As we’ve been reading in 2 Corinthians, in Paul’s original plan, he wanted to travel from Ephesus to Macedonia to Corinth to Jerusalem. Meanwhile, Timothy was sent to Corinth on his behalf. Timothy discovers that the church was in turmoil, due to arrival of Paul’s opponents. We know the Corinthians were struggling with in continual struggle with impurity, sexual immorality and sensuality. At the same time, they also quarrelled over which leader to follow, displayed anger, hostility, slander, gossip, conceit and disorder. Paul immediately proceeds to Corinth to resolve the issues, and his visit turned out to be a very “painful” one due to the church’s open rebellion against him.
However, Paul adapted his plan. He decided it’s best to suffer humiliation and not visit them again on his return journey in order to extend mercy towards them and not cause more pain. Once back in Ephesus, Paul sent Titus back to Corinth with a tearful and severe letter (now lost and we do not have any copies), warning the church of God’s judgement if they did not repent.
To Paul’s great joy, the majority of the Corinthians did repent, which Paul discovered when he met Titus in Macedonia Paul decided to refrain from going back to Corinth on his return journey. This was to prevent causing them more pain.
Today’s passage tracks the response that the Corinthian church had when they received Paul’s letter.
(A) Gospel Repentance and its observable attitudes (2 Cor 7:10-13a)
Paul’s letter caused them to grieve, though only for a little while (2 Cor 7:8). In 2 Cor 7:10, Paul speaks of 2 kinds of contrasting griefs — godly vs worldly. Interestingly, Paul doesn’t contrast godly grief with apathy or the absence of grief.
What is godly grief? In 2 Cor 7:10, we see that godly grief produces repentance that leads to salvation. The result of godly grief is important. Godly grief in itself is not repentance, but repentance is produced from it. As this phrase implies, we also see that it is about God. Sin is not just a sad thing that makes God sad and it’s not just something that wrecks our lives. Godly grief understands that God is the chief offended party when sin is committed and God is in fact angry at sin. God finds sin offensive. His anger is aroused not because they had missed out on the best that he wanted for them, but that they had violated his law. They had rejected his Lordship, and instead made themselves gods in his place.
Godly grief realizes the seriousness and utter ugliness of sin and hates it more and more. This is the type of grief that leads to true repentance that Paul mentions. The Corinthians could not possibly have repented if they did not know who they had sinned against, and how serious God was toward sin.
At this point it is also important to note that even godly grief does not equal repentance. One can feel a deep sense of remorse but not actually progress to repentance. There is a big difference between remorse for past sins, and repentance that turns away from past sins, to live differently than we have been. In repentance, there is a step of turning away from our sins and turning towards God.
In contrast, what is worldly grief? It produces death (2 Cor 7:10b). It could be centred around the self, focusing on the consequences of sin on the self. It involves feeling sorry for something that we have done because it has backfired on us. Sometimes the consequences are humiliation or punishment, and worldly grief arises from our regret of having to experience this. Pride regrets making a fool of itself, and fear regrets putting comfort and safety at risk. We can grieve over hurting somebody, but if that grief is not understanding that we are called to love people made in the image of God, and by hurting them we have disrespected God’s creation, then that grief is worldly.
This passage teaches us that feeling sorry for something we have done is not the best indicator of repentance. It is incredibly dangerous to think that just because we feel sorrowful, it is repentance. Worldly grief, not only doesn’t point us to repentance and reliance of Christ’s death on the cross for our sins, but it brings forward the consequences of grief and regret. As Prov 17:22 also tells us, grief in itself leads to death, not life! Worldly grief is empty.
What can we take away? It is that Godly grief is good for us. If our conscience is being pricked in a God centered way, it is good grief. It is a warning sign of a disease that leads to death that we should not deny or push away. Social media will tell us that guilt is toxic and something that we need to cut out of our life. Paul reminds us that we should be able to discern godly and world grief, and embrace godly grief. We should allow God’s word to show us how we have sinned against a holy God.
We also learn that this grief is not intended to paralyse or hurt us. Godly grief is intended to channel us towards gospel repentance. A life that is changed from one degree of glory to another to be more like Christ. If we are not comfortable with this then we need to familiarise ourselves with it, because through this we become more like Christ.
Paul also speaks of 8 perceptible changes that attests to the Corinthian’s repentance (2 Cor 7:11). The godly grief produces present, observable fruit in the Corinthian’s lives.
(1) Earnestness
This is a sincere and intense conviction. They are keen to aggressively pursue righteousness. This is the attitude that ends indifference to sin, and complacency to evil.
(2) Eagerness to clear yourselves
This shows the Corinthian’s strong desire to clear their name of the stigma that accompanies sin. This also marks a repentant sinner’s desire to restore trust and confidence of other believers by making their genuine repentance known. There is no procrastinating when it comes to dealing with this sin.
(3) Indignation
This is a righteous anger over their own sin, a holy anger. True repentance brings about anger over one’s sin, and displeasure at the shame that it has brought over the Lord’s name.
(4) Fear
There is a reverence toward God, who is the one most offended by our sin. Repentance leads to a healthy fear of the One who disciplines and judges sins.
(5) Longing
There is a yearning to restore the relationship with the one who has been sinned against. Repentant sinners seek to restore broken relationships.
(6) Zeal
This is an energized, motivated, love towards someone that hates anyone or anything that harms the object of this love. Repentant sinners grow in their love towards their brothers and sisters in Christ. In this case, they grew in their love towards Paul whom they sinned against.
(7) Punishment
This speaks of church discipline, borne out of a desire to see justice done. Paul has spoken of it previously in 2 Cor 2:6-7. The repentant sinner no longer tries to protect themselves, but wants to see sin avenged no matter what it might cost to themselves. There’s also tenderness in meting out the punishment.
(8) At every point proved yourselves innocent in every matter
Repentant sinners aggressively pursue holiness as they seek to be pure and holy. As Christ becomes more attractive to them, they seek to become more and more like Him!
What attributes do we think of when it comes to repentance? Are these 8 attributes foreign and strange to us? Or are they bittersweet and familiar? If not, I suggest that we normalize these responses to godly grief and look out for them and treasure them on our journey of sanctification.
Just like Paul concluded in 2 Cor 7:10, this true repentance is not just for the now, but it leads to salvation without regret. There is an end to this repentance. Repentance results in a salvation that saves us from this world suffering the effects of life in a fallen world: of struggling with sin, repenting, being forgiven. This salvation is once and for all to be rid of this struggle with sin and to be with God. The reassurance is that there will not be a shred of regret in this. You will not enter into salvation having regretted obeying God.
How then do we know that godly grief leads to repentance? The test is whether it produces real change in our life. Are there people whom we have allowed into our lives to cause us godly grief? Can they attest to the observable changes in our lives? If they are in our lives, how then would we respond if they brought us a tearful letter? We should not be surprised when it happens and this is why we have this passage. We need to know how to respond to such a tearful letter. Will we make excuses, or grieve in a God centered way to move towards repentance to turn our lives around?
In 2 Cor 7:12, we also learn of the purpose of this letter. Paul wrote the letter not for the leader of the mutiny in Corinthian church nor for the party that has been wronged (namely, Paul himself) but that the Corinthian’s earnestness for the apostles might be revealed to them in the sight of God. In other words, he wrote it so that they might go through this process of repentance and witness the fruits of repentance and that God himself might witness to it.
Paul was putting into practice what he had wrote about earlier in 2 Cor 5:17-21. Paul, Timothy and Titus are ambassadors for Christ that are entrusted with the message of reconciliation. As they were in this painful back and forth process with the Corinthians, they were reconciling the Corinthians to God through Christ’s finished word on the cross. That is why Paul can say that he is comforted, because he has finally brought them back into a right relationship with God.
Because of the present and observable fruit revealed, Paul and Titus are comforted that their ministry to them was not in vain and the Corinthians are bearing the marks of true disciples and are reconciled to God. If Christ has reconciled us to himself, are we ready to be ambassadors of reconciliation to others? Friends, are we ready to bring tearful letters to each other? Are we ready to painstakingly pursue others to grieve over them, and help them to grieve in a godly way?
What does modelling repentance look like in a church? What will our young see? The young and old repent in front of each other, and all will submit to the Lordship of Christ! In the church, hopefully we get a view of repentance at each stage of life.
(B) Gospel Repentance brings about shared joys and mutual affection (2 Cor 7:13b-16)
Paul was thankful that his boasting about them were not false, because of their response (2 Cor 7:14). Paul is rejoicing because Titus is rejoicing. His spirit has been refreshed because he saw believers in fear and trembling in obedience. There is a joy in seeing God’s hand moving in a church to shape them.
Paul was concerned about sending a young disciple, Titus into a messy Church in Corinth with a high potential for discouragement and disappointment. Paul was worried that the corinthian church would be nothing like what Paul had described, and was concerned of the negative impact that a young servant of the Lord might face regarding ministry discouragement. Paul could not control the response of the church, nor Titus’ response. We see here God’s sovereign grace, in control of the Corinthian church, but also in this young servant’s life. He builds up the church, and at the same time brings joy and encouragement to Titus. The response of the church must have given Titus the confidence that the holy spirit can change men’s hearts, to turn godly grief into repentance.
In 2 Cor 7:15, we see how Titus got to witness obedience of the Corinthians, not begrudgingly, but with fear and trembling. Imagine how that must have given him confidence in the Holy Spirit that only can change men’s hearts! Friends, If you have been labouring, and labouring, trying to establish others in their faith and finding it an impossible task. You might find yourself feeling out of control of so many elements tonight. Maybe you feel like your discipling is in vain. But God’s word tonight reminds you that God knows what his servants need and he knows what his church needs. God is sovereign and he knows, trust in him, that he will bring about encouragement and growth in its season. The church is his, and the labourers within are not forgotten.