Hard Truth, Soft Hearts

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If you have your Bibles, turn with me to 2 Corinthians chapter 7 and hold your place at verse 2.
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There's an old saying among preachers and the saying goes like this, soft preaching makes for hard hearts and hard preaching makes for soft hearts.
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There's an extended version which says that hard preaching produces hard men with soft hearts and soft preaching produces soft men with hard hearts.
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And I like the second version because it stresses an issue that we deal with today.
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And that is men have become very soft in their bodies and in their minds, but they become very hard in their hearts.
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And I think it's because we are unwilling to hear the truth. We're unwilling to even say that truth exists.
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We're unwilling to be honest with one another about the truth. We're unwilling to speak with straight speech.
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We're unwilling to hear someone speak straight to us.
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Soft preaching is malleable, inconsistent, and compromising.
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It's soft on truth. Hard preaching is firm, consistent, and foundational.
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It's immovable on principle. It's not about tone.
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A lot of men get up and preach very loud, but they preach soft because they are malleable on the truth.
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And other men preach reservedly, but they preach hard truth and they preach it to the glory of God.
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Well today we are going to look at a text where the Apostle Paul talking to the
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Corinthians tells them, I have spoken to you a hard word.
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I have actually written, because this is about a letter that he wrote.
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He calls it the severe letter and he says, I wrote this letter to you and it grieved me because I knew that it grieved you, but I don't regret it because it brought about what was needed and what was needed was repentance.
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Hard truth brings soft hearts. Let's stand together and read
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God's word. Beginning at verse 2. Make room in your hearts for us.
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We have wronged no one. We have corrupted no one. We have taken advantage of no one.
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I do not say this to condemn you, for I said before that you are in our hearts to die together and to live together.
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I'm acting with great boldness toward you. I have great pride in you. I'm filled with comfort.
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In all affliction, I am overwhelmed with joy. For even when we came into Macedonia, our bodies had no rest, but we were afflicted at every turn, fighting without and fear within.
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But God who comforts the downcast comforted us by the coming of Titus, and not only by his coming, but also by the comfort with which he was comforted by you, as he told us of your longing, your mourning, your zeal for me, so that I rejoiced still more.
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For even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it. Though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you, though only for a while.
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As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting, for you felt a godly grief, so that you suffered no loss through us.
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For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.
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Father in heaven, I pray by the mercy of God, and by the power of your
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Spirit, Lord, that you would keep me from error. For Lord, I am a fallible man.
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I am a man capable of preaching error. And for the sake of your name and for the sake of my conscience,
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I pray that you would keep me from that. Moreover, for the sake of your people, for they,
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Lord, need the truth. We all need the truth. And Lord, the truth is the foundation of everything.
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For without the truth, Lord, there is no hope. So I pray,
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O God, today that what I preach would be in accordance with the truth. And where those truths are hard, that they would make for soft hearts that are willing to receive the truth.
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Like the ground which received the seed in the parable of the sower, and it sprouted and produced a crop,
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Lord, I pray that the seed of the word of God would go into the hearts of your people and would produce fruit. And Lord, if there are those here who are not yet in Christ, that today would be the day of salvation, that they would turn from their unbelief and turn to Christ, that they would repent of their sin and that they would trust in him.
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And that today we would see, Lord, your movement of your spirit in the lives of the unbelieving.
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And Lord, may it be according to your word and will, in Jesus' name, amen.
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Well, as always, I like to welcome those of you who are who are visiting with us or new with us, because I know that coming in, sometimes it's a little difficult because perhaps you might feel like you're jumping in the middle of the deep end of the pool because we're right in the middle of a letter.
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You haven't received all of the previous lessons, so perhaps you might be a little bit confused. So for that,
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I always like to at least try to bring everyone up to speed. Many weeks ago, we began this book and we talked about the structure of the book, and we noted that this is not
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Paul's first letter to the Corinthian church. Obviously, it's entitled Second Corinthians, but it's not really even his second letter.
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According to the evidence that we have, this is actually his fourth letter. Paul wrote a letter prior to what we call
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First Corinthians, and he references it in First Corinthians chapter five, verse nine. Now, we no longer have that.
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It's not part of the Bible. It's not part of the canon of Scripture, and that's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. Not everything
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Paul ever wrote was intended to be Scripture. It just is the way that it is. Not everything that the other apostles wrote was intended to be
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Scripture. God gave us what he intended for us to have, but there were letters that we know of because he references those.
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And in First Corinthians chapter five, verse nine, he references a previous letter that he had written. We call that Corinthians A.
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And then we have the letter that he did wrote. First Corinthians is our First Corinthians, but it's actually what we would identify as Corinthians B.
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And then in this letter, Second Corinthians, he references what is known as a severe letter.
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Some people think the severe letter is First Corinthians, but I am of the mind that I think it's actually a separate letter that he wrote between First and Second Corinthians, our
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First and Second Corinthians, which we would then identify as Corinthians C. So, again, this is just an idea of trying to give you some of the correspondence that Paul has had with these people in Corinth and this church.
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And it began, Paul began this church in about A .D. 50. We know that because it happened in Acts chapter 18.
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If you're studying through the book of Acts, you will see when Paul goes into Corinth and Paul begins to preach and plant the church in Corinth and you can read the story and the correspondence between Paul and the church at Corinth lasted about seven years.
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He began the church in A .D. 50 and Second Corinthians, his last letter to them is written about A .D.
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57. And throughout these years,
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Paul is interacting with this church, which is having a lot of problems. When I preach through First Corinthians, I titled the series
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A Church With Problems. Because First Corinthians is all about the issues that were going on within the church, all of the problems that were going on within the church.
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And Paul was seeking to correct them because a cohort of people called Chloe's people in that letter came to him and said, hey, here's the problems that we're having.
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Here's the issues that we're having. And Paul writes First Corinthians, our First Corinthians to them to try to rectify some of the issues.
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But then Paul begins to find out that within the church at Corinth, there are those who are rejecting his ministry.
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There are those who are claiming that his ministry is a ministry that is a false gospel ministry, that he has not been teaching the truth, that he himself is not to be trusted.
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So Paul sends to them a letter, which again, we no longer have, a severe letter, and he waits.
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He waits to see how the church is going to receive this rebuke. He waits to see how the church is going to receive this severe affront to their behavior.
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Paul is about to step on their toes and he doesn't know how they're going to respond.
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Well, Second Corinthians is written when he finds out the response, because he began in Troas, as he told us in chapter two, he was in Troas, which was north of Ephesus, and he was waiting on Titus.
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Titus was the one, I believe, who actually delivered the severe letter and was bringing the message back for how the people received it.
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And so Paul is in Troas and he's waiting on Titus to return. Titus doesn't come back.
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So Paul makes his way over the sea, the Aegean Sea, to Macedonia, where he will there await his reunion with Titus.
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Because Paul wants to know. He wants to know how the church has received his rebuke.
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He wants to know how the church is responding to his correction. And understand the nature of that concern.
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Have you ever had to bring a correction to someone and you were concerned with how they might respond?
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Maybe it's your children and you know you're going to have to correct them in a very serious way, but you're not sure how they're going to respond.
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Or maybe it's a dear friend who has fallen into some form of sin and you go to that person and you know you have to tell them the truth and you know it's going to be hard and you know it's going to be difficult and you're apprehensive.
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Maybe you're not. Maybe I'm the only one. Maybe I'm the only one who gets a little timid when I have to tell someone something
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I know they don't want to hear. We know what that feels like.
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And it's hard to be on the giving end. But isn't it also hard to be on the receiving end?
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Doesn't it feel really bad when you get that text that says, hey, we need to talk. Please don't text me that if it ain't serious.
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I just want to say, if you just want to talk about something that ain't serious, say, hey, pastor, how's your day going?
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Can we get together and chat? That sounds good. But when you text, we need to talk.
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And then I find out that it's nothing. Oh, man, that's worse. I thought we needed to talk.
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No, we didn't need to talk. You just wanted to talk. I'm being honest.
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Maybe a little too honest, but. But it's a reality when you know someone wants to tell you something hard, when you know it's going to be hard, when you know it's going to be probably true and hard.
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That's real tough. Well, that's what Paul's doing. Paul has written a letter to these people and he knows that it's going to go one of two ways.
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They're either going to well, one of three ways. They're either going to receive it with anger.
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And absolutely rebuff it. Or they're going to receive it with ambivalence, not not care at all.
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Or they're going to receive it with repentance. And obviously that's what he wants.
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But he doesn't know. Not certain how they're going to receive the rebuke.
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So Titus has returned, Titus has come to Paul and there's great joy in the reunion, not only because Titus is safely back with Paul, but because the message he brings is positive.
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Hey, Paul, they heard your rebuke and it was in repentance.
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They heard your truth and they received it. So if you have an
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ESV Bible, you might be interested to note the heading of this section in the
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ESV is called Paul's what? Paul's, what is it?
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His joy. The section, this section, verse two to verse 16 is called
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Paul's joy. The reason why the ESV translators put these little headings in there is just to give you an idea of what's being going, what's going on in that section.
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And this section they chose to entitle Paul's joy because this is Paul's joy. Paul is finally finding out or finally letting us know that he has found out that the
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Corinthians have received his rebuke positively. And that is worthy of rejoicing.
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So that brings us into the study of the text. So we'll begin now walking through the text.
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The first thing we read is Paul's conclusion to his previous admonition.
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He called them to open their hearts to him back in chapter six and not to join themselves to false teachers.
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That was our study last week. Not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers and particularly in this context with those who would call his ministry into question, who would teach false things.
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And now he reminds them yet again of the integrity of his ministry.
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Let's begin looking at verse two. He says, make room in your hearts for us.
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We've wronged no one. We've corrupted no one. We've taken advantage of no one.
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Now, why is he saying that? Well, again, it could be one of two reasons. One, he could be saying we're not like the false teachers that are among you because in fact they have wronged you.
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They have corrupted you. They have taken advantage of you and we're not like them. But more likely what he is saying is the accusations that have been made against us are false.
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We have been accused of being wrong and wronging people. We have been accused of being corrupted and corrupting people.
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We have been accused of taking advantage of people and it's not true. We have wronged no one.
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We have corrupted no one and we have taken advantage of no one. And I tend to believe that's what
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Paul is saying. And I base that on verse three, because the next words out of his mouth were this.
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I do not say this to condemn you, for I said before that you are in our hearts to die together and to live together.
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What's that mean? Well, what he's saying there is he's saying that, yes, these accusations have been made.
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I've been accused of wronging you. I've been accused of corrupting you. I've been accused of taking advantage. I've not done that to anyone.
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And I'm not saying this to condemn you. I'm not saying this to beat up on you. I'm not reminding you of your errors just because you've made errors and I want to keep throwing it in your face.
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Because ultimately we live together and we die together. What does that mean? Well, ultimately what he's saying, we're in this together.
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I'm not simply trying to throw your errors in your face. I'm not just simply trying to make life hard on you and make you feel bad and add badness onto badness.
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And ultimately, we live together and we die together.
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That phrase simply means we have a shared destiny. We are in this together.
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One of the things I think we forget, brothers and sisters, is that when it comes to the
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Christian walk, we are in this together. Sometimes I'll say to my wife when we're struggling through a particular issue and.
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We have a very good marriage, I'm very thankful for my wife. But we don't always agree. Amen.
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I guess I'm OK, a few are honest, but in those moments of disagreeable days, there are times where I'll look at her or she'll look at me and we'll say, you know, we're in this together, right?
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You know, we ain't neither one of us going anywhere. You leave, I'm coming with you. We're not going anywhere.
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So we got to figure this out. We live together, we die together. This is us.
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Beloved, what if it would be wouldn't it be great if we felt like that as a church? Wouldn't it be great if the person who hurts you in the church, that you were willing to go to that person, tell them that they hurt you.
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They were willing to say that they were sorry for hurting you and you were willing to forgive them. And then they were willing to move forward with you as brothers and sisters in Christ rather than just departing the first time someone hurt their feelings.
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You see what I'm saying is we live together and we die together. Even when we speak hard words to each other, if it's true words, we should receive those words and if need be, repent and move forward together.
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Paul's saying we're in this together. We have a shared destiny. If we're going to spend heaven together, we ought to be able to enjoy church together.
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So, brothers and sisters, we have a shared destiny. And Paul says,
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I am going on to verse four now, he says, I'm acting with great boldness toward you.
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I have great pride in you. I'm filled with all affliction. I'm overflowing with joy.
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Now, I want to mention something about the first phrase in verse four. It says in the
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ESV, I'm acting with great boldness toward you.
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The New American Standard Bible says great is my confidence in you. But in other translations, this particular word, which is translated confidence or boldness, almost always is attached to the idea of speech.
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In fact, the King James Version in this text says speech. Right, Mike?
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I always look to Mike. He's my King James man. The New King James, what does it say,
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Andy? Right there, verse four. Does it mention speech? Thank you. The Christian Standard Bible says
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I'm being frank with you, which frank usually refers to speech. Right.
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And so I looking up this word and looking how it's used in other places,
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I look to Mark chapter eight. When it talked about Jesus, he said it says in that term, he said, and he said this plainly, right?
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To speak plainly means to speak straight, right? To speak with straight speech. And in John chapter seven, it says he spoke openly, meaning he spoke frankly or without any hindrances.
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And the idea, the point I'm trying to make is I do believe in verse four when he says I'm acting with great boldness towards you in the
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ESV, I think it's his boldness of speech that he's referring to. And when it says in the
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NAS, great is my confidence towards you, I think what he's saying is great is my or my confidence in you is my confidence to be able to speak hard things.
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Because again, this ties to the idea of speech. And the reason why I'm bringing this up and the reason why
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I'm making this a point of the message is because when we think about one of the ways that we have to show love to other people and one of the most difficult ways that we show love to other people is when we speak to them in a way that they don't want to hear when we speak straight to them, when we speak with confidence to them, when we speak to them courageously about an issue.
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And Paul is saying, I'm speaking, if you will, I'll make this in the ESV, I'm speaking with great boldness towards you because I have great pride in you.
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I'm filled with comfort in all our afflictions. I have overwhelming joy. Why? Because they've received it. I'm speaking boldly to you because you have received it.
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And then he expresses his joy about his knowledge of their receiving it beginning at verse five.
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He says, for even when we came into Macedonia, our bodies had no rest, but we were afflicted at every turn, fighting without and fear within.
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But God, who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the coming of Titus and not only by his coming, but also by the comfort with which he was comforted by you.
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And he told us of your longing, your mourning, your zeal for me so that I rejoiced still the more.
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Basically, what he's saying is this. I gave a difficult word to you.
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And I was concerned how you would receive that word. Titus has returned and he's comforted me by showing me that you've received that word.
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And so I rejoice all the more. Four times the word comfort is used in verses five through seven.
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And the word comfort here is important because Paul has not been comforted for much of this book.
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If you go back into chapter one, chapter two and chapter three, Paul has been accused, Paul has been called out,
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Paul has been misidentified, Paul has received all of these false accusations against him.
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And he has said he has been in distress. He has said he has been in turmoil. He has said he has been even in, we would translate the word depression.
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In fact, if you if you were to study the whole of Second Corinthians and you were to look chapter two, verse 13 and chapter seven, verse four, that section in between two, two, fourteen to seven, three is what we call a digression.
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Because chapter two, thirteen and chapter seven, four actually can the whole section could come out and they could go right together because what he's talking about in two thirteen is he's talking about the stress and the problems and the issues that he has.
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And now we come to the point where he finally shows us his comfort. And where is his comfort coming from?
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It's because Titus has returned in chapter two. He's waiting on Titus in chapter four. I'm sorry.
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Chapter seven, Titus has returned. He said, well, why is all that stuff in the middle? Well, he had very important things to say, and we've looked at this for the last several weeks.
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He said very important things in between. He's talked about the ministry of the new covenant, the glory of Christ's gospel, the message of reconciliation and the call for separation.
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All those things are important. But now we're back to the main point of the letter, which was the fact that he was stressed over the fact that he wasn't with Titus.
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And now Titus is back and he is comforted by that return. The word comfort.
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Is an important word in our faith, you probably know this.
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But it's the word most associated with the Holy Spirit and John's gospel, Jesus said.
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When I go away, I will send you another comforter.
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Now, some modern translations don't translate the word as comforter, but translate it as the word helper.
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But the comforter, I think, I think is a great word and I think is an important word because of where it comes from.
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And I know some of you know this, but the good thing is we always have visitors. So some of my stuff's new. But understand the word comfort in English comes from the
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Latin. And Latin come forte, the prefix com come means with just like when we have communion, it's with union, the union of us with Christ, that's communion come forte.
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If you've ever studied music, forte means strength. Like when we're singing and you see on the music notation, it says forte.
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That means loud and strong. Latin come forte means with strength.
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So when Jesus is talking about the one he would send, the
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Holy Spirit of God, he in Greek calls him the parakletos or what the
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Southern pastor calls the paraclete. Been in church for a while, you hear the paraclete.
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Well, the Greek word means one who stands beside you. Keletos means to call, para means to be beside.
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So parakletos means to stand alongside for what purpose? To give you strength.
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So when the Latin translators are translating this word into Latin, they translate it as comforter, the one who comes to strengthen you, the one who is alongside of you to give you strength.
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And God says that's what's happening right here. God comforts the downcast.
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He comes alongside and he gives strength. And sometimes he does that through a brother.
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In Christ, because notice what it says, but God who comforts the downcast comforted us by the coming of Titus.
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Let me ask you a question. Have you ever been in a situation? Where you felt like you were falling apart and a brother entered the room and held you and it gave you strength.
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Amen. That's what Paul's saying. I was I was broken.
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I was hurting. I was waiting. I was grieved. I was depressed.
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I was Paul. Paul was a man, y 'all. You got to remember as as blessed as Paul was, as saintly and godly as Paul was.
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A man at best is still a man at best. Right.
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And yet he's and he says, I was comforted by God through God bringing me
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Titus and Titus comes and stands with me and strengthens me. And not only was
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I comforted by his coming, but I was comforted by the message he brought. And I was comforted by the fact that he was comforted by you.
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He's talking to the Corinthians. He says he went there and didn't know what to expect. And but when he got there, you comforted him and you sent him back to me.
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And now he can comfort me with joy. Beloved, this is there's a lot here that we could learn simply about how we should behave to one another.
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There's a lot here to teach us about just how the church ought to be. Can we all agree that in many ways the church ain't what it ought to be?
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I mean, in many ways we struggle, not our church only, but the church in general struggles to be what we ought to be.
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And if it's one thing it ought to be, it ought to be a place where we know we can go and find strength.
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Well, we know we can go and find brotherly love, where we know that when we're broken, someone will help us put the pieces back together.
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Oh, for the church like that. Oh, for a church that trusts one another.
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That strengthens one another, that comforts one another.
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And then verse eight. Paul now addresses the actual reason for all of this when he talks about his letter.
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He says, for even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it. Though I did regret it.
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I love that. He's honest. He says, I don't regret it, though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you, though only for a while.
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As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting, for you felt a godly grief so that you suffered no loss through us.
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For godly grief produces a repentance. That leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.
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Now, next week, I just a little preview for next week's message. Next week, we're going to go on into verse 11, where Paul actually defines what godly repentance looks like.
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And the seven marks of godly repentance are what we're going to look at next week. So we won't get there today.
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But just understand what he's saying. He's saying, I made you grieve with what
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I said. Because what I said was hard to you. And I grieved about being about having to say it because I didn't know how you would receive it.
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But I'm glad I said it. You ever been there? Where whatever you had to say to somebody was really hard and you paced the floor.
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Have you ever? Boy, I got a spot on my rug. Where I have paced the floor. Some of us just talking to Mike because we talk for hours and I just walk.
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You give me the best steps. I get all week. I just walk back and forth when we're talking. But I but I have
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I've paced that floor preparing for a conversation.
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And you probably aren't like me. You probably don't think about all the ways a person might respond. You probably don't go through all the scenarios of what's going to happen when you tell them the truth.
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And you probably don't worry like I do about, oh, how's it going to happen when it finally happens? Am I the only one?
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I'll take it if I'm the only one. And you say, oh, you're supposed to be better than that. You're supposed to be a pastor.
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It's a hard life, man. Every one of us who's got to tell the truth and we're all called to tell the truth.
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And when it's time to tell the truth, it's tough. And Paul says. He says,
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I do not regret it, though I did regret it. I've never read something so true. I don't regret it, though I did regret it.
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I did for a little while. You ever sent that email, hit the send button and then went.
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I got I don't know how this is going to go, but click and then it's gone.
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And how how fast have you ever looked for a email return? Like, is there something that can cancel it?
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Like, is there a way to cancel this? How many of you have ever gotten a message on Facebook and then the person deleted it and it says they deleted a message and you're just wondering what they wanted to say and were unafraid to say it or too afraid to say it?
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Am I being too honest? This is this is the way this is it's hard truth, hard truth.
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But he says, I don't regret it. Because it had the desired effect,
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I don't regret it, and I don't think he would have regretted it either way.
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I want you to understand, even if the people hadn't responded positively, even if the church would have ran off into apostasy,
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I think Paul would have still known he did what was right. But in this sense, he can say, I'm overjoyed that I sent it because now
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I see the result and the result is good. Beloved, there is not much of a better feeling in life.
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Than to hear a person say. I repent. When you've shared with them their sin.
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Not because you hate them, but because you love them, not because you're angry with them, but because you're concerned for their soul and you've been honest with them and they have responded to you.
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And repentance. You understand, Matthew 18 begins with that very scenario, we want to talk about church discipline and what church discipline means.
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Matthew 18 begins with this scenario. If your brother sins against you, you go to him privately and share his offense.
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And if he repents, then you stop. And you restore him and it's over.
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And there should be at that moment a moment of rejoicing, even if it's only rejoicing between two people.
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And that's all it should be. So understand, here's the simple application of what we've seen today.
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Paul used hard truths, excuse me, Paul used hard truth with the
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Corinthians. Understand this. That does not mean that Paul was intentionally hateful, rude, spiteful or mean.
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I am not encouraging you all today to go out and become holy jerks.
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I should have got an amen. So some people say, well, I just tell it like it is.
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Most of those people are insufferable. When that's just the way that's their attitude, I just tell it like it is.
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Most of you are insufferable because you're more you're more concerned about what you're saying than how they're responding.
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If you're more concerned about getting it out than you are getting it in.
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Then you're more concerned about you than you are them. Paul wrote hard words, but they were loving words.
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I don't believe Paul nuanced his words, and sometimes nuance does get us into trouble because we nuance things into oblivion.
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But I do believe Paul's words were loving, even though they were hard. So Paul used hard truth of the
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Corinthians. We ought to be willing to use hard truth ourselves.
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Number two, hard truth produced genuine repentance, genuine repentance.
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Understand this, we can't. Well, the gospel message includes a recognition of sin.
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And when we are talking to people about an issue. We have to be willing to call them to repentance if they are sinning.
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Not just say, oh, it's OK. But it has to include if there is sin involved.
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And by the way, not every issue you have with someone is sin. I want to say that to be clear. Sometimes it's just an issue of personality.
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Sometimes I say something you don't like. You say something I don't like. If I didn't sin against you, then I don't need to repent. If you didn't sin against me, you don't need to repent.
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But we may still need to clarify some things. If there are some words that were said that maybe were misunderstood or something. That's one thing.
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But when it is sin. We need to be able to claim it, name it, say what it is and call the person to repentance.
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Again, going back to Matthew 18, if a person sins against you, you go to him and tell him.
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A true friend will be honest. In fact, I don't have it on the board. Most of you probably maybe know it, but Proverbs 27, 6 says this.
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Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but profuse are the kisses of an enemy.
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Ever thought about what that means? That means when your friend who is truly a friend says something that hurts you, that's a faithful hurt.
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Because that is intending to do you good. But profuse are the kisses of an enemy.
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Why? Because an enemy who really doesn't love you. Is quick to do things like flatter you.
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You ever notice how many times in the Bible it warns us against the flatterer? The person who flatters with their tongue.
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Why are we so concerned? Why is the scripture so concerned with flattery? Because flattery is not truth.
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And I want you to know this. I'm thankful, very thankful when people tell me, hey, your ministry helped me.
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It encouraged me. Your sermon helped me. It encouraged me. I'm thankful for that. I appreciate that. But I'm also very thankful when people say, hey, what about this?
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Did you think about this? Even though it's tough to get picked apart, nobody wants that.
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But at the same time, if I'm not willing to be corrected, then I shouldn't be standing here. Right.
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If I'm not willing to have someone say, hey. There might be an issue here.
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And that person is being a friend to me. Now, there may be a time when they're being a nitpicker and that's a problem, too.
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And again, there's ditches on both sides. Brother Andy, right? Not the brother Andy's nitpicker. He's the one with both ditches. Brother Andy's always talking about the two ditches and the two ditches are right.
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You don't want to be a flatterer, but you don't want to be a nitpicker. You want to be a truth teller. You want to speak with straight speech and you ought to be a person who's willing to hear straight speech.
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See, there's there's lessons on both sides. Are we willing to say the truth and are we willing to receive the truth?
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Because if all you're willing to do is say it, but not receive it, then you, my friend, are insufferable.
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I know people like that. They will condemn everyone. But if you call them to account for anything, they will not hear it.
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And that, my friends. Is absolutely I can't that's intolerable for a person who only wants to correct others, but will not be corrected themselves.
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We have to be willing to both speak the truth and hear the truth.
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And pray for repentance. Pray for repentance, beloved, genuine repentance.
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Is worthy of rejoicing, that's the last thing on the on the list we saw, Paul use hard truth with the
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Corinthians, hard truth, produce repentance and genuine repentance is worthy of rejoicing. I mean, again, just look at the text.
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He says he is rejoicing over this. Because godly grief has produced repentance and leads to salvation without regret.
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I am rejoicing over this. Did you know the
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Bible says that there's actually joy in heaven over one sinner who does what? Who repents.
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We should be excited. We should be thanking God when a person who is an unbeliever rejoice or repents and becomes a believer, because that's the initial act of repentance, turning from unbelief to belief, turning to Christ.
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We should be overjoyed by that. Because Jesus says there's rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents.
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And that should be our goal. If we are speaking straight to someone, particularly about the issue of sin, our goal in speaking straight, our goal in straight speech should never be,
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I'm going to tear this person down. I'm going to break this person down. I'm going to make this person feel bad. I'm going to make this person feel terrible.
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No, my goal is to restore them. I want them to repent. Now, sometimes that means
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I have to say something that's going to bring them shame. Do you understand shame is actually a good thing?
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You know what the Bible says in the Old Testament about the people of God with one of the problems they had?
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They had forgotten how to blush. You know what that means? That means they no longer felt shame.
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Shame is one of the things that's actually good. And you listen to modern psychologists and they'll tell you shame is the worst thing in the world.
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You don't want to feel shame. No, understand this. If shame is what leads us to repentance, then shame is good.
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And by the way, do you know the difference between guilt and shame? Someone will come to me and they'll say,
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Pastor, I feel guilty. I said, no, you don't feel guilty. You feel shame. Because guilt is not a feeling.
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Guilt is a state of being. You are either guilty or you're not. If you did it, you're guilty.
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And if you didn't, you're not guilty. But if you're guilty, the feeling that comes along with that is shame and shame is good because shame moves us to repentance.
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Don't run to the psychologist who tells you not to feel the shame. Run to the Savior who's the only one who can save you from your shame.
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Run to the only one who has an antidote. The one who has the antidote is not the guy with the pill.
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The one who has the antidote is not the one who wants to sit there and talk about how your mother or dad treated you for an hour.
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The one with the antidote is Jesus. And he can solve the problem of your shame because he will remove your guilt.
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So what do you do when you take straight speech to a person? You don't leave them in their distress, but you point them to the cross.
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One thing I know, I've never read Paul's severe letter, so I can't say this with the authority of having read it.
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But I can say this with knowing the Apostle Paul, that letter pointed them to Christ.
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That letter said, your sins are scarlet, but he can wash them white as snow.
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Turn from your sin and trust in him. Beloved, if our straight speech doesn't include that, then it's not worth anything.
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Our straight speech must include pointing people to the gospel. If so, if it doesn't, all it's been is an exercise and airing of grievances.
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But if it points people to Christ, then it's an opportunity to see a sinner repent and be restored.
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And beloved, again, I call you this morning to two things. One, be willing to share straight speech with the gospel.
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And two, be willing to hear straight speech when someone tells you.
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And if we did that as a church, if we were honest and truthful and loving, boy, what a revival we would see.
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Let us pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you for the men and women in my life who are willing to be truthful with me.
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And I thank you, Lord, for the opportunities you've given me to be truthful with others. And I pray, especially today,
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Lord, that we would recognize the importance of straight speech.
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As Paul has said, Lord, even though it grieved him, he did not regret it because it brought about life.
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It brought about repentance. Lord, what a blessing. I pray, Lord, if there are those in this room who maybe have been holding back and needing to talk to someone, needing to share with them, needing to go to them,
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Lord, I pray that this has been an encouragement to them. Not to take and go with a hammer, but Lord, to go with the gospel to someone who is in need.
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And Lord, I pray that we would all be those who would take the gospel with us into these conversations, always pointing people to Christ and know that he is the solution and he is the savior.
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And he is the one who can bring our shame and guilt to nothing because he has taken it on the cross.
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We pray this in his name and for his sake. Amen. So each week, either myself or one of the other.