I love getting to spend time with church people, especially playing board games. But if you tell me you likes games and you pull out Apples to Apples, I will storm out of your house.
Do you know this game? You pair an adjective with a noun, one person picks their favorite, and you play to five “points.” It’s basically rule-less. There is no real rubric or scorecard. Winning means nothing because you didn’t do anything to win. What’s the criteria? How do I know I’m doing the thing how the thing ought to be done? It’s all based on moods and opinions, and subjectivity, and I hate it!
Instead, I want a clear rubric. I want 10 points, and I want it to be clear how to get there, and then I want to beat you to those 10 points, and then I want to gloat in my victory!
What About a Rubric for Living?
In 2 Corinthians 10, Paul diagnoses our tendency to measure ourselves against two wrong rubrics before finally offering the right rubric.
Paul is several letters deep into correspondence with the church at Corinth. There’s history there. And that history has been made rocky by people who have cast doubt on Paul’s authority and legitimacy. Paul — the apostle who planted this church — is rightly defensive and a bit irritated that these folks who know and love him are being swayed by good-looking, good-sounding false teachers.
Interestingly, Paul doesn’t spend his time doing what he does elsewhere in this letter. He doesn’t spend the book countering their teaching per se. That’s not the main issue. Rather, he’s countering their rubric. He’s challenging their scorecard.
Wrong Rubric #1: Living for What My Eyes Can See
In 2 Corinthians 10:7, Paul says, “Look at what is before your eyes. If anyone is confident that he is Christ’s, let him remind himself that just as he is Christ’s, so also are we.”
The ESV reads as an imperative — “Look” — but it can also be interpreted as an indicative: “You are looking.” In context, the latter makes more sense. “You are only looking at what is before your eyes.”
In the previous section (vv. 1–6), Paul reminds them that his meekness and gentleness — like Jesus — should not be confused with weakness. There is a war we can’t see. We don’t fight with weapons of warfare like the world. “Flesh” can mean sinful nature and appetites, but it can also mean the domain of flesh and blood, the merely physical world.
Our Christian life is not reducible to a test tube. You can’t say, “Ah, there’s God here, He’s the Spirit, and here’s my quantifiable, observable, repeatable growth in Christlikeness.” We operate on a different plane. So you have to look beyond what you can see.
Paul asks, essentially: Are you just looking at flesh and blood? Is this how we operate? No. We are in Christ — all of us. We view the world differently.
Corinth was a wealthy city, highly concerned with presence, appearance, presentation, and status. Paul was speaking to a status-, beauty-, riches-, wealth-, image-obsessed culture. The so-called “super apostles” had a wrong rubric, a wrong scorecard. “Paul is weak, unimpressive. Paul lacks the rhetorical punch we possess.”
But Paul says don’t be fooled by the stuff you see. That’s not how we — those in Christ — operate. We don’t regard according to the flesh. We operate on a different playing field, with different values and priorities and long-game goals.
Hypothetically, if we were in a status-, beauty-, riches-, wealth-, image-obsessed culture, we might be tempted to think we’re lesser because we’re not “doing it right” by our eyes’ measurement. We don’t have the same external markers as others or what we expected of ourselves by now. I’m not as fit or beautiful or wealthy or successful or popular. I don’t carry the same status. I’m not impressive or effective.
But you are only looking at what is before your eyes.
Hebrews 12:18 says we approach a kingdom that cannot be touched. Philippians 3:20 says we are citizens of another kingdom, the kingdom of heaven. We don’t walk according to the flesh — according to what can be seen, measured, shared, and liked.
We’re after things greater than beauty and wealth and status. We live for a world that cannot be seen, and we live according to the values of another world that can’t be seen.
That’s true of churches, too. How easy is it to measure a church’s health only on the surface? Our rubric becomes what our eyes can see: bodies, budgets, buildings.
It’s the wrong rubric. But it’s only one of the wrong options. There’s a second.
Wrong Rubric #2: Living for the Approval of Others
Paul continues in verses 8–11. He asserts himself, somewhat uncomfortably: “Even if I boast a little too much of our authority, which the Lord gave for building you up and not for destroying you, I will not be ashamed.”
He doesn’t want to frighten them with his letters. They say, “His letters are weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech of no account.”
Paul responds: What we say by letter when absent, we do when present.
He doesn’t want to pull apostolic rank. He wants to build them up. His authority has always been for their spiritual well-being. He’s consistent — same message in letters and in person.
Then, in verse 12: “Not that we dare to classify or compare ourselves with some of those who are commending themselves … when they measure themselves by one another and compare themselves with one another, they are without understanding.”
Paul says he’s not playing the status and comparison game. Measuring yourself by one another is foolish.
We relate to this, don’t we? The constant pressure to scroll down your feed, comparing yourself with the success, beauty, or impressiveness of others. The result of which is either always propping up our ourselves against others or being crushed by them. Even the pagans know this is folly! The fastest way to be miserable is to compare yourself to others.
So, what is the right rubric?
Right Rubric: Living for God’s Commendation Where God Puts You
In verses 13–18, Paul says he will not boast beyond limits, but only with regard to the area of influence God assigned to him. He doesn’t overextend himself. He doesn’t take credit for other people’s ministry. He hopes that as their faith increases, his area of influence may be enlarged so he can preach the gospel in lands beyond them.
“‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.’ For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends” (2 Cor. 10:17–18).
Paul works not to be approved by man but to be approved by God in what God has given him. He boasts — rejoices — in the specific ministry God assigned to him.
This ministry is his assignment from God. So he leans into it and owns it. He lives for the commendation and approval of God, not for the approval of man or earthly accomplishments.
This is the only rubric worth living for: God’s commendation.
This means living to please God and God alone in the place He’s put me. This means boasting in the assignment given by God. This means pleasing Him is my rubric.
Some of us hear “commendation and approval of God,” and our hearts sink. Wait, approval from God? But I thought Jesus died so that we could be approved, finally and forever?
The New Testament teaches two important truths here. On the one hand, in the gospel we are approved by God in Christ. In Him, we are loved, known, treasured, and saved, as God’s beloved sons and daughters.
On the other hand, as sons and daughters, we are given an assignment. We can be more or less faithful in that assignment. I’m not talking about salvation, but about being rewarded for faithful stewardship of what God has given us. That’s what Paul has in view. He wants to be faithful and ultimately commended by God for how he handled his assignment.
Am I Living for God’s Commendation?
So where are you right now? Could it be that God has put you there and given you a ministry there? Are you single? Are you a father of three? Do you have aspirations for the mission field but feel stuck in the “secular” world?
God has you here right now. Not your mistakes. Not your indecision. Not your spouse who wrecked your plans. God has you here. God has given you something here.
The revolutionary teaching of the New Testament is that master, slave, free, Jew, Greek, man, woman, child — top of the heap or bottom of the pile — we can honor God there.
Live for God’s commendation in what God has assigned to you. Own this as an assignment. I’m going to honor God right here, right in this situation, now. Kill comparison and the craving for the commendation of man. Living for the commendation of man is foolish. Don’t worry about impressing your peers or being more impressive. Worry about being faithful with the thing God’s given you here and now. Seek the commendation of God.
“‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.’ For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends” (2 Cor. 10:17–18).
How Can We Do This?
Consider Jesus. Hebrews 12:1b–2: “… let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”
The Lord Jesus, for the joy set before Him, endured a cross. He embraced the calling and ministry God had for Him, stepped through the cross and its shame into the joyous embrace of the approving glory of God His Father.
We are saved, approved in Him. So now take His example. Like our Lord Jesus — given a life and a calling — we, too, are given a ministry by God. Step through it with faithfulness and be greeted by the joyous embrace, the approving glory of God our Father saying, “Well done, good and faithful servant. Welcome into the joy of your Master.”
— Trevor Hoffman is a teaching pastor at Ridgewood Church in Greer. This article was adapted from a sermon preached at Ridgewood Church in Greer on Feb. 15 entitled, “Jars of Clay: Wrong Rubrics.” Find the sermon on the Ridgewood Church podcast.