WHERE TO FIND COMFORT

2 Corinthians 1:3-7

INTRODUCTION

The subject matter of 2 Corinthians is trouble. Paul addresses several different kinds of troubles - troubles in the heart, troubles that affected the congregation in Corinth, troubles in human relationships. Judging from the way he addressed the letter, the same troubles affected churches throughout Achaia. Sometimes we become so absorbed with our own troubles that we think nobody shares our woes, but usually misery has plenty of company.

The Greek word thilipsis occurs in 2 Corinthians more than in any other New Testament book. Sometimes it's translated "trouble." It's also translated "affliction" and "tribulation." Through this letter, Paul kept hammering the message that the people of God are going to live with affliction.

• 1:8 "we were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life."
• 4:8 "we are hard pressed on every side."
• In 5:4, he compared our eternal home with the conditions that we deal with as we live in this body, which he calls a tent. "For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened."
• In chapter 11, he listed a number of calamities he personally suffered - things like being beaten, left for dead, living in hunger and being shipwrecked.
• 12:10 "I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties."

You get the idea that throughout the letter that trouble, affliction, distress, and tribulation were never far from the apostle's mind.

HOW HE DEALT WITH TROUBLE

In the process we catch a glimpse of the manner in which he dealt with his trouble. 2 Corinthians is not a letter of instruction. It's a personal, painful letter, which lets us see more of the personality of Paul than any other New Testament document. In 2 Corinthians we learn about his thorn in the flesh. In 2 Corinthians he felt compelled to defend his apostleship. One writer said of 2 Corinthians, "It enables us to lay our hands on Paul's breast and feel the very throbbing of his heart."

The first 11 verses of chapter 1 are introductory in nature. The heart of his remarks occur in 3-7. In the NIV, Paul used the term "comfort" no less than nine times in those four verses. He concentrated on the inevitability of trouble. He urged his readers to expect it, anticipate it, plan on and deal with it. He also wanted his readers to know that Christians can deal with trouble because we have every reason to praise God, who is the God of all comfort.

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