Finding Stability in Christ Amidst Life's Challenges
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The Christian is so essentially different, essentially different, and it's one of the profoundest tests we can ever apply to ourselves. It's the great test between believism and Faith, between taking up religion and being taken up by it, having it in your head, having it in your heart, in your spirit, at the center of your life. [00:24:02]
What happens to us as Christians is, as is put so frequently in the New Testament, that we have been delivered from this present evil world. We have been taken out of that and translated into the kingdom of God's dear son. Now, when it says that we've been delivered from this present evil World, it doesn't merely mean that we are delivered from its practices, from its habits and its Customs. [00:24:53]
The man who's not a Christian is dependent upon what happens to him. He's dependent upon his surroundings. He's dependent upon his circumstances. Now, there's no need to prove this. It's something that's shouting at us. Why do people spend the amount of money they spend on drinking and smoking and on Pleasure? Well, it's obvious, isn't it? They've got to do it. [00:25:42]
Life, the life of the unbeliever, is indeed like a bubble. You keep it going, you go on blowing, and then if you can't for some reason, it all collapses, and it's gone. There is nothing within. There is no Foundation. There is nothing to fall back upon. There is no sense of having an inward Reserve onto which you can fall back when everything round about you is collapsing. [00:26:43]
The righteous runneth into it and is safe. In other words, he's got a place he can Retreat into when the enemy is attacking powerfully outside, and he feels his defenses are being penetrated. He's tending to lose ground. It's all right. There is no Panic. The Strong Tower here is this tower that is impregnable. [00:30:22]
The Apostle Paul exemplifies the Christian's ability to remain joyful and at peace despite suffering and imprisonment. His life demonstrates that true contentment and strength come from an inward relationship with Christ, not from external conditions. [00:33:04]
We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed, not in despair, persecuted, not forsaken, cast down, not destroyed, always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal bodies. [00:36:24]
For our light Affliction, which is but for a moment, that's all he's been describing as happening to him, calls it a light Affliction but for a moment. What do he mean by but for a moment? Does he know that the persecutions are going to stop? Has he got some Second Sight? Is this some prophetic understanding? [00:39:00]
The light Affliction which is but for a moment, all these terrible things that are happening, are having this effect upon me, he says, that they are creating Within Me and increasing within me and enhancing within me a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory. [00:39:00]
The more circumstances are adverse and cruel and trying, all they do for this man is to remind him of his imperishable soul, to remind him of the Lord Jesus Christ, who had similar experiences when he was in this world, to remind him that the Lord has gone on to prepare a place for him and will come again and receive him unto himself. [00:41:30]
The trouble with us all is that we think so little About That Glory. We're looking so much at the outside, at the seen, the visible. We don't look and gaze upon the Unseen, the Eternal, the Glorious, this which God in Christ is preparing for us. We don't heed the exhortation of Paul to the Colossians. [00:41:30]
The Christian, you see, again, to use the language of the great Apostle, he doesn't merely put up with things. He doesn't merely manage just to get through. That's what the stoic does. Here has the question: who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or Peril or sword? [00:47:23]
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What happens to us as Christians is, as is put so frequently in the New Testament, that we have been delivered from this present evil world. We have been taken out of that and translated into the kingdom of God's dear son. Now, when it says that we've been delivered from this present evil World, it doesn't merely mean that we are delivered from its practices, from its habits and its Customs. [00:24:53]
The man who's not a Christian is dependent upon what happens to him. He's dependent upon his surroundings. He's dependent upon his circumstances. Now, there's no need to prove this. It's something that's shouting at us. Why do people spend the amount of money they spend on drinking and smoking and on Pleasure? Well, it's obvious, isn't it? They've got to do it. [00:25:42]
Life, the life of the unbeliever, is indeed like a bubble. You keep it going, you go on blowing, and then if you can't for some reason, it all collapses, and it's gone. There is nothing within. There is no Foundation. There is nothing to fall back upon. There is no sense of having an inward Reserve onto which you can fall back when everything round about you is collapsing. [00:26:43]
The righteous runneth into it and is safe. In other words, he's got a place he can Retreat into when the enemy is attacking powerfully outside, and he feels his defenses are being penetrated. He's tending to lose ground. It's all right. There is no Panic. The Strong Tower here is this tower that is impregnable. [00:30:22]
The Apostle Paul exemplifies the Christian's ability to remain joyful and at peace despite suffering and imprisonment. His life demonstrates that true contentment and strength come from an inward relationship with Christ, not from external conditions. [00:33:04]
We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed, not in despair, persecuted, not forsaken, cast down, not destroyed, always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal bodies. [00:36:24]
For our light Affliction, which is but for a moment, that's all he's been describing as happening to him, calls it a light Affliction but for a moment. What do he mean by but for a moment? Does he know that the persecutions are going to stop? Has he got some Second Sight? Is this some prophetic understanding? [00:39:00]
The light Affliction which is but for a moment, all these terrible things that are happening, are having this effect upon me, he says, that they are creating Within Me and increasing within me and enhancing within me a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory. [00:39:00]
The more circumstances are adverse and cruel and trying, all they do for this man is to remind him of his imperishable soul, to remind him of the Lord Jesus Christ, who had similar experiences when he was in this world, to remind him that the Lord has gone on to prepare a place for him and will come again and receive him unto himself. [00:41:30]
The trouble with us all is that we think so little About That Glory. We're looking so much at the outside, at the seen, the visible. We don't look and gaze upon the Unseen, the Eternal, the Glorious, this which God in Christ is preparing for us. We don't heed the exhortation of Paul to the Colossians. [00:41:30]
The Christian, you see, again, to use the language of the great Apostle, he doesn't merely put up with things. He doesn't merely manage just to get through. That's what the stoic does. Here has the question: who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or Peril or sword? [00:47:23]
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