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Amen, glory to God. Welcome to the program.
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Welcome to the cafe. I’m so glad you’re here today. Today we are looking at the idea, the biblical principle that God has a plan for us as we go through trials, as we go through hard times. You know, sometimes we can wonder if we’ve done something wrong, if we’re being punished
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for something as we go through hard times. But as we grow in knowledge of Christ through God’s Holy Word, we learn that it’s not so much punishment. Oftentimes, it’s God’s love that is bringing us through those hard times. Jeremiah 29:11, For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you an expected end. So if God loves us
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and he has thoughts of peace towards us, us being those that are saved, those that have come to a saving knowledge of Him, if He loves us and he has a plan for us that’s not evil to give us an expected end, then why is He putting us through hard times? I mean, again, when you look at the love aspect of it, it’s undeniable that God loves us. He sent His only begotten Son, Jesus.
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He gave Him to die on the cross. The Bible says it pleased Him that He would do that, to die on the cross for our sins, for your sins, and for my sins. And when we believe on Christ as Savior, His death, burial and resurrection were saved as clearly pointed out in 1 Corinthians 15 :1-4. That’s the gospel, friend.
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That’s love. That is God’s love. His love continues as He provided many prophets and evangelists over the years to share that good news despite all the affliction that they faced, Amen, the persecution that they faced. In a previous message we talked about, I believe it’s the book of John:16, and how
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Jesus is telling the disciples, people are going to think they’re doing God a favor when they hurt you and kill you. And God’s love, and so by the way, why is that God’s love? That’s God’s love because not only did he give his only begotten, but his own saints had to suffer greatly to continue the message, the gospel. And then God’s love is to give us the Holy Spirit when we’re saved, the Comforter, Amen.
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And all of this shows us that God really loves us. And at the same time, a loving God puts us through hard times. You know, the prosperity preacher would say, God loves you so much, you can live rich and easy. But that’s a lie. And the fundamental Bible preacher, the one that is preaching God’s Word, straight, without
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any error, studying to show themselves approved, rightly dividing the word of truth. The Bible preacher says God loves you so much, you’re going to go through hard times because that’s how you grow and become more like him. So we’ve talked about in past episodes the idea of expecting turbulence but not panicking. And now we’re talking about the idea of encountering obstacles and while we do we seek God and then in the next episode We’ll talk about trusting the Lord’s plan because it’s for our own good. Amen, and we should work with others brothers and sisters in Christ
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but we’ve seen the great men and women of God They have experienced turbulence in their lives and they haven’t panicked They’ve experienced obstacles in their lives and they’ve sought God and they’ve trusted the Lord’s plan and certainly worked with their brothers and sisters in Christ and some examples I’ve given recently here is Fanny
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Crosby and Corton Boone boom and DL Moody all of these individuals faced great obstacles yet they sought the Lord and they trusted God and you know one example biblical example that I was going to get to last episode and we ran out of time was the Apostle Paul and we’re gonna see how the Apostle Paul Believed in God through faith suffered as he waited on God and showed endurance turned to God in prayer Stayed in service to God while suffering that’s obedience got delivered from situations by God
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That’s deliverance Praised God for that deliverance and that’s true praise and worship and then went through those things over and over again. 2 Corinthians 11:22-33. This is Paul writing here. Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they the seed of Abraham? So am I. Are they ministers of Christ? I speak as a fool. I am more. In labors, more abundant. In stripes, more measure, above measure. In prisons, more frequent. In deaths, oft. Of the Jews, five times received I. Forty stripes save one
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Thrice was I beaten with rods once was I stoned thrice as suffered shipwreck a night in a day. I have been in the deep Just right there in 2 Corinthians 11 24:25 it says five times he received 40 stripes save one that’s 39 Whippings of the of the cat of nine tails the whip. As I understand it, one experience of that could kill you. And he went through it five times.
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And he was stoned. Remember, he was stoned to the point of seeing heaven, we believe. That’s when the Lord took him to heaven. He was literally, I believe, basically dead and God brought him back to life. He was shipwrecked. He spent a day and a night in the deep.
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Could you spend a day and a night in the ocean? I don’t think I could. Verse 26, in journeyings often, in perils of water, in perils of robbers, in perils by my own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren, in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness, besides those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches.”
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So here Paul is mentioning all the things he went through, all the feelings he had experienced, all the hardships he had to endure, all of these things just greatly would bring anyone down. And then he said, upon all that, he’s got to care for all these churches that he had planted, that he had preached to, these young vulnerable churches. That’s enough to bring someone down on their own, on its own.
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Verse 29, Who is weak and I am not weak? Who is offended and I burn not? If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things which concern mine infirmities. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
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which is blessed forevermore, knoweth that I lie not. In Damascus, the governor under Artaeus, the king kept the city of the Damascus with a garrison, desirous to apprehend me. Garrison would be like a troop of soldiers.
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Verse 33, and through a window in a basket was I let down by the wall and escaped his hands. Imagine Paul in a basket getting hoisted down through a window so he wouldn’t be put in prison or killed. Think of all Paul went through, and yet did he not thrive in the midst of it?
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What must have it looked like to him at that time?
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Right?
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Think about looking at things through Paul’s eyes. It must have been brutal. He must have felt like, goodness, he was suffering a lot at the hand of God. And what do you think relieved him? Was it not going to the Lord in prayer?
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Was it not seeking God through these troublesome times? Was it not petitioning the Lord? You have to remember, Paul had great faith in the sense that he was walking on the road to Damascus. He’s blinded. He sees God.
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God tells him, I’m Jesus, the very one you’re trying to persecute. And he says, Lord, what will that have me to do? He literally believes on Jesus at that point. He is saved. He spends three years in the wilderness in Arabia with the Lord. He gets all this doctrine from the Lord directly, not from man.
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He goes out and he is witnessing to people, he is planting churches, and he is most importantly providing the doctrine, the apostle to the Gentiles is providing the doctrine of it’s by grace alone through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone that we’re saved. Now you have to remember before that it was what? It was a salvation based upon the law. So you had to be Jewish and follow the law, right?
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That was the Old Testament way. God gave the commandments to Moses and Moses then told the Israelites, here’s what you got to do. The whole point was they thought they were righteous, they can’t follow the law, the law is just there to convict and show them they’re not righteous. And Jesus came and fulfilled the law.
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He died on the cross and was risen again so that we are no longer under the law, that when we believe on Him we are saved from the law, Amen. Not that the law itself is bad, but we are saved from it by what Christ did on the cross. And how can I preach that authentically and authoritatively? By Paul’s abyssals. This is Pauline doctrine, as a theologian may say.
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This is why we as Gentiles believe in the Bible to follow Paul and what he teaches. Because Paul says, follow me because I follow Christ. And so Paul has this special revelation. Paul gives us this information, and it is life-changing, and it is monumental, and at the same time, it doesn’t discount the fact of what Paul had to go through, Amen, what he had to suffer.
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And the point is, you know, Paul, using Paul as our example, he continued on. He had hard event after hard event, life-threatening event after life-threatening event, and yet he believed in God. He suffered, but yet he waited on God. He served the Lord. He endured. He trusted in God. He stayed in service to God and God delivered him from situation to situation and he praised God for that deliverance. He gloried in his infirmities.
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He said, I can’t do anything right and I’m sickly and I’m half dead here, there and everywhere and I glory in that because God is going to get the glory. And God and one preacher, 2,000 some years later is going to be preaching at least, many more I’m sure, saying, look at Paul and look what God did through Paul. You see, God gets the glory. And now how do you apply this to your life, Amen.
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Well, that means that when you are going through hard times, you have to look to God and trust God. You have to understand that I believe this is a principle in the Bible and you can research this and tell me if you think differently but I believe to be great in the kingdom of God you must suffer greatly to be great in the kingdom of God you must suffer
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greatly look in the Bible at those great men and women of God Peter, Paul, John the Baptist we think about it Peter was crucified upside-down Jesus told him so much you know they’re on the beach he said look it’s not gonna get pretty ugly to you.
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And they’re thinking, oh, maybe we won’t die. We’ll just be translated. No, no, they were going to be persecuted as Jesus was persecuted. John the Baptist, who Jesus called the greatest human to ever walk the earth, was martyred, was killed, was murdered for telling the king he was in an inappropriate relationship. John the Baptist was imprisoned.
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It wasn’t a good situation for him. Jesus suffered the most brutal death of all time for all mankind. On and on and on. I mean, anybody that’s really doing something for God is going to face persecution. I heard a preacher say recently on a video, and I wish I could remember which one it was, something to the extent of, if you are not facing any opposition from the world, then
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you’re probably not doing anything for God. And I think that’s an excellent point to make. You know, if we are friendly with the world and everything’s going smooth and good, you may think that you’ve got it figured out and everything is good, but that may be a sign that you are not living for God. Because when you are living for the living God, they will hate you because they hated him first. That’s what Christ tells us in
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the Bible. When we face battles, do we seek God and do we call on him? Do we look at this as a good thing? Do we think about Romans 8:28, that this is for our own good? Are we conditioned to do so? You know, all everything I’ve preached, I feel like I have to conclude a lot of messages this way, everything that I’ve preached, I preached about us living a certain way. But that’s impossible without the Holy Spirit. And to have the Holy Spirit we must be saved. So we get saved, right? And you can read John 16, go through that and
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you’ll understand the role of the Holy Spirit. But you get saved, you get the Holy Spirit, He, the Holy Spirit’s a He, He is living within you, He is convicting you of sin, He is convicting the world of sin, He is helping you to live righteous, He is giving you discernment, He is passing on your prayers to Jesus the mediator who gives it to God the Father, He is an active role in our life. And so we need by the power of the Holy Spirit to seek God as we endure hard times.
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And I’m not telling you this from a perspective of sitting in some cushy lifestyle and saying, well, tough for you, but I’m doing good. I’ve been through some hard times. I’m going through some now. And I preach this with all my heart and soul,
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that it is the gospel truth, that the way to get through hard times is to seek the Lord. Oh, to seek Him with all our heart, mind and soul. Isn’t that what He wants us to do? Isn’t that how we grow closer to Him? Amen.
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And make sure that we repent it before Him. We’ve gone to Him and made sure we’ve gotten it under the blood and that it’s forgiven, it’s cast away in the sea of forgetfulness, all of our sins. And that we have that clean heart before the Lord. And there’s nothing standing in between us. And we have that closeness with God.
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And that’s when He can use us. And that’s when we can have that faith to keep us going day in and day out. Oh how good our God is. Give Him praise today. Turn to Him in hard times as Paul did and so many others. And tune in next time as we get to the final episode in this series.
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Thank you so much. Take care. God bless and Amen.