2 Corinthians 12:1-6 It is not expedient for me doubtless to glory. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord.… The old question as to his apostolic authority, which had recently been revived in a most exciting form, was not yet disposed of, and he must now discuss it in another aspect. So far as external circumstances were concerned, had not the prophetic declaration to Ananias been fulfilled? - "I will show him how great things he must suffer for my Name's sake." And, furthermore, he had proved that his own state of mind, the inward being of his soul, had corresponded with his call to suffer. The flesh had been subdued. Years of growth had brought him to a stage of experience that allowed him to speak of glorying in his infirmities. But he would now turn to another branch of experiences, viz. "visions and revelations of the Lord." Glorious as these exaltations were, they would see that, while they were exceptional in certain respects, yet they fell in with the providential discipline of his life, and opened the way for a keener sense of his infirmities by "a thorn in the flesh" All along St. Paul has been painfully aware that his enemies were using these infirmities to his official disparagement. Painfully, we say, for it is obvious that he was sensitive to the disadvantages under which he appeared before the public. "Humble," "rude in speech," "bodily presence weak," "speech contemptible," were things that had some foundation in fact. Of course, his adversaries exaggerated them, but the apostle could not escape instinctive feeling, and at times acute feeling, touching this matter. This, however, was only one source of depression. A fuller account of his sufferings, physical and mental, than he had ever given bad just now been presented, and the conclusion of it was that his bodily disadvantages as a speaker, his low repute as a public teacher, his constant endurance of pain and solicitude, had resulted in his realizing the fact that this very weakness was his strength. Could "visions and revelations" be entrusted to him - such visions and revelations - and he not be humbled by Divine direction? The more glorious the revelation, the greater the necessity for him to be reminded, and most painfully reminded, that the treasure was committed to an "earthen vessel." Witness the following: a man fourteen years ago - the memory of it still vividly present as a reality of today - such a man, whether in the body or out of the body it was impossible to tell, elevated to, the third heaven, and hearing "unspeakable words not lawful for a man to utter." "Fourteen years ago" the fact now first divulged, and yet the fact alone; the secret disclosures still a secret and personal to the man alone; and the sanctity such that it would be profanation to make the contents of the communication known. "Caught up to the third heaven, caught up into Paradise," face to face with the Lord Jesus in his mediatorial glory; and there, the senses laid to rest and the body forgotten and the spirit opened to receive instruction and inspiration, the man taught what he was to be and what he was to do as the servant on earth of his Divine Master. Of this man, as a man in Christ, he would boast; of himself in the flesh and subject to its infirmities, be would not boast save of his weakness. Under grace, what a debtor was he to these humiliations! Intellectual pride and vanity, spiritual pride and vanity, pride and vanity as a Jew to whom the God of the fathers had manifested himself - how could these be kept down except by mortifications of the flesh? If, nevertheless, he were to boast of these revelations, he should do it truthfully. Suppose, then, that he should make this boast; who would be able to transfer himself into the proper attitude of a listener? It would not be weakness, but power, the observer would see. "I forbear," and I shrink from it, lest the contrast between this power and my visible weakness, this glory and my present humiliation, be too great for any man to bear. - L. Parallel Verses KJV: It is not expedient for me doubtless to glory. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. |
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