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Good morning. Welcome to our ninth Sunday away from our church location and I'm glad that you're here this morning and able to join with us in this service. Let me ask you to do something I don't normally ask you to do and that is get a piece of paper and a pen might be helpful. today, and I don't really know that I should like this, but you could pause the player, whatever's playing this, and it's kind of scary to think that you could mute this or whatever, turn this off, but I hope you could just hit the pause button and go get a piece of paper and a pen and 10 points this morning, but they're going to be quick ones, but maybe kind of a little checklist as well, something you can go back and look at that might be a blessing to you. I enjoy reading biographies and a lot of times my normal work week, Monday I'll take a little bit of downtime after preaching on Sunday and I'll take a book in my Bible and I'll go to the library and I'll just read for that morning. And I love biographies. Some of my favorite, maybe I've shared this before and you know these already, but Hudson Taylor, Spiritual Secrets, is a great biography about a man of God from England that went as a missionary to China, started the China Inland Mission, and was just a man of faith that had a deep love for the Lord. Darlene Dybler-Rose is another biography that I've spoken of. I'll speak of it in this message today. But Evidence Not Seen is her autobiography. Jonathan Goforth, By My Spirit. Jonathan Goforth and his wife, Rosalind, were missionaries in China in the early 1900s when the Boxer Rebellion took place, a man that God used for revival in China. and had a great walk with the Lord. Our church knows that for the last year and a half or two years, I've been, I was reading a series of memoirs of Thomas Chalmers. And it was a four book series from the 1850s that the Lord allowed me to get. They have five to 600 pages each book. And so I read over 2000 pages about this man, Thomas Chalmers, compiled by William Hanna and often supplemented by his son-in-law, William Hanna. As you read about Thomas Chalmers, you read about a Church of Scotland preacher, pastor, that was ministering near St. Andrews in Fife and was not saved. He came under conviction after trying to earn his salvation by being a good person and trying to be more moral and yet finding no victory until he read a book by the MP William Wilberforce. that spoke of salvation by grace through faith in Christ alone. And as a preacher, he accepted Jesus Christ as his savior, I think around the age of 30. You read about his love for nature and his garden that he had and that he kept and his countryside rides and his travels around the United Kingdom and his love for even going into caves and exploring caves and cathedrals and old buildings even in his day, looking at those. And he was involved in ministering to the poor. as God took him to Glasgow and he had a large area that was very poor people and largely uneducated. He got burdened about educating some of these that couldn't afford schooling and did a lot like John Knox to educate Scotland. He became a professor at Edinburgh University and there his impact went from being a minister and ministering to his people to ministering to those that would minister to people as he trained preachers. He led in the disruption that took place in the 1840s as the Church of Scotland, for sake of religious liberty and not being under the thumb of the Parliament, the Free Church left the Church of Scotland and lost everything. And he was a leader in that, became the first leader of the Free Church of Scotland. And as I read that, there's a sense as you read about somebody's life that you feel like you know the person and you get to know somebody that lived a couple hundred, in this case, years ago. My wife feels like that. She'll tell you that she feels like Amy Carmichael is a dear friend because she enjoys reading her writings. There's a great man of God in the New Testament that stands out as an incredible figure in the early church. His name is Saul of Tarsus. And he's a killer, he's a persecutor of Christians, but he becomes the Apostle Paul. Acts 9.15, the Lord said unto a man that was to come to Paul to help Paul in his spiritual journey and also to get his eyesight restored after his conversion. He says to him, go thy way for he is a chosen vessel unto me to bear my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. And as we read about Paul, and God has given us an immense amount of scripture about this man, we get to know him. We read about his life in Luke's early church history, the book of Acts. as he writes about the journeys and the missionary journeys and the experiences of the Apostle Paul. We get to read his inspired letters. Paul is the human author under the Spirit of God's leading of the majority of the books in the New Testament. They were epistles that he wrote to his churches that he had started, that he wrote to his preacher boys that he was training. And so again, we have an opportunity to get to know this man, Paul. He was a man who when given a charge by God, he fulfilled it. Acts 14 verse 26, it says, and thence they sailed to Antioch from whence they had been recommended to the grace of God for the work which they fulfilled. And that was the end of the first missionary journey. And I read that in my Bible reading this past week. And that statement just stood out to me that God had given them a responsibility to take the gospel to these people. And the Bible says that they had fulfilled it. the work which they fulfilled. His final book, 2 Timothy, was the last one that he wrote. It was a letter to one of his preacher boys, Timothy. It was written in the Mamertine prison in Rome, where Paul would be taken from there to his execution. 2 Timothy 4, 7, he said this, I have fought a good fight. I have finished my course. I have kept the faith. And so our text this morning is 2 Corinthians chapter 12 is what we're gonna look at. It's a letter, 2 Corinthians is a letter to the church in Corinth, but it's an interesting letter in that it's written in defense of Paul's apostleship. And because there had been some heresy in the church undermining Paul's authority and such. And as he is under attack, he's gonna defend what God has called him to do. And as he does, there is a great revelation given to us in 2 Corinthians about the man, the apostle Paul. And so I've entitled my message this morning, Paul Revealed. It's God revealing to us a man of God that was well used of God. I want us to get to know Paul in this message as we look at the person who God could use. The person who God could use. Paul was one that they said about him as he came to an area, you know, these that have turned the world upside down have come hither. He's the one that the idolaters were afraid because so many were turning from idolatry to Christianity that they thought they were going to lose their business and the making of their idols for the goddess Diana. And so again, this morning, the person who God can use. Are you a person like Paul, whom God can use? A faithful man or woman who will fulfill God's calling? And so we're going to, again, just kind of highlight some things as we look at 2 Corinthians chapter 12 and things about the life of a man whom God could use. Let's pray. Father, we praise you for the grace that you give. We thank you for the opportunity that we have to come to the word of God this morning. Lord, thank you for each one that is here present and ready to listen to the word of God. And Father, I've been encouraged as I've looked at Paul, I've been challenged as I looked at these principles about a man whom God could use. And Father, I pray for that if we need it. Father, we're praying in our prayer times as ministers on Tuesdays and Wednesdays that God, you would raise up faithful men. We're praying, Lord, the harvest that you'd send forth laborers into the harvest field. And so Father, we pray that the Spirit of God would deeply wrap these principles around the hearts of God's people that we consider your ability to use us because of the characteristics that we see in the life of Paul, which can be modeled in our life. And so may the Spirit of God help us as we hear, give us ears to hear. Father, we pray that the Word of God would have free course. Father, I ask that the Spirit of God would lead me in that which I say, that Jesus Christ may be glorified. And Father, I pray that you would work mightily. We need revival. Father, we need a day of awakening. We need some unbelievers to hear a message from the word of God, respond to the gospel, get saved and decide that they're gonna live their life for Jesus and make a difference in their family, make a difference in their neighborhood, make a difference in their nation, make a difference in the world. And so Father, would you do a good work? It's in Christ and we pray, amen. Alright, so here they come. There's 10 of them. And so again, we're just going to move quickly through these. But the first thing about a man whom God could use is that he's a man who is heaven-bound. He's a man who is heaven-bound. God wasn't using Thomas Chalmers until Thomas Chalmers was born again. Thomas Chalmers was not fruitful in ministry because Thomas Chalmers didn't have life in himself. The Bible says about somebody that gets saved is the Holy Spirit moves in and as Jesus spoke about the Holy Spirit and somebody that's saved, he said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. Christ is the living water. And that is an outflow of somebody that's saved. So we look at Paul, Paul wasn't being used of God. Paul was persecuting Christians. Paul hated Jesus Christ. Paul was against the church until that day that Paul got saved. Now, as we think about Paul's conversion, and what's interesting as we come to 2 Corinthians chapter 12, is this, Paul didn't just think that he was on his way to heaven. Paul knew that he was on his way to heaven. He knew that, first of all, by faith, having surrendered to the Lord Jesus Christ, and accepted him as his savior. But secondly, he knew it by experience and a very unusual experience in that Paul was a man that by God's grace was given the experience of being in heaven. And he speaks about it here at the beginning of this text in 2 Corinthians 12, verse 1. He says, it's not expedient for me doubtless to glory. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. So he's gonna talk about an experience that he had. I knew a man in Christ above 14 years ago. And he's speaking generically because this is such a incredible experience that Paul very humbly gives an account of it. He says, whether in the body or out of the body, in the body I cannot tell, or whether out of the body I cannot tell, God knoweth, such a one caught up to the third heaven. And I knew such a man, whether in the body or out of the body, I cannot tell, God knoweth, how that he was caught up into paradise. All right, so he had this heavenly experience and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter. Of such a one will I glory, yet of myself I will not glory, but in mine infirmities. For though I would desire to glory, I shall not be a fool, for I will say the truth, But now I forbear, lest any man should think of me, above which that he seeth me to be, or that he heareth of me. Paul himself didn't know how God did this, whether it was by revelation of a dream or that type of experience where Paul went into a trance and it seemed like he was in heaven, but he wasn't, or if God actually translated him to heaven for this experience in the body, out of the body, Paul, I didn't know, but what's clear is that he had an experience of seeing the glory of heaven. It says he was caught up to paradise. Paradise is the place of the departed dead that are in Christ. And so like the thief on the cross, remember he said there on the cross, as he's putting his faith in Jesus, he said, Lord, remember me in paradise. And Jesus said, behold, this day thou shalt be with me in paradise. He heard the words of heaven and God forbid that it's not lawful, he said, for him to give an account, a true account of what even he had heard in heaven. None of his hearers could say that God had graced them with a similar experience. Again, Paul's defending his apostleship. He's defending the fact that he has been blessed by God with revelation, and so he accounts for this experience, but none of his hearers had so experienced what Paul had with regard to his salvation. So Paul knew the truth of his salvation by faith and by experience. One of my favorite questions that I ask people about Jesus is this, do you know for sure that if you died today, you'd go to heaven? Are you 100% sure? I mean, is there, is it without a doubt? And I love to look at them and tell them, I know for sure that if I died, I'd go to heaven. I've got Jesus Christ in my heart as my savior. A lot of times people will wrongly say, nobody can know that, especially if they've been brought up in a religion that has taught them that you've got to earn your salvation and you just kind of hope that you do enough good things and those good things outweigh your bad things. And they really hope they're going to heaven, but they don't know they're going to heaven because they have not received Jesus Christ. And yet the Bible says in 1 John 5, 13, these things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God. And when somebody gets saved, God moves in. Let me just say this about salvation. Salvation is such a clear experience that somebody that has been born again knows that they have been born again. And that's because the Spirit of God indwells them. And so the Bible says in Romans 8, 9, but you're not in the flesh, but in the spirit. If so be that the spirit of God dwell in you. Now, if any man have not the spirit of Christ, he has none of his. If that's not your experience, having received the spirit of God at salvation and knowing the presence of God moving into your heart, then the Bible says, if you don't have that, you're not saved. It says in Romans 8-16 that when the Spirit of God moves in, He is a convincer within us. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. Before God can use anybody, and there might be some very sincere people that really have a desire to please God. They have a desire to serve God. They want to help maybe their neighbors or friends or somebody else after God, and they're trying to serve God, but they've never had that experience of being born again. The man whom God uses, first of all, is a man who is heaven-bound. Secondly, he's a man who is humbled by God. He's a man that's heaven-bound, he's a man that is humbled by God. Verse seven says, and lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations there was given to me, a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. And Paul says, as I had that experience, it's like the story of Job. The Bible says that Satan, when he came before God, God said, have you considered my servant Job, a righteous man, one that feareth God and escheweth evil. And Satan says, does Job fear God for naught? You've put a hedge about him. There's nothing I can do against him. And God says, okay, I'll give you permission for this. And so it's as if with Paul, it's a similar type of experience where God's hedge of protection is about the man of God, but God allowed that to be broken a little bit so that Satan could afflict Paul, as Paul speaks about it here, the messenger of Satan, to buffet me, lest that I should be exalted above measure. Because of the incredible revelation that God had given, the experience that Paul had had, there was a great danger in Paul's life of pride coming into his heart. And so God allowed Paul to be afflicted in a very specific way, lest Paul become proud and fall in his ability to serve God. This past week Katie, and Paul describes it as a thorn in the flesh, this past week my wife told me a story about a roommate of hers in college and apparently this past week her son has had a bad fall. into some brush and he severely broke his arm and they got it the surgery or whatnot that he had to have on his arm but then it had a festering sore and they went in and they found that a thorn had actually gotten in there and it become infected and so they had to go and get the thorn out because it was festering. And so Paul had something in his life that God had allowed that was festering like a like a thorn that just had gotten in there and couldn't get it out. And he had prayed and asked God to take it out. But God had left it in there to protect Paul from pride. You know, Jacob. in the Old Testament had a similar experience. He had a wonderful experience of God as a pre-incarnate appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ. We call it a theophany. It was God somehow manifested in a way that Jacob could actually grapple with God and wrestle with God. Genesis 32, verse 24, it says, in the story, Jacob was left alone to wrestle the man with him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against them, he touched the hollow of his thigh, that's Jacob's thigh. And the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint as he wrestled with him. And he said, let me go for the day break. And then he said, I will not let thee go except thou bless me. And he said unto him, what is thy name? And he said, Jacob, and he said, thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men and has prevailed. And so it's an incredible story that Jacob was allowed to grapple with God and succeed. And it's a great picture of prevailing prayer, except there was a very real experience that Jacob had of wrestling with God. Yet as he did that, God touched the hollow of his thigh. And so the Bible goes on to say, Jacob asked him and said, tell me, I pray thee thy name. And he said, wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name? And he blessed him there. And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, for I've seen God face to face, and my life is preserved. And as he passed over Penuel, the sun rose upon him, and he halted upon his thigh. And so you can see Jacob walking away and he's limping. He's had an incredible experience of God, but again, God humbled him in that experience. Therefore the children of Israel, eat not the sinew which shrank, which is upon the hollow of the thigh unto this day, because he touched the hollow of Jacob's thigh in the sinew that shrank. God humbled these men. They're both great men that God was going to use, but God allowed them to be afflicted in a way after an incredible experience of God. So God uses a man that's heaven bound. God uses a man who is humbled by God. And then God uses a man yielded to God in prayer. God uses a man who is yielded to God in prayer. Verse eight says, for this thing I have sought the Lord thrice that it might depart from me. 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. And the Bible says that Paul three times went to God about that in prayer. Now, I don't think that that was Paul's, you know, in his list of things that he was praying about. He said, oh, Father, by the way, please remove the thorn of my flesh. I think there was an intensity about it. I think it was a time devoted to going to God and asking God to take care of it. Paul had seen God heal incredibly. In fact, Paul himself had been a participant in that, and he knew God's ability to heal. I mean, his faith in God's healing power would have been great, and so his dependence upon God as he went in prayer would have been intense, and he would have been asking God once. asking God twice, asking God three times, and then God says, My strength is made perfect in weakness. God gave him grace, but God didn't give him healing. And it's reminiscent of the Lord. And it's also three times that the Lord Jesus Christ in the garden went to his father in that intense series of prayer with his disciples as he came back and said, what could you not watch with me one hour? And maybe multiple hours were spent and prayer, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not as I wilt, but as thou wilt. God didn't take away the suffering of the Savior, but he gave Jesus the grace and strength to face it. God answered Paul's prayer similarly. He didn't take away what Paul had to face, but he gave Paul the grace to face it. Are you content in prayer to yield to God? To be willing to say, okay, I'm burdened about this. I really wanna see this affliction or this burden taken away. And yet God, if it is your will that I go through it, so be it. And to hear God say, my grace is sufficient for thee for my strength is made perfect in weakness. I mentioned Darlene Dibler Rose and she was a missionary to Papua New Guinea. She and her husband Russell went there and she's a story that I'm familiar with from my youth because as a child traveling in our church van. 45 minutes to Christian school and back, we would often listen to the testimony given by Darlene Deibler Rose from herself at an auditorium as she shared the incredible story of her life. This past week or two weeks ago here, my wife found that online and the same thing that I've listened to growing up and we put it on and we listen to her again, count those stories. And let me say, I'll put the link on Facebook and make it available to her. Just ask us and we'll send you the link to this lady's testimony as it is very, very powerful. But as the war took place and they were separated and put into prisoner of war camps, and then she was separated from her husband. They were just newlyweds. She never saw her husband again. She was a prisoner for four years. She was taken and beaten and taken to her execution, but God spared her. It's an incredible story, and she recounts this. I mean, we were in tears, again, just listening to it. And you can tell the audience is deeply impacted by what she's saying, but she looks at them and says, I wouldn't trade places with any of you. because of the experience that she had had of the grace of God. And obviously, as you look at her life, you see the incredible power that God put into her life. The person that God will use is a man yielded to God in prayer. that's willing to go through it with God and not necessarily have God take it away. God uses a man who is heaven bound. God uses a man who is humbled by God. God uses a man yielded to God in prayer and then a man who embraces trials. A man who embraces trials. It says in verse 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. And Paul says, okay, God's strength is made perfect in weakness, therefore I accept and I embrace the trials that God brings into my life. Remember Paul's conversion story, God said, for I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake. Again, 2 Corinthians is a defense of Paul's apostleship. And in chapter 11, he recounts things to the church in defense of himself. And he says, I'm compelled to boast about what I've done for God because you have compelled me to it by doubting that God has worked and is working in my life. And so he says in chapter 11, are they ministers of Christ? I speak as a fool. I am more. In labors, more abundant. In stripes, that's being whipped above measure. In prisons, more frequent. In deaths, oft. Of the Jews, five times received I 40 stripes, save one. The Jews would only whip a man with a cat of nine tails that would rip the flesh off their body, but that nine-stranded whip would only hit their body 39 times lest they break God's law which forbid them to go above 40. Paul received 195 lashes. Five times he received the 40 stripes minus one. Thrice was I beaten with rods. Once was I stoned. Thrice I suffered shipwreck. A night and a day I've been in the deep, in journeyings often, in perils of water, in perils of robbers, in perils by my own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren, in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness, beside those things that are without which cometh upon me daily. the care of all the churches. And Paul takes that list of experiences in chapter 11, and in chapter 12, as he speaks about it, he says, therefore, because God's strength is made perfect in weakness, he says, I take pleasure in infirmities. Paul rejoiced and embraced suffering because in suffering, Paul found the strength of God working through him. and using him. Remember on his final missionary journey as he's coming back to Jerusalem and every city that he goes into he finds out that the Holy Spirit is witnessing in every city saying that bonds and afflictions abide me. But he says, but none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy in the ministry which I've received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God. Paul embraced it. He said, it doesn't move me. It doesn't matter that this affliction, this persecution, these distresses, I embrace them because these are the things that make it possible for me to serve God in power. Paul would have us learn about this idea of God's strength being made perfect in weakness. Acts 14.22, as he came through having suffered himself, coming back, he says, confirming the souls of the disciples and exhorting them to continue in the faith and that we must, through much tribulation, enter into the kingdom of God. I'll confess I struggle with this. Even, I mean, I'm writing this message and then life, some things come and they're not really that tough of things, but it's not natural for us to say, hey, that's great, I'm so glad that I get affliction or distress or financial tightness or things like that. And yet Paul looked at that and said, I embrace that because when I'm weak, then am I strong, for Christ's sake. The man who God uses is a man who embraces trials. He's a man who is heaven bound. He's a man who is humbled by God. He's a man yielded to God in prayer. And then a man who God uses is a man who remembers his nothingness. A man who remembers his nothingness. Verse 11 says, I am become a fool and glorying ye, ye have compelled me, for I ought to have been commended of you. They should have saluted Paul and not that they should have overly honored him, but God had given him a very high position. And Paul said, you should have acknowledged that because you haven't acknowledged that I'm having to defend who I am by God's grace. For in nothing am I behind the very cheapest apostles, though I be nothing. Truly the signs of an apostle were wrought among you in all patience and signs and wonders and mighty deeds. In nothing, I'm behind the very cheapest apostles. You know, Peter, the great preacher at Pentecost, and you read the book of Acts and you see how God was using Peter. But then the story switches and it turns to a second great man of God, an apostle as well, the apostle Paul. Last night as I was reading my Bible, I just happened to be in the life of Paul right now in my reading, but I said to my wife, Paul, the temptation for pride would have been extreme. Paul was one of 13 men that after Jesus Christ left were entrusted with the health of the church and everything Jesus Christ had just purchased by his sinless death on the cross, and they were responsible as men. to get that message out to the world. Now, praise God, it wasn't without God because they had the Holy Spirit indwelling them and Christ was multiplied in the lives of his servants as they received the Holy Spirit. But what a sober responsibility Paul had. And yet Paul says in verse 11, though I be nothing. Paul never forgot who he was in reality, that he was nothing. If Paul had a modern hymn or theme song, it might be something like this. I'm only a sinner saved by grace. Paul never forgot the depths from which God had rescued him. 1 Timothy 1 15 says, this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am chief. If there's a list of sinners and great wickedness against God, Paul says, put me at the top of the list. He was a persecutor of Christians. He was a killer of those that followed Christ. Back when I was in Bible college, I got to be in a play called The Merchant of Venice, a Shakespearean play. The lead role was performed by Dr. Bob III, Bob Jones University, Dr. Bob Jones III. By God's grace, for the first 70 years of the university, the president was a Jones. It started with his grandpa, and then his dad, and then Dr. Bob III. And as he's in that, and Bob Jones is a well-known Bible college in the United States, very well-known within fundamentalism, even in the United Kingdom, there's an awareness of the university among believers, but a great university that God had used. Dr. Bob was known all over the United States. But as I had him sign my program for the Merchant of Venice, he signed it, and then he signed this verse as well, Psalm 34, six. And I got back to my room, I thought, I wanna see what verse Dr. Bob used as he signed that. And the verse is this, this poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. You know, you look at that and I thought, praise God, here's a man that could boast of the things that God has done in his life. And yet he has, I don't know if it's his life verse or not, but as he signed it, he signed it with that verse, this poor man cried and the Lord heard him. Like the man that wrote that, that was the king of Israel who never forgot his humble shepherd beginnings, King David. He was a man who remembered his nothingness. Do you remember your nothingness? That God can't use you because you're great, but that like Paul, though I be nothing, God has seen fit. The man who God uses as a man who is heaven bound. He's a man who's humbled by God. He's a man yielded to God in prayer. He's a man who embraces trials. He's a man who remembers his nothingness. And then he's a man who carries his own weight. He's a man that carries his own weight. We've enjoyed as a family, being able to walk out on the golf course by our house. And COVID-19 does have some hidden blessings in that there's no golf taking place. And so you're not watching out for anything and just enjoying walking around. I told my kids about a golfer that went golfing and his wife knew he was away and he got back and she said, how did the game go? And he looked kind of depressed and discouraged. And he said it was horrible. And she said, well, what was the problem? He said, well, on the hole number three, Jim died, his golf partner. And she goes, that is terrible. And he said, yeah. After that, it was hit the ball, drag Jim, hit the ball, drag Jim. And that's a humorous thing, but it isn't funny in life when somebody doesn't carry their own weight. When they're a burden to everybody else that is going along and it's like they're dragging them and they're not pulling their own, they're not in the harness, they're not getting it done, that can be burdensome. Paul wasn't a burden. Paul was somebody that carried his own weight. It says, for what is it wherein you were inferior to other churches, except it be that I myself was not burdensome to you? Forgive me this wrong. Paul says, forgive me for coming and carrying my own weight, as it were. You know, Paul was the one that said, and I reminded Mac of this, Mac's getting to that age where he enjoys, you know, helping out and doing some things and he gets paid every week and I pay him and I tell him, you know, that's for work and that's for doing things around the house. We were even thinking about that last night and I told him, I said, you know, the Bible says, if a man doesn't eat, doesn't work. I said it that way too last night. If a man doesn't work, neither should he eat. You know, that's what Paul taught. He taught to dig in and get the job done. You know, the term tentmaker, we actually get from the life of the Apostle Paul. A tentmaker is a minister that is seeking to preach full-time, but also seeking to supplement his income by doing work on the side to help him be able to do what God has called him to do. We get that term tentmaker from the Apostle Paul, who was a tentmaker. And Acts chapter 18 says, after these things, Paul departed from Athens and came to Corinth and found a certain Jew named Aquila, born in Pontus, lately come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because that Claudius had commanded all Jews to depart from Rome and came unto them. And because he was of the same craft, he abode with them and wrought, worked, for by their occupation they were tent makers. Now, as mission started, it wasn't a common understanding that we're gonna send support and put these men out and get behind them. Paul and Barnabas and others went by faith, trusting as Jesus taught his disciples that God would supply and meet their needs as they went along. And Paul was willing to work to get that done. Paul did have some mission support, but not from the church at Corinth. And Paul speaks about that. in Philippians chapter 4 verse 15 says, Now ye Philippians know also that in the beginning of the gospel, when I departed from Macedonia, no church communicated with me as concerning giving and receiving, but ye only. For even in Thessalonica ye sent once and again unto my necessity. not because I desire a gift, but I desire fruit that may abound to your account. But I have all, and abound, and I am full, having received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you, an odor of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable while pleasing to God. But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Paul knew that it was right for those that tread out the corn to eat of the profit of that ministry, and Paul wasn't opposed to that, but as he went to the church in Corinth, he didn't demand that, that they helped him, and so he was willing to work to supplement his income so that he could be there as an evangelist sharing the gospel. You know, do you carry your own weight? Are you somebody that's willing to grab hold and work in your family, in your neighborhood, in your church? A man who God uses is a man who carries his own weight. He's a man who is heaven bound. He's a man who's humbled by God. He's a man yielded to God in prayer. He's a man who embraces trials and a man who remembers his nothingness. And then he's a man who willingly pays for those under his care. He willingly pays for those that are under his care. Verse 14 says, Behold, the third time I'm ready to come to you, and I will not be burdensome to you. For I seek not yours, but you. For the children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children. And I will very gladly spend and be spent for you, though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved. Paul had a great heart for the people of Corinth. He said, I didn't come to get from you, but I came for you because I care about you. And Paul viewed his ministry as a parent views his ministry to his children and providing for them. My wife and I were talking about parenting the other night and I said to her, I can understand how people become grandparents and that transition seems to be coming soon in our future. I can just feel myself transitioning a little bit as I've got a five-year-old and I said that to my wife. And I said, I can understand why people spoil their youngest. And she said something about, yeah, you know, I've noticed that you're kind of spend kind of easy for Mac. And I said, but he doesn't get paid a lot. He doesn't. But, you know, I don't mind doing that as a dad. We don't mind doing that as parents. Why? Because that's what we do. We're burning about our kids going to Bible college. We're praying about that. And we're asking God, to supply it and I anticipate helping my kids as much as I can to be able to do that. Why? Because I'm their dad. I will very gladly spend and be spent if it's for their benefit. And so Paul looked at that and he said, you know what, the expense doesn't matter. He said, I am willing to spend and be spent for you even if the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved. You know, are you a person that is willing to spend and be spent for God even if nobody pats you on the back? Even if it's not appreciated. Even if somebody despises you because you're investing in their life and really seeking their spiritual benefit. The man who God uses is a man that goes, you know what, I expect to pay for God's family. The man who God uses willingly pays for those under his care. He's a man that's head and down. He's humbled by God. He's yielded to God in prayer. He embraces trials and he remembers his nothingness and carries his own weight. But then we find as well that he's a man who isn't seeking personal financial gain. He's not a man that's seeking personal financial gain. Verse 16, He says, but be it so, I did not burden you. Nevertheless, being crafty, I caught you with guile. And he's being a bit sarcastic in what he's saying. He's saying, did I come with trickery? Did I come trying to deceive you? I desired Titus, verse 18, and with him I sent a brother. Did Titus make a gain of you? Walked we not in the same spirit? Walked we not in the same steps? Paul didn't come to fleece the sheep. He didn't come as a religious profiteer to try to make money off of the religious interests of the Corinthians. I can remember two distinct services that I've been at that grieved me when it came to this idea of fleecing the sheep. I said it after this one that I'll recount right now and that is a preacher that got done preaching and he held up a visa sign. And he was taking his own offering. And, you know, it's a good thing for a church to be a blessing to the man of God that comes in and preaches the word of God. We do that at our church and I get up as pastor and I say, you know, this is a good man that's serving the Lord and we want to participate in meeting his needs. And that's a blessing. But this man was taking his own offering. Another time I walked out of a service I was at, the evangelist was taking his own collection. Paul had taught Titus that it's a false teacher that seeks financial gain through religion. Titus 1 verses 9 through 11 says, holding fast the faithful word as he hath been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine, both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers. For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, especially they of the circumcision, whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not for filthy lucre's sake. Filthy looker again is money wrongly acquired in the Bible. And these people for what they could get, they taught falsehood to rob God's people. Heaven's gonna testify how many people were turned away from seeking God at all by the false churches that are reaching into the pockets of people and trying to take their finances. Remember Jesus, the one time he got upset in the Bible that is recorded that at the temple, is when there were religious profiteers picking the pockets of God's people as they came to worship God. John 2.16 He said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence, make not my father's house. a house of merchandise. False religion preys upon a very lucrative audience when they get unbelievers in fear of eternity and take their wealth to secure their eternal security. A lot of churches like that. The Catholic Church is a very, very wealthy church that talks about this idea back in the day of indulgences and now about paying to have a priest come or paying to participate in their church, not by willingly, but by compulsion. The man who God uses is a man who isn't seeking personal financial gain. He's willingly paying for those under his care. He carries his own weight. He remembers his nothingness. He embraces trials. He's yielded to God in prayer. He's humbled by God and he is heaven bound. And then he's a man who builds up the church. And by church, we mean ecclesia, the called out assembly, not the building. And so verse 19 says again, thinking that we excuse ourselves unto you, we speak before God in Christ, but we do all things dearly beloved for your edifying. Paul was under attack and they're saying whatever lies were being told about the Apostle Paul, that he was in it for the profit and whatnot. And Paul said, I just want to tell you everything that we have ever done for you in the ministry has been with a desire to build you up. That's what the term edify means. It's a very foolish person that seeks to tear down the things that need to be built up in their lives. Solomon had a problem about that, about a woman that would tear down her own house. In Proverbs 14, verse one says, every wise woman buildeth her house, but the foolish plucketh it down with her hands. And Paul might be rebuking those back in Corinth that everything that they were doing was heretical. It was undermining God's work. It was destroying God's work. It was seeking to tear it apart. And Paul says, wait a second, we're being accused over here, but everything that we've ever done has been for the good of the church. And Paul taught that to the church in Corinth. 1 Corinthians 14, 26, let all things be done into edifying. Paul said whatever's taking place in the church when it came to the different spiritual gifts that were being used there, it was to be building up that assembly. No man is gonna be used by God that brings heresy into a church, that brings a division into a church. There are people today that think by rejecting the authority of the word of God and rejecting some truths of the word of God and throwing those out that they can somehow build up the church and yet they're deceived. because a church is built upon the truth, and that is what edifies. And so the man who God uses is a man who builds up the church. He isn't seeking personal financial gain. He willingly pays for those under his care. He carries his own weight. He remembers his nothingness. He embraces trials. He's yielded to God in prayer. He's humbled by God, and he's humble-bound, heaven-bound, heaven-bound. And then lastly, He's a man who confronts lest the church fail. He's a man that's willing to confront lest the church fail. It says in verse 20, lest, when I come, I shall not find you such as I would, and that I shall be found unto you such as you would not, lest there be debates, endings, wraths, strifes, backbitings, whisperings, swellings, tumults, and lest, when I come again, my God will humble me among you, and that I shall bewail many which have sinned already, and have not repented of the uncleanness, and fornication, and lasciviousness which they have committed. Now Paul is writing a very tough letter to people that he loved. But he's writing because he doesn't want to get to that church and come back and find that everything has been destroyed because this heresy has come in his absence. Paul is willing to put himself on the line and confront it. And indeed he does. That's what 2 Corinthians is. It's a letter of confrontation saying, I do not want to come back and see God's work fail because I didn't take a stand and confront you. He would expose the heresy. It would have been easy to walk away. He said, well, Lord, I've tried. I've been there. I've done the work there, but Paul didn't just let it go. Paul would seek to minister to them. It's tough to confront disobedience, but Paul would stand. 3 John 1, 4, another apostle, the apostle John said, I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in the truth. Paul's greatest desire was to see the church at Corinth succeed and get a hold of this and get the ship righted so that they could go on for God. But Paul would take a stand. You know, Spurgeon, in something called the downgrade controversy, downgrade because the Baptist Union was diminishing the authority of the Word of God. When it came to the inspiration of the Word of God, they were undermining that authority. And Spurgeon is a great man of God. He's called the Prince of Preachers in modern church history. But as he took a stand about that, he ended up leaving the Baptist Union. And in leaving, a lot of his, even students that had attended his seminary that he had helped train that had loved him turned on him. His wife believed that that led to an early death for her husband. But he was a man that God used because he was a man that was willing to confront lest the church fail. Do you want to be used by God? Are you ready to take a stand for God and confront and say, you know, I'm gonna stand with God on this because the most important thing is God's work. Thomas Chalmers memoirs were a great blessing to me. You feel like you get to know somebody, you read all these pages about them, them expressing their heart for God. As we come to 2 Corinthians chapter 12 is Paul just sharing his heart. And showing us the man that God will use is a man that's heaven bound. Are you born again? God could use you, but it's gotta be somebody that has come to faith in Jesus Christ and received Jesus Christ as a personal savior. Are you a man that's been humbled by God that you've let that pressure that God has brought into your life do the work that God desires it to do? Are you a man that's yielded to God in prayer? If God gives you grace instead, will you take it? Are you a man who embraces trials and the tough times come and you say, I rejoice in this because this is what makes me strong for God. Are you a man who remembers your nothingness? No matter how God uses you, that you're always nothing, that you're just a sinner saved by grace. Are you a man who carries your own weight? Are you somebody that is a responsible person in your family, in your community, in your church, that you're carrying the weight of the work that needs to be done? Are you a man who willingly pays for those under his care? Will you spend and be spent for God, even if nobody applauds you, even if nobody pats you on the back? Are you a man not seeking personal financial gain, not seeking to profit from anyone's religious interests, but just desiring to please God? Are you a person that is building up the church that you can say everything that I do is to edify the assembly, all things? And then are you a person that confronts with their sin lest the church fail? And so we see a man who God used incredibly. And arguably, he and Peter are premier examples of men that God used in the Bible. May God help us. We need faithful men. We need faithful women. And forgive me women, if you've heard this message, and you know, as we consider that we're speaking about godly women as well. May God help us to have godly men and women in our churches. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for the grace that you give. And Father, it's our desire that you would raise up mighty men and women in our church. And Father, thank you for the example of Paul. May the spirit of God help us to take that list now and to consider it and maybe check some areas that we need to work on so that we can be like Paul, a man who God can use. It's in Christ's name we pray. Amen.
Paul Revealed
2 Corinthians 12 is a wonderful sort of autobiography revealing Paul as a man of God. Paul fulfilled God's work in His life and was a man used by God. This message highlights ten characteristics of the man whom God can use.
Sermon ID | 516201028435404 |
Duration | 55:44 |
Date | |
Category | Sunday - AM |
Bible Text | 2 Corinthians 12 |
Language | English |