Journeying with Paul...part six

Journeying with Paul continued...

It seems that Paul wrote the 2nd letter to the Corinthians about the time that he started out for Macedonia. From what I've read he wrote the 2nd letter about 6-12 months after he wrote the first one. It would appear that the Corinthian believers required more care from Paul than the believers in other towns. They are also requiring instruction from him on some very weighty matters, sexual immorality, marriage, and now he is once again having to instruct them.

Did he really have time to be constantly instructing, or often instructing, this group of believers? Did he have time to essentially hold their hands through issues that it would seem should be fairly easy to understand are unacceptable? After all, did it really take Paul, or, for us, Scripture, to know that being intimate with your step parent is wrong? This should have been a fairly easy thing for them to handle on their own but they required Paul's help to do it, now he is once again having to instruct them.

We don't get very far into this second letter to the Corinthians before we once again gain insight into Paul's life. He tells them...

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. 2 Corinthians 1:8 ESV

Life was so bad for Paul in Asia that he 'despaired' of life. How bad must things have been, things that we get short snippets of glossed over information on?

If verse 8 isn't enough to tell us what he went through look what he says in verse 9...

Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death.

He felt, strongly felt, the trials and tribulations that he faced in Asia. That was a very trying and difficult time for him and those with him.

In three short sentences he shows us that things were so bad for him that he 'despaired' of life. What does it mean to despair of life? To wish you were not born? To wish you could die? To despair life goes way beyond wishing your circumstances were different, it goes beyond the trials that stretch us to our limit but not to the breaking point. And Paul despaired of life.

Even in that we are given only three short, to the point, sentences to tell us what he experienced. We see a brief snippet of what he felt, what he thought, and then...

But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God...

He uses his own situation to point his audience straight to God.

In the midst of posting, and finishing writing, Journeying with Paul, my husband got me onto another topic that led to me writing something even as I was writing this. I must admit that writing the other article, Knowledge is meaningless, was a nice break from Paul. I'm enjoying writing Paul, enjoying journeying with him, enjoying learning about him but...writing Paul is intense. It's hard work and it has taken me many, many hours to get this far. And so writing an article about something my husband brought up was a nice distraction for a short time but here, as I read 2 Corinthians, I realize that the very article I wrote that distracted me from Paul for a short time, actually ties right into Paul and his teachings, well...I already knew that, I just didn't know it would tie in quite like this.

You see, Paul goes from pointing the Corinthians, and all readers, to God to telling them...

...we behaved in the world with simplicity and godly sincerity, not by earthly wisdom but by the grace of God... 2 Corinthians 1:12 ESV

Paul clearly states that he is doing nothing from earthly wisdom. He also says that 'we' behaved with simplicity. That very simplicity that the Christian finds so comforting goes against all that the world wants us to be and do. A number of years ago I had a book that was about Amish simplicity. I don't know how I came to have the book but I well remember the book. It was a small book, the size of a regular paperback but not the bigger ones, and thin. I had that book for probably several years before I got rid of it. In the time that I had it, I would pick it up from time to time, read a page and put it down again. I doubt I read a total of ten pages. When I owned that book I also owned other Amish books, some fiction, some non-fiction. Amish fiction was pretty popular at one time, for all I know it might still be.

I don't recall exactly what the few pages of that book said or even the subject of any of the pages but I do remember that the whole book, and each one page...chapter...article...were instructions to what the Amish call the English, although it did not say that was who the book was for, on how to live a more simple life, more like the Amish.

I have visited the Amish multiple times, in several different states. I have been to their houses, to their stores, to their auctions. I have talked with them, eaten their food, and admired their wares. They do live a more simplified life than we do. But they also live a harder life. How hard they make their own lives by refusing to use those things that make day to day life easier.

I was once asked if I enjoy sewing. The only answer I could give was...I guess. You see, I really don't know if I enjoy it, I don't dislike it, but I don't know if I enjoy it. It's something I have always done. My grandmother sewed with me on her knee when I was a baby and as I child I was under her, 'helping' her, every time she sewed, or at least every time I knew she was sewing. It was just what I did then and sewing is just something I do now, but how much harder would I make that job on myself if I insisted that store bought material wasn't good enough and insisted on weaving my own material? How much harder would life be if we refused to wear store bought clothes? Use a washing machine? Drive a car?

Life is simpler without the distractions, frustrations, and...benefits...of modern things. Life without electricity simplifies things because you simply cannot use an electronic device. Life without a car simplifies things because you cannot drive and therefore don't need to worry about insurance, tags or getting gas.

But...life without electricity means no fans or air conditioning when the temperatures soar about one hundred. Life without a car means no way of going where you need to when you need to go, or no way to get there quickly, which creates problems when emergencies arise.

Simplicity has it's ups and downs and Americans, as I understand things, have a fascination with simplifying life, at least in theory but rarely are they able to actually live a simpler life. Of course a simple life is all in the eye of the beholder.

Paul, though, clearly says that 'they' lived simply. I have no idea exactly what this meant. I know that Paul said he was like the scum of the earth. It's unlikely that he traveled with more than a medium sized bag containing his belongings.

I once read something about a man that owned...I don't remember how many items but well under 100. This was all that he owned, or so he said. It all fit inside a backpack. I remember little about the article other than how few things this man owned and the picture that was with it. In the picture the backpack lay on the floor with all of the man's possessions laid out neatly around it. There, in that single picture, was everything this man had.

Could Paul have laid out all that he owned like that and, if he had had the ability, taken a single, fairly up close, picture of his belongings. Was that what he meant by simple? Maybe. But I tend to think it had less to do with what he had than it did with how he lived. By our standards today, everyone in Bible times would have had simple lives, even the most wealthiest of people in those times had nothing compared to what we have now, not in things and technology anyway. But by the standards of the time he was in...did simple mean that he lived simply among them? Owning little? Being what American's have at times past referred to as hobo's or vagrants, roaming the countryside, living off what he had at any given time and place than moving on with little or nothing?

I have heard a reformed preacher say that settling into this life is much like staying in a hotel for a few days and redecorating the room, buying new furniture and paint. There is no purpose to decorating a hotel room you will be in for a few days and there is no purpose in making so much about a life that will fade away. Now, that's easier said than done. Staying in a hotel is one thing, living on earth for however long we're allotted is something else. And yet...that's what Scripture tells us to do. We are not supposed to love the things of the world, we are not supposed to be a glutton for anything, stuff would be included in that, and we are supposed to live as if this life doesn't matter.

It would seem that Paul managed that, traveling from place to place. If nothing else all those travels would have made it nearly impossible for him to acquire much worldly possessions, including a home. This was Paul's life, simple, with godly sincerity, like the 'scum' of the earth, despairing of life, feeling as if he was given a death sentence. We now gain much more insight into at least a portion of Paul's life. Before we saw how he lived, heard how he believed, but here, finally, we get an idea of what he feels. Early in this book he wrote of how he had previously written them with 'tears', so we know he cried over the first letter he sent to the Corinthians. But this...this...is so much more insight than that. We get a glimpse into his thoughts, his feelings, a brief glimpse but a glimpse all the same. If we take this bit that we have now seen and add it to what we knew before...

Paul was a fairly powerful man that lost all his power, all his status, and his eyesight, in one encounter with Christ. He was yanked from the life he had, one he may have enjoyed, and thrust into a life of persecution and hardship. He worked as a tent maker while working night and day to give the Gospel. He labored to provide for himself and others while teaching, with much difficulties, strife, and tears. He gave up all he had, or very near all he had, and all he knew, to live like 'scum', travelling from town to town, land to land, giving the Gospel, teaching people how to live as believers, writing them letters of instruction when he couldn't be with them, all while experiencing enough trials and tribulations to despair of life, a simple life that gained him the love of some and the scorn of many, a life that had him telling believers that the Holy Spirit had told him that prison was in his future. He now only experienced all these trials on a daily basis but he knew what awaited him in the future.

This was Paul's life.

And he gave such great insight in the midst of all that...

Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.(vs. 16-18)

Oh, the insight Paul gives us, teaches us...

For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this; that one has died for all, therefore all have died' and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. ( 2 Corinthians 5: 14-15 ESV)

And in the midst of all the great insight, all the wonderful teaching, Paul once again gives us a glimpse into him...

For even if I made you grieve with my letter (1 Corinthians), I do not regret it-though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you, though only for a while. As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting. (2 Cor. 7:8-9 ESV)

We see that Paul grieved as he wrote his first letter to the Corinthians and he rejoiced that they paid attention to what he said, that they grieved over their sins. He hurt writing that first letter, hurt, and if we remember from before, cried over that letter. And now we see what that letter accomplished, what it did, and how Paul feels over the result.

As we move into chapter 10, we once again gain insight into Paul, this time to his character...

...I who am humble when face to face with you, but bold toward you when I am away!

So, Paul is humble when face to face but says what needs to be said when he isn't with them. Does this mean he didn't say what needed saying when he was with them? Or does it mean that he said what needed saying when he was with them but did it in a meek and humble way, gently admonishing them, whereas, by letter he, maybe through necessity because of their writing supplies at that time, he was forced to say what needed saying in as few words as possible, instructing, teaching, and admonishing, without trying to be humble about it? Or maybe Paul was a bit on the shy side, hard to imagine considering he was once a soldier going after Christians, but able to boldly write on paper what he couldn't say in person? Who knows. We aren't given the reason why he was humble in person but bold when away all we know is that he was and it adds another piece to the puzzle that is Paul.

In chapter 10 verse 10 we gain yet another piece to the puzzle of Paul...

For they say, 'His letters are weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech is of no account'. Let such a person understand that what we say by letter when absent, we do when present.

It sounds to me like people were accusing him of acting one way in person but speaking another way in letters. As someone that writes, I have long since known that I can often say things when I write that I just never seem to get out when I talk. Something just happens, in me, with me, when I write that makes my thoughts show up so much clearer when I write them. Was this the case for Paul? Who knows? But he does give us more insight than just that he said things in letter form that he didn't say in person. He went on saying, 'what we say by letter when absent, we do when present.'

As I read that I got the impression that he may be humble in speech but he lived boldly, showing the things he said in letter through his actions. How many times in his letters did he write of how he showed 'you' by example. He wrote of how he lived, how he worked, and he wrote of it as it being an example for others to follow. In my mind, verses 10-11, are telling me that Paul boldly lived what he taught even if he did not speak those things in person. He may not have said them but he led by example. Many times I have seen the statement that children learn more by watching what parents do than listening to what they say. It seems to me that Paul lived what he preached. I guess what I'm trying to say is that Paul may have spoken humbly but he lived boldly.

Paul, in his second letter to the Corinthians, continues to instruct and reprove them. The tone of this letter is much different than the tone of his first letter to them. He instructs here more than chastises. In his first letter he got onto them even while telling them how to act as believers, but, here, in his second letter, he does more instructing and less chastising. It's clear from the tone of both letters that he holds this group of people in high regard, they matter to him. He labors over them, worries over them, cries over them. In fact in this second letter he tells them he loves them...

...God knows I do (love them)! 2 Corinthians 11:11 ESV

Paul has given us great insight into not only the life of a Christian in these two letters but also into himself as well. We have seen much, or at least it seems like much to me, of his thoughts and feelings. We know how he felt under persecution and strife, we know his feelings for those in Corinth, and for Christ. We, or at least I, have gained an understanding of Paul that I did not have before.


To be continued...