Faithful are the Wounds of a Friend

0:52And that was a little boy's dream because all around my house were these vacant lots that had scrap wood and nails and everything that you could want to play with as a little boy. And so we would run around and we'd build these forts and swords and you name it. We had a great time out there. But what that meant was that at the end of every day, I would come home and I would have about nine different splinters in my hand.

1:17And I think dads, just tell me if I'm wrong about this, I think dads get some kind of twisted pleasure from digging splinters out of their kids' hands. I would do anything to get those out myself. Because I knew that if I had to go see Dr. Dad, that surgery was going to be brutal. No painkillers, no liquor, just that sewing needle and those tweezers and that crazy look in his eye. But I will say this: although I dreaded it, and I felt like I was going to pass out while he was working on me every time, every time he got those splinters out, my hand felt so much better.

1:58He wounded me, but he wounded me in order to heal me. Last week we saw that the Corinthians were upset with the Apostle Paul because he hadn't come to visit them after he said that he would. So some were accusing him of vacillating, of changing his mind, of lacking integrity with respect to doing what he promised that he would do. And so today, what Paul is going to do is he's going to explain his actions. He's going to tell them, listen, if I hurt you in any way, I only did it out of love and with a desire for reconciliation with you.

2:34And so we're going to be reminded this morning of the truth of that ancient proverb: profuse are the kisses of an enemy, but faithful are the wounds of a friend. So let's pick up here in verse 23. You can see with the language that Paul is using as he starts this section that the Corinthians have placed Paul on trial, so to speak. And what does Paul do? He plays the role of the prosecuting attorney against himself.

3:08He calls a witness against himself. And who does he call as his witness? God. Who does that? What defendant prosecutes himself? And what defendant calls a witness against himself? What defendant certainly calls God, the omniscient, almighty God, to witness against himself? Only a man who knows that he's innocent. Remember what Paul said in verse 12? If you back up there, take a look. For our boast is this, the testimony of our conscience, that we behaved in the world with simplicity and godly sincerity.

3:54See, Paul knows that he's innocent of the charges that have been leveled against him, that he was vacillating with his travel plans, that he lacked integrity, that he couldn't be trusted to keep his word. And so finally, here in verse 23, he gives the reason that he did not make his visit. He says, It was to spare you that I refrained from coming again to Corinth. It was to spare you. He's not saying that if he came, he was going to drop the hammer on them. He never abused his authority as an apostle. That's why he says this: not that we lord it over you. Faith in verse 24, but we work with you for your joy, for you stand firm in your faith.

4:40You may remember back in Matthew chapter 20, the disciples are upset with each other and they're arguing about who's going to be the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. They're having this big discussion, this big argument. Here's how Jesus corrected them. Take a look at the screen. Jesus called them to him and said, You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lorded over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you.

5:06But whoever would be great among you must be your servant. And whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many. So Paul is saying that unlike the false teachers who came to Corinth since he left, Paul and his team never lorded authority over the church. That's what the Gentiles do. No, they came to Corinth and they planted the church and they preached and they wrote and they lived their lives in front of them to serve.

5:49That's why they came. They were with them for their joy. They were already standing firm, the Corinthians were, in their faith, because as Paul talked about in 1 Corinthians last year, he had already. Laid the foundation of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Other people could come in and they could build on that foundation with wood or hay or stubble that would be burned up when God judged the work. Other people could come in and build with gold or jewels or precious stones that would survive the refining fire, but the foundation was there. The foundation was set. It was laid.

6:22So other people are just now coming and building on that. And so Paul says, listen, I am not coming to judge you. I'm coming to build on that foundation when I come. And the only reason I didn't come was to spare you. Now let's pick up in chapter 2. He says, for I made up my mind not to make another painful visit to you. You may remember that after Paul wrote what we call 1 Corinthians, he came to Corinth to check on the church and see how they were doing in terms of implementing all the things that he commanded in his letter. But the visit ended up being very painful because not only had they failed to do anything that he commanded them to do, but they were also rejecting his authority as an apostle.

7:14So he writes them a letter, which he refers to here in verse 4. He writes them this letter, and look at the language that he uses. For I wrote to you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears. Not to cause you pain, but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you. So that letter was obviously very hard for Paul to write. He talks about the affliction and the anguish of heart and the many tears that he shed over it. But it was a necessary corrective. It was discipline that was motivated by love.

7:55You see, one of the ways that Paul describes his relationship with the churches that he planted is by using familial terms. He uses family language. He calls himself a father with his children. He refers to him and the other apostles as nursing mothers among them. And kids in every generation have probably never believed this, they probably never will believe this. But no parent likes to discipline their child. I mean, what do parents always say in the act of discipline?

8:28This hurts me more than this hurts you. And every kid ever is like, of all the dumb stuff that you say, that is the dumbest. But it's absolutely true because no parent delights in disciplining his or her child. It's hard, it's painful. That's why so many parents just ignore disobedience. That's why they redirect their kids instead of dealing with it for the 110th time that morning, because it's hard and it's painful. But it's a good thing. Look at what Hebrews 12 has to say.

9:06It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good that we may share his holiness. For the moment, all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

9:57So, what Paul is doing is he's explaining his rationale for not coming to visit them at this time. He had already made a painful visit. He'd already written this painful letter. He'd already disciplined them as a loving parent. That was all he could do. Now, all he could do is wait for the Spirit of God to bring the heart change that they needed. And every parent knows that. You can discipline your child, you can correct them, but there comes a point where you just have to wait for the Spirit of God to bring that heart change. Because the best that we can do is behavior change. God has to change hearts, he has to change us from the inside. And only after their hearts have changed could he be glad, as he talks about in verse 3. And see, that's because discipline, loving, godly, biblical discipline, it's all about restoration.

10:56It is all about reconciled relationships between us and God and between one another. That is the whole point. That's what Paul wants in this situation. He wants reconciliation between the Corinthians and God, and between the Corinthians and him. That's why he wrote the painful letter after his painful visit. It's why he refrained from coming again because he wants reconciliation, and this is the only way that he could see that happening. Now, I want to do something that may seem a little strange at first. I want to skip this next section and go to verse 12. Because one of the things that Paul does in this letter is he sometimes addresses things thematically instead of chronologically, and that's what he's doing here. So let's pick up in verse 12.

11:49When I came to Troas to preach the gospel of Christ, even though a door was opened for me in the Lord, my spirit was not at rest because I did not find my brother Titus. There. So I took leave of them and went on to Macedonia. So after Paul writes this painful, sorrowful letter, he sends it with his brother Titus to carry it personally to the Corinthian church. And the plan was that Paul was going to finish ministering in Ephesus. Titus was going to carry the letter to Corinth, and then they were going to meet up in the city of Troas. Paul had wanted to bring the gospel there, he'd wanted to plan a church there for some time, and so that just made sense.

12:33But like so many plans on the mission field, this one fell apart as well. So Paul is forced out of Ephesus after the riot that's recorded in Acts chapter 19. And so he comes to Troas, he begins ministering, and Titus isn't there. So Paul is like, well, that's okay. God has opened a door for me. I'm going to do some ministry here. There were people that were at least willing, if not eager, to hear the good news of Jesus. But Titus still wasn't there. And the more time that passed, the more anxious Paul became about him and what happened. I mean, just on a personal friendship level, what if Titus encountered difficulty on his journey? What if the same thing happened in Corinth that happened in Ephesus and Titus was in prison? Even more, Paul is worried about the Corinthian church. How did they receive the letter? Did they ever get it? Have they responded? Did they respond well?

13:36Here's how torn up that Paul is about this situation. He gets to Troas, he begins to preach the gospel. God has opened this effective door for ministry, and yet look at verse 13 again. My spirit was not at rest because I did not find my brother Titus there. He was concerned about Titus. But he was so concerned about the Corinthian church, so concerned about their obedience to God and about being reconciled with them, that the apostle to the Gentiles, Paul himself, even though this effective door for ministry had been opened, he's so distracted that he has to leave.

14:22Church, we should be challenged by how emotionally invested Paul is in the church. The fact that they weren't submitting to God's word, the fact that they weren't at peace with one another, this just tore him apart. And so I think we should all ask ourselves, am I emotionally invested in the church? Does it bother me when people aren't walking in obedience to Christ? In the church, does it bother me when I'm not reconciled, when I'm not at peace with people in the church?

15:10I think without a doubt, many of us are, but for others, the honest truth is that we're just not that emotionally invested in the church. Church is an event. We go once in a while, if our schedule permits, might listen or watch online as our schedule permits, but we're not that emotionally invested. It's just not that big of a deal to us whether our fellow believers are walking in obedience or whether we're at peace with one another.

15:36But I'll tell you, it is a big deal to me. I feel like there are seasons where I just go around with knots in my stomach because of some of the choices that my brothers and sisters in Christ are making. Or if I feel like people are upset with me because of something that I've said or done, maybe just as a Christian, maybe as a pastor, and that we're not at peace for some reason, it bothers me because I'm emotionally invested.

16:09And sometimes I meet people and I tell them I'm a pastor, and they'll say, you look so young. And I'm like, well, now you know God is real. Because after 15 years of pastoral ministry, I feel as old as Methuselah. And that's because I'm emotionally invested. I care. I think we should all care to a deep level, like Paul does. He's emotionally invested in the church. And so finally, what happens is Paul leaves Troas, he goes to Macedonia, and he does link up with Titus, who tells him how the Corinthians responded. So let's back up now to verse 5 and pick up in that previous section.

16:55So what you find here in verse 5 is that when they connect, Titus tells them that the Corinthian church did receive his letter well, and they did carry out Paul's instructions. What were those? It was to discipline the man who was living in unrepentant sin. Well, who is this man? Is it the man who was living in sexual immorality back in 1 Corinthians 5? Maybe so. Is it the leader of this rebellion against Paul? Maybe so. Whoever he was, what is certain is that Paul instructed them: you've got to discipline this guy who's living in unrepentant sin because he's causing you, the whole church, a great deal of pain.

17:37And see, I think we're all tempted to believe that our sin really only affects us. What I do in private only affects me. But you've got to remember what Paul talks about in Romans. We are the body of Christ. And so if one part is suffering because of sin, it affects all of us. There is no such thing as private sin. And so, what did this discipline look like? Look at verse 6. Paul refers to this punishment by the majority. In other words, by a majority of the believers in the church at Corinth. And what we have to do is, no matter who he's talking about, we have to go back to 1 Corinthians 5 because that will explain what Paul is commanding the church to do with somebody who's living in unrepentant sin. So, let's assume for a moment that he's talking about this man who's living in sexual immorality. Take a look at the screen.

18:33He says, This, it is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans. For a man has his father's wife, and you are arrogant. Ought you not rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you. For though absent in body, I am present in spirit. And as if present, I have already pronounced judgment on the one who did such a thing. Listen to his instructions. When you are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus, and my spirit is present, with the power of our Lord Jesus, you are to deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord.

19:22So, what Paul is referring to by the punishment of the majority, or by the majority, is that the church gathered. Together for the purpose of considering this man who is living in unrepentant sin in light of his profession of faith. And so the church gathers together and they say, You know what? Paul is right. We need to remove this man from our fellowship. And you might hear that and say, Now, wait a minute. They removed a man from membership in the church because he sinned?

19:59That seems very unloving. More than that, it seems hypocritical. I mean, didn't Jesus say, Judge not, lest you be judged? Well, he certainly did. The problem is that most people only know that phrase. They don't know the full context of what Jesus taught. So let's take a look at Matthew 7. He says, Judge not that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce, you will be judged. And with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, Let me take the speck out of your eye when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite. First, take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.

20:57So, what does Jesus actually teach? He doesn't teach, never judge your brother. No, he says two things. The first thing he says is, you have to have the same standard for others that you have for yourself. Whatever standard you use, whatever measure you use, that's the standard that's going to be used for you. There are no double standards allowed. But the second thing he says is, take the speck out of your brother's eye. He doesn't say, notice the speck in your brother's eye. Shrug your shoulders and say, well, I'm a sinner too. What can I do? No, he says, take the speck out of your brother's eye. Just make sure you take the log out of your own eye first.

21:50See, we don't go to other professing believers and tell them, you can't live that way. We go to them and we say, my brother, my sister, we can't live that way. Because what is a Christian? A Christian is a repentant sinner. The difference between non-Christians and Christians isn't that they're sinners and we're not. The difference between Christians and non-Christians is that Christians are repentant sinners. We see our sin for what it is. We acknowledge it. We confess it. And we seek to turn away from it and to live in obedience to the commands of God.

22:42So when we practice church discipline in obedience to Jesus' commands in Matthew 18 or in obedience to Paul's commands here, all we're doing is we're holding each other accountable to actually live out what we say that we believe. We're saying to someone who's living in unrepentant sin, listen, you profess to be a Christian, but you aren't living like a Christian. So we have to remove you from our fellowship so that you don't think that living in sin is okay, and so that our community, these people around us, don't think that we think that that's okay.

23:22Otherwise, we're allowing people to think that their sin is no big deal. And we're telling outsiders that sin is no big deal. And we're ruining our witness in the community. So the majority of the church disciplines this man for his unrepentant sin. And it's clear that this man repented. That's why Paul says the punishment by the majority is enough. It's enough. Why is it enough? Because it had the intended effect. The man repented. So take a look at verse 7.

23:56Paul says, so you should rather turn. To forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So I beg you to reaffirm your love for him. See, what did we say earlier? What's the purpose of discipline? It's restoration. It's reconciliation between God and people who have sinned and reconciliation with other believers. That's the purpose. Punishment is not the purpose. We're not trying to make people feel guilty or feel ashamed. Paul says we don't want anyone to be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. The goal is reconciliation. And so Paul says here in verse 9, that's why I wrote, to secure your obedience to God. Now that you've disciplined him, now that he's repented, it's time to comfort him. It's time to forgive him. It's time to reaffirm your love for him.

25:00Verse 10. Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. Indeed, what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ. In Matthew chapter 18, Peter comes up and he asks Jesus, how many times should I forgive my brother? And he kind of goes out on this limb and he's like, up to seven times? That seems like a lot. And Jesus says, not seven, but seventy-seven. He wasn't saying, oh, the 78th time you dropped the hammer. He's just saying, there's not a limit to how many times you forgive your brother. And why is that? It's because we have received abundant grace and mercy from God. He has forgiven us so much. So then we must turn to our fellow brother or sister and forgive them when they sin against us. That's the primary reason that we forgive other people. It's because we have experienced God's amazing, unlimited grace and forgiveness.

26:14But there's another reason that we forgive each other. And it's one that we always overlook. Look at verse 11, so that we would not be outwitted by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his designs. Isn't that remarkable? Paul is saying that one of Satan's schemes, his designs, to render the church powerless, is to convince us to live in unforgiveness. We are living a few hundred years now after the Enlightenment, and one of the central tenets of the Enlightenment is that.

27:00There's a functional denial of the supernatural. So, in other words, this material world in that worldview is really all that exists. And I think that many Christians today, especially in the West, we're just unaware of how much that worldview gets imported into our theology. So, we know that Satan is in the Bible. We just don't think that Satan can be in our ears whispering his poisonous lies. When somebody sins against us, it's already hard to forgive them because we're offended. We don't want to forgive. What do we want? We want justice. We want them to get what they deserve.

27:51So, forgiving anybody is already a hard task because of our sinful hearts. We forget that we've been forgiven much and therefore we need to forgive. But then it's even harder because we have this enemy, this adversary, who is whispering lies to us. Can you believe that he did that again? She doesn't deserve your forgiveness. You've already put up with so much. She's just a hypocrite. She always does this. Guys, that's spiritual warfare. It's Satan trying to do what he does. Steal and kill and destroy. He wants to embitter us. He wants to ruin relationships. He wants to divide the church.

28:40Satan loves it when we make assumptions and when we jump to conclusions and we gossip and slander and basically talk to anybody and everybody except for the person that we actually have a problem with. So when someone sins in the church, or even when there's just hurt and misunderstanding, and it results in divisions and factions, maybe there's something else going on. Maybe we're actually in the process of being outwitted by Satan. But there's no reason for us to be outwitted by Satan. We have the Holy Spirit living in us and among us. And what's more, Jesus gave us Satan's playbook.

29:32We know who he is and what he's trying to do. So there's no reason for us ever to be outwitted by Satan. But he was active in this situation between Paul and the Corinthians. He was capitalizing on their sinful hearts. He was capitalizing on those false teachers that came into Corinth. And as much as anything, he was probably capitalizing on the time and the distance that separated them and Paul. And aren't we experiencing? This exact same thing during the pandemic? Everything is harder. Everything is worse because we can't get together face to face. Even if we can get to face to face, we just get eye to eye. That's it.

30:13You can't, in this environment, it's very hard to get together with anybody and work out conflict. Satan loves that. He loves to capitalize that. And he got the church to turn on Paul, the man who had planted the church and loved them and served them and sacrificed so much for them. Friends, Satan is really good at what he does because he's been at it for thousands of years. He lied to Adam and Eve. He lied to Job. He lied to David. He lied to Jesus. He lied to the Corinthians. And he's still lying to us.

30:56If you're not yet a follower of Jesus, it might be because of this very reason that Satan has been lying to you. Every time you start to think about Christianity, every time you start to think about Jesus, you have this thought that seems to come from nowhere that you're like, but Christians are just a bunch of hypocrites. They're just a bunch of pretenders. I don't want to be associated with that. Being a sinner doesn't make you a hypocrite. Hypocrite. Being a sinner makes you a human.

31:37Being a sinner while covering up your sin or while pretending that you're not a sinner, that's what makes someone a hypocrite. A Christian is a repentant sinner. So when you see us fall into sin, just know that that's not the goal. We're seeking to turn away from that. But let it be the reminder to you that it's not just you. We're not pointing fingers at you saying you need a Savior. We're saying we all need a Savior. All of us are sinners. All of us have fallen short of God's glory. All of us will be judged righteously for our sin. And so every one of us needs a Savior, and Jesus is that Savior. He is the one who came and lived and died and rose again on behalf of sinners. Anyone who acknowledges their sin, anyone who turns from it to faith in Christ, God promises to save.

32:39So don't let Satan outwit you. Don't let him fill your head with every excuse and every justification for not following Christ. Instead, receive him. He is the Savior that you need. And for those of us who are already following Jesus, let's not allow Satan. Satan to outwit us either. See, if he can't get us to destroy ourselves through our sin, he'll try to get us to destroy each other through unforgiveness. And in the process, what he wants to do is he wants to destroy any chance that we have to bring other people into the kingdom of God.

33:21And so let's love each other enough to pray for each other and to confront one another when it's necessary so that we can seek forgiveness and reconciliation because that's the goal. We don't wound each other just to wound each other. We wound each other so that there could be healing, so that there could be reconciliation between us and God and reconciliation between each other. All these years later, that ancient proverb is still true. Profuse are the kisses of an enemy, but faithful are the wounds of a friend.

34:05Let's pray. God, your word is always perfectly timed. It's always relevant. And I think about our culture and this unhealthy place that we've come to. Where so many people are willing to confront each other on the internet, sometimes anonymously, but always behind the safety of a computer screen or a phone. And yet, we are so unwilling to pursue a person face to face to seek understanding and to seek reconciliation. God, forgive us for the ways that we have handled conflict poorly.

35:12Forgive us for being at peace when there are people in the body of Christ who are not obeying your word. Forgive us for being at peace when we're not at peace with each other. We can't possibly be at peace with you if we're not at peace with each other. And so, Lord, we pray today that you would help these words sink deep into our hearts so that we would believe them. And we, by your grace and by the power of the Holy Spirit, would put them into practice.

35:53Thank you, God, for the way you worked to reconcile us to yourself and for the way that you have caused. Called us to reconcile with one another. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening to the sermon audio from New Life Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. For more information or to support our ministry, visit us online at newlifecs.net.