Community Bible Chapel

 

1. Paul’s Exaltation – 12:1b-4

Snatched into Paradise: Wow, but I can’t tell you about what I saw and heard!

  a. Time of the experience: “fourteen years ago” – v2

  b. How Paul felt: “whether in the body or apart from the body, I do not know” – vs2-3

  c. Location: “third heaven…paradise” – vs2,4

  d. What I heard: “words too sacred to tell” – v4

 

2. Paul’s Reservations – 12:5-6

I prefer to boast only about weakness!!

  a. Rejects adulation: “I will not boast on my own behalf” – v5

  b. Seeks anonymity: “But I am refraining from doing so in order that a certain person may not evaluate me beyond what he sees in me…”

2 Corinthians 12:1-6

v1 It is necessary to continue boasting. Although it is not helpful, nevertheless I will move on to visions and revelations from the Lord.

v2 I know a person in Christ who, fourteen years ago—whether in the body or out of the body, I do not know; God knows—was snatched up to the third heaven.

v3 And I know that such a person—whether in the body or apart from the body, I do not know; God knows—

v4 was snatched up into paradise and heard words too sacred to tell, words that a person is not permitted to speak.

v5 I will boast on behalf of such a person, but I will not boast on my own behalf, except with regard to weaknesses.

v6 Now, if I want to boast, I will not be acting foolishly, for I will be telling the truth. But I am refraining from doing so in order that a certain person may not evaluate me beyond what he sees in me or anything he hears from me.