Context No. 3390 of 4322 · 2 Corinthians

2 Corinthians 7:8-16: in context

8For though I grieved you with my letter, I do not regret it, though I did regret it. For I see that my letter made you grieve, though just for a while. 9I now rejoice, not that you were grieved, but that you were grieved to repentance. For you were grieved in a godly way, that you might suffer loss by us in nothing. 10For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, which brings no regret. But the sorrow of the world produces death. 11For behold, this same thing, that you were grieved in a godly way, what earnest care it worked in you. Yes, what defense, indignation, fear, longing, zeal, and vindication! In everything you demonstrated yourselves to be pure in the matter. 12So although I wrote to you, I wrote not for his cause that did the wrong, nor for his cause that suffered the wrong, but that your earnest care for us might be revealed in you in the sight of God. 13Therefore we have been comforted. In our comfort we rejoiced the more exceedingly for the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all. 14For if in anything I have boasted to him on your behalf, I was not disappointed. But as we spoke all things to you in truth, so our glorying also which I made before Titus was found to be truth. 15His affection is more abundantly toward you, while he remembers all of your obedience, how with fear and trembling you received him. 16I rejoice that in everything I am confident concerning you.

Paul reflects on a hard letter he had sent, one that grieved the Corinthians, and he distinguishes two kinds of sorrow. Godly grief, he says, produces a repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but the sorrow of the world produces death. This is a crucial distinction.

Godly sorrow is grief over having sinned against God that turns us toward him in genuine repentance and real change, and it does us good in the end. Worldly sorrow is mere regret over the consequences, being caught, feeling ashamed, that produces only despair or a hardened heart, and no real change at all. Paul rejoices not that the Corinthians were pained, but that their pain was godly, working in them earnestness and repentance and a longing to make things right. The test of our sorrow over sin is where it leads: toward God and change, or only into self-pity and death. The same tears can flow from either, and they end in very different places.

When I grieve over my sin, is it godly sorrow that turns me toward God in real repentance, or only worldly regret over consequences that changes nothing?

Sources

2 Corinthians 7:10: "For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, which brings no regret. But the sorrow of the world produces death."
2 Corinthians 7:9: "I now rejoice, not that you were grieved, but that you were grieved to repentance."
2 Corinthians 7:11: "What earnest care it worked in you."