2 Corinthians 6King James Version
Now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation. Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. What concord hath Christ with Belial? Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate.
Paul's anxiety lifts when Titus arrives from Corinth with news of the church's renewed affection. He explains that his severe letter was not meant to cause pain but to reveal love. Godly sorrow, he argues, is completely different from worldly sorrow: one leads to repentance and life, the other to death. The Corinthians' response has proven everything Paul hoped about them, and Titus's joy confirms it.
Godly sorrow is not guilt that crushes; it is grief that redirects, producing the carefulness, zeal, and cleared conscience that worldly regret never generates.
"For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death." (2 Corinthians 7:10) The distinction between these two kinds of grief is one of the most practically useful in all of Scripture, explaining why some remorse transforms and other remorse paralyzes.
Titus walks in from a long journey and his face tells the story before he speaks. Paul has not been sleeping well. He has been in Macedonia with fightings without and fears within, and the sight of Titus coming through the door is the first genuine relief he has had in weeks.
Titus, whose arrival in Macedonia ended Paul's physical and emotional distress. The Corinthians, whose mourning, zeal, and desire to clear themselves impressed both Paul and Titus. The unnamed offender, referenced obliquely.
This chapter resolves the emotional arc that began in chapter 1 with Paul's near-despair in Asia. The relief is palpable. Paul has been carrying anxiety about this church across hundreds of miles and months, and Titus's report is the answer to the prayer implied throughout the opening chapters. The teaching on godly versus worldly sorrow is grounded in a real pastoral situation, not a hypothetical.
Paul says he rejoices not that they were made sorry but that their sorrow led somewhere good. He did not want them to suffer; he wanted the suffering to produce something real.
1We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain.
2(For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.)
3Giving no offence in any thing, that the ministry be not blamed:
4But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses,
5In stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings;
6By pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned,
7By the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left,
8By honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report: as deceivers, and yet true;
9As unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed;
10As sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.
11O ye Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you, our heart is enlarged.
12Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own bowels.
13Now for a recompence in the same, (I speak as unto my children,) be ye also enlarged.
14Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
15And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?
16And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
17Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you,
18And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.