Equipped for anything--not lacking a thing

My drive to Chicago the other week for my church's summer Bible conference was made trickier by the fact that I had no working air-conditioning and it was super-humid outside.

With all my windows fully open all I could do was play the radio loudly, and since I traveled on a Sunday morning there were some different preachers I found on local AM stations going through different small towns in western Ohio and then northbound in Indiana.

What gave me a much-needed break from them (they sometimes tend to yell and scold and harp, not to mention the issue of bad doctrine) was a powerful thunderstorm with rain so heavy everyone turned on their emergency lights and I actually had to pull over into the berm because my defrost fan couldn't keep up.

With my windows closed, I put in an old CD (popped in randomly from a big pile) that had the title "Turning 50 Again." It was my pastor's last sermon before he went in for his heart surgery in 2012. I used an outtake from the sermon's beginning yesterday and now here's more from it:

Being strong in faith means you’re going to walk by faith, not by sight. There are going to come times, especially as you get older, where you realize that everything about you—the circumstances, everything you think, all of your wisdom, all the wisdom of everybody else who looks around you and says one thing and God says, “Do this.” Wisdom’s going to tell you, “Being strong in faith, fully persuaded.”

You want to finish strong? Be strong in faith. Be strong in an understanding of what God’s doing and believing that what He says, He’ll do it. Take whatever little bit of understanding you have and trust it and you know what? You’ll find it won’t fail you, says Richard Jordan.

Romans 15: [1] We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves.
[2] Let every one of us please his neighbour for his good to edification.

They need you. They need you to be for them what they need you to be for them; not what you want to be for them.

That strength of faith is designed to produce something in you that ministers to others. You’re not using it just to please yourself. That’s what happens so often. You know, “knowledge puffs up.” Charity edifies. Charity is not knowledge; it’s the ability to esteem a thing the way God does. It’s the labor of love. It’s faith working by love.

II Corinthians 1: [3] Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort;
[4] Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.
[5] For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ.

He didn’t comfort you in all that just to get you through it. The reason He comforted you in that is that “we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.”

Being strong in faith means you go into the circumstances of life where the weak are and minister to them and provide them some comfort that they couldn’t find otherwise. Because you’ve been equipped and made useable and you can give them some of your hope.

Romans 5 goes on: [3] And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience;
[4] And patience, experience; and experience, hope:
[5] And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.

You go through some tribulation, you get some skill in handling the problem, some experience, and it gives you some hope—you say, “This isn’t going to destroy me; there’s something in here that’s going to produce some steel and some mettle and some maturing in me,” and the love of God just brightens up every part of your life.

Then you see someone else in that circumstance and you’re able to go there and share with them some of the same hope that you had. It’s amazing, isn’t it?

II Corinthians 12: [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.
[10] Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.

What a statement.  The Lord Jesus Christ says, “My grace is sufficient. It’s able to make you stand, lacking nothing. You’re complete. You’re blessed with all spiritual blessings. You’ve got everything on board you’re ever going to need. You’re not lacking a thing. My strength is made perfect in weakness.”

I don’t know if the Lord said that to you what you would say back to Him?! Look what Paul said: “Most gladly therefore . . .”

Why, Paul? “Because I’m a masochistic nut.” No, no, that’s not what he said, I’m sorry. He said, “That the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

Paul said, “There’s something better than simply being delivered physically. Therefore, I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak then am I strong.”

Notice how Paul puts all the suffering into the same pot. He lumps them all together. You see, we like to take a few of them and say, “That one over there is that and this one over here is this.” Paul just puts them all in one box and just makes all of them the same.

Paul doesn’t separate them out like there’s this one and that one. It’s just pain no matter what the pain is; difficulties no matter what the difficulties are or where they come from.