2 Corinthians 6:10 Commentary and Bible Study

Oh there was sorrow and there is sorrow for us today: sorrow for witnessing Christians and those that make known the Lord, even in their family. We see people reject the Lord, sometimes after great effort to lead them and show them the way to salvation. We see teens, teenagers, and I was one of those, reject the Lord, contemptuous of him. We look at the teens and we are so sad when they do this. And I think of myself as a youngster. Somebody may have said of me – but you are a teenager and you walk around so haughtily, and you dismiss things that we have proved to be true and are our strengths and consolation in life, and we have been shown so much and blessed and helped so much. They could have looked at me and said, ‘Oh, you youngster; you have not seen anything and yet you reject the gospel from a lofty position of superiority.’ It is so saddening and we pray for them. And then some of them begin to come through and to come to the Lord, and he shows them himself and their need and humbles them. But there are disappointments along the way. Sorrowful also when we see believers lose their first love and then by the blessing of God, joy when they are reinstated in it. We see the faith denied, we see attacks on Christians, we see our own failings and failures. There is sorrow, ‘yet alway rejoicing’ because we have the blessing of God, and his power, and we have our testimony, and we have the word of God and it lifts us up and we have a future destiny.‘As poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing.’ How wonderful is the example of the apostle Paul! He had nothing. He worked for a living wherever he went so that nobody should attribute to him a desire for gain and he should spoil his witness. He did nothing to acquire money or goods though there were many people and many rich people who were so grateful to him for his work and his witness. When Felix, the Roman procurator of Judaea, wanted to release him from prison on a bribe, the apostle gave him nothing. But the apostle could not have given him anything. He had nothing; he was a poor man.‘And yet possessing all things.’ When the apostle Paul went to glory it was by martyrdom. In this world he had nothing, but he possessed all things. Think of him. When the apostle was moved by the Holy Spirit to go to Rome, he did not need money to get there. He did not need the support of the churches; he did not need the liberty. He knew that God would get him to Rome. And he did: by arrest and by appeal to Caesar, and he sure enough he went to Rome, that great journey, with a full military escort. He had nothing but he possessed all things. He could stride the globe, as it were, of those days. His influence was everywhere. The churches he founded were everywhere. Preceding him to glory, were thousands of believers who had come to the Lord through his word. He had nothing, but he had everything. And he had that triumphant end when he was taken by grace into the glorious hereafter. The apostle lived it and the apostle proved it.