II Cor. 1:1-2
Thanks so much for joining us here on Hope for Today, it is good to be with you and we are excited that today’s lesson is from a New Testament book. It has been a while since we spent time in the New Testament. We just completed about a year of study in Exodus and before that, we went through Genesis. Now we are switching it up a bit and going through the New Testament book of Second Corinthians.
Here at Heralds of Hope, we are convinced the whole Bible is true and in every book of the Bible there are things we can learn when we take the time to study. The reason we study is not only so we can become more intelligent. This can happen and to me, it’s amazing to see the principles God has given us in His Word.
But our main goal for studying God’s Word is so our lives become more like Jesus. The goal is life change, we don’t want to stay the same, we want to become more like Jesus. As it says later in II Corinthians, “we are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory.” This is a neat promise, and this is what we want to happen as we study God’s Word. It is the incredible power in the Word that causes this to happen, we don’t completely understand it, but we have seen it happen and we look forward to the Spirit continuing His transforming work in our lives.
Our title today is “Rightly Dividing the Word” since this is the first lesson from II Corinthians. This lesson looks at the city of Corinth and what made it such an interesting city. If we take some time to understand the city, it will help us understand the rest of the book as we go through it. J Mark also asks other good questions to help us think about what may have gone into writing this book. Our goal is to rightly divide the Word as our title suggests. Now, let’s give our attention to Pastor J Mark Horst as he brings us this first lesson from II Corinthians.
When Heralds of Hope began its Bible teaching ministry more than 50 years ago, the defining feature of that teaching was exposition. One of our core values as an organization is “a focus on the expository teaching of Scripture.” But what does that mean?
The heart of expository preaching and teaching is this; a commitment to preach the text. This commitment is rooted in the biblical declaration of Second Timothy 3:16 that “all Scripture is God-breathed and is profitable for teaching, for correction, for reproof, and for training in righteousness.” Since that is true, the pastor/teacher who wants to speak for God must use God’s Word as the basis for his teaching.
So, how do you know if a sermon is truly an exposition? Here are some questions you can ask. Is the text accurately interpreted, according to both its immediate and broader biblical contexts? Are the main points of the sermon and its sub-points derived from the text? Does the sermon’s application come from the text and is the text being brought to bear on the listeners?
An expositor doesn’t merely preach from a text or on a text, he preaches the text. These three essentials mark an expository sermon, and these three questions will let you know when, in fact, the Word has been preached.
Hopefully, you’ll see how this works itself out as we begin our study in the New Testament book of Second Corinthians.
Whenever we want to understand a document, we must understand the historical background of that document. The importance of understanding historical background is especially true with our interpretation of the Bible. The culture in which the Bible was written is very different from our culture today. If we don’t have some understanding of the cultural practices existing when the Bible was written, we can very easily end up with a wrong interpretation. It was also written in languages unfamiliar to us. Because of this, some people say the Bible is out of date, it’s irrelevant to us today. But that’s not true. Although the outward, cultural scenes have changed, the universal principles remain and apply to us today.
The significance of understanding the historical background is determined by the extent to which a text deals with the specific problems of a particular situation. For example, in Acts 6 we have the situation of Greek-speaking Jewish widows in Jerusalem being neglected in the church’s distribution of resources. To properly understand the passage, we need to know some historical background.
This factor of understanding historical background plays a larger role in the interpretation of some books of the New Testament than it does in others. Knowing the cultural and historical background of Paul’s letters to the Corinthians is very important to our understanding of them and making proper application to our lives today.
There are several questions we must ask ourselves when we study any portion of Scripture. When was this written? What did the author want to communicate? How would his original audience understand what he wrote? What’s different from the time of the writing than today; what’s the same? What timeless principles are involved? What’s the application to our day? These are all questions we’ll attempt to answer as we begin a study of Second Corinthians. Here are the opening verses.
1Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
To the church of God, which is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in all Achaia:
2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Corinth was a prominent city in the first century. It was a Roman colony and the capital of the Roman province Achaia (uh-KI-uh). It was located in Greece on an isthmus, a narrow strip of land between the Aegean and Ionian Seas. This location was strategic – picture the hub and spokes of a wheel – and that made it important both militarily and commercially.
Because of its location, Corinth was a cosmopolitan city. People of many different nationalities either lived there permanently or passed through in their travels to other parts of the region. We’ll discover in our study that this diversity of people became a challenge to the formation of a thriving church.
Corinth was a prosperous city and known for its immorality. Because of its bad reputation, a new Greek word was coined, which meant “to live immorally like a Corinthian.” One Bible commentator described this important city as “intellectually alert, materially prosperous, and morally corrupt.”
Imagine, in that setting, a church being born. All churches reflect, to some extent, the society in which they exist. The church in Corinth existed in a grossly sinful atmosphere that affected them, and it led to some of the issues addressed in Paul’s letters.
The temple of the goddess, Aphrodite, was in Corinth. Hundreds of young women served in that temple as ritual prostitutes! So, idolatry and immorality were closely linked together. There were also other popular idol temples popular. These temples played a significant role in the life of the community. One issue that arose in the church directly from this fact was the discussion of whether a Believer should or shouldn’t eat meat that had been offered to idols.
Acts 18 records Paul’s ministry in Corinth during his second missionary journey. Paul came to Corinth from Athens, which was about 45 miles away. We understand that Paul wasn’t anticipating a very warm welcome in Corinth. His experience in the neighboring cities caused him to approach Corinth “in fear and much trembling,” according to First Corinthians 2:3.
In Corinth, he met Aquila and Priscilla and worked with them in the tentmaking trade. Paul used the income from making tents to preach the gospel. So, he worked all week and then preached in the synagogue every Sabbath. When the majority of Jews rejected his teaching, Paul left the synagogue and began teaching in the house of Justus, next door. I’m sure that irritated the Jewish leaders. His ministry resulted in the salvation of Jews and Gentiles, so the church in Corinth was made up of both. And Paul ministered in Corinth for about a year and a half.
During Paul’s time in Corinth, opposition began to grow. The unbelieving Jews in the city brought charges against Paul before the Roman proconsul, Gallio. But Gallio refused to get involved in a religious dispute. Paul stayed a bit longer but eventually moved on to Ephesus. He remained in contact with the Corinthian church through letters and personal representatives, sending them warnings and instructions.
Paul’s letters to the Corinthians make up his largest body of work directed at an individual congregation. These letters address specific problem areas in Corinth that, unfortunately, are still in the church today. Human nature hasn’t changed since the fall of our first parents in Eden.
After Paul planted the church there and moved on, a variety of factions formed and began quarreling among themselves. These factions developed around various leaders like Paul, Apollos, and others. This was reported to Paul by the people of Chloe, and he also received some questions sent by the church. His counsel and his answers form the letter we know as First Corinthians.
That first letter didn’t clear up the issues in Corinth and the situation continued to get worse. So, Paul made what he referred to as “a painful visit” to them. After this visit, which didn’t seem to have the desired effect, he returned to Ephesus and wrote what we now know as Second Corinthians somewhere around AD 55 or 56.
There appear to be several reasons for Paul’s writing this second letter. One of primary reasons was to defend his apostolic authority to a rebellious minority in the Corinthian church. They accused him of taking too much authority. Because of this, his letter becomes deeply personal as he shares experiences and information that verify his apostolic authority.
Another reason was to strengthen the faithful Believers there, who, thankfully, were in the majority. Finally, he urged them to exercise generosity toward other Believers as an expression of Christlikeness. The overarching theme of the letter seems to be the relationship between suffering and the power of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer.
So then, I’ve titled this series, “Jars of Clay – Suffering, Submission, and Sanctification.” I hope you can join me each week as we explore the book of Second Corinthians.
Thanks, J Mark for these encouraging thoughts on how to better study the Bible. I don’t know about you, but I hope to improve in this area. It was good to hear the background of Corinth and II Corinthians. We have just started our study in Second Corinthians so if you would like a copy of today’s teaching or if you have any questions about it, please let us know.
Here is how you can contact us. The best way is by email. Our email is [email protected]. If you don’t have email, you can write to us, our address is Hope for Today, Box 3 Breezewood, Pennsylvania 15533. Or you can connect with us on our website. Our website is heraldsofhope.org. On our website you can find other helpful resources and more teaching programs like this one, so please look around while you are there. Again, the website is heraldsofhope.org.
Thanks so much for joining us and we hope you will join us next week as we continue this study through Second Corinthians. We have been blessed and we bless you as you study God’s Word. Paul encouraged Timothy by saying, “Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of truth.” And this is the challenge we leave with you, study, rightly divide, and be an approved worker. God bless your week.
*This episode is an exposition by J. Otis Yoder, re-recorded by J. Mark Horst, with an opening and closing by Arlin Horst.