This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

(upbeat music) - Welcome to day two of our look through 2 Corinthians 11. This
is a chapter about how you and I can set relationships right, do the things that
God has called us to do. Yesterday we talked about the choice to be jealous, to
be jealous for what's good in our lives and what's good in a relationship.

And also the need to be afraid, to be afraid of what's evil and how evil can
tear our lives apart. How do you set a relationship right? You follow the
example of Paul, you be jealous for the good, you be afraid of the evil.

Number three, be humble, be humble. In verses seven to 11, Paul talks about his
actions towards the Corinthians. Did I do wrong when I humbled myself and
honored you by preaching God's good news to you without expecting anything in
return?

I robbed other churches by accepting their contributions so I could serve you at
no cost. And when I was with you and didn't have enough to live on, I did not
ask you to help me. For the brothers who came from Macedonia brought me another
gift.

I've never yet asked you for any support and I never will. As surely as the
truth of Christ is in me, I will never stop boasting about this all over Greece.
Why, because I don't love you?

God knows I do. In these verses, Paul talks about his humble choice to serve
them without charging them. When you want to change a relationship, you've got
to look for humility and you've got to look out for pride.

And that's what these verses are all about. First, you have to look for
humility. Paul had every right to ask them to support him as he served them.

In fact, he believed in churches doing that, but he chose not to exercise that
right. Instead, he chose to humbly serve them, even though it made it more
difficult on him and on others. Now, that's the kind of spiritual leader to look
for.

That's the kind of spiritual leader to become, who's looking to those that they
serve for support, for strength, for affirmation. It's okay if people encourage
you, but if you need those things so much that you can't do without them,
there's no humility. Paul says, I'm not acting out of some need for you to build
me up, I'm acting out of love.

He says at the end, God knows I love you. That's the kind of love that will set
a relationship right. Love that's all wrapped around with this choice to be
humble.

Let me say it as clearly as I know how. No relationship is ever set right
without someone making the humble choice. Never.

What usually happens when relationships are going wrong is two people go to like
their neutral corners ready to fight it out, and neither one will budge an inch.
Neither one will be humble, neither one will give in because it could be
embarrassing 'cause the other person could use it, 'cause the other person could
come against you. Why would you set yourself up for them to slap you one more
time, slap you down one more time?

If the relationship is going to be healed, someone has to make the humble choice.
That's true of our relationship with God. I was out of relationship with God,
out of sync with God, separated from God.

And the only way that I got to be back in relationship with God, the only way
any of us can be back in relationship with God is because Jesus made the humble
choice. He came to earth, he became a man. That's a humble choice for God to
come into human flesh.

And then he allowed himself to be put on a cross, spit upon, ridiculed. He
allowed himself to be humbled. Why?

So that our relationship with him could be set right. If he had not humbled
himself, I could not be in relationship with God. If you're going to set a
relationship right, you're going to have to humble yourself.

Now, does that guarantee that the relationship will be set right? Of course not.
Jesus humbled himself and died on the cross, yet there are many who still
ridicule him.

But there are also many who have come to know him. Humility opens the door for
the other person to make the right choice. Humility gets the barrier of pride
out of the way.

Now, there is a problem with this whole choice of humility. The problem is
pride. I've always loved what C.

S. Lewis said about pride and humility. He said, "If anyone wants to be humble,
"I think I can show them the first step.

"The first step is to admit that one is prideful. " I struggle with pride, you
struggle with pride, we all struggle with it. We struggle with other people's
pride and how it affects us.

But the amazing thing is, when other people's pride affects us, it doesn't make
us want to be more humble because we realize how prideful they are. It makes us
want to be more prideful in return. So we have pride against pride, pride building
pride, and of course it forces relationships apart.

So I've gotta face my own pride, I've gotta face my own selfishness, and I've
gotta make the humble choice. But as I make the humble choice, I have to look
out for pride and the way that it can keep taking me back to the wrong place in
my relationship with God and my relationship with others. Listen to what Paul
says about this in verses 12 to 15.

But I will continue doing this to cut the ground out from under the feet of
those who boast that their work is just like ours. These people are false
apostles. They have fooled you by disguising themselves as apostles of Christ,
but I am not surprised.

Even Satan can disguise himself as an angel of light. So it is no wonder his
servants can also do it by pretending to be godly ministers. In the end, they
will get every bit of punishment their wicked deeds deserve.

Paul made the choice to lower himself in order to serve, in order to lift up
those that he served. He's saying here, you gotta watch out for those who
elevate themselves and lower you, who actually lower you, make you feel lower in
order to elevate themselves over you as servants in order to meet their own
needs for selfish pride. Satan's lies ruin relationships, and here he comes to
it again.

Satan's lies ruin relationships with God and with others. We talked yesterday
about Satan's lies and how they ruin relationships, and you might think, well,
Satan's never lied to me. Sure he has, many, many times.

We just don't recognize it when it happens. If Satan showed up in a red suit
with a pitchfork and flames around him and said, here's the lie, of course you'd
recognize it, but that's not how he lies. Notice what Paul says, he disguises
himself.

He disguises himself even as an angel, even as an angel of light. You wouldn't
buy the lie if it looked bad. The reason you buy the lie is because it looks
good.

In fact, Satan's lies, many times, almost seem beautiful at first glance. His
lie when it comes into a relationship is the lie that, oh, you're going to be a
much better person for this, for not knowing or loving that person any longer.
His lie when it comes into a relationship is, they really weren't worth it
anyway.

Satan even lies to parents about that sometimes. Satan's lies come through the
most unexpected people in ways that almost seem beautiful at first glance. There
are people in your life who seemingly love you, but they're just passing along
Satan's lies.

Oh, don't even try, don't even love, don't even be humble. You don't follow the
example of that advice. You follow the example of Jesus Christ.

Now, am I saying that some of your best friends and even some of your family
could be passing along lies of Satan? Of course I am, because I know I've done
it, and I know you've done it. It's easy to buy into his lie.

It's easy to pass it along, especially to people that we love, people we don't
want to see hurt. So rather than seeing them hurt, going through the solving of a
relationship, we tell them, oh, just get out. It's a lie of Satan.

So the question in my life, your life, is not how does this look, what I'm going
through right now, or what are people going to think, or how do I feel. The
question is, what is God's truth? And what is God's truth leading me to do?

And when I can get there, it gives me the power, it gives me the strength to
choose humility. God's truth, through God's Spirit in my life, gives me the
power that I don't have in myself. In myself, I'm always going to choose
selfishness.

But God's truth, through God's Spirit in my life, can cause me to choose
humility. It's an often difficult and often painful choice, but you will never
regret it. Even if the other person does not choose to respond in the right way,
you will know I did the right thing.

I did the godly thing. I gave God the opportunity to work, and there will be
things that unlock in your life that you cannot unlock any other way than by
choosing humility. Let's take a minute to pray together.

Our Father, You gave us the greatest example of humility possible in sending
Jesus to die for us in what happened on the cross. But even that example is not
enough for us to choose humility. We need the more that You've given us through
Your Spirit.

So thank You for sending Your Spirit into our lives. And I pray that Your
Spirit, the fruit of Your Spirit, would lead us to places in our lives of
unselfishness, even though Satan may be tempting us to be selfish, would lead us
to places in our lives of humility, even though Satan may be tempting us to be
prideful, would lead us to places of trusting You. We ask this in Jesus' name,
amen.

Tomorrow, we're going to get to look at how to deal with codependency in
relationships.