INTRODUCTION

The early church father John Chrysostom once said that the apostle Paul went through a “blizzard of troubles.” This passage, this text, is one of the places where we learn something of them. But, if truth be told, we are probably just learning a fraction of them.

Paul’s adversaries at Corinth were apparently arguing that Paul could not be from God—look at how much trouble he was in, all the time. The man was a controversy magnet, and this was upsetting to that breed of Christian that wants to stay well away from all controversy magnets. But Paul’s reply that the troubles did not negate his ministry. Rather, his long endurance through those troubles confirmed his ministry.

THE TEXT

“Giving no offence in any thing, that the ministry be not blamed: But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, In stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings; By pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, By the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, By honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report: as deceivers, and yet true; As unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; As sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things. O ye Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you, our heart is enlarged. Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own bowels. Now for a recompence in the same, (I speak as unto my children,) be ye also enlarged” (2 Cor. 6:3–18).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Paul here works through a litany of his troubles. He is careful not to give offense in anything (v. 3). He is of course talking about unnecessary offense. In the original, there are 28 descriptive comments. As Kent Hughes points out in his commentary, the first 18 are prefaced with the word in, the following 3 by the word through, and the last 7 by the word as. Not only so, the first round tends to come in triplets. First we see general troubles—afflictions, necessities, and distresses (v. 4). The second triplet was made up of troubles from others—stripes, imprisonments, and riots (v. 5). Remember that Paul went through riotous tumults in Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, Philippi, Thessalonica, Corinth, Ephesus, and Jerusalem (Acts 13:50; 14:5,19; 16:22; 18:12; 19:23; 21:27). That man knew his riots. Then there was the triplet of troubles he went through that might be called self-sacrificial—labors, watching, and fasting (v. 5).

How could he endure all this? Paul then gives us a list of the inner graces that made it possible for him to maintain his steady equilibrium, despite all the commotion around him. In the middle of this list he mentions the Holy Spirit Himself by name. So Paul does what he does BY pureness, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, and by genuine love (v. 6). He does it BY the word of truth, the power of God, and the armor of righteousness on the right and on the left (v. 7). The word armor here would be better rendered as weapons—for the right hand and left. He does what he does BY honor and dishonor, BY evil report and good (v. 8a).

For the last seven, Paul gives us a series of paradoxes, all of them ending on an upward note of triumph. AS deceivers, but actually true (v. 8). As unknown, but actually well known. AS dying, and yet look at us live. AS punished, but actually not killed (v. 9). AS sorrowful, but always rejoicing, and AS poor, while actually enriching many others, and AS possessing nothing while at the same time owning everything (v. 10).

Paul then speaks straight to the Corinthians—our mouth is open, and our heart is enlarged (v. 11). They were not restricted in Paul and company, but rather were constricted in their own attitudes (v. 12). The kink in the hose was in them, not in Paul. Paul pleads with them as with his own children—be enlarged in heart, just as Paul is (v. 13). This is something we can imitate the apostle in.

THE GRACE OF CONTROVERSY

There are those who believe the ministry to be an indoor job with no heavy lifting. There was an old Southern joke that said that a hot sun and a slow mule had been responsible for many a call to the ministry. This has always been a lure. There were men in the first century who confounded gain with godliness (1 Tim. 6:5). And remember what Paul warned against just a few chapters before—“For we are not, as so many, peddling the word of God; but as of sincerity, but as from God, we speak in the sight of God in Christ.” (2 Cor. 2:17, NKJV). And when there is constant trouble, it disrupts marketing. It discourages sales. It makes it hard to be friends with the world, and to monetize that friendship. That’s why Demas had to leave Paul’s company to take a new position (2 Tim. 4:10).

BEDROCK JOY

Notice that biblical joy is not a frothy bubble gum kind of joy. It is not happy happy joy joy. It is not superficial sentiment. Paul says “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” (v. 10). This shows us that when Paul tells us elsewhere that we are to rejoice all the time (Phil. 4:4), he is not urging into a masochistic glee. The soil in your life may grow some plants that have thorns, but down underneath it all must be the bedrock of joy.

LARGENESS OF HEART

Paul concludes this section by urging expansiveness of heart upon the Corinthians. He tells them that it was because of his largeness of heart that made tell them about all the troubles he had gone through. His mouth was open because his heart was enormous. He spoke because he loved. “I will run the way of thy commandments, when thou shalt enlarge my heart.” (Psalm 119:32).

When King Solomon pleased the Lord by asking for wisdom instead of other things, what did God do for him? “And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore” (1 Kings 4:29).

Fussers don’t have this largeness of heart. They fuss right and they fuss left. They fuss about their meals, they fuss about the traffic, they fuss about the sermons, they fuss about the lack of things to grumble about. Because this had happened at Corinth, the saints there had fallen prey to certain agitators who wanted to circulate complaints. So Paul opened his heart wide, and poured everything out. And it was at that moment that he told them the problem was in their own twisted, constricted hearts. Open up, Paul says. Imitate him as he imitates Christ. Join him and his company of great hearts. It sounds inspiring, but what is the cost? It means going and walking with Paul as he works through his blizzard of troubles.

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INTRODUCTION

When the gospel is stated in its bare outlines, it is the kind of thing that takes the breath away. It leaves us stupefied. If we hear the preacher declaring the unvarnished truth, we look heavenward in amazement. You can’t be serious. But in the cross, that moment of glorious exchange, an exchange of sin and righteousness, we see that wisdom of God is terrifying in its mere goodness.

THE TEXT

“For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: And that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again . . .” (2 Corinthians 5:14–6:2).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

We are bound by the love of Christ because of a determination we have made—which is that if one died for all, then all have died (v. 14). And the reason He died for all was so that they could stop living toward themselves, but rather toward the one who died for them and rose again (v. 15). This is why we don’t look at anyone on an earthly level alone anymore—we used to know Christ on that level, but not anymore (v. 16). If someone is in Christ, absolutely everything is transformed, new for old (v. 17) This is all from God, who reconciled us in Christ, and gave us the ministry of reconciliation (v. 18). That is, God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, refusing to impute their trespasses to them, and giving us the charge to tell them that this is now the case (v. 19). So we are ambassadors, as though God Himself were speaking through us—be reconciled to God (v. 20). For God made the sinless one to be sin for us, so that He could make us, the sinful ones, to be the righteousness of God in Him (v. 21). So then, this is the basis of the gospel appeal. As co-workers of God, we plead with sinners not to receive the grace of God in vain (6:1). Paul then states the invitation, using the words of the LXX, quoting Is. 49:9. God says that He has heard us in the time accepted, and has comforted us in the day of salvation—and that day of salvation is now (v. 2).

THROUGH NEW EYES

If we know the gospel, then we have to look at the world differently. Paul absolutely refused to look at anyone in the old way anymore, and this was because he could not look at Christ in the old way anymore— now that Christ had risen. C.S. Lewis put his finger on the direct implication of this:

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, help each other to one or other of these destinations” (The Weight of Glory).

When you are dealing with someone who is being tedious, meditate on the glory that is coming for them, and which will swallow them up. And remember, such an exercise is the very best way for you to mortify the ways in which you are being tedious.

THE GROUND OF APPEAL

Note that God objectively reconciled the world to Himself through Christ. The thing is done. We are therefore not pleading with the world to reconcile themselves to God. The plea is that the world has been reconciled, and so therefore be reconciled. To be stiff-necked and rebellious is to be the recipients of grace in vain (6:1). The vanity is on our end, not the Lord’s—His purposes always come to pass. But it is a heartbreak when residents of a saved world insist on their own damnation.

AUDACIOUS IMPUTATION

How does God do this? How is this tremendous thing accomplished. Look first at v. 14. One died for all, and therefore all were dead. To grasp this, we have to comprehend the true nature of Christ’s substitutionary death. There are two kinds of substitution. One you see in a basketball game, where one player goes in for another, and that second player goes to the bench. That is one kind of substitution, and it is not the kind of substitution that Christ provides for us.

The second kind of substitution is covenantal or representative substitution. This happens when we elect a congressman, for example, and he goes to Washington to represent our interests. When he votes, we voted. When he is caught up in scandal, we are humiliated. When he does right, we are gratified.

Christ died for all as the representative head of the new human race. Just as when Adam sinned, we sinned (because Adam was our federal representative), so also when Christ died, we died. When He was buried, we were buried. When He rose, we rose. When He ascended, we ascended. Because of this, all our sins were imputed to Him. Because of this, all His righteousness was imputed to us.

So Christ was never a sinner (1 Pet. 2:22; Heb. 4:15; 7:26; 1 Jn. 3:5; cf. Rom. 5:19; 8:3; John 8:46), but He would knew no sin was made sin (through God’s imputation of our sin to Him). And because of the death that was reckoned there, it became possible for life to reckoned in the other direction (v. 15)—for righteousness to be imputed to us (v. 21).

BUT DO NOT MISS THE INVITATION

So then, when should we act upon this truth? The answer is plain. We should act on it as soon as we hear about it. Look at the calendar. Is it today? Now is the moment. Now is the day of salvation. Look to Christ, and Christ will look toward you.

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INTRODUCTION

The fear of God is not a craven, crawling thing. In this passage, the fear of God is a driving motive force for evangelism, and evangelism is a proclamation of the good news, not the declaration of dreadful news. The fear of God therefore needs to be something that we understand as powerful and attractive.

THE TEXT

“Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; but we are made manifest unto God; and I trust also are made manifest in your consciences. For we commend not ourselves again unto you, but give you occasion to glory on our behalf, that ye may have somewhat to answer them which glory in appearance, and not in heart. For whether we be beside ourselves, it is to God: or whether we be sober, it is for your cause” (2 Cor. 5:11–13).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

In the light of this judgment, in light of the fact that every man will stand before the judgment seat of Christ, we know what it is to fear the Lord. Precisely because we know “the terror” of the Lord, we seek to persuade men (v. 11). Persuade them of what? Persuade them to consider their true condition. A human life without true, complete, utter, and entire accountability has not yet been lived, and never will be. It is madness not to factor this in to how we live our lives. This is something Paul does coram Deo, in the manifest sight of God, and Paul trusts that it is manifest enough to be obvious to the consciences of the Corinthians also. The reason Paul is writing about this here is not to brag to the Corinthians, but rather to give them an opportunity to brag about him. They needed the material so that they could answer the false teachers at Corinth—identified by Paul here as those who glory in appearances, and not in heart (v. 12). Paul acknowledges that some will think he is crazy, while others will call him sober-minded. He divides it up this way. If we are out of our minds, it is for God. If we are calm and judicious, it is for you Corinthians (v. 13).

TESTIMONY AND APPEARANCES

We should begin by acknowledging that there is a sense in which believers ought to care about our testimony and reputation. Elders should have a good reputation with outsiders (1 Tim. 3:7). A good name is greatly to be valued (Prov. 22:1). Because we live lives of integrity, those who slander us should be ashamed of themselves (1 Pet. 2:15).

But at the same time, Jesus tells us that when all men speak well of us, we should consider that as a real danger sign (Luke 6:26). That is how they speak of false teachers, and in our passage, Paul tells us that false teachers cultivate and pursue such appearances (v. 12). This is their currency. They care about appearances, which is not the same as caring about testimony. Caring about testimony is caring about the truth, and caring about appearances is caring about the lie.

So test your hearts in this. Would you rather be truthful and thought a liar, or a liar and thought a truthteller? Would you rather be courageous and thought a coward, or a coward who is thought to be courageous? Would you rather be honest and thought to be dishonest, or dishonest and thought to be honest? The answer will reveal whether you are standing before God or men.

JUBILANT TERROR

Knowing therefore the terror (phobos) of the Lord, we seek to persuade men. I began by saying that the fear of God is not a craven thing. This is not a religion for lickspittles. Although the same word (fear) is used, there is a vast difference between the flinching that wants to avoid a blow and the awe that swallows you up when you consider that the paving stones in God’s palaces contain numberless galaxies. Perfect love casts out the first kind of fear (1 John 4:18), and perfect love ushers in the second kind (Ps. 8). What is man, that you are mindful of him?

This is why Paul can tell the Philippians to work out their salvation with fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12). But working out our salvation includes rejoicing constantly (Phil. 4:4). Rejoice with fear and trembling.

This is what the kings of the earth are commanded to learn. “Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling” (Psalm 2:11).

And when Moses and Aaron were dedicating the tabernacle, the fire of God flared out from the glory of God and consumed the burnt offering.

“And there came a fire out from before the Lord, and consumed upon the altar the burnt offering and the fat: which when all the people saw, they shouted, and fell on their faces” (Lev. 9:24).

But these were not religious feelies. The fire of God devoured Nadab and Abihu in the next verses (Lev. 10:2), and so God instituted a law for priests against drinking on the job (Lev. 10:9). And yet the people fell on their faces, shouting and jubilant in their terror.

JOY UNSPEAKABLE AND FULL OF GLORY

And this is what the Scriptures point us to, constantly. Paul wants us to have the “spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.” He wants us to have the “eyes of our understanding enlightened” so that we might “know what is the hope of our calling,” not to mention the “riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints.” And what else? The “exceeding greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his mighty power” (Eph. 1:17–19).

He also prays that we might be “able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height,” and more than that, to “know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge,” and he wants us to be “filled with the fulness of God.” He wants us to ask and think that, and then to commit it all to the one who can do “exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us” (Eph. 3:18–20). He wants us to grasp the ungraspable, and to know the unknowable, and to be filled with the infinite. And then he wants us to be hungry for more than that.

“Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory:” (1 Peter 1:8).

This is the reality that will make evangelism potent. Knowing what it is to fear the Lord, we seek to persuade men. As we reflect Christ, we point the way to Christ. And as we witness to Him, we pray for the fire to fall.

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INTRODUCTION

As Christians, we must live our lives here in the light of the life to come. Those who live in the ways of YOLO are like pigs under a vast oak tree, looking for acorns. They do not consider what is above them, not at all, they do not care about the source of their blessings, not at all, and they keep their snouts pointing toward the dirt always, hunting for the next acorn. We are summoned to a way of life that is completely and entirely different.

THE TEXT

“For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven: If so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life. Now he that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit. Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord: (For we walk by faith, not by sight:) We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord. Wherefore we labour, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad” (2 Corinthians 5:1–10).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

So we begin with a summary of this passage. Paul starts by comparing our mortal bodies to tabernacles, to be followed by an eternal body in the heavens, fashioned by God Himself (v. 1). Dwelling in tents is a time for groaning, as we look for our permanent heavenly house, which will clothe us (v. 2). If we are clothed in this way, we will not be found naked (v. 3). While we live in these tent bodies, it is a burden, and we groan under it. But we do not groan in the direction of “no body,” but rather in the direction of “ultimate body,” so that our mortal bodies might be swallowed up by life (v. 4). God has fashioned us for this very thing (v. 5), and He has given us the earnest payment of His Spirit (v. 5). This means that the Spirit is dwelling here with us in these tents. This is the ground of our confidence—we know that to be present in these bodies is to be absent from the Lord in Heaven (v. 6). We walk by faith (faith generated by the Spirit who is the earnest within us), and not by sight (v. 7). But the confidence we have while not seeing with our eyes is a confidence that is looking forward—to the time when we leave this body, and are present with the Lord (v. 8). This is why we work as hard as we do, so that whether we see Him with our eyes or not, we are nevertheless accepted by Him (v. 9). This is what we want and need, because absolutely every one of us is going to appear before the judgment seat of Christ (v. 10). The upshot of this judgment is that we will all receive according to our life in the body, whether good or bad (v. 10).

THE SPIRIT HELPS US GROAN

When Paul points out we live in a tent, he says we groan (stenazo, v. 2). With the burden of tabernacling, we groan (same word, v. 4).

He teaches something very similar in Romans 8. The whole creation groans (stenazo), like a woman in labor (Rom. 8:22). We who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan as we look forward to the redemption of our bodies (Rom. 8: 23). Yearning toward that same end, the Spirit Himself labors with groans too deep for words (Rom. 8:26). This is because the entire cosmos is pregnant with the new creation.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE DIE

Putting all this together, we can see what happens when believers die. Our bodies are called tabernacles, and this is where we live now. If this tent is destroyed, we are (Paul says) “with the Lord.” This is some sort of intermediate state, and too many Christians confuse this intermediate state with our final eternal state. That final eternal state is after the dead are raised. So being a ghostly spirit in Heaven is not our final hope. We are Christians, and we believe in the resurrection of the body.

CHRISTIANS AND THE JUDGMENT TO COME

As we consider the end of the world, we must distinguish between two different aspects of how God will judge the world at the last day.

In the first instance, there is the Great White Throne Judgment. We see this in Revelation 20:11-15. This is a judgment that distinguishes and separates the saved from the lost. We see the same thing in Matthew 25, in the separation of sheep and goats (Matt. 25:31-36). Those who are saved through this judgment are saved on the sole basis of the righteousness of Jesus Christ, imputed to them by the grace of God. You will stand in this judgment, or not, on the basis of whether or not you are in Christ. Salvation is based on whether or not their names are found written in the “book of life from the creation of the world” (Rev. 17:8).

But there is another judgment, often called the bema-seat judgment. This is a judgment that evaluates the lives of Christians, and rewards them (or not) on the basis of how they lived. Paul refers to this in our passage (v. 10), but also elsewhere. “For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ . . . So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God” (Romans 14:10–12). If we compete in accordance with the rules, we will be crowned (2 Tim. 2:5). “And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible” (1 Corinthians 9:25).

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INTRODUCTION

We read in the book of Job that man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward (Job 5:7). This being the case, we need to learn how to handle these troubles rightly, for you will have them. They are not optional. There are no exceptions. What do you call a man who is really wealthy, who has a sunny disposition, and good digestion, and a photogenic family, and a shelf stacked with trophies and assorted other honors? Well, one name for him is “worm food.” This is the only way to reckon the value of everything “under the sun.”

But there is another calculus, introduced to the world three days after the crucifixion of Jesus.

THE TEXT

“We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak; Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you. For all things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many redound to the glory of God. For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:13–18).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Paul has the same spirit of faith as Christ, and so he speaks the same way the psalmist did. He believes, and therefore he speaks about it (v. 13). This is cited from Ps. 116:10. True heart belief is connected to the tongue. Paul then turns to reason from the certainty of the Lord’s resurrection to his own resurrection (v. 14). The one who raised up Jesus will raise up Paul, and will present them all together with the Corinthians (v. 14). Everything is for their sake, Paul says, so that abundant grace might redound to the glory of God through the thanksgiving of many (v. 15). Widespread gratitude in a community of saints is potent. Grace brings that gratitude, and gratitude brings abundant grace, which glorifies God (v. 15). This truth is what keeps Paul going. He does not faint (v. 16). The outward man might be getting beat up, but the inner man is getting younger every day (v. 16). Now remember that we have previously noted that Paul was one of the most afflicted men who ever lived. He certainly had gone through countless troubles. But how does he describe it here? He calls it “our lightaffliction” (v. 17). It is light affliction, and it is also a momentary affliction (v. 17). It will pass in a minute. But notice something else. Paul says the light affliction “worketh for us” a much weightier thing—the eternal weight of glory (v. 17). So gratitude works abundant grace, and affliction works its weight in glory. Paul therefore says that the key is to keep your eyes off what you can see, in order to fix your eyes on that which we cannot yet see (v. 18). Why? Because the things you can see you will only be able to see for a minute—they are temporal (v. 18). All day yesterday is now ghostly. What was so real turns out to have been momentary. And the eternal things you cannot now see in the present moment are things you will be able to see forever and ever (v. 18).

NOT KIDDING HIMSELF

Now when Paul calls his afflictions “light,” this is not because he is delusional. He knows very well the weight of his afflictions. Talking about how pressed and pushed down he was, he earlier referred to the weight of his troubles in Asia (2 Cor. 1:8). He was not a block of wood, and no Stoic. He is not arguing that his pains are non-existent, or trifling. Rather, he is telling us, by faith, that his pains fade in comparison to something else. He refuses to weigh his troubles in isolation. He evaluates his life, and the troubles in it, by the video and not by the snapshot.

This is a typical Pauline turn of mind. He says elsewhere in Romans that our present sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory that will be revealed in us (Rom. 8:18). You put the glory of the resurrection on one side of the scales, say ten bricks of gold, and then drop twenty or so lead molecules of affliction on the other side. That is the kind of thing he is doing. He is comparing, not muscling through. This is not a stiff upper lip approach. He calculating and comparing. But in order to do this you have to be able to see the coming glory, and this is only possible with the eye of faith.

AFFLICTION’S BLOOM

But Paul is not saying that there are bad things that happen down here, but then later, in a completely different realm, good things happen up there, and so it all evens out somehow. No, he is not saying that. Rather, the weight of glory that is coming for us, which we cannot now fully comprehend, is the bloom of our afflictions. The afflictions are the instrument that God uses to bring the other about. The “light” affliction works for us the weight of glory. That is what he is saying, that is what he is arguing in v. 17. As the cue ball put the eight ball in the corner pocket, so your troubles are laboring industriously for your gain. They are your friends. They are your very best friends. You ought to be nicer to them.

They are remodeling contractors, come to renovate your soul. They showed up right on time, 8 am, and they all have crowbars in their gloved fists, and that kitchen is going to be fabulous when they are done. Your afflictions are the dust all through the house. So this is why you need to count it all joy when you meet various trials (Jas. 1:2)—you can see what is coming (Jas. 1:3-4). This is why we are to glory in tribulations (Rom. 5:3). This is why, when you are tempted to look at your demolished kitchen in despair, you are instructed to go pull out the computer rendering of what it is going to look like, and then rejoice in the chaos (Rom. 5:4-5).

THE SPIRIT OF FAITH

This is not courage, not in the first instance. This is not endurance, not all by itself. This is not insight, not as the first thing. This is faith. That is what lies at the foundation of all courage, endurance, and insight. This is faith, and because Paul believes, he speaks. Because he speaks, he gets stoned and dragged outside the city again. And then he gets up, and because he believes, he goes on to speak again. He does this because he knows how the transaction works.

Where does this faith come from? According to Paul, faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God (Rom. 10:17). This is why faith is being formed in your hearts right now. The Word is being proclaimed, right now, and you are hearing it, right now.

What is that Word? It is that Christ was crucified. He was buried in the tomb. On the third day, in accordance with the Scriptures, He rose again from the grave. A short time later, the Holy Spirit was poured out into the world with the express purpose of anointing that message, making it powerful to save. Because all of these things are true, I am authorized as an emissary of Christ, to invite you to come. Are you already a Christian? Then come. Are you not a Christian at all, in any sense? Then come. Are you a nominal Christian, a Christian only on the surface of your life? Then come. This is the gospel call. What does Isaiah say? “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is none else” (Is. 45:22). What does the Lord Jesus say? “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28). And what does the Spirit say, together with the bride? “Come. And he that heareth, let him say, Come” (Rev. 22:17). And this is why we say, every week we say, “Come, and welcome, to Jesus Christ.”

And when you come, be assured that your afflictions will not disappear. But do understand that when you come, your afflictions will start to make sense.

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