Reader: TBD
Title: A Confidence Suffering Can’t Take Away
Call To Worship: 1 Peter 1:3-7
Leader:
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,
All:
5 who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, 7 so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Second Call To Worship: PLAY WITH INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC
SLIDE 1 (25 seconds)
Matthew 6:19-21
19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
SLIDE 2 (25 seconds)
Matthew 5:10
10 “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
SLIDE 3 (25 seconds)
John 15:20 Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.
2 Timothy 3:13 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted
Central Text:
32 But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, 33 sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. 34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. 35 Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. 36 For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. 37 For,
“Yet a little while,
and the coming one will come and will not delay;
38 but my righteous one shall live by faith,
and if he shrinks back,
my soul has no pleasure in him.”
39 But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.
Benediction:
Romans 8-18-25
18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Notable Quotes:
“We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain
"Never did the church so much prosper and so truly thrive as when she was baptized in the blood. The ship of the church never sails so gloriously along as when the bloody spray of her martyrs falls on her deck. We must suffer and we must die, if we are ever to conquer this world for Christ."
- Charles Spurgeon
"It has become a settled principle that nothing which is good and true can be destroyed by persecution, but that the effect ultimately is to establish more firmly, and to spread more widely, that which it was designed to overthrow. It has long since passed into a proverb that "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.""
- Albert Barnes
“You may never know that JESUS is all you need, until JESUS is all you have.”
― Corrie ten Boom
“The point is plain: while martyrdom is a special category set aside for a select number of Christians (Rev. 6:8-11), persecution is the normal experience of every Christian everywhere. From stiff fines, to family shame, to being kicked off college campuses, to laws against sharing our faith, to unjust trials, to public mockery and scorn, to arrest and brutality, if we faithfully follow Jesus in this world we all will face persecution at some point in our Christian discipleship.”
Kevin DeYoung
Questions:
Pastoral Notes:
Commentaries used:
Bruce, F.F. “The New International Commentary on The New Testament: The Epistle to The
Hebrews” Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964
Hendriksen, William and Kistemaker,Simon J. “New Testament Commentary: Thessalonians,
The Pastorals, and Hebrews” Grand Rapids: Baker Academic 1984
Hughes, Philip Edgecumbe. “A Commentary on The Epistle to The Hebrews”
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1977
Lane, William L. “Word Biblical Commentary 47A”
Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1991
32 But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings,
The original audience the author of Hebrews was writing to were indeed people who had endured great suffering. The original Greek woodenly reads “you endured a great conflict of sufferings’. Suffering never is something that leaves you neutral. It will either push you to become cold and hardened to God and the world, or push you right to his throne room to meet him and experience his grace. The author of Hebrews has been unpacking in ch. 10 what it means to live out a confident faith. Yet, suffering seems to strip us of our confidence. There is nothing more unnerving and disruptive than it is to suffer and or be persecuted for your faith. Yet, what suffering does is strip us of any confidence we have in ourselves or our things. That sounds terrible, but we must realize God is not being abusive to us, he is helping us by showing us only the things that last eternally are the things we must put our confidence in.
That being said, I have personally seen how I am much more attentive spiritually during lean times than fat times. Yet, my faith wavers. Doubts are exposed. Sin is exposed. Anger I have towards God is exposed. Prosperity hides that. I rarely hold up well in suffering and in large part want to do everything I can to avoid it. We must know God’s plan is to redeem this world, to give us eternal bliss in a place free from suffering. Yet, in this period of overlap, we do suffer and it does not mean God loves us less. Look at Jesus, he lived perfectly and yet he suffered.
33 sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated.
They experienced multifaceted suffering which is true of suffering. Suffering can be persecution, ridicule, the monotony of a job, a body that brings constant physical pain, children that have physical and or emotional development issues. What we see here is the diversity of their suffering. They were publicly exposed, the Greek word literally means to be brought on stage. It carries with it the notion of the fear we all have, of speaking in front of people on stage in the nude. They experienced a suffering that brought afflictions. They word for affliction means to press together. Growing up we had a garbage compactor. It is the same thought, things gets hard pressed together in our suffering. They shared in the same suffering of others. It was a trying time to say the least.
34 For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.
Here we see how suffering changed their disposition towards others. Suffering makes us far more compassionate to others if suffering weaves grace into our hearts. They became a people who had understanding, compassion and sympathy towards those in prison. What does that mean? While I do not know exactly what their previous attitude was towards prisoners, we do know this is mentioned and mentioned for a reason. It is likely this is reflective of a change in disposition. We all struggle to be judgemental and unsympathetic towards others we simply say ‘i can't relate to them or that’ .We all tend to distance ourselves from people or situations like that. The way suffering weaved grace into their hearts moved them closer to people, not further. It made them far more sympathetic of people. It also made them hold far looser to things we all seek to make us happy or to define ourselves. The text literally says they had gladness and joy when their stuff was taken from them. Huh? How is that possible? The author gives several clues. He uses two different Greek words here for property. In referring to the earthly loss of property, the author simply uses a word that means ‘things you have’, but later in talking about a ‘better possession’ he uses the Greek word for property, wealthy, goods. He says it's the heavenly ones that are real, not the earthly ones. It is not heavenly ones that are of substance, not the earthly ones becuase they last forever.
35 Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward.
The literal Greek word for confidence means “free and fearless confidence, cheerful courage, boldness, assurance”. What does it stem from? It stems from understanding there are eternal lasting rewards awaiting those in Christ. In the face of suffering NT writers were not being pollyannish about it. They constantly fed them with a diet of understanding that life ends one's day, you suffer in this life, happiness is never found in seeking to avoid it all costs and true happiness comes from being so united to christ in the heaviness that your hopeful for his return at any minute.
36 For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. 37 For,
“Yet a little while,
and the coming one will come and will not delay;
38 but my righteous one shall live by faith,
and if he shrinks back,
my soul has no pleasure in him.”
39 But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls
The hard juxtaposition the author had to deal with was simultaneously trying to comfort and warn his audience. In the face of persecution, they began to draw back in concealment, feeling justified to do so as well. Here, he quotes from Habakkuk 2 which was a messianic prophecy of the righteous one to come (the messiah). This messiah would be identified that he would be obedient to the end on behalf of his people. The garden of gethsemane best demonstrates this. Jesus fully submitted himself to the father while everyone of his disciples abandoned him. In response to such faith, this is our salvation. Jesus is faithful for us. Consider that after the resurrection, Jesus did not give up on those disciples. He built his church on people who abandoned him during persecution. Yet, it was this that changed them. Grace changed them.
The point the author is making is that if our lives are characterized by concealment of our faith, of avoiding all suffering and ridicule that comes with being identified with Jesus. Then we must respond by evaluating our faith. We may not actually be a christian. A Christian by no means is saved by their faithfulness, but by the faithfulness of another. Yet, if that faithfulness of Jesus is ours, our faith cannot be concealed.