![]() For Paul, grace is the power of God, poured out in and through the faithful, to bring life in the face of a destructive culture. And this command sounds continuously as the ground-note of 2 Corinthians 6:3-10. The passage opens with a negative command: do not receive the grace of God in vain (2 Corinthians 6:1). Paul’s account of extraordinary courage and willingness to suffer points to the reality that living the gospel is not solitary work it takes solidarity to stand up against a culture that does not respect the values of God’s justice, and to endure its punishment.The close relationship between Paul and his co-workers is evidence of the characteristic way in which people understood themselves in the first century: as primarily persons-in-community, not as autonomous individuals.As Paul says of him in the letter to the Philippians, “Timothy’s worth you know, how like a son with a father he has served with me in the work of the Gospel” (Philippians 2:22). ![]() And yet there must be a very profound relationship bound up in this “we” who have experienced such a “great endurance” described in 6:4-10. The opening to 2 Corinthians mentions Timothy as the co-author, though it is hard to know whether Timothy’s presence pertains to all the pieces of the current letter.Second Corinthians 6:1-13, with its emotionality and autobiographical references, appears to concern Paul’s individual experiences, and yet the plural “we” also points to the fact that Paul was probably never alone in his ministry. While 1 Corinthians contains some of the most significant passages for understanding Paul’s practical theology, it is in the patchwork of letters that form 2 Corinthians that he reveals inner dimensions of his life of prayer, and the lengths he is willing to go to convey his passionate love and concern for this community. Paul’s voice in 2 Corinthians reminds me of a person in a long marriage that has become frayed and contentious, and who has reached the point where nothing will do but a raw and honest expression of his heart and commitments.
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