Hello, you are listening to Second City Sermons,
a ministry of Second City Church in Midtown Harrisburg.
This fall we're studying the book of Second Corinthians.
Second Corinthians is a heartfelt and practical
book calling us back to the life of the cross.
We, like the Corinthians, so often pursue glory,
admire eloquence, shun suffering, hide hurt,
and hoard our goods. And yet the gospel of Jesus
tells us that resurrection comes after a cross.
that comfort comes after being crushed, that
the way up is the way down, that the way to glory
is through suffering, that his strength is made
perfect in our weakness. We'd love to meet you
and we hope you'll consider coming and joining
with us each Sunday morning at 10 a .m. in the
heart of Midtown Harrisburg. You can find us
online at secondcitychurch .org and on Facebook,
Instagram, and YouTube. We hope you enjoy this
sermon. God bless. Lord, this morning as we turn
to this second chapter of 2nd Corinthians and
come to the great subject of forgiveness and
as we hear, as we just heard this powerful parable
from your mouth, Lord Jesus, I pray that we might
live into the reality of what you have done for
us and that we might image you in our life with
others. Write these holy words on our hearts,
and would they shape our lives? Amen. Some of
you, maybe many of you know the remarkable story
of Corrie Ten Boon. She was born in Amsterdam
in 1892. She was born to a devout Christian family.
Her parents raised her in the knowledge of the
Lord. At least we have a sense of early on in
her life, around the age of five. Some of you
are close to that age. She had a living and active
faith in Jesus. Well, her dad actually inherited
the family watch shop in Harlem and they moved
there, which is, you may know, nearby to Amsterdam.
And remarkably, at the age of 20, she became
not only the first woman who was licensed as
a watchmaker, but also the youngest one at 20
years old. working there alongside her dad in
their watch shop. She had two older siblings
who were married. She and her sister, Betsy,
they never married. They lived their life with
their parents and they were very active in evangelism
and in caring for those in need. They actually
started a club for younger folk with different
disabilities, sharing the good news of Jesus
with them and giving them fellowship with one
another and enjoying their life. And a remarkable,
remarkable woman When the Nazis invaded the Netherlands
in 1940, she began cycling around as they do
over there. My sister is actually a missionary
in the Netherlands. They ride their bikes all
over the place. And she would cycle to these
different resistance meetings. And she actually
gathered ration books during the war specifically
for the Jews that were not given ration books
for their food. She helped organize long -term
places of hiding for those Jews who were seeking
refuge. And you may know the story, but there
was actually a hiding place for these Jews right
off of her own room, her own small bedroom. Well,
on the 28th of February in 1944, this Dutch resistance
movement that was hiding Jews was betrayed. And
Kori Tenbun was actually not feeling well and
was sort of caught off guard when Jews rushed
into her room and into the hiding place. And
she and her entire family and the Jews there
with her were arrested and caught. And she was
taken to prison. Actually, interestingly, she
was put in confinement because it was believed
that she was one of the great underground resistance
leaders. she later confessed and expressed just
how unbelievably difficult solitary confinement
was, but she was reunited with her sister Betsy
and they were taken off to Ravensbrook, which
was the concentration camp where so many women
went. It actually read, it's estimated that 35
,000 women would be at that camp at any given
time. 35 ,000. They were brought there, they
were stripped naked, they were placed in housing
situations where there were hundreds and hundreds
in a little barracks housing. Lice infected the
mattresses which they shared with one another.
It was an awful, awful situation. They would
rise for roll call at 4 a .m. They were forced
to work long days. They were watched over, they
were berated, they were beaten by the guards.
And of course the smell of dead bodies permeated
those concentration camps. Betsy, her sister
died there at Ravensbrook on the 16th of December.
And Corey was released actually on the 31st of
December, just a few weeks after her sister's
passing. But it was determined that it was a
clerical error, because just a few weeks later
every woman her age was killed in that camp.
Remarkably, her life was spared. But I read this,
that just before her sister Betsy died, she told
Corey, when we are set free from this terrible
place, and we will be freed, Corey, before the
New Year, we must go over the world and tell
everyone who will listen what we have proved
to be true in this terrible place, that the love
of God is stronger than the deepest darkness.
I wonder if you believe that? That in a place
like that, We have been so incredibly sinned
against. The love of God is deeper, stronger
than the deepest darkness. Here's something that's
true. Some of you have been hurt unbelievably
deeply beyond what you ever imagined. Never thought
you could be hurt this much. Some of you have
been betrayed. Others of you have been abused.
Some of you have been mocked. Others of you have
probably experienced the pain of adultery and
betrayal. And the fact is that every single one
of you have been sinned against. We are sinners.
We confess this. This is true. And yet every
single one of us have been sinned against. And
Jesus tells us that if we do not forgive others,
we will not be forgiven. how we have to believe
that the love of God is even stronger than the
deepest darkness. I said last week that at the
heart of 2 Corinthians is the truth that power
is made perfect in weakness. And I think that
one of the places in our lives where this truth
is most known or can be most powerful because
it is so hard is in our acts of forgiveness.
The things that we have to forgive. So I want
you to open up your Bible, okay? If you do not
have a Bible open, I want you to open it up to
2 Corinthians chapter two. We're starting there
in verse five. We went through verse four last
week. We're going to finish this chapter. And
what we're going to do is we're going to look
at a few things. We're going to see a number
of important things that come up when we come
to the subject of forgiveness, okay? Looking
at the idea of forgiveness, 2 Corinthians chapter
two, verse five. We look at that first paragraph,
there's a few things that you see sort of immediately.
And one of the things that I want you to see
first is sort of what I've just said, is that
there is a command to forgive. The command to
forgive, verse seven says, Rather turn to forgive
and comfort him. Verse eight says, so I beg you
to reaffirm your love for him by this act of
forgiveness. Verse nine says, this is why I wrote
you that I might test you and know whether you
are obedient and everything, which is in the
context of forgiveness. Are you hearing what
I'm saying? Do you understand the command to
forgive? Certainly this paragraph is speaking
of this command to forgive. And that command
can be seen all throughout the Bible, but actually
there is no one who says it more clearly and
more starkly and maybe even more sort of stronger
than we want than our Lord Jesus himself. Matthew
chapter six, verses 14 and 15. For if you forgive
others their trespasses, your heavenly Father
will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive
others their trespasses, neither will your Father
forgive your trespasses." The unbelievably strong
command of our Lord Jesus to move towards forgiveness.
Think of the parable that was just read for us
from Matthew chapter 18. the great parable of
the unforgiving servant. He was forgiven so much
and he came out from that being just forgiven
so much and he demanded somebody else pay him
back. And I want you to hear again how Jesus
ends that parable. Then his master summoned him
and said to him, you wicked servant, I forgave
you all that debt because you pleaded with me
and should not you have had mercy on your fellow
servants as I had mercy on you. and in anger
his master delivered him to the jailers until
he should pay all his debt. So also my heavenly
father will do to every one of you if you do
not forgive your brother." It doesn't just say
with your words, it's from your heart. Difficult
thing, but it is very clear in our passage in
2 Corinthians, it's very clear from the words
of our Lord Himself, the mouth of our Lord. that
there is a command to forgive. The command is
clear. But one of the reasons why maybe right
now for you this is sitting a little hard is
because we also know forgiveness is an unbelievable
challenge. Forgiveness is not easy. And this
is also brought up in this paragraph actually.
It's a challenge, first of all, because actually,
if you are actually going to forgive, you have
to acknowledge how deeply you were hurt. You
actually have to face the pain of the sin that
was done against you. We can be hurt so deeply.
We've been sinned against so intensely. It affects
us so incredibly. It affects all of us. Verse
five, Paul says that the pain that one has caused
wasn't just to him, but it was to the community
at large, right? It wasn't just against him.
It's affecting everybody. Which is to say, your
sin, the ways that you've been sinned against,
isn't actually just something that touches you,
but it touches your community. That's one of
the reasons why forgiveness is so deeply hard.
Here's another thing, though, on the flip side
and away, your faithfulness to our Lord also
doesn't just affect you, but it affects those
around you. We should say that the Bible assumes
a communal life that is so much deeper and so
much richer than we imagine, than we have minds
to comprehend. It assumes that our lives are
intertwined that when one is sinned against,
the whole community is affected. When one forgives,
the whole community finds life. Brothers and
sisters, when you hurt another, you hurt us all.
When you harbor bitterness against another, we
are all a little worse off because of it. All
sin separates, it distances, it breaks. And when
one of us is distant because of sin, sure, there's
like practical things like, oh, you're not present
in worship or in small groups or jumping into
volunteer in different ways like English language
classes, stuff like that. But when you are withdrawn,
when you're emotionally withdrawn, when you're
distant, it actually affects the entire body.
That's what the Bible tells us. All of us are
affected by sin. All of us are affected by unforgiveness.
We are not what and who we should be as individuals
and as a community When we are sinned against
and we are not what and who we should be as a
community when we harbor unforgiveness Part of
why forgiveness is such a challenge is Because
sin is so real and the effects of it are so deep
Did you notice I read this in my first point
there of the command but Paul has to beg them
to forgive. He assumes that it's a challenge.
He assumes this is not an easy thing to do. But
he also says he has to beg them and he acknowledges
that Satan wants to outwit them. It's a challenge
because it's hard to do, but also because Satan
actually doesn't want you to do it. That's one
of the things that he's acknowledging there.
What he's saying is that forgiveness is a great
challenge. It's command, but it's not some easy
thing that we should sort of brush off. Yeah,
I forgive you. You actually have to look at the
pain of what happened to you to enter into that.
And you have to acknowledge there has to be a
death of my power grabbing, of my saying, I must
be right and you must pay. Forgiveness is a great
challenge. Paul demonstrates here that forgiveness
can be incredibly liberating. Maybe you notice
this in verse 10. It's kind of wild. He says,
anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. Indeed,
what I have forgiven, if I forgive in anything,
has been for your sake. Commentators say, Paul
is actually demonstrating that there is the possibility
of genuinely forgiving and forgetting. Paul's
like, I'm not even sure I completely remember
everything, if I've forgiven everything. Meaning
that he's been so liberated from grabbing on.
He's demonstrating that forgiveness is deeply
liberating, but he is not ever denying that it
is not challenging. He's calling us to something.
It's the great command of our Lord, but he is
admitting the difficulty of it. And CS Lewis
was a little boy. He was nine years old the age
of my son James nine years old that was the year
when his mother died and maybe some of you know
this he was sent off to a boarding school in
England and He writes about this quite a bit
But the the headmaster of that boarding school
was actually a pretty sadistic kind of guy and
it seemed as though he loved to cane The little
boys there at the school to punish them severely
He was a very evil man Meaning he would whip,
you know whip the boys with a cane when they
were in trouble Warren he went by warning see
us. This is brother He went to the same school
and he wrote this I have seen Him this headmaster
lift a boy of 12 or so from from the floor by
the back of his collar and holding him at arm's
length as one might a dog apply his canes to
his calf. I mean, the ways that we have been
sinned against are so deep. You might not have
that story, but I guarantee you have a story.
We live in a world that is infected by sin. And
we can share our stories of how unbelievably
difficult it is to offer forgiveness. This was
a miserable school. Like I said, Lewis writes
about a number of times. And it was a time that
sort of marked his life as one of the worst times
of his life. He'd already suffered the loss of
his mother. He's sent off by his father to this
horrible, horrible place. And it was only shortly
before his death in 1963, a half a century later,
that Lewis could write that he had finally been
able to forgive that man. of the scars that he
had put in his life. Forgiveness is a command
of our Lord, but it is also deeply, deeply challenging.
It's a clear command, but it is a hard one. Here's
the thing, okay, so second Corinthians... to
hear, almost everybody that you read believes
that what he's addressing is actually one of
the sins that was being addressed in 1 Corinthians,
specifically in 1 Corinthians chapter 5, where
there was a man who was having inappropriate
relationships with his father's wife. And what
happens in that context in 1 Corinthians chapter
5, if you know it, Paul says, have nothing to
do with him. Discipline him in such a way that
you sent him out from the community. Paul is
so adamant that sin can actually affect the life
of the community that you must deal with it.
It's got to be dealt with. And there are some
sins where you say, if you are persistent in
this, you must actually be, well, the term is
excommunicated, but you have to be actually shunned
from the community. And almost everybody believes
that's what Paul is addressing here in this paragraph.
This man who has sinned so grievously and it's
infecting the life of the community so intensely
that this man actually must be taken out from
the community. One of the things that we're seeing
here though, is that this discipline, this severe
discipline for sin has actually been met with
a tender heart and a receptivity very likely
from this man. And Paul says, as much as you
might want to continue to shun him, that is not
the way of the Christian. You must actually receive
him back. You must actually embrace him. because,
again, the community's life is bound up together.
What happens to one affects the rest. If one
is sorrowful, a blight is cast on the whole community.
If one lives in constant sin, it does affect
the rest. And yet, it seems as though, like I
said, this discipline works. And so Paul now
says, if you don't forgive, It affects the whole
body. Part of the reason, again, why forgiveness
is such a challenge in the Bible is because sin
is taken so seriously. Not brushed aside as nothing,
but it's taken so seriously that Paul says, actually,
this person must be outside of the community.
That's why freedom is so hard. It's such a challenge
because it's such a serious thing. It affects
us so much. Forgiveness is a command. Forgiveness
is a challenge. I'll say this though, thirdly,
that forgiveness is a comfort. And here's another
truth. In the absence of forgiveness and love,
in the absence of those things, there is always
bitterness and division. You do not grow in godliness.
when you harbor unforgiveness. Unforgiveness
always invites bitterness and division. As another
said, unforgiveness is the poison we drink, hoping
another will die. NT Wright says, forgiveness
is a two -way street. By releasing the other
person from guilt, you release yourself from
being crippled by their actions. As a command,
as a challenge, it's also actually a great comfort.
We actually get a little glimpse into this. This
is kind of interesting. If you look down in your
Bibles to the next little paragraph that begins
in verse 12 then, there, just verse 12 and 13.
He says, when I came to Troas to preach the gospel
of Christ, even though a door was opened for
me in the Lord, my spirit was not at rest because
I did not find my brother Titus there. So I took
leave of him and went on to Macedonia. He's there
in Troas, and Troas is, it's sort of the upper
eastern side of the Aegean Sea, or if you can
think of modern day Turkey, it'd be like the
very northwest. It'd be like looking at a map
of the U .S. to be in the Pacific Northwest,
but a map of Turkey. Well, it was a great city,
a great port city. So you would often take a
boat from there, a ship from there, and you would
sail to other places. And one of the places where
it would go would be the city of Corinth. And
so Paul goes to this city of Troas because he'd
heard a door was open for him in the gospel,
which is sort of every missionary's dream, every
pastor's dream. Oh, people that are receptive,
they want to hear, they want to repent, they
want to trust in Jesus. The door is wide open.
Sort of exactly what he probably longed for and
yet What does he say there? My spirit was not
at rest My spirit was not at rest Because Titus
wasn't there and what why does that matter? Well,
we'll actually we'll get to this later to Titus
was supposed to bring the news from the Church
of Corinth Had they lived into the reality of
just how awful sin is, how it infects us, how
it must be dealt with, and have they actually
embraced the reality of forgiveness? What did
the Corinthian church do? Can they hold these
things together? And Paul can't, he can't stay
at Troas even though the door's wide open because
he is not, he's not at rest. Brothers and sisters,
forgiveness heals. Forgiveness brings comfort.
It brings comfort to the offended and to the
offender. And it brings comfort to the communities
that touch them. Parents. Parents. So many of
you are parents. One of the greatest gifts you
can give your children, I promise you, is living
a life of repentance and forgiveness before them.
With one another, with them. It is the fertile
soil of life in your families. And it's the fertile
soil for all of us. It's not a parental thing.
This is the way the world works. You harbor unforgiveness.
It will be bitterness and divisiveness that fester,
live. Bitterness brings comfort. In the absence
of love and forgiveness, the bitterness and division
thrive. It's true here. For Paul and the Corinthian
community, for Titus, it's true for you and it's
true for me, it is. This is the way the world
works. So, forgiveness is a command, it's a challenge,
it's a comfort. But here's what I want to say.
It's precisely because it is this command and
it's this challenge and it's this comfort that
it is also the aroma of Christ. that it's the
fragrance of the good news. You know, forgiveness
is this thing that can be smelled and lovely
that you wonder how in the world, how in the
world could somebody forgive? How could C .S.
Lewis come to the end of his life and say, I've
forgiven? How can you forgive somebody that treats
somebody that way? So if you look with me down
at the next paragraph, the one that begins in
14, What you'll see is that in that verse, as
we spread the fragrance of the knowledge, let
me read it, but thanks be to God who in Christ
always leads us in triumphal procession and through
us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of
Him everywhere. The next verse grabs onto this
idea of the scent of the good news also, verse
15, for we are the aroma of Christ to God among
those who are being saved and among those who
are perishing. the fragrance, the aroma. And
here's an interesting thing is that most commentators
point out that there's sort of like two references
that are being made in these words of smell,
smelling words. And I wanna say that in a way
these two references point to the cross and to
the resurrection. Christ's victory and His atonement.
But first, the resurrection, okay? So verse 14
tells us that, it says this, okay, but thanks
be to God who in Christ always leads us in triumphal
procession and through us spreads the fragrance
of the knowledge of Him everywhere. The ancient
world would have been so familiar with this image.
It's sort of lost on us a little bit, but it
was a common practice in the ancient world to
have a victory procession. This was very common
in the Roman world, particularly in Corinth was
a Roman sort of colonial hub. So a military leader
would come back from a battle and if they were
victorious they would parade through the streets
and actually oftentimes they would lead their
captives behind them. But they would parade through
the streets and as they did this what would often
happen is throughout the city and throughout
the streets incense would be burnt. And so even
if you weren't at the parade itself you would
smell it. You'd say, oh, we were victorious.
They conquered. There's a fragrance. The greatest
actually parade that we sort of have recorded,
Josephus records this and other ancient historians,
was actually the Emperor Titus, not the Titus
that's mentioned here, the missionary, but Emperor
Titus in 71, in AD 71, when he actually took
over Jerusalem. And the great Titus arch, which
still stands in Rome, that was considered the
greatest victory procession in the Roman world.
But what marked these processions was the sweet
smell of victory. And the Corinthian church,
we're going to get into this later on in other
sermons, but the Corinthian church was inclined
to this kind of triumphalism, this sort of ease.
They wanted to have their ears tickled by the
peddlers of the Word of God. But they often shunned
humility. They shunned giving up of oneself,
giving up our means, our finances, getting low,
living into weakness. And something that's very
true is that to forgive, you actually have to
go down. And the Corinthians shunned that dynamic.
So one of the things that we're getting from
this fragrance is that Christ conquers. He's
leading us in victory. It's a resurrection kind
of idea. And it's precisely because of the resurrection
that you all have both forgiveness and the power
to forgive. As you know, that going down is not
the end of the story. Lift it up when you're
humble. But that kind of victory That kind of
fragrance is empty without the cross. Okay? And
so you first have this triumphal procession with
this fragrance mentioned, and then verse 15 says,
for we are the aroma of Christ. We're the aroma
of Christ. And that word is a word that's used
a lot in the Greek Old Testament. And almost
always it is used, as it is actually, you just
heard that one verse from Numbers chapter 6,
but it's used throughout Numbers in that chapter,
as the sweet aroma of the sacrifices that God's
people offered in worship that would ascend up
to the Lord. He says it's a sweet aroma. Sacrifices
are a sweet aroma. Which is to say, we are the
aroma of the sacrifice of Christ. in our living
into what Christ has done in forgiving us. What
he's done on the cross was to accomplish the
great sacrifice for the atonement of sin. What
he's done in that act of offering himself up
as the sweet aroma of the sacrifice is forgive
us. So, This act on the cross was a necessity,
which is to say it was a command by the Father,
right? The Father commands the Son. Jesus says,
not my will, but yours be done. This act on the
cross was a challenge. Paying for sin and forgiveness
is not an easy thing ever. It demands the very
death of the Son of God. for us to be forgiven.
And this act on the cross brought comfort and
peace to our bitter and our divided world. You
see, these sweet smelling aromas are actually
connecting us to this idea that it is the command,
it is the challenge, and it brings comfort. Forgiveness
is never easy. What these words of fragrance
and aroma say is that they demand, forgiveness
always demands death. But forgiveness always
brings life out of death. This is the way of
the gospel. This is how we live into the gospel.
This is why Jesus can actually say, if you do
not forgive your brother, you will not be forgiven.
Because if you taste the forgiveness of God,
you know how difficult it was for our Lord to
forgive us, demand His very life, but how willingly
He does so. We've got to live out of this reality
of being forgiven. Let me end with a portion
of Corey Ten Boone's wonderful book, The Hiding
Place. I will end with this. She says this, the
room full of mocking men, the heaps of clothing,
Betsy's blanched face. He came up to me as the
church was emptying, beaming and bowing. How
grateful I am for your message, Frowline, he
said. To think that, as you say, he has washed
away my sin. His hand was thrust out to shake
mine. And I, who had preached so often to the
people of Blomondal the need to forgive, kept
my hand at my side. Even as the angry, vengeful
thoughts built through me, I saw the sin of them.
Jesus Christ had died for this man. Was I going
to ask for more? Lord Jesus, I prayed, forgive
me. and helped me to forgive him. I tried to
smile. I struggled to raise my hand and I could
not. My guess is that you know that experience.
I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth
or charity. And so again, I breathe the silent
prayer, Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give me
your forgiveness. As I took his hand, The most
incredible thing happened. From my shoulder,
along my arm, and through my hand, a current
seemed to pass from me to him, while into my
heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost
overwhelmed me." Brothers and sisters, I guarantee
you that you hear the command of our Lord that
you must forgive or you will not be forgiven.
And you have ways that you have been so deeply
sinned against that that challenge is way too
much for you to bear. But our Lord is with you
in it and He promises you to bring comfort in
the midst of it. And our Lord Jesus knows the
challenge of forgiveness. He died. It's a man
acquainted with grief, familiar with pain, because
he was sinned against by you and me. Yet he offers
you his forgiveness, and he calls you to live
that life for others. It is the way of life and
peace. It is the only way of life and peace.
Without it, bitterness and division will grow
and fester. and with it, life and peace. Let
me pray. Lord, I pray that we would not be those
who make light of sin. Brush it aside, that's
nothing. And yet, Lord, I pray that we would
be those who are eager to be like Paul here,
who almost can't even remember what he forgave
somebody for. though we know how much He was
sinned against. How we think of how you tell
us, it's as far as the East is from the West
that you have removed our sins from us. You've
forgiven us. Though they meant your very death
on the cross, it's as though they are utterly
and completely, it's as though they never happened.
And I pray that we would be a community that
can hold these truths. Brush aside pain. Brush
aside the evil of the world. Brush aside the
ways that we have been hurt, cut deep. And yet,
Lord, Would we be a community that is running
to forgiveness? Because running to forgiveness
is running to the cross and to the empty tomb.
Holy Spirit, give us this strength. As Paul himself
says, Who is sufficient for these things? Amen
Thank you for listening to second city sermons
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