2 Corinthians — Chapter 7

Authorship & Background

Deep Dive

Setting: Paul writes from Macedonia in about AD 55–56, probably from Philippi or nearby (Acts 20:1–2). Since 2:14 he has been reflecting on what gospel ministry is, and that long reflection ends here. Verse 1 closes the call to holiness that began at 6:14. Verses 2–4 return to the plea of 6:11–13 to open their hearts. Then at v5 Paul picks up the story he broke off at 2:13: he had left an open door at Troas because he could not find Titus, crossed to Macedonia, and waited. Titus was carrying news of how Corinth had received the "letter with many tears" (2:4), sent after a painful visit in which someone had badly wronged Paul. This chapter tells what Titus finally reported, and it is one of the warmest passages Paul ever wrote.

The Temple of the Living God (v1)

• "Since we have these promises, beloved" (v1). The promises are the ones Paul has just strung together from the Old Testament (6:16–18): God will dwell among his people, welcome them, and be a Father to them. Holiness here is not the price of those promises. It is the response to them. Because God has promised to live among his people, they clean house.
• "Let us cleanse ourselves" (v1). Paul says "us," not "you." He puts himself under the same call. "Defilement" (molysmos) appears only here in the New Testament, a word for pollution or stain. In context it points back to 6:14–17, being yoked with unbelievers and touching "no unclean thing," most likely meaning the idol feasts and temple life that still tugged at the Corinthians (1 Cor 8–10).
• "Of body and spirit" (v1). Sin is not only physical. There are sins of the body, such as the sexual immorality Corinth was famous for (1 Cor 6:18), and sins of the inner life, such as pride, bitterness and divided loyalty. Both stain, and both need cleansing.
• "Bringing holiness to completion" (v1). The verb (epiteleō) means to complete or carry through to the end. Paul uses it for Titus completing the collection (8:6) and in Philippians 1:6 for God completing the good work he began. Holiness is something already given in Christ (1 Cor 6:11) and something to be carried through, a lifelong work, not a single step.
• "In the fear of God" (v1). Not terror of punishment but reverent awe before the One who has chosen to live among his people. Paul used the same idea in 5:11: "knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others."
• One passage or an insertion? Read 6:13 and then 7:2, and they join neatly: "widen your hearts… Make room in your hearts for us." For that reason some scholars think 6:14–7:1 was added later from another letter. No manuscript lacks it, and many others see it as a deliberate turn: the Corinthians' hearts were narrow toward Paul because they were too open to the world, so he deals with that before renewing his plea.
• Commentators: Henry calls this "an exhortation to progressive holiness," and warns that "Faith and hope in the promises of God must not destroy our fear of God." JFB links "defilement" back to "the unclean thing" of 6:17 and adds, "The cleansing away impurity is a positive step towards holiness." Guzik stresses that sins of the spirit, like pride and self-righteousness, can be more dangerous than sins of the flesh, pointing out that tax collectors and prostitutes came to Jesus more readily than the Pharisees did. He also reads "completion" as holiness made whole, not sinless perfection, which fits the lexicon's "complete, accomplish."

Paul's Joy (vv2–16)

• "Make room in your hearts for us" (v2). The verb (chōreō) means to have space for, to hold. Paul's heart is wide open to them (6:11). He asks them to stop being cramped toward him.
• "We have wronged no one, we have corrupted no one, we have taken advantage of no one" (v2). Three short denials, each answering a charge someone had probably made. "Taken advantage" is the word Paul uses again in 12:17–18: "Did I take advantage of you through any of those whom I sent?" With a large collection for Jerusalem in progress (chs 8–9), suspicion about money was in the air. Paul had refused to take support from Corinth (11:7–9), and his rivals apparently twisted even that.
• "I do not say this to condemn you" (v3). He is defending himself, not accusing them. "You are in our hearts, to die together and to live together." This was the language of deep friendship in the ancient world, friends pledged to share life and death. Paul puts death first. For a man who faced death daily (4:11; 6:9), that was not a figure of speech.
• "Great boldness… great pride… filled with comfort… overflowing with joy" (v4). Four phrases piled up, and the last is literally "I super-abound with joy." This verse is the bridge into the rest of the chapter. Paul has just said he has confidence in them. Now he explains why.
• "Our bodies had no rest" (v5). The same phrase he used at Troas ("my spirit was not at rest," 2:13), except now it is his body (literally "flesh"). Leaving Troas did not bring relief. "Afflicted at every turn, fighting without and fear within." Outside were quarrels and opposition. Macedonia was hard ground, and the believers there had been suffering for years (Phil 1:29–30; 1 Thess 2:14; 2 Cor 8:2). Inside was fear, most of all fear about Corinth and about whether Titus was safe. An apostle admits he was afraid.
• "But God, who comforts the downcast" (v6). "Downcast" (tapeinos) means low, brought down, humble. Paul is quoting the character of God more than describing himself. The phrasing echoes the Greek of Isaiah 49:13, where God comforts his humble ones. In 1:3–4 Paul called him "the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction." Here is a case study.
• "By the coming of Titus" (v6). God's comfort arrived on foot, in the shape of a friend. The comfort was not only that Titus was alive and well. It was "the comfort with which he was comforted by you" (v7). The news traveled like a chain: the Corinthians comforted Titus, Titus comforted Paul. The words for comfort (paraklēsis, parakaleō) run all through vv4–13, as they did in 1:3–7.
• "Your longing, your mourning, your zeal for me" (v7). Titus reports three things. They longed to see Paul again, they grieved over what had happened, and they were now eager to stand with him. Whatever had been said or done during the painful visit, the church had turned.
• "Even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it, though I did regret it" (v8). An honest, untidy sentence. After sending the letter, Paul had second thoughts and wished he could take it back. Now he sees the grief was "only for a while" and it did its work. The word for regret here (metamelomai) means to feel sorry or have second thoughts, and it is not the usual word for repentance.
• Which letter? The traditional view, held by Henry and JFB, is that it was 1 Corinthians, with its sharp rebuke over the man living with his father's wife (1 Cor 5). Most scholars today think it was a later letter, now lost, written "out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears" (2:4) after Paul's painful visit (2:1). 1 Corinthians, for all its correction, does not read like a letter written through tears. Either way, the point is the same: hard words, given in love, bore fruit.
• "Not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting" (v9). Paul takes no pleasure in their pain. What he celebrates is where the pain led. "Repenting" (metanoia) means a change of mind that turns a life around. "You suffered no loss through us." The rebuke cost them nothing in the end. It saved them.
• "Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret" (v10). Literally, grief "according to God," grief that sees sin as God sees it. It leads to repentance, and repentance leads to salvation, and no one ever looks back on that and wishes it undone. "Without regret" (ametamelētos) is a rare word, used elsewhere only of God's gifts and calling, which are "irrevocable" (Rom 11:29). Paul plays on his own word from v8: he regretted the letter for a while, but the repentance it produced is beyond regret.
• "Whereas worldly grief produces death" (v10). Worldly grief is sorrow over getting caught, over consequences, over lost reputation. It is turned inward and goes nowhere. The New Testament's starkest picture is Judas. Matthew says he "changed his mind" or was "seized with remorse" (metamelomai, Matt 27:3), the very word for regret Paul uses here. But he did not turn to Christ, and he went out and died. Peter wept bitterly over his denial (Luke 22:62) and came back. Both were sorry. Only one repented. Esau sought a blessing "with tears" but found no change of heart (Heb 12:17). David, by contrast, said simply, "I have sinned against the LORD" (2 Sam 12:13), and Psalm 51 shows what godly grief sounds like.
• "See what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you" (v11). Paul lists seven marks of real repentance, each introduced with "what": earnestness, taking it seriously after a season of not caring; eagerness to clear yourselves (apologia, a defense), wanting to show they did not approve of what was done; indignation, anger at the sin and at their own tolerance of it; fear, probably of God, possibly of Paul's coming visit; longing, for the relationship with Paul to be restored; zeal, energy to set things right; and punishment (ekdikēsis, vindication or justice done), meaning they had dealt with the offender, as 2:6 says the majority did. Repentance in this list is not a feeling. It is a church that changed what it did.
• "At every point you have proved yourselves innocent in the matter" (v11). "Innocent" is literally "pure" (hagnos). Paul is not saying they never did wrong. They had tolerated it. He means that by their response they had cleared themselves of any share in it.
• "Not for the sake of the one who did the wrong, nor for the sake of the one who suffered the wrong" (v12). This is a Hebrew way of speaking that means "not so much for this as for that." Paul did care about both men. But his deeper aim was for the church to discover its own loyalty: "that your earnestness for us might be revealed to you in the sight of God." The letter showed them who they really were.
• Who were these two people? The traditional reading (Henry, JFB) takes the wrongdoer to be the man in 1 Corinthians 5, and "the one who suffered the wrong" to be his father, which would mean the father was still alive. Many modern scholars read it differently: during the painful visit someone in Corinth publicly attacked or insulted Paul, and "the one who suffered the wrong" is Paul himself, speaking modestly. The text doesn't settle it, and Paul seems deliberately to name no one. What is clear is that the matter is now closed, the offender has been disciplined, and Paul has already urged that he be forgiven and restored (2:6–8).
• "Therefore we are comforted" (v13). The paragraph ends where it began, with comfort.
• "We rejoiced still more at the joy of Titus" (v13). Paul's joy doubles because his friend is happy. Titus had gone to Corinth carrying a hard letter into a hostile church, perhaps uneasy about how he would be received. Instead "his spirit has been refreshed by you all." "Refreshed" is the word for rest and relief, the same word Jesus used: "I will give you rest" (Matt 11:28).
• "Whatever boasts I made to him about you, I was not put to shame" (v14). Before sending Titus, Paul had told him, in effect, "Underneath it all, they are good people. They will respond." It was a risky thing to say about Corinth. They proved him right. "Just as everything we said to you was true" answers the charge, back in 1:17–18, that Paul's word could not be trusted.
• "With fear and trembling" (v15). Not cringing terror, but the seriousness of people who know they are dealing with God's work (compare 1 Cor 2:3; Phil 2:12). They received Titus as Paul's representative and obeyed the letter. As a result, "his affection for you is even greater." The literal phrase is "his inward parts," the seat of deep feeling. Titus now loves this church, and he will soon go back to help complete their gift for Jerusalem (8:6, 16–17).
• "I have complete confidence in you" (v16). "Confidence" here can also be translated "I am of good courage," the same word as 5:6, 8. After months of fear, Paul can speak freely to them again. This sentence also prepares the ground for chapters 8–9, where Paul will ask them to finish what they started in the collection. Not everything is resolved, though. Chapters 10–13 show that the rival teachers were still a problem.
• Commentators: All three agree that godly grief and worldly grief differ in where they lead, not in how intense they feel. JFB puts it well: worldly sorrow is "not at the sin itself, but at its penal consequences," and it notes that "the Greek words for regret and repent are distinct," which the lexicon supports (metamelomai is to regret, metanoia is a change of mind, though the lexicon cautions the line is hard to hold in every use). Henry's summary: "Godly sorrow produces repentance and reformation, and will end in salvation; but worldly sorrow worketh death." He reads v11's indignation as directed "at sin, at themselves, at the tempter and his instruments." Guzik uses the Peter and Judas contrast and insists that sorrow is a feeling while repentance is a change of life. He also observes that God often comforts us through other people, so cutting ourselves off from people cuts us off from much of his comfort. Guzik takes the letter to be a lost intermediate letter and names no offender. Henry and JFB both assume 1 Corinthians and the incest case, and identify the wronged party as the man's father, which most modern scholars doubt. On v6 JFB adds, "Those that are of an high spirit are not susceptible of such comfort." The lowly are the ones God lifts.

Pointing to Christ

The chapter turns on two kinds of sorrow, and only one of them has somewhere to go. Worldly grief stares at itself and ends in death. Godly grief looks to God and finds a way through, because God has already provided it: Christ took the sin and its judgment on himself, so a repentant sinner is not crushed under it but restored. That is why repentance in the New Testament is never a dead end of shame. It leads "to salvation without regret." And the God who comforts the downcast sent comfort to Paul on foot, in a friend. He sent it to the whole world in a Son, who was himself "acquainted with grief" (Isa 53:3) so that our grief could become the kind that heals.

Commentary

• Enduring Word (David Guzik): enduringword.com Guzik examines the call to holiness, Titus' good report, godly vs. worldly sorrow, and the seven fruits of repentance.
• Jamieson-Fausset-Brown (1871): blueletterbible.org A critical and explanatory commentary on the whole Bible, more concise than Matthew Henry and closer to the Hebrew and Greek, with attention to historical and geographical detail. Public domain.
• Matthew Henry's Exposition (1710): blueletterbible.org A devotional verse-by-verse commentary in the Puritan tradition, still among the most widely read three centuries on. Public domain.

Videos

Articles

• GotQuestions.org: gotquestions.org On the whole book: an overview of the book of 2 Corinthians -- who wrote it, when, why, and how it fits the rest of Scripture.

Links open on the publisher's own site. Nothing here is reproduced on this page.

Reflection

• An Active Cleansing (v.1) — Paul calls believers to actively cleanse themselves of everything that defiles body and spirit, not to passively wait for change. What specific behavior or attitude do you need to actively deal with rather than just hope improves?
• Comfort Delivered Through People (v.6) — Paul says God comforted him specifically through the arrival of Titus. Who has God used to comfort you in a hard season, and who might He want to comfort through you?
• Godly Sorrow Versus Worldly Sorrow (v.10) — Paul distinguishes sorrow that leads to repentance and life from sorrow that only leads to death. When you feel bad about sin, is it grief over offending God or just regret over getting caught?
• The Evidence of Real Repentance (v.11) — Paul lists the earnestness, concern, and zeal that godly sorrow produced in the Corinthians as proof their repentance was genuine. When you repent, does it show up in real, active change, or does it stay passive?