What Happened in Macedonia

I. Introduction
A. Go over the story again, using map.
1. On his second missionary journey, Paul proclaimed the gospel in Corinth and planted a church there, staying for a year and a half, longer than anywhere else before heading home.
2. On his third missionary journey, Paul was evangelizing in and around Ephesus, in Asia Minor, while his associate Titus was Corinth.
3. Titus came to Paul with a report of problems in Corinth. Judaizers had infiltrated the church and had won over one key man in the congregation, who had begun to speak out against Paul.
4. They went together to Corinth to try to address the problems, but it doesn’t go well, with that one man in particular opposing Paul, and the rest of the congregation failing to back the apostle.
5. They leave, Paul pens a severe letter to the church at Corinth (a letter which has been lost), telling them that they must oppose this man.
6. They part ways: Titus takes the letter back to Corinth, Paul returns to Asia Minor
7. Paul gets impatient waiting for Titus to return with a report about how his letter was received
8. Paul heads to Troas, the port city where Titus will arrive on his way back from Corinth.
9. Titus is not there yet. So, Paul begins proclaiming the good news of Christ. And people are interested and eager to hear more.
10. After a while, though, Paul can’t stand it any longer and he sets sail for Macedonia.
a. 2Corinthians 2:12–13 When I came to Troas to preach the gospel of Christ, even though a door was opened for me in the Lord, 13 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.
11. In Macedonia he experiences opposition along with his worries about the Corinthian response to his letter.
12. But there he finally finds Titus having just arrived from Corinth by land.
13. Titus gives him the good news that his severe letter has generally been well received, and that the church did discipline the man, and the man had in fact repented.
14. Gushing with love, relief, and joy, Paul pens 2Corinthians and sends it to Corinth with Titus.
B. 2Corinthians 7:4–7 I am acting with great boldness toward you; I have great pride in you; I am filled with comfort. In all our affliction, I am overflowing with joy. 5 For even when we came into Macedonia, our bodies had no rest, but we were afflicted at every turn—fighting without and fear within. 6 But God, who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the coming of Titus, 7 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.
C. There are so many things here, we only have time for a few. But first...
II. Two questions
A. Why are there lost letters?
1. I believe every letter written by an apostle would have been treated as the word of God. But that doesn’t mean God wanted US to have it.
2. We only have a fraction of all the prophecies God has given to mankind down through the ages.
3. For many prophets mentioned in the OT, we are not given one word of what they prophesied.
4. Some things people needed to know at the time, but we don’t need to know them now. We have what we need.
5. God only knows why. But I have a guess as to why we don’t have the severe letter. Some folks have a very strong impulse to sinfully rebuke in anger, I wonder if God didn’t want us to have an entire letter of rebuking because we could turn it into justification for over-rebuking.
B. Why is this passage here? A man took at boat ride. When he arrived at his destination, he had some problems and was feeling bad. But he met a friend who shared some good news with him and he felt much better. This kind of stuff happens everyday all around the world, and yet two thousand years later and half way round the world we’re reading about this one incident. Why? Who cares?
1. 2Timothy 3:16–17 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
2. For some reason God in His infinite wisdom wanted us to know about this one. This is not here by accident. This is God’s word. Therefore we know that it is useful; we know that we need it.
3. Surely one of the purposes for us having 2Corinthians is to teach us about love. And this story does that.
III. Angst born of love
A. In v.4 Paul refers to the affliction he had before he found Titus. He says in v.5 he experienced fears. In v.6 he says he was downcast.
B. Why would Paul feel this way? He was anxious as to how the Corinthians would respond. But why?
C. I would suggest that it was because he is like Christ, and filled with the Spirit of Christ, and possessing the mind of Christ. Paul carried the burden of Christ for His people around in his heart.
D. He talks about this in 2Cor.11:28-29“Apart from other things, there is my anxiety for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?”
E. You see, when Jesus commanded us to love one another, He didn’t mean just to be nice to each other, He didn’t mean just to put up with each other. He meant for us to have a zeal for each other’s welfare.
F. Generally we think of having peace as a godly thing. But there is a wicked peace.
1. When your Christian friend is wavering in her faith, or when your church is in turmoil, or when your children are not walking with the Lord, not being deeply concerned can be a wicked thing.
2. The apostle Paul was disturbed in his spirit because of his profound concern for the Corinthians.
3. And God has commanded us to be disturbed on behalf of our brothers and sisters when they suffer or when they weep or when their faith falters.
4. Sometimes the godly thing to do is to be disturbed. Sometimes the call of God is to be disturbed.
5. If it did not bother Paul when the faith of the Corinthians was faltering, he would not have been reflecting the love of Christ. His unrest was born of love.
G. Folks, this “being a Christian” is not a hobby. It’s not a club. It’s not a business. This is the kingdom of heaven, the church Jesus is building. Jesus gave His life for His people. He bore the weight of His Father’s wrath for His people. What do we do for them. We can treat them so cheaply.
H. Why is someone’s faith such a big deal? Why is the state of a church such a big deal?
1. It’s because Christ is such a big deal! It’s because knowing Christ and being a part of his family is the only thing which really matters!
2. Physical pain is difficult; relationships can break your heart; disappointment can really hurt. But, my dear friends, all this stuff we deal with constantly in our lives is as nothing compared to the magnitude of knowing the Christ of God.
3. Wanting my child to do well in a game – That’s love, yes. But here it is a zeal for something much more significant than the person’s momentary happiness. It is a zeal their eternal welfare.
4. Paul had “great sorrow and unceasing anguish in [his] heart” for his fellow Jews who didn’t know Christ. (Romans 9:2)
IV. Joy born of love (7:4b)
A. It is remarkable that Paul goes on to say, “In all our affliction, I am overflowing with joy.”
B. So much of Paul’s ministry was a ministry of tears. He faced tribulation and humiliation, "conflicts without" and "fears within," disappointment, betrayal, and persecution.
C. But what made it all worthwhile for Paul were the moments like this one, when he could see the positive effects of his tearful toil.
D. Paul is delighting in the Corinthians’ positive, repentant reaction to his letter of rebuke. In all of his affliction, this is what makes him overflow with joy.
E. Why was it such a big deal to him? Because he loved them so much.
F. Reading The Thought of God by Maurice Roberts in 1996, coming to his chapter on “Prayer for Revival.” He said that it’s not enough to faithfully serve the Lord and leave the results to Him. You must also long for and pray for good fruit to be born in the lives of those you serve. You must pray for revival in their lives.
1. I put it on my prayer list, but when I prayed, something wasn’t right. There’s something wrong with my heart.
2. Eventually I realized that my joy was based on my own success, and my own renown, not on the welfare of those I was ministering to.
G. The older I get in the Lord, the more clear it becomes to me of what is important in life. It is easy to think that someone’s health or job or family or self-esteem are the most important things about how a person is doing. But all of these pale in comparison to what is truly important.
H. Because of his love, Paul found comfort and joy in positive signs of spiritual health he saw in the Corinthian believers.
I. What is it that gives YOU comfort and joy? The older I get, the more I agree with the apostle John: "I have no greater joy than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth." (3John 4)
J. “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.”
V. Confidence born of love (7:4a)
A. “I am acting with great boldness (confidence) toward you; I have great pride in you”
B. Think about how extraordinary this verse is! The Corinthians had given Paul much reason to distrust them. Though he had poured out his all for them in the sincerity of Christian love, they had been suspicious and quick to believe vicious lies about him. And yet their believing the worst about him had not turned his heart away from them. He was still ready and eager to think the best about them, to show confidence in them, to be proud of them.
C. I can’t tell you how many times as a pastor I’ve listened to people trying to justify their distrust of another believer by cataloguing all the "terrible things" that have been done to them.
D. And I’m not saying that we should be naive and mindlessly trust anyone and everyone even when they abuse our trust. But we are so quick to justify self-protection.
E. We are much too afraid of getting hurt, and not nearly afraid enough of grieving our Lord by failing to love one of His children.
1. We are much too afraid of not being loved, and not nearly afraid enough of not loving.
2. We are much too concerned about being wounded, and not nearly concerned enough about one of Christ’s little ones being wounded, or the name of Christ being wounded.
F. It seems so clear to me that most of our distrust of other believers stems more from a lack of love, not from some kind of godly caution. And one of the reasons I suspect this is because whenever I have witnessed people trying to justify their distrust, they seem to lack love for the one distrusted. Rather, you can tell — they’re offended, they’re irritated, there is an edge in their attitude.
G. The attitude of your heart toward another person channels your interpretation of that person. If we hate someone, we look for negative things in them to justify our hatred. We magnify their weaknesses and failures and minimize their strengths and virtues. But when we love someone, we look for positive things in them. We so want them to do well, that we interpret the slightest sign of good in them as an encouragement.
H. In 1Cor.13, Paul says that love believes all things. Love for others breeds trust in others; love breeds confidence in the one loved; love breeds a zeal to look for things to boast about in the one loved.
1. This gives us a helpful way to evaluate our love for others. Am I quick to show confidence in them? Am I eager to find ways to praise them? Am I instinctively looking for things about them to boast about? If not, there is most likely a significant failure to love.
I. The fact is that for most of us, the one we really, really love is ourselves. I am the one I am quick to praise and trust and boast in. I am the one who gets the favorable interpretation. I always construe my own words and actions and motives in the most positive way. I always give myself the benefit of the doubt. But my love for others is often so small.
VI. Conclusion
A. We have spent another morning observing the love of Christ at work in the life of the apostle Paul.
B. Paul had been a man with great zeal for the destruction of Christ’s people, and God turned him into a man with a great zeal for the welfare of Christ’s people. And then he said, “Imitate me as I imitate Christ.” (1Cor.11:1)
C. You see, this isn’t just an inspiring story of apostolic love. It is a marvelous testament to the love of Christ for His people. For what is Paul’s zeal for the welfare of his people but a reflection of the loving zeal of Christ for His people.
D. And just as Paul was willing to rebuke them severely because of his love for them, so God is willing to rebuke us severely because of His love for us. And just as Paul rejoiced at Titus’ report, how God rejoices when we finally see the error of our ways and repent and reopen our hearts toward Him.
E. “Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.” – Luke 15:22–24