As God’s co-workers we urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. – 2 Corinthians 6:1

Today’s Scripture Reading (December 20, 2014): 2 Corinthians 6

It is easy to get caught up in the comparison game. We all do it. Every time we meet someone new, something inside of us begins to compare our lives with theirs, evaluating how well we measure up to them. From my experience, we often make two opposite mistakes with our comparisons – and sometimes at the same time. We place a higher value on ourselves and the things that we do – after all we know more, we have more education or, at the very least, more common sense, than the average bear – and we want to be honored for what it is that we do. Yet at the same time we often feel we don’t measure up on some scale – maybe it is that we are not as rich as they are, or not as pretty. It doesn’t really matter what the scale is. It may seem superficial to everyone else, but to us it is important – and the comparison we build up in our mind reigns.

Paul had every reason to believe that he was better than the Corinthian Church. After all, he was Paul, the great missionary. He was the one who had planted most of these churches in the first place. Paul was the church executive, the sought after teacher of the faith, the one who would one day define the theology of the Christian Church. And Paul would have had every right to demand and command. But he chooses not to.

Instead, Paul urges the Corinthian Church to listen to him “as God’s co-workers.” He reminds them not that they are under his command, but that together they were working toward the same goal. His message is clear. We are one together on a journey and our goal is the same. You are called to work for God, just as I am. And together we can make the God Dream a God Reality. But this can only happen if we are willing to work together toward a common goal – to stop playing the comparison game.

Specifically, Paul was worried that the Corinthians had received the grace of God in vain. The comment could mean two things. First, it could mean that the Corinthians had adopted a works righteousness apart from faith. This was a favorite issue that Paul seemed to like to write to the churches about, but the context of the Corinthian letters don’t seem lend themselves to this conclusion. It was much more likely that Paul’s concern in Corinth was actually the opposite – that the Corinthian church was making a mockery of grace by believing that grace meant that there was no need to change their behavior – grace meant that there was no need for repentance. The truth is that Paul did not advocate either extreme. For Paul, salvation was by faith, but the grace of God demanded a change in our lives. If there is a passage that shows that Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, and James, the leader of the church in Jerusalem, were actually on the same page and not fighting against each other – this just might be it. Neither believed that that grace was easy. Both believed that when grace was truly understood, lives were changed.  And if that did not happen, then grace had been received in vain.    

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2 Corinthians 7