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The War for the Soul of the Church
It is without question that Christ will succeed fully in His stated mission to build God’s magnificent house. When David’s son Solomon completed construction of the Old Testament temple, God’s glory filled it so powerfully that the priests could not even stand up to minister (2 Chronicles 5). But as great as that event was, it was but a symbol, a type, or a shadow of an even greater fulfillment yet lying ahead in our future. When the greater Son of David brings to completion His work of construction among the living stones of His Church, the glory of God will have so permeated our midst that the strength, ideas, and values of man will have fallen to the ground just as the priests did in Solomon’s day.
Simply put, where we are headed is Christ revealed in His Church with clarity for all the nations to see. Therefore, we must set aside in our midst all that distracts our attention from Him. How grievous it must be to God when the very ones sent to implement His design instead insert their own thoughts, priorities, and personas into the picture. The false apostles among the Corinthians had done just that.
Because of their influence, the church’s focus had been diverted from the Lord and onto men. And God had become jealous over them. Drawing Paul to experience in some measure what He was feeling, He anointed His servant to reveal the heart of a true apostle.
I am jealous over you with God’s own jealousy.
(2 Corinthians 11:2 Weymouth)
Paul’s experience of God’s jealousy had a bit if a twist to it though. While Christ wanted to be as a Bridegroom to His people, the apostle’s role was to be as a dad who had betrothed the local church as his little girl to the Lord.
For I have betrothed you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.
Sometimes when godly parents prayed, the Lord would reveal to them who their children should marry. A father might then betroth his little girl to the one chosen by God. But as she grew into maturity, it was important that she not stray from the Lord’s choice by yielding her heart to Satan’s temptations.
Similarly, Paul saw the devil’s crafty scheme at work among the Corinthians. The enemy intended to divert their attention and deceive them just as he had misled Eve in the Garden of Eden.
But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
Through the lie in Eden, Satan brought corruption into God’s creation causing sin and death to spread throughout the whole Earth. Indeed, the damage done through that one deception has been catastrophic. But what many might not have noticed is that parallel to the destruction in the natural realm is the damage wrought by the enemy in the new creation, the Church of Jesus Christ.
Indeed, Satan had a strategy to infiltrate God’s house just as he did Eden’s garden, and he began implementing it at Corinth. At the same time, Paul saw the corruption that would occur among the believers and began warning them. While the apostle’s approach was to take captive the thoughts of the believers to the obedience of Christ, the devil’s tactic was to corrupt their minds from the simplicity that is in Christ.
It would be nice to say that the early apostles won the war and that today Christ’s Church is in a glorious condition. But it simply is not so. The war continues unabated.
Though Paul saw glorious days ahead for the Church (Ephesians 3), at the same time he saw spiritual decline in her even in his own generation. Near the end of his life, in his last known epistle, he laments how so many brethren did not stand with him in his afflictions.
This you know, that all those in Asia have turned away from me.
He had written powerfully inspired revelation to the Ephesian Christians of God’s plan for the Church. Yet Ephesus was one of the main cities in the Roman province of Asia, and all those in that province had turned from Paul in his time of need.
Why had they turned away? The reason is clear from Jesus’ own words to the Ephesians.
Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
Their minds had been corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. Paul had specifically warned the elders of this local church that not only would savage wolves come in among them to devour God’s flock (Acts 20:17, 29), but that from within their own company men would arise speaking the gospel in twisted ways so as to draw away disciples after themselves (Acts 20:30).
The local church at Ephesus had become corrupted in their thinking, and had lost sight of their betrothal. The beauty of Christ was dimming in their minds. Was it the siren song of spiritually gifted ministers who preached about Christ while promoting themselves that had begun drawing them into a passion divergent from their first love?
Here was Paul’s primary concern for the church at Corinth: like the Ephesians, they were running the risk of drifting from their first love. The enemy wanted their minds corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. The word “simplicity” could also be translated as singleness. As long as the believers had a singleness of vision, to keep Christ as the priority, the central focus, and the love of their lives, they would be fine.
So how could the apostle get their attention? What strategy would the Lord give him to call them up short and to turn their hearts back in the right direction? Very simply, he would let the zeal of God’s jealousy stir him up to begin speaking like a fool.
Oh, that you would bear with me in a little folly–and indeed you do bear with me. For I am jealous for you with godly jealousy.
I say again, let no one think me a fool. If otherwise, at least receive me as a fool, that I also may boast a little. What I speak, I speak not according to the Lord, but as it were, foolishly, in this confidence of boasting. Seeing that many boast according to the flesh, I also will boast.
Did God reveal His wisdom through Paul’s tactic of looking foolish? Yes. The apostle’s words became part of inspired Scripture. But one thing is clear, his boasting reveals how not to speak. His speech was not according to (or in harmony with) the Lord, even while yet revealing God’s strategy.
The problem today is that some ministers speak like Paul did when speaking foolishly and think they are expressing wisdom. How grievous! We will look more at this subject in the next chapter.
So where are we today? I believe that the Church of Christ has become corrupted in our minds and that God is jealous over us. True apostolic ministry will both experience and express to some degree that jealousy. In other words, they will get the point concerning what the war is really all about. And they will carry an authority, a zeal, and even righteous indignation over how the Bride has been led astray from the simplicity that is in Christ.
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