Agony of victory

II Corinthians 12: [8] For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me.

[9] And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

"We quote that verse a lot but what does it mean? Paul's saying, 'Lord, if you take this away then' and we fill in the blank. God says, 'Paul, the doctrine works. Trust the doctrine.'

"Doesn't that therefore demonstrate that taking away the problem isn't the sufficient resource? Doesn't it also say, 'In the midst of whatever the problem is . . .'? Doesn't that demand that the doctrine is still going to work? In fact, it is the opportunity," explains John Verstegen in his study entitled, "The Agony of Victory."

" 'Perfect in weakness.' In whose weakness? There's the battle; there's the agony. The struggle is in coming to agree that there's value in us realizing, 'I'm weak; I can't do this. This is not about self-confidence, self-reliance. I've got to get over self.'

"How many of us think that our flesh likes the idea that there's no good thing in our flesh? 'The flesh is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be . . .'

"But the flesh goes, 'Well, give me a chance again,' and we give it another chance and the flesh goes, 'See, I got you again.' Doesn't it do that? Read Romans 7.

" 'My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.'

"That statement right there completely revolutionized Paul's thinking about suffering forever. He realized, 'Wow, God's grace is the treasure; it is the resource. It is the POWER. It is the very thing that sustained Christ.'

"Paul says, 'In light of this, I can either stay over here in the agony, and whine and complain about Oh God, why are you putting me through this? Why don't you fix my problems. You must be mad at me,' all of which is false doctrine.

"Or we can say, 'Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.'

"Then he says, 'Most gladly therefore . . . '

"Public confession time. I'm not quite there yet. I'm still working on that part. I suspect I'm not the only one, but do you see the revolutionary change that happened in Paul's thinking and therefore how he approached the afflictions, the sufferings, the hardships, the difficulties? Completely changed his thinking forever.

"There's the agony for Christ's sake, 'For when I am weak then am I strong.' Because it is coming to the realization of, 'Yet not I but Christ.'

"Let's use Psalm 50 as an illustration: [14] Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most High:

[15] And call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.

"That's a prophetic verse about what Israel's going to do in that tribulation period, but, boy, do you see the parallel? It is IN the trouble . . . our trouble brings us to the end of ourselves; at least it can if we let it. It brings us to the place where we call upon the Lord and let His Word deliver us, and by doing that He gets glorified.

Zechariah 13:9: [9] And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, The LORD is my God.

"You put it through the fires of death. 

II Timothy 4:7: [7] I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith:

"What made it a good fight? It's a good fight because it's a fight worth fighting. There's a lot of fights we get ourselves involved in that are a total waste of time. They're not worth fighting, but this fight is."

(new article tomorrow and conference notes--sorry for delay)