Theologians can develop a reputation for being a little bit heady at times, a little bit deep, a little bit persnickety, maybe difficult. Dr. Shumate and I the other day were talking about a chain of emails that we had sent to each other. And it was sent after midnight and I had inadvertently said tomorrow when I meant that same calendar day. So we were discussing whether it was appropriate at 12.01 p.m. 115 AM, whatever the case may be, to say tomorrow or today. And Mrs. Sturtzbaugh walking down the hallway astutely observed, you guys sound like theologians. Sometimes we read an epistle like Romans or an epistle like Hebrews, and we do a lot of deep diving in the theology, and rightly so, Ephesians. Paul is very precise. He opens up vistas to us that really enhance our understanding of God, of what God's doing in the world, of our place, and what God's doing. But sometimes there are epistles that give you a window into the personality of the apostle in a unique way. 2 Corinthians is one of those. If you read 2 Corinthians, you really get to hear Paul's heart. He has written 1 Corinthians already, an epistle where he's having to deal with sin in some pretty direct ways. In fact, our reputation, our understanding of the Corinthians is often governed by the fact that they have to be corrected so much in 1 Corinthians. a preacher might stand up and say, what do you know about the Corinthians? And everybody just starts talking about all their problems, right? The sin problems, the issues, you just start naming it, and they're just doing a chapter content of 1 Corinthians. There were problems of immorality, problems of divisions, problems in worship, problems in how they handle one another, lack of love, I mean, you just, the list goes on. But this is not 1 Corinthians, this is 2 Corinthians. They have actually responded rightly to Paul's first letter, by and large, but there's still false teachers. There's still wolves in sheep's clothing within the congregation. So Paul is on the one hand, commending them for their good response to the instruction. And on the other hand, he's finding himself having to defend his authority to write to them in the first place. Can you imagine an apostle having to defend his authority? And here, Paul is in that very situation. So as you read through this epistle, you kind of have this push and pull as Paul will exert his authority and then step back and defend his authority and then commend them for what they're doing well and then exhort them to do something different and then rebuke the false teachers and then go back at it again. Well, when we come to 2 Corinthians 6, we're finding him in one of these places where he's shooting pretty straight with the Corinthian church. But this is not an attitude of belligerence. This is not an attitude of anger. This is an attitude of love that comes out sounding a little bit impassioned. In fact, he's really expressing some of his confusion over how they're treating him. He's tried to be transparent to them, and yet they have not been to him. Look, for example, at 2 Corinthians 6, verse 11. Paul says, O Corinthians, we have spoken openly to you. Our heart is wide open. What a great statement from the Apostle Paul. We've spoken openly to you. We're transparent with you. Our heart is wide open. Paul really cared. He's honest with them. He really cared. You think about the Apostle Paul and the kinds of things that he suffered, right? The kinds of things that he went over. In fact, if you drop back just a little bit, to the beginning of this chapter, Paul describes himself as a worker together with God, picking up on that ambassadors for Christ illustration from the end of chapter five. And so he's pleading with the Corinthians not to receive the grace of God in vain. And then in verse three, Paul says that he labored to make sure that there was no offense on his account. We labor to make sure there's no offense in anything so that our ministry may not be blamed. Hey, what's Paul's ministry like? Well, look at verse four. In all things, we commend ourselves as ministers of God. Here's what service for God looks like. Impatience and tribulations and needs, distresses, stripes, imprisonments, tumults, labors, sleeplessness, fasting. Can you imagine if you had spiritual leaders in your life and this is the kind of thing they were enduring to help you grow in Christ? Imprisoned for their faith, beaten for their faith, working hard, sleepless, going without food, patient, and all of these things. But then Paul addresses the character by which he did it, not just the fact that he suffered. There are people who suffer who don't have the character to back up their ministry, but here Paul says, by purity and by knowledge and by longsuffering and by kindness, by the Holy Spirit, by sincere love, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report, good report, Okay, here he's saying, here's our character, and now he's talking about their reputation. So what's their reputation, broadly speaking? If he has a laboring, diligent, careful, concerned, pure, truthful, spirit-empowered ministry, what's his reputation? Well, for some it's honor, for some it's dishonor. Some people bring an evil report, others a good report. They're accused of being deceivers, and yet they're honest. To some, they're unknown, and yet they're well-known. As dying, behold, we live. As chastened, yet not killed. As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing. As poor, yet making many rich. As having nothing, but possessing everything. Oh, Corinthians, we've spoken openly to you. Our hearts are wide open." What a testimony for a servant of God. to have that kind of commitment to this local church, to have that kind of heart for these believers, these people whom he had witnessed to, these people whom he had discipled, these people whom he had written to, these people who God had given him the burden of all the churches so that he could minister to them. So this was a great relationship, right? I mean, Paul and the Corinthians, they got along great, right? Well, Paul really cared, he's open with them, so what went wrong? What could possibly get between somebody and a spiritual leader with that kind of heart and that kind of ministry? Well, Paul describes it in the next verse. He says, you're not restricted by us, you're restricted by your own affections. You're not restricted by us. The problem's not with us, the problem is with you. in your own affections. If you have a King James there, it says in your own bowels. That's a Middle Eastern expression describing the heart, where your seat of affections are, the innermost part that expresses what you love, what you really care about. And Paul describes them as being restricted in their affections. That is hemmed in or closely cramped. So one summer during college, I was back home, and we were working to replace the deck on our back porch. So in Maine, we had this nice back patio area right off the kitchen, right off the family room. And there was one major problem with this patio. It only had two conditions, full sun or full mosquitoes. So we didn't really use it like ever. All we did with it was occasionally strip and repaint it to try to keep it looking okay. That was about the only use that this back porch got. So we went ahead and at one point built an addition off the back family room and enclosed a screened porch. But my dad realized that screens by themselves cost as much as screens with windows, because windows come with screens. So you can buy screens, or you can buy windows, and they're the same price, and the windows come with screens. So we bought windows. And so now this became not a screened-in porch, but a three-season porch. That would kind of work a while. So we insulated the walls, and we built out this room that really worked well. We could open windows many different directions in the summer and get cross breeze through. It was really nice in the spring and fall. And in the winter, it was a walk-in refrigerator. So it wasn't quite cold enough to call it a refrigerator. Things wouldn't normally freeze, but breads and pastries and things that just needed to be kept cool. It was a great place to put all those kinds of things. So when we decided one summer to redo the other half, we had built that addition right on top of half of the porch. We decided to redo the other half with composite board that we wouldn't have to repaint every year. And we figured, while we're tearing everything apart, now is a great time to go underneath and insulate the floor underneath this room. We'd insulated the walls and the ceiling, but not the floor. So we thought, let's insulate the floor. So we got stone wool insulation. and decided to go underneath there and insulate it. The problem was that that addition was built on top of a deck that was really only 12 to 18 inches off the ground. So my job was to insulate between these joists that were about 12 inches, 18 inches off the ground, and then about 8 inches deep. So here I am in a Tyvek suit to protect myself from the stone wall, trying to shimmy myself through these 16-inch on center joists, and put insulation up. And then to avoid having mice or something else build nests, we had to pull in sheets of a board that we would put up and screw in place. So you couldn't use a regular screwdriver. You had to use one of these 90-degree compact screwdrivers. And here I am underneath. My brother was extremely helpful. He said, hey, I'll pass you anything you need. So we worked together, and we were doing this. And you know what? Putting up insulation and board in an area that's two feet wide, 15 inches tall is not that difficult on its own, but the space made it really hard. Is it that I'm incompetent with a screwdriver? Well, maybe, but I would like to think I'm not. Was the problem that I didn't understand what I was doing? No. What made it so hard? It was the space I had to work with. It was the restrictions that were put upon me. Paul felt that way trying to minister to the Corinthians. He's competent, he cared, he had the supplies he needed, he's trying to do something to help them, and he can't operate because they're only giving him this much room to work. They were restricted in their own affections. The problem was not with Paul. The problem was not with Paul's associates or their other spiritual leaders. The problem was they weren't listening. And even if they were hearing, they weren't being teachable. They were not giving Paul the space to work. So in this passage, as you go through, you find that Paul is going to appeal to the Corinthians to open up their hearts to him. Look at verse 13, he says, I'm open with you and the restrictions are on your end, so in return for the same, I speak as to children, be you also open. Drop down to chapter seven, verse two. What does that verse open with? Open your hearts to us, okay? Paul is, in this whole next section, gonna be talking about this idea of opening up their hearts to apostolic instruction. Okay, I'm pointing out the bookends here so that when we go through here, you realize Paul's not gonna change topics on us. Paul's going to elaborate on the topic. So I might say to my son, son, I need you to clean your room. Stop playing Legos. Stop reading that book, stop working on your math homework, clean your room. How many different topics was I addressing in that sentence or in that paragraph? One, stop doing your math, stop playing with Legos, stop reading a book are all different ways in which he's going to accomplish the primary goal of clean your room. That's what Paul is gonna do in this passage. He says, in return for the same, I speak to children, you also be open. And here is how they are going to open their life to Paul. It actually means they need to stop opening themselves up to somebody else. Verse 14, do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? What communion has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? What part does a believer have with an unbeliever? What agreement does the temple of God have with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God. They will be my people. Therefore, come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean and I will receive you. I will be a father to you. You shall be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty. Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. Open your hearts to us. We've wronged no one, we've corrupted no one, we've cheated no one. I don't say this to condemn you. I've said before, you're in our hearts to die together and live together. Great is my boldness of speech towards you. Great is my boasting on your behalf. I'm filled with comfort. I'm exceedingly joyful in our tribulation. And he just goes on and on, right back to his relationship with them. Paul's point is that enlarging your heart to the ministry of the spiritual leaders in your life requires that you keep space in your heart by shutting out other voices. It's like your hard drive on your computer. This semester you're gonna have class assignments, right? There's gonna be things you're gonna have to store on your hard drive or store in your cloud storage. How many of you have ever found that your phone storage was filling up with photos and videos? and you were running out of things, your operating system wouldn't even work because your phone starts crashing because everything's full of something else. Hey, your hearts are like that. Your hearts have a capacity, a capacity for influence. And you can either fill the capacity for influence with those outside of Christ, with the things of this world, with those who don't have your best interest in mind, or even with people who are well-intentioned but not spirit-filled. And if you allow your heart capacity to be filled with that, you will lose the space for God's leaders in your life to have the space to work. You're restricting them. That's what Paul is doing. So what Paul is saying here is that as believers, there's an absence of fellowship. There's certain things that don't go together, right? Stripes and polka dots. don't go together. Some of the guys are scratching their head. They don't. Stripes and polka dots don't go together. Water and gasoline. Fish in the Sahara Desert. Or hot sauce and ice cream. We had a collection of hot sauces. We had a collection of hot sauces growing up. And the tagline on the back was good on everything except ice cream. Like, who would have thought to try that? But apparently there are some. OK, we've got two, three who have tried that. OK, well, apparently it's a thing. But Paul's illustrations here are not frivolous. Paul's illustrations here are serious. He's going to walk through a variety of illustrations here. What fellowship does righteousness have with lawlessness? Hebrews 1.9 commends our Savior as one who has loved righteousness and hated lawlessness. Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness more than your companions. God's blessing comes on our Messiah, our Savior, because he loved righteousness and hated lawlessness. Matthew 24, Jesus warns us that many false prophets will arrive and deceive many. And because of lawlessness, because of that lawlessness will abound and the love of many will grow cold. Lawlessness is an action word. It's not just a doctrine word. It has to do with what you do, right? Second Thessalonians, Paul's demanding church discipline. And do you remember the sin that was demanding church discipline in Second Thessalonians? It's laziness. Somebody who refused to work and expected other people to meet his needs while he would not even bother to do his part. Because he was refusing to accept the apostolic instruction of 1 Thessalonians. So somebody who refuses to submit to apostolic instruction is lawless. And righteousness has no part in lawlessness. Or Paul talks about light and darkness, right? 1 John chapter one, verse five, this is the message we've heard from him and declare to you that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him and we walk in darkness, we lie and we don't practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus Christ, his son, cleanses us from all sin. There's a book I read several years ago called Jesus the Word according to John the sectarian. And it's a discussion of the gospel of John and the way that John thinks. Have you ever noticed that John's kind of black and white? He who has the son has life, he who does not have the son does not have life. You walk in the light, he who loves God doesn't sin, right? You're like, okay, we got a lot of black and white going on here. It's like John, it's like, it's almost as if John thought that there was such a thing as who was in and who was out. It's almost like John actually believed that what you did with Jesus mattered. This book was written by somebody who would be called a new evangelical. So Dr. Schall described those in his messages this week. This book about John the Sectarian is written by a New Evangelical. His subtitle is a paleofundamentalist. In other words, not the modern fundamentalists, but the old fundamentalists, the paleofundamentalists. A paleofundamentalist manifesto for contemporary evangelicalism, especially its elites in North America. And here's a description of this book. Few have failed to notice the increasing accommodation of evangelicalism to worldly culture. Unless this trend is corrected, evangelicalism will soon lose the distinctives that catapulted it to unparalleled success in the religious marketplace. If evangelicalism becomes like the world, it's no different anymore and it loses its voice. The antidote in this book is John's Gospel. Because the gospel of John addresses the fact that there is such a thing as living like Christ. John's what Gundry calls logocentric sectarianism, focusing on Jesus who has brought a message from God that is a knife that divides. Right from wrong, good from evil, light from darkness, godliness from worldliness. Paul's next illustration is Christ and Belial. Belial meaning worthlessness, a common phrase in the Old Testament, describes even as a proper name for Satan or even the Antichrist in the New Testament. In latter times, some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits, doctrines of demons. Question for you, who was it who invented the idea of conflict between people and Satan? Between the sons of Adam and Eve? and the sons of Satan. Who was it who invented the conflict between God's people and the worldly culture? It was God himself who invented the conflict. Genesis chapter three, verse 15. I will put enmity between you, Satan, and the woman, and between her seed and your seed. It is God himself who unilaterally instituted the enmity between his people and Satan's people. And anyone who befriends the seed of the serpent is not a friend of the seed of the woman, Christ. Right, if you take Satan's side, you are not taking Christ's side. To blur that line, to pacify the enemy is to undermine the work and the intention of God himself. So, James goes so far as to cry out adulteresses. Don't you know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. So Paul says, what part does a believer have with an unbeliever? Part is your portion, your share, your inheritance. What is the similarity in the eternal inheritance of a believer and an unbeliever? There is none. What fellowship does the temple of God have with a believer? As Paul said in 1 Corinthians 10, you can't drink of the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You can't partake of the Lord's table and the table of demons. Are you going to provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are you stronger than Him? Is your arm strong? Is your arm long enough to box with God? Paul says, all things are lawful for me, but not all things are edifying. So what Paul is doing in this passage, okay, is just identifying the fact that there's a contrast here. There's a distinction between God's people and the world. And if we fail to recognize that distinction, we endanger ourselves because we will open ourselves up to all kinds of influencers. and crowd out the opportunity for God to work through the leaders he's put in our lives to address God's word to our heart when we need to hear it. We'll be hearing the preaching of the word and say, oh, that doesn't sound right to me. Because we've had the philosophy of other voices constantly in our head. Oh, that application can't be godly. No, there's no way scripture would expect that of me. Because it looks so different than what's around us. How important it is that we guard our hearts, and that we guard our hearts to be open to those whom God has given to us. I know that you know better, okay? This is not new, what I'm saying. But I would have said the same thing that summer when I was working on that porch. You know, when we put the extra wood on the other side, the composite board, we extended the porch a little bit, made a nicer area, and we got some stone on clearance that complemented it really well. In fact, we were going to take two of these square pavers and inset them into the step that went from the porch to the kitchen. So a border of composite board around the edge and two stones inset. So I was working one afternoon on that, and we had used the skill saw to cut out the insets that we needed. But skill saws don't help entirely, because they're rounded blades. I needed a square edge, cutting down so I could drop the stone in. So I got a utility knife and was whittling away at the board, cutting in the corners. And I needed to do one last cut. I thought, I shouldn't do this, but I'll be careful. And I worked it, and all of a sudden it slipped, and it came right up my thumb. I still have the scar, as you can imagine. That goes from this side of my thumb around to this side. I missed the tendons. I missed the bones. I just cut across the skin. Did I know better? Yep. Did I let my knowledge change what I did? Nope. I doubled the cost of that project with that trip to the emergency room. Trying to save money by doing it ourselves and double the cost by a trip to the ER. You know, it helps you, by the way, Tip, it helps you get into the ER more quickly if you wrap a towel around your hand and hold it over your head when you walk into the emergency room. You know, all these other people are sitting around waiting for an appointment. They're like, come on in, we'll help you. I got it stitched up and took years for the nerves to grow back. I knew better. I knew better. But I did it anyway. Hit it anyway. Let's not be that. Let's take the admonition of Paul, whose heart was wide open, who labored on behalf of the Corinthians with the filling of the spirit, with genuine love, with kindness, with patience, with the word of truth, with the armor of righteousness that earned him a reputation. Among those who rejected him, It was not a good reputation among those who knew the truth. He didn't have to defend what God was doing through him, but let's not be those Corinthians who restrict the ministry of somebody so given by God for our good. Let's be wide open to spiritual ministry.