Don't Miss the Messages in Your Misfortune - Charles R. Swindoll

well good morning i also bring my greetings to those of you that are visiting today welcome to the campus we're always honored to have you here it is a privilege to introduce our speaker today dr charles swandahl chancellor emeritus of dallas theological seminary and senior pastor teacher of stonebriar community church in frisco texas we are delighted to always have him on campus many times throughout the year throughout the semester dr chuck swindoll or simply known as chuck again serves as our chancellor emeritus his name is probably familiar to many christians around the world in fact i would guess that some of you based your decision to attend this very seminary because of his association and affection for it he served dts from 1994 to 2001 as the fourth president and is known by millions around the world for his practical application of the bible to everyday living he serves dts as chancellor emeritus as i've said and also again as the senior pastor teacher of stonebriar community church he and his wife cynthia reside here in the metroplex and a big priority for them is spending much of their time with their four grown children and their ten grandchildren and their seven great grandchildren so it's always an honor to have dr swendell with us and so would you please join me in welcoming chuck today [Applause] when the chaplain mentioned michael's voice it reminded me of the conference i did on one occasion with the lloyd ogilvy the late or lloyd ogilvy who is now with the lord we were at mount hermon together a conference center out in northern california and if you've ever heard the voice of lloyd ogilvy like a the sound of many waters i mean this angelic deep voice i got up and felt like mickey mouse when it was my turn some voices are just made for a pulpit so you'll put up with mine since it was not made for a pulpit but i've adapted to it i was shocked when i sat where you're sitting in chaper chapel back in the summer or the really the early fall of 1959 i was a first-year student sitting not knowing what to expect from the chapel speaker i was really in for a surprise i think it was either his opening line or the major line of his message when he said when god wants to do an impossible task he takes an impossible person and crushes him that put a chill down my back even though i just recently come out of a tour of duty in the marine corps even though i was at that time approaching my mid-20s i had not been crushed cynthia and i were happily married at that time we had no children though four would come along in the years to to come we we had we had known the love of one another and of so many friends our arrival at the school was an answer to prayer and my even having a place and a desk at the school was just an act of god for which i to this day do not cease to give thanks but crushed i wondered what that meant in fact i had that that statement in mind when i selected the hymn we just sang maybe its words are so familiar you have forgotten what isaac watts wrote am i a soldier of the cross a follower of the lamb shall i fear to own his cause or blush to speak his name and get this line must i be carried to the skies on flowery beds of ease while others fought to win the prize and sailed through bloody seas are there no foes for me to face must i not stem the flood is this vile world a friend of grace to help me on [Music] to god those are powerful words and unpopular in our self-serving era where it's all about me mine myself my comfort my desires my will my plans when in fact ministry is none of the above we are not called with me in mind he is the reason for our calling his plan is the plan to follow and it is often surprising which ties in with the statement that the lord breaks us down as that speaker put it crushes us to carry out his will through us during the more than 60 almost 60 years that have followed that time i of ministry i have come to know something of the crushing though not nearly as much as many of my brothers and sisters but i know of no one greatly used of god who has not also been wounded hurt bruised broken lacerated crushed it's an essential part of his plan i call it the crucible that god puts us through and you who have not yet entered into ministry can only imagine and you may even wonder if that's going to happen in your life and i will tell you it will though i cannot tell you how or when it will he will break you he will shape you into the image of his son whatever that may take and the crushing will often be very very difficult to bear this ties in with my theme during this academic year i want i want to speak on the pros and cons of ministry during this fall semester i want to talk about what makes the ministry so challenging and then the spring semester i want to address what makes it so fulfilling lest we think it is all crushing it certainly is not but some of it is and it's that part that becomes disillusioning because we didn't expect it to happen even though people tell us as i'm telling you today we could never guess how it will impact us i've already talked about two areas that make the ministry challenging on one occasion when i was here earlier this semester i talked about the people who are around us who are difficult people to deal with they cause a great deal of challenge for us when we serve our savior difficult people and then the next time i was here this fall i talked about the human characteristics we bring into ministry especially those of fleshly carnal characteristics that we don't leave behind we're not rid of them when we enter the halls of learning or the ranks of ministry you carry yourself with you your bad habits here are bad habits then later on your ugly side remains your ugly side and it doesn't go away just because you have earned a degree at a seminary or because people refer to you as dr this or reverend that you you're still who you are and sometimes it'll embarrass you it'll often disappoint you how it comes out we we simply cannot rid ourselves of the old nature it's with us until we breathe our last and we are in that glorified state where we no longer have that nature to hound us and haunt us and so today i want to talk about the unexpected things that happen to us i get this they are rarely our fault they happen to us and they impact us deeply as i said earlier they hurt us they can crush us and unless we realize they are all for our good and for our god's glory we'll resent them we'll even resist them we may even try to deny them but there they are nevertheless before i turn to the scriptures and and illustrate these things from god's word let me turn first to a very interesting commencement speech it's delivered by well an unusual source first of all the audience is a group of ninth grade graduates rather modest gathering and the chief justice of the supreme court is this is the commencement speaker john roberts now he's the commencement speaker because one of the ninth grade graduates is his son that's how that happened but i'm sure not even his son expected his daddy to talk on what he spoke on because commencement speakers usually tell you what you long to hear how great you are how marvelous your accomplishment is how good things will be and great wishes for you just all the great things that pour forth from a commencement speaker not with john roberts not that day he called his speech i wish you bad luck but he did so with good intentions i'll cut to the chase and not give you all of his speech but listen to his wishes for the graduates and be sure you hear all of them not only the event but what follows because that's where the lesson is that's where the message is he told his audience from time to time in the years to come i hope you will be treated unfairly so that you will come to know the value of justice second i hope that you will suffer betrayal from someone you trusted because that will teach you the importance of loyalty his unusual wishes went on so he had sorry to say this to you but i i hope you will be lonely from time to time so that you never take your friends for granted and he added and when you lose as you will from time to time i hope every now and then your opponent will gloat over your failure it's a way for you to understand the importance of sportsmanship and i hope you'll be ignored so that you know the importance of of listening to others i will hope and and i hope you will have just enough pain to learn compassion whether i wish these things or not adds justice roberts whether i wish these things or not they're going to happen and whether you benefit from them or not will depend on your ability to see the message in your misfortune that's the title of my talk today don't miss the messages in your misfortune there are many of them you have yet to learn you've not learned them because you've not suffered the crushings of those misfortunes and they will crush you they will break you down they will cause you to wonder should you be doing what you're doing should you keep on doing it should you ever trust anyone else when a really good friend betrays you should you ever try to select another elder when [Music] an elder you have endured has made your life miserable for years you're going to be crushed so don't miss the messages that's my point now the scriptures second corinthians chapter 4 verses 8 and 9 give us sort of a well difficult job description we are afflicted in every way we are perplexed the passage goes on to say it means not knowing which way to turn several render this in paraphrases we are at wit's end you'll be there you'll be there we are afflicted we are at wit's end third we are persecuted and fourth we are struck down knocked down now each of them has a contrast the benefit the message and the misfortune i'll not get into from this passage the point is you will be pressed on every side you will be bewildered you will be at a loss to explain why this happened and you will be knocked flat down wondering if you'll ever get back up yes yes yes that will happen right now it doesn't seem possible i understand that that's where i was in the in the in the fall of 1959 i i thought well that he must be talking to some of these guys around me because uh crushing is not in uh that that's really not not part of my mo i made it through the marines i'd make it through anything the stuff i've had in ministry would make the marines look like uh i don't know knitting daisy chains and in the scouts you ain't seen nothing yet until you enter the ranks of ministry and i'm here to warn you i'm here to help you enter there those ranks realistically so many times in your ministry you'll ask i wonder what could happen next and here's the really confusing part what's happened isn't your fault so you'll ask what did i do to deserve this you really did nothing it's happening to you like a really good friend of mine i had lunch with let's see it was i think early this week he's involved with us at insight for living while engaged in ministry he gets a phone call from home his wife is in er she can't see very well out of one eye she was able to get to er and she doesn't know what the problem is and they're calling to let him know he needs to come home quickly after testing they found a tumor in her brain about the size of a tennis ball just stop right there just stop right there this is the woman he loves the mother of their three children godly couple finest couple you'd ever want to meet going blind in one eye from a tumor and their words were it's got to be taken out it wound up being a cut from here down to here and they got it all but they didn't know the details of this i told scott when i heard the story again from him i said you know all of us had our hearts go out to your wife but i got to tell you i identified with you how that must have felt and by the way the ministry goes right on i forgot to mention that it just goes right on sunday comes next sunday sounds like yogi berra here next sunday sunday happens yeah and next sunday and the following sunday as the tumor has been growing as surgery has happened as the neurosurgeon who is so qualified he's known as the artist excises the tumor it's benign is there a better word to use ever in life than benign and as he puts it scott said you can't even see where she was cut and she is recovering but during that period of time who knew could have been you could have been your your spouse or mine things happened to us and they crush us and we're reading the bible we're in a whole new light suddenly it's talking to us about our lives so when we read words like verses 8 and 9 we're not reading about paul living through this though it's true we're reading our autobiography our biography our knowledge is limited to bits and pieces we can't figure out the work of the ministry goes on so what do you do well i'm going to turn to a verse of scripture you have memorized and i'm i'm going to um use it on purpose so that you will have a whole new appreciation for it i hope i'm referring to romans 8 what verse right 28 and we know that all things work together for the good to them who love god to those who are the call according to his purpose you just give those words out and just preach those words just write those words but i want you to see them deeply and how they apply by the way we need to see the context look at the context maybe you've never checked it before romans 8 28 is preceded by verse 24 which includes the words we do not see and verse 20 or 25. now you know it's 24. what's the matter with me it's verse 25 and then verse 26 we do not know we do not see we do not know we do not see what's coming we do not know how to pray as we should we don't how does scott pray for his wife how does the 17 year old pray for their mother how do you facing sunday's service go on you don't see with any sense of perspective and you don't know how to pray in fact it is so difficult the spirit of god prays for you with groanings that cannot be uttered isn't that an amazing way to put it since we don't see and since we can't know then there's only one place to look and that's up and there's only one to turn to and that's the one who sees and knows and may i add that his ways are not our ways neither are our thoughts his thoughts his thoughts are higher than our thoughts his ways are better than our ways in light of that we look to him with some sense of confidence and that's where verse 28 plays its vital role first we know look at that this is a promise that's to be claimed and never ignored we know this we don't hope this is true we don't guess this is true we don't just think this is true we know it we know it everything in this verse starts with something we know we have absolutely unshakeable faith in the words that are going to follow we know this is true what's true god causes not because he's cruel but because he's wise he either makes it happen or permits it to happen but he's behind it he okays it the plan and the project these are god's not ours it's all in his hands he is fulfilling his will in his time and in his way in all this mess and misery he is at work his plan is relentlessly unfolding he's causing his plan that he doesn't stop to explain to you to you it's a storm george herbert wrote on one occasion storms are the triumph of his art he specializes in storms nahum 1 7 speaks of he has his way in the whirlwind and the storms and the clouds are the dust of his feet he causes these things he permits these things he okays these things they have his approval what is he he causes all things to work together for good for his glory for our good so i'll remind myself when such things occur this is for your glory lord and for my good remind me of that drill that home in my brain remind me of it these are profound words and they have gaps my gaps of ignorance in them romans 11 33 oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of god get this how unsearchable are his judgments how unfathomable are his ways unsearchable unfathomable all for his glory and for our good because they are according to his purpose you enter ministry you enter into his plan and purpose for your life and god immediately goes to work shaping you into the image of his son it isn't an easy shaping it includes as i've said painful unexpected times when we think we can't go on and so in light of that just as the justice chief justice brought a message to that group of graduates i want to give you five wishes that i have for you along the same line as john roberts gave at that little commencement address first i hope you will not know early success let me repeat that i hope you will not know early success in your ministry rather i hope you will encounter difficulties that will drive you to your knees that will teach you the value of vulnerability and it will enable you to keep success from ever going to your head early success can make people awfully proud i hope you are beginning to show a few gray hairs before you begin to taste any measure of success in ministry i hope it comes later on second i hope you will experience obscurity and anonymity after you leave these halls of learning especially if you are greatly gifted and intellectually bright the result will be great lessons in humility keeping you surprised that god would be pleased to use you in the years to come may that always be a surprise to you i hope you will experience obscurity and anonymity remember paul shortly after he gained his eyesight back following his conversion he went away to arabia for years we never know what he did there no one knows obscure anonymous probably for many people forgotten that was for the revelation of god's plan for his life and for the future which included by the way the thorn in the flesh whatever that was it was severe it was painful the greek term foreign means a sharp stake so whatever it was it was physically painful and he lived with it till he died easy to forget that helped him become the man he was as he was crushed by the thorn third i hope you will fail because you relied on your own flesh to reach certain personal goals those failures will be a healthy part of your personal growth toward maturity you will learn far more from your failures than you will ever learn from your great accomplishments fourth i hope you will be forced to deal with a difficult elder or a fellow staff member who gives you fits even one who like demas who forsakes you i could keep you busy for the rest of the morning telling you stories from my own life where i really relied on certain individuals only to find out they had deceived me man carried on a sexual encounter with other women while serving on the staff quite effectively until he was found out speaking of that i know of another individual now gone who at the time was a very effective bible teacher taught a large adult fellowship class at a church was the chair of a bible department at a fine bible college while carrying on with one of his students sexually i got a call in the middle of the night from a detective who said he had to meet with me it was pouring down rain i said i i'm not coming out tonight he said yeah you will you you need to be meeting with me because if you don't and he named the man he'll be dead in less than two days the husband of this woman that he's having the affair with already has a hit man and he'll be dead he's going to kill him well i went out that rainy night and we had quite a conversation the next day i confronted the man he denied it they usually do and then i said you see this fellow sitting at the end of the room over there we were in an empty room except for the detective with a brown envelope i said before you lie any further see this man over there yep see that envelope yep in it or photographs of you with her in bed you want to look at the photographs with me no i don't you need to know something tomorrow you'll be dead if you don't break this off it's a man i trusted it's a man hundreds of people believed in living a lie i hope you'll know that experience and it'll break your heart it'll disillusion you you'll probably lose your way home that day wondering how in the world could this have happened right under my eyes you're crushed you're broken you realize the heart of man is desperately wicked you'll learn to hold people accountable you'll learn not to be so gullible you'll take your time in selecting leadership you'll be very very cautious about the choice of elders you won't just get a couple of good friends your buddies as you form the church please don't you need qualified godly capable men to serve in that capacity i hope you will be forced to deal with difficult people fifth i hope you will be hindered by unexpected obstacles that will keep you from reaching your goals in your ministry so that you will discover what god's goals are by the way this has a great ending even though right now you feel like taking your life uh i i i want to tell you that um god knows what he's doing he's not wiping you out he's just breaking your heart he's just interfering with your will he's just cutting your legs out from under you so you'll quit walking in your own strength paul really wanted to go to rome he really wanted to make the gospel known to the seat of power and he stated that this was his plan his hope he never dreamed how he would get there he would wind up being a under house arrest of all things he couldn't even move out of that house chained to another praetorian guard member and he realized while he was there those two years hey this is a captive audience so he led him to christ and tomorrow he led the next one to christ and before long he led a whole barracks full of them to christ and the whole praetorian guard talked about christ and guess who they talked to well they had access to the emperor himself he never dreamed it would come through an imprisonment and he said it's fallen out to me for the greater expanse of the gospel that's a strange evangelistic plan don't miss the message okay don't get hung up in the in in the misfortune it'll be dreadful there'll be some that are miserable don't forget you were warned don't forget you heard it don't forget it may be your spouse it may be your elder it may be in your community for the flood happens it may be into your home the thief breaks it may be one of your children it'll crush you don't miss the message there's a great passage in deuteronomy 8 2 you shall remember all the way the lord your god led you these 40 years in the wilderness get this to humble you to test you to show what was in your heart whether you keep his word or not 40 years to humble you to put you through the tests to reveal to you what's in your god knows what's in your heart you need to see it and then you will turn to him and you'll give him praise for walls that crumble down by just walking around him you'll give him praise for being able to conquer the strong enemy the canaanites as you move into home you didn't build and eat from trees you didn't plant and drink from cisterns you didn't dig and blessings will come and you'll go lord god you get all the glory for this thank you for the years the years when you broke me down and cut me down to size thank you john oxenham once wrote these fine words he writes in characters too grand for our short sight to understand we catch but broken strokes and try to fathom all the mystery of withered hopes of death of life the endless war the useless strife but there with larger clearer sight we shall see his way was right there's a great hymn in our hymnals that unfortunately most churches don't sing anymore written by a man who lost four daughters at sea they were traveling with their mother to get to england having left chicago they went to new york and then set sail and of all things there was a collision at sea and their ships sank the mother lived through it and sent a wire back that said to the dead her husband saved alone shortly thereafter the dad mourning the death of his precious girls went to sea and took a ship across to be with his wife when he came to what was figured to be this area where that ship had sunk he stood on the deck of that ship and wept and later wrote when peace like a river attends my way when sorrow like see billow's role whatever my lot whatever my lot thou has taught me to say it is well it is well with my soul horatio stafford did not miss the message though he lost all four of his daughters let's pray father i have no idea what you're saying to different ones in this meeting i i don't know most of these men and women but i do know this i know you and i've trusted you throughout my ministry even when i didn't know which way to turn thank you for never leaving me in the lurch thank you for teaching life's hardest lessons when i couldn't even explain why they had happened we do pause now asking you to get us ready for whatever you have for us knowing that when you want to do an impossible task you take an impossible person and you crush him may you find it well with our soul following the crushing in jesus name everyone said amen

Channel: Dallas Theological Seminary

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Length: 49min 58sec (2998 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 15 2021