We continue looking at the book of Colossians this morning, and we come to Colossians 1 and then over into Colossians chapter 2 The normal Christian disciples life is Discovering along the way that the plans that we had are not going according to our schedule That the things that we had thought about The jobs we had anticipated or the particular success to which we had looked forward to the particular marriage We thought would certainly come our way at age 22 and three months years old The house with the white picket fence or Anything else that was in our mind as the normal life and the normal Christian life We have often discovered things don't go that way There are twists and turns in our career paths. There are Children that don't come When we pray for them and Children who do come whether we pray for them or not that sometimes we wish we pray for differently God is full of twists and turns in our lives Because he has something else in mind for us Then we expect this is what this passage is really all about It's the something else that God has in mind for us The something unexpected There's something we did not anticipate There's something that comes that is even hard Not what we planned for And there's something that deeply challenges us In ways that God intends to use
Someone once said, I know God will not give me anything. I can't handle. I just wish he didn't trust me so much
Why is it that the Apostle Paul can begin this sentence? This passage With this statement. I rejoice in my sufferings Is he psychotic? Is it diluted? Is he masochistic? What kind of person is it who rejoices in Suffering the answer is very plain in this text and Very plain in the life of the Apostle Paul and very plain in the lives of all of those Scripture has chosen to portray to us as Models for our life and growth in the things of Christ Most especially the Lord Jesus himself The answer here is that the Apostle Paul knows something about suffering that most of us are still learning It produces something unexpected Suffering produces something unexpected and Something that is far greater than we think
Paul is saying that every time you experience suffering as a Christian You are participating in a pattern a Pattern which was established by Jesus himself Here is the pattern. I can say it in four words Trouble now Glory then We suffer with Christ in order that we might be glorified with him That's a direct statement from the Apostle Paul elsewhere But it is a direct statement of all of the Bible's intentions for our understanding the warp and wound of our lives Particularly the parts of our lives which are not going the way we wish they were You are participating in a pattern which Jesus established Trouble now and Glory then We suffer With Christ in order that we may participate in the glory Into which he has already coming himself And which he is preparing for us a promise from your pastor Get a hold of this idea and it will change everything About your life Real followers of Jesus Christ Participate in his sufferings Because they deliberately follow the pattern which he established deliberately that doesn't mean we seek the sufferings out Oh, no, they'll come to us. We don't need to find them But the pattern wrote is clear in Romans 8 chapter chapter 8 verses 17 through 18 where Paul says we are heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ provided we suffer with him in Order that we might be glorified with him For I consider that the sufferings of this present time Paul says there are Not to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us This is a typical pattern There is a time of suffering And after the time of suffering there will be a fullness of God's glory It was the pattern of Jesus's own life He brews 12 verse two Jesus for the joy set before him endured the cross That makes no sense In any terms Except understanding things from a vantage point of God's ultimate purposes in your life For the joy set before him Jesus endured the cross Jesus intentionally Connected the suffering which he experienced With the joy that he knew would follow and In fact, he was saying you cannot have one without the other When the apostle Paul was knocked to his knees on the road to Damascus and he came face to face with Jesus Jesus said of him I will show him Paul how much he must suffer for the sake of my name What an introduction to the Christian life This is Paul's conversion This is not the way that I would probably likely sit down with you if you were honestly here this morning saying I don't know if I believe the Christian faith is true And I hope that there are many of you who are here who are saying that we're glad that you're here But my honest instinct would be to sit down with you and tell you all the wonderful benefits that will come to you if you become a Christian And I'm not likely to say I need to tell you about all the difficulties and all the suffering that are going to come your way if you become a Christian But how could I be honest and in some ways do otherwise? For down the road if you do become a Christian in six months or a year or six years You will experience something of the sufferings that are akin to those that Jesus and Paul suffered And in fact if you don't a Large question needs to be written in your mind Do I really know this same Savior? Do I know the one who told me that the Christian life is Trouble now and glory then you see the Apostle Paul knew that his suffering was an indicator like the turn signal on our cars Say you're driving down a very ordinary street. It may be not attractive at all Some would barren houses run down not pretty Not many shrubs or trees One of these hundred degree days where the sun is just beating down on the asphalt You're going to turn right you turn on your indicator and you turn in all of a sudden The the street before you changes into one of these leafy green Beautiful places where the road is overshadowed with the trees and everything is lush and lovely and green
That is what Paul is saying He is saying that you're in the car you're going down the road of life and your turn indicator better beyond Because right now it isn't all pretty, but you're going to turn the car He says the same thing in the parallel passage in Philippians chapter three that is perhaps very well known to many of you He says I pray that I might know him and the power of his resurrection and may share in his sufferings Becoming like him in his death That I may attain to the resurrection of the dead This pattern you see Trouble now glory then This is the only way we can make sense of what Paul goes on to say In my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body That is a very odd expression And taken by itself and taken out of context it is open to a great deal of misunderstanding Paul understands what all of you should understand all of us should understand Namely that reconciliation with God was accomplished by Jesus' work on the cross and that that work is complete There is nothing to add to it There is nothing more I do by way of my own effort Even my faith does not add to the work of Christ But my faith is merely the response to the completed Once and for all accomplishment of Jesus on the cross So why does he put it this way that my sufferings are filling up the afflictions of Christ? When uniquely and completely Jesus has accomplished everything There is nothing missing There is no shortfall There is no lack in what Christ did Paul therefore is not saying that there's anything that we must do to add to Christ's suffering to make it effective The issue is not one of effectiveness but of timing He is saying that in God's plan for the way in which it is all going to unfold That is everything moves toward the end of history There are appointed sufferings For him For every Christian That fill up the period between Christ's sufferings And the end of history which is glory with him In fact, some commentators believe that the implication of Paul's words here is that there is a fixed amount of suffering A precise amount as it were that must take place before the end comes We suffer We sometimes wonder Because it appears that God has forgotten us We wonder if God even Knowes that we're going through what we're going through Where is God in my suffering? I say Why is he allowing this to happen? It seems like inevitably I've called some bureaucracy in Washington and been put on hold Forever Never to get an answer to my question Quite to the contrary the Apostle Paul is saying the startlingly opposite thing These sufferings do not indicate that we are not in God's plan Our sufferings are actually the signposts the sure indicators That we are precisely in the middle of its plan for history And that we will be with him when those sufferings are over and that's why I say to you if there is no trouble now in your life And you say oh, I'm blessed because I have no problems. I want to say you're not blessed There's something wrong
Romans 5 says that we exalt in the hope of the glory of God Because and then Paul goes on to say there suffering produces endurance and endurance produces proven character and proven character produces hope His point is That if we want the glory we need to take the suffering which produces certain things in us that prepare us for that glory Now all of this makes more sense and I think is deepened in our understanding When we appreciate as we have often tried to do in these weeks of looking at the book of Colossians The background against which the Apostle Paul writes in the ancient Greek world. He didn't write in a vacuum He wrote with In the context of people who had several ideas Philosophies assumptions about life even about the Christian life and all of those weren't correct Suffering in the ancient world was a word that was used by writers of Greek tragedy to mean those difficulties that come to a person by fate So for example, we may speak of a person who is a tragic figure Say an athlete or a celebrity who seems to have it all going for them and then because they do something silly wrong They abuse drugs or they abuse other people or they begin to use Scientology as a way of saying stupid things We begin to see these people as tragic figures Who somehow have brought upon themselves their own undoing but Paul knows that it is not faith that causes suffering He knows it's not faith, but rather his own faith To take on what God sends him and so Paul sees that God has entrusted to him a certain amount of suffering And that's why he uses the word stewardship to explain it He says that he's like an executor of someone's estate He has a serious obligation to administer the property according to the plan established by the benefactor But in this case, of course the benefactor is the Lord and as the executor Paul is a steward and He's not a steward for property or for a plan or for a program but for a person a Person who has spoken to him whose message was entrusted to him and Paul says that his stewardship is to make this word of God entrusted to him fully known. That's what he says In verse 26, he calls this word of God a mystery He says the mystery hidden for ages and generations, but now revealed to the saints Mystery is an important word. He repeats it two more times in this passage It was an important word in Colossi and in this Greek culture in which Paul lived It was what was promised by the secret cults the so-called mystery religions That were rampant in the Greek ancient world and particularly in Colossi and Which unfortunately some Christians in Colossi were saying you know what those guys have looks pretty good We need to borrow or imitate some of it and incorporate some of their way of thinking into our Christian lives So some Christians were saying you know, there's an exclusivity to the Christian faith There's an inner group an inner circle of people who really get it
Some were saying that there's a kind of self-promoting glory in the Christian faith that they were seeking to Enjoy and Others said that the Christian life promised a kind of spiritual perfection now Paul is trumping these Colossian mystery cults By saying in effect. Do you want mystery? Let me tell you about mystery Let me tell you about what the real mystery is in other words He does what he often does he takes a word that is being misused in his own time and he fills it with the right content He says the mystery that you really need to know about has been hidden from ages and in generations It's been gradually revealed in the Old Testament, but now it has been fully revealed to his saints in Christ And it is revealed not to a select inner group It is revealed to all the mankind which is why he makes in this passage as he does elsewhere the contrast between Jews and Greeks the Jews wanted it to be just for them and Some of the Greek cultists wanted the truth the spiritual truth of the faith to be just for them But Paul says no It's for the Gentiles to and that word Gentiles Paul's code word for everybody Every kind of person Every sort of human being And he repeats in verse 28 the word everybody three times to make that point The gospel isn't just for certain kinds of folks. It's for all kinds of folks now to be sure we know Not everyone receives the gospel we know that But it is for Everyone as FF Bruce says there is no part of the Christian teaching that is to be reserved for a spiritual Elite all the truth of God is for all the people of God
And then Paul goes on to say that the mystery is not just revealed to the saints in Christ But the mystery is Christ The riches of the glory as he puts it in verse 27 the riches of the glory of this mystery Is Christ in you the hope of glory Which relates to our central theme of understanding the whole book of Galatian of Colossians to which I called your attention repeatedly Chapter three verse three that our lives are hidden with Christ We are with Christ In Christ united to Christ and he is in us United to us The hope of glory This mystery is one writer puts it in as I suggested a moment ago is not a timetable of events But it is a person And it is knowing this person that makes you mature Paul says in chapter one verse 28 28th an interesting verse because some of your translations some of the translations that probably some of you have or looking at even this morning Translate the word mature in verse 28 as the word perfect so that it reads this way Paul's goal is to present everyone perfect in Christ Well in the ancient Greek way of thinking The perfect man was the ideal person We've said this before strong In control Aware of his own importance Showing no weakness whatsoever The perfect person would never suffer especially physically Because the ideal Greek man was a pletonic man he followed Plato who lived 500 years before Christ And he'll believe that there was a kind of upstairs of the mind and beauty and aesthetics and control and poetry and life And then there was the downstairs of the rest of us the physical appetites And so the notion of physically suffering Was something that was despicably wrong and misunderstood You know how Paul worked with his hands makes a point of that on the number of occasions in his letters He was a tent maker and it is often pointed out that one of the reasons he did that is that he did not want to be a financial burden To the churches that would have to support him instead of giving money to other causes and that is true But there's much more to the reason why Paul was a tent maker He deliberately worked with his hands He deliberately did that which in the Greek ideal would be seen as wrong As lowly As inferior And he was trying to say by that don't you understand that the Christian life is physical material That it incorporates everything mind heart spirit body appetites are physical being
The perfect Greek ideal man would never suffer But Paul says the mature person in Christ does suffer and understands that suffering is a part of what he or she is called to
Let me put it to you this way Is Jesus still suffering right now in heaven It's a trick question Because in the one hand you want to say no of course not he's a but he's finished his suffering once and for all But the other answer to the question is yes, he is suffering in the church in his body in its members So when the apostle Paul was stopped on the road to Damascus where he's going to pursue Christians Jesus says to him why are you persecuting me But Jesus is already in heaven how could Paul be persecuting Jesus and the answer Because he was persecuting the body of Christ So Charles Spurge in the great Baptist preacher of 120 years ago says Do we not become members of the body of the divine person of Christ Yes The same blood that flows in the head flows in the hand And the same life that quickens Christ quickens his people For Spurge and says quoting our theme from Colossians you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God if Christ suffered you and I as his hands and feet and eyelashes and kidneys and kneecaps and toenails We will suffer
The afflicted in the Old Testament were promised today The poor those ravaged by natural disasters Those who had plagues of locusts Who experienced starvation These people were promised that there would become a day when everything would be changed But that day is not here yet For God has set a definite measure of suffering that is to be filled up Against the promise of that day
Now do you think that these promises of Suffering are physical in nature The answer is yes, they are They're not exclusively physical, but they are certainly not less than physical So Paul could say in 2nd Corinthians chapter 4 verse 8 We are afflicted in every way but not crushed Perplexed but not driven to despair Persecuted but not forsaken Struck down but not destroyed now is that physical suffering or emotional suffering or spiritual suffering or psychic suffering Answer it's all of the above And this is how he goes on in the next verse to explain it verse 10 of 2nd Corinthians 4 Always carrying around in the body the death of Jesus So that the life of Jesus They may be manifested in our bodies For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus's sake So that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh there it is Trouble now glory then but But note the glory then begins now There's a certain sense in which we are also experiencing the glory of the life of Jesus That's why this is not a doomsday message That's why this is not sad what I'm saying to you That's not why this is not something horrible that you should go away and be depressed all afternoon about Because to the degree that you are experiencing the sufferings of Christ in some measure Then to that degree the promise of God is that you are also beginning to experience a foretaste of that glory Which admittedly you will not completely experience until you are with him
In the body we suffer and in the body we will experience glory That's what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15 where he says For this perishable body must put on imperishable and this mortal body must put on immortality This is God's plan. I didn't invent this plan Paul didn't invent this plan No church leader in the last 2000 years has invented this plan God the father and God the son and God the Holy Spirit in eternal counsel prepared a plan and the plan is that you and I would grow closer to Jesus By our experiencing Sharing his sufferings now and that one day that will be consummated Completed fulfilled when we experience his glory Completely this is very anti-photonic It could not get more anti-classical Greek and it could not get more different than the way many of us Want to read our new test and it's now The message given through our lives is given incarnational
The incarnation is one of the greatest doctrines in christian thinking God became flesh God came down Every other religion the aspiration of the religion is that we rise up to God's level In christianity the aspiration is to grasp that he has come down to our level It's incarnational in flesh and it is in flesh that we will experience trial and suffering and it is in flesh that we will experience glory One day we will see Jesus in glory But we will also see the nail marks The wounds in his side and Paul speaks of those wounds elsewhere as glorified wounds And that's the way he speaks of your suffering It's going to be glorified As painful and as hard and as difficult as it may be now That suffering is in the process of God glorifying it Making it wonderful Through these sufferings christians enter into the kingdom of God Look in Acts chapter 14 the apostle poem Paul was stoned in a place called Listera I can't think of a thing that's more incarnational than stoning You think when Paul was being stoned he said sticks and stones and they break my bones, but you know No It hurt to have stones thrown at him He suffered in the body in the flesh
So why can he say I rejoice in my sufferings Because he likes to be a martyr Because he likes to inflict pain on himself no Because he knows his suffering is going somewhere It has a result better than anything Anything that we can imagine Our sufferings reveal a mystery The mystery His Christ in you
You in Christ Christ belonging to you You belonging to Christ and the marks of that belonging Are that we share in his afflictions Paul is saying that all Christians all true Christians will suffer in one way or another for some it might be outward suffering even a form of persecution For others it's inward A long slow battle with sickness and and we just say this I hadn't planned to but I'll say it as as I get older I am around more people who are getting sick And in fact whose lives are defined by deteriorating physical conditions So that they must spend more and more of their time Thinking about the maintenance of these physical bodies
And I want to tell you that if I did not believe that there was being prepared for these dear people and for myself Gloring It would be very depressing or how about this Bearing the hurts of others Christians do that you know we bear the hurts of others like Christ bore our hurts Or anxieties or pressures that come when you take some position of leadership in Christ church do not eagerly seek to be an elder a deacon a Bible study leader a a Sunday school teacher Yes, in some ways eagerly seek it But be aware of what you're getting into as you seek it because with these responsibilities will come a certain measure of suffering that grows from the responsibilities attached therein or take the struggle that Some have the life long Unrelenting Unmitigating wicked and mean struggle they have with temptation of one kind or another
Or as one author put it the doubts and uncertainties which accompany the obedience of faith doubts and uncertainties That accompany the obedience of faith all of these Paul says are things to rejoice in Because they are signs that the mystery Of Christ in you Of you hidden in Christ Are being revealed That's why we can rejoice in them So Paul says in second Corinthians chapter four given all of this do we lose heart
And you know what i want to say If it weren't for the second two words and all we had was the first two words trouble now you bet we lose heart But the second two words glory then means we don't lose heart Because we live somehow now in the reality of that glory. We taste it We get glimpses of it by God's good grace
So we're back to where we started I know that God will not give me anything. I can't handle. I just wish wish that he didn't trust me so much
Or as CS Lewis put it so wisely and so deeply We are not necessarily doubting he said That God will do the best for us Even in our suffering But we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be
And that is an honest question
You know how to have trouble now
Mary a minister My wife has learned more about trouble by being married to me Than she ever could have learned any other way But this is what it produces I am struggling with my sermon last night There are times when minister struggle with their sermons and their times and they come easy This one did not come easy I kept trying to figure out how to say it. I I literally this is Funny if you were there I literally had my sermon cut up in little pieces all over the floor of my study last night Because when I went to look at it at six o'clock in the evening it made no sense to me I thought it was all done It made no sense to me And I ended up having to cut it up into little pieces and paste it all together again And Barbara walks in the middle of this process and she says oh cut and paste time we're in for it now
And then she brought me this Which is what she wrote yesterday morning in her devotions Just coincidentally How to suffer purposely she said Remember Christ's pattern That's what she said Remember Christ's example
Remember the past times of suffering she said when God Has brought you through and given you a glimpse of his glory In and through it remember that let it be encouragement to you Pray that you will have eyes to see his daily provision
In the midst of your suffering and pray that you will know how to take your position And stand Not seeking your way out of the suffering but looking to him
Which Barbara went on here to call the weight of faith W-A-I-T the weight of faith To know how to cast your burden on the Lord and leave it there in prayer
When I suffer I think too much about it Oh, I pray but then I grab it back and start planning my own schemes for how I can get out of this suffering Leave it there. This one's really interesting When you suffer Still continue to minister to those with needs in your midst
Even through your own suffering Continue to give your life away
Keep the song of the gospel alive in your heart The undercurrent of chorus in your life
the undercurrent That Jesus paid it all And Suffering now Means glory then and she striving to control she said And enter The rest of God in the midst of your difficulty
This is the pattern It's not a masochistic pattern It's not a pattern that comes out of delusion It's not a pattern that actually Pretends that the real world isn't there
This is precisely the opposite This is the pattern that recognizes what the real world is And lives in it Live in it friends Live in it Following Paul who followed crust Trouble now Glory then But keep your eyes open in the meantime For the little sparks of glory That God lets us see Along the way