Hi First Presbyterian Church,
It’s time for our Mid-Week Meet-Up! I know many of you are still reflecting on the amazing Safari to Kenya event from Saturday. All the leaders and volunteers organized an incredible fundraiser for the In Step Children’s Home in Kenya. Many of you may have already seen the update that that single event raised $56,219 for the children’s home! Incredible! What a blessing!
Allow me to remind you one more time that if you want to submit a question about the Bible reading we’ve been doing this year, you have until this Friday to send your question to connect@pittsfordpres.org, which will then be used in our summer sermon series.
Today is Day 255 in our Bible-reading journey, and we are currently reading through Isaiah and 2 Corinthians (plus Psalms and Proverbs). Since we’re focusing on Isaiah during Sunday worship for the next three weeks, I want to spend a moment with you reflecting on our reading from 2 Corinthians.
One of the most interesting passages in the New Testament appeared in our reading yesterday - 2 Corinthians 12:1-10. In this section of this letter from Paul to the Corinthian church, Paul is addressing some criticisms that have circulated among the Corinthians about Paul’s credibility. Outsiders were telling the Corinthians that Paul is not worth listening to, because he wasn’t Jewish enough, wasn’t clever enough, and wasn’t qualified to teach them about Jesus.
He spends some time trying to tell them why his preaching doesn’t follow the standards of the world. While these outsiders thought that a person who was truly persuasive must appeal to their qualifications to preach by boasting about themselves, Paul believed that the Gospel must be taught with humility, albeit with the seriousness and sincerity it requires. Nevertheless, Paul says to the Corinthians, “You want to know about my qualifications? Fine, let me tell you.” Then in a sort of tongue-in-cheek manner, he tells them about all the suffering he endured in the name of Christ (2 Corinthians 11:22-29) and about the source of all his knowledge of the Gospel (2 Corinthians 12:1-10). You can tell Paul thinks it’s silly that he has to do this for the Corinthians because he frequently says things like, “I am speaking as a fool” (11:21) and “I am talking like a madman” (11:23). He’s trying to remain humble, while also addressing the criticisms about himself.
This is when we read the interesting thing he writes in 2 Corinthians 2:1-10. He says, “I 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. And I know that such a person—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows— was caught up into Paradise and heard things that are not to be told, that no mortal is permitted to repeat” (12:2-4).
Who is this person Paul knew fourteen years ago and what does it mean to be “caught up to the third heaven?” Paul is talking about himself in an indirect way (trying to remain humble), and what he’s saying is that he had a profound spiritual experience (perhaps even an “out of body” experience.) Jews and Christians in the first century thought that everything above the earth was divided into three sections - the “first heaven” is where the birds and clouds are, the “second heaven” is where the sun, moon, and planets are, and the “third heaven” is where God must be. While this isn’t how we would describe the universe today, Paul’s point is that he had a vision of God in heaven. Paul is saying that fourteen years before writing to the Corinthians (which would have been at the time when he had his “road to Damascus” experience, when the risen and ascended Jesus appeared to him), he had a spiritual experience that took him from this world into the realm of God. Though Paul never met Jesus while Jesus lived on this earth, he did meet Jesus in a true, spiritual, and even supernatural experience.
This demonstrates an important point to us about the Gospel. What the apostles teach us in the New Testament about Jesus came straight from the source - Christ himself. This is why we can trust what the New Testament tells us about Jesus - it came from him by entrusting it to those early leaders of the church. This is why Paul admonishes the Corinthians for believing anything about Jesus that didn’t come from Jesus: “If someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you submit to it readily enough” (2 Corinthians 11:4). Paul says something similar to the Galatian church: “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— not that there is another gospel, but there are some who are confusing you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what we proclaimed to you, let that one be accursed!” (Galatians 1:6-8).
We can and should trust what the New Testament tells us about who Jesus is and what he wants to do in and through his church. This is one of the most important reasons for our one-year Bible-reading journey. Do you want to know Christ and his will for your life? Then read the New Testament. That is where you will find your answers.
Peace,
Pastor Aaron