Audio Transcript:

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Good morning. Welcome to Mosaic Church. My name is Jan, I'm one of the pastors here at Mosaic along Pastor Shane and Pastor Andy. If you're new or visiting, we'd love to connect with you. We do that through the connection card you can get in the back of the worship center, if you fill it out, and then just leave it there on the way out, we'll get in touch with you over the course of the week. With that said, would you please pray with me over the preaching of God's Holy Word?

Heavenly Father, we thank you for the start of a new sermon series through this incredible book of 2 Corinthians. We thank you, Lord, that you called your servant, Paul, to yourself. Is by your will that he became an Apostle, and you're the one who inspired him with the Holy Spirit to write these holy words. We pray right now Holy Spirit, come take these words and apply them to us individually as Christians, apply them to us as a church. St. Paul wasn't just writing to the church in Corinth, he was writing to the church in Boston. He knew the same problems that they had there, we will encounter and do encounter. And it's only by your spirit that we can make our way through.

I pray Holy Spirit, focus our attention on Jesus Christ, who truly unites us. We're in Christ, we're one body in Christ, and we have one mission from Christ, to go and make disciples of all nations and all nations are here. They're all around us. They are our neighbors. And I pray during the sermon series, that you ignite our hearts for sharing the gospel, proclaiming the gospel, speaking it, each one of us to get a vision of each one of us speaking to our friends and our neighbors. There is only one hope, There is only one way to be saved, to be reconciled with God, to be forgiven of sin. I pray Lord during the series, save many, draw them to yourself. I pray that you send awakening, a great awaken, use George Whitfield right here in the Boston Common, he preached to 30,000 people. Lord why not? Why not? Why not now and why not us? I pray that you bless our time with the Holy Scriptures and I pray all this in Jesus name. Amen.

We today are beginning a sermon series through 2 Corinthians, we're calling it prodigal church season two, we did season one a few years ago. It's online if you want to listen. And season two, we're going through 2 Corinthians. Why are we calling it prodigal church? Because the church has always been in a sense prodigal, because the church is full of saints who are still sinners. You're saved, but you're still in the flesh. There's still temptation of the flesh of the world of Satan all around us. So it's a tug of war for each one of us and it's a tug of war for the faithfulness of the church.

I remember a few years back, I was taking my daughters to school, and right here off of Babcock Street on the sidewalk, I saw a little plant growing through a crack, just from a crack, a little plant. And I just kept watching it every day as I'm taking my girls to school and little by little by little, I realized there was a tomato plant. And then finally I'm walking to school and there's a little tiny tomato hanging off the plant. For me, that was a sign from God, an illustration, an image of what it means to be a Christian in Boston, Massachusetts, and what it means to be a church in Boston, Massachusetts. And we've been at this for ... we're going to be celebrating a decade come October, and it's just a decade of God's faithfulness.

I was at a convenience store in Austin this week, and the owner of the store's a guy named Pete. And I met Pete when he just opened the store right before the pandemic. And anytime I go in there and I asked him how he's doing, he says the same thing. I'm still here. And he asked me how I'm doing and I'm like, I'm still here. We're still here. We're still at it. And he told me, he said, I'm from India. I'm from India. And we have a saying in India that if you start something, you need to know that you are not quitting that thing for three years. Whatever it is that you start, do not quit that thing for three years. And I said, why three years? He said, 1,000 days. And I don't know why, but that just connected. 1,000 days.

I bring that in to say this is how St. Paul viewed his church planting work. He started a church in Corinth. He spent 18 months, a year and a half in Corinthians, he started the church with his disciples Timothy and Silas and the godly couple Aquila and Priscilla, and they went to Corinth because Corinth was strategic. It was the number three city in the Roman Empire after Alexandria and Rome. It was situated in the Isthmus of Greece. So it was a master of harbors, they call, it was the crossroads of the Roman Empire. They call that passage of all mankind. It was economically bustling.

So people would go to Corinth to make a new life for themselves, a name for themselves, to create wealth for themselves and their family. It was a city filled with materialism and pride and self-confidence. There was sports, entertainment, the isthmian games were held there, they had a theater for 18,000 people, a concert hall for 3,000 people. People went there to make a life for themselves and people went there to sin. Those are their goals. I'm going to get away from my family and get away from my traditions, I'm going to go where no one knows me and I can be whoever I want to be. I'm going to recreate an identity. I'm going to indulge. And St. Paul knew that if we plant a church here in this strategic place where people are coming and going, very transient, very expensive, we plant the church here. We're going to reach the Roman Empire. He spends 18 months there, then he leaves and then he starts hearing about problems. He sends a first letter to the Corinthian church by the hand of Titus. We learned about this the 1 Corinthians. That letter preceded 1 Corinthians.

So there's actually three letters that St. Paul sent this church, the first one we don't have, it didn't enter the canon. The second one we do have in 1 Corinthians. And in 1 Corinthians, we see St. Paul writing a letter as a father to his children who are in sin, and he understands if they continue in sin, they are going to die eternally. It's a very difficult letter, 1 Corinthians, he dealt with a number of serious problems, divisions that marred the Brotherhood, a toleration of scandalous behavior, even incest. There were certain men consorting with prostitutes and they were asserting a Christian right to do so, they're free in the Lord, brothers taking one another court, lovelessness of relationships express in the practice of the Lord's Supper where people weren't waiting for the poor people who worked all day. This agreement about eating of meat offered to idols participation and banquets, held in pagan temples. They misuse the spiritual gifts of the Holy Spirit, confusion about the resurrection of the dead. It must have been a hard letter to write, it must have been even harder for them to read and to apply.

No one likes being rebuked, not even by your dad. No one likes being rebuked. No one likes being taken to the woodshed. And that's what 1 Corinthians was. And Paul must have wondered, what do they think? How do they feel about him, and 1 Corinthians makes it clear that someone in the Corinthian church already had a negative opinion about him. So what we learn in this letter in 2 Corinthians that Paul planned to meet Titus to get an update, how's it going in Corinth, and he finally meets Titus, after missing him in Troas, meets him in Philippi, and Titus reports and he says, look, the people who were insane, they are repenting furiously, things are on the mend, the church is doing better, in many ways, but it wasn't all good news. There were still a group of people in the church that refused to submit to St. Paul's authority. There are also false teachers that arrived seeking to advance their own claims, doing their best to discredit Paul, impugn, malign his character, which explains why Paul shares so much of his personal character and story in 2 Corinthians.

So with that context, Paul writes another letter. He relentlessly loves this church. He realized my 1,000 days are not up yet. I'm going to keep pursuing, and that's what 2 Corinthians is all about. Today we're in 2 Corinthians 1, 1 through 11. Would you please look at the text with me? Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God and Timothy, our brother, to the Church of God that is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our afflictions, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ, we share abundantly in comfort too. If we are afflicted it's for your comfort and salvation, if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken. For we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.

We do not want you to be ignorant brothers, the affliction we experienced in Asia, for we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength and weak that we despaired of life itself, indeed we felt that we had received a sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril and He will deliver us. On Him we have set our hope that He will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayer so that many will give thanks in our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many. This is the reading of God's holy infallible, authoritative word, may you write these eternal truths upon our hearts.

Three points to frame up our time. First, love like a sibling, parent the children. Second love like a sinner saint. And third, love number one, anxious less about the rest, and I'll explain what that means. First, love like a sibling, parent the children. Paul begins the letter by explaining that he is a fellow sibling in the church, with the brothers and sisters, the Adelphi, with the other Christians, we are a family. Paul, an Apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother. So Paul here at the same time that he is pointing to his authority saying, I'm a brother just like you, we are siblings, God is our father, Timothy, our brother, Timothy is with Paul as he writes. Paul calls him a brother later on the text. He addresses the Corinthian church as Adelphi, as brothers and sisters.

On the one hand, St. Paul views Timothy as a brother, but if you read first and second Timothy, what does he call Timothy? My precious child. My child. And now this is getting trippy. How are you brothers and your brother's your child? Well, he's talking about spiritual family, and as spiritual family, yes, we are siblings. But my friends, as you grow in the faith, you cannot always remain a sibling, especially as your parents age. In your family, in your family, I have four siblings, and in my family, I am the older brother, and then I have three sisters and a younger brother. And as my parents age, I see just a deeper desire to care for my own siblings in a way that my dad does. My dad has his own relationship with my siblings, with each one of them just like I have my own relationship with each one of the siblings. I have a group chat with each single one of them, and then we have group chat where there's three of us, excluding the other two. And then we did a group chat of the four of us excluding one. And then there's a group chat of the five of us, but my dad can't do that. My dad's got a group chat of the whole family because he cares for the whole family.

This is St. Paul group chat letter to the whole family. I'm your brother, but I'm also your dad. And he calls himself an Apostle, an Apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, he's an Apostle. He's an Apostle ... a capital A, I don't know why in the ESV they may have small A, is capital A, he's one of the 12. He's one of the 12 called by Jesus Christ and you had to see the resurrected Christ I witnessed and Jesus called you and Jesus allowed you to see the resurrected of Christ. St. Paul wasn't initially part of the 12, he became the 12th after Judas betrayed Jesus, and Jesus shows up and meets Paul on the road to Damascus. Why does St. Paul start with this? By the will of God. He didn't choose this. God chose me to do this by the will of God. And he's bringing his apostolic credentials because they were under attack. And the opening salvo here in the beginning is a defense of his divine authority as a messenger of the Lord Jesus Christ. The resurrected Christ himself called Paul to follow him and to reject the authority of Paul the Apostle is to reject the authority of Christ. God chose Paul, God filled him with a spirit, and to reject the writings of Paul is to reject God.

I say that because this is still relevant. This is all relevant. So many in the church today say I love the writings of Jesus. I don't like the writings of Paul. Well, here's something, is like fun fact Bible trivia. Jesus never wrote anything. The only time Jesus wrote anything was with his finger when the woman caught in adultery was brought to Him, the Pharisees are like, alright, what are we going to do? And Jesus is writing on the ground. I don't know what He wrote. No one knows what he wrote. That was the only thing Jesus Christ ever wrote. So every single book that we have in the New Testament is a book written by either an Apostle, or someone who had a close relation with the Apostle, and they were filled with the Holy Spirit. So we do not have the right as Christians to pick and choose. This isn't a buffet. You take it or leave it. And that's why St. Paul starts with this.

And also, he says, Paul, by the will of God, Paul belongs to Christ, the authority that God gives to Paul belongs to Christ. And Paul doesn't own the church. In the same way that Paul belongs to Christ, and Paul's authority belongs to Christ. The church belongs to Christ. Who does the right to? To the church of Paul, although Paul started the church. No, he says to the Church of God, it's not my church. This church isn't my church. It's not your church. This is God's church, and we are God's people assembled under God's word, to worship God, and we're filled with the Holy Spirit of God. He says, grace to you and peace from God, our Father, in the Lord Jesus Christ, we're all under God's grace, and the only way to peace is with God.

2 Corinthians is the most personal of all Paul's letters. He shares details, autobiographical details that he doesn't share in other places. The book is full of references to people, places, events, only shared here in the New Testament. Why? Because Paul is defending himself against the attacks of people who are vying for authority. So Paul rises to his own defense, because his character and credentials as an Apostle are under attack. And he knows if you attack my credentials as an Apostle, you are actually questioning the authority of the Holy Spirit. The false teachers accused Paul of being ... and I find this hilarious because they couldn't find anything wrong with this guy's character. So the only thing they could find was the fact that he didn't keep his appointments.

So later on in this book, this is what they talk about, is Paul, you promised that you are going to come visit us as a church and you did not. And Paul couldn't make it. And then they said, because he couldn't make it, he couldn't be trusted. Paul originally had planned two visits to Corinth, and that changed in Acts 20, he changed to one longer visit. But they didn't understand that they were unforeseen circumstances and reasonable people understand the plans change. But not all people are reasonable. And these false teachers seize on innocent harmless things and they make issues of them. And on the basis of this change [inaudible] of his likeness, of his flip flopping, and this is 2 Corinthians 1:7. He says," was I vacillating when I wanted to do this", meaning come visit? "Do I make my plans according to the flesh ready to say yes, yes, and no, no at the same time?"

And this is what's challenging, I don't even remotely come close to St. Paul. But there is this challenge of when you are called by God to proclaim God's [inaudible] mouthpiece for God that's absolutely flawless. And St. Paul's like, I'm not God. I'm not Jesus. Yes, I wanted to come visit you guys, but I was caught in a shipwreck, I was beaten, I was stoned ... and not the Austin kind of stone, like literally stoned 40 lashes, this happened five times. I'm not God. And this is balance of like, yes, this person is called by God and filled with the Spirit, but I'm not God. Yes, sometimes I wake up and I'm in a bad mood and I don't even know why, and then I realize is because I haven't had coffee. I know. And I say that because I'm just a dude. That's what Paul's saying, I'm the Apostle, but I'm just a dude. I'm just a guy. I'm just trying to love Jesus as much as I possibly can, fight sin with everything I got. Love my wife, love my girls, but I'm just a dude.

Every once in a while I just want to sit back and watch the Sox, watch the Pats, every once in a while I just want to talk about ... whatever, whatever. You know what saying. You know what I'm saying. I have people in my life who I just hang out with, because they don't expect anything out of me. You're a dude, I'm a dude, you know what I'm saying. So that's part of what Paul is doing here, is your expectations of me are unrealistic. I'm just a dude. That's his response. And this is what these people are saying, the false teachers are claiming that Paul isn't to be trusted.

Later on they say, hey, Paul, where's your letters of recommendation? So they accuse him of not having the credentials that he himself had given to Timothy. He had sent letters of recommendation about Timothy to the Corinthians, and then Corinthians are like, where's your letters of recommendation? And St. Paul's like, letters of recommendation? I'm the guy that writes the letters of recommendation. I'm the Apostle. What are you talking about? And then they begin to question his authority. And he's like, you're questioning my authority? You're only Christians because of me. You exist the church in Corinth, you want to authenticate my authority, the fact that you are a Christian. It would be like my daughter Milana who looks the most like me. I take that as a compliment, because she's very beautiful. She looks the most like me. That would be like her coming up to me, would be like, Dad, show me a DNA test that you're my dad. Look in the mirror. Look in the mirror. That's exactly what's going on, is Paul's spiritual children are coming to him and they're like you're not our dad. He's like, what are you talking about? And this group of false teachers also undermine Paul's authority. Why? To increase their own authority. That's what's happening. So Paul writes this letter and he addresses the issues one after another, in the final four chapters, what he does is he exposes the false teachers, answers insinuations that they spread about his character. Here's what I've been wrestling with this whole week. Paul poured his life into this church, into these people, and then he sees it just unravel a little here, he's going to write a letter and then it unravels again, he's going to write 1 Corinthians, unravels again, he's going to write 2 Corinthians, and after 2 Corinthians, he goes, he spends three more months with them. But what he sees is it just unravels, it's one thing after another, bad theology, bad morale, turf wars, petty jealousies, empire building. I'm sure he he was wounded, injured, emotionally, because these people whom he loved so much quickly go from loving him to deep suspicion, from seeing the best in him to believing the worst about this man that God used to save them. And he could have just thrown up his hands and said, you know what, fine, fine. Good luck. Have a nice life. I am done. I'm doneski. I'm going to a different church. I'm going to a different city. I am out of here. You want to follow false teachers, go ahead. But he doesn't.

And this is really ... for some of you, this might be hard to understand, why doesn't he? Why doesn't he just quit? And I'll tell you why. Because dads, good dads do not disown their kids. Good dads do not give up on their kids. You keep loving, you keep pursuing. And this St. Paul, he viewed himself as a spiritual father. He took responsibility for this church. It's not my church, it's God's Church. Ultimately, I want them to know God, that's the best thing for my kids, for them to know God. So here's the practical application, dear friends. Do you view yourself only as a brother or a sister, as a sibling in the church? If so, I want to give you a vision for being a spiritual father or mother, where you come into this church and you're like, oh, we need older people, and I hear this all the time, we need older people and I'm only like 20, I'm only like 25.

Let me tell you something. When Jesus called his disciples, how old were they? How old were the other Apostles when Jesus called them to himself? Only one of them was over the age of 19. And that was Peter. Because Peter and Jesus were the only ones who had to pay the temple tax. And the temple tax was, if you're 19, now you are responsible for the finances of this temple. All of the other guys were teenagers. In the Hebrew culture in Israel, you become a man at 13. So Jesus Christ, He picked up these guys who were 14, 15, 16, 17, they were all under 19, except for one, and then Jesus gets resurrected and then He sends in the Holy Spirit. Now Peter gets up, he's probably in his early 20s, preaches a sermon, and 3,000 people get saved. Now, these young people, early 20s, are spiritual fathers and mothers in the church. Do you view yourself as a spiritual father or mother? And here's what I mean. You take responsibility for the health of everyone else.

For some of you, that's hard to understand, Because the only human life that you are responsible for is your own and you might have another life that you care for, that's your pet. For some of you, your only fatherhood or motherhood is being a dog mom or a dog dad. That's the only ... So this concept is ... This is weird. But this is a true reality that yes, you become a child of God. When you regenerate, you become a child of God. Now you're an infant, now you're a toddler, now you're growing, you're a sibling in the family, but you got to get to a point where you are actually responsible for the church. And this is my prayer that over the course of this series, that you catch this vision that I am responsible. So in your community, I'm responsible for the spiritual health of these people. So I got to care for them. I got to love them. I got to know them. And if we get a vision for that, it's going to change everything. And that explains why St. Paul is willing to deal with the suffering. A lot of people think the Christian life is like a marathon. You just keep running and keep running and keep ... and it's not a marathon, it's not a ... I don't like that analogy.

The Christian life is like a 12 round boxing match, where every single round for three minutes you're going full tilt and then you get a water break and a breather for 30 seconds, 45 seconds as you sit on the stool and coach Jesus massaging your traps, and then you get back in. It's a slugfest. Here's the thing about fighting and I love fighting movies, I love combat sports in general. Here's the thing. The best guys always have something to fight for. And those are the stories that really capture our imagination, that captivate us. You have something to fight for, and that something can't just be money. It's always the family. It's Adrian, that's who it is. It's the boxers who are like, I just had a baby. Now I'm going to go kill a man in a ring. It's that. But it's like, even if I'm not good, I'm going to get pummeled and whatever, I'm going to get check at the end of this whole ... that's what I'm ... So St. Paul is that. He deals with that suffering because he's doing what's best for the family. He's willing to suffer because he wants the best for the family. So that's point one.

Point two is love like a sinner saint. So these people have caused him a lot of pain. They've injured him emotionally, and then Paul writes and he's like, yes, I'm an Apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother to the Church of God, that is in Corinth of God has a church. And the universal church is localized. It's in Corinth, all the saints were in the whole of Achaia, what does he call them? What does he call them? He calls them saints. You're saints. They've sinned. One guy was sleeping with his mother in law, or step mom or something, that's 1 Corinthians 5, just scandalous. And he writes, some guys were sleeping with prostitutes, and they're like, we're doing evangelism, and St. Paul, what? Are you nuts? And he writes, he calls them saints, he addresses them as saints, no matter all the trouble they had cause them, he calls them saints, you're set apart, you're the holy people of God.

And what St. Paul understands is that even the saints, the holy ones can behave badly from time to time, and they weren't saints because of their behavior. They weren't saints because they were perfect. They weren't saints because of their righteous. There's a lot of people who aren't familiar with the teachings of Christianity, they don't understand this and they come in, they're like, a lot of Christians are hypocrites. A lot of Christians are hypocrites. Some of you have unbelieving friends, who would be better Christians than you are. I've got friends like that. The reason why we're saints isn't because of our behavior, the reason why we're saints is because we're in Christ. It's our position in Christ. The way you become a Christian is you repent of your sin and you trust in Jesus Christ, was saved by grace through faith. Not because of any works, nothing, nothing, nothing. Nothing that you do makes you a Christian. The only thing that you add to your justification is your sin. That's the only thing that you added. You're only a Christian because Jesus, you're only a Christian because Jesus chose you and set you apart.

1 Corinthians 1:30 through 31. And because of him, you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that as it is written, let the one who boasts boast in the Lord, grace to you and peace ... No, not grace, but yes, grace to you, that only comes from Jesus. The point is, the sanctification from Jesus, the righteous ... everything is from Jesus. So St. Paul was so effective as a minister in the church because he understood that he himself was a sinner saint. No matter what sin he saw in the church, he never lost sight of the fact that I used to murder Christians and God saved me. So when I see sin in the church ... This is a life hack. This is a life hack. Let me just share this with you. You want to learn to love people well? Never lose sight of the fact that you're a sinner. And then when they sin against you, you're not shocked. I know. I'm whatever, the same.

So in the church, when the saints are sinning against him, he's never lost sight of the fact that he's a sinner as well. And he's reminding them that, hey, you're not just sinners, you're also saints. So you need to grow into your full potential of being as a saint. So with Christians, this is why he was so tenacious and relentless in his love. And with unbelievers, understanding the fact that they're sinners and you're a sinner just like them, the only difference between them and you is the fact that Jesus saved you, then you can relate to them. When you look at them and you see their sin, you're like, man, I understand. I'd be living just like you if Jesus didn't save me. So now I can speak your language. I can understand ... We relate, we can connect. Some Christians forget, but still don't forget that you're a saint, even when evangelizing, don't forget you're a saint and don't forget that you're a sinner within the church and St. Paul never forgot even when he was wounded.

With evangelism, this is how I view with evangelism, when I see an unbeliever, man, I just look at them like ayah, not only do I relate, but you have so much potential to be a saint. If you Go saved, oh my, we live in a city of St. Paul's. Imagine if the people around us is God saved, we live in the city of CS Lewis's. We live in a city of like, man, if you've God saved, this is how I view every single unbeliever. If you God saved, we would have some crazy awakening. I got a roommate from college that I grew up with, we were roommates for three years. This is how I view. I've told him. I'm like bro ... and he's Jewish. I'm like, you'd be just like Paul. If he's just like Jesus, you need to get saved. If that mind and those talents that you have now get filled with the Holy ... Oh my. So that's with unbelievers.

And then with believers, I never lose sight of the fact that you're a sinner and I look at you and when I see you sin, I'm like, you had so much potential to be a sinner. You had tremendous potential. You will be so bad. I can't believe God saved you. So this right here, the sinner saint paradox when it becomes real to you, it changes the way you do ministry in the church and changes the way you do ministry with unbelievers. And that's why St. Paul, he calls them saints and those are sinners. And what does he do? This is incredible. In verse 10, he asked them for help. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us, on him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayer. Pray for me. Could you pray for me? So that many will give thanks in our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many. St. Paul, he's like, could you pray for me? And this is really sneaky. He's asking his spiritual kids to pray for him. This is incredibly sneaky. He's asking the people who are fighting him. Don't trust him, pray for him.

It's sneaky because I do this with my kids. Every single Sunday, I walk with one of my daughters to church and today I'm walking with my daughter Ekaterina. She's my third one. She is six and she's going to be seven in December and she wants a pet. She wants a pet so bad. She started off with a dog, I went to fish and now we met at parakeet. I asked her, could you pray for me? Could you pray for me? And she's praying for me. It's just natural. Well, what does that ... all of a sudden, that's becoming part of our life. I'm going to pray. I'm going to pray for ... dad needs prayer. I'm going to help Dad out. That's part of the growth process and this is what it means to grow spiritually. It means to grow from just being a sibling to a spiritual father or a mother, and it's growing from being just a saint, a sinner just barely a saint, to growing as a saint. It's through nutritious food, it's through the Scriptures.

Hebrews 5:12-14. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again, the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. The most practical way that you become a spiritual parent, is you begin to feed children. You feed them. Well, what do you feed them with? You feed them with scriptures, the Holy Word of God. Well, in order to feed them, you got to learn how to feed yourself first. And then you have to learn how to take the word and create a meal, and now you're cooking for your children and then you're feeding your kids. This is how you grow into a spiritual parent. A lot of you go to church to get fed. This is what you do, I go to church to ... Oh, I didn't like that church. It didn't feed me. I'm going to a different church to be fed. You need to start cooking. And to start cooking, you got to know your ingredients and you got to know the cookbook, you got to know the Holy Scriptures.

And then point three is love number one, and anxious less about the rest. Here's what I mean. St. Paul was a man who was willing to suffer and he was willing to experience physical and spiritual pain. And the reason why he was doing it is because he cared about the primary thing. He cared about God, he cared about God's mission, he cared about God's church, he cared about the Holy Scriptures. Jesus said, seek first the kingdom of God, and everything else shall be added on to you. In that text, he says, don't worry. Don't worry about money. Don't worry about food. Don't worry about clothing. Seek first the kingdom of God. So he's saying, the problem is a lot of you are riddled with anxiety about things that don't really matter. And when you start caring about the thing that really matters, and you begin to endure pain, even despite the fact that there is pain, your pain tolerance goes up. And then when you deal with these problems that actually are eternally consequential, problems of other people's souls, problems in the church, then you go back to the real world, and those problems kind of don't really feel like problems.

When you care about a friend's soul and eternal soul, you care about sharing the gospel, and you're fighting, vying with God in prayer, God save this person, you get up and you don't ... you're not really that worried about how you look or your weight, or your bank account, or what you're going to eat that day, you got more important issues. And I get this principle and the reason why I focus on this principle now is because we see this principle all throughout 2 Corinthians, but look at Philippians 4: 4-7, Paul wrote, rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be known to God and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Don't be anxious about anything. And a lot of people are like, well, how do I do that? And they're missing the other piece.

Do not be anxious about anything, does not mean do not be anxious about anything. Do not be anxious about anything means don't be anxious about secondary stuff. And I get this because Saint Paul was a man who had anxiety, but he had anxiety, but the most important thing ... in 2 Corinthians 11, he gives us a whole list of resume of his suffering, and you can read it on your own. But then at the end, this is the punchline of the resume. He says apart from other things, that's the physical suffering, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for whom, for all the churches, who was weakened, and I'm not weak, who was made to fall and I'm not indignant, because I had anxiety for the churches.

I had anxiety for the things that really matter, anxiety for eternal souls. And when you start caring about eternal souls like this, and you're willing to overcome whatever suffering comes in the way of proclaiming the gospel and sharing the gospel to your friends and caring for the church. Well, you go back to your job and you get an inbox of 300 emails. You're not that worried about it because your friend got saved. You know what I'm saying? Eternity of change. So this right here ... and then you can do your work without anxiety. And this is like a life hack. And then you do ... like this isn't the thing. It's like we'll take his stuff, it's just money, it's materialism, and when you care about the primary thing, you're less anxious about everything else. So St. Paul does start with, the God who is blessed, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Corinthians 1:3, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. He starts with the fact that we worship a God that allows his children to be afflicted. We worship a father, a Heavenly Father, allows his children to suffer. We worship a God, who like a good general allows his soldiers to suffer. And he does this so that we are now better equipped to comfort others. He grows us as ministers to make us more useful. He allows us to go through suffering to increase our pain tolerance. This is what St. Paul is saying. He's saying, God allowed this, the word comfort here is in the noun and verb appears 10 times verses three through seven. St. Paul is saying, look, you are worried that in keeping appointment, and he does later on in the book. He's like, let me tell you what I've been through. I almost died time and time and time again. I'm sorry that I didn't come to the appointment.

As I said, I suffered, and he says we suffered and we do this to share abundantly, verse five, for as we share abundantly in Christ's suffering, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. In Philippians St. Paul says that he aspires to have a fellowship in Christ sufferings. If you really want to know Christ, you need to know his suffering. And when you know his suffering, when you experience his suffering, you realize that he is closer to you than ever, and he comforts you. And what you realize is that there is true, true comfort, and we have access to true comfort. He's not just talking about physical suffering, he's not just talking about sickness. Christians aren't the only ones who experience sickness. Christians aren't the only ones who suffer loss. Christians aren't the only ones who are persecuted. In general, he's saying for the faith, for the faith.

Jesus Christ said in John 5:18 through 20, if the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own, but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, a servant is not greater than his master, if they persecuted me, they will persecute you. If they kept my word, they will always keep yours. I used to read texts like this, and I thought that's not in our lifetime. I no longer read texts like that. I do believe we're going to see persecution, Christians will see persecution in our lifetimes, in this country, just for being Christians, just for proclaiming the Word of God and dear Christian, are you ready? Are you ready to stand up and are you ready to say, yes, I am a Christian and yes, I'm not budging, I'm not recanting. Kill me. Kill me. I know exactly where I'm going. Do me a favor. No, don't. But you know what saying? I'm going to heaven. I'm going to heaven. And I'm going to proclaim the gospel until the very last second that my heart is beating. Are you ready?

It starts like you before the battle, you need to prepare yourself. And St. Paul says, God does allow the suffering, and you need to know we have an enemy and Satan does attack Christians and he does attack the church. And obviously, the followers of Satan will attack us and will attack the church. But God allows us to suffer and suffer a lot so that after suffering, we begin to be more sympathetic and tender hearted and more helpful and hopeful. When trials mount, the coffee mug that you have at home with like a trite little Christian, saying platitude, it's not helpful, it's not helpful. When trials come, what you need is to sit down with a sage, who's been through it and you sit down with a Gandalf, who's been through it, white beard, I've been through the suffering, I know how much it hurts, but also I know how much stronger you get. And I know that there is access to true deep waters of comfort that God sends. And the more useful you want to be in the church, like if you want to grow as a spiritual a father or a mother, that means you're going to be in positions of leadership where you're leading other people.

Well, if you are in a position of leadership, you're calling shots. And you need to know that if you want to be the one calling the shots, you will take shots, is pain tolerance. That's it. It's a key to growth in the Christian faith, it's the key to effectiveness and fruitful ministry. 2 Corinthians 1:6, if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation. If we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. St. Paul says, you know why I'm willing to deal with this, I'm willing to suffer as much as I do, because I know it's for your good.

Last week, my wife was visiting her family in Philadelphia, and she texts me pictures of just their life, and I'm sitting in my basement, I work in my basement, just concrete all around and just Ah back electricity. I have an air quality thing down there just to make sure I'm not going to die of lung cancer anytime soon. So that's where I work. It's kind of like a dungeon. I call it the dungeon and I do it and I write my sermons there and I feel like I read more spiritual sermons because St. Paul was in the dungeon etc., etc.

And then I'm sitting in the dungeon and my wife sends me a picture of my youngest daughter at a hibachi place in Philadelphia, like a swanky spot, for some reason, it's half off. And she's sitting in front of this whole massive thing of food with the biggest smile. And I hearted, and I'm like, she's living her best life now. And I was thinking about that. I'm like, if I were there and I had that food, I would not experience nearly the amount of joy of getting that picture and seeing my daughter living and enjoying life. I'm willing to do the suffering. And I learned this from my dad. He's an immigrant dad. He was willing to go through suffering for the betterment of his children. And this spiritually speaking is the principle of usefulness. A. W. Tozer said is doubtful that God can bless a man greatly unless he is hurt him deeply. Because when God does allow pain, a great pain, he also provides a great cure.

Verse 7, our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort. 2 Corinthians 1:8, for we do not want you to be unaware, brothers of the affliction we experience in Asia, for we were so utterly burning beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Is he referring to persecution and suffering Ephesus? We don't know. Is he referring to the thorn in the flesh here? We don't know. Was it some deadly illness? We don't know the nature, but we know the fact that he was at the brink of death. Other places, he said, I've suffered the loss of many things. His suffering didn't weaken his faith.

A lot of people as soon as they begin to experience a modicum of suffering, there is no God, God doesn't love me. God is love. God is good. And God is all powerful. God doesn't love me. St. Paul suffered. Probably after Christ, He was number two in terms of suffering, and his suffering actually deepen his faith. Why? Because as he's in the depth of his pain, he knows he's with Christ. He knows that God is with him. He didn't turn his back on God and that suffering, because he understands if God allowed the suffering, then this is for my good and if this is for my good, then I can rejoice because God is with me.

Verse 9, indeed, he says, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead. And this is why suffering is so important. This is why God allows suffering. Because suffering teaches us the greatest lesson that there is. That we are not to rely on ourselves. We are to rely on our God. And when you're in suffering, when you're in pain, and you know you can't save yourself from that moment, there's only one whom you can cry out to and that's God. And this is why St. Paul, he's focused on the number one, and in suffering, the number one is clears. He's in the depth of this well, and the deeper he goes, the brighter number one is the North Star above him and he cries out to God, a God who, present tense, raises the dead.

It's a lesson that it takes a long time to learn to rely on God every single day. It takes a long time to learn and takes a second to forget. Because there's so many other things we can rely on. My question here towards the end is, upon whom or what do you rely? Is it money or treasures? Is it other people? Is it your accomplishments, your resume, your job, your boss, your real estate? What are you relying on? St. Paul says, I learned to rely on God. I learned to rely on Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ, He was in the same ... To participate in the sufferings of Christ is to remember Christ when He was in the depth of his suffering that began in Gethsemane, and he says, God, if there's any other way, if there's any other way, then he prays the most powerful prayer that anyone can pray, not my will, but yours be done.

And then Jesus Christ goes to the cross. Yes he was flogged and yes he carried the cross, he experienced immense physical suffering, but the greatest suffering he experienced was the spiritual suffering, when he went through hell on the cross. God's wrath poured out on him. Jesus went through hell, so that you wouldn't have to. And St. Paul knows because Jesus Christ did that and because Jesus Christ died, because Jesus Christ rose from the dead, because Jesus Christ's gospel, his death, his burial, his resurrection, his ascension, that gospel when you trust in him, that that right there saves you and St. Paul was saved. He knows that Jesus Christ made all the difference. He completely powerfully alters the meaning and the purpose of our lives, therefore he imbues even the darkest, hardest moments of our lives with hope.

St. Paul says, I suffered but I suffered for you. He suffered a lot. But he took his troubles lightly. He's like yes, I did this thing, yes, I was flogged five times, 40 lashes five times, I was shipwreck, I was stoned, yes, I did that thing. Because that stuff doesn't really matter. My life doesn't really matter. I did this because I see the great need for the greatest work and I see great fruit from the Gospel. He couldn't doubt that he led a wholly happy life after this, obviously, in heaven, but he didn't allow all those troubles to outweigh and lose sight of what's most important.

He talks about the cycle of comfort, the cycle of comfort. I will suffer so that I can comfort others. I suffer, Jesus comforts me, I comfort those who suffer. And I'll conclude with this. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was one of the handful of German theologians to stand up to the Nazification of the German church. And one of his prominent writings was the Barmen Declaration in which he rejected the infamous Aryan clauses imposed by Nazi theology. He tried to fight the Nazi ideology within the church in the German church, he couldn't, and then he went and start his own seminary, his own church. He founded an underground Seminary in Bavaria, which then was closed by the Gestapo Chief, Himmler himself. And after that, Bonhoeffer was like, you're not going to let me preach the gospel. I'm going to fight the Nazis. And he joined the resistance movement and he was imprisoned by the Gestapo in April 1943.

Now he knows he's going to die. And he was engaged to Maria von Wedemeyer, and he knows he's going to die, and before he dies, he writes her a poem about ... she doesn't know he's going to die. He already knows how the story ends. And he wrote her a poem, and stanza three is the famous. The poem was called New Year 1945. And he says, this should it be ours to drain the cup of grieving, even to the dregs of pain. At that command, we will not falter thankfully receiving all that is given by the loving hand. He knows God allowed this suffering, is going to bear the weight of suffering, is going to drink it down until it dries. He wrote this poem, and it comforted his fiancée. Just as the war was ending, Bonhoeffer was hung in prison three months later.

18 years later, across the Atlantic in America, another bride to be was grieving the death of her fiancé. Her fiancé died in a freak accident, but he was the son of the author of Joseph Bailey and his wife, Mary Lou. Joseph Bailey, he read this poem, his son's fiancée found it and she read it and then she sent it to Joseph Bailey, the author, and he read it and they found comfort both Joseph Bailey and his wife, Mary Lou. So Joseph Bailey, he is author, he wrote a book of poems, compiled a book of poems called Heaven, and then 12 years after this, so this is 30 years after Bonhoeffer's his death, Joe Bailey receives a letter from a pastor friend in Massachusetts, relating that he was just in a hospital in Boston and he was visiting a terminally ill woman, and he knew that she was at the brink of death. He gave her Joe Bailey's book of poetry called heaven to comfort her soul. And the pastor said that the dying woman had stayed up awake late the previous night, read it and told him the comfort that she had received, a few hours later she died.

That woman, the pastor wrote, was Maria von Wedemeyer. Bonhoeffer's fiancée. So Bonhoeffer's words comforted his fiancée twice. And you see that the cycle, God's comfort circulates among his children. Sometimes it comes full circle as in this true story, from Bonhoeffer to Maria von Wedemeyer, in her grief, the Joseph Bailey Junior's grieving fiancée and to Joe and Mary Bailey, they write the book and then back to Bonhoeffer's fiancée to comfort her in her dying hours. The astounding cyclical nature of comfort, and it all starts with Jesus Christ. But let's thank him now.

Lord Jesus, we thank you for enduring the greatest suffering that anyone endured, and we thank you that you did that in order to comfort us. To comfort our souls, to forgive us of our sins so that we can have eternal comfort. In the meantime, you send us the great comfort of the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, you're with us and we thank you for that. And I pray Holy Spirit that even when we do enter dark times of persecution, that you give us a steel strength to keep proclaiming the gospel, to remain faithful to you. Even if we endure suffering, so what? We know that there's nothing more important than the work of the gospel. And make us a people who like St. Paul, are just focused on what's most important, with our words, with our thoughts, with our time, our talent and treasure. We pray this in Christ's name, amen.