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What the Bible says about Apostle Paul's Credentials
(From Forerunner Commentary)

2 Corinthians 3:1-2

Paul boasts that the church at Corinth displayed such a fine example that their behavior worked like a letter of commendation for him, the apostle who started the congregation and served it.

Earl L. Henn
Have the Ten Commandments Passed Away?

2 Corinthians 12:7-10

Was there ever a man who was given as many gifts as the apostle Paul? Judging from how much God wrote through him—how much God used his mind, intellect, training, experience, yieldedness, and willingness to work and sacrifice himself on behalf of God and the church—it might have been very easy for him to have been puffed up. He even said himself that nobody worked any harder than he did, writing, "I labored more abundantly than they all" (I Corinthians 15:10).

However, he was not bragging. It is not wrong to take the right kind of pride and to speak the truth about what we really have done. There is nothing wrong with a developed skill and confidence in our ability to do it. If we do not have any confidence, will we ever offer ourselves in service to others? There must also be a proper recognition of where all that power, strength, and everything flows from. It flows from the gifts, from what God has given.

God mercifully allowed Paul to suffer a physical problem to keep him mindful of his dependence on Him. The truly humble are knowledgeable of their dependence, and they cry out to God continually for help, for what God only can supply: His Holy Spirit, His love, His faith, the forgiveness of sin, etc. Theirs is not just a feeling of weakness, because everyone, the converted and the unconverted, experiences weakness.

People with pride experience a feeling of weakness too, but they compensate, not by seeking God's help, but by flaunting what they think others will accept and bring praise to them. As long as a person continues to depend on himself, this world will continue as it is. Nothing will change. This attitude is illustrated in the beginning so simply. Without actually saying the words, Adam and Eve told God in Genesis 3, "We don't need you."

John W. Ritenbaugh
Faith (Part Seven)

Philippians 1:15-18

Notice how Paul, an apostle of God, reacts toward those "out there," others who were apparently not part of "Paul's group" or were Paul's converts, those whom Paul was serving as an apostle of God. However, these others were "out there" preaching the gospel. They had the truth. Paul acknowledges that they were there, and he does not say they were false apostles or false ministers. He does disagree with the way that they were doing what they did. Yet God does not condemn them through the apostle Paul. Paul finds fault with the way they were approaching things, but not with the fact that they existed.

John W. Ritenbaugh
What Is the Work?

Related Topics: Apostle Paul's Credentials


 

 




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