The Sunday School Lesson Predators in the Church by David McGee
May 13, 2018
Predators in the Church (40:06)
Referenced Scriptures: 2 Corinthians 10; 2 Corinthians 11:1-15
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God's Word enables us to recognize and confront false teachers.
Have you ever heard something that immediately struck you as false teaching about Jesus or the gospel? How did you know it was false? What did you do in response?
The apostle Paul confronted false teachers within the Corinthian church and outside the church. Both posed a great threat because of their potential influence against Paul's teachings and ministry to the believers there. As we read 2 Corinthians 10-11, we note that Paul acted both gently and boldly in confronting them. From his words and actions, we can learn much about how to respond when spiritual predators threaten to divide our churches and mislead God's people.
The scriptures below are from the WEB Bible.
2 Corinthians 10
1) Now I Paul, myself, entreat you by the humility and gentleness of Christ; I who in your presence am lowly among you, but being absent am of good courage toward you.
2) Yes, I beg you, that I may not, when present, show courage with the confidence with which I count to be bold against some, who count of us as if we walked according to the flesh.
3) For though we walk in the flesh, we don‘t wage war according to the flesh;
4) for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but mighty before God to the throwing down of strongholds,
5) throwing down imaginations and every high thing that is exalted against the knowledge of God, and bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ;
6) and being in readiness to avenge all disobedience, when your obedience will be made full.
7) Do you look at things only as they appear in front of your face? If anyone trusts in himself that he is Christ‘s, let him consider this again with himself, that, even as he is Christ‘s, so also we are Christ‘s.
8) For though I should boast somewhat abundantly concerning our authority, (which the Lord gave for building you up, and not for casting you down) I will not be put to shame,
9) that I may not seem as if I desire to terrify you by my letters.
10) For, "His letters," they say, "are weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech is despised.
11) Let such a person consider this, that what we are in word by letters when we are absent, such are we also in deed when we are present.
12) For we are not bold to number or compare ourselves with some of those who commend themselves. But they themselves, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves with themselves, are without understanding.
13) But we will not boast beyond proper limits, but within the boundaries with which God appointed to us, which reach even to you.
14) For we don‘t stretch ourselves too much, as though we didn‘t reach to you. For we came even as far as to you in the gospel of Christ,
15) not boasting beyond proper limits in other men‘s labors, but having hope that as your faith grows, we will be magnified in you according to our boundaries to abundance,
16) so as to preach the gospel even to the parts beyond you, not to boast in what someone else has already done.
17) But "he who boasts, let him boast in the Lord."
18) For it isn‘t he who commends himself who is approved, but whom the Lord commends.
2 Corinthians 11:1-15
1) I wish that you would bear with me in a little foolishness, but indeed you do bear with me.
2) For I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy. For I married you to one husband, that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ.
3) But I am afraid that by any means, as the serpent deceived Eve in his craftiness, your minds might be corrupted from the simplicity that is toward Christ.
4) For if he who comes preaches another Jesus, whom we did not preach, or if you receive a different spirit, which you did not receive, or a different gospel, which you did not accept, you put up with that well enough.
5) For I reckon that I am not at all behind the very best apostles.
6) But though I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not unskilled in knowledge. No, in every way we have been revealed to you in all things.
7) Or did I commit a sin in humbling myself that you might be exalted, because I preached to you God‘s gospel for nothing?
8) I robbed other assemblies, taking wages from them that I might serve you.
9) When I was present with you and was in need, I wasn‘t a burden on anyone, for the brothers, when they came from Macedonia, supplied the measure of my need. In everything I kept myself from being burdensome to you, and I will continue to do so.
10) As the truth of Christ is in me, no one will stop me from this boasting in the regions of Achaia.
11) Why? Because I don‘t love you? God knows.
12) But what I do, that I will do, that I may cut off occasion from them that desire an occasion, that in which they boast, they may be found even as we.
13) For such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as Christ‘s apostles.
14) No wonder, for even Satan masquerades as an angel of light.
15) It is no great thing therefore if his ministers also masquerade as servants of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works.
The WEB Bible is provided by Public Domain.