Opening and Introduction
In our text today, Paul has a summary of one of his travels, and how it affected him. There was a time when things were so bad, that he lost all hope, and despaired of life itself. Despair is one of those words we don’t use every day. We talk about feeling down, sad, or even depressed. Despair is a whole different level.
Tonight, we’re going to look at despair and how it may be problem for us, or for those that are around us. We all experience problems in life that can bring us down. Some of those problems might bring us into a really dark place. How do we work through those difficult times?
Tonight, we’re going to look at the Apostle Paul’s experience that caused him to despair.
We’ll also look at how we might fall into our own pit of darkness.
Finally, we’ll examine a few ways that can get us away from despair, and restore our hope in God, and life itself.
Paul’s difficulties in Asia
In our text today, Paul talks about troubles in Asia. He doesn’t add many details in our text today, but he does in the book of Acts chapter 19. It’s there that we hear about how his journey to Asia went. (Acts 19:23-41)
Paul’s travels brought him through the town of Ephesus, located in modern-day Turkey. In that town, as with so many others, Paul preached the Gospel to the Gentiles.
Ephesus had a patron deity, the Greek goddess of the moon, Artemis, and a thriving trade building idols and shrines to that goddess. Paul’s missionary work must have had some impact because a local silversmith named Demetrius was threatened that his livelihood might go away if less people worshiped their goddess.
He gathered a bunch of craftsmen skilled in making the idols, and got them worked up, and built anger among the crowd. Soon, the whole city was in an uproar and a riot formed. The people seized two of Paul’s companions, and brought them to the city’s amphitheater.
Paul tried, but couldn’t get in. The town clerk was finally able to regain control, and the crowd disbursed. But, the threat on Paul and his followers was real. They had a reason to be concerned about their lives.
But there was more to Paul’s list of problems. In 2nd Corinthians, Paul lists the problems he’s faced:
“Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure.And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.” (2 Corinthians 11:24-28, ESV)
This is an awfully long list of trials. Being caught up in so many disasters. People out to hurt him. Nature seems against Him too. Not able to provide for himself all the time… and worrying about his job, which was the church.
Paul faced resistance from a world that didn’t want to hear about Christ, and wanted to stay with their sinful lives. Many times, Satan looks for ways to slow down the faithful, and limit the message of God. Sometimes, we feel the impact on our lives. The impact of failure, of sickness, and of loss.
Along the lines of all this loss, our text today says that there was a time that Paul was anxious, and fearful. Paul wrote, “We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself.” (2 Corinthians 1:8, NIV 2011)
Losing Hope
If the Apostle Paul, who lived and breathed God’s word, who was called directly by Christ… if even he can fall into despair, any one of us could find ourselves losing hope at some point.
That’s what despair is. It’s the complete loss of hope. It’s being filled with only negative thoughts, and feeling like nothing good, and only bad things will happen, and there’s nothing that can be done to make a really bad situation better.
There’s going to be a time in our life when we’re going to face problems. Paul faced a whole list of bad situations. We’re going to face something too. When we do, we’re going to deal with those problems in different ways.
Some of those problems, we’ll bounce right back and they won’t impact our life too much. Others, may live in the back of our brain, and cause us to fall into a pit of depression. If things get really bad, we might find ourselves slipping into despair, and feeling the emotional pain of total loss of everything good in our lives.
Pain like that, can make it really difficult to work through any situation. It might make us blind to simple solutions and keep us from seeing clear choices that are in front of us. Our emotional state greatly affects our mental abilities and how we work through problems. If we can’t see a positive future, what does that leave?
Sometimes we lose things that cause deep seated pain, and cause us to lose hope too. A job we depend on, the loss of good health… the loss of trust in someone or something… the loss of a close relationship… these can be times that really test our faith.
Sometimes we gain things that we don’t want, that might remain with us, and we just want them to go away. An illness that will impact our life or cut it short… the guilt of something that we don’t think we can ever get forgiven for… the pain of the unending questions of why me, why now… that haunt us, and never seem to let us go.
Often, when one problem happens, more follow. When we’re disappointed time and time again, we might get the feeling that there’s no hope. I prayed, but God didn’t bless me. I came to worship, but I still feel so empty. I see all these bad people around me living wonderful, but ungodly lives, and I’m tying to be faithful, and I feel like the world’s crashing down around me.
The pain of losing something valuable, and gaining something that is unavoidable, the emotional burden that we think God isn’t paying attention to us… any of these can lead to us to a place where our hope is in jeopardy.
Digging out of the pit of despair
Moving from hopelessness and despair to something less destructive is a matter of how we focus on our problems, and how we view God being part of our solutions.
Our spiritual health has a great deal of influence on our mental health, our physical health, and the attitude that determines how we’ll tackle our problems. Our faith directly relates to the hope that we experience.
Hope is being able to see the light at the end of the tunnel and knowing it’s not a train. It’s understanding that there may be dark days, but that there still will be a dawn too.
In the time that we have remaining, I’d like to look at three ways that we can restore our hope, and avoid, or even remove, the despair in our lives.
First, God knows our problems and knows exactly what we’re going through.
God knows everything that’s going on in our life. Psalm 139 captures this really well it reads,
“LORD, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I stand up; you understand my thoughts from far away. You observe my travels and my rest; you are aware of all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue, you know all about it, LORD.” (Psalm 139:1-4, CSB)
He knows everything that happens in and around our life. Sometimes He allows things to happen, to bring us closer to Him, bring us to our knees.
(Possible story of 911 bringing people to prayer)
- Almost 20 years ago, a terrible disaster occurred that we often call 911. Three planes crashed. Two into the twin towers, one into the Pentagon and a fourth in Pennsylvania. Over 3,000 people were killed that day.
- But God used even an evil event like this. Shortly after that even, people were hurting. They were searching for answers. Across the country, prayer vigils sprung up everywhere. People were brought to their knees, and brought closer to God in the process.
Other times, He may allow challenges so that those around us may be blessed.
There’s a purpose for everything, even if we don’t see what it is. God knows what’s going on, and He has a plan for all of us.
Second, God wants us to surrender our problems to Him. He wants us to turn over all of our cares, concerns, and our worries over to him.
Our worries, that’s a really hard one to turn over. A lot of us tend to worry more than we should. We dwell on our problems, and think about a really bad future that might not happen. Worries focus us to think about a negative outcome, without thinking about who’s in control.
If it’s up to us to control, we should just change the situation and move on. If we can influence how things are going to turn out, then we should move the problem in the direction we want it to go. If we can’t do either, we should leave it to God, and let Him handle it for us. The Apostle Peter wrote:
“Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.” (1 Peter 5:6-7, ESV)
God really does love everyone of us. He showed us how much He loves us when He sent his Son into the world just to save us from our sins. Reliance upon God instead of our abilities doesn’t come naturally. Sometimes we might forget that God has been in control from the very beginning. He created the universe, and everything around us. He has the power to take care of any problems we throw His way.
Third, and this one’s tough, sometimes God wants us to wait. When we’re hurting and just want the hurt to go away, that’s not exactly the message we want to hear. We want our problems removed now! Not later!
We’re not the only ones who don’t like to be patient. In the Old Testament, we read about how the temple was destroyed and for 70 years wasn’t rebuilt. In the book of Zechariah, a vision came to the prophet and an angel asked God:
“O LORD of hosts, how long will you have no mercy on Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, against which you have been angry these seventy years?” (Zechariah 1:13, ESV)
God answered,
“I have returned to Jerusalem with mercy; my house shall be built in it.” “My cities shall again overflow with prosperity, and the LORD will again comfort Zion and again choose Jerusalem.” (Zechariah 1:16, 17, ESV)
The temple was destroyed, and took 70 years before it was rebuilt. We might have to wait too.
God’s timeline isn’t the same as ours. He often uses circumstances to shape our life, and sometimes that takes time. We don’t learn to walk in a single day. Sometimes other lessons take even longer. God may use time to build our trust in Him.
Sometimes God uses time to wean us off of our idols. There are a lot of things that we put between us and God. That’s not how He wants it. God wants nothing separating us from Him. But it may take time for us to learn how to toss the idols.
There are many reasons for God to ask us to wait. Many that we won’t understand until that waiting period is over.
No matter how long it takes, God loves each and every one of us, every step of the way.
Conclusion
What can we learn from Paul who lost hope?
All of us are going to face problems from time to time. Some of those problems may be really difficult things to deal with. No matter what size our problems are, whether they’re big or small, God is watching us through all the trials and temptations of life. He understands what we’re going through.
When we do have those problems, put our worries aside, turn everything over to God, and let Him handle it for a while. We can’t control everything, but God can. He can handle your problems too.
But it may take time. He’s going to take care of us, but on His time, not ours.
