The people of Corinth have not been Christians for very long, but false teachers and false doctrines have already crept into the city. The devil doesn't waste time! He couldn't prevent hundreds or thousands of them from being saved, so he's trying to do the next best thing: keep them from being effective for the kingdom of God. If he can deceive them and make them poor ambassadors for Christ, he can keep them from leading others to the truth. Wherever the gospel goes, opposition to the gospel is right on its heels.
Paul warns the Corinthians not to give the time of day to anyone who teaches a gospel that's in any way different than the gospel he already taught them. There are minor points, of course, in which believers may disagree when interpreting the Scriptures, but the basic facts of the gospel cannot be changed and they go like this: Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God, the proof of which is that He fulfilled the prophecies concerning the first advent of the Messiah. He was born of a virgin just as the prophet Isaiah predicted (Isaiah 7:14), of the tribe of Judah as Jacob envisioned (Genesis 49:10), of the line of David as Isaiah predicted (Isaiah 11:1) and as the Lord promised David (2 Samuel 7:12), born in Bethlehem just as the prophet Micah foresaw (Micah 5:2), killed at Jerusalem as both the prophets Daniel (Daniel 9:26) foresaw, dying for our sins as Isaiah proclaimed He would (Isaiah 53:1-9), and rising victoriously from the dead as God promised the prophet Isaiah He would (Isaiah 53:10-12).
All along Paul has had trouble getting some of the Corinthian believers to accept his God-given authority over them as an apostle of Christ and as their father in the gospel (the one who first brought the good news to them). They are a fickle people. They willingly entertain viewpoints that are vastly at odds with the gospel that saved them. The citizens of Corinth were brought up in a society that welcomed debate and dissent, and even now they have difficulty committing themselves to the idea that anything can be an absolute truth. In my opinion, our nation is currently in danger of falling into the same trap. More and more our society is unwilling to accept that anything can be an absolute truth. More and more those who hold anything to be true and unchangeable are ridiculed and accused of being backwards, old-fashioned, prejudiced, and filled with hate. This attitude is not new, for Paul encountered it at Corinth in the first century B.C. Since Satan had a modest amount of success with it there, he still uses this method wherever he thinks it might turn people from the truth of the one and only message that is capable of saving souls and changing lives for the better.
Paul is deeply concerned about the tendency of the Corinthians to reject the idea of an absolute truth. He loves them with a fatherly love, so he uses the example of himself as a father who has promised his daughter (the church at Corinth) to Christ in marriage. "I hope you will put up with me in a little foolishness. I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to Him." (2 Corinthians 11:1-2) He is saying something like this, "I love you as a father loves his child. I want the best for you; in other words, I am jealous for you. I want nothing but love and happiness for you, so like a father whose daughter is the apple of his eye, I betrothed you to One who will love you with all His heart. I guarded your virtue while you were under my care so that I could present you to Him as a pure bride."
But Paul is afraid something will happen between now and the time that Christ claims His bride. Some of the believers of Corinth may be seduced by false teaching and fall out of love with Christ. "But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent's cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ." (2 Corinthians 11:3) We are not being narrow-minded when we refuse to entertain false doctrine; we are being faithful to our Bridegroom. Just like an woman in love turns a deaf ear to the flattery of men other than her fiance, we must turn a deaf ear to the seducing whispers of the world. Have you ever heard the statement, credited to Alexander Hamilton, which says, "If you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything."? Paul is essentially telling the Corinthian church the same thing. If they do not hold fast to the truth of the gospel, they will fall for lies and fall away from their love of the Lord.
Paul has already observed a trend of the Corinthian believers to put up with false doctrine. "For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the Spirit you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough." (2 Corinthians 11:4) Paul can't prevent liars and false teachers from rising up. Neither can the people of Corinth. But they can refuse to listen to them.
We can refuse to listen to wrong doctrine as well. Will anyone consider us impolite for this? Possibly so. Will anyone accuse us of being old-fashioned because we hold the Scriptures as our standard for living? I think we can count on it. Will people claim we are narrow-minded for proclaiming that Christ is our only way to heaven (John 14:6) and that there are not "many paths" to God? Most definitely. Will we be accused of being a bunch of ignorant hicks because we believe that disobeying God's commandments and laws is sinful? Of course. But like a woman who is deeply in love with the one to whom she is betrothed, we must be faithful our Bridegroom, keeping ourselves only unto Him.
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