- Sermon - Mickey Anders

Text: 2 Corinthians 12:2-10

In 1969, in Pass Christian, Mississippi, a group of people were preparing to have a "hurricane party" in the face of a storm named Camille. Were they ignorant of the dangers? Could they have been overconfident? Did they let their egos and pride influence their decision? We'll never know.

What we do know is that the wind was howling outside the posh Richelieu Apartments when Police Chief Jerry Peralta pulled up sometime after dark. Facing the beach less than 250 feet from the surf, the apartments were directly in the line of danger. A man with a drink in his hand came out to the second-floor balcony and waved. Peralta yelled up, "You all need to clear out of here as quickly as you can. The storm's getting worse." But as others joined the man on the balcony, they just laughed at Peralta's order to leave. "This is my land," one of them yelled back. "If you want me off, you'll have to arrest me."

Peralta didn't arrest anyone, but he wasn't able to persuade them to leave either. He wrote down the names of the next of kin of the twenty or so people who gathered there to party through the storm. They laughed as he took their names. They had been warned, but they had no intention of leaving.

It was 10:15 p.m. when the front wall of the storm came ashore. Scientists clocked Camille's wind speed at more than 205 miles-per-hour, the strongest on record. Raindrops hit with the force of bullets, and waves off the Gulf Coast crested between twenty-two and twenty-eight feet high.

News reports later showed that the worst damage came at the little settlement of motels, go-go bars, and gambling houses known as Pass Christian, Mississippi, where some twenty people were killed at a hurricane party in the Richelieu Apartments. Nothing was left of that three-story structure but the foundation; the only survivor was a five-year-old boy found clinging to a mattress the following day. (http://www.sermonillustrations.com/a-z/a/arrogance.htm, retrieved 7/6/2006)

Arrogance can be a dangerous character trait. And spiritual arrogance can be even worse. Those to whom much has been given sometimes suffer from arrogance; but more often the people around them suffer.

In our text for today, the Apostle Paul was being opposed by arrogant teachers who bragged about their spiritual superiority. They were the "superlative apostles" as Paul once called them. They were probably the Gnostic followers who boasted of special knowledge. They claimed a spiritual superiority because of their secret knowledge and mystical experiences.

Paul obviously is hesitant to compare resumes because, in the end, he thinks it is a useless exercise. But he has been having difficulty with the Corinthians, and many had turned away from the true faith to embrace these false prophets. They have apparently agreed that visions and revelations are important signs of spiritual authority. So Paul pulls out his own mystical experience which trumps them all.

In fact, Paul had reason to be arrogant as well. He describes an experience he had 14 years earlier. This would have been about seven years after his conversion on the road to Damascus. Now the Damascus Road experience would have been a vision to brag about, but apparently it was nothing compared to the one seven years later. Listen to the way he describes it:

2I know a person in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows. 3And I know that such a person—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows—4was caught up into Paradise and heard things that are not to be told, that no mortal is permitted to repeat.

Everyone seems to acknowledge that the man Paul was describing was himself. He puts this experience in the third person to avoid the appearance of spiritual arrogance.

The notion of heaven having layers or levels or of there being more than one heaven is mentioned in other passages in the New Testament. Some scholars say that some depictions portrayed as many as seven levels of heaven. But this reference seems to indicate a place where the first heaven is the sky (where the birds fly), the second heaven is the universe (home to sun, moon, and starts), and the third heaven is the realm where God dwells.

Some will even suggest that there were two experiences described here. One in which he was caught up to the third heaven and another when he went to Paradise. What is the difference between Paradise and the third heaven?

Some people try to make a whole cosmology out of such references and will be glad to give detailed descriptions of all these places mentioned. I would hesitate to pursue such detailed descriptions of heaven. Surely humans can only see that realm as through a glass darkly. We should be satisfied with knowing that Paul felt he had been taken up to the very presence of God. He was caught up to the place where God lives.

At the end of verse 4, he says he "heard things that are not to be told, that no mortal is permitted to repeat." There are two ways to interpret this. First, he may not have been permitted to say what he saw. The book of Revelation contains a similar reference. Second, he may not have been able to say what he saw because words just can't describe how wonderful it was. I like this view.

There is a word that is sometimes used about God. It is "ineffable" which means "too overwhelming to be expressed or described in words." I hope that there is a lot about our lives, especially about our spiritual lives, that are ineffable - too wonderful to be put into words. Sometimes words can't begin to describe how wonderful something is.

After mentioning, almost in passing, his mystical experience, he returns to the theme of spiritual arrogance. He says:

5On behalf of such a one I will boast, but on my own behalf I will not boast, except of my weaknesses. 6But if I wish to boast, I will not be a fool, for I will be speaking the truth. But I refrain from it, so that no one may think better of me than what is seen in me or heard from me,

7even considering the exceptional character of the revelations.

Paul has told his story in the third person to avoid boasting, but he says his experience was certainly worthy of a boast. If anyone wants to boast, he can boast with the best of them. But that is not Paul's intention or desire at all.

Paul is content to let the record of his relation to them stand on its own; as he wrote earlier in this letter, "Look at what is before your eyes" (10:7). Paul will not use any vision or revelation, no matter how grand, to trump his own day-to-day performance - that is, what they see in him or hear from him. The intruders are boasting of their spiritual experiences. Paul could easily one-up them with his experience. But no, he refuses to build a case for his authority upon that. He wants people to follow him because of what they have seen and heard in him.

This passage raises an interesting question for us. Do we give people our respect based on their visions and revelations or do we respect them based on their performance? When someone says, "I have seen a vision," how are we to know if they are really telling the truth or when they are making it up? How do we know that what they have seen is not merely the result of some psychological state?

When someone says, "God told me to do this." How do we know they are not simply lying? By nature, visions and private messages from God cannot be subjected to scrutiny.

Paul prefers for the case for his own authority come not from unsubstantiated visions, but from his performance. We can really know someone's spiritual nature by the day in and day out work they perform.

At the end of verse 7, Paul turns to the antidote for spiritual arrogance. He says, "Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated."

I am sure you have often heard of Paul's thorn in the flesh. What was his thorn? I was interested to read in the Ancient Christian Commentary that all of the old time commentators assumed the thorn represented Paul's opponents.

But most modern commentators assume his thorn was a physical ailment. A wide variety of illnesses or conditions have been suggested: epilepsy, hysteria, depression, headaches, eye problems. Even leprosy, malaria, stuttering, spiritual temptations.

Perhaps it is best that we do not know. That way we can all identify with Paul and we can focus on his interpretation of this thorn. He says twice that it was given him to "keep me from being too elated." He understands this difficulty in direct relation to his experience of ecstasy. It was given him to keep him humble, to keep him from being too proud.

Notice that he calls it "a messenger of Satan to torment me." Did this thorn come from God or from Satan? Perhaps like Job we could argue that God permitted Satan to give him this thorn. Paul clearly believes that Satan prowls around like a lion seeking whom he may devour. And Paul seems to be convinced that Satan is targeting him specifically because he is a leader in the new church. Paul has been identified as being a prime enemy of Satan, so Satan is trying to bring him down.

Paul nowhere says God causes such things to happen to us. Instead, he portrays God as working through the bad things that happen. Romans 8:28 says, "We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose."

8Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me,

Paul felt it right to ask God to remove this burden. He sees God on the side of removing the difficulty not causing it. But God uses this thorn in the flesh to help Paul keep perspective, to avoid the sin of pride.

Pride was one of the main targets of Jesus. I always find it interesting that Jesus was considered the friend of sinners. The Pharisees were scandalized because he hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors. He brought the outcasts into his friendship.

But he always opposed the proud. It seems that Jesus thought pride was one of the deadliest of sins. He wasn't so bothered by the sinner who stumbled and fell, but he had no use for the person who was puffed up and proud.

This passage leads Paul to revisit one of his favorite themes, the paradoxical relationship of power and weakness:

9but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”

Yesterday, I climbed the hill by my house to pick a pail of blackberries for a cobbler. I was reminded again of the paradox of the blackberry - that delicious fruit is only found with great difficulty in the midst of the briars. The same paradox is found with the beautiful flower, the rose. This, the most beautiful of flowers that symbolizes love, is found on a bush with thorns.

The Christian life is not all blackberries, not all roses. There are thorns as well. There seems to be a message here for all of us. Life is not easy. There will always be hardships. And we can take comfort in the fact that Paul was not relieved of his thorn in the flesh. Sometimes our prayers for relief will not be answered either.

But in the midst of the thorns and briar patches of life can be found a special beauty. Paul calls it grace.

In the same way, we are called earthen vessels. We are weak but God's power is poured into us: So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

Paul ends with two powerful statements. First is his hardship list: 10Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; Then he sums his view of power and weakness by saying: for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.

Anyone who travels to Edinburgh, Scotland will find Edinburgh castle a tower of seemingly insurmountable strength. But the truth is that the castle was once actually captured. The fortress had an obvious weak spot which defenders guarded--but because another spot was apparently protected by its steepness and impregnability, no sentries were posted there. At an opportune time, an attacking army sent a small band up that unguarded slope and surprised the garrison into surrender. Where the castle was strong, there it was weak. It is a reminder of the danger of pride. When we think we are strong, we will fall. When we are weak, then we are stong. (Today in the Word, Feb 89, p. 36.)

Some time ago I read the story of a church that began to circulate a petition stating that their pastor was not worthy. The pastor asked several people to find him a copy. At long last, he got a copy. Instead of destroying the petition and being angry about it, the pastor signed his own name. No one is worthy to be the pastor. It is in my weakness that God is at work.

Even in our weakness, that is when God's power is shown most clearly. We must rely on the power of God, not on our own strength. In fact, when we are weak, then we are strong.