Question 7 - Persevering as Workers for the Lord

Greetings, and welcome to the Faith Chapel podcast. My name is Jason,

and I am the pastor of Faith Chapel.

In the podcast right now, we are going through a sermon series from 2021 entitled, Questions.

The congregation of Faith Chapel was asked to submit any questions they had

about Christianity or the Bible, and the answer to those questions was given in the form of sermons.

Today the question is, how do we stay positive as workers for the Lord in troubling times?

Thanks for joining us today.

This August I was able to attend virtually the Global Leadership Summit and

during the summit I was able to hear from a guy by the name of Shola Richards.

He really had two profound things that really stood out to me as he was giving his presentation.

The first one is his definition of determination.

He says, determination is doing something long after the feelings of wanting

to do it have passed you by.

And so this really resonates with me. I have for a while now had some back trouble

and I constantly repeat this phrase to me because every morning I should do

several exercises to stretch my back out and to get it ready for the day.

And when I don't want to do it, I really want this thought to come into my brain

that I am determined to do this because I think determination is a really good quality to have,

but it is something that I really need to foster inside of me.

It's really easy for me to revert back to some sort of laziness and to really

walk away from doing these exercises that in the end help me function and move like I shouldn't.

And so I repeat this over and over again to myself.

Determination is doing something long after the feelings of wanting to do it have passed by you.

The second thing that he said was a story from his dad, who was from Africa.

He was born and raised in Africa.

And his dad came up to him one day and he told his son, Shola.

Be the buffalo, not the cow.

It's a really weird thing to say, and Shola had no idea what he meant,

and so he asked his dad to really help him to understand what in the world he was trying to say.

And so his father went on to explain, the buffalo, when a storm is approaching,

they run toward the storm and through the storm.

And his father said, this lessens the amount of time that they are in the storm.

This lessens the amount of rain

they have to endure, of lightning and wind that they have to overcome.

On the other hand, when a cow sees a storm approaching, they will run away from the storm.

Inevitably, they're not going to run as fast as the storm.

And so the storm catches up to them. And as they continue to go with the storm,

they elongate their time in the storm.

And so his father's message was this, don't run away from the calamities that are going to come.

Face them head on. Be the buffalo, not the cow.

And when we come to today's questions, these two takeaways that I had from Shola's

talk really resonate with me.

We are going through a series just as a reminder of questions that you guys

have asked and put on the poster board regarding any form or function of Christianity.

And we've been in this series for six weeks now and we've answered some really

good questions and today's question is no different from them.

The question is, how do we stay positive and continue to be good workers for

the Lord in the midst of the crazy things that are going on in our world?

It's really easy, like me in the morning when it comes time for me to do my

exercises, to just say, no, I'm not going to do them today.

But how do we overcome that? How are we determined enough to really pursue God

in this time and to continue to be a good worker for him?

Because the times, they are tough. There's a lot of things going on in our world.

And over the past couple of years, you can name one of a dozen things.

You can name isolation that came from shutdowns because of COVID-19.

You can name social unrest over masks, social unrest over racism,

social unrest over the election that was held last November.

Social unrest over school boards and what they have the authority to do and

what they are doing in our children's lives.

There is so much that's going on that can hamper our spirits,

that can really get us down in this world.

And we can lose sight and we can lose determination about who God is and what he wants done in us.

So how do we stay positive? How do we continue to be a good worker for the Lord

in these times of chaos and stress and anxiety and fear?

The first thing as I was processing through this question is the realization

that we are not the first people in human history to go through times of discomfort, times of persecution,

times of prejudice.

We're not the first Christians to ever go through these sorts of things.

And we have plenty of examples in the history of the church and even in the

Bible itself of people who have been subject to chaotic, crazy times.

And so there were a lot to choose from, a lot of voices, stories that we could hear from the Bible.

But today we're going to go over 2 Corinthians chapter 4.

2 Corinthians 4 · chapter mention

And in 2 Corinthians, we have the apostle Paul. He's writing a letter to a church

that he planted, that he watered, that he tried to raise up into being a follower of Jesus.

But they, since he has left, they've had some turbulent times.

And some of these turbulences have been directed at Paul himself.

And in 2 Corinthians, he addresses some of these issues.

There were other Christian missionary type people that came into Corinth who

were much better spoken than Paul.

Paul wasn't the best orator in the world and other people who had Christian

influences and who were teaching about Jesus came in.

And so the Corinthians, they bought into their teaching more because they presented

it better in their opinion.

And so they started wandering away from Paul's teaching because Paul wasn't as good of a speaker.

They also went away from Paul because he.

He decided not to tax the Corinthians, not to take their money,

but to work as a day laborer in the daytime and teach them at nighttime.

And so he would come and he would sleep. He would get up after his sleep and

he would go out and do his work as a tent maker.

And then he would come and he would teach them during times of the day where

he wasn't working. He would spend time with them, eat meals with them, and that sort of thing.

And he didn't want to take their lodging without being a worker.

He didn't want to take any of their possessions, any of their food,

because he wanted to be just right with him and God.

And he believed this is what God was asking him to do, not to really go after

the people of Corinth and their money and their food and their shelter and that sort of thing.

The last thing that they really started to reject Paul for was because he endured a lot of suffering.

These eloquent speakers who came in, they didn't seem to suffer at all.

They were affluent, and so they were in the upper echelon of the social hierarchy,

and they didn't seem to suffer at all.

And this was much better to the Corinthians' eyes and ears because they didn't

want to suffer the way Paul suffered.

And so these reasons, they started walking away from Paul's teaching and going

after these other teachers' philosophies and teachings.

And so Paul, he had a lot of work to do in the Corinthian church.

He visited them on multiple occasions.

We know he wrote multiple letters to them, and 2 Corinthians is one of them.

And when we get to 2 Corinthians 4, this is kind of the attitude that he is trying to rebuke.

He's trying to say, yes, I have authority over you.

Yes, you should submit to my teachings and my theology.

And he's starting to give his reasons why. But before we get there, let me pray.

Lord God Almighty, speak today. May your words that we read today resonate with us.

If it's one word or if it's a phrase, or if it's the whole chapter four of 2

Corinthians, please, Father, give us a love and a desire to go after what you teach us today.

Jesus, I pray for this in your name. Amen.

2 Corinthians 4, verse one says this, therefore, since God in his mercy has

given us this new way, we never give up.

Okay, the first word here, therefore, connects what Paul is going to say with

what Paul has just said. So we need to revisit quickly what Paul said in chapter 3 of 2 Corinthians.

At the end of chapter three, he talks about how there is the glory of the new covenant.

And this new covenant is brought about by Jesus.

It's initiated at the last supper where Jesus says, this is my body broken for

you. This is my blood shed for you.

This is the blood of the new covenant.

And so this replaces the old covenant, the covenant that God gave through the

mediator Moses on Mount Sinai, those 613 teachings that you can find in Exodus, Leviticus,

Numbers, and Deuteronomy, all of those teachings.

And this, Paul is talking about how this new covenant that is initiated in Jesus's

blood is so much better than those 613 teachings that God handed down to Moses.

And so he's saying, since this new covenant, this new way God has given us in

his mercy is better than what we had previous, than the old covenant, the old Testament.

We never give up.

There's this concept of determination.

Paul has been through so much in his life. And he's like, I don't care.

I'm never giving up because the

new covenant is so much better and God in his mercy has given it to us.

We rejoice in what Jesus has done for us. And that is why I have determination.

That is why no matter how I feel, I am constantly going to be pursuing God.

He continues in verse 2, We reject all shameful deeds and underhanded methods.

We don't try to trick anyone or distort the word of God.

We tell the truth before God and all who are honest know this.

He's kind of going after these other people coming in who the Corinthians are starting to follow.

And he's like, no, I don't care what they do. I don't care what they say.

I don't care how much money they have. I don't care how much they don't suffer.

Like I'm doing what God tells me to do.

I'm constantly doing it. And even though it's hard and even though it's challenging

and even though Paul writes later in 2 Corinthians,

even though I've been in prison, even though I've been shipwrecked before,

even though I've received the 40 lashes less one, even though I've been stoned

and left for dead, I am going to be persistent in this.

I am going to have determination to follow Jesus all the days of my life.

And I'm not gonna take any shortcuts. I'm not gonna go through any underhanded ways.

I'm really just going after him with authentic authenticity in myself because

that's what God has called me to do.

And when we think about the hard and troubling times that we're going through

right now, this is the attitude we need to have. Yes, it's hard.

It's a lot harder to be a Christian than when I was growing up.

It's a lot harder to receive ridicule and mockery from people that I went to high school with.

It's a lot harder to be a follower of Jesus in our day and age.

But that doesn't mean we give up. We have determination.

We do it even when we don't want to or even when we don't feel like we do it

because God's new covenant is so much better.

Verse 3. If the good news we preach is hidden behind a veil,

it is hidden only from people who are perishing.

Satan, who is the God of this world, God with a little g, has blinded the minds

of those who don't believe.

They are unable to see the glorious light of the good news.

They don't understand this message about the glory of Christ,

who is the exact likeness of God.

You see, we don't go around preaching about ourselves. We preach that Jesus

Christ is Lord and we ourselves are your servants for Jesus' sake.

For God, who said, let there be light in the darkness, has made this light shine

in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.

Earlier in chapter three, Paul talks about Moses. And when he saw God,

God hit him in the cleft of the rock.

And then God passed by and then let Moses look and behold his glory as God was walking, going away.

And what happened to Moses's face was that it started shining.

It had such radiance that the people of Israel, when Moses came down,

were terrified of him and said, you got to put on a veil. All right, you're freaking us out.

And so they hid the glory of God from themselves because they didn't,

they were scared of it. They didn't want it.

And so Paul is using this analogy again in chapter four with the glorious face

about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.

And then when he says the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus.

Paul, even though he had hardship, he had remarkable encounters with God.

On the road to Damascus, He heard the voice and saw the brilliant light.

He was blind for three days. He fasted. He didn't eat or drink for those three days.

And God talked to him on multiple occasions then.

We also have the story where Paul says he was called up to the third heaven.

He was called up into God's throne room.

Like he has had remarkable experiences.

But he says, none of it, none of these experiences surpass knowing the glory of Jesus Christ.

For Paul, this is the ultimate thing. And this is the concept,

the idea that gets him over when determination runs out.

When that feeling of want or the feeling of, yeah, this is what I desire to

do. When that fades away, Paul's like, I just remember Jesus.

And the glory of His face.

So this is all kind of more cerebral for what Paul is saying.

How do we, when we're answering the question of how do we stay positive and

be good workers for the Lord in these chaotic times?

Paul's like, it starts in your brain. First of all, you have to know who Jesus is.

You have to know what he did for you. And it's not about the experiences that

I've had, but it's about him and what he's done for me. within this new covenant,

in this shedding of his blood.

And so Paul moves on with this cerebral notion in mind.

Verse seven, we now have this light, the glory of Jesus shining in our hearts,

but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure.

This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.

The concept of jars of clay or these clay jars was a common expression in Paul's

day for the fragility of the human body and spirit.

Because the determination is not always there.

The feeling of following after Jesus in this dark world is not always there.

And Paul says, yeah, I get that. And I've experienced it too.

But I continue. I am determined to follow Jesus.

Because of the great power that he gives to me.

And it's at times where we don't want to step forward, at times where we don't

want to really go after Jesus or pursue the holiness that he calls us to,

that we have to rely on the spirit of God that dwells in all true believers and.

He continues in verse eight. We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed.

We are perplexed, but not driven to despair.

We are hunted down, but never abandoned.

We get kicked down, but we are not destroyed. Through suffering,

our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus

may also be seen in our bodies.

And so he's like, yeah, life is hard. You're crushed on every side.

You're perplexed. like it's not easy, but through that suffering,

through that pain, through that turmoil, and we went over Jesus's last hours

last week, line by line, verse by verse in the gospel of Mark.

Through suffering, our suffering, we can say, yeah, Jesus endured too.

Jesus went through it all as well.

Through suffering, we take part in the death of Jesus because that's where he suffered the most.

He says, this is a reminder to us that Jesus persevered.

Jesus was determined. He set his mind to go to Jerusalem and to carry out the

plan that his father had for him.

Even though it wasn't going to be easy, even though it was challenging and even

though suffering was ahead for him, He determined it in and of in himself.

This is what I'm going to do. That prayer that he prayed, not my will, but your will be done.

I don't want to go through this suffering, but I am submitting to you.

Through the suffering that we have, we are enabled to say, like Jesus,

I have suffered for the name of God.

And this is where we need to take a step back. because not all suffering is

because of persecution. Not all suffering is because of the chaos in this world.

Suffering happens to us based on the choices of other people.

Suffering happens to us because we live in a fallen world.

But suffering for Jesus' name, that's what Paul is talking about here.

And that's the suffering he endured, where he was stoned, where he was beaten,

where he was imprisoned, where he was shipwrecked.

This is what he endured. The disciples of Jesus in the early chapters of Acts

also had a very similar response to when they were beaten.

You see, they walked out of the beatings by the religious leaders and they rejoiced

because they were considered worthy enough to suffer for Jesus's name.

It's about a mind that's focused on Jesus and his glory and we take a step back

and we say, he must increase and I must decrease.

And when we do this, the life of Jesus can live in and through us.

His generosity, his goodness, his healing, his restoration, his justice, his truth.

Just think of all the stories you know about Jesus.

His life, where he talked to the woman at the well in Samaria.

His life, where he rebuked the religious leaders for being hypocrites,

for being like whitewashed tombs.

His life where he saw suffering and he stepped in and he took care of it.

This is the life that we can live because of him.

When we, through suffering, remember the death of Jesus so that the life of

Jesus may be apparent in us.

And so we need, as we're answering this question, to really understand that

suffering doesn't mean that you're being punished.

Suffering doesn't mean that the God of this world, as Paul describes him,

is winning or victorious.

The suffering that we experience is all about us being refined and purified in who God wants us to be.

So that his life, his truth, his justice, his mercy can live through us.

Verse 11, yes, we live under constant danger of death because we serve Jesus,

so that the life of Jesus will be evident in our dying bodies.

So we live in the face of death, but this has resulted in eternal life for you.

But we continue to preach because we have the same kind of faith the psalmist

had when he said, I believed in God, so I spoke.

We know that God who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus and

present us to himself together with you.

All of this is for your benefit.

And as God's grace reaches more and more people, there will be great thanksgiving

and God will receive more and more glory.

That is why we never give up.

Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed day by day.

For our present troubles are small and won't last very long,

yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever.

So we don't look at the troubles we can see now, rather we fix our gaze on things

that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone,

but the things we cannot see will last forever.

And so Paul ends it on what we need to focus on.

When we go through this life, how we can stay positive, how we can continue

to be a good worker for God in troubling times is to keep our eyes focused on the real prize.

And what Paul says is that that prize is unseen, basically eternal.

It's being with God in eternity forever and ever and ever.

And so we press on, we are determined in and of ourselves to pursue this relationship

with God because of who he is and what he has in store for those who persevere.

The whole idea and concept of this great question really goes back to when we

talked about hope hope at the beginning of the year.

And our hope has to be in a preferred future, the vision we see for ourselves in the future.

And that needs to be an eternity with God, where he wipes every tear from our eye.

Where we get to see him face to face, where there is no more sickness or dying

or death, where all the present troubles that we are going through will melt away.

This week, I was really challenged to look at God in a different way.

I went through Revelation chapter four this week.

And in Revelation chapter four, it talks about worship in heaven.

So John gets called up into heaven in the spirit, and he experiences some remarkably awesome things.

One of them are four living creatures who have different faces.

One a human face, one a face like an ox, one like a lion, and the fourth like an eagle in flight.

And they are constantly saying night and day, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God,

the almighty, the one who always was, who is, and who is still to come.

These heavenly beings rejoicing in who God is,

seeing him in his glory and in his radiance, and they're crying out, holy,

holy, holy.

Also, John sees in the throne room 24 chairs with 24 elders sitting on them.

And as these living heavenly beings are shouting praises to God,

these 24 elders cast their crowns before the throne and say, You are worthy,

O Lord our God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things,

and they exist because you created what you pleased.

And the thing that really stood out to me was the word worthy.

I found out this week that the term worship comes from an older English word called worth-ship.

And when we worship God, we're ascribing to him worth to be praised,

to be honored, to be glorified.

Now, it's not the easiest thing in the world to do when this world is in chaos

and there's turmoil going on in our own households, in our community, and in our world.

But Paul said, guys, keep your eyes where they belong. Keep your eyes on Jesus.

Remember the glory that he showed upon Moses That was shining through that the

Israelites were scared of That's nothing to be scared of You ascribe worth to

God And that is how, in my opinion,

where God has led me this week That's how we continue to be a good worker for

God And to stay positive Because we know who our God is and we know that he

reigns forever and ever and ever.

And we know that he is, when we believe in Jesus, preparing a place for us to be with him.

Keep our eyes on our hope for the future.

Keep our worship to God because he is worthy of everything we can give to him.

All honor and power and glory are his.

Yes, it's hard to stay positive and to continue to work for the Lord.

But determination, it's doing something even when the feeling of wanting to do it has passed away.

And you can ask any married couple who's been married for any length of time,

those really good feelings of when you get married, they're not always gonna be there.

And you have to be determined in that relationship. Yeah, you're my life partner

and I'm gonna be with you forever.

It's a really good characteristic to have. And if we're going to stay positive

and if we're going to continue to be a good worker for God, we need it in our

hearts and in our minds. Let's pray.

Lord God Almighty, we just thank you that you are worthy of worship and you are the only one who is.

Father, we ask for your spirit to come upon us, to mold us and make us into who you want us to be.

Keep us determined to continue to be a good worker for you and follow after you.

And Father, when we experience the storms in this life,

I pray, Father, that we will run into them and not away from them,

that we will not prolong our suffering, but that we will shorten our suffering by facing them head on.

And Father, in everything that we do, as we approach or are in the midst of suffering right now.

Pray that you will keep our hearts and our minds full of integrity so that we

don't try any backhanded, back-channel ways to get to the end goal,

but that we focus on you and your will for us.

So reveal to us what that is and change us by it.

Jesus, we ask this in your name. Amen.

Thank you again for joining us

in our discussion on staying positive as we serve God in troubling times.

This series was designed to promote questions in and amongst followers of Jesus.

Remember, it is good to ask questions. Questions show you want to learn.

Be curious and always ask questions. In our next episode, we will look at the

healing power of God. Have a great week.