INTRO.- Job 14:1 "Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble."
Eccl. 2:22-23 "What does a man get for all the toil and anxious striving with which he labors under the sun? All his days his work is pain and grief; even at night his mind does not rest. This too is meaningless."
WHAT JUST A MINUTE! Life doesn’t sound so good according to these verses of scripture!
The truth is that life IS full of trouble and difficulty! As some have said, "If it isn’t one thing, it’s something else." It seems almost every day we’re hit with some new problem or difficulty.
ILL. - Mark Twain said, "December is the toughest month of the year. Others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, October, August, and February." EVERY MONTH IS TOUGH OR CAN BE!
ILL.- I heard about a little boy sitting on his front steps with his face cradled in his hands, looking so very sad. His dad came home just then and asked him what was wrong. The little boy looked up and said, "Well, just between us, Dad, I’m having trouble getting along with your wife, too!"
ILL.- Jimmy Carter once said, "I have often wanted to drown my troubles, but I can’t get my wife to go swimming.”
ILL.- Summer vacation was over and Little Johnny returned back to school. Only two days later his teacher phoned his mother to tell her that he was misbehaving.
"Wait a minute," she said. "I had Johnny with me for three months and I never called you once when he misbehaved!"
ILL.- A man in a hurry taking his eight-year-old son to school made a turn at a red light where it was prohibited. "Uh-oh, I think I just made an illegal turn!" the man said. "It’s okay, Dad," the boy said, "The police car right behind us did the same thing."
Sometimes it’s trouble at home or school and sometimes it’s trouble at work or perhaps anywhere out in the world.
ILL.- A friend asked Prime Minister Lloyd George during WWI, "How do you manage to keep yourself together with all this work and worry?" George replied, "Oh, with me a change of trouble is as good as a vacation." That’s a good way to look at it.
Some people seem to have so many troubles that anything different is a welcome change.
ILL.- Someone said, “Troubles are like babies - they only grow by nursing.”
Sometimes we make our troubles worse by nursing them, that is, by dwelling on them all the time. Some people can’t leave their troubles alone. It’s like picking at a sore on your arm, which only makes it worse.
ILL.- A nurse in one of the great London hospitals complained to Bishop Taylor Smith that she had been rudely treated by some of the patients.
“Thank God for that!” he said.
“What do you mean?” asked the astonished nurse.
“Why,” said the Bishop, “if you are carrying a vessel and somebody knocks up against you, you can only spill out of the vessel what is inside. And when people misjudge and persecute us, we can only spill what is inside.”
If people give us trouble in this life it may be for this very reason; because we have something special on the inside! If you have the Lord living within you some people will give you trouble in this life, because at the same time the evil one is at work in others! AND WE SHOULD NOT BE SURPRISED!
ILL.- A 73-year-old woman in Lutterworth, England was fined for driving south on a north-bound lane of a highway. She remarked to the officer: “I thought something was wrong. The traffic seemed to be coming the wrong way.”
In life, the traffic sometimes seems to be coming the wrong way. In other words, at us!
PROP.- Paul got into trouble by preaching the truth of the gospel of Christ. Preaching the truth seems to always cause trouble because some people don’t want to listen to it or believe it. Paul experienced two difficulties in this text.
1- The difficulty of being misunderstood
2- The difficulty of being hassled
I. THE DIFFICULTY OF BEING MISUNDERSTOOD
17When we arrived at Jerusalem, the brothers received us warmly. 18The next day Paul and the rest of us went to see James, and all the elders were present. 19Paul greeted them and reported in detail what God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry. 20When they heard this, they praised God. Then they said to Paul: "You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law. 21They have been informed that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to turn away from Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or live according to our customs. 22What shall we do?
Paul first reported to those elders about his ministry to the Gentiles and they rejoiced and praised God for this. Thousands of Jews also became believers but many certainly didn’t understand the message of grace and freedom from the law.
When you’ve been living one way for a very long time and then make a switch, it’s hard to give up old habits. It may even be hard to understand why you should. So they may well have misunderstood Paul’s ministry and/or message.
I think there are some churches today that have misunderstood the message of the gospel and the Bible as well. Some still cling to the O.T. law as if they thought that would save them. And yet, the N.T. scripture declares that it’s not the law that saves us, it’s Jesus. It’s faith in Jesus as the Savior.
Many people have the idea that if they do good, they will be saved. It’s that calculator type salvation. Good versus bad.
Gal. 3:23-25 "Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law."
ILL.- Someone said, "The law is the light that reveals how dirty the room is, not the broom that sweeps it clean."
ILL.- Someone described the law in this way. He compared it to a dentist’s little mirror, which he sticks into the patient’s mouth. With the mirror he can detect any cavities. But he doesn’t drill with it or use it to pull teeth. It can show him the decayed area or other abnormality, but it can’t fix the problem.
Our sin solution is not the law, but Christ. He alone can take away our sins and give us the promise of eternal life. And many people seem to misunderstand this simple message of the gospel.
ILL.- When Alan Greenspan was the Federal Reserve Chairman, he said, “I guess I should warn you, if I turn out to be particularly clear, you’ve probably misunderstood what I’ve said."
I think sometimes no matter how clear a person is, they will still be misunderstood.
ILL.- While preaching in a small Iowa town many years ago I announced an upcoming revival that we were going to have. I gave the people all the details about the meeting and then told them about our preacher for the meeting. He was a preacher from the other side of the state. He had originally been a farmer and then became a preacher. I said something about him being just a old good old farm boy and that everyone would enjoy him and his sermons.
Well, that was apparently the wrong thing to say because one lady and her husband waited until nearly everyone left the church that morning and then she left me have it at the door! She was very angry, thinking that I was putting down farmers, and here I lived smack dab in farm country!
It was a complete misunderstanding. I tried as best I could to explain that I meant nothing bad or degrading in what I said.
Col. 4:2-4 "Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should."
Fear of being misunderstood is probably why Paul asked for prayer to proclaim the message of Christ clearly.
It’s almost inevitable that some might respond after hearing a message, "Did I hear you say?" Or "Did I hear you correctly when you said....?" Or "Could you explain something to me?"
No matter how noble you are or whatever it is you are doing, some people will misunderstand you in life. SO WHAT SHOULD YOU DO? Make yourself clear as possible when called upon to explain yourself or your actions. Otherwise, let people figure out things for themselves. I Cor. 14:38 KJV "But if any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant." Or we could say, "if anyone misunderstands, let them be that way."
II. THE DIFFICULTY OF BEING HASSLED
27When the seven days were nearly over, some Jews from the province of Asia saw Paul at the temple. They stirred up the whole crowd and seized him, 28shouting, "Men of Israel, help us! This is the man who teaches all men everywhere against our people and our law and this place. And besides, he has brought Greeks into the temple area and defiled this holy place." 29(They had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian in the city with Paul and assumed that Paul had brought him into the temple area.) 30The whole city was aroused, and the people came running from all directions. Seizing Paul, they dragged him from the temple, and immediately the gates were shut. 31While they were trying to kill him, news reached the commander of the Roman troops that the whole city of Jerusalem was in an uproar. 32He at once took some officers and soldiers and ran down to the crowd. When the rioters saw the commander and his soldiers, they stopped beating Paul.
Talk about being hassled. That was Paul.
Only it was much more than just being hassled about the message he preached. HE WAS BEATEN AND PERSECUTED FOR HIS MESSAGE.
ILL.- The mother of four young boys often had difficulty curbing their energy, especially in church. But when her minister preached on "turning the other cheek," the boys gave him their undivided attention. “No matter what others do to us,” he said, “we should never try to ‘get even.’”
That afternoon the youngest boy came into the house crying. Between sobs he said he’d kicked one of his brothers, who then kicked him in return. "I’m sorry you’re hurt," his mother said. "But you shouldn’t go around kicking people."
Still choking back tears, he replied, "But the preacher said he isn’t supposed to kick me back."
THERE WILL BE TIMES IN LIFE WHEN YOU WILL GET KICKED BY SOMEONE! And if you follow Jesus very closely and try to live a faithful Christian life someone will hassle you!
ILL.- July 14, 2006. HONOLULU - Junior Stowers raised his hands and exclaimed, "Thank you, Jesus!" in court last when he was acquitted by a jury. But his joy was short-lived when Circuit Judge Patrick Border held him in contempt of court for the "outburst" and threw him in jail.
His attorney said, "I don’t think there’s anything about saying ’Thank you, Jesus’ that raises to the level of contemptuous behavior in this case. Stowers is a devoutly religious man active in his church who spontaneously expressed his thanks to the higher power in which he believed.”
Brothers and sisters, you would think that here in America you could praise the Lord anywhere, but apparently, not so. But so what?! We must realize that we are living in a hostile world that is basically opposed to the message of Jesus!
How do you handle being hassled by someone? Someone offered this advice. "Remember, when someone annoys you, it takes 42 muscles in your face to frown, but it only takes four muscles to extend your arm and smack the guy in the head."
That might solve some problems but not all of them. It could only make more problems for you.
I Pet. 4:12-16 “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any other kind of criminal, or even as a meddler. However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name.”
CONCLUSION-------------------
ILL.- A young man was trying to establish himself as a peach grower. He had worked hard and invested his all in a peach orchard which blossomed wonderfully—then came a frost. He did not go to church the next Sunday, or the next, or the next. His minister went to see him to find the reason. The young fellow exclaimed: “I’m not coming any more. Do you think I can worship a God who cares for me so little that He will let a frost kill all my peaches?”
The old minister looked at him a few moments in silence, then said kindly: “God loves you better than He does your peaches. He knows that while peaches do better without frosts, it is impossible to grow the best men without frosts. His object is to grow men, not peaches.”
James 1:2-4 "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."
