2 Corinthians August 9, 2022
Corinth: Capital of the region Achaia.
He references things from other letters he had written, which lets us know this is not his second letter. It is simply what we call 2 Corinthians.
Written from Macedonia 56 A.D. about a year before he wrote Romans from Corinth. 2Corinthians is largely a response to church drama. If you’ve spent any time in church, you know there can be drama. Most people just leave and go to another church leaving their relationships behind.
Remember, this was a church Paul planted. They were attacking him because there were teachers who were “better communicators” so they wanted him to defend why they should listen to him.
Paul felt that what he preached and who he was were the same.
Paul was encouraging the church to take up an offering to take to Jerusalem to aid the church there through a famine. Paul sends Titus to prepare the church, but Titus is met by a group teaching a false gospel in the church. So Paul wrote this letter to correct them.2 Corinthians
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother, To the church of God that is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia: Letters were on scrolls so it was common to identify yourself at the beginning.
He declares Jesus was the one who sent Him.
He is speaking to those who are believers.
2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Grace is to ask God to shower blessings on you that you don’t deserve.
Peace is to ask God to be with them in a known way.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort,
4 who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
5 For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.
6 If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer.
7 Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.
com·fort
[ˈkəmfərt]
VERB
ease the grief or distress of;
console: parakalein
παρακαλεῖν
to comfort
(to invite, to draw near)
Comfort is an invitation to walk through pain or distress with God by our sides.
Paul saw his suffering as equipping him to help others. We see suffering as compounding our own misery. Me, me, me, me, me.
When you suffer it is so that you can be comforted.
When drama occurs we need to learn how to reconcile and resolve these things.
8 For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself.