2 Corinthians 7:5-16 Sorrow: the Good Kind

by Edmund Hilder

All right. Let's open our Bibles to II Corinthians Chapter 7 verse 5. This morning we'd like to read through the end of Chapter 7, which will also finish the first part of this book. The whole direction will change after Chapter 7.

We get some context for what is going on here by looking at Chapter 2.

Here's what Paul said in Chapter 2 verse 12, "Furthermore, I came to Troas to preach Christ's gospel, a door was opened to me by the Lord, but I had no rest in my spirit, because I didn't find Titus my brother; and so taking leave of them, I departed for Macedonia." From verse 14 of this chapter all the way till Chapter 7 verse 5, where we are this morning, is a long aside of Paul writing about his ministry and his heart and what he's gone through.

In verse 5 this morning we pick up the story from verse 13 of Chapter 2, where he writes this: verse 5, Chapter 7, "For indeed, when we came to Macedonia, our bodies had no rest, we are troubled on every side. Outside were conflicts, inside were fears. Nevertheless God, who comforts the downcast, has comforted us by the coming of Titus."

Put yourself for a minute in Paul's shoes. Back in Ephesus there had been a riot, and they had chased him out of town. He comes to Macedonia, and everywhere he turns there's conflict. The word is strife, or fighting, if you will. It is an interesting picture that the place where Paul had come for years was still not really willing to embrace him. So outside, his flesh could find no rest. But then notice he writes, inside was phobia. It means great anxiety. In fact, the word "downcast" in verse 6 is the Greek word for clinical depression. So, Paul was not just having a hard time with it; Paul was in a pretty dark place serving the  Lord and loving the people. What was troubling him the most was the influence of the false teachers in the church of Corinth.  

He had written an extremely confrontational letter that he had sent with Titus.    It was one of those letters where you just go for broke, no stone left unturned. He wrote it out of love for them. It was do or die. But he realized it could probably not have to be received that way. So, think about Paul here looking for Titus. He’s at his limit. He's been chased out of Ephesus. He's too distraught to minister at Troas, where a legitimate work is open for him. He has excessive kind of anxiety over the wellness of the church over in Corinth. He has great concerns whether his letter he has written will be received or if it's being second guessed, or maybe he was.       He now worries about Titus's safety. And then if that isn't bad enough, he looks out the window and there's people out to get him there too.

We read in Psalm 126 that if you go to sow with tears, you can hope to reap in joy, and that if you continually do that, doubtless you will come back with rejoicing with the fruit in your hand, the sheaves with you.

And I think that's an excellent description of what Paul's been going through. He's hurting only because of the people that he cares for. This isn't Paul hurting for a business that went bankrupt or an investment that went sour. Paul's only concern was God's people and God's word. He was hurting for all the right reasons. And he would be rejoicing for all the right reasons as well.

But I wanted to have you see this picture of Paul, an extremely tough guy in the Lord who's kind of a softy; right? He is moved by the concerns of others. We tend to go to the Bible and think of Bible heroes as invincible, supermen. But they're not cast in iron and they don't have mechanical hearts, and they're not  exempt from sorrow or concern. And Paul struggled, hurting for the people, hurting for the unresolved issues, and worried about how they were doing. Though he had great faith, he had great emotion as well, and there's certainly nothing wrong with that.

So, we read in verse 6 that finally Titus showed in Macedonia. We think probably in Philippi. Paul praises the Lord and says in verse 6, "God has lifted up my downcast soul." Paul's no different than you and I. I know sometimes the enemy will try to put you on the  bench by telling you, you don't measure up to Bible people  but you do, because God's work is the same, and we're weak, but He's strong. But notice I want you to get a glimpse of this great apostle, Paul, and he's languishing, and he's unable to minister until some news comes to allay his fears about his brother and about the church. He loved both of them with his life. And until he got the news, he was a downcast kind of out of business kind of preacher.          

It's a great lesson to learn. I know sometimes you come to church and everything seems to be going wrong, and you're discouraged, and God hasn't moved, or you wish that He would, but I guess you learn with Paul that God is greater than your distress. He's certainly larger than your distress, and He's able to meet your needs.

And Paul had hung in here by faith, mind you, but that didn't mean his knees weren't knocking.

So he says in verse 6, “The Lord has comforted the depressed, and He has comforted me by the coming of Titus, and not just his coming,” verse 7, "But also by the consolation with which he was comforted in you, when he told us of your honest desire and your mourning and your zeal for me, and then I rejoiced even more." It was good to see Titus alive; even better to see his smiling face and the news that he brought. I couldn't ask for more, Paul said. So concerned about your well-being, and now he tells us about the health of the church and the spiritual well-being of God's people. And in one degree or another, these are the folks who had turned on him for well over a year now, but now they were coming back to being loyal.

Titus  comes and  he says to Paul these are genuine brokenhearted tears, and the Corinthians are wanting to do good, they want to do right. Blessed are the mourning, for they'll be comforted. This is the kind of mourning that comes when you realize you've failed the Lord, and you're not what He wants you to be, and you've come up short. It's the kind of mourning that leads to real change. I don't want to do this anymore.

Not only that, Paul says, I heard about your zeal for me. But it must have been a great feeling for Paul that his spiritual kids, and indeed they were, were now interested in him again. And he said, I rejoiced all the more. I couldn't be happier. They were loyal to him again. Loyalty is important in broken relationships. I know today loyalty seems like a disability, at least in the culture. Biblically loyalty is probably the most desirable virtue in human relationship that exists. If you're loyal, you have a friend. If you're not, it can destroy everything. Well, these folks had come back around, and Paul, you just see him grinning from ear to ear.

Secondly, he heard that they were repenting of their sin. Literally they wanted to get away from what they were doing to what God wanted for them. So, he says in verse 8, "But even if I made you sorry with my letter, I don't regret it; although I did regret it. For I perceive that the same epistle made you sorry, though only for a while. And now I rejoice, not that you were made sorry, but that your sorrow has led to your repentance. For you were made sorry in a Godly manner, that you might suffer loss from us in nothing. For godly sorrow will produce repentance that will lead to salvation, not to be regretted of; but the sorrow of the world will produce death."

I suspect if I was in Paul's shoes, that all of that relationship with the church over this last year, the back and forth, the letters, the worse news, that if you wrote a really strong letter of rebuke or confrontation, as he decided to do, that once you sent it, you might go, "maybe I shouldn't have sent it."        I don't know if you’ve ever felt bad for doing the right thing. You said the right thing, you meant to reach out, and you're not sure how it's going to be received, and so you start to say to yourself, I wonder if I did the right thing, or maybe I could have done it differently, or maybe I shouldn't have yelled so loud.

Maybe I chased them off. I'll never get another chance, and yet Paul was kind of in that spot. He knew everything he wrote was right. He wasn't sorry for any of that. But he was a little worried about how the fallout might go, and so he wondered. It was part of his depression, the difficulty that he was facing.

And I think that's true in any kind of relationship. Sometimes you have to confront others with their words, and love would demand that you speak up. The false teachers will be lying anyway. They're not going to shut up. But Paul needed to speak up in true love. But that has a cost involved.           Rebuke is something if that if you receive it, it's like honey. It's sweet, it's good, it's nourishing. But more often than not, people don't receive rebuke very well. And Paul was worried about that. So, he'll point out, even though the rest of this chapter, that he was so thankful that his letter produced sorrow. Not that he was happy they were sorrowful, but that that sorrow produced in them a genuine repentance.

I mean, you don't find the Corinthians already defensive, which is how people usually get when you call them on something. They weren't trying to be victims. Oh, that's really not my fault. They were turning back to the Lord, they were turning back to Paul, and so Paul writes here in verse 9 and verse 10, I'm not happy that you were sorry or grieved, but I'm thrilled that that grief brought you to repentance.

And then he makes this axiomatic kind of statement in verse 10, godly sorrow is a good thing. It'll produce in you a repentance. And he says in verse 9, and that way you're not suffering loss from us. There aren’t any resentments, but godly sorrow produces repentance that will lead to salvation, whereas worldly sorrow is just an emotion that leads to death. Pretty important truth.

I suspect that most people in prison are sorry. Not necessarily sorry they did it; certainly sorry they got caught. If I had it to do over again, oh, I'd still do it, but I'd plan better. I'd look around a little bit more. I'm sorry that I wasn't as smart as I thought I was.

The sorrow God is looking for over sin causes you to turn and go another direction. It's like I hate where I'm at, I hate where I'm going, I hate where I've ended up in all of this. I want to find the life that God had.

 And by the way, the Bible is filled with examples of those who were sorrowful versus those who are sorrowful in a godly sense.

Probably the classic example of the two is Judas and Peter. Both of them did roughly the same thing.                               

  Judas was sorry his actions led to Jesus' death. In fact, in Matthew 27 it says, "Judas, his betrayer, seeing that he had been condemned, was remorseful, brought back the 30 pieces of silver to the high priests and elders, and he said this: 'I have sinned against innocent blood.'" And he threw it back at the feet of the priest, who didn't take the money; tried to act real spiritual about it. He was remorseful. It's the word for regretting something or he was upset at the consequences of his treachery. He wasn't upset at the cause. He didn't really believe Jesus was the Messiah. He certainly wasn't going to bow his knee to Him. He wanted Him out of the way; he didn't want Him dead. So, he regretted it. I can't  believe that what I did led to His death. Eventually finding no place for repentance, he went out and he killed himself. The world's sorrow produces death. He had remorse, no repentance.

Peter, on the other hand, was at dinner the night before Jesus was betrayed, or saw the effects of the betrayal, and at dinner he swore to Jesus in front of everybody how faithful he would be. Even pointed at his buddies and go, "These guys, I don't trust them. But you can trust me. I'm your loyal follower." And yet it wasn't three hours later that he's in a courtyard, standing there, cursing at the top of his lungs, taking vows and oaths, swearing to have never known Jesus at all, even as the Lord looked down from the trial up above.

And it  says that Peter went out and he wept bitterly. What  a horrible three days for Peter, who did love the Lord, and thought too much of himself and had put himself in this predicament. But he found God's mercy. He  truly repented. On the day of the resurrection, it was the angels who said to the women, "Go tell the disciples, and make sure you tell Peter I'm alive," and God singles Peter out. And then in John Chapter 21, in front of all of his buddies, Jesus restores Peter to ministry, because Peter has to say now to the Lord, "Peter do you love Me?" And no bragging now, "Lord, you know my heart. You know I love You." "Peter do you love Me?" And finally, he just says, "Lord, You know.      No more bragging. I'm just depending on You to help me." And God restored Peter.

He found a place of restoration through actual repentance.

Same thing with you and I. John was in his 90s when he wrote 1 John, and he said to us in Chapter 1 verse 7, "If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ will cleanse us from all sin." Two verses later, "If we confess our sins, He's faithful, He's just, forgives all of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." We need to be repenting a lot, don't we? I think a good practice before, you go to bed every night, look back over the day, and let the Lord have the failures. Stay close by the blood of the Lamb.

The joy of Paul's heart for the Corinthians was, they weren't just saying I'm sorry, they were doing something about it. Have you ever said to your kids, "Say 'I'm sorry'"? And they do this: "I'm sorry," like anyone's going, oh, that's sincere. I'm sure you are. No, they were sorry, and they were doing something about it. God was turning them from their sin and from their deception, back to the Lord, and back to Paul who had been so faithful to them.

It produced in them a vehement desire, a longing, a zeal to do what was right, to break habits, to form new ones. It vindicated them. It set them free.

I think what God wants to do here is, for us to not only help others to be set free from this struggle, but for us to be set free and find a godly grieve that will produce freedom.