2 Corinthians 3, verses 1 through 6. Are we beginning to commend ourselves again, or do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you, or from you? You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts to be known and read by all. And you show that you are a letter from Christ, delivered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God. not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts. Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. Praise God for His holy word. Now let's go to Him in prayer one more time and ask Him to bless our time together looking at these verses. Heavenly Father, we bow in your presence, and the prayer of our heart is we would desire that your word would be our rule, your spirit our teacher, and your greater glory our supreme concern. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. Well, in the previous chapter, and I think looking around, most of you were here for this, but in chapter 2, verse 17, Paul mentions some people that are causing trouble for the church in Corinth. He mentions the peddlers of God's Word. A kid's a peddler is someone that's selling something, okay, traveling around and selling stuff. So there were… and these people, they're in Corinth. And they were in ministry, but they were in ministry to benefit themselves. They were in it to get rich, to make a name for themselves. They're trying to undermine Paul's ministry, and by doing so, they're undermining the gospel. And previously, first, they attacked Paul's integrity and his sincerity, and then second, they questioned whether or not he really could be God's representative because a lot of bad things happen to Paul, and he suffers a lot. How can someone that's so blessed by God suffer so much? Well, looking at our passage, it seems like part of their plan and their strategy in the Church of Corinth was to attack Paul's credentials and his credibility by putting forth their own. And this isn't a surprise to us. We know that the evil one hates Christ and that he hates his church. And since the beginning, Satan has always tried to undermine and twist the Word of God. He's trying to undermine God's Word as it's come to the Corinthians through the Apostle Paul. And Paul gives a surprising defense of his mission and his message. And he points to the Corinthians themselves as proof that his message is from God, that they are the living letters of recommendation. They are the testimony of the power of this gospel that Paul preaches. And this thought brings us to our main idea or our theme this evening, and that's this. Christians are living letters of recommendation that testify to the truth and power of the gospel for the whole world to read. So we'll just split this in half, verse one, verse two. We'll talk about the peddler's letter of recommendation and then Paul's letter of recommendation, and we'll have a lot of application along the way. So first, you know, revisiting the situation in Corinth here, figuring out what's going on with these letters of recommendation, and even kind of doing some thinking about how in the world are the Corinthians being led astray? Verse one again, Paul says, are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some do, letters of recommendation to you or from you? So paraphrasing verse 1, this is a little difficult here. So if we want to paraphrase this and help us understand what Paul's saying here, he's saying something like this. Do we really need to put forth our own credentials again? I mean, you know us. We were with you for a year and a half. We've continued to stay in touch. Do we really need letters of recommendation in order for you to listen to us? And for that matter, Do we need letters from you so other people will listen to us? This is silliness. This makes no sense. So this verse is giving us some idea of the situation in Corinth. The peddlers of God's Word came to Corinth. It seems that they had their own set of letters and, you know, testimonials about how wonderful they were. And presenting a letter of recommendation, in the ancient world, similar to today's world, is a common way to introduce strangers and to get credibility. You couldn't just, you know, Google someone to find out who they were. A person could carry a letter from a ruler or an important person that a lot of people knew and then they could go somewhere and they could say, you know, here's my letter of recommendation from, you know, R.C. Sproul or, you know, Dr. Menninger and then you would have a lot of a lot of credibility, right? So, letters of introduction in the ancient world, they were designed to get you into the door and to kind of foster some level of trust. Well, these peddlers have these letters and their plan worked. They gained some measure of trust to those that really had no idea who they were and now they But they had the Corinthians' trust. The Corinthians were buying into what they were selling. They liked it. Whatever they were hearing, they were enjoying it. And as a result, then, they were questioning Paul. They were questioning Paul, which led them to question Paul's message, which is the message of God Himself. So they're actually also questioning the Gospel, the Word of the Lord. Well, sitting here nearly 2,000 years later, we might be thinking, How could this happen there? How could they do this? I mean, who of us wouldn't have loved to hear Paul live in person or his daily podcast if he had one? Well, before we just think how in the world could they do this and start thinking too little of them and too much of ourselves, how could I be led astray? We only have to look once again into our own hearts and to know that there are doubts there. and that we struggle at times receiving and believing God's Word, not so much in the moment, but sometimes we struggle believing it for the long haul. We're prone to doubts. We're prone to wander from the truth. Error creeps in unnoticed. And this is by Satan's design. This is probably his most successful strategy, and that's to convince God's people to question the reliability of God's Word, or just to twist it ever so slightly. In the garden, Satan questioned God's Word and he twisted it. As the tempter said to Eve, did God really say you shall not eat of any tree? He twisted God's words. And then he questioned God's motives. You shouldn't listen to God. He doesn't have your best interest in mind. He's keeping you from something. He's keeping you from something because He's a selfish God. Well, Satan uses the same strategy over and over again. I'm not going to say he's a one-trick pony, but he certainly likes this trick, to attack God's people by attacking God's Word. And in chapter 2, Paul reminded us to be sure, to make sure that we're not ignorant of this, that we're not ignorant of Satan's designs and his plans. So let's not be ignorant. Knowing this attack is coming and what it's going to look like means that we must constantly expect it and be ready to fight against it. Satan is a lot smarter than me and everyone else in this room, and his attacks for us are not obvious. They're subtle. He usually takes something God has said, a truth or a good gift that God's given and then just distorts it ever so slightly. And this strategy works, and here's why it works. It works because we like things that are shiny and new. We like, oh, that's interesting. I've never heard that before. We're constantly on some level, many of us are looking for the next best thing. We're not just satisfied with what we have. We get sick of it. We get tired of it. And we seek something new, some new experience, or something new to believe, or some new conspiracy theory. Maybe not all of us are conspiracy theorists, but that's why those things are so attractive to so many people. They're looking for that brand new secret stuff. And sometimes we don't even do this because we think the new thing is better. We're just tired of what we've got. Well, to prepare for this attack, we must identify it. For those of us that have been around for a little while, we've seen this play out in many trends that come and go. Not just trends in the world like, oh, now this diet is healthy and now it's not, but trends in the church. We see things come and go and then they come back again. It's hard to identify these teachings when you're in the midst of them, and that's why it's so easy for us to get a little bit off course. They're usually something that has to do with some new take on a political view, or some new mission to cure some societal ill, or just something else that takes over the minds and the hearts and the resources of the church. And this can even be some kind of theological topic that might not even be a bad topic, but it's one that's not essential. And it's one that a lot of different Christians, godly Christians, have different opinions on within the bounds of orthodoxy, but sometimes people will take that and make it essential, essentially adding it to the Apostles' Creed. Sometimes we all want the exciting new and shiny object. I know we have many young people here who are studying and even we have seminarians come through our door. Beware. Beware of the shiny new object that's the popular thing and getting all the excitement. You want what's old and tried and true. The best way to defend against this attack by Satan is to be vigilant. It's to keep exposing yourself to the truth of the gospel, the apostolic faith, to sit under solid preaching of the word week in and week out, to continue to grow in our knowledge of the doctrines taught, the key doctrines that are taught in the Bible. And one way that we do this is making sure that we continually study our confessions and our catechisms. That's one of the reasons that that's why we do that in this church and have a systematic way of going through these basic doctrines, and we have our youth doing catechism. And it's not only about the doctrine and staying connected to those things. What's equally important is that we stay connected to people, that we stay connected to a loving community of believers in person. You don't want to be a part of some obscure theological community online and get our fellowship and all our teaching there. We need to get our teaching and our fellowship here because if we go astray out there in the world on the internet, no one's going to be able to come get us. People might not even know. But if we're here, our friends will know. That's one of the blessings of church membership, of being a Presbyterian, is that we have each other and we have elders and shepherds that will reign us back in if we start to stray. So may the Lord keep us from error and keep us from straying and hold fast just to the nuts and bolts of the gospel. In Corinth, they strayed. So let us beware and make sure that that's not us. Now in verse 2, getting into our second point here, Paul counters these false teachers with his own letter of recommendation or his letters of recommendation. Now we might have been expecting him to say that this letter of recommendation that I got from Peter you know, or James or John, but surprisingly the letter of recommendation that he's mentioning is a living letter that they always have that's with them all the time because they themselves are the letter. God's power at work in them is the proof of the truth and power of Paul's message. Verse 2 again says, you yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written in our hearts to be known and read by all. So Paul and his ministry team, they don't have and they don't need letters of recommendation from famous people. They have something far better, far more convincing. They have living letters of recommendation. The very fact that there's a church that exists in pagan Corinth and that it's full of people with changed lives, that's their letter of recommendation. Before Paul arrived, we know who was in Corinth, those of us that have read 1 Corinthians. We see what the people were like before Paul got there and even what they still struggled with in 1 Corinthians 6. The Corinthians were sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers. Homosexuality was widespread. They were thieves. Greed ruled. They were drunkards and swindlers. And after this list in 1 Corinthians 6, Paul says this, and such were some of you, were some of you, but you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. They were sinners, but now no longer. They've been saved. They're being transformed in the image of the risen Christ. They're new men and new women who were enemies of God, who hated God, who hated God's law, but now they're in fellowship with God, and they love His law. Paul has something better than a recommendation on parchment. He has the evidence of those who have been completely changed in the church of Corinth, changed by Christ himself. Paul's evidence is the fruit of his ministry. His proof is not in the pudding, but it's in the people. The very existence of the church in Corinth is Paul's endorsement that his ministry is approved by God. This recommendation is engraved, it's etched, it's tattooed on Paul's heart. His love for his spiritual children is as deep as the ocean and he carries it with him everywhere that he goes. Paul also says this letter is to be known and read by all. Now in general there were two types of letters in the ancient world, perhaps there are still two types of letters, but some were for private correspondence and others were written and intended to be read in a public setting. Well, the Corinthians are the public type of letter, not the private type of letter. They were to be the aroma of Christ, making Christ known through their suffering. They were also to be a testimony of the transforming power of the Holy Spirit to everyone around them. The Corinthians didn't need an additional endorsement from Paul because they already had it. And it wasn't hidden, but it was on display for the whole world to see. Paul's letters of recommendation They were not in a bag or kept in his pocket, but they were out there. They were posted for anyone who knew anyone in the church of Corinth to see. So if Paul's message then, if it wasn't from God, if it was a scam, If it was for his own good, there wouldn't be a church gathered in Corinth worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ. There wouldn't be changed lives and healed relationships there. The very existence of Christians in Corinth was a living, breathing letter of recommendation, proving that Paul's message was God's message. So now as we understand these letters, we can make a few applications about Paul's living letters of recommendation to us here this evening. The first is this. We can be equally confident in the transforming Word of God, the evidence of God's power, and the power of the gospel. We can be as confident, even more confident than those in Corinth, Because we wake up and look in the mirror, and we see our transformed lives. Our transformed lives are the evidence of the power of the Gospel to us. There are many, many proofs that the Bible is the Word of God. But one of the proofs that the Bible is the Word of God and does what it says it does, and does what God says He will do through the gospel, one of those evidences is not just, you know, manuscripts and it's the Word of God because it says it is the Word of God, but it's because the Word of God is used to change minds and change hearts and change wills. And like the Corinthians, we are living letters of recommendation and evidence that the gospel and the power of the gospel is true as well. One commentator put it this way. True Christianity is not a veneer of morality glued to the exterior of our lives, but a profound change of heart, mind, and will, which is then expressed in our outward behavior. The Word of God changes individuals in the context of Christian fellowship from the inside out. Now for those of us who came to faith a little later in life or took a long time to make profession of faith and have lived a little while to see some, by God's grace, spiritual growth in our life, this change describes us. and we've experienced it and we can see it. We know we're changed from the inside out. We know who we were. We remember that we were only out for our own self-interest, that we were seekers of our own pleasure, that we were hostile to Jesus, that we hated God's law and we were those without hope. Now, if we didn't hate it, if it was never that bad, but God's law is certain, we just viewed it as something I have to do or a burden, you're in that boat too. And now we know, though. We know who we are. Now we are changed. We're those who know and love God. We love our neighbor and actually want good things for our neighbor. And even though we don't feel very successful at this thing called the Christian life and Christian living, we don't feel like we do a very good job at it. The desire is there. We desire to serve others. We know we've been transformed because we want the kingdom of God to come. We can't wait for the kingdom of God to come because that's when the fun really starts. We have a blessed hope. We're new people. The only explanation for this transforming power of the Holy Spirit causing us to be born again as the children of God is that the message is true and it's reliable. We read this letter, which is us, this letter of recommendation, this testimony that the truth of God's Word is true, we read it every single time we look in the mirror and remember what we were and we remember who we are in Jesus Christ. You were dead in your sins, now you are a new creation in Jesus Christ. And this letter, it's also a public letter, it's not just for us in our mirror. We should also be read by each other. We do this when we share our struggles and how God has ministered to us in the midst of them. When we share things of areas where we've had victory, sharing things about our Christian life with one another. This lets other people read our letter, and then they're encouraged about the power of the gospel as well. It's good for us to have conversations like this, and granted, a lot of, some of you know, I love football, and I'll talk about it whenever you want. But there's better conversations to be had, whether it's in Christian fellowship, especially on the Lord's Day, and that's tell me how you came to Christ. What kinds of things has the Lord been teaching you lately? Hearing and witnessing radical transformation, personal testimonies and others assures us of the truth and power of the gospel. Now sometimes we don't think as much of personal testimonies as we ought to because that's just not a huge thing that we do in the Reformed Church. But if you read our directory of public worship, when someone comes to faith in Christ, it says in there that there's basically, it could be a good idea or it's desirable or they may share their Christian testimony. So even as Reformed people, we don't use that that often. in our worship service, but it's in there. There's a provision for it because we're letters of recommendation. We're evidence of the transforming power of the gospel and seeing each other transformed and that speaks to our hearts and reminds us, yes, the Bible is the Word of God that changes sinners from the inside out. It's also good for us to remember that as public letters of recommendation, that's not just for each other here in the church, but it's also out there for non-Christians in the world to read as well. Paul says we're the aroma of Christ as we walk through this difficult Christian life. We're also living letters of recommendation as we show the evidence of this transformed life to non-Christians. We do this certainly by telling people about Jesus, what he's done for us, what he's done in us. But people are also to see us by our transformed lives and our love for one another. And when they do, when they hear about Christ, and they see our love, and that we tell the truth, and that we're concerned about other people, and we genuinely ask, how can I pray for you? We give people the time of day. This is another way that we're letting our letter be read by the world. And in order to do this, we need to be interacting with the world on some level. We need to interact with our neighbors, look for opportunities to make a few non-Christian friends. Part of what we do here at church is to equip the whole church to speak of Jesus wherever you go. We have to look for these opportunities, pray for these opportunities. If you don't have any non-Christians in your life, look, there may be seasons where that happens. And that's okay. It may be a time where maybe you can't handle that. Or it may be a time where you're really being built up. But as a Christian life in general, we should be looking to get to know unbelievers at least enough so that we can be a witness to them and they can see the transforming power of the gospel in our life. So pray for those opportunities. to reach out to the lost, pray for opportunities to be read by others. And making progress in this area, having this prayer and this desire, that's also how the Lord is going to add to our number here at New Covenant Community Church. We certainly will take anyone. You know, if a Christian needs greener grass, great, come here. I told someone at the baseball game, we take defectors, right? But in order to grow and to see new Christians come to Christ, we'll do some things. We'll work on our, quote, marketing, so to speak, and getting the word out there. But that's not how most people come to church. Most people, it's because they know someone else that invited them. So we must ask the Lord to give us the desire, the wisdom, and the courage to get out there, because we are the living proof that the Bible is the power of God unto salvation. We're going to bring this to a close tonight. Just summarizing our two major takeaways. We want to make sure that we have these. First, we do want to remember that Satan is constantly desiring to tear us down and to twist the Word of God. And that we need to recognize this attack and in order to defend against it, We need to faithfully attend upon the means of grace, the preaching of the word, understanding and studying our confessions and catechisms, and being with each other so that we can hold on to those truths and never let them go. And if we start to stray, we've got somebody to bring us back. And our second major takeaway is that we are living testimonies that the Bible is the Word of God and that the Gospel has the power to transform and bring new life. We're the proof of the Gospel. Each other, as you sit around one another, to each other, you're the proof and we also see it when we look in the mirror. And this letter is to be read and known by all. Let's pray and ask the Lord to put a few more non-Christians in our life so that we can be read. Sometimes this is hard. It's uncomfortable. Sometimes it can be a little dangerous. It can be, putting yourself out there. But the Christian life is not a call to a safe life. It's a call to a life of witness. We're called to this life, and we praise God for it. We praise God for it not because we like danger, but because this means that God the Father has been made known to us through Christ the Son, and even now that transforming power of the Holy Spirit is working in us for us to see, for each other to see, and for the world to see. Let's pray. Lord, we do thank you for this time that we've had to think about being a witness maybe in a way that we haven't before. We do ask that you would, by your grace, continue to work on us and continue to work in us. Help us to increase just the power and effectiveness of these letters of recommendation that we are by increased knowledge of you, increased holiness, increased love for our neighbors here and out in the world. We thank you that you use us in this way to make Christ known. In his name we pray, amen.