This is the sermon preached by Worship Pastor Timothy Christian at NewDay Community Church on May 18, 2014 entitled My Grace Is Sufficient for You from 2 Cor 12:1-10. This is sermon #3 in the 4-Part sermon series called “Broken No More.” Below is the sermon outline.
Introduction
- Scripture Text: 2 Cor 12:1-10
- Recap of “Broken No More”
- Week One: Foundation of Sickness, Pain, Brokenness
- Week Two: Courage to Bring Our Hurts to God and His People
- Bob reminded us that God doesn’t always heal.
- This Week we are tackling the question: What about when God doesn’t heal?
- So where do we turn in the pages of Scripture for guidance?
- Who better than Paul?
Paul, Paul, Paul: WWPD? What Would Paul Do?
- Now I have a slight bias toward Paul.
- Not WWJD alone.
- Paul was the greatest disciple of Jesus of all time.
- I want to learn from him how I can better follow Jesus.
- He’s the best example.
- What did Paul do? He suffered!
- Acts 9:10-16 (“…how much he must suffer for my name’s sake…”)
- Romans 8:15-17
- The necessity of suffering in the Christian life!
- Suffering is part of the Christian life. God does not always heal us.
- Suffering leads to glory. It is the prerequisite.
- More than anything, we need a robust theology of suffering.
- This is all but lacking in popular Christianity today. They preach health and wealth; no suffering if you become a Christian. They claim that if you didn’t get healed, then you didn’t have enough faith or you didn’t give enough money to the preacher! Outrageous! Paul would’ve said MH GENOITO! May it never be! No way Jose!
- Just because we are bound to a life of suffering does not mean that we are doomed having no hope. Rather Paul says in Rom 5:1-5 – suffering produces hope. Let us be wary of the temptation to think that suffering produces depression, perhaps it does in some cases. But suffering from God leads to hope, this hope being the hope of glory!
Text of 2 Cor 12:1-10
- Overview of 2 Corinthians
- His situation with the super-apostles and defending his apostolic ministry. Fake = pride, arrogance; Auth = humility, meekness, sufferings
- 2 Cor 6:3-10
- 2 Cor 11:23-30
- Walk thru 2 Cor 12:1-10.
- What is this thorn?
- Perhaps his eyesight. Perhaps other things. We don’t know.
- What we do know is that God said no to Paul’s pleading for healing.
- What is your thorn?
- My thorn has been my back problems. God still hasn’t healed me.
- But I’m doing all I can
- We seek help from all appropriate means; balanced as Bob said.
- Doctor/Chiro; Prayer; Exercise/Self-Care
What to do in the “Already, Not Yet” tension?
- We are living in the already-not-yet. It’s here but it’s not.
- “Outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are gaining for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all…” (2 Cor 4:16-18).
- What do we do when Jesus says no? Hear his words to Paul.
- Depend upon the grace of Jesus.
- Jesus says he will give us the strength and sustain us, and that he will be glorified through our bearing of sufferings.
- Pray for healing. Ask him to remove it. He might.
- For Paul, he didn’t. But the important thing was that his heart was sensitive to the Lord; he didn’t get offended at God for allowing this, but he let it draw him closer to the Lord in utter dependence. Bringing him to a place of humility, a place that 14 years earlier he wasn’t at.
- You see, God gave Paul that lofty heavenly vision 14 years ago along with his thorn in the flesh to humble him and to shape him into the humble and authentic apostle that he was by the time 2 Cor was written. He wasn’t false like the “super-apostles” preaching a different Jesus, a different gospel. And his thorn is what brought him there.
- You see, suffering produces perseverance, then character, and ultimately hope. So Paul’s thorn produced his authenticity as one called by God.
- How are you letting your thorn, your weaknesses draw you into deeper places of humility in the Lord, deeper places of surrender, of hope? In other words, how are you letting your thorn shape you into the authentic Christian disciple that he has called all of us to be?
- Paul goes on to describe how he handles his sufferings in this present day in the “already, not yet” in Rom 8:18-23.
- Remember, suffering produces hope and is our necessary prerequisite for sharing the glory to come in the new creation, which is what we will explore next week.
Conclusion
- We are going to offer a time to receive healing prayer.
- If you are in pain and God does not heal you in the here and now, know that in the eschaton, you will be. But in the here and now, Jesus is saying my grace is enough, to sustain you. Your weakness displays my strength. And one day I will make it alright.
- “For our light and momentary troubles are gaining for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” (2 Cor 3-4) Let us fix our eyes on what we do not see.
Dr. Timothy J. Christian 