Today’s Scripture Reading (February 17, 2018): 2 Corinthians 11
Donald Trump has increased my vocabulary, well, he has added at
least one word to it – braggadocious. Donald Trump loves the word. He repeatedly
tells his audience that he is not braggadocious. And actually, the people at the
Merriam-Webster dictionary would tend to agree. They claim that Donald Trump is not braggadocious because
braggadocious is not a word. Merriam-Webster argues that the word that Donald
Trump is actually trying to reach for is
braggadocio. By the way, my laptop agrees. It places angry red lines under the
word braggadocious while giving braggadocio a free pass. But who knows, maybe
Merriam-Webster will see the light and include braggadocious in their next
dictionary, and maybe Donald Trump will have given us the next word of the
year. Or maybe not.
However, the reality is that Donald Trump, while he might not be
braggadocious, does display evidence of braggadocio, which means boastful or
arrogant behavior. Even in a recent stop on his never-ending
campaign trail, the self-delivered claim that Trump was not braggadocious was
too much for one supporter standing in the background who broke out in spontaneous
laughter at the comment before quickly ducking
out of the picture.
It is this braggadocio that Paul claims is foolishness. He asks
that the Corinthians put up with what is coming next. Paul is about to list his
credentials. It is a curious place in which the Apostle to the Gentiles to finds
himself. After all, one of Paul’s biggest arguments has been that God’s
strength comes through in the places where he is weak. Paul seems to know that
he doesn’t speak well and that the visual
that he presents is not that of an overwhelming person. He has never claimed to
be a speaker like Apollo, or as charismatic as Peter might have been. And, for
Paul, this is good. Because then the Gospel that he teaches needs to be
considered on its own merit and with the
presence of God in the discussion rather than with the force of Paul’s
personality.
But because Paul’s underwhelming presence has come under criticism
in Corinth, Paul is about to do what he has always claimed to be foolishness.
He is about to display some braggadocio. Paul is about to talk about his credentials
as an Apostle, even though none of this, in the mind of Paul, is of any
significance. It is foolishness because
the Gospel that he preaches stand on its own merits, and not on the credentials
of the one doing the speaking.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2 Corinthians 12 & 13
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