For your sake He became poor (2 Corinthians 8)

Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.

My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist.

Today we are going to be looking at 2 Corinthians chapter 8.

Now in 2 Corinthians chapter 8, Paul begins to focus his attention on an offering that is being raised for a church that is in need and so he is focusing the Corinthians on the need for this offering.

He begins to talk about it, but in the midst of this conversation he brings up a passage that has a lot of theological significance.

He talks about the fact that Jesus Christ, though he was rich, this is 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, though he was rich, he became poor so that in his poverty we might become rich and that is a very important statement that is really being used, in a sense, as an example of Christ's willingness to humble himself, willingness to, in a sense, be generous with his riches and Paul is using this as an example of the need of the Corinthians to be generous.

But the point that I want to show from this passage today, the point I want to make is this passage actually says something theological about the person and nature of Jesus Christ.

When it says that he was rich, yet he became poor, that is in no way referring to his earthly life because there was never a time in Jesus's earthly life that one would say that he was a rich person.

Jesus was always, in a sense, from a worldly perspective, he was poor.

He was born into a humble family, even though his earthly father Joseph had a royal lineage going back to King David, as did his mom, we see that as well, and so the reality is even though they had this royal lineage, they were not rich by any means and Jesus was not a rich man by any means.

So this passage is not referring to any type of worldly riches that Christ gave up, in a sense, to go out into the ministry and to work in a state of financial destitution.

This is referring to the fact that prior to the incarnation, Jesus Christ, because he has always existed in the person of the Son, he has always existed as the second person of the Trinity, he did not come into existence when he was born in Bethlehem, but he was incarnated in the person of Jesus in Bethlehem.

He has always been, and in the 17th chapter of John, when Jesus is giving the great high priestly prayer, he says to the Father, Lord, or Father, glorify me with the glory that we shared before the world existed.

And so, this reminds us in that passage that prior to the incarnation, Jesus Christ was the second person of the Trinity in the glorious presence of his Father, John 1.1 says in the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God, that's telling us Jesus is the second person of the Trinity, shared in the very nature of God, and he was in the presence of the Father, and so he was, in that sense, he was rich.

He was completely and utterly rich as the second person of the Trinity, and yet, he humbled himself, Philippians 2 tells us, by taking on flesh and coming into the world as a man, and that's the sense in which he was rich, and he made himself poor, and so that through his poverty, we can become rich, well, what is that saying, because had Christ not become a man, had he not humbled himself and come as a man, he would not have been able to represent men to God.

See, Christ is prophet, priest, and king, that's what Christ means, it means the anointed one, and he is prophet in that he represents God to man, but he's also priest in that he represents man to God, and the only way to represent someone is to be a part of that particular group, and so Jesus became a man to represent man to God, and he is also king, he's prophet, priest, and king.

So, when we think of Jesus giving up his riches, he is, this is a picture of his incarnation, and Paul is using it, as it were, simply as a reference to the generosity of Christ, look how generous Christ was in that he gave up the glory of the heavenlies to come to the earth as a man, he didn't give up his divinity, he certainly did not divorce himself from his divine attributes, he maintained his divine attributes, and we see them at work as he is doing his miracles, but at the same time, as the God man, he was fully man, and as man, that is the picture that Paul is giving us when he says that though he was rich, he became poor, that's a picture of his humility, it's a picture, and it's something that often times when reading by that, I think it's something that would be easy to miss, so as you're reading your passage today, I wanted to encourage you, please, focus on that particular verse, and focus on the fact that for our sakes, he who is the king of the universe, the second person of the trinity, the God man, Jesus Christ, became poor, so that through his poverty, we could become rich, not physically, not in this world to have riches, but that we can look forward to a world where we will have the riches that he experienced, we will have the riches of being in the presence of God forever, in a place where gold will have no more true value in the sense that we need it for buying things, the gold is so plentiful that it paves the streets, as the writer of Revelation says, the true value in heaven is not the pearly gates, it is not the golden streets, the true value in heaven is the presence of God, that is true riches, and may we all look forward to that day when we are present with our God in heaven, and only those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and who have repented of their sins, and trusted in him, will get to experience that, so my encouragement to you today, if you have trusted in Christ, to look forward to that, and if you have not, remember, there is only one time for salvation, and that is now, today, today is the day of salvation, repent of your sins and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, and I thank you for watching, I hope this has been an encouragement to you, may the Lord bless you, and draw you to himself, thank you for watching.

Thank you for tuning in to Coffee with a Calvinist, I want to remind you that if you like what you have seen, please take a moment and thumbs up this video if you're watching it on YouTube, leave us a comment and even subscribe if you haven't yet, this helps us to reach a larger audience, if you're watching on Facebook, please like and share this video, and thank you again for watching Coffee with a Calvinist, my name is Keith, and I've been your Calvinist.