2 Corinthians 4:13-18 - ”In the Meantime…”

The Old Testament reading this morning

is Psalm 116.

I love the Lord because he has heard my

voice and my pleas for mercy.

Because he inclined his ear to me,

therefore I will call on him as long as

I live.

The snares of death encompassed me. The

pangs of shol laid hold on me. I

suffered distress and anguish.

Then I called on the name of the Lord.

Oh Lord, I pray. Deliver my soul.

Gracious is the Lord and righteous. Our

God is merciful.

The Lord preserves the simple.

When I was brought low, he saved me.

Return, oh my soul, to your rest. For

the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.

For you have delivered my soul from

death, my eyes from tears, my feet from

stumbling.

I will walk before the Lord in the land

of the living.

I believed even when I spoke, I am

greatly afflicted. I said in my alarm,

all mankind are liars.

What shall I render to the Lord for all

his benefits to me? I will lift up the

cup of salvation and call on the name of

the Lord. I will pay my vows to the Lord

in the presence of all his people.

Precious in the sight of the Lord is the

death of his saints.

Oh Lord, I am your servant. I am your

servant, the son of your maid servant.

You have loosed my bonds.

I will offer to you the sacrifice of

thanksgiving and call on the name of the

Lord.

I will pay my vows to the Lord in the

presence of all his people.

In the courts of the house of the Lord,

in your midst, O Jerusalem.

Praise the Lord.

The New Testament reading is from 2

Corinthians

4:es

13 to 18.

Since we have the same spirit of faith

according to what has been written, I

believed and so I spoke, we also believe

and so we also speak, knowing that he

who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us

also with Jesus and bring us with you

into his presence.

For it is all for your sake, so that as

grace extends to more and more people,

it may increase thanksgiving to the

glory of God.

So we do not lose heart. Though our

outer self is wasting away, our inner

self is being renewed day by day.

For this light momentary affliction is

preparing for us an eternal weight of

glory beyond all comparison

as we look not to the things that are

seen but to the things that are unseen.

For the things that are seen are

transient, but the things that are

unseen are eternal.

This is the word of the Lord.

Thank you, Edith. And thank you to the

band.

You guys are doing great this morning.

Okay,

Christmas has come. New year lies ahead

of us.

Who knows what the new year is going to

bring?

Yeah, me too. We don't have a clue, do

we?

But whatever it is, there are a whole

lot of different attitudes out there

that

are really all over the map. But I want

to focus on one because it's it's pretty

dominant and it's having a big effect on

us

on our society.

Viral post from the exac account of

person called not Jerome Powell

recently laid out the millennium resume

of chaos.

Look at that. Millennials living through

two economic recessions, 911, a global

pandemic, eight stock market crashes,

jobs replaced by AI, and possibly World

War II

before they're 42 years old.

That hit home for a lot of people.

There's no denying that's quite a list

and that millennials

have lived through some wild times.

Zoom out just a little though and

history offers some helpful perspective.

My parents [snorts]

now Yeah. Okay. I'm 77. might be your

grandparents

came of age

under global threats

that make even the most intense

doomcrolling today look mild.

They didn't deal with bad housing

market. They dealt with the Great

Depression,

25%

unemployment.

They didn't deal with theoretical food

insecurity.

They dealt with real starvation.

They didn't face global tension. They

watched World War II consume multiple

continents and then got drafted to go

relieve them of that.

Before them, my grandparents,

World War I generation, lived through

trench warfare and a global flu that,

all respect to CO, killed 50 million

people.

I could go on.

All of us

have every right to feel stressed.

Catastrophes aren't unique to one age

group. History is basically a highlight

reel of disasters with small breaks

for catching our collective breath.

Something has changed.

Two things stand out.

Social media now turns every crisis into

a catastrophe you cannot escape.

If you have thrown social media out the

window, good on you.

A lot of people haven't done that.

When Pearl Harbor was bombed 84 years

ago, Americans were confronted with the

news on the radio and in the newspaper.

They were shaken, sure, but they weren't

then force-fed

300 angles of exploding battleships, hot

takes, conspiracy theories, and

algorithm organized panic for the next

72 hours nonstop.

That's social media now.

Today, a tragedy doesn't happen. It

consumes.

We inhabit the tragedy from every angle,

every perspective, every inch of our

mental bandwidth. We wake up to it, eat

lunch with it, go to bed with it.

It's livereamed, analyzed, politicized,

meme'd, debunked, redebunked,

and weaponized

all before we catch our breath.

That makes everything exponentially

harder.

The second thing is

that the foundations are so much weaker.

The difference between generations is

far deeper than economics or

geopolitics.

For generations, imperfect as they were,

we had a shared moral and spiritual

grounding that simply does not exist

anymore.

Family, church, and community fostered

and cultivated notions of duty, higher

meaning, and greater purpose.

It generated a sense that the world was

ordered and that suffering could be

faced with hope instead of helplessness.

Today, we've traded these stabilizing

institutions

for entertainment.

Influencers

and online tribes that champion TEDT

talk spirituality like you do. You live

your truth.

Follow your heart.

Sounds empowering until it actually hits

you. Then you discover what Jesus meant

about the foolishness of building your

foundation on sand.

Human beings who face global chaos need

anchors,

not vibes, not self-affirmation.

It's the fact that our culture has

abandoned them and leaves us looking

like this. The real issue isn't that

millennials, Gen Zed or Gen Z or the

upcoming Gen Alpha have it worse. It's

that they are dealing with it uned.

Do you get that impression of the world

[clears throat] around you?

The good news is that such a problem can

be fixed.

We can't stop recessions or wars or

pandemics, but we can rebuild the

foundations

that help people endure them.

Fear has proved effective

once again

at organizing our sense of chaos. It's

so easy to diagnose and yet it feels too

unreasonable and bewildering to hope.

And yet hope is the thing that so much

of our society has lost.

When fear dominates us, we can either

strike out against it.

Oh boy, we see that happening all too

often.

Or we can withdraw from it and try to

hide.

When someone fears that hope is gone,

the extreme reaction can be either rage

or despair.

Rage turned outward

becomes meaningless violence. All too

often, rage turned inward

leads to total despair.

What a difference. I'll just use one

person, Ben Sass. He may not be familiar

with you, but Ben was a US senator for

two terms from Nebraska.

and he was diagnosed with metastasized

stage four pancreatic cancer.

That's a death sentence. [snorts]

And here's what he said recently.

There's not a good time to tell your

people you're now marching to the beat

of a faster drummer.

But the season of Advent isn't the

worst. As a Christian,

the weeks leading up to Christmas are a

time to orient our hearts toward the

hope of what is to come.

Is that a It is clear. It's all fuzzy on

my

Paul

has been

undergoing a lot of

stress

lately

when he wrote second Corinthians.

Uh I guess in terms of what we would say

today, what's happening to Paul when he

wrote this letter and one of the reasons

caused him to write it is that he was

being cancelled by some pretty powerful

people.

Paul, he's a nobody. Look at him. And

they climbed on Paul. These people that

were putting him down, tried to cancel

him. And Paul's response

in second Corinthians is,

"So what?

Don't look at me.

Listen to what I'm saying. Look at what

the gospel is. [snorts]

Cancel me if you want.

It's happened to me again and again, and

it's going to happen again.

But he never let go of hope.

What on earth is with this man?

His response to these guys [snorts]

and Paul knew what he was talking about

was,

I have come so close to death. I have

been beaten. I have gone hungry. I have

known

friends, associates

to abandon me

or attack me.

Paul knew what he was talking about

and his response is to refer to Psalm

116.

In Psalm 116, the psalmist

knew what it was to be close to death

and he believed God had saved him and so

he spoke about it.

That's what Paul referred to. Emory told

us last week that when we get a

reference to the Old Testament in the

New Testament, you don't just take those

few words.

You have to go back and refer to the

whole context of what the speaker is

referring to. And that's what Paul's

referring to. He believed he had been

spared [snorts] from death.

and he was going to talk about it

because it was God that saved him. At

the heart of everything that Paul is

doing, his faith in God is absolutely

central.

God has saved me.

Not just from all these physical things

that happened,

but spiritually as well. Paul knew that

beyond a doubt. His faith is central to

everything that he's saying.

He refers just in the verses before this

how weak he was.

And I'm going to

change the translation again, but

this is Merl Tenny. the way that he

translates part of 2 Corinthians 4. Paul

was squeezed but not squashed,

befuddled,

sorry, bewildered but not befuddled,

pursued but not abandoned.

Knocked down but not knocked out.

There's a weakness power principle

happening here. And Paul, as weak as he

might seem to some people,

knows

that.

So what? I'm weak. So I'm small. So I

get beat up.

People attack me all the time.

It is the power of God that shines

through in Paul.

That weakness power principle and God's

faith in the power of the God he serves

kept him on track.

the foundation

of Paul's faith

was in the past.

Jesus came. Jesus died. Jesus rose

again.

And he goes on to show how this focus on

faith determined his future.

Sorry,

this is such a pain. I wish I had two

hands to use again.

It'll come. It'll come.

What Paul longed for

determined everything about how he

lived. Now,

that's one of the things I want you to

see in this passage.

I'm going to dig over here.

I'm sorry about this.

Since we have the same spirit of faith

according to what has been written, I

believed and so I spoke. Reference to

Psalm 116. We also believe and so we

also speak. knowing that he who raised

the Lord Jesus will raise us also with

Jesus to bring us with you into his

presence.

That speaks to the resurrection.

I'm going to cut this short a little bit

and jump to

an observation

that as central as the resurrection was

to Paul's faith and it is dead center

important for Christianity.

I wonder sometimes how much we really

believe we will be resurrected.

Stop and think about that for a minute.

Jesus is coming back.

And when he does,

the dead in Christ will rise first to

meet him in the air. And then we

>> [clears throat and snorts]

>> also who are living will rise with them.

And so we shall always be with Christ.

But we will have

new bodies,

new minds.

There will be

no more death,

no more pain.

It's gone. No sorrow.

Those are biblical promises.

Whatever Paul faces, [snorts] that's in

front of him.

For some of us, I might get in trouble

for saying this, but so what needs to be

said. For some of us, the idea of a

resurrection doesn't go much beyond the

last 20 years of our life and planning

for retirement.

We spend so much energy

and money

on our retirement

and that's what we live for.

There are too many of us like that.

Paul

had his eyes way past that.

Paul understood that the ark of history

didn't just lead out there to

retirement.

The ark of history pointed to

the resurrection and eternity with God.

And he wanted to find out what that was

like.

He knew it was coming

and that's what he lived for.

His confidence in the resurrection was

remarkable.

As grace extends to more and more

people, it may increase thanksgiving to

the glory of God.

That's why Paul lived

to give glory to that God that he served

that was going to give him an existence

in the new heaven and earth.

that we should take seriously. Paul

certainly did. It kept him going. So we

do not lose heart.

Though our outer self is wasting away,

our inner self is being renewed day by

day.

This light momentary affliction

is preparing for us an eternal weight of

glory beyond all comparison.

as we look not to the things that are

seen but to the things that are unseen.

Paul had this incredible

faith

in the reality of the resurrection. How

did he know what was real? Jesus rose

from the dead

and he said you're going to be just like

this.

That should keep us going.

There is the foundation

for our faith as Christians.

It's it's really not

rocket science.

Now the world

laughs at us.

Sure they do. Let them.

But Paul has just finished

a few verses before

explaining why that happens.

The god of this world

blinds the eyes

of the people who cannot understand or

believe this.

He says that there is a veil put over

their eyes.

They can't see.

When the Holy Spirit comes, he removes

that veil.

Boy, there's a difference between a

Christian and a non-Christian.

Think about it. We can give the gospel,

the good news [clears throat] of what

Jesus has done for us, the hope that he

holds out for us, and they haven't a

clue. They think it's

baloney.

It's not. And when the Holy Spirit lifts

that veil and opens our eyes,

the world and everything in it changes.

That's what we can rely on.

Paul believed about the future and it

had everything to do with the way he

lived.

How and in what terms we conceive of the

future is a decisive question. It really

is. Think about the slide that we looked

at when I started.

All the hardships and the bleak outlook

that is in front of so many people

around us. No wonder despair is rampant.

No wonder violence is rampant. No wonder

clowns like Nick Fuentes have such a

strong following.

There's nothing to live for and it's

only going to get worse.

Paul would disagree absolutely with

that.

We have hope. We don't have to be afraid

of the future or the present. So as 2026

comes along,

bring it.

We are here to show people that there is

real hope

and that hope

will lead to

future glory.

Paul talks about that too quite

powerfully in I want to read this here

chapter three.

We all with unveiled face

beholding the glory of the Lord are

being transformed into the same image

from one degree of glory to another. For

this comes from the Lord who is the

spirit.

Give glory to God. We're going to be

part of it.

And there's that passage in Revelation

about

an unnumberable

vastness of people praising God, singing

together from every nation, every tribe,

every language.

That's something to look forward to.

Paul's futures.

One other thing I want to point out

is that Paul had a tremendous confidence

in being transformed.

We talk about deconstruction today.

Well, let's talk about reconstruction.

To me, to my understanding,

I went through the 60s. I know for some

of you, you remember that and it's

worth forgetting about in some ways, but

uh for a lot of you that

doesn't ring a bell at all. But doubt

was a big deal.

Doubt about this. doubt about well in

Christianity a lot of people doubted

for a lot of different reasons that's

simply rebranded today

and people are deconstructing their

faith

come on that's nothing but but man-made

doubt

and there are answers

Paul

knew that he was being changed. He would

be changed, but he was being changed

right now. He was being taken apart and

put back together again by the Holy

Spirit of God. That's called

sanctification in theological terms.

As a Christian,

you may be dissatisfied with how slowly

things are going sometimes.

But scripture says that

you have the Holy Spirit working within

you. Now, you may be stubborn like me.

It may take a long time for you to get

changed in some things. You're still

fighting the same sins maybe that you

were five years ago as a Christian.

But stop and take a wider look.

God is changing you.

As much of a jerk I can be when I am

tired and grumpy and I snap at my wife.

I can come back

and she

forgives me. that gracious lady

and we can talk about it and that

doesn't happen as much as it used to.

And I hope that's true with you, too.

Now, there's a lot of self-help and a

lot of self-improvement gurus out there,

but come on.

you know that they can only go a little

bit toward making you a different

person. What you need is a change inside

you that the self-help gurus can't give

you.

God the Holy Spirit can give you that

change.

That's his business.

Transformed

So we do not lose heart.

Though our outer self is wasting away,

our inner self is being renewed day by

day for this late momentary affliction

is preparing for us

an eternal weight of glory beyond all

comparison.

See two things about that. One is that

pain, hard times, suffering

prepare

us

for what's coming.

God uses those things.

He transforms us.

Might take us a while to see it,

but God is at work in his people. He is

preparing us through these hard things

for an eternal weight

of glory.

It's interesting to me like the New

Testament's in Greek, but every time I

see that

I think of the Hebrew word for glory,

kaf, which is the same weight, same

word. There's a Hebrew word used for

heavy.

Heavy and glory are the same word in

Hebrew.

Weight of glory. In the beginning of the

letters of the second letter to Corinth,

Paul uses this phrase

weight

of affliction

and all that he's gone through. Now he

uses it as weight of glory

as we look not to the things that are

seen but to the things that are unseen.

For the things that are seen are

transient, but the things that are

unseen are eternal.

He's assured of that reward.

And when he refers to the outer man, he

doesn't refer just to the body.

When he refers to the inner man, he

doesn't mean just the soul. He's talking

about the whole body, soul, person

being changed. Take two tennis balls.

One new one, bright neon yellow. Bounce

it on the floor and you catch it up

here.

The other one, I won't use this hand. It

hurts.

is an old

tennis ball beat up.

It's more gray than yellow and there's

scuff marks on it and you bounce it and

you got to pick it up down here.

As much as you feel like an old tennis

ball,

whether you're young or old, that can

happen to us.

God wants to make you into a brand new

neon yellow tennis ball.

And Paul knows that that day is coming

useful,

bright

to the glory of God.

There's a future perspective that we

should all want.

The tragedy of our times is that men and

women have lost their eyes for the

unseen

and believe and hope and work in the

visible.

What is unseen is very very real

and we live in it every day.

We have

come through Christmas.

Okay. Thank you. see us. Lewis,

my eyes aren't good enough to read this

small print on that. Advent was always

intended to remember the arrival of

Jesus, the baby in the manger, and

rehearse

the arrival of Jesus, the conquering

king of the universe.

He is coming back

2026

maybe.

We don't know.

But we can be ready for it.

And we have to lift our eyes

above

all the hardships that are all around

us. [snorts]

As CS Lewis put it, all that is not

eternal is eternally out of date.

Lift your eyes. Make that arc of history

longer than what you have been looking

at

because out there

is the resurrection

of us.

Out there is our total transformation

into a new person that we can't even

dream about. Squeezed

but not squashed.

Bewildered not befuddled.

Pursued but not abandoned. Knocked down

but not knocked out.

We can get through this together.

What about your future?

What are you looking for? What are you

looking ahead to? I hope it's not just

doom scrolling on social media.

I hope that as a Christian you have the

hope that Paul did.

You know, it's never too late to get it

right.

CS Lewis also said,

"You can't go back and change the

beginning, but you can always start

where you were and change the ending."

Paul knew about that.

In the meantime, we remember our

foundation.

It is in the life and death and

resurrection of Jesus Christ.

We lift our eyes, the eyes of our heart

and soul

to the certain return of Jesus.

We rejoice in the steady reconstruction

we experience in the spirit and the

magnificent transformation

ahead of us.

Bring on 2026.

Let's pray.

Father God, you have given us hope

that surely we need help

to understand and to live.

We thank you this morning for the gift

of the Holy Spirit

to lift our eyes to a far horizon

when Jesus returns

when hope

becomes real.

guide us there

for your glory,

for the sake of your name.

We pray

in the name of our savior and king

Jesus.

Amen.