Sunday Sermon: Examine Yourselves (2 Corinthians 13:1-10)

You are listening to the teaching ministry of Gabriel Hughes, pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Junction City, Kansas. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on this podcast, we feature 20 minutes of Bible study through a New Testament book.

On Thursday is our Old Testament study, and then we answer questions from listeners on Friday. Each Sunday we are pleased to share our sermon series, presently going through the letters to the Corinthians.

This is the sermon that was preached last week from our pulpit. Here's Pastor Gabe.

Paul’s Warning to the Corinthians and the Call to Church Discipline

2 Corinthians 13, starting in verse 1. The apostle Paul writes, this is the third time that I am coming to you. Every charge must be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. I warn 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 he 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 you up and not for tearing you down.

Let us pray. Our Lord, as we come to the text this morning, I pray that your Spirit is opening our hearts to receive it, to understand it, and to discern what it means, that we may examine ourselves and know that the power of Christ is upon us for all those who believe in him and are followers of Jesus.

We pray and ask these things in Jesus' name, and all God's people said, amen. Thank you. You may be seated. So the Apostle Paul, starting in this particular chapter by saying, this is the third time that I am coming to you, his visits have been in between the letters that he has written.

He first came to the Corinthians. He preached the gospel. He stayed with them for 18 months. For a year and a half, he was there in Corinth. Then he left. He wrote 1 Corinthians. Then he comes back, makes another visit with them.

He leaves again. He writes 2 Corinthians. And now he says he's going to be coming back to them for a third time. This is the third time that I am coming to you. Every charge must be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.

Now, that statement comes from the law, comes from Moses, that if you make any charge or accusation against someone else, there must be witnesses to this. There must be accountability. It cannot just be the charge of a single person, but rather his testimony must agree with another in order for a sentence to be carried out.

Jesus gave this same command to his church, that we would abide by this also. In Matthew 18, starting in verse 15, he says that if any of you has a disagreement with his brother, go and settle that between the two of you alone.

And if your brother consents to what it is that you have said, then you have won your brother. But if he will not repent of what it is that you have to approach him about, then you're to take someone else along with you or another.

So you would have two other friends that would come with you and approach this so that every charge may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses. And if he will not listen to them, take it before the church.

And if he will not listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector. In other words, treat him as someone who cheats and extorts and divides the body of Christ and is not actually one of you.

So that this is the way that we confront disagreement within the body. We would not gossip about somebody else. We would not try to solve the problem by taking it to someone who can't help us to solve it.

I once worked for a guy and this employer wanted to have complete honesty among his staff. He abhorred gossip. And he said, this is the quickest way to divide this staff is if we start gossiping about one another and talking behind one another's backs.

So he said, here's the principle that I'm going to lay down so that you might know the difference between gossip and speaking the truth of one another in love. He said, if you're talking about somebody else to somebody who can't help you solve the problem, it's gossip.

So if you have a problem and you need to take care of that problem, you need to go to the person who will help you solve the problem. Not just talking idly about one another behind each other's backs.

I thought that was a pretty good principle. If you're talking about someone else to someone who can't help you solve the problem, that's gossip. And so even the Lord establishes within His church that if you have a problem with someone else, you take it to them.

And if they won't listen to you, then you take somebody else along. So that maybe the thing that you have to say would be a little bit more persuasive. That the truth is established by two or three witnesses.

Do you see that we are abiding by the truth and yet you are against the righteousness of God according to His word? So maybe they would be convicted by this and they would repent and they would come back to the path of righteousness.

But if they still will not relent from sinning or dividing the body or whatever their sin or grievance might be, then it should be brought before the entire church and the church bear witness to this and the church makes the decision as to whether or not this person should be removed from the body because they are unrepentant.

This is the matter of church discipline that has been laid out. And as Paul is confronting these things in the church in Corinth, he's following that very command that has been given by our Lord Christ.

He's accusing members of the church in Corinth of listening to false teachers and not submitting to the truth of God's word as it was given to His apostles to teach. And so Paul is saying that to know who it is that I'm talking about and who remains unrepentant in these things, every charge must be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.

I am coming and I will know who is guilty of this and who is not. This is not just going to be a matter of a word that has come to me from afar and so I'm listening to this person, but I'm going to come and see for myself who is not listening to the word or the command of Christ as was given to His apostles to give to His church.

Apostolic Authority in 2 Thessalonians and the Great Commission

Let's go to 2 Thessalonians. Go with me to 2 Thessalonians chapter 3. I didn't mark this so all my pages are stuck together here. 2 Thessalonians chapter 3. In 2 Thessalonians 3, Paul gives a warning against idleness and this was a warning that he gave the church even in his previous letter to the Thessalonians.

So apparently laziness was kind of a problem there. And one of the things that he says in 2 Thessalonians 3 .6, now we command you brothers in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. So what Paul has to say to them is absolutely authoritative and it is as the same as if God Himself were speaking to the church.

There is such an attack even in the church today on the authenticity or the authority of the word of the apostles. And I encounter teachers that do this all the time. Like the words that we have in red in the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, those are authoritative words, but all these others, they're kind of apostles' opinions about the words that we actually have in red.

The easy counter-argument to that is, well, who wrote Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John? Jesus? Did He have a pen in His hand and He wrote the four Gospels? No, it was the apostles. So if the apostles wanted to make stuff up, that would have been the place where they would have done it.

So what we have in the words that follow is the commission that Christ gave to His apostles to take the gospel into all nations. And what did He say in that great commission, Matthew 28 verses 19 and 20?

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. And then He says to His disciples, now therefore, go into all nations, baptizing in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

And lo, I am with you always, even to the very end of the age. So this is part of that commission, that the apostles would go out under the authority of Christ to continue to teach the word of Christ, that the people who hear it may obey Christ.

And so here Paul even says to the Thessalonians, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, going on into verse six, that you keep away from any brother who is walking in idleness and not accord with the tradition that you received from us.

Now understand that what he's saying here is that this person has been confronted. You've had that one-on-one confrontation. The brother did not repent. You've gone with two or three witnesses. They still did not repent.

Now it must come before the church. And if he is refusing to do the work that is charged him to do, if he's deciding to be lazy and mooch off of everyone else, then you must discipline that man. And that's where he's going with this as we continue.

Verse seven, for you yourselves know how you ought to imitate us, because we were not idle when we were with you, nor did we eat anyone's bread without paying for it. But with toil and labor, we worked night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you.

You see a consistency in Paul's message here, because did he not say the same thing to the Corinthians? We were not burdening any of you. I came preaching the gospel to you for free. I paid my own way.

I made my own living so that I might be an example to you. And so here he's offering that same example to the Thessalonians. Verse nine, it was not because we do not have that right, but to give you in ourselves an example to imitate.

For even when we were with you, we would give you this command, if anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busy bodies. Now such persons we command and encourage in the Lord Jesus Christ to do their work quietly and to earn their own living.

I have to say, I love the translation of 2 Thessalonians 3 .12 in the NIV Bible. What does it say in the NIV? It says, mind your own business and work with your hands like we taught you to do. I like that rendition.

Verse 13, as for you brothers, do not grow weary in doing good. If anyone does not obey what we say in this letter, take note of that person and have nothing to do with him that he may be ashamed. Do not regard him as an enemy, but warn him as a brother.

So there you see the purpose and the intention of church discipline. It's not because we're going to kick the sinful guy out of here. That way we can all be holy again. But the point is to warn him as a brother.

If anyone does not obey what we say in this letter, take note of him, have nothing to do with him that he may be ashamed. This was the same punishment that Paul had given to the Corinthians in the previous letter in 1 Corinthians chapters 5 and 6 when he said, purge the evil person from among you.

To remove somebody from the congregation as a matter of church discipline is supposed to give them as if a little taste of hell. They realize what it's like to be separated from the people of God. And they realize I don't have fellowship with God's people, I'm separated from his body, so I am not united to the head who is Christ.

If I'm not united to the head, what is going to happen to me? I'm not going to be redeemed. I'm not going to have a part of that eternal kingdom that we are promised in Christ Jesus. So that in realizing that they're separated from the body in this way, they may understand that the sin that they have committed is so great, it would cause them to have to be removed even from the kingdom of God.

I don't want that to happen. And so coming back to the body and saying, I'm sorry, I see what I have done was so sinful, and they will be restored back to the body and the grace of God will be displayed among that membership.

And we will know that this person is not walking in unrepentant sin for which they will be judged, but instead they've been restored to the body of Christ and they have been covered by his blood and his forgiveness.

That's why we do that. It's not to treat one another as enemies, but it's to warn them as brothers and sisters in the Lord. And if anyone would neglect or disobey the commands that have been given to us by God in his word, that would be the penalty.

For Jesus said in the book of Mark, whoever is ashamed of me and my words, I will be ashamed of him before my father in heaven on the day of judgment. Jesus said in John 14, 15, if you love me, you will obey my commandments.

So if we love the Lord Christ, that is what we will do. And if we are filled with the Holy Spirit of God, then when we transgress his commandments and we have to have a brother or sister in Christ confront us and say, I think that you're sinning and I am concerned about you and I wanted to bring this to your attention, then by the Holy Spirit that dwells in our hearts, may we be convicted over that.

Because the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, as Jesus also said in the gospel of John. So that we would repent of that and we would come back to walking in the gospel, walking in the truth, obeying his commandments.

Do not walk in idleness. Do the work that is set before you. Do not disobey the words even of the apostles, but that we would obey the Lord Christ and grow in him in every way, knit together in love. May we consider this of one another in loving affection and kindness toward each other.

Not to try to lord ourselves over anyone else, but as humble servants of each other, considering one another's needs ahead of our own. I don't know if you've thought about this in terms of discipline or confronting a sin problem in a brother or sister in Christ, but doing those things, practicing church discipline is considering someone else's need ahead of your own.

Does anybody in here like confrontation? If you like confrontation, I will pray for you. But nobody really enjoys that. And sometimes we'll even stay away from having to correct anyone of anything because I just don't like that.

I don't like the fact that they're going to be angry at me because of what I have to come and tell them. And so we'll just stay away from it altogether. But that's selfish because all you're thinking about is how you feel in the situation instead of considering the need of your brother and sister in the Lord who needs to be shown their guilt so that they might repent and walk in righteousness as we've been called to.

So these confrontations and church discipline, all of this is a matter of considering someone else's need ahead of your own. And we would think about what is best for the body of Christ and not for ourselves.

Amen? And this is the same motivation that Paul has with the Corinthians because recognize what it is that he says at the end of the section that we've read today. 2 Corinthians 13 verse 10. 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 to me for building you up and not for tearing you down.

Why is he doing this? Why is he confronting them in these things, in these matters that they need to be repentant of? It's to build them up, not to tear them down. Lest anybody think that his motivation is just to make the Corinthians feel bad.

Like Paul's got a bruised ego here because the Corinthians are listening to the false apostles rather than the true apostles. That's not Paul's problem. It's not that his pride is wounded and so now he's going, oh guys, come on, follow me.

Don't follow those guys. That's not Paul's motivation here. It is considering the needs of the Corinthians first and foremost. First and foremost, it's defending the truth of the word of God. But certainly as far as loving your neighbor is concerned, Paul has the Corinthians in mind, their needs ahead of his own.

And so he says to them, I warn those, chapter 13 verse 2, I warn those who sinned before and all the others, and I warn them now while I am absent as I did when present on my second visit, that if I come again, I will not spare them.

I have no idea what that means, but it's scary to think about. Because I tell you, when Paul is threatening them with the authority of an apostle, there are some disobedient ones there that must be removed from your midst.

And the power of God is about to be displayed through the authority of an apostle. I'll tell you where my mind went first of all, and that was to the book of Acts, Ananias and Sapphira. Anybody remember this story?

So the church in Acts had everything in common. It's a beautiful picture. With everybody sharing what they had with one another, and there was nobody in need. Everybody was cared for. That's exactly the way that the church should be caring for one another.

And so people would even sell their property, and they would take the money that they had from their property, and they would give it to the church. They would say, however this can benefit the people of the body or advance the gospel, that's what I'm giving this to.

Well, there was this couple named Ananias and Sapphira, and they had sold some property and they gave a portion of what it is that they sold the property for to the church. But they led the church to believe they were giving all of it.

Here is everything that we got from this land. Look at how much money we have and we're giving to the church. And what happened as a result of this lie? They fell down dead on the spot. And Peter even said to them, it would have been fine if you had said, hey, we sold our property for this much, but we're going to give you this much.

That would have been okay. But you've lied about it and have led everybody to believe that you're giving more than you're actually giving and keeping some for yourself when you have said that all of the proceeds are going to the Lord.

And they fell down dead right there in the middle of church. So it's scary to think about what Paul is threatening the Corinthians with when he says that when 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 he is powerful among you.

We don't know what happened after this letter, 2 Corinthians. The benefit of this letter is we get to see what happened after 1 Corinthians. And when Paul had confronted them in their sin, they repented of it.

Titus, we even have his account here in this letter of coming back to Paul and saying, hey, you confronted them in their sin, they repented. And everybody's rejoicing and celebrating together, but there's still a problem going on in Corinth in that there's some of the people there in that church who are listening to false apostles and not obeying the true commands of our Lord Christ.

And so now that problem has to be dealt with. I'm glad we took care of some of those sin issues, but there's still a problem. And the evil person still needs to be purged from among you. And if this is not taken care of by the time that I arrive there, you will see that Christ is speaking with me and he is not weak in dealing with you.

My friends, I do believe that a person still can experience illness or suffering or sickness because of sin. And I know that because the Bible says so, but furthermore, because I've experienced that in my life.

And I've shared this story with you before of a chapter when I was in college in which I was in sin and I was sick. And I mean, this sickness went on for like three semesters or something. The doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong with me.

They even gave me the purple pill. Apparently, that was like the miracle drug at that time. Take the purple pill and that'll make you feel better. Didn't make me feel any better. I had to drink the radioactive stuff so they could check my digestive tract.

Nothing worked. In fact, that just made me feel all the more worse. It was because I was doing some things in my life. I was sinning against God and my conscience was even wrecking me physiologically.

But I did not want to pay attention to those things. And I continued to suppress it and continued to ignore that it was a problem. And I will tell you that I didn't actually repent of it until years later, but there did come a time where I eventually wasn't sinning with that sin anymore and I did end up getting better.

So I do believe that a person can sin in a way that it will wreck a person's body. It will affect them physiologically. There is actually a story that even comes from this church, from First Southern Baptist Church decades ago, where there was a man here in this church who was having an affair with another woman in this church.

And he decided to leave his family for this other woman. And the woman and the man who were having an affair were asked to leave the church and they did. They didn't try to make a big stink out of it.

They're like, okay, yeah, we know that's a problem. We know it's sin, but we love each other and this is what we're going to do. So they left the church, they left each other's families, and they decided to be together.

That man was affected with a disease. I do not recall the specifics of the story to know exactly what it was he was afflicted with, but I know that it would eventually kill him. And when he was in the hospital, there was a man who was from this church who was the one who told me this story.

He said he went to his hospital bed and he said to him, I am pleading with you to repent of this sin that you are guilty of. And he would not do it from his hospital bed. And two weeks later he was dead.

God will still punish sin in this way. And it concerns me greatly to see somebody who is walking in sinfulness and they will not repent. Not just because I think that you might get sick and die. Some people don't.

Some people sin just fine and they live healthy lives all the way to their death. So that's not my gravest concern. My gravest concern is that you would stand before the Lord in judgment, having not repented of sin and having not obeyed the commands of our Lord Christ.

We're told in John 3, 36, that he who has the son has life. He who does not obey the son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. And I say to you again, obedience is not the thing that saves you.

We've said that many times before. The message of the gospel is justification by faith alone. It is because you believe that you are saved. But the works that you do are going to be the demonstration as to whether or not the Holy Spirit of God truly lives in you.

Do you have the power of God in you through the Lord Jesus Christ to turn from sin which you have been set free from and released of, no longer enslaved to its desires and its passions, and now you're walking in newness of life after the image of Christ your Savior?

If the power of Christ is in you, he has given you the power to resist temptation and walk in righteousness. And so the good deeds that you do don't save you, but they will be the demonstration that you are in the truth.

It is a scary thing to me that somebody would be confronted in sin, and instead of repenting, they walk away because they just don't want to deal with the confrontation, and I'm left wondering if they really were in the faith at all.

Now, I am not God. I am not the judge in that situation. Praise God I'm not. So I cannot say absolutely whether they are in the faith or not in the faith, but it vexes my spirit that I can't answer that question.

I don't know because I've not seen the fruit in that person's life that shows evidence that they're truly walking in the truth. Paul wants to see for himself. Are you in the truth or not? Who is it that's guilty of these things, and who is not obeying the word of our Lord Christ?

So he says that he is going to come to them, and the power of God would be displayed through him. God is not weak in dealing with you, but he is powerful among you. For he was crucified in weakness, but lives by the power of God.

My friends, Jesus Christ is not on that cross. I don't know why the Catholics still have him on there. He's not on the cross anymore. He was buried, and he rose again, and he is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Christ was crucified in weakness for our benefit. He laid down his own life of his own accord, but he rose again in power, and he is seated with all authority, and it's that authority that is present with Paul as he will come to deal with these problems that are going on in the church in Corinth.

He was crucified in weakness. He lives by the power of God, for we also are weak in him. When he says we, he's talking about himself and his missionary brethren, but in dealing with you, we will live with him by the power of God.

The Corinthians should be trembling. Verse 5, 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 test.

Now, I want to say something about that particular passage. This has been quoted before. I've used it before, 2 Corinthians 13, 5. Test yourselves to see whether you are in the faith. Now, oftentimes this passage is used to check yourself to see whether or not you are a Christian or you're not, and there's certainly that aspect about it, but here specifically is what Paul is saying to the Corinthians.

Check to see if that power of Christ really is in your heart. If you are a follower of Jesus, then it is. So why are you following false teachers, believing that they can give you something more than you already have in Christ Jesus, the power of God in you?

Examine yourselves to see that that's there, or are you going to find out through that examination that you don't pass the test and the power of Christ is not really there? Turn with me to Colossians chapter 2.

Colossians chapter 2, verse 8. I had the chance to preach to some high school students last night in Manhattan after they finished up a forensics tournament, speech and debate, and this was a group of homeschool students.

I was truly impressed by everything that they had done over the course of that two days and all the hard work that they had put into that, and I've seen public school stuff, I've judged public school debates, I've judged the homeschool debates, and the homeschool debates, I believe, could take the public school students to task.

Truly, I think that they could. But it was a privilege to be asked to come and share the closing devotional with them at the end of the tournament last night. So they asked me to speak for 15 or 20 minutes, and it was this passage out of Colossians 2 that I shared with them.

And in Colossians 2, verse 8, the Apostle Paul says the following, see to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.

For in him, the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily. That's true. In Christ, all the fullness of God dwells bodily. What is God like? Look at Jesus. What you see in Christ, that's who God is. But look at what we have after that.

In him, the fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority. One of the things that I encouraged the students with last night in reading that particular passage is, if you are in Christ Jesus, then you have the Spirit of Christ dwelling within you.

And as knowledgeable and as smart as you all are, and I was fully convinced that every single one of them was smarter than I was at their ages, as knowledgeable and as smart as you are, and as committed and dedicated as you are to knowledge and learning and getting wisdom and insight, as we're instructed to do in Proverbs 4, 5, the world is not going to be impressed by your knowledge if your knowledge comes from Christ.

In fact, they'll hate you for it, and they'll make fun of you for it. Are you serious? You believe in a guy who was a carpenter that was crucified on a cross and came back again from the dead? You believe in zombie Jesus?

Is that what you're telling me? That's what the world is going to make fun of you for. And I said to them, do not be shaken by that. Do not be rattled from a foundation that is built upon Christ because what you have in you is the head of all rule and authority.

It doesn't matter what they say. You have the truth, and nothing can shake you from that. It is incredible to me. Ten years ago, I never would have imagined that we would be enthralled in this debate, embattled in a war over what's a boy and what's a girl.

Are you kidding me? We can't even figure out what a male and a female is? And this is the spirit of darkness that is over this depraved culture and generation, that they might actually even call you absurd because you believe in something called manhood and womanhood.

But do not be shaken from the truth. For when you declare such things, what God created a man to be and what God created a woman to be, you speak with authority because you speak according to what God's Word says, not what the shifty culture changes their minds about every two seconds.

This is the authority of God that we have been gifted, and it's by the grace of God. None of us should be boastful about it. Look at how much knowledge I got. I'm smarter than you are because of this.

No, at one point, you were as dumb as the rest of the culture is. And it's by the grace of God that the gospel was given to you, and you have been changed from having a darkened spirit to walking in the light of Christ.

So we must be humble, and we must be gracious, as appalled as we are and should be by the things that are going on in this culture. Yet when we talk to somebody who's been blinded by the snares of Satan, we have been instructed, 2 Timothy 2 .25, to correct opponents with gentleness, for God may perhaps grant repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may escape from the snare of the devil after being captured by him to do his will.

Understand, when you're sharing the gospel with somebody else, you're talking to someone who's been ensnared by Satan. Paul even specifically says in Ephesians that when we minister with the gospel, we are preaching to the forces of darkness that we can't see, those forces that have ensnared human beings made in the image of God to hate God rather than worship him.

And so it is by the power of the gospel that they may be released from this snare. And furthermore, my friends, it's not just that we get released from the snare of Satan, we get filled with the power of God.

And that's what Paul is reminding the Corinthians of here. Examine yourselves. Is that power in you or not? Do you have the ability to discern right from wrong and truth from lies? Are you able to resist temptation or are you still enslaved to the passions of your flesh?

If Christ is in you, you won't be. But if there is no Christ there, you will fail the test. And Paul says in verse 6, I hope you will find out that we have not failed the test. In other words, you're following after these false apostles.

We speak the truth and we pass every test when it comes to who is a true apostle and who's a false apostle. We are the true apostles. We are the ones who have been appointed by Christ to preach the good news of the gospel to you, to tell you what Christ has said for you to do and what he's told you not to do.

We have that authority. We won't fail that test. And I hope that you know that we pass the test. Verse 6, I hope you will find out we've not failed it, 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.