Pressing On Through the Unexpected

welcome back I'll pray and I'll pray for Dr Kemble and I'll pray for our speaker and then without further introduction dr. swindle will come and address us let's pray father the very root of our Thanksgiving is in your good grace the very meaning of that term it's a response the good things you have provided for us every good and perfect gift comes down from you the father who is identified as one who is a father of lights without any change of character without any shadow of turning we can come to you and you're not one way today and another way tomorrow is gives us great security because we come to you with our needs our sins the need for guidance cleansing protection direction and you've told us because of the finished work of your son we can come boldly we don't totally understand that because we cower in coming to you when we need to at times and we shy away from you rather than to run into your presence so teach us what it means to come and what it means to come boldly thank you for the Grace and the mercy and the help that you give to us father we pray for that for the Campbell family Lord we thank you for our beloved brother our leader our colleague our friend who has modeled so well for us the love commitment first to be when she was alive and then to live on until her passing he's been a stalwart soldier a faithful service to you we're grateful for him Lord his time is in your hands do with him what would be best for him and for your glory we entrust him to you the future will raise him back up to health and strength if not take him gently we pray or thank you for today the privilege of restarting after a break pray for our students our faculty both here and our extension campuses and our on the line that you would help us finish the semester well and to be good stewards of the time the privilege that you've granted to us thank you for our Chancellor my friend dr. Chuck Swindoll and ask that you would empower him again to minister again to us as he has so ably and so faithfully for so many years thank you for his gifts his heart his skills his dedication to you we ask that you would use him in our midst again in Jesus name we pray [Applause] [Music] it is uh always such a privilege to be here and to look into the faces of you who will be the voices and the ones who influence for Christ in the years ahead and the good part of that is that you have no idea of what role you will fill and it's good that you don't know that seriously it's good that you just do what you do now as a student to do your best to learn well and to take it a day at a time a season at a time knowing that each day and each season moves you closer to the place where the Lord will have you serve him forever that will be so it is an honor to stand here and I would like to thank help in that preparation because I would like to do as much as possible to lower the the possibility of surprise in your life and for that reason for the semester I've done a I'm doing a three part series on things that make ministry a challenge you'll recall if you were with us earlier I've talked about two areas that make ministry challenging and I think all the veterans of ministry here today would vouch for it first of all would be difficult people which you'll be dealing with throughout your ministry thankfully they're not all difficult but there will be some who will be and we talked about that so I won't go back over that and that is one area that will occur so please do not be surprised when that happens to you because there will be those who will make your ministry difficult to carry out but greater is He Who is in you than any of those who will work against you second the fact is and always feel like I'm like Yogi Berra when I say this you you're gonna take yourself into ministry and therein lies a big part of your problem because your own humanity will will be a difficulty if you are given to impatience it'll come out in ministry if you are given to a pride that'll that'll emerge if you are a the type person who slumps into a depression having gone through a little time of testing you'll be depressed again and perhaps somewhat often well the thing that is in your nature will not be canceled out when you graduate it will only it will remain and will begin to emerge unless of course the Spirit of God is in charge and gives you victory in areas where you now suffer a great deal of defeat in in the flesh my hope my prayer for you is that you will be able to get into and have an effective ministry that will be beyond your own struggles with your own humanity it's a big struggle everybody has it and I'll not get into that because we talked about it the third of the three this is the one that you really have nothing to do with or little to do with and this would be those things that happen that you never expect the unexpected surprises that can cut your legs out from under you and take it to take their toll on your effectiveness every person I know has gone through unexpected trials and you will to I certainly have all of my colleagues have and obviously because they are unexpected there's not something you can you can specifically prepare for but at least you can be informed that this is a probability a very real probability and it's interesting about seminary this is a microcosm of ministry what you go through here this is all part of the preparation it doesn't start 3 years from now or ministry doesn't begin two years from now or four of whenever you get your degree ministry is pre is going on now and some of the unexpected things happening now or a part of that preparation I made a note here when I began my schooling and kept notes through schooling up things I encountered while at school while a student among fellow students and among faculty members during my four years at Dallas seminary heartbreaking disappointments brain tumors terminal illnesses financial struggles that didn't let up birth defects in children recurring illnesses battles with dark forces supernatural sources of attack domestic conflicts emotional upheaval feelings of loneliness and displacement times of exhaustion the byproduct of over-commitment that would occur exotic diseases and even several deaths during my years at the school it's as if God was saying pay attention this is ministry or a side of ministry that will occur and you must press on through it you don't give in or give up because of it you press on through it what one of you your own faculty members has a wife that lives with multiple sclerosis and has for years I knew him when he drove a bus from Moody Bible Institute picked me up when I was a speaker there for a conference and she was a picture of health and from the time she got that disease until now it's been there it stays there and he dresses her for the day he prepares her meals he bathes her he puts her in bed he gets her out prepares her for the day this happened to them and I have yet to hear the first word of complaint remarkable individual ah Joe Bailey wrote a book called a view from the hearse they later changed the name of it - the last thing we talked about which i think is the kind of innocuous title i like a view from the hearse says it's straight the reason they said it because he lost three of his own voice one named danny 18 days old died after surgery another aged five died from leukemia and another aged 18 and a sledding accident and a battle that got complicated by hemophilia and died there so he wrote the book in the book which you really should read gosh Joe Bailey's gone now but he leaves that in his legacy listen to Joe Bailey's writing a woman wrote me from a small town in the east this is an example of what can happen unexpectedly uh on January 25 gives the year in Memorial Hospital John Rizzo or is Oh red-haired laughing tall eighteen tactic a tractor driving cow scratching shy died after two and a half years of leukemia after six weeks of a raging temperature experimental drugs bleeding and an abscess in his rectum that became gangrenous he died soft and gentle finally after six hours of violent death Rose listen to that six hours violent death Rose his face so thin is hair only a memory soft red fuzz arms blue and green from shots and intravenous feeding he looked like an old picture of a saint after his torch were over well what a kind God do what was done to John or such a thing to me she asks in the letter I'm poor we only have secondhand furniture and clothing the things about you were my husband and my son all our lives we've struggled to make ends meet how can I live with the memory of the agony he suffered part of the time he was in a coma a coma he kept saying mama help me mama help me mama help me and I couldn't and it's killing me I whispered in his ear John I love you so much all of a sudden his arm came stiffly straight and then fell across my back and very quietly he said from some vast depths me too who the great theologian Charles Hodge said that if anyone thinks he has a simple solution to the problem of suffering he should hold an infant screaming with pain in his arms and any simple solution will fly out the window careful with simple answers to complicated situations careful when you get your degree and you have really come to the edge of your of your advancement and knowledge careful that you don't come across as a know-it-all keep learning the words I don't know I don't understand it is a mystery things happen to me I can explain I thought about this and then I want you to get into second Corinthians with me I thought about how poets and hymn writers have a beautiful way of writing about Peyton you noticed that went through fiery trials i pathway shall I my grace all-sufficient shall be that supply the flames shall not hurt the eye only designed eye draws to consume that gold to refine trust singing that after you've lost your baby Aref your daughter's raped or your son is mugged and left to die or they find him in an alley with a needle in his arm these are great songs and we ought to sing them they are great words much older when kanji disconsolate where are you languish come to the mercy seat fervently kneel here bring your wounded heart here bare your anguish earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal love that 190 year-old him my brother taught it to me when he visited us years ago great words somehow they just don't have a same ring to him when the doctor says I don't like the way the x-ray looks it looks like a malignancy or the growth is larger than it was last time you get the picture down I'm simply preparing you for what is not academic and I'm not taking away from anything related to the academic stay a student of the scriptures dig into these things as deeply as you can during your years here but remember things will happen to you that will just cut your legs out from under you and this Paul writes in this great fourth chapter of second Corinthians verse 7 we have this treasure in earthen vessels you've read it haven't you the New Living Translation we are like fragile clay jars that that's all we are I'm just as fragile as I was when I started seminary I'm just as human as when it all began I'm just as given to discouragement as I was then by the grace of God I've been able to say on my feet but there have been times when I wondered if I could and if I would because I'm an earthen vessel and he says this so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves he goes on in the same chapter verse 8 were afflicted in every way but not crushed we're perplexed not despairing persecuted but not forsaken struck down but not destroyed one man renders it we are so oppressed at every point but not him then we are at our wits end but never at our hopes and we are persecuted by others but ever abandoned by God knocked down but not knocked out Mary Harris renders it we are hard pressed on every side but not completely cornered or without room for movement never driven to surrender bewildered but not at wit's end at a loss but never totally at a loss hounded by the foes but not left to his by the fold but not left to his mercy knocked to the ground but not permanently grounded and on and on that's life that's your ministry that will happen and in the midst of all of it God will use you in ineffective ways and in your in your brokenness which hopefully you will not try to hide and now try to look like today's athlete you know Superman there is no Superman especially those of us who represent the Savior he didn't try to look like a Superman he didn't do sideshow stuff he could have caused every group he was in front of to go oh wow but he didn't his restraint is as amazing as his power and and put a model let him see the cracks let him know the pain through it all through it all I've learn to trust in Jesus I've learned to trust in God not always I would like to say that I've always done that but I haven't and neither will you now how gone it I don't know how to say these things without discouraging you I don't want to I mean when I'm true you're gonna go yeah where do I turn it in yeah please get a hear it in a balanced way just keep your equilibrium Paul writes his second letter to the Corinthians it is his most personal letter and in it he just unveiled his life this is where we find that litany of heartbreaking things in Chapter 11 it is here we just read in chapter 4 being fragile jars of clay and it's here at the very beginning he admits he kind he came to the to the end of his own strength look at verse 3 of chapter 1 and now I won't try to discipline myself and not jump around let me get to my notes here verse 3 blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ the father of mercies and the God of all comfort this is Paul's favorite word in the early part of the letter it appears 10 times para Cletus para la Oh beside to call to call alongside to bring comfort to bring help that's why Jesus when he promised the one who would come John records it is the Paraclete the one called alongside to help this one who is the least studied and known of the Trinity the Spirit of God how invaluable is his presence and his power at work in our ministry and and he comes with a bulk load of comfort he is our God is a God of all comfort and now Paul seems I used to say sort of stubs his toe on the word he uses it over and over four times in this word in this verse verse four look who comforts us in all our afflictions that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God again and again and again and again he driving it home so in the midst of the unexpected there is this magnificent supernatural presence of power that comforts us and gives us hope beyond the rape and strength beyond the heartbreak and whatever may be the disappointment look at four it's the first of three reasons we suffer there are three clauses there are three purpose clauses notice them they are introduced with so that look at them these are the three reasons according to Paul's words in second Corinthians 1 we suffer number one he comforts us in all our afflictions so that here is the first reason verse 9 indeed we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that that's the second purpose clause the third is in verse 11 you joining and helping us through your prayers so that there's the third forgive it sounds pedantic to put it like that but you when you go through your exposition you see those stand out when you teach this passage point that out to people that that you're teaching they love to see in the text these these clues the these verbal reminders they can hang their thoughts on 1st reason we suffer verse 4 so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction how with the same comfort with which we ourselves were comforted by God we had a baby between our 2nd and 3rd year at the seminary and a little boy wonderful precious child not long after that God allowed Cynthia to get pregnant again and we were looking forward to another baby and at 5 months she miscarried cord got wrapped twisted around a baby's neck and and died in the waiting hallways at Baylor Hospital or water broken and we both sat there and cried and God chose not to have us give birth to a little baby girl let me tell you something as a result of the loss of the baby Cynthia and I were able and to this day are still able to identify with people who miscarry and and God has used that miscarriage I don't know how many times for us to help comfort those who've lost a baby that's an example of how we were comforted and were able therefore with the same comfort to be able to comfort others who went through the same thing your situation will be different it won't be a miscarriage it'll be something else and it'll be that that God would use to comfort others and your ministry will be enhanced by that dimension that you'll be able to communicate and to model it won't be theory because you will have been there you will understand now read on just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance so also our comfort is abundant in Christ's abundance if we are afflicted it is for your comfort and salvation if we are comforted it is for your comfort see it's not about us it's about others when we go through this and we finally realized we will go women through this so that God would use this in an effective way in someone's life going through it because they're going through a suffering our hope for you is firmly grounded verse 7 knowing that as you are sharers of our suffering so also your sharers of our comfort now he gets into a second subject when he slumped into a deep we call it a a depression look at Paul's admission he doesn't hide it we do not want you to be unaware brethren of our affliction which came to us in Asia how deep was the affliction Paul so deep we were burdened excessively beyond our strength so that we despaired even of life I call that a deep dark place Alfred Plummer writes as he as he handles this we were utterly without a way of escape utterly at a loss quite in despair even of life st. Paul had many moods and he has no wish to conceal them from the Corinthians how profoundly great trouble had depressed him he Wright said in his commentary on 2nd Corinthians he we despaired even of life unusual word rare word the idea and the Greek is a total unavailable and availability of an exit from the oppressive circumstances I could not escape the oppressive circumstances in our words we come to that place and we go that's it that's it one of our daughters had surgery on her eyes I didn't think her eyes would ever be straight again and after surgery the eye that was worked on was even worse and I just kind of hit bottom never forget the experience we were in Fullerton California and I just knew that after the surgery that that they would be straight I mean he's a pediatric ophthalmologist kind of money we were paying he got to get him straight you know even though he said you know I have no guarantee because these muscles are fickle and I could over overcompensate but remember when she wakes up it may be it may be all but it could straighten it's best I be able to to guess at this I I thought don't guess you know do it right and and he did but when I first saw her I was looking right at the bridge of her nose I just hit bottom and so I went back to my study and hung old side of the door don't disturb I want to put permanently God but I didn't I just put don't disturb and a buddy of mine came by who was an artist and he got a big poster board he heard about what happened and he painted a picture that looked like an old monk and he wrote on it in beautiful calligraphy did we in our own strength confide our striving would be losing were not the right men on our side man of God's own choosing just ask who this may be Christ Jesus it is he Lord savvy all his name from age to age the same and he must win the battle and he propped it up right where I said of the death I looked at my first thought was Bob Elias was here yeah I could tell from that artwork anywhere friend of mine took me to a park we had a hamburger and I told her all that I was at the very bottom and he said you know it's only been six hours since the surgery doctor said it could straighten up and I go I know that I did it of course in the power of the Spirit when I answered he was very kind he didn't rebuke me didn't say don't yell at me just said I understand I understand I thought you can't understand you never had a daughter with an eye that didn't straighten after surgery but he had a lot of compassion and so I went back to the hospital and Cynthia was there and when Teresa finally got her eyes open again it is straightened a little bit and today she doesn't even need to wear glasses right on worth every dime forgive me I just had to throw that hand how God how good is God he makes eyes eyes are never fickle to God but he may have chosen not to straighten it Lord saveth is his name from age to age the same he must win the battle when what I ever learned that I tell you if you're like me you're strong-willed and if you're strong-willed you've got a bigger challenge in front of you because you'll be forever fighting your will against God's will that's what my recent study in Gethsemane was so helpful for me that's where I think the greater pain of Jesus occurred not on the cross emotional pain releasing of the will pain I think the victory was won in Jesus life before the cross the victory was won for us at the cross but it was won for him and gets cemani not my will but yours be done and he accepted the cup and when you finally do accept it it's amazing what happens well Paul got through this and noticed the reason we suffer verse 9 we had the sentence of death in ourselves so that there's our purpose cloths we would not trust in ourselves second reason we suffer so that we don't trust in ourselves first reason is that we may be able to comfort others the same comfort we are comforted second reason is that we might not trust in ourselves if suffering does nothing else affliction does nothing else it teaches us how weak we are and that there is only a strength found in another and his name is Jesus and we learned that when we go through it and he verse 10 delivers us from so great apparel and he will deliver us he's the one on whom we have set our hope and he will yet delivers and the third reason verse 11 you joining and helping us through your prayers so that here's our third purpose clause thanks maybe given by many persons on our behalf third reason we suffer that we might learn to give thanks in everything God graciously in our country gives us a day every year that's named for that very discipline thanks giving it isn't thanks keeping thanks giving we keep enough to ourselves and for ourselves learn to just thank him even though you can't unravel the mystery that thanks may be given on our behalf for the favor bestowed so I'll wrap it up with these three simple words of application when you suffer the unexpected and you want to press through it instead of focusing on yourself now think of others later who are gonna benefit from what you're going through it'll give you hope it will give you a hope here's the second rather than fighting surrender rather than resisting release this will increase your faith as you verse 9 learn not to trust in yourself and the third even though getting back at somebody or getting even at the moment may make us feel better try giving thanks this will bring peace rather than a fist doubled-up open-handed Lord I'm yours and I I want this to play a role in my ministry in my life I want to model this authentically John Bunyan when he was set aside in prison began the writing of his immortal the pilgrims progress includes a scene that has always moved me it's where Christian with that heavy pack on his back falls into this slough of despond and he can't get out and he's wallowing around in it and he he's uh struggling to survive this place of despond and pliable says to him o neighbor where are you now and Christian says truly I don't know at this plot will began to be offended and angrily said to his fellow if this is the happiness you've told me all of all this while love if we have such ill speed at our first setting out what may we expect betwixt this and our journey's end may I get out again with my life you shall possess the brave country alone for me and with that he gave a desperate struggle or two and got out of the mire on that side of the slough which was next to his own house so away he went and Christians saw him no more where for Christian was left to tumble in the slough of despond alone but still he endeavoured to struggle to that side of the slough that was still further from his own house next to the wicked gate and that which he did but could not get out because of the burden that was on his back but I beheld in my dream that a man came to him whose name was help this is the Spirit of God his name was help and asked him what he did there and Christian said I was bid go this way by a man called evangelist who directed me also to yonder gate that I might escape the wrath to come and as I was going through the raw fell in here and they conversed together regarding his his plight and it ran and help reaches down and he said you reach up and he does and he lifts him there will be occasions in your ministry when you will because that is the only way you have to look and the Spirit of God will rescue you beautifully and you may not even be able to explain it well to others but it'll keep you strong in the work of God and you'll stay at it and you'll look back over it over life and over your ministry and realize it was those moments when the Spirit of God came to your rescue as only he can and as only he will let's bow our heads I don't know how any of this prepares any of you for whatever lies ahead but I know it is meant for all of us when through fiery trials your pathway will lie his grace all sufficient will be your supply when peace like a river attendeth my way when sorrows like sea billows roll whatever my lot you've taught me to say it's well with my soul and so our Father in the midst of these days of schooling and times of testing and experiences that are surprising and often totally unexpected have your way in the whirlwind and the storm and remind us that the clouds are but the dust of your feet keep us trusting keep us reaching for the hand of help who is there for us in the name of Jesus I pray everyone sit

Channel: Dallas Theological Seminary

Views: 40,021

Rating: 4.6796341 out of 5

Keywords: Dallas Theological Seminary, DTS, Jesus, Bible, Grace, Community, Dr. Charles Swindoll, 2 Corinthians 1:3-11, Philippians 1:12-14, ministry, faith, trust, pain, stress

Id: 7qD74NGyztA

Length: 47min 29sec (2849 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 29 2017