2 Corinthians 4:17-18 | Elder Mike Moseley | 07-19-2026

Wonderful prayer and continue to pray, please.

And if you'd like to turn with me, I would um want to look in Second Corinthians.

We'll start in chapter 4, move into 5, Lord willing.

Woke up yesterday morning, literally woke up with this on my mind, and hasn't left since.

So I'm praying that the Lord's in the matter and ask you to pray too.

2 Corinthians chapter 4.

2 Corinthians 4 · chapter mention

And uh before we get to the 17th verse, which is where I'd like to start actual comments, I want to set some of Paul's context in this letter at this moment at this juncture of the letter.

Um he had started off, or starts off the fourth chapter with, therefore, seeing we have this ministry as we have received mercy, we faint not.

So he's talking about his ministry.

He's talking specifically about his apostleship, but it will extend to each and every one of us in our service to God.

That's what ministry means.

Now, that means, I am saying this means something to you, each, individually, because while you're not an ordained minister of the gospel, that does not mean you don't have a ministry.

And the ministry you have of God, the service to God and to others that you each possess a duty to and a privilege to, you receive by mercy.

Just as Paul says, as we have received mercy, you've received from God a wonderful calling to his service.

And so seeing you have this service, he says, we faint not.

He's encouraging himself and every one of us to press into this service without fainting, without allowing the troubles and tribulations that we go through to weigh us down, to burden us to the point that we can't and don't continue.

He goes on to talk about things that they don't do and things they do, as in we renounce hidden things of dishonesty, we manifest the truth openly.

He's talking about again, his preaching of the gospel is out for everyone to see, and he says, commending ourselves to every man's conscience.

So that point, that part there put uh takes away the thought that it doesn't matter what people think about me.

He he did care.

He cares.

It matters what people think about us in the church.

Now, what it does not matter is if we are walking, manifesting the love of God and the truth of God openly for all to see, and not trying to dish it deceitfully, like he said.

We don't do that.

We don't take the word of God and hide it behind a lot of flash and fluff and try to, you know, for instance, I've heard some say the idea that, well, we just need to get them in the doors however we can get them in so they can hear the truth.

So we'll do some kind of thing to get them in.

That's hidden dishonesty.

That's marketing.

Now it works great in the business world, but it doesn't work in the church.

Okay.

You need, we he said we're open.

We want everyone to hear the word of God.

We want to reach those that love God.

We're not gonna do it hiding behind some dishonest way.

Paul says we did it openly, but we are commending ourselves to people's conscience.

It does matter what they think of us.

Like, if they think that's a person that follows God and loves God, and therefore I don't like them, well, that's fine.

I'll take that.

Okay.

But if they say that's a person who says they follow God, but look how they act, I want I don't want that.

I want my reputation without to match my belief in my words.

And that's what Paul says here.

But then he moves on to say that we preach, verse 5, we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus our Lord, and ourselves, your servants, for Jesus' sake.

So when it matters what people think, ultimately he's like, What I want you to think is about the Lord, and if you think of me at all, you think of me as a servant of the Lord for your sake.

But then he says this, uh, this beautiful truth that God who commanded the light out to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts.

The same God that created all things by the word of his power, he's also given you the light of the knowledge of Jesus Christ.

You didn't come up with that on your own.

You're like Peter, who is blessed because flesh and blood has not revealed this unto you.

God's revealed to you who Jesus is.

Not only who he is, but who he is to you.

He shined in your heart the light to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

But we have this treasure in earthen vessels.

He says, This treasure here is the gospel message and the ministry of it.

And it is a beautiful, rich treasure that allows us to be able to serve God in spirit and in truth, to worship him in spirit and in truth.

And it's something we didn't get on our own, it's something God gave us, but we have it in these earthen vessels.

And why?

Why is that?

He goes, so that the excellency of the power of maybe of God and not of us.

So we would understand and know that all the glory for this goes to God.

We don't get to claim any credit for even the service we do.

As soon as we start to look at, look how much service I do, we've lost the excellency of the power of God.

But when we say, when we've done all, and as Jesus says, when you have done all, say just to yourselves, I am an unprofitable servant.

I've done what it's just my duty to do.

Okay?

But guess what?

This is beautiful.

The Lord doesn't say that about you.

See, there's a difference.

How we're just saying to ourselves, when we've done everything, all we've done is our reasonable service.

All we've done is what the Lord.

I'm unprofitable.

It doesn't mean you're no good.

It means you didn't add anything to the Lord in any way.

You didn't make him richer, but you did what is yours to do.

But the Lord says this, Well done, thou good and faithful servant.

What a blessed um like wage that would be.

What a what a reward to get from a smile from the Lord that says, Well done, thou good and faithful servant.

And I I strive for that.

I want to hear my Lord say that to me.

That's not wrong to want.

Okay?

I want to hear that I've pleased the Lord.

So he says here, when you've done that, when we the reason God gave flawed individuals this beautiful blessing is so that the power be of him and not of us.

Anytime that you have ever felt any blessing that came from while I was trying to preach to you, I hope you know just how powerful God is because that came from God and not from me.

As I so often do, I sit down and say, that was just unprofitable.

That was not, I was, that was no good.

To me, I was so disappointed in that effort, and then people are blessed, but I know that came from God.

And then we get to redound all the glory back to him because it's this flawed earthen vessel that God put this beautiful treasure in.

Now, he goes on to say this.

Verse 8 through, he talks about some things.

He says, and I think I might have quoted, well, wherever I was recently, I quoted this, we are troubled on every side.

He goes, we are perplexed, persecuted, cast down.

But I did skip some words.

Thanks be to God that uh the words that are here.

I I trust we all remember this.

Think about this.

This is a hope, this is the case.

Let's not rem we are troubled on every side, he says, and yet not distressed.

And that distressed part is something I want to move to in the 17th verse.

But he goes, we are perplexed, but not in despair.

That's a total, like total loss.

Perplexed is like at a loss, and despair is at a total loss.

He says, We are persecuted, but not forsaken.

Now I trust, no, that we are not persecuted like the apostle Paul was persecuted, and yet we feel we feel to be persecuted.

But in any case, Paul knew he was not forsaken, and I trust you know you are never forsaken of the Lord.

He goes, cast down, but not destroyed.

Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also, that the life of the Lord also of Jesus might be made manifest in our bodies.

Now I'm gonna move to the 17th verse, because if you really read about what Paul was going through, that the 17th verse is going to feel like the understatement of the century.

Right.

And the Apostle Paul's uh summary of the troubles he had gone through and was going through for the sake of the ministry he had to God's people, the troubled, the perplexity, the persecution, cast down, those were summaries.

We can go to the 11th chapter and read details of all of that that the Apostle Paul had gone through.

I think I won't for time's sake, but as you go through to when you read through this letter and you get to the 11th chapter, want you to understand he talks about boasting in this, but that boasting he calls foolish.

He's only boasting to make a point.

He'd rather not have to do this, but they compelled him to because some of them were bragging about their service to God and that's bad.

So Paul's like, if you just bear with me, I'm gonna brag a little too, and then he's gonna put all that bragging to bed and boast in Christ.

Okay.

I'm not gonna read through it just for the time's sake.

Um, but when you go read that, this is what he, these are the afflictions he's talking about.

When he says in the 17th verse, for our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

He's putting up a contrast between the afflictions of this life, the afflictions he's undergoing, and something that's take that works for us something.

Now, it works for us this glory, this weight of glory.

This is not to say that God uses our afflictions to bring about something good.

That's not what it's saying.

Now, I'm not saying that never happens.

I'm not saying that God does not use things that we go through in this life for our chastisement, which brings about correction and a peaceable fruit of righteousness.

There are times I go, I'm, I can, I just know that what I'm going through is my own fault, and it might be the chastisement of God.

But remember, you're not forsaken.

Even if you feel that persecution is coming from God, it's coming from the loving hand of your father.

There's comfort that should be taken from the chastisement of God.

In Hebrews chapter 12, he says that you have forgotten this.

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

He goes, he's like, Hebrews, you're complaining about this.

He goes, um, when he tells them to consider the our Lord who endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest you be wearied and faint in your mind, he goes, You have not all uh resisted always unto blood, striving against sin, and you have forgotten the uh exhortation of the Lord.

Now I'm paraphrasing this because I can't get the quote exactly right, but he's basically quoting from Job, he's saying, Whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth.

Now, if it so be that what I am enduring, right, like at a moment is from God as chastisement.

I should remember that means he loves me.

That he is the loving father, bringing about correction.

And it's and certainly you should take that with that in mind that Lord restore me to the right path.

If I am walking astray, I want him to correct me.

I don't want to keep going off in my own.

But you know what?

That's not the only afflictions we have.

And I don't even know if it's the majority.

Sometimes we go through things, afflictions, and Paul certainly is an example of this.

Paul's afflictions numerated out in the 11th chapter.

These afflictions he had, these stripes he endured, these stonings and being left for dead, the things like that.

That was at the hands of wicked men because he was doing the will of God.

And make no mistake, Paul says, all that shall live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution in some way or form.

This world is not a friend of grace, and it is not a friend to the child of grace.

This natural world is an enmity against God.

And so there is a sense, there is afflictions that come on us from without that are not chastisement of God, and God is not causing those or even having a hand in those things to try to bring about this weight of glory.

That's not God working in that to do this.

That's not what he says here when he says, these afflictions worketh in us a weight of glory.

Okay?

God's not working in that, but it is working.

Sometimes there's afflictions that just happen because we live in a sin-cursed world.

Sicknesses, things like that.

They're not, they're not necessarily, I'd say necessarily, because we certainly know from scripture that there were some that were sick because of their sins.

There were some things that were brought on as chastisement, but I tend to think some most of the time it's just because we live in a world that Adam plunged into a curse.

Okay, not only did Adam bring sin into the world, one man's sin entered the world, and death came by sin, but dying came by sin.

And a curse came upon all the earth because of Adam.

Someone asked me just recently, like, why do animals die?

Why do animals suffer?

Because animals didn't sin.

But you know what?

Adam was created, man was created as the pinnacle of God's creation.

He is the one in his image.

No other creature, you know, what is it, animal, vegetable, or mineral.

No other creation of God was created in the image of God.

Why?

Because no other of God's creation is the family of God that he loved before the world began.

Think about that.

Before the world began, you were already on his mind and heart.

You were already his child.

Everything else he created was a backdrop, as it were, for this for loved, foreknown people.

It was a place for us to dwell, things for us to use.

And God tells Adam, go out into the world and replenish it, populate it.

He goes, and have dominion over all the fish and all the animals.

And all and I paraphrase, we go read Genesis chapter 1.

Genesis 1 · chapter mention

It tells you man was given dominion over all creation because man is God's loved people.

And man is the only of God's creation on this earth.

Now, I know the celestial angels and things too, they've never been on earth except when they come and minister to God's people.

They don't live on earth, they're not of the earth, and they're never, they're good, they're in heaven.

But other than that, of all the natural element creations, the only thing not going to be folded up and like a vesture put away, the only thing that's not going to burn with a fervent heat are the people of God that are going to be delivered up.

So man's creation was very special to God, near to God's heart.

When man sinned, he said, Cursed be the ground for thy sake.

Why do animals die?

Because of sin, because of man's sin.

Why do uh like things all around change and decay all around?

I see, as the song says, because of man's sin.

And so sometimes our sickness is simply because we're in a sinful world, a sin-cursed world.

Our bodies are plagued with sin, but it isn't necessarily your particular sins causing your particular illnesses, but it is sin.

Okay?

So we have afflictions that come from within, they come from chastisement of God.

We have the afflictions like the Apostle Paul was dealing with, stonings and stripes and things like that, that just come from, uh that come from wicked people that are actually enemies of us and of God.

And we have things that happen in life just because nature is filled with the curse of sin.

And Paul went through some of that too in the 11th chapter.

It talks about being shipwrecked and spending like a day and a night in the deep, meaning he was floating around in the ocean after a shipwreck.

And you can read about it in Acts.

Um that's just because this world is filled with things like we've recently endured, weather that causes catastrophes.

And people ask the questions like, what happened and who sinned?

That's a foolish question.

Even the disciples were prone to it.

They'd ask questions like, Who sinned that this man uh would be born blind?

Was it him or his parents?

And think about how foolish that question is.

Um, bad thoughts bring about foolish questions.

He goes, Who was whose sin caused this man to be born blind?

Was it his sin?

Well, no, it wasn't his sin.

He was if he was born blind, it wasn't his sins, but it was sin.

And Jesus tells him it wasn't because of his sin or his parents' sins, but that the glory of God might be revealed in them.

And then he healed that man.

Now, Jesus was not saying the man was born blind for the purpose of the glory of God being revealed, but he did say, I'm here right now for this moment, and I'm the glory of God is going to be revealed in this situation.

But he's putting to bed the foolish idea of blaming it.

Who's blamed?

Who gets the blame for this affliction?

That's not the point.

Um why am I going through this?

What is God trying to teach me?

Well, good question.

But separate the questions.

The why are you going through it is not necessarily because God's trying to teach you.

But there is something to be said about what we can learn in these afflictions.

So back to this verse.

We understand it.

You're going through afflictions.

Paul went through great afflictions, and he says, it's worketh for us, this weight of glory.

But it isn't about trying to figure out why God is doing this to me.

He's not talking about putting blame on God.

It's not necessarily chastisement.

If it is chastisement, then I pray God, show me that.

Show me where I erred so I can correct my steps.

Paul, um, David would write things similarly in the Psalms, like, teach me to number my days, that I might apply my heart to wisdom.

Show me my iniquities.

Um, we sang the song this morning about pure in heart, oh God, help me to be.

The end of that verse says, keep me from secret sins, meaning sins I don't even know I'm doing.

And I need God to show me that that's the case, if that is indeed the case.

So praying to God in the midst of a situation to show you if you need repentance is good to do.

But understanding, it may just be that you're going through afflictions.

And what do you need in that case?

You still need God to show you what.

How you should walk.

How should we proceed in this situation?

But here he says it's working for you a weight of glory.

Again, it's the affliction that's working for you.

It worketh for you something.

Now, he calls it a light affliction, which I again I find to be an understatement when I think of what the what Paul's going through.

And sometimes the affliction I'm going through, I don't feel to be so light.

And I almost feel like if anyone were to call it light, I'd say, you just don't know.

And therefore, I've learned from poor experience to not do that.

To not try to console somebody with the thought that, well, what you're going through is really not that bad.

It could be worse.

That's like the worst thing you can say.

One of the worst things you can say to someone in a trouble is it could be worse.

I don't know, maybe it helps some people.

It does not help me.

Or when you say, I know what you're going through.

That's like never, I never say that.

Like our, I just don't.

I might say it could be worse sometimes, but I hope I don't.

That's just not the way to comfort someone.

When Paul is saying for our light affliction, he is not trying to get you to think, well, you're afflicting.

He's not saying your afflictions are light.

He doesn't say for your light afflictions.

Okay.

Paul has made this determination of his own afflictions on his own.

Now, we can use the Apostle Paul.

I'll use him, not me, to set side by side.

That's fine.

The Holy Ghost inspired this.

But I'm not going to tell you your afflictions are light.

What I am going to tell you is if you'll do what Paul does here, then you may come to a place where you're able to say, My light affliction.

Okay?

But notice it's the affliction that's working this weight of glory.

The next verse is key.

He says, 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.

He says, your perspective is what will determine how this works.

Whatever the affliction is, your perspective will determine how it works.

This heavy affliction that I'm going through, which seems to be internally long, okay, that's not gonna work this weight of glory that he talks about.

But because I'm looking at the affliction, I'm looking at what I can see, I'm looking with my natural eyes.

And he says that this light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us, this weight of glory, while we look not at the things that are seen, but at the things which are not seen.

And then he contrasts that the things you can see, they're temporal, they're timely, they're a part of this world, they're they're natural, but the things that are not seen with the natural eye, they're eternal.

The way to, the way that he compares is not by comparing his troubles with others' troubles.

It's not by even comparing his troubles with his other troubles.

He's not comparing the natural with the natural.

It only works while you are not looking at the things that are seen, but you're looking at the things that are not seen.

In other words, his whole directional view is not left, right, front, back, certainly not down.

It's up.

He is looking upward.

As the psalmist says, he says, Um, I will look to the hills from whence my help cometh?

My help cometh from the Lord.

It's looking up, as uh the Hebrews chapter 12 says, and I already quoted it once when he was telling them that they had forgotten some things, um, and that's why they were fainting in their mind.

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

Paul says about this whole chapter, starts off with we faint not.

How do we not faint in the service of our God?

He says, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is sat down at the right hand of God.

Looking unto him, you're gonna have to look up, because he's not here anymore on this earth.

He is risen and seated at the right hand of God.

Looking unto him who has endured such contradiction of sinners against himself.

It said, for the joy that was set before him.

You know what that means?

He was also looking forward and up.

He was looking to the Father whose will he came to do.

He was looking to the finished work.

As he even approached the work, he was looking at the completed, finished work where he would redeem all of his people.

The joy was you set before him as having you with him in glory someday.

And it's that glory that it's that this is working toward, this glory that we will have with God someday.

In Romans chapter 8, it says, Paul, the same writer, Paul, he says this, I have reckoned that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

Now, in this chapter in 2 Corinthians, it sounds like he is comparing it, but he's not really comparing it as much as he's just he's shifting his perspective.

In Romans chapter 8, he says, I've given it a lot of thought, and what I've come to conclusion is you can't lay them side by side and compare them.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

Um I'll tell you what I think that really means.

It means that when we think of heaven as only the absence of all the sufferings, we haven't really considered heaven right.

Heaven is not just the absence of all of these afflictions.

Heaven is the presence of the glory of God.

It is the absence.

By no means do, I mean, forget that.

That is the starting point of this comfort that comes from this.

But the but move beyond that when we think about heaven.

It is not just no more tears.

It's eternal joy, it's not just no more suffering, it's everlasting peace.

It's not just no more corruption, it is the glory of God, and it's revealed in us.

So as he talks about this glory, that this these afflictions work, he says this glory is a weight.

A weight of glory.

A weight of glory is an interesting phrase.

A weight is a burden, it's a load, it's a pressing down.

But this weight of glory is not a negative thing, and that sounds like a negative thing.

But I'll tell you what, the affliction is a weight, it's a burden, it's a pressing down, it's a casting down.

These afflictions, when we're looking at them, they weigh us down from whatever source they come.

They make it hard to lift up your eyes.

But while when he when you do, while you are looking up, then that weight, you're taking that off because you're casting it on him.

He says in 1 Peter, or Peter says, casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you.

You know how you cast something?

Have you ever cast a stone?

Or throw it.

We now have like casting of a phone up on the TV.

You're kind of throwing the thing up on the TV.

What you should do with all your worries and your cares and your afflictions is not bear them yourself, but cast them on your Lord before he careth for you.

Now, when he does that, it's like this load is going off, but something else is going to replace it, and that's this weight of glory.

Now, the weight of glory, it is a load, but it's not a burden, and it's not a pressing down.

I think it's a lifting up.

Okay?

In Romans chapter 5, Paul talks about this.

Romans 5 · chapter mention

Um, Romans chapter 5, I'm going to start with the first verse.

Romans 5 · chapter mention

Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

And by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

That sounds great.

I'm right on board with you, Paul, when I know by faith that I have been reconciled to God and Jesus Christ died for my sins, I'm able to rejoice.

But don't forget or focus on this fact.

We have grace, and we stand in that grace because He's placed us in that grace.

But this says we have access by faith into the grace wherein we stand.

That's something that means you can use it right now.

And there's two ways to use this grace that God has given you in this life.

One is rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

But he goes, not only so, but we glory in tribulations also.

Then that's where I'm like, hold up, Paul.

I'm not sure about this glorying in tribulation stuff.

This is tied to what he's talking about, and for our light affliction, which is but for a moment worketh for us, this weight of glory.

And I know y'all think, here you're skipping some words.

I'm I hope I won't leave them off completely, but here he says, Because of the grace that God has given us and that faith by which we can access it in this life, we can do two things.

We can rejoice in hope of the glory of God, and not only so, but we can glory in tribulations also.

Now the word rejoice and the word glory in the Greek are the exact same word.

I am thankful that the uh King James translators decided to use two different English words for the same word, because he said there's a difference.

They are ultimately the same thing, but there is a difference.

It's the application of it that's slightly different.

Now think about flipping it for a second.

If I said that we glory in hope of the glory of God, that the um that we glory in hope of the glory of God, not only does that sound redundant and weird, glory has a uh seems to be something like, well, I'll I'll tell you what the Greek means.

The Greek word kind of means lifting up, lifted up.

The rejoice is lifted up, the glory is lifted up.

But when I say I glory, I kind of sound like I'm lifting myself up.

And lest that be confusing, he says, no, no, no, we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

We are lifted up with the hope of the glory of God.

Lifted up out of the despairs of this life.

Lifted up because he's lifted up.

But not only so, he says, we glory in tribulations also.

Now let's flip.

What if he said, if what if they decided to use the English word rejoice?

We rejoice in tribulation also.

I that's where people sometimes, I don't, I just can't say, I can't say that.

Well, if you really get down to what the word means, you can say it, but we just confuse rejoicing with happiness.

And it's not the same thing.

They can coincide, but they're not the same thing.

See, happiness, and I've said this before, but I'll say it again.

Happiness has to do with what is happening.

It is a cheerful thought based on the happenings that are happening right now.

And when you see that word happy in the scriptures, there's so it's always about what's happening.

Like, if you know these things when you're washing the saints' feet, he says, if I'm your master of washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.

And he says, if you know these things, happy are ye if you do them.

The happiness comes with the happening.

But rejoicing has a cheerful disposition, a cheerful thought, or a cheerful emotion, not just at the receiving of good, but at the anticipation of good.

You can rejoice in something that hasn't happened yet.

And that's what we do so often in this life when we are able to rejoice always.

Again, I say rejoice.

Why does Paul say that?

Because we are hoping and anticipating something good.

There is something good coming, and we know that, and we're able to rejoice.

Doesn't mean we're happy.

So that's why I think the English translators do not use the word rejoice here.

But there's another another reason to distinguish the difference because if the root of it is to lift up, what's being lifted up?

In hope of the glory of God, you know what's God is He's lifting us up in that hope.

In tribulations, we are lifting up Him.

When we glory in tribulations, we're lift, we are lifting up Him.

And in doing so, we're lifting up our eyes unto Him.

That's how we're able to have this glory in tribulations.

Because he goes on to say, knowing, knowing, this is, if you're going to glory in tribulations, you have to know these things.

You have to know that tribulation worketh patience.

That sounds a lot like our Corinthian verse where he says that these light afflictions worketh for us, this weight of glory.

It does not mean that the only way to get patience is to have tribulations.

That's an old joke I've heard.

I just I'd like to kill it.

I like jokes, but I don't like bad jokes.

Um you don't need, I mean, you need patience.

James says you have need of patience.

Why?

Because this world's full of tribulations.

And the idea that you shouldn't pray for patience because you'll get tribulations, that is ridiculous.

You need to pray for patience because you're gonna have tribulations, but you need to know that tribulation worketh patience.

In other words, when you're enduring tribulations, you could either endure it without patience or you could endure it with patience.

And patience, it says, experience.

Patience works experience.

Now, if you endure a tribulation without patience, your experience is going to be different than if you endure tribulation with patience, that experience is going to be different.

And so, what Paul is recommending is working, is if you know that tribulation worketh patience, or in other words, you need to exercise patience during the tribulation, that you're gonna have an experience.

And that experience is going to be more focused on God and his deliverance than it is gonna be on you and your troubles.

Then what you're gonna do is as you're waiting on God to deliver you, you're gonna and you're waiting with patience.

What is patience?

Patience is, I've read the definition as a cheerful endurance.

I don't know, I don't really like it that way because I don't I don't feel that cheerful.

Um, it it's certainly right, it's correct, but because we use the word cheerful to be like smiling, I prefer a hearty endurance.

The kind of endurance our forefathers had to have when they're out there, you know, settling new land and you're enduring the tribulations that some of us we just don't even fathom.

Our tribulations are not easier than theirs, they're just different.

But that hardiness that you had to have in the pioneer days, think of that in the endurance.

And in fact, they use he uses that kind of analogy in in James when he talks about you have heard of the patience of Job.

He says the husbandman has long patience.

What is he waiting for?

He's waiting for the rains, the latter rains, the harvest.

Right?

Because a farmer does not get instant gratification.

You can't plant your field and the next day go harvest.

You have to endure the waiting and you have to work in the endurance.

So it's a great analogy, even though it's not one that I've personally experienced.

It is a great analogy to realize that if you go out there because you just can't wait any longer and you cut down the corn stalks, you're not going to eat nothing because they haven't yielded fruit.

You have to wait.

Sometimes we have to wait.

It's not that the affliction, um, it doesn't matter how the affliction comes, there is an end to it.

There will be a finale of this trouble, whatever the trouble is.

But sometimes we have to wait.

They that wait on the Lord, this uh I the um was it in Isaiah or is it a psalm?

Anyway, it says, they that wait on the Lord, yes, Isaiah 40, I think, shall renew their strength.

They shall walk and not be weary.

That says they shall mount up like with wings of eagles, uh, walk and not be weary, uh, run and not be weary, walk and not faint.

And we're talking about not fainting, waiting on the Lord.

But waiting with purpose and with looking, with lifting him up in the midst of the affliction, in the midst of the tribulation.

Now, when he does that, when Paul does that, the same thing happens that here, experience worketh hope.

Hope is an expectation of God to deliver.

Now that is going to come about as a truth as soon as you finish the tribulation and you look back and you see how God was with you throughout the whole time, that you were persecuted but not forsaken.

You were perplexed, but not in despair.

You can see that at the end.

And you look back and you say, look at that experience.

Hope, it says, make it not ashamed.

Hope will never confuse you.

Hoping, expecting that God will deliver will never be wrong.

And he will always deliver.

Sometimes the night seems so long.

It says, weeping may endure for the night, but joy cometh in the morning, and the sun is going to come up, metaphorically speaking, in your night season.

Even if it is that great morning of all mornings, and the day that we are actually in glory with Him.

But in some way, there will be an end to the tribulation.

And when that end comes, we'll have experienced the deliverance of God, and we will see things more clearly.

But Paul, and I'm going to get back to this because as we're saying, he got this burden of affliction that if we're, while we're looking not at the things that are seen, not looking at the troubles, but instead looking at the things that are not seen, the eternal, looking at Christ, looking at what he's done for us, when we're looking at that, then the affliction gets lighter and lighter, and it's replaced with something that gets heavier and heavier, but not in a bad way, in a lifting up way.

This weight of glory, this burden for glory, this longing for glory, this desire to be where he is.

And he says that this, the reason it gets lighter is because this weight of glory, it says, is exceeding.

It's greater.

This desire for glory and the glory of God is greater than any of the afflictions.

It's not always at first, because we're looking at the things that are seen.

They seem so heavy.

But when while we're not looking at that, this glory, it exceeds.

As he says, it's not that it's a bad comparison.

Pause.

Says it's not worthy to be compared.

It's not a good way to describe heaven that it's got, it has no afflictions.

It's a good way to start, but it gets so much better.

He goes, it's not just exceeding this weight of glory, this burden for glory, this longing for glory doesn't just exceed the afflictions.

He says it's far exceeding.

It worketh for us a far exceeding.

The more you look toward heaven and the things that God has done for you, the more you look toward the love of your Lord for you, the lighter the afflictions will seem while you're looking at it.

Then he says it's not just far exceeding, he says, and eternal.

Because I'll tell you, whether you see it or not, this longing for glory is always within you.

And I don't, I mean, it's time to close, so I certainly can't go over to Romans chapter 8 now at this moment and talk about the earnest expectation of the creature that's waiting for the manifestation of the Son of God.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

But you know whether we see it or not, the inward man is always longing for heaven.

And that's the fifth chapter.

So when you're reading on your own readings, you move straight into the fifth chapter, realizing that there was no chapter, he just went straight in and he said, For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heaven.

And for in this we groan.

In other words, the inward man is longing to be free of this life, this prison, as it were, of clay.

Now that's what the inward man sees, but what God sees is you, your entire self, body, soul, and spirit is what he bought, paid for, and loves.

And that body, this isn't this text is not meant for you to despise your body.

It's not meant for us to think like the body is bad and the spirit is good.

God loves all of you.

And he will, as Job says, has a he will have a desire to the works of your hand.

And so we wait in Romans, it says, we wait for the adoption to it, the redemption of these bodies, too.

These bodies are going to go to heaven.

But your inward man doesn't care.

If you'll let me say it that way, he does not care whether it gets to go right now without the body or or when it gets to go with the body.

The inward man just wants to be with God.

And sometimes we see that, and when we see that, it's this weight of glory.

It's this far exceeding weight of glory, it's this eternal weight of glory because the inward man will never stop longing for heaven.

Even when it gets to heaven, it's going to love to be there and want long to stay there.

Like this weight of glory is eternal.

How much more does that exceed this temporal troubles?

And if I look at it that way, and while I'm looking at it that way, I, like Paul, can say, it's a light affliction.

It's but for a moment.

Because what's coming is eternal.

Um, so again, Paul's not telling you your affliction is nothing.

He's telling you to keep your eyes up until such time that you feel as if for even a little while that what's coming is so great.

What the Lord's done for us is so great.

What we have even right now, the experiences of his deliverance allow us to glory in tribulations also.

I thank you for the time this morning.

Pray the Lord's in the matter.

If there's anyone here that wants to join with Grace Church, you just let that desire be known.

I think there's only a few people who aren't even members right now.

Here, but we'll stand and sing a hymn.

Um stand number two zero nine.