Paul’s Pain: Finding purpose in persecution
-I went snowboarding for the first time and got hurt pretty bad with all of the constant falling. My wife snowboards and I was hoping to get a little compassion. She would have except for the fact that she could not stop laughing at me.
-The pain that it caused told me not to go anymore.
-Pain, for being such an unpleasant thing, is also a very good thing.
-Scientist Paul Brand, had funding to find a way to create nerve ending.
-Developed an alarm and lights to alert pain, but was not unpleasant enough for patients to react.
-Pain needs to be unpleasant so we do not damage ourselves.
-This is very obvious and easy to understand, but what about suffering and tragedy?
-This is a question that has stumped every generation since Adam. Why is there so much hurt?
-We see hurricanes and terrorists and disasters and even the most religious ask “why God?”
-I have a friend who asked, “Doesn’t it worry you that you don’t know these things? Aren’t you concerned when you don’t understand God?”
-My response is that it would concern me if I did totally understand God, because that would put me on the same playing field as God. If my mind operated on the same level with God so that I understood what he was doing in the world around me, that would be scary! I prefer to be stumped by God.
-Besides, God says to Isaiah, “my ways are not your ways, my thoughts are not your thoughts, just as the heaven is higher than the earth, so are my ways and thoughts higher than yours.”
-I believe that God left certain things blank because there is no way that we would be able to understand them.
-For example:
-There are an estimated 70000000000000000000000 grains of sand and
361,000000000000000000000 gallons of water in the ocean. And the amount of sunflower seeds that have been spit out at our new building cannot even be calculated!!
-these are things that are minds can not grasp and when we try to make them make sense with our limited abilities, we actually get farther from reality not closer.
-I think that this is the case with our suffering and our trials. We may never understand them in our lifetime. It might be generations until they make sense. All we can do is trust and know that “he works for the good of those that love him, for those called unto his purpose.
PRAY
-Please open up your bibles to 2 Cor 11:22
-I titled today’s message: Paul’s pain: purpose in persecution
-We all know of Paul. We see him first in the book of Acts holding the coats of the people who stoned Stephen. Soon he goes from spectator to participant and becomes a Christian killer of his own. He was a feared and menacing enemy of the cross. And then, God changes him in a blink of an eye by knocking him off of his horse in Damascus. Paul goes from enemy to ally.
-Then God says a curious thing “I will show him how much he must suffer for my names sake”
-We catch up with Paul in 2 Cor 11:22, where Paul is confronting a growing opposition to his teaching within the church. False teachers are leading his young church astray.
READ verse 11:22-33
-These false prophets were stealing God’s people, Paul the fiery apostle, gives his resume for Christ.
-He does not speak about the revelations, about what happened in Damascus, about all of the things that he has been told. Instead, he tells them how much he was persecuted.
-He says “I have been beat up, I have been whipped, shipwrecked, stoned and not only that, but watching you turn away is killing me! What have these other “apostles” gone through?”
-Maybe what Paul is saying is that the path is not supposed to be easy. Like a church building project like ours that keeps getting harder and harder. My bible says “wide is the road that leads to destruction” so that must mean that road is easy and we are not on that road.
-Paul says that his suffering qualifies him in ministry.
-I conducted an interview for a manual labor job. My decision was made as soon as I shook the applicant’s hands. The first person had very soft hands, but the second guy had very rough, big hands. The second guy’s calloused hands qualified him for the work we had in mind.
-Paul says, look what I have been through and tell me who you believe.
-Pascal a French philosopher said it like this, “I prefer to believe those who got their throats cut for what they wrote.”
-Paul and his great suffering would convince every generation of Christians that he was telling the truth. If this was not true, why keep getting beat up?
-One other thing that pain taught him. The other side of his persecution is that it taught him to encourage those that are persecuted.
Persecution was Paul’s trademark. He was kind of an expert. So he could say to a young timothy, “keep running, keep fighting” because had to do the same under tremendous trials.
-In fact, Paul was the one who said, “be all things to all people” and his trials were what brought him to all people, royalty, chained next to crooks and peasants, Jews gentiles. His message was the loudest reached farthest and most diverse out of any of the apostles.
Read 2 Cor 12:1-7
Paul speaks of a man who was up in paradise and we know that he is actually speaking of himself, but he says instead “someone I know”. Of this person I will boast, not myself.
-You know, Paul has a lot of things that he could boast about. It was Paul’s pen that God’s message was spread. He wrote the lion’s share of the new testament.
-But, God had a way of bringing Paul down to earth and part of it was persecution.
-In the book of Acts (chapter 14) we see Paul and Barnabbas worshipped as God’s in Lystra after God healed a cripple through them. They could barely contain the mob from worshipping them. And then, just a verse later it says that the Jews persuaded the multitude and they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city!!
-What a crazy turn of events! God had a way of bringing the great apostle down to earth and to remind him who was in charge.
-But, how ridiculous we must look when we are proud. Have you ever seen a small dog trying to act tough? It looks ridiculous doesn’t it? We must look even more ridiculous to God.
-God wants us to be humble. In fact, the meaning of the word humus, root word for humble means clay in Greek. Being humble means that we are able to be molded and shaped.
-One time I was really sick and I knew that I couldn’t take care of myself. I called my parents and had them pick me up to take care of me. I could have been proud, but I was humble enough to admit that I needed their help.
-God will do the same with us. Sometimes he makes us weak to help us lean on him.
Read 2 Cor 12:7-9
Paul pleaded with God for him to remove the thorn and I think it is interesting that he does not mention what the thorn was.
-Paul gladly endured all of his persecution, but the thorn was too much for him. What could it have been that drove the apostle to his knees in prayer for God to remove?
-I think that it is blank so that we can fill in the blanks with our own thorn. What troubles us today?
-I think of Paul pleading with God to remove this thorn and I think surely God will remove it. After all this is Paul. This is the apostle. Surely God will hear him.
-Jesus says, “sorry, but my grace is sufficient”.
-C.S. Lewis story: He was asked what the most unique thing about Christianity was. He responded, “That’s easy, it is grace.”
-Of course it is grace. His grace is without precedent, there is nothing close that could compare
-Grace. Paul knew well what God’s grace could do. It completely transformed his life.
-There is temple in Ephesus, or at least, used to be a temple that was one time one of the seven wonders of the world. If you look at it today, you would see a pile of rocks, some rubble, complete ruins. But, another person will look at it and see a beautiful temple, an amazing glorious building.
I think that God see’s us the same way. Not as what we are, but as we should be. Maybe you walked into this place feeling like your life is sitting in a pile of rubble. God not only sees you as a beautiful temple, but he restores you to that temple.
-Jesus says to you today, “My grace is sufficient my power is made perfect in your weakness.” Maybe he has placed you in a place and persecuted you so that his grace can be seen in your life.
-Rich Mullins sings a song called “Hard to Get”
“I’m reeling from these voices that keep ringing in my ear,
All these words of shame and doubt, blame and regret,
And I can’t see where you’re leading me
Unless you’ve led me here
To where I am lost enough to let myself be led.”
Can anyone admit today that they are just lost enough to let his grace lead you.
If you are his grace is sufficient.
Read 2 Cor 12:10
Finally, Paul ends with a statement that sums the crux of everything, ”When I am weak, He is strong”
-There is a song that you all have heard by Carrie Underwood called “Jesus take the wheel”. Sometimes it is only when we are at our weakest point that we finally let go of the wheel and give it to Jesus.
-When we are without hope and we are completely weak, that is when He is at his strongest.
-Example: Wedding story
-I was a groomsmen at a wedding once. It was a formal wedding, the place was packed and everyone was looking there finest. The wedding coordinator put a piece of tape on the floor for me to stand and said, “this is your spot, do not move”. The wedding was going beautifully until something awful happened. Out of the corner of my eye I watched in horror as a bridesmaid lost her balance and fell onto the ground. A gasp was heard in the audience like air being let out of a raft in the middle of the ocean. Nobody knew what to do, she laid there so pitifully weeping at her own embarrassment. I was the closest to her, but all I could do is look at her and then my piece of tape and then at her again. I remembered the words that the wedding coordinator said to me “this is your spot, do not move”. She didn’t give me instructions on what to do if anybody did a face plant on the stage.
Then, I saw something that I will never forget for the rest of my life. I saw her father. . . He was running down the aisle. He did not have a piece of tape to stand on, what he had was a hurting daughter with a world of idiots standing around her. He had to get to her out of there. He ran up the steps and scooped his weeping little girl off of the floor as if she weighed nothing at all. And, in an instant, they were gone.
This made me think about what Paul said, “when I am weak, He is strong”. A young girl whose life seemingly fell apart. Could there be a greater horror for a teenager? She was weak, but her father was strong. He removed her from the situation because she was not strong enough to do so.
-When I am weak, He is strong. I know that my father’s strength is greatest when I am at my weakest.
(Worship Team come forward)
-Are any of us weak today? I am.
-Our struggles today our like a tightly sealed jar. We can work at it until red in the face. God hovers above us and says “I can open up that. My grace is sufficient for you.”
-Will you let Him today? Will admit that you are weak and he is strong.
