just have a gift for the gab.

They're smooth talkers. They're people pleasers. They're successful men with numbers to boast about. They can draw a crowd, which looks like we don't have much of one today, but they can draw a big crowd, fill up a gym maybe.

They're men with swagger, but who learn, oddly enough, never to run in front of the other men with swagger. And they do that by challenging the sins of those out there, their sins, and never the ones of the sins right in front of them.

So like preaching against those homosexuals in San Francisco while ignoring the racists who are right in front of them. And that's what so many people... That's what many people like in this culture, right?

I've been told myself. I remember one man told me,.

Preach the word, brother.

Okay, and when I did, boy, he didn't like it. He wanted me to preach the word to somebody else out there. He didn't want it preached at him. And so in that religious system, which is common here in this culture, I think the same for the Corinthians.

It doesn't matter how often you quote scriptures on leadership, on following, on church discipline, 1 Timothy 5, verse 19, not accepting an unverified accusation against an elder. The leader, especially the pastor, is always wrong because we just know in our enlightened cynicism that he chose that line of work to profit himself, serve himself.

And we've got to always keep a close eye on him because we know he's inauthentic. And so Paul asked them a series of rhetorical questions starting in verses 17 and 18 to get them to see past their cynicism.

He asked them these things about Titus, why did this happen? In other words, to get them to thinking for themselves, to examine what's going on. They don't believe anybody. They're not going to be taken advantage of by anyone.

They're that kind of type. I'm not going to be taken advantage of by anybody. Not even Paul, crafty fellow that he is. They just knew, oh, he's not taking any money from us. He is something up about that.

He's something up. He must be doing something wrong. And so we asked him, look at the test. Have I ever taken advantage of you? Many of them were saying, no, not yet, but the time is coming, you will.

Like that. Did I use any of those I sent to you to take advantage of you? Titus, did he try to pull one over in you? Did he manipulate you for pay? Haven't we all been always authentic? Look past your cynicism, your suspicious assumptions that everyone is out to take advantage of you.

Somehow the answer to all those questions of verses 17 and 18 are all to prove that Paul has been tested and he's passed. He is authentic. Now, if he's authentic, they're audacious. They're audacious because instead of accepting the results of Paul's test, that is that he's authentic.

And now submit to his authority to test them. They presume that's what audaciousness is,.

Right?

It's just to presume.

They presume to still be testing him. They should be the ones undergoing testing. But instead they presume to be the ones implementing the test to be the testers. And so Paul proceeds to try to relieve them of their audacity from chapter 12 verse 19 to chapter 13 verse 4.

He asked him in verse 19, if you've been audacious enough to imagine that me, Paul, that you contest me, if you're that audacious, what's your problem? Is all this that he's been writing about in these previous three chapters, this foolish boasting that he's indulged in?

He's outboasted the boastful because he actually had more to boast about. And they didn't know it because he hadn't been boasting about it. Has he been merely interested in proving himself to them? Notice that.

He says,.

Am I just proving myself to you? Is he submitted after three chapters of this? You know, outboasting the boastful, showing that he has more experience than the super apostles. Has he been submitting to their presumptuous demand that they can put him through testing?

Is that what's been going on?

Remember, the authority does the testing, right? The one who does the testing is the authority. It's not the students who test the teacher. It's the other way around, right? So by putting himself out there to be tested by them, is he submitting to them?

Is he saying, okay, Corinthians,.

You're my authority. You're my teacher.

No, that's what they've been thinking because they're audacious. But that's what's been going on. In verse 19,.

That's their audacity.

Has Paul been defending himself to them because they're their authority? That's what they audaciously thought. Here, Paul has defended himself for about three chapters because they're also audacious. They assume that is because Paul is submitting to their demand to put him through more testing.

So they're just assumption about themselves that they are the authority and they get to examine Paul. But he clarifies, do you think that I've been saying this to prove myself to you? No, I've been speaking before God for the purpose of not proving myself to you, but for the purpose of building you up to teach you that your spirituality, like what we talked about last week, your spirituality is all wrong.

You're boasting in your glory, in your success, in your numbers, in your budget, your love of swagger, of people who like to talk about themselves and their visions and their revelations.

And their experiences.

And you just laugh that up. You just think that's what it means to be spiritual. That is all misplaced. It's all off target to show you what it means to take up your cross in this life so that now you'll finally know that if you're going to follow a man who was crucified, don't be surprised when he shares some crucifixion with you.

Paul says, I wrote all that not because I was submitting to you as if you were the authority. Now you think you're the authority because you're audacious. But he says, no, that's not why I was doing it because you're not the authority.

Now we're going to address your audacity. I wrote all that to you to build you up. And then he ends beloved. You notice that verse 19. I'm not submitting to you because you're not my authority. You think I have been because you're audacious because you have this character problem.

You have this spiritual ality problem.

You're distorted.

And you're beloved.

You're loved.

By God, by me. I'm showing you that you are loved and building you up by taking from you the audacious assumption that you should be testing me. That you can even test me. They are so audacious by continuing to insist that they can put him through testing because in reality, it is Paul who was coming.

To test them for.

Because he says in verse 20, you need to understand this is the reason that it is not you testing me, but me testing you. I'm coming for a third time,.

He says,.

And if they are still.

When I arrive,.

Paul says, and you are still audaciously thinking that you can test me.

He says,.

Well,.

I won't be finding you as I wish. Very understated, very mild way to put it. I'll be like a very self-controlled parent after a badly misbehaved child. I'm disappointed in you. Paul is saying, if I come and you're still audacious thinking you can test me, I'll be very disappointed in you.

And he says, you won't find me as you wish either because you'll find me severe. He's coming to test them and they won't like it at all. Proud people, audacious people who don't understand that they are the ones undergoing testing resent it when their tester arrives, when they are put to the test.

And this is what proud people today in the church find so strange. Think about church discipline, the very idea about it, the idea that they can be tested by the church. They just find that they have almost no category.

For it in their brains.

What do you mean? The church can test me. No, the church can't do that. Church is a test-free zone,.

They think.

Today, the average American churchgoer audaciously thinks.

That no one.

Can test him.

That same proud, audacious attitude is fertile ground for all the sins that are listed in verse 20. Notice those sins, they come out of pride. Paul is saying that as long as you are so proud, there might be quarreling, quarreling is because people can't tolerate each other's differences.

They can't tolerate someone being in the lead for a while.

So they quarrel.

There might be jealousy because people suspect that what others have, including authority or respect, actually belongs to them. I want it. There might be anger because the proud person can't tolerate when someone impinges on what they think they deserve.

I deserve more respect than that. There might be hostility as deep down they resent others. There might be slander as they think they have the right to say anything about anyone to put them in their place, put them under them.

There might be gossip which is kind of like slander for the same purpose. Gossip is often true, but it's unnecessary. Gossip is they use little morsels of truth to put down others,.

Under them.

Gossip is usually half-truths. Slander is just outright false. Conceit is audacious. Audacious people assume that they are better than each other. And disorder is proud people who can't tolerate being asked to submit to some kind of authority who will put them in order.

A tester. Paul is coming to test them, and they need to understand that or else they could find that the same, he could find that the same sins that he's corrected for, like in 1 Corinthians, are still being practiced.

And Paul says that would humble him in verse 21. It would humble him by showing him that they still have it turned from their sins. After all his ministry there, his preaching to them, his letter writing to them, that they're still living the same way.

That there's still those who are practicing sexual immorality, who are greedy or disorderly, and nothing's changed. That would humble Paul. He would think, well, I'm a failure. I've produced nothing in you.

Well, all along they are audaciously testing Paul.

He said,.

This is the third time I'm coming. Chapter 13, verse 1. And I'm going to put you to the test. And he quotes the law that every charge must be supported by two or three witnesses. And he says his own third visit will be his third witness.

And he will have other people along with him to be supporting witnesses. In verse 2, he reminds them that they've been warned. He will not spare them,.

He says.

He is coming to test them. And if they are still in their sins, they can expect discipline. They can expect severity. They audaciously think that they can continue testing him in verse 3. They're seeking proof from him as though they are in a position to seek proof.

Right?

You driving down the road don't pull over a policeman and ask him for his ID and driver's license and insurance card, do you? No, it's the other way around because he's the authority. He can do that to you.

You can't do that to him. Here with the Corinthians,.

These Corinthians.

That got into their head, they can pull him over and ask for his driver's license and ID and insurance. No, Paul is saying, no, it's the other way around. You've been audacious. They're seeking proof from him as though they were in a position to seek proof.

They're not. The proof is, though, he says, he will not spare them. He will test them and fail them if necessary. He will expel some of them from the church. He will be powerful in dealing with them, with you.

They've mistaken swagger for strength and true strength, the meekness and gentleness of Christ. They've mistaken that for weakness. And they're about to find out if they remain audacious,.

Arrogant,.

Putting themselves at the place of the tester. They're about to find out that Christ himself, through the apostle Paul, will be strong dealing with sin just as he said he would. Christ himself was weak.

As they think of weakness, in verse 4,.

He was physically vulnerable.

He was crucified by those he submitted to. But through that weakness, that voluntarily chosen weakness, he now lives, having been raised up by the power of God. And now we submit to him. We admit our weakness, our sins, our needs, our position as those being tested.

Not as the cynics who get to test everyone else to their own standards, audaciously thinking that, you know, we are the strong ones. No, as Paul says, because we are weak in relation to Christ, that he's our Lord to whom we trust and submit, we will be strong in dealing with you, Corinthians.

It will be as if Christ himself, in all his resurrection power, was dealing with them in their sins if they do not repent. They audaciously, in their pretended swaggering strength, their own self-appointed authority, they think they can put Paul to the test.

But Paul is coming in the power of God to test them. Now, the best way they can prepare for that, the third point, the best way they can prepare for that then is to test themselves. Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith.

He writes in verse 5. And I found that there is probably no more insulting command to the modern, presumptuous, audacious, professed Christian than that. If you want to deeply offend.

Professed,.

Probably nominal, Christians today, tell them simply, as Paul does here, test yourselves to see if you're really saved. Examine yourselves.

Now, first,.

Many of them have a theology that doesn't even allow them to make sense of that command. What are you talking about test myself to see if I'm saved? It doesn't register with them. They believe that salvation is having made a decision in some time past.

They believe that being in the faith means just agreeing.

Intellectually.

With a few basic doctrines about Jesus. And that once they do that, then they are, quote, saved and they are eternally secure and they never need to doubt it. So with that understanding of salvation, it makes no absolute,.

It makes no sense,.

From absolutely no sense from Paul when he asks them to examine themselves. Because he's writing, think about it, he's writing. Remember, many people today, so-called Christians, they have this theology.

Basically, salvation is just saying you believe some things and I don't have to make any change in your life. And here's Paul writing to a whole congregation of people, all of whom say they believe in Jesus.

And so if that theology is right, all of them should be saved, but he's writing to them, this congregation full of people who say they believe in Jesus, who've made, all of them have made some kind of decision for Christ.

It makes no sense then to ask them to examine yourself to see whether you were in the faith. What are you talking about? They all say they believe, so they're in the faith. But Paul does ask that and he asks that because that understanding of salvation, that it's just a decision about whether we supposedly agree with some facts about Jesus, that isn't real salvation.

That whole idea is false. Real salvation results in what Paul called earlier in this very letter in 2 Corinthians being a new creation. If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. All things have become new.

God has made us new and that newness will show in our lives. Not perfectly, but it will show. Authentic salvation results in an objective change so radical it will show in some definite ways.

It's not just like having.

A change of opinions. I used to not believe those doctrines. I used to not believe that about history. Now I do believe that. No, there's much more to it than that. It's more like a pregnancy. There is an objective new life that that is now in you.

That was not in you before. There's something new there. That's alive in you. And that's different. The presence of that new life can be tested. You can come back positive with test to show that you have Jesus Christ living in you.

And so he says in this verse, do you not realize this about yourself that Jesus Christ is in you? Don't you understand that? If you're born again, the same Jesus who was raised from the dead is in you and he is going to make a difference in you.

So it's not like some put it.

Sure.

OK, maybe Jesus is in your life, but he's not he's not on the throne of your life. That's the way some try to people explain why you have some people who profess to say they're believers and then don't show it.