1. Because it hurts so much and is so tough, there is the thought throughout the church today that:
• ‘WE SHOULDN’T HAVE TO SUFFER’.
• We’re Christians. We live in the United States.
• We’re should be immune to suffering. We’re blessed!
IT’S TRUE: we do live in an incredible time in history.
• We live a tremendous country with great freedoms & prosperity.
• We are seeing the gospel go forth with power & effectiveness.
• BUT… understand, everyone, everywhere suffers!
• Believer and unbeliever alike.
• Even, no especially, those who have placed their faith in Jesus.
2 Timothy 3:12 (NKJV) Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.
John 16:33 (NKJV) These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”
YOU AND I… we’re going to suffer in this world.
• Sometimes it will be because of our own faults & failures.
• Other times it will be because of others sins against us.
• But the root of all suffering is sin & its effects on the world.
YET, Paul reminds us in v18 that sufferings are ONLY TEMPORARY.
• They don’t follow us into eternity.
• He says FOR I CONSIDER… mark that word. CONSIDER
• It means to ‘calculate, to reason, to account.’
• Paul’s used this word 15 times already up to Romans 8
• He’s saying, “I understand the value of sufferings in this present time and they don’t compare to what’s up ahead!”
• Any suffering for Christ’s sake is a small price to pay for the gracious benefits received because of that suffering.
TURN OVER TO 2 Corinthians 11:22ff.
• Notice a few things our brother Paul lived through.
• The church in Corinth was listening to false teachers, both to their false doctrines and false accusations against Paul.
BY WAY… when accusations come against pastors, teachers, spiritual leaders, did you know that you’re not to receive them?
1 Timothy 5:19 (NKJV) Do not receive an accusation against an elder except from two or three witnesses.
• You see Satan is the accuser of the brethren, wanting to plant seeds of doubt, and poison spiritual minds.
Revelation 12:10 (NKJV) 10 Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, “Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down.
• If someone has something, take them with you to the person and straighten out. But be careful not to entertain accusations.
SO… Paul, in response to His love for Jesus & the church, he begins to share the true credentials of a Christian!
• Read through 2 Corinthians 11.22ff…
• I’m humbled when I consider the price that our brother Paul paid to be a minister of the gospel!
• And you know, that story is repeated over & over, even today.
THE STORY IS TOLD of Pastor Florescu. (p268-269)
The communist torturers came towards Pastor Florescu again, this time with red-hot iron pokers. “Who else believes as you do? Give us their names.” Florescu would not speak. They had already cut him again and again with knives and beaten him very badly. When he refused to cooperate, he was returned to his cell.
Starving rats were then driven into his cell through a large pipe. He could not sleep having to defend himself at all times. If he rested for a moment, the rats would attack him. Still he remained silent.
In the end they brought his 14-year old son and began to whip the boy in front of his father saying they would beat him until the pastor told them what they wanted to know. The poor man was half crazy. He bore it as long as he could. But when he
could stand it no more, he cried out to his son, “Alexander, I must say what they want! I can’t bear your beatings anymore!”
His son answered, “Father, don’t do me the injustice of having a traitor as a parent. WITHSTAND! If they kill me, I will die with the words, “Jesus and my fatherland’”
The Communists became enraged and killed the young man for his unswerving faith in Jesus Christ! -- TAKEN FROM JESUS FREAKS… - PICK UP A COPY!
And so we read in the lives of the early church…
Acts 14:21-22 (NKJV) And when they had preached the gospel to that city and made many disciples, they returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch, 22 strengthening the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith, and saying, “We must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.”
Revelation 12:11 (NKJV) 11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death.
Again back in v18, sufferings!
• The word ‘pathema’ speaks of both Jesus’ sufferings and the sufferings that we face as Christians.
1 Peter 5:9 (NKJV) 9 Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world.
• Paul would encourage the Corinthian believers.
2 Corinthians 1:6-7 (NKJV) 6 Now if we are afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effective for enduring the same sufferings which we also suffer. Or if we are comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation. 7 And our hope for you is steadfast, because we know that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so also you will partake of the consolation.
TURN OVER TO 1 Peter 4:12-13
1 Peter 4:12-13 (NLT) Dear friends, don’t be surprised at the fiery trials you are going through, as if something strange were happening to you. 13 Instead, be very glad—because these trials will make you partners with Christ in his suffering, and afterward you will have the wonderful joy of sharing his glory when it is displayed to all the world.
1 Peter 4:12-13 (MSG) Friends, when life gets really difficult, don’t jump to the conclusion that God isn’t on the job. 13 Instead, be glad that you are in the very thick of what Christ experienced. This is a spiritual refining process, with glory just around the corner.
OH HOW STRANGE WE THINK IT IS WHEN TOUGH TIMES HIT!
• We DO THINK it’s strange that WE would go through it.
• It seems strange to us that the righteous suffer while the ungodly seem to have it all.
• It seems strange to us that of all that we’ve done, our time would be rewarded with pain.
• It seems strange to us that here we are living for God while others hate God seem to prosper.
• The Psalmist really wrestled with this too…
Psalm 73.12-14 (NLT) Look at these arrogant people-- enjoying a life of ease while their riches multiply. 13 Was it for nothing that I kept my heart pure and kept myself from doing wrong? 14 All I get is trouble all day long; every morning brings me pain.
That’s the real world guys… good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people.
NOTE: As a pastor, what I see on TV makes me just sick.
• This constant offering of false claims that if you just give to their cause, if you just support their ministry…
• You will have SPECIAL FAVOR with God and sickness won’t touch you and 10-fold blessings will follow you.
• If you give, and give right now!
• I’m sick of it because we live in the real world, not TV LAND.
NOTE: I have in my hand a paper replica of a cloth. (READ SOME)
NOTE: We minister to real needs, real suffering, real sorrows…
• Real people suffering with real things and have a genuine, growing faith in Jesus Christ!
• I see things almost every day, difficult things. The kind of things that can cause you to be discouraged in your Christian life
• AND even begin to wonder what’s wrong with me?!
• OR What’s wrong with God? Why has He abandoned me?
• Peter says: It’s NOT STRANGE that you’re suffering Christian.
Paul says… what you’re going through now. What I’m facing today isn’t WORTHY TO BE COMPARED with the glory up ahead.
I’m sure if you ask some of the heroes of the faith, if we asked ALL of the heroes of the faith… they would agree!
JOSEPH… spent 13 years in prison, falsely accused. That was after being thrown into the pit by his own brothers…
• From the PIT, to PRISON, to the PALACE – God was at work!
MOSES… spent 40 years in the backside of the desert, alone, isolated, and nowhere near where He believed God would have him.
• God was going to undo all that the world had taught him.
• But when it was time, He rose up to deliver the people of God.
• YET where did he spend the last 40 years? In the desert!
• YES… God was working!
SHADRACH, MESACH, & ABEDNEGO… young, thriving, wonderful men of God, thrown into a fiery furnace bound & tied up.
• But they came out of the fire free.
• YES… God was working.
And those brothers are NOW in glory… rejoicing in the presence of their Savior, Jesus Christ!
THOSE WHO DO NOT KNOW Christ have no hope when they suffer.
• Whatever the reason might be, their sufferings don’t come upon them for Christ sake, or righteousness sake…
• SO their sufferings don’t produce any spiritual blessing or glory.
• Those that live only for this life cannot look forward to any wrongs being made right. There is no comfort up ahead.
• Their pain, their loneliness, their afflictions serve no eternal purpose and bring no divine reward.
CHRISTIAN… you have great hope…
• Hope that soon your afflictions will end!
• Hope that God is working in you to bring about great changes.
• Hope that your suffering will add to your eternal glory!
Hebrews 6:17-19 (NKJV) 17 Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath, 18 that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us. 19 This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil,
Suffering… all of us would like to avoid it, but we can’t.
• Until we are delivered from this body of death, suffering will be a part of our lives.
• Yet, the present sufferings ARE NOT WORTHY to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
Let’s close with Matthew 25:14-30
• Guys… let’s be faithful, looking forward to that time when we hear from Jesus, “Well done good and faithful servant…”
• It WILL BE GLORIOUS!
