Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / December 17, 2023 | 2 Corinthians - How To Brag

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December 17, 2023 | 2 Corinthians - How To Brag · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Great to be with you.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: So if last week when we talked about um meekness, if that was one of those things that just kind of hit you straight between the eyes, you're gonna love today because it's basically it's the same thing but different.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um we're gonna talk a little bit about boasting this morning, bragging.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: And um so if you if you have one of those friends that you know makes everything about themselves, or if you are the grandparent that whips out your wallet and you know, the the photos of all the grandkids just hit the floor and you have to tell everybody about how wonderful every one of them is, or you know, the person on social media who just goes, so humbled and embarrassed to say that I have been announced the greatest person ever.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they they give the the false sort of humility, and it's like, who is asking?
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Not me.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't have known unless you said something.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: So more often than we like to admit, right, we we do like to think about ourselves, and um we we like other people to think about us and be impressed by what we have going on.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's natural.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Natural in the sense that we are by nature, by our sin nature, selfish people, so it makes sense that this is something that we would want to do.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: And our primary tool for doing this is bragging or boasting, right?
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's telling people who didn't ask about things in our life that should impress them.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um but what happens though when uh we're just trying to maybe tell the truth and somebody takes it as a boast?
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: Is there uh a proper time for some kind of boasting?
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: Is it is it possible to do it without being wrong?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um these are some really interesting questions that Paul is going to get into because he has a very unique situation as he's speaking with the Corinthians, which is that he is um boasting certainly, and he has no problem saying actually that he is boasting, but he's doing it in a very specific way and for a very specific reason.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh the problem is that there are many in Corinth who think that he is boasting for the wrong reasons or have this perception of him, and so he's gonna spend this morning we're gonna look at this passage that gives a couple reasons why.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: Paul kind of sort of separates the wheat from the chaff, and he says, Well, there's two ways to boast, and I'm doing it this way, and you're you're trying to do it this way.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna look at that this morning.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: But if we actually rewind just a little bit to last week, we we touched on this briefly, and I said, We're gonna talk about this next week.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: And you said, Oh boy, and here we are.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: He says, For if I boast a little too much about our authority, which the Lord gave for building you up and not for tearing you down, I will not be put to shame.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so Paul, I mean, just beginning, like right off the bat, he has no problem saying, I am boasting, I am, I am bragging in a way, and I'm not gonna be put to shame about it, but it doesn't mean that the Corinthians are justified in their perceptions of Paul and his bragging.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because it is hard to say, I mean, I would challenge you to do it, it is hard to go up to somebody and say, Ah, Jesus Christ sent me on my mission to minister to you and share the gospel and not sound like a bit like a tryhard, right?
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: To say that Jesus Christ sent you and that you are anointed essentially by God as an apostle to minister to the Gentile nation, that you have a special role that you are carrying out.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so Paul has to come in and say some of these things.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: And yet, everything he is saying is true.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: He was appointed by Christ to go and minister to these people.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: He is deserving of respect.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: He should be able to have spiritual authority over them because of his position.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so, at the same time, the things that he is saying are completely true and valid.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: But then there are those, we've talked about them as we finish uh 2 Corinthians, the final two weeks, um, or two weeks left after Christmas, uh, we'll look more at these super apostles who have invaded the church and these false teachers who've come in, and Paul's kind of devoted the end of his letter to combating them.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things that they are doing is they have come in and sort of in this vacuum of power, as Paul has left, um, they have come in and they have tried to set themselves up as the leaders, and they are certainly boasting, and they are doing it in a way that Paul does not like, and they are doing it in a way that is very, to use Paul's word, very fleshly, very focused on sort of human perception and not heavenly things.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: And so now what Paul is going to do is he says, well, okay, if I boast, let's at least talk about this.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: What are they doing?
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: What am I doing?
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: What are the differences here?
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: And we're going to see that there are three main differences that Paul is going to draw out.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: And finally, before we get to the text, you also have to understand there's this kind of nitty-gritty issue happening here where back in Greek culture, uh, it was typical for teachers or leaders who were coming into an environment, a new environment, that they would have some sort of like letter of recommendation or verbal uh sort of support for their teaching.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: So essentially they had a resume and they would be like, this is who I've spoken to, this is who thinks I'm fantastic.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they've spoken on behalf of me, right?
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: The idea of shame and honor culture, this is what we're talking about back then.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: America does not have shame and honor culture.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: We have no problem with shame.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: But back then, the shame and honor culture, Paul should have, according to the Corinthians who are immersed in this, uh, they would be expecting uh that he would have this sort of recommendation or commendation uh before him.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: And the problem is that he, Paul then, has expected that since he left the Corinthians, that basically when these new people came in, that they should have, the church body itself, would have been, uh they would have commended Paul to those who had come in, and therefore he should have no need to justify himself, if that made sense.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: He's expecting that the church would stand up for him, but instead they're not.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: And therefore that puts Paul in the very awkward position of needing to commend himself.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a cultural thing, but this is where some of the boasting comes from.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: He's it's part of making sure that they understand his authority.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, to the text.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: This morning we're in one long block of text.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's all in one slide, so don't get overwhelmed.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: For we don't dare classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: But in measuring themselves by themselves and compare comparing themselves to themselves, they lack understanding.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: We, however, will not boast beyond measure, but according to the measure of the area of ministry that God has assigned to us, which reaches even to you, Corinthians.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: For we are not overextending ourselves as if we had not reached you, since we have come to you with the gospel of Christ.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: We are not boasting beyond measure about other people's labors.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: On the contrary, we have the hope that as your faith increases, our area of ministry will be greatly enlarged, so that we may preach the gospel to the regions beyond you without boasting about what has already been been done in someone else's area of ministry.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: So let the one who boasts boast in the Lord, for it is not the one commending himself who is approved, but the one the Lord commends.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: So, you can see by use of the word recommendation and commendation here what Paul is talking about.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: He's been put in an uneasy position where he needs to commend himself.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And to get to the end of that point, basically he's saying, The Lord is the one that commends me.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: I am not going to do it myself.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to jump through all of your hoops that you want me to jump through.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: Nevertheless, I will show you what it looks like to boast in the Lord, because there are things to brag about when God is in the situation.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: The problem is that the Corinthian superapostles, again, Paul uses that word ironically later on, the superapostles, very sarcastically.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: He says, They, though, they have fallen into these three failures in the way that they're boasting.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so Paul draws out these three things.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: The first one is that they are comparing themselves, or when we compare ourselves to others.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: And then the quote there at the beginning, for we don't dare classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves, but in measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves to themselves, they lack understanding.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: So these superapostles have come in, and what they've done is they've begun to compare themselves to Paul.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: And from a very worldly sense, uh, Paul fails that test.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: They are more charismatic, apparently, than he is.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: They are better speakers.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: They are for all, long story short, for all the things that the Greek society really cares about, they are what they would imagine as great leaders.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: And Paul sort of like falls on his own sword multiple times.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: He goes along with them, they're roasting him, and he's like, more.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, no, I uh I am poor and and I don't speak well, and I don't dress well, and I am oftentimes homeless, and I didn't ask you for money, which back then they wanted him them to be asked for money because it was a sign that they were supporting their teacher.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: And so all of these different things are going on, right?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: And Paul says, Yes, I fail that test.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: You are better than I am.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so these superapostles are comparing themselves to Paul.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: But in response, what Paul consistently does is one of two things.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Either, like I said, he emphasizes his own weakness, so therefore, doesn't, you know, compare himself back to the superapostles, or he begins to lift up the other people in his ministry and describe the works of God.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: And so what he does is he takes out the game of comparison entirely.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: He moves it from this sort of horizontal relationship of person against person and into this vertical plane where he's comparing himself over and against to Jesus Christ.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: How many times have we talked about in this series?
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: Paul says, the gospel of Christ is compelling me to do this thing, and I am trying to live like Jesus.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: That was where the message on meekness came from.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so Paul has removed himself from kind of that rat race of yes and no and who's better at what.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, no, I'm resting in my relationship with Christ, and when it comes to this game of comparison, I'm not gonna play it.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: What instead I'm going to do is I'm gonna lift up other people.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna sacrifice myself.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so the first error they have made is that they have sort of used taken this opportunity of boasting and used it to lift themselves up, these superapostles, instead of other people.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: Paul's gonna use the opportunity of boasting to either lift up other people or to lift up God.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: This is what he does.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: We talked about this in the uh sermon just a couple weeks ago on giving, that everybody has struck from their memory, right?
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_00: This is in 2 Corinthians 8.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: This is what Paul said.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: You might have forgotten.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, show them proof before the churches of your love and of our boasting about you.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: He says this to the Corinthians.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: He's like, We, I and my ministry partners, we are boasting about you to other people.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: We go to these other churches because Paul wrote uh 1 Corinthians from Ephesus, and now in 2 Corinthians, he's writing that letter from Macedonia.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: And so while he is writing this letter to the Corinthians about how great the Macedonians are, he's like, Well, we're also telling them how great you are.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so Paul loves taking these chances to brag on uh the work of God, right?
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's a great sign.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: But what can also be true is that we uh brag on or boast about other people in situations and think that it removes us from the act of comparison, right?
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: This is why, so I bring up, you know, that the example of the grandparent or the parent that has the wallet, you know, fold-out photo sort of thing.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like there's a situation where that is perfectly wonderful, and there's a situation where that falls into a sinful kind of boasting, right?
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: And it all comes down to the heart.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: Where is the heart when these things are happening?
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because it is not just that you remove the boasting from yourself specifically, the situation can still be about you generally.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_00: Why are you bringing up these other people or these other situations?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: Is it still for the purpose of comparison?
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: In this first error, we often fall into it.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, because comparing ourselves with other people never comes out the right way.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: We either do it and we're disappointed because we don't live up to whatever standards we feel like we need to have, and then it drives us forward, and sometimes we boast in that way, right?
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: As a need to then compare to other people and a need to show that we are better than, um, even if we might not want to use those words, that's still what's happening.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes we use the proxy of a business or kids or grandkids or some other situation in order to do the work for us, right?
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: My kid's better at soccer than your kid is, so just saying, you know, my kid scored six goals, your kid didn't score any.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_00: Just a reminder, right?
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: So sometimes we use this as a proxy for still comparing ourselves and getting into this thing, which is a failure in many ways, and uh a reference to our sin nature and the fact that we like to boast.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: So what we have to remember is that when we do this, we're simply falling prey to our flesh, which is just a reminder that we are people who constantly need God in our lives to remind us of the true way to think about things.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so one of the things we can do with this first error is we remove ourselves from that horizontal plane and we think about ourselves in the vertical one.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: And let me tell you, when you begin to compare yourself to Jesus Christ, there become a lot less things to boast about, right?
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: And when you compare yourself to Jesus Christ, and when you begin thinking about how he thinks of you, which is not based on all of those little tiny things we want to measure, right?
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: But he looks at the heart, cares about your faith, desires for you to have a love for him and a love for others, for your neighbor.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: All of these things that we talk about, those don't require any sort of boasting to have um, well, God cannot love you any more than he already does, but nevertheless, for God to be pleased in the way that you are living, right?
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: God uh is not concerned about your boasting.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, your boasting to the Lord sounds very silly to him because he is God.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so when we move ourselves into this vertical plane and think more often about that, it sort of lessens the pressure, allows us to focus, and sort of releases us from that desired innate desire that we have to compare ourselves to other people, and instead to do exactly what Paul was doing, which is lifting up other people, allowing them to get the credit, allowing them to receive praise and honor, giving them sort of their due, and then also giving it to the Lord.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: So it's not about us, it's about other people.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: So a question that we can ask ourselves is when we are in a situation that sounds like boasting, who is growing, right?
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: Who is benefiting from that comment?
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: Who is really the one that is coming out ahead because that thing has been said or typed?
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's a good question to ask.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: But that's not the only error of these superapostles in Corinth, that they were comparing themselves to other people.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: But the second error is that they were boasting beyond their limits.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: This is what Paul says we, however, will not boast beyond measure, but according to the measure of the area of ministry that God has assigned to us, which reaches even to you.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: So three times in this passage, Paul uses this word in the Greek, it would be measure.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: You'll see it here, boast beyond measure, and then he uses it here, and then some translations include it, but there's actually a third one in the Greek that it just doesn't really make sense to say the way that we would talk about it, but of the area of ministry that God has assigned to us by measure.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: There are different words there.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_00: But anyhow, Paul brings it up three times, okay?
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so obviously, this is a very important thing that there is this measure, but then he uses it uh once in this verse and two times afterwards uh to you, and he uses the phrase area of ministry.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh your Bible might say something like sphere of influence.
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's this Greek word, kanone.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh all right, everybody say canone with me on the counter three.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: One, two, three, canone.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: There we go, you know Greek.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: Canone.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: So one of the definitions and the one that's being used here is it's a uh definitely bounded or fixed space within the limits of which one's power influence is confined.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's also used to describe like a measuring rod to make sure that something was um straight or even or parallel.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: And so what Paul is saying is he's he's using this word canone, uh, which designates, and I use the picture there of somebody like um slapping a chalk line down, right?
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: So that there's this perfectly straight line that is sort of being used as reference there.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: And uh Paul is using that phrase, that sort of image, to describe the area of ministry that God has assigned to him.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: Which frankly, it's it's a pretty fascinating theological concept that this is the way that Paul views his ministry.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's not like this boundless sort of a purpose that he has, even though he's kind of the apostle to the Gentiles, he still feels like God has given him, sort of constrained him in this way, to reach certain people in certain places.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: And later on in the passage, he's gonna talk about how he desires that this boundary, this measure would move, and that the Corinthians could uh basically be his launching pan to launch launching pad into uh further westward ministry out in the Mediterranean.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: He desires to go to Spain.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: But nevertheless, um Paul is talking about an area of ministry that he has.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so therefore, the superapostles have transgressed because now they're laying claim to this.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: But the problem that Paul has is not, it's not like they're getting credit for something that he did, right?
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: Paul has no problem sharing the credit.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: He did it at the beginning of 1 Corinthians, when everybody was bickering over their different uh sort of their favorite teachers.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: Paul's like, hey, Apollos is fantastic.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: One of us planted, one of us watered, like the Lord brings us all in together.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: The Lord brings the growth, in fact, and so we're all happy to serve here.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: You can imagine in his mind he says, this is all our known, this is all our area of ministry.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: Now the problem is that he believes that the superapostles, which, again, to steal from the future, he thinks are false teachers that are, whether they recognize it or not, have been sent by Satan and are infiltrating the midst.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: His problem is that they don't have an area of ministry at all.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: They don't have anything to lay claim to, they have no credentials, they have not been called by God in any way to do this thing.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so, therefore, when they're coming in, people who have no right to be there and are saying, this is our spot, right?
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: Paul's like, no, no, no, no, no, you can't do that.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's you don't get a boast about those things.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: You don't get a boast about what God is doing in an area that you had nothing to do with.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so, like I said, it it's not about credit necessarily to Paul, but in terms of who gets credit, is it the Lord or is it you?
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because what he begins to develop here is this idea that when we go beyond our limits, when we go into areas that don't belong to us, we're stealing credit.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: We're stealing sort of uh the rights to boast from the Lord because we are going beyond what he has given to us.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so then there's this kind of implicit idea that God has presented each one of us, sort of with this mission and this purpose and this area of ministry.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: And for some people it is to be the best neighbor, and for some people it is to minister in other ways.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: For some people it is like Paul to go and plant churches, whatever, but God has this specific thing envisioned, and the superapostles have gone beyond that boundary.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: But then Paul also kind of takes it a further step, and he's like, So when I boast, Paul is saying, when I boast, I'm very careful that I don't go beyond this boundary.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: I recognize that I have been given this area of ministry.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm very careful that the things that I talk about, and when I do boast, because he does, he says that it is sort of constrained within the place that God has given me.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not talking about somebody else's ministry.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to steal credit from the Lord.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: What instead I'm going to do is say that God has given this to me.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: This is what I'm going to talk about.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so, Corinthians, be wary, because you in your midst you have people who are laying claim to things that aren't theirs.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: This is sort of an idea that James gets into when it comes to us taking credit for things we have no right to lay claim to.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: James chapter 4 says, Come now, you who say today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring, what your life will be, for you are like vapor that appears for a little while then vanishes.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: Always a helpful reminder that we are vapor.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, you should say, if the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: But as it is, you boast and your arrogance, all such boasting is evil.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: And the point that James makes here is he's like, what you can control, right?
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: The things that you, if you will, own, in this case, are basically your initiative, right?
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: Your desire for the businessman to go out and do this thing.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: But who actually is the one that controls whether that will happen, whether that will take place, whether that will come to fruition?
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: James says, it's the Lord.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: He says, So what are you doing?
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: Boasting about, oh, I'm sort of the master of my destiny.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: I am the one who controls this.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: I am the one who, you know, even sometimes we have to be careful to like pick your up, you know, this very Midwest, like pick yourself up by your bootstraps ideal of like, I'm a hard worker that built this thing from the bottom.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, be careful.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes that you are not going beyond what God has given to you.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: He is the one who's given you the ability and the skills and the talents and the opportunities to pursue these things.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so be very careful that you are not boasting beyond your limits as well, right?
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: This is, I get this impression.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: I I enjoy reading and I enjoy reading leadership books.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: And some leadership books are just garbage.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_00: And they are because in part because the person who wrote them was basically on this rocket to success that they had very little to do with.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then they got all the credit in the world, and somebody paid them a huge fee to write a leadership book.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: And their greatest takeaway is that you need to offer like free breakfast at your business or something like that.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: And you're just like, what is this?
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's and what is so apparent is that there was, they began to boast beyond their limits.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_00: They were recognized as the sort of luminary and this fantastic leader, and what was so obvious is that they had done very little to actually get to that point, even setting aside how God allowed them to get there as well.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: I will tell you, um, church leaders struggle with this very much when it comes to the size of churches.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: When I went to a conference, uh two springs ago, it was a big conference, and like the first thing they did when we got to the plenary session, the like big group session, is they had people start standing up based upon how big their churches were, right?
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: And you're like, who cares?
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know any of these people, and I don't want to know any of these people.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: That's just more my personality.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: But like, like, I'm not here for them.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: I don't care.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: I I'm not going to, you know, I'm not, first of all, going to remember any of these things.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: And yet it was just this weird way for, you know, 50 people to be able to stand up because they had the largest church.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: And what goes often without these things, and it's so applicable because of it really fits the context that Paul is talking about, is it's like, do you want to know how to get a big church?
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: You go on a map, you find census data, and you pick the areas of the United States that are growing in population the most, and you plant a church there, okay?
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_00: That is how you get a large church.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: If you look at, well, I'm not going to give examples, but anyhow, that is how some people do that.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so then they begin to equate church growth or the size of a church with authority or quality.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes that's true, but sometimes it's not.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: Pastors are sometimes guilty of boasting beyond measure, not giving God the credit that He is due and instead taking it for themselves, right?
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: So we do that.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_00: At issue, just in sum there, it's a matter of truthfulness, right?
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: What is true about what we can control, and the truth is that God is the one who gives the growth.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: Alright, final point, though, that Paul is going to make here, the third error that uh the superapostles are committing is they are failing to boast about God.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: If you are going to boast, it is necessary that God is included in there at some degree.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: He says, So let the one who boasts boast in the Lord, for it is not the one commending himself who is approved, but the one the Lord commends.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: So Paul is actually, and you might see it in your Bibles, Paul is quoting a passage here from Jeremiah when he says, Uh, so the one who boasts uh boasts in the Lord, right?
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: And he's really doing, he's summarizing a thought that, funny enough, he actually used that exact same phrase, let the one who boasts boast in the Lord, uh, when he quoted Jeremiah uh earlier in 1 Corinthians.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: He did the, he quoted the exact same passage.
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_00: And um both of them are relevant here.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: So in Jeremiah, what he says is uh this passage in Jeremiah 9.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_00: This is what the Lord says.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_00: The wise person should not boast in his wisdom, the strong should not boast in his strength, the wealthy should not boast in his wealth, but the one who boasts should boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord, showing faithful love, justice, and righteousness on the earth, for I delight in these things.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: This is the Lord's declaration.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so Paul's kind of like summary of this passage that he is referencing is let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is what he gets into in Jeremiah.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_00: And what Paul understands is that those who understand and know God are the ones who are able to boast properly.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: And not that they know God, right?
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_00: But that in this sort of, it's one of those things like a catch 22, like the only way this happens is if you understand it the first way, which then allows you to do it.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_00: And so he's like, those who are able to boast are the ones who understand the Lord, and the ones who understand the Lord are the ones who boast.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: And so this lays claim to sort of his uh comment earlier on in the passage that we're at in 2 Corinthians, where he said, those superapostles, they don't understand what is going on.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: What he's referencing here, what he has in his mind, is he's like, they don't understand what it means to boast in the Lord.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_00: They're doing it for their own purposes and their own aims.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: They are very selfishly pursuing this idea.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: And he says, it has a purpose, it has a use.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: How can we boast?
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: We include the Lord.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_00: We use him.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_00: It means that we understand and know God.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: So when he says that they lack understanding, Paul is criticizing them that they have failed this passage in Jeremiah.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: And then this dovetails into his loving criticism of the Corinthians that has been there the entire time, not just in second, but in first as well.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: Recall this passage where Paul, this is the other place where he used it.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_00: Brothers and sisters, consider your calling.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_00: Not many were wise from a human perspective, not many powerful, not many of noble birth.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, God has chosen what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen what is weak in the world to shame the strong.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: God has chosen what is insignificant and despised in the world, what is viewed as nothing to bring to nothing what is viewed as something, so that no one may boast in his presence, right?
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so if you're the Corinthians and you're hearing this, um what you might have missed is that you were just called foolish, weak, insignificant, despised, and viewed as nothing.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: And Paul says, you should be happy about that, right?
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: Because the point, and this obviously flows into boasting, is that when God lifts up and chooses that which is weak, which would be us, it glorifies him, right?
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: Displays his power to the world, and is in fact perfects us because we are leaning into, we are allowing, we are recognizing the fact that we are weak and we are relying on God for his strength.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: It is the healthiest position for us to be in.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: So, with boasting, though, Paul says, first of all, you have no reason to boast.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's why he says here, because we are weak.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: But if we then begin to boast, think about this, if we then begin to boast and brag and talk about how great we are, what this does is it undermines God's working in drawing up the weak things.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: Because what happens is we begin to argue.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: We say, no, actually, I'm strong.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: No, no, actually, actually, uh I've got it going on, you know.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, my business is great because I'm fantastic.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, my kids are great because I'm a fantastic parent.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_00: Actually, my kid is in the MBA because I am got a genetic gold mine here, right?
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_00: All these things that are going on, we begin to make ourselves, lift ourselves up and whether, again, we're saying it directly, we are acting and proclaiming that we are strong.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so what that does is instead of what should be this beautiful gospel statement of weakness, actually back to last week, meekness and allowing this idea of insignificance to sort of pervade our life and allow God to be the one that sort of lifts us up and commends us and strengthens us, when we want to take that role upon ourselves and strengthen ourselves and commend ourselves and do all of these things, it weakens that gospel message and instead makes Jesus out to be just this add-on, this thing that we want to include for a well-formed life.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: He is not the necessary component, which is true.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: He is a spoke in the wheel instead of the hub.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so Paul says, right, no one may boast in his presence, and then let the one who boasts boast in the Lord, right?
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_00: He is the one that we get to brag about, for it is not the one commending himself who is approved, but the one the Lord commends.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so this sort of concludes Paul's statement as he says, After I've sort of laid out these different things for you, ultimately my final position is, I will let the Lord commend me.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: He will be my letter of reference.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: I will wait upon him, and essentially, of all the evidence that I've presented to you, uh Corinthians, of God's work, of my weakness, of his strength, you know, flowing through me, yes, but still being his works, right?
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: When Paul is bragging about the ministries in other places, it's not, oh, I planted that church.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's look what the Lord has done.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so as Paul is doing all of these things, he is the one who is actually approved.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: Ironically, even though he is the one that is doing what we would consider the least amount of boasting or is not boasting at all, he is the one that is actually commended.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: The ones who are trying to lift themselves up are knocked down.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: So, in summary, there are two kinds of boasting.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: The one that the false apostles are doing, where they're comparing themselves to others, they're going beyond their boundaries, and they're ignoring God.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: And then on the other side, you have the Apostle Paul who is lifting others up, who is staying within his boundaries.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: He is saying only what is true and giving credit to God.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: And then when he is glorifying to God, it's different than the second point, because glorifying to God is he's willing to be weak.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: He's willing to sort of set aside the throne of strength and say that belongs to God.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_00: He's the one who is there and should stay there.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is the two kinds of boasting.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_00: So when Paul says, I'm boasting, I have no problem with it, I'm not ashamed that I'm boasting, you say, Well, how are you not ashamed, Paul?
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't boasting a bad thing?
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: Not if you stay on the right hand side.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: If you stay on the right hand side, what comes out of your mouth is not confusing to people or should not be confusing to people as self-fulfilling pride, but rather something that is glorifying to God and edifying to other people.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: So as a final uh kind of statement, I guess, um a further summarization, here's my encouragement to you.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: When you boast, lift up others and lift up God.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_00: If you boast and you keep these things in mind, you're gonna do pretty well.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh two things, though, kind of caveats to keep in mind that I do think sort of add a layer to boasting.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: One is the audience that you are speaking to and one is your heart.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: Let me speak about those briefly.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_00: Your audience matters because you can say the same thing to different groups of people and have it mean different things, right?
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: If I am speaking to um like my spouse or a best friend, okay, I am not necessarily saying anything so that they would think that I'm fantastic, right?
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it is I'm just encouraged by something that is going on, and so I want to share that with them.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: And in many ways, again, this is it has to do with the audience, but also the heart.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: Like what I'm doing is not boasting intentionally.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_00: But if I were to say that to a different group of people, if I were to go out to a people who um very much would see that as boasting or think of that as comparison, or even in my own heart be comparison, the audience matters.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if you're going into a job interview, I might recommend that you boast a little bit.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: Like within measure, that's sort of kind of what they want to see that you were accomplished.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: So there are still situations where some of these things can come about and be appropriate.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: But then it goes back to ultimately the heart.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: Why are you saying what you're saying?
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: Why are you doing this?
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know, why have you found yourself once again talking about this thing that you love to talk about?
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: Is it because, whether consciously or unconsciously, you think other people will like you more because you've got this?
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_00: Do I think that other people will find me more impressive or likable because I do have impressive children or grandchildren, or I do have a business that is successful, or you know, I am the best watercolor painter in Kansas, and people need to know that, right?
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever it is, is where's your heart?
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: So my challenge for you, and the thing I want to leave you with, is right, we're we're in the holiday season, but in a week, ten days, we've got Christmas, okay?
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_00: When whenever that lands for your holiday, I know when Christmas is.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_00: What I mean is, like, at some point in that range, you're going to celebrate Christmas with your family.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_00: And you are going to have so many opportunities to boast.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_00: So many opportunities where people are going to say, What is going on in your world right now?
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_00: And so my challenge to you is that you would lift up others and you would lift up God when those opportunities arise.
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_00: When people are asking you for information where it would be so easy to throw in your success, use that opportunity to do this.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have a great business?
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_00: Talk about the great employees that you have, talk about the fantastic clients that you serve.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, see, explain it as a blessing from God.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_00: Are you proud of your child's extracurricular activities, right?
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: For many of us, that's a huge way that we spend our time, sometimes too much, but huge way that we spend our time, right?
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh if they are good, talk about their fantastic coach that has helped them do this, or the hard work, right?
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_00: Not their accomplishments, but the effort they're putting forth.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_00: That's a great thing to boast about, um, as a blessing from the Lord.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have an amazing mac and cheese recipe, or you just got finished with a semester of college and you got straight A's, right?
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_00: In any situation that you can think of, you always have the opportunity to lift up others and lift up God.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: So, my encouragement to my challenge to you is that, especially as we have family coming around for the holidays, use this as an opportunity to minister to them.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: How can you make other people feel great?
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_00: How can you give glory to the Lord by the way that you are answering that question of, you know, what's going on with you?
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_00: What's new in your world?
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: What's going on?
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: So ultimately, when we do that, we reflect the weakness that we should have as ministers of the gospel.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_00: We uh have we display confidence, right, whether other people pick up or not, uh, to the Lord, and the fact that we understand how he sees us, we're not trying to worry about how other people see us.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_00: And lastly, we are giving, making sure that God gets all the credit and not trying to steal anything from him.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_00: For just like those businessmen back in James, right, he says, Who are they to say that they get to decide what happens one day after the next?
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: It is God who controls all things.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: Let's keep that in mind and pray.
• 40:32
  SPEAKER_00: Heavenly Father, we come before you.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_00: God is the one who does direct all things, the one who directs our lives.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_00: And Lord, like Paul has given each one of us an area, a boundary, a ministry, a work for us to do.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_00: Lord, you have prepared us in advance for these things as people of your kingdom.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: And God, we desire to do them well.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: And Lord, we desire to be, to display our use our skills and gifts and talents to do impressive things, God.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_00: We we want to be good at what we do.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_00: We love being around things that are good and beautiful and talented.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_00: God, this is a this is a good part of your kingdom.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_00: But God, may we not take undue credit for these things.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_00: May we not use them to boast about ourselves or to strengthen ourselves, but God, to recognize you.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_00: God, I pray that you would give us the heart of Christ, that your Spirit would help us to be meek and mild, to be those who are willing to boast about others and about you, God, and not necessarily about ourselves.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: And Lord, through that, that you might open up a door for us to minister to other people, that they might recognize that we don't have the need to constantly be impressing people.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_00: But Lord, rather, we want people to be impressed by you.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: God, we thank you most of all for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ that gives us the ability to find strength and weakness.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_00: Lord, we love you.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_00: We thank you as we go forth into this Christmas holiday season, Lord, especially with family.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_00: May you give us the power and the courage to do this according to your will.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's in Jesus' name we pray.
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_00: Have a great week, everybody.