2 Corinthians 1:8-11

It is a joy to have this holy privilege and opportunity to bring the word to you this morning. And the text that we’re going to be in today is in the 2 Corinthians. If you want to turn there, we’re going to be in 2 Corinthians chapter 1. And I’m just going to begin reading where we covered the last time I preached, starting in verse 3, and we’re going to go all the way through verse 11.

So 2 Corinthians chapter 1, beginning in verse 3, Paul writes, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction. So that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ abound to us, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.

“But whether we are afflicted, it is for your comfort in salvation; or whether we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is working in your perseverance in the same sufferings which we also suffer. And our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are sharers of our sufferings, so also you are sharers of our comfort. For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of our affliction which came to us in Asia, that we were burdened excessively, beyond our strength, so that we despaired even to live.

“Indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not have confidence in ourselves, but in God, who raises the dead; who rescued us from so great a peril of death, and will rescue us, He on whom we have set our hope. And He will yet rescue us, you also joining in helping us through your prayers on our behalf, so that thanks may be given on our behalf by many persons for the gracious gift bestowed on us through the prayers of many.”

 Just recapping a little bit to to get into verse 8, where we’re going to be this morning. The source of all of our comfort is our Trinitarian God, the Father of Mercies, the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, the Holy Spirit who lives in each of us as a personal divine comforter. This eternally blessed being is the spring that just continues to produce a boundless stream of comfort to those who are in need.

In this eternal blessed God there is no end or there is no limit to his comfort. It never runs out. It is infinite. And while the Holy Spirit is the divine agent that comforts us, we who have suffered and have been, comfort, comforted, we are also to be conduits of that comfort that we have received, and we are to pipe that comfort into the hearts of others who are in need.

This is one purpose for which God gives us trials so that we will be able to comfort those who are in need as well. The result in the church that practices this. Paul gets into this in verses 6 and 7. The results of a church that practices this is fivefold and it results in a super abundance of comfort, results in salvation, the perseverance of the saints. It results in confidence of salvation and fellowship.

As the church practices this, that Paul describes here, people find real comfort in their trials; people who don’t know Christ, they are saved. As we do this, we sustain one another as one means that God uses for the perseverance of the saints. We sustain one another as we comfort one another. It creates in us a confidence that we know the Lord, when we endure trials and we don’t fall away, we prove to belong to Christ and it knits all of our hearts together in a common goal of the gospel.

That’s what Paul wrote to the Corinthians. He was trying to foster there in that church, that kind of fellowship, and that’s the kind of fellowship that we want to foster here at Grace Church. Who doesn’t want to be a part of a church like that, that has a super abundant supply of comfort to go around for any who are in need or the gospel is freely shared, freely given. People are saved and sanctified, and those who are, are persevering to the end, sustained by one another.

As Paul gets into verse 8, he begins then to explain how this personally worked out in his own life. He essentially seeks to put this very thing that he just described in verses 3 through 7 into practice and bring the Corinthians comfort by explaining one of his own trials and how he was comforted. Here, in these verses, in 8 through 11 that we’re going to talk about today, we find instructions for each of us, no matter where we are at in life, whether we are enduring a trial or not.

If you’re enduring a trial, maybe a significant one, maybe a light one, it’s an example for what you ought to do, how we can think about that and find encouragement in it and if you’re not going through a trial, we also find an exhortation from Paul as to what we ought to do as well.

Let me just read verses 8 through 11 today. These are the verses we’re going to cover. Paul says, “For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of our affliction which came to us in Asia. We were burdened excessively beyond our strength, so that we despaired even to live. Indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not have confidence in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead;” the same God, “who rescued us from so great a peril of death, and will rescue us, He on whom we have set our hope. And He will yet rescue us, you also joining in helping us through your prayers on our behalf, so that thanks may be given on our behalf by many persons for the gracious gift bestowed on us through the prayers of many.”

In our passage here today, we find an example from Paul on how to put those previous verses into practice, how to draw others righteously into our trials in order that they might share in the suffering as well as in the comfort. We might say, this is how we involve others and how we get involved in others lives in order to have the kind of fellowship that Paul talked about in verse 7.

We’re going to see this in four points for this morning. First, the stress of life, the stress of life, and then the sentence of death, and then the sureness of rescue, and then finally the supplication of saints. So the stress of life. Paul immediately jumps into telling us the stress, that of a trial that he had gone through. He said, for we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of our affliction, an excessive burden beyond their strength.

 But he begins by saying, “I do not want you to be unaware, brothers.” In this verse, Paul bears his heart before the congregation, reflecting on a past trial, letting them understand how seriously he and Timothy were afflicted in their souls. He says, I do not want you, we do not want you to be unaware, brothers. Paul and Timothy do not want the Corinthians to be ignorant of their affliction.

Paul knows that if the Corinthians are going to share in their suffering and also share in their comfort, they have to be brought into what’s going on. If others are going to share in our affliction and comfort, they have to know. Ignorance, it’s just a lack of knowledge. But in this economy of Christ, when we are to be conduits of God’s grace to one another, ignorance is like missing a section of pipe.

The comfort can’t make it from one heart to another. We have to know what’s going on in one another’s lives in order to bring comfort. Paul’s leading by example here in sharing his heart with the people of Corinth, to let them in on a very dark time in his life. But he knows telling people about it is essential. That is to say, we can’t read one another’s minds and hearts.

No one can really know what’s going on in your heart, where you are struggling, how you are suffering, unless you tell them. Oftentimes we sit back and we wait and we’re just hoping someone asks. This is not a burden to wait on other people to try to discern. It’s a burden for you to make people aware of. If we are going to comfort and be comforted, we have to make others aware of our affliction.

If you are the kind of person, maybe you’re more private, you’d prefer to just suffer alone through your trial. You don’t easily let anyone in on your suffering. Maybe you just think you’ll grit your teeth and you’ll get through it. That’s not allowing the Lord to use it to its fullest effect. That’s not allowing others to be brought into and participate in your suffering and do what Paul says the church is supposed to do here.

Paul wanted his trial to have the fullest benefit to the Corinthians. It was a past trial at this point. They had gone through it, and Paul wanted to make them aware of it. And there’s great humility in this. It’s very instructive for the Corinthians and it’s instructive for us. I think there’s a temptation and even a pride in our own affliction to fear man, which leads us to shrink back and suffer alone.

Paul corrected the Corinthians in the first letter that he wrote to them, because they were being influenced by Greek thought that a crucified Christ was foolishness, that a suffering savior was no savior at all, but those who were worthy of being followed, they were the conquerors, the victors, maybe men who did suffer, but they stood tall and triumphed in the end. And I think we can tend to t