There is a trope in the development of a young man’s life to take an old car, work on it with their dad to get it running, and turning it into their first car. George Strait has a song called, “Best Day of My Life,” and its second stanza sings,
“His fifteenth birthday rolled around, classic cars were his thing.
When I pulled into in the drive with that old ‘vette, I thought that boy would go insane.
When you’re in your teens your dreams revolve around four spinning wheels,
We worked nights on end, ‘till it was new again, and as he sat behind the wheel.
He said Dad, this could be, the best day of my life.
I’ve been dreaming day and night about the fun we’ve had.
Just me and you, doing what I’ve always wanted to,
I’m the luckiest boy alive, this is the best day of my life.”
For a lot of people there is an appreciation and love for restored vehicles. I’m not a car guy, but I love seeing old cars that someone took the time to work on and restore. I think the reason for this is because we like to see things back to the way they were meant to be.
And it’s that idea of restoration that brings us back to our final week in our summer series where we will be reading the last four verses of 2nd Corinthians chapter 13, starting in verse 11, as Paul closes out his final letter to the Corinthians. But before we read 2nd Corinthians 13:11-14, let’s take a quick look back at what we’ve gone over these last sixteen weeks.
Paul’s fourth letter to the Corinthians, what we refer to as 2nd Corinthians, can be separated into three sections of topics that Paul is trying to cover. First, Paul opens up this letter by confronting a bad situation that happened on his last trip to Corinth. While Paul was there, a false teacher ridiculed and demeaned him in front of the Corinthian congregation. Paul was more hurt that the people he’s work hard to teach the word of God to did not come to his defense. So instead of lashing out from his pain in anger, Paul took some time to compose himself and write out his hurt. This hurt letter, was then taken by Titus to the Corinthian Church and read. The Corinthians repented of their sin and when Titus returned, Paul wrote this letter to explain his thought process. The reason why Paul writes is to confront the situation, but to do so with restoration as his purpose.
Since restoration is happening in the Corinthian Church, Paul then spends the bulk of the letter encouraging the Corinthians to move forward in their faith. Paul is trying to teach the Church a valuable lesson, bad situations have to be dealt with restoring purpose, and once that restoration happens, we all must move forward in our ever developing spiritual walk. That is the life cycle of the believer, fellowship with God, stumbling to sin, restorative work, a step forward in our walk, and return to full fellowship with God. The goal is less stumbling in sin and more time fellowshipping with God. This only occurs when we turn from that sin and move forward in our walk. When we begin to lock down those two aspects, sin’s appeal lessens more and more.
In the final section, Paul then addresses the false teachers, or what he sarcastically calls, “super-apostles.” He addresses them with hyperbole and sarcasm to point out the ridiculousness of these false teachers claims. In doing so, Paul shows us that to avoid the types of leaders, we must present our selves with bold humbleness, be active in our serving one another, working from a place of weakness, and self-examining our spiritual walks. When we do these things, we understand and seek to follow leaders who do the same. In this way we can avoid “super-apostles” who are out for their own good and not the good of the work of God in the Church.
With all of this in mind, we can read Paul’s final words to the Corinthian Church, from 2nd Corinthians 13:11-14.
11 Finally, brothers, rejoice. Aim for restoration, comfort one another, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. 12 Greet one another with a holy kiss. 13 All the saints greet you.
14 The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
In these four verses, Paul echoes his words from his greeting in chapter 1, adding a few elements to it.
Paul begins calling the Corinthians brothers. This is the general term that includes everyone. All are brothers who accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior. No matter the gender, or the ethnicity, or social status, or economic affluence. As Paul writes in Galatians 3:28, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” Anyone who trusts in Jesus is Paul’s brother, and though he’s had problems with the Corinthians, and they have grieved him so much, he still considers them brothers in Christ, because of their repentance.
Paul then calls them to rejoice. Sometimes it can feel like Paul deals with downer topics. He’s having to correct sexual immorality, fights within the body of Christ, and questions about apostolic authority. Yet in it all, Paul calls the Church to rejoice. It’s the same thing Paul would write to the Philippians Church in Philippians 4:4, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.” No matter the hardship, no matter the set back, we as Christians should be able to rejoice, because our God has overcome all things. Paul is calling the Corinthians to that rejoicing.
From rejoicing, Paul calls the Corinthians to have an aim to restore. How should this be accomplished? Paul gives us several ways. Through comforting one another, agreeing with one another, and living in peace. If we are to aim for restoration after dealing with a bad situation, we have to comfort one another. That means we encourage each other. We don’t dwell on the past problems, but instead we help each other move forward.
We also seek agreements with one another. In our congregation here in Quartzsite, there’s a lot of different opinions on what we call secondary and third tier doctrines. If we focused on those disagreements, there would be endless infighting and this ministry would tare itself a part. So instead we focus on where we agree on the core of the Gospel. From there we can move into Paul’s final aim of restoration.
We live at peace. Problems will come and when they do, we deal with them. No one likes to face problems, but we have to in order to have restoration as our aim. But when conduct ourselves with grace and impartiality, we can move forward in peace. We can do this because we do not harbor ill will towards our brothers and sisters in Christ.
Paul’s words in his early letter to the Corinthians ring out here, “4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. 13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. (1 Corinthians 13:4-13).”
If we call ourselves Christians, yet do not aim for restoration so that we may live in peace within the Church, we are not loving. And if we are not loving, Paul would say we are, “… a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal (1 Corinthians 13:1c).”
From that aim to restore, Paul then calls the Corinthians to “Greet one another with a holy kiss.” This carries with it the idea of embracing. Don’t just say we love, commit to actions that show we love. This is not avoiding people whom we’ve had disagreements with. This isn’t just acting like we love people, but truly having the Holy Spirit transform our desire to be in line with his. This is a hard thing and it might take time to do, and there are some restrictions to it, but it’s embracing those who are also aiming for restoration. Paul writes in Romans 12:9-10, and I like how the New Living Translation puts it, “9 Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. 10 Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other.”
We are to not play at embracing and loving people, we are to really do it as if we are loving and embracing Jesus himself. And just like the Corinthians are to embrace each other, Paul points to the greater embrace that the whole Church of Jesus is doing to them. In Paul’s third lost letter after the Corinthians dealt such a deep pain to Paul, that congregation seemed have cut themselves off from the rest of the Church. But at their repentance, fellowship was restored. So Paul is moving past the offense and showing that the Corinthians are restored, not just to Paul, but to the entire Body of Christ., when he states that, “All the saints greet you.” The whole Church is re-embracing t4he Corinthian body of believers, just as each individual believer should embrace their brother.
Finally, Paul sends a blessing to the Church. It’s a Trinitarian blessing, that oddly begins with Jesus, but makes sense in how Paul uses it. Paul begins with, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ …” It is through the grace of Jesus on the cross that we are in the Body of Christ, and that restoration can occur.
“… and the love of God …” It is by the love of the Father that Jesus was sent to save humanity. Thereby opening the path of restoration.
“… and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” The Holy Spirit binds believers together. We are not simply saved to live and walk on our own. No, we are saved to walk hand-in-hand and arm-in-arm with our fellow saved brothers and sisters. No matter what the situation, if we are aiming for restoration, we embrace one another in true godly love.
There will always be hurt in the Church, because it’s filled with hurting sinful people. Our job as individuals is to seek the aim of restoration. We must learn to be graceful with people, knowing they’re working through sin, just as we are. We must allow for growing pains, confronting improper acts with love and mercy, as best we can. And we must do all this in the power of the Holy Spirit who is building us together for the glory of the Father and Son.
My challenge for you this week is to ask yourself, have you been hurt by someone in the Church? It might be in this congregation, or it might be from a different congregation. Whoever it is, or wherever happened, take this week and seek the Lord’s forgiveness in harboring ill will toward them, and ask of the Holy Spirit to work in you to forgive that person. Write out the hurt, and then erase it as an act of desire that God would take it and restore that person to right fellowship with you.
It’s hard and there might be other things that need to be done before full restoration can occur. Yet we are called to be a people who aim for restoration. We are called to comfort one another, agree with one another, live at peace with one another and embrace one another. God did it with us, “… but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)” That love is to flow from us out onto our brothers and sisters.
Let us be a people who can love as Jesus loves us. Amen.
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