2 Corinthians | Chapter 6 – Scripture Supply

2 Corinthians 6:3-7

“The Well Pleasing Life”

I. Intro.

Paul has written to the Corinthians, and through them to us, about “Radicalized Christianity” and the “living to be well-pleasing” life. Then, Paul spoke about the outward mission of this well-pleasing life, which he called the “Ministry of Reconciliation.” We took two weeks on this: first, to give an example of just what “reconciliation” is, and second, the “how-to’s” of how to employ it. Now in this section, Paul moves on to address the fact that we will have opposition in this ministry. It won’t be easy if we try to employ radicalized lives seeking to be ministers of reconciliation. This passage breaks apart into three parts:

Vs. 3: Paul shows how careful he was before men.
Vs. 4-7: Paul reveals how his ministry was approved by God.
Vs. 8-10: Paul, in a series of paradoxes, reveals how his life confounds and confuses the world.

I’m reminded of Fanny Crosby, who was blind her whole life, lived 95 years, yet had such a joyous heart that she spent her life writing hymns. At the tender age of 8, she wrote:

Oh, what a happy child I am
Although I cannot see,
I am determined that in this world
Contented I will be.
How many blessings I enjoy
That other people don’t.
To weep and sigh because I’m blind
I cannot and I won’t.

On her tombstone in Connecticut under the name “Aunt Fanny” are these words, “Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine. Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine.”

II. Vs. 3-5 Ministry without misery

Vs. 3: Paul writes in this section that his endurance through so many trying things proves the authenticity of the message of reconciliation because if it weren’t true, why would anyone endure so many trials that go with the message? The temptation is to do what the psalmist sang about in Psalm 55:6, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove! I would fly away and be at rest.” It is very important that we have an awareness of what we look like to others, that we are careful not to allow anything in our lives to turn someone off from becoming a Christian. Paul lived continually with that objective in view. Paul lived in this continual awareness that he was being examined by men. Therefore, he is very careful to ensure that there is no fault found in his ministry.

It is interesting that the record of Paul’s endurance is introduced by three words: “IN,” “BY” (or through), and “AS” (YET). These 29 words provide the basis of endurance:

It is because we are IN Christ that we endure.
It is THROUGH Christ we endure.
It may appear AS if we are defeated, YET in Christ, we have already won.

Vs. 4: Paul says that this was done in “much patience,” which tells me that he was speaking of endurance. Here we are given the university in which Paul received his doctorate: the school of “Hard Knocks.” His classes were not in homiletics (the art of preaching), hermeneutics (the principles of biblical interpretation), and biblical languages. No, they were in tribulation, needs, and distress! And passing those classes had to be in longsuffering, kindness, and sincere love. How many would pass those classes that way in seminary? Having passed the classes, his career didn’t take off; instead, most thought of him as unsuccessful and having nothing. Crowds of admirers didn’t follow Paul as he traveled. Based on the story in Acts 19:15, where he was involved in casting out demons, an “evil spirit” informed the sons of Sceva that Paul was far more famous in hell than he was on earth. No matter what came Paul’s way, he stuck with it. The word is literally to “stay under the pressure.” The mark of a Christian who has learned how to walk with God is that they stay under the pressure and do not quit.

There were certain pressures that Paul lists in three groups of three (tough circumstances, tough opposition, and tough commitments) that he faced.

Vs. 4b Tough circumstances: tribulation, needs, distresses:
1. Tribulation: These are the normal problems we face. The literal word is “distresses.” It describes the normal circumstances that stress you out, like finances, relationships, illness, and a host of other things that can cause disappointment.
2. Needs: Literally means “necessities” and describes the things that you cannot help but face and cannot get away from. An example might be that your mother or father has taken ill, and you now have the responsibility to help them, putting your life and plans on hold. There is nothing you can do about them; you have to live with them.
3. Distresses: This word means “narrow places,” where life kind of presses in on you and squeezes you to the point where you feel stuck. But in all of these, Paul says he hung in there, and thus glorified God. He did not quit; he stayed with it.
Vs. 5a Tough opposition: stripes, imprisonments, tumults: The next three were beyond tough circumstances; they were tough opposition.
1. Stripes: In chapter 11:23-27, Paul will write that at present he had been beaten five times, and he uses a word that described corporal punishment, meaning he had 39 lashes laid upon his back. He had felt the pain of 195 stripes. Then there were three times he had been beaten with rods, which were an inch in diameter. Once he had people stone him and leave him for dead outside the city of Lystra.
2. Imprisonments: According to Clement of Rome (who wrote just a few years after Paul died), Paul had been in prison seven different times in his life, although we only have three of those times recorded in the Scriptures.
3. Tumults: This describes riotous mobs where Paul was overwhelmed by people beating on him with no one to help.
Vs. 5b Tough commitments: labors, sleeplessness, fastings: These were certain commitments that he had undertaken, things he chose for himself. His work of supporting himself by making tents at night so that he wouldn’t be an economic burden upon the Church meant long sleepless nights and many missed meals. Paul didn’t have to do this, but he chose to because it was the most efficient way to get the gospel out to people.

So in these three categories of “tough circumstances, tough opposition, and tough commitments,” Paul faced continual conditions of pressure; yet he never quit. This is the thing that challenges us today when so many want to quit, throw in the towel, and give up when God sends us into tough circumstances. But Paul didn’t quit, as he had already stated in 5:9 that his aim was to live “well-pleasing to God,” not to live well-pleasing to himself.

III. Vs. 6-7 Ministry is a character profession

Not only did Paul face (tough circumstances, tough opposition, and tough commitments), but in the midst of them, he displayed godly characteristics. Here again, we are given two divisions, each containing four parts. The first part we take up today, and the rest we will look at next week.

Vs. 6a The first four are consistent qualities of the apostle’s life:
1. Purity: Paul put purity first, even though he, like us, lived in an immoral age. He traveled and lived in the midst of a people given over to the pursuit of sexual immorality, yet he says he was careful to see that his mind and his thoughts were pure. Wherever he went, he was guarded and stood by the conviction that he was possessed by the Holy Spirit.
2. Knowledge: What enabled him to be pure, according to Romans 12:2b, was that he constantly “renewed his mind.” Paul kept himself in the Word of God to remind himself how God saw things.
3. Longsuffering: The word implies patience, particularly with other people. Mel Trotter, the great evangelist, used to say, “There are a lot of people I know who are wonderful Christians. I know they are going to go to heaven someday, and, Oh! how I wish they would hurry up!”
4. Kindness: The word means thoughtfulness, courtesy, warmth in our words—no coldness, no sharp, cutting sarcasm.

It is not endurance alone that authenticated Paul’s ministry, for many have endured. No, it was the way in which Paul endured that proved that it was real. Ministry is a character profession!

2 Corinthians 6:6b-10

“The Real Deal”

I. Intro.

Last week, we took note of Paul’s words describing the way he was on display before the world. His education in Christ had been in the school of hard knocks, where he describes three of his classes as “tribulation, needs, and distress,” yet he passed those classes not by receiving a letter grade but rather by demonstrating that despite tough circumstances, tough opposition, and tough commitments, he operated in “purity, knowledge, patience, and kindness”! I left off last week with us wondering how such grades were possible in these classes, and we shall find out that Paul was given essential equipment and the right uniform that allowed for his complete makeover.

Sigmund Freud would no doubt have taken an alternate view; this view, I might add, is the world view. In his 1927 book called “The Future of an Illusion,” he describes his interpretation of religion, its origins in human thinking, and its future—a view that he believed was a false belief system. Freud said that religion provided for humans a necessary threefold task of:

Exorcizing the terrors of nature
Reconciling men to the cruelty of death
Compensating them for the sufferings of life

Having rejected God, Freud opted for what he described as a “civilizing and developing government,” thus making man and government his god! Freud would have had nothing to do with what Paul has written here and probably would have had Paul committed after psychoanalyzing him. Yet Paul would have everything to do with Freud and would have gone to the ends of the earth, enduring every persecution and trial in the attempt to deliver to him his treasure of Jesus’ love for him. In comparing the two—the apostle Paul and Sigmund Freud—I know which one is the sane one and which one isn’t!

II. Vs. 6b-7a Essential equipment

Vs. 6b-7a: Paul shows how those qualities were possible as he relied on these four things:

Holy Spirit: The moment you became a Christian, the Holy Spirit came to live in you, but in Acts 1:8, Jesus went on to say that the Holy Spirit will come upon you and you shall receive power to be witnesses. You cannot continually manifest these characteristics apart from the baptism and infilling of the Holy Spirit, and I believe that is why Paul lists Him first.
Sincere love: In 5:14, Paul said that “the love of Christ constrains me.” As Jesus spoke to the Church in Philadelphia that He was the One “who opens and no one shall shut, who shuts and no one opens,” that is what the “sincere love of Christ” will do in and through us. The things that stop others won’t stop the love of Christ in our lives as we will just plow ahead. Then sometimes we will try plowing ahead, and the love of Christ will stop us. I realize that this is a “no-brainer,” but we will never be able to exhibit the love of Christ if we aren’t experiencing the love of Christ. The reason for this is that we don’t manifest the love of Christ; we merely reflect it upon others.
Word of truth: Paul is speaking about the Scriptures or, as we are learning in the “Truth Project,” the knowledge of how God sees life. The Bible tells you what reality is really like. The Bible brings us back to what is relevant, true, and right. It is so sad that folks today feel that they have to do something to the Word of God to make it relevant.
Power of God: Twice in these four things that Paul relied upon to produce godly characteristics in the midst of difficult things, we are taken to the work of the Holy Spirit. That tells me that the Holy Spirit is not an “option”; He is a “necessity” if I’m going to be able to live in this world. So much of the time, well-meaning people try to motivate us to do the work of the Spirit in the energy of the flesh. If we are going to have an impact on the world we live in, then we are going to need the Holy Spirit empowering us to do so.

III. Vs. 7b-8a The right uniform

Vs. 7b-8a: Finally, Paul mentions the conflict itself. In chapter 10:4, he will say in this regard that the “weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds.” Paul handled these strongholds—these injustices of drug and human trafficking, erosion of morals, the breakdown of the home, the rise of crime, etc.—with spiritual weaponry.

Armor of righteousness: Paul didn’t employ worldly tactics to correct these injustices. He didn’t rely upon the government to change the moral evils of his day. I’m not saying that it is wrong to try to pass a legislative bill or elect a different government official. What I’m saying is Paul saw those things as a spiritual battle. Paul relied upon prayer, faith, love, godly living, and the Word of God to pull down those strongholds. He says that he did this in honor and dishonor, whether he was popular or unpopular. “Honor” is what people say to your face; “dishonor” is what they say behind your back. But Paul says it didn’t make any difference because he was living a life that was “well-pleasing to the Lord,” not one that was “well-pleasing to man.”

IV. Vs. 8b-10 A complete makeover

This armor of righteousness enabled Paul to do six things seen in these contrasts:

Vs. 8b Evil report and good report: Some were calling him a fake, but now he was of good report with the Lord.
Vs. 8c-9a As deceivers, and yet true: At one time, Paul had been an up-and-coming rabbi superstar, yet he was untrue to God. Now he was true to God, but those he used to run with saw him as a deceiver.
Vs. 9b As unknown, and yet well-known: Once Paul strived to be well-known among his peers, but in so doing, he wasn’t known by God. But now it was the other way around.
Vs. 9c As dying, and behold, we live: Before, he saw himself as alive when he was in reality dead. Now he died daily and had never been more alive.
Vs. 9d As chastened, and yet not killed: Paul had learned not to despise the discipline of the Lord, for whom the Lord loves, He disciplines. The instruction of the Lord in his life was a sign of love, not a sign of elimination.
Vs. 10 As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing: The world considered Paul as “sorrowful…poor…and having nothing,” yet it was in his poverty that Paul found the most “joy.” It was in his absence from the world that he made all rich, and it was in the emptiness of what this world had to offer that he possessed all things.

What a magnificent life we can experience no matter what we face! At the beginning, I quoted the world view as penned by Sigmund Freud. Now hear what A. W. Tozer wrote:

“A real Christian is an odd number anyway. He feels supreme love for one whom he has never seen; talks familiarly every day to someone he cannot see; expects to go to heaven on the virtue of another; empties himself in order to be full; admits he is wrong so he can be declared right; goes down in order to get up; is strongest when he is weakest; richest when he is poorest; and happiest when he feels the worst. He dies so he can live; forsakes in order to have; gives away so he can keep; sees the invisible, hears the inaudible, and knows that which passes knowledge. The man who has met God is not looking for anything; he has found it. He is not searching for light, for upon him the light has already shined. He is not a copy, not a facsimile. He is an original from the hand of the Holy Spirit.”

I think I’ll stay with Tozer’s view!!!

2 Corinthians 6:11-13

“Restricted Affections”

I. Intro.

When I was a young heathen doing stupid things at night, we would take street repair signs that were intended to warn cars of road repairs and put them on people’s yards. We thought it was fun to hear the kids talk about the flashing yellow lights that awaited or awoke them in their front yards. For better than two summers, we did this, never thinking of the void that sign left in the street for motor vehicles driving at night. It wasn’t until we read in the paper that someone had damaged their car because they hadn’t any warning of the repair. Our fun had sent someone on a dangerous path because we removed the warning. Paul’s love for the Corinthian believers caused him to warn them of two obstacles that can hinder people from the love of God.

Paul has given the Corinthian believers our purpose as Christians in this life in 5:9, which is in every way to “live well-pleasing to God.” Then he told us what our vocation was while here on earth in 5:18-20: we have been given the ministry of reconciliation, and we are to operate that ministry as ambassadors for Christ. Paul then went on to write about the opposition you will experience in this in chapter 6 by saying that he went through tribulations, needs, and distress while thus employed. We are very prone to think of ministry as singularly a “speaking” profession, but according to Paul, it isn’t so much what we say that speaks to people—it’s our conduct of holiness, knowledge, patience, and kindness in the midst of trying circumstances and difficult situations. In John 16:33, Jesus told His disciples, “In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” Opposition is certain, but so too is our victory because of Christ! That was Paul’s thought last week as he noted for the Corinthian believers that such personal character traits were only possible for the believer because of the resources God has given us by way of the Holy Spirit, sincere love, and the Word of God. Paul moves on to talk about two more dangerous obstacles (verse 12 and verse 14), and these are even more difficult to deal with because they deal with our own flesh.

II. Vs. 11-13 Restricted Affections

Vs. 11-13: The first one is easy to find in Paul’s words as we read in verse 12. There are folks who wonder why I don’t read out of the KJV of the Bible, and here is one reason: this verse reads, “Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own bowels.” Compare that with the NKJV, which reads, “You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted by your own affections.” I’ve had “straitened bowels,” and it has changed my “affections,” but somehow I think something has got lost in translation. Pardon the pun, but with that “out of the way,” I believe that what Paul is speaking of here is better understood as the NKJV renders it: “restricted affections”!

One of the amazing aspects of this 2nd letter to the Corinthian believers, once you know the reason he is writing to them, is his genuine affection and love for them. It is for this reason alone that this letter brings such conviction to my heart personally. Like most of you, I find it easy to have affection and love towards those who exhibit like sentiments towards me, but I don’t fare so well towards those who don’t like me. That is what Jesus said in Matthew 5:46, where he said, “If you love only those who love you, what good is that? Even corrupt tax collectors do that much.” Paul demonstrated that affection towards them in two ways:

Vs. 11a “Spoke openly to you”: By this, I believe Paul is talking about full communication by which he hid nothing personally from them. He was “transparent” about his failures and fears, stresses and struggles. One of the things I’ve noticed as a pastor is how guarded people are in their speech about themselves and how unguarded they are with regard to their opinions about others. Friends, that reverse is very unloving! If you want to be loving, you will say nothing negative about others and be very open about your own failures. The church ought to be a place where we can: James 5:16 “Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.” Galatians 6:2 “Share each other’s troubles and problems, and in this way, obey the law of Christ.”
Vs. 11b “Heart is wide open”: Here, I think Paul is speaking of the fact that he showed no favoritism in his love and affection. Paul wasn’t just loving those who thought well of him; he loved all of them, even the difficult ones. Paul knew what some of them had said about him, and yet he still accepted them in their weakness and resistance to his love. There is a problem when it comes to love most of us humans experience, and that is when we are hurt, we tend to close ourselves off to protect ourselves from further getting hurt. But love can’t function in a “closed system”; it will die if all it does is receive love and not respond in like kind. Paul says in verse 12 that they had become “restricted by their own affections.” When a person becomes “restricted,” they protect themselves from further hurt, but they also limit the amount of love they can take in, and over time that which started out as protection becomes a prison of selfishness and bitterness. What is even a greater tragedy is that we also close ourselves off to experiencing the love of Christ, and we can become cold as we don’t experience the riches of Jesus’ love for us. To love is to be vulnerable and to risk heartache. Ray Stedman made an amazing statement that caused me a great time of reflection as he wrote: “Even God cannot love beyond what we let him love us. He loves us and he is constantly displaying that love in a thousand and one ways, but we do not feel that love until we respond to what we already have.” If you do not respond to love, then do not wonder if your life remains cold, barren, lonely, empty, and meaningless. C. S. Lewis said, “Love anything, and your heart will continually be wrung, and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully around with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your own selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The only place outside heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and annoyances of love is hell.” The problem isn’t that the person isn’t being loved; the problem is that they aren’t being loving back! That’s why Paul is admonishing them to not be “restricted by their own affections” and then goes on in verse 13 to say, “I speak as to children, you also be open.”

Paul encourages the Corinthians to “open up” and be “transparent” to all people so that when you are loved, you will love back, and in so doing, you will continue to grow more and more in love. Friends, it’s not our lack of being loved that hinders us; it’s having been so loved that, out of fear of being hurt, we close ourselves off and become cold, which hinders us from receiving more of God’s love. We have far too often become “hoarders” instead of “distributors”! It is only in our giving love away that we can receive more. It is like the manna that fell from heaven to sustain the Israelites while in the wilderness for 40 years. There was enough supplied for each day except for the Sabbath, but they couldn’t store it up. It had to be consumed and distributed, or it would become rancid and breed worms.

2 Corinthians 6:14-7:1

“Unequally Yoked”

I. Intro.

In chapter 3, Paul began his teaching of the New Covenant, and here he will conclude it. This teaching was given in part to answer the legalistic Judaizers who had come and corrupted the believers in Corinth, turning them against Paul and his teaching. But it took on much more than that as it described Paul’s philosophy of life, which also serves as a guide for what our philosophy of life ought to be.

Paul had spoken of the natural opposition that believers would face in employing our vocation of the “Ministry of Reconciliation.” You can bet that Satan isn’t just going to roll over and let us win the world to his enemy, Jesus. But in the end, Paul said that our two biggest obstacles come not from without but rather from within! The first, which we saw two weeks ago, Paul called “restricted affections.” By this, he warned against not loving others by failing to be open and transparent about our own failures and needs. The second warning is when we begin to close ourselves off from hurt. We become a funnel of love instead of a tube, and we no longer receive the full volume of God’s love for ourselves simply because we are restricting it in an attempt to protect ourselves from getting hurt. That’s what C.S. Lewis was warning against when he said, “The only place outside heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and annoyances of love is hell.”

II. Vs. 14-7:1 Unequally Yoked

Vs. 14-16: Paul next takes up yet another obstacle that can hinder our ministry of reconciliation, which he identifies as being “unequally yoked together with unbelievers.” Remember, the context of these words is obstacles that can hinder us in distributing the treasure of Jesus to those who have not yet received Him. Here, Paul is warning believers that we must be careful because we can “compromise” our ministry by what he describes as being “unequally yoked together.” To simplify this, Paul states to us that:

The first problem was not being loving enough.
The second problem is in loving the wrong things.

The key to interpreting what Paul is talking about is in understanding the phrase “unequally yoked together.” This is a phrase that every Jew would know as it is a reference to Deuteronomy 22:10, where we read, “You shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together.” A yoke is a wooden frame or bar with loops at either end, fitted around the necks of two animals, which ties them together and forces them to function as one. It is clear that God was concerned that they not tie together two animals of a different nature. It is a cruel thing to yoke together two things that aren’t compatible. When I was a kid, I’d dig up ant nests of red ants and place them right next to a black ant nest and watch these two nests fight, as clearly, they had incompatible natures. Yokes have two characteristics by which we can always identify them:

The first: A yoke is not easily broken. It is a kind of permanent relationship. When you yoke two animals together, they are bound together; they do not have any choice. Uncomfortable as it may be, they must do things together.
The second: A yoke constrains someone; it does not permit independent action. There is something that forces you to comply with what the other one wants to do, whether you like it or not. It’s kind of like a “three-legged race.”

Clearly, Paul is talking about getting involved with unbelievers in ways and associations that limit us and keep us from distributing the treasures of Jesus. To further clarify what he means, Paul uses four contrasts:

Vs. 14a “For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness?”: What partnership can a person who loves what is right have with a person who wants nothing to do with what is right? There can be no teamwork or partnership when one person loves what is fair and just, and the other person refuses all authority and does only what pleases them.
Vs. 14b “And what communion has light with darkness?”: Christians are said to be light, whereas unbelievers are in darkness. Imagine knowingly joining yourself to someone who sees and lives life in ignorance and illusion. That is a formula for disaster, pain, suffering, and heartache.
Vs. 15a “And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever?”: Belial is another name for Satan, and the word means “worthlessness.” It refers to Satan and his activities. Here are the two great captains of the opposing philosophies of life: Jesus Christ and Satan. A Christian joined in a permanent relationship that doesn’t permit independent action lives with the reality that someday their loyalties will clash with the person they are joined with, and they will have to decide who will be their “captain” in that area—Jesus or Satan.
Vs. 16 “And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God.”: This is one of the most beautiful descriptions of the glory of Christianity, the fact that God dwells in His people. The glory of Christianity is the revelation that our bodies are the temples of God. Therefore, we are guided by His principles in worship and in service. Imagine a person who, as the temple of God, is joined to another person who is the temple of an idol.

The great unanswered question is: What specific human relationship constitutes a yoke? Is it a business partnership, a union membership, a marriage, or dating non-Christians? There have been some who have taken it to mean that Christians should live in a commune or a monastery, withdrawing from the world and from contact with non-Christians; a complete Christian life from the womb to the tomb without making any friends or even contacts with non-Christians. But that would be inconsistent with our ministry of reconciliation. Jesus said as much in Matthew 10:16, saying, “Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves.” Clearly, we are not to withdraw from the world, and not all associations are yokes—only those that are “permanent in nature and do not permit independent action.” We are called to be IN the world but not OF the world! The church has long taken this to mean marriage, and I can see why they do so, as the “two become one flesh,” and biblically, marriage is seen as “permanent in nature and does limit independent action.” That is why Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 7:39 that marriage is to be “in the Lord”! But what about those who are already “yoked” in relationships? Well, the wording in the Greek of verse 14 literally says, “STOP forming yokes.” In other words, “Don’t continue doing this” because a yoke is not easily broken.

Vs. 16b-18: No one person is the keeper of another man’s conscience; we must all hear from the Holy Spirit and decide for ourselves what constitutes being “unequally yoked.” Paul’s quotes are from Leviticus 26:11-12, Isaiah 52:11, Ezekiel 20:34, 37:27, and 2 Samuel 7:14, and he does so to show that God hasn’t changed His mind on this issue. He warned Israel of this danger in Isaiah 42:6, where the Lord spoke, saying, “I, the Lord, have called You in righteousness, and will hold Your hand; I will keep You and give You as a covenant to the people, as a light to the Gentiles.” Paul is not advocating total separation from unbelievers, as he has already stated in 1 Corinthians 5:9-10: “I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world.”

So what constitutes being “unequally yoked”? I would say that: “Any kind of relationship that does not permit a believer to follow his Lord in all things is a yoke.” A friendship can be a yoke if it is the type of friendship in which you cannot do what God wants you to do because you will offend your friend. God’s love is saying to us and through us, “I am here to bless you, to make you my royal son and daughter. I want to be a Father to you, a tender, loving, powerful Father to you, but I can’t do it while you are still giving all your affection and all your ties to something else.” Bob Dylan sang, “You’re gonna have to serve somebody, Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, But you’re gonna have to serve somebody.”

Vs. 7:1: Breaking that yoke before it becomes permanent or making sure that you don’t continue to make yokes that you shouldn’t is what the Lord is saying here. But look carefully at how God is saying this to you as Paul writes “beloved.” God’s love is waiting to bless us and envelop us, but the choice is up to you. You may need to “come out, be separate and touch no unclean thing” before you can experience His welcoming love and realize that He is a Father to you and you are His sons and daughters!