Restoring The Sinner
RESTORING THE SINNER
2 CORINTHIANS 2:5-11
The penitent man is to be restored in love just as he was excluded in love.
Still in reflective mood, Paul remarks on the outcome of the visit he previously made and the insult he had to bear. 2:5-11 deal with his attitude to the one who caused him pain, ie the man who had insulted him and stimulated trouble at Corinth. Once more we are faced with a problem of detection: who was this man, and was the insult directed against Paul personally?
We may dismiss the view that it was not Paul himself whose character was attacked but one of his associates (eg Timothy) as most improbable. Paul’s use of the personal pronoun in 2:10 clinches the point.
Many older scholars find here an allusion to the case of the immoral man in 1 Corinthians 5:1ff., but we have no proof that this man, although severely reproved for his sinful ways, ever bore animosity to Paul himself. Once the supposition of an intermediate visit to Corinth is made, it becomes a natural consequence that the cause of the painful visit should be traced to the actions of this offender on that occasion.
Whatever the immediate outburst of feeling against Paul may have been caused by, there is no doubt what the outcome was. Following the “severe letter” (see 7:8), the church had condemned the behavior of this man and imposed a disciplinary penalty. The stern measure adopted by the church had moved the man to penitence, and Paul’s purpose now in writing is to advocate a forgiving spirit and the restoration of the punished man, so that he is not driven to despair (2:7). If this undesired effect did follow, it would serve only Satan’s interest, whose intentions are constantly to set Christians against Christians (Revelation 12:10). Forgiveness is now important: Paul has forgiven and holds no grudge. He calls upon the Corinthians to do likewise (2:10). Paul catches the spirit of Christ whose generosity he will later extol (10:1).
Thought On 2:11, “The greatest ruse of Satan is to make us believe that he does not exist” (Oberlin). Are we alive to what schemes sometimes (as here) he devised in unusual ways?