“This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?” (John 6:60)
Young pastors struggle with questions that arise from the congregation in the middle of their teachings. You’re holding forth on some rich teaching and someone blurts out, “But pastor, doesn’t Paul say such-and-so?”
Sure enough, Paul did say such and so, and said it in two or three places so strongly and clearly no one but the most resistant can deny. However, what he said does not fit with the point you were trying to make. Now, you have no choice but to deal with it.
Until that moment, you always liked the Apostle Paul and considered him one of your favorites.
You find yourself remembering–treasuring even–something the Apostle Peter said about Paul: “In all (Paul’s) letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.” (II Peter 3:16)
That’s a good verse to remember, young pastor. The time will come when you will need to refer an insistent questioner to it. After reading it–never quote it; the heckler (smiley-face goes here) needs to see it in black and white in his own Bible–you will then say, “If Peter had difficulty getting a handle on some of Paul’s writings, it’s no stretch to think you and I might.”