God is Good All the Time!
By Pastor Matt Black
04
March 2007
Lord's Day morning
Ephesians 2:22-3:1
Introduction: Open your Bible to Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. The title of this morning’s message is “God is Good All the Time”. Let’s stand together and read Ephesians 2:19 through chapter 3 and verse 1.
Ephesians 2:19-3:1, “Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; 20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; 21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: 22 In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
1 For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles,”
Introduction: Do you believe that God is good all the time? No matter how you or I are doing today, we can all say that we are doing better than we deserve! It is easy to say that God is good in the good times, but we vary rarely praise God for His goodness during difficult times.
Illustration: Have you ever been in traffic, and someone cuts you off, and you say, you know it is amazing how much the Lord is blessing me today! When is the last time you told the Lord how good he was after a time of illness. How many times have you thought about God’s goodness as you heard a difficult and depressing diagnosis from your doctor?
The truth of the matter is that we don’t often think about the goodness of God is our suffering. But I want to tell you today that God is good ALL the TIME, even in suffering and affliction!!
David said in Psalms 119:71 It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes. Can you say that with all the saints of God. It is GOOD for me that I have been afflicated?
This morning we are going to see how Paul was in prison, and how he seemed to be rejoicing in all of his trials and suffering. There was a reason for His joy.
He had one motivation that carried him through all of his suffering.
Outline:
I. One Motivation of all our Suffering. As we come to our text in Ephesians 3:1, we read, “For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles”. At this point we have to ask ourselves, why was Paul in prison?
The long and short of it is found in verses 22-22. God was building an “holy temple in the Lord: 22 In whom [Christ] ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.”
Paul was willing to suffer for Making Jesus Christ Supreme. For the cause of making Jesus Christ supreme.
A. Paul knew that people could not change themselves. Jesus Christ alone could take these people who were filling themselves with all kinds of sinful things, selfish people, and Christ could change them from the inside out and make them a place where God would dwell—changing them from the inside out!
Change on the outside is easy. 1 Samuel 16:7 tells us that “the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.”
If you heart is not right with the Lord, He could care less how good you look on the outside.
Application: Paul was not about showing the Gentiles how they could “be all that they could be”. He knew that at best all that they could be was “dead in trespasses and sins” and “strangers and foreigners” from the grace of God. Paul was not about telling them how they could have a more successful life, or how they could be happy. Paul’s message was radical! They had no ability to the help themselves. Their only hope was to cast their lives, their hopes and their dreams upon God, and confess that only God could change them!
B. Paul knew that God could change people! You see God didn’t just demand for people change their sinful ways and to be holy! No, we serve a God who will come into your heart and life through the new birth and invade your soul and Himself teach you how to be holy! Paul knew that the worst sinner could be a place where God would make His habitation! Where He would take up residence!
Application: HAS THERE BEEN A TIME WHEN THIS HAS HAPPENED? Has God taken residence up in you through His Spirit? Has there been a time when you were filled with yourself and your own desires, and one day God invaded your personal space and took up residence in you? Has there been a place in your life when God renewed your heart and mind and you became flooded with the awareness of the presence of God in your life—sin became exceeding sinful, and you began to hunger and thirst after God?
Paul had seen the worst heathens have God take up residence in them. It wasn’t a mystical thing. He saw their lives change!
Paul was willing to suffer for this. His One Motivation was Making Jesus Christ Supreme. Paul says: “I want God to be exalted in you!”
That was Paul’s, and ought to be our motivation for suffering. Paul was willing to suffer all things to make Jesus Christ known and exalted. Paul suffered more than any one on earth has ever suffered outside of the Lord Jesus Christ. He suffered sickness, persecution, dangers of every sort, and eventually death by beheading. He could endure it all because His one motivation in all His suffering was that Jesus Christ would be lifted up!
Transition: So we see one motivation for all our suffering: the GLORY of God. That Jesus Christ would be supreme in our lives. As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:9 Wherefore we labour, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him.
We agonize to the point of exhaustion that whether alive (present) or dead (absent) we may be accepted (pleasing) to Him!
Is that your motivation today? Let’s look at two examples of suffering for the glory of God.
II. Two Examples of Suffering for the Glory of God. We read of two people in verse 1. We read of “Paul” and we read of Paul’s Lord, “Jesus Christ”.
Explanation: Paul’s teaching was that God’s people will constantly suffer until we come to glory. There are false teachers out there that teach that once you get saved, all suffering after that is a result of a lack of faith. That is a false teaching! If there was anyone who had faith, it was Paul, and he suffered more probably than any Christian that has ever lived. He suffered every trial you can imagine!
The truth is (as we read in Peter) that all Christians will suffer. Peter said in 1 Peter 4:12, “Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you…”
It is not strange that any one of us should suffer! Paul knew about that.
A. So let’s look at Paul. We read in our text, “For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles”.
Paul was in prison, and how he seemed to be rejoicing in all of his trials and suffering. Why could Paul be filled with joy and rejoice in all his trials?
1. He understood God’s sovereignty. Paul did not say that he was a prisoner of Rome or of Caesar. He is not in prison because of the mighty Roman Empire. Nero was in power at this time (around AD 59 or 60). Paul was not in prison because of Nero. He is not in prison because of Roman law. He is not in prison as all the other prisoners presumably are because of some misdemeanor or crime. No there is another reason Paul is in prison.
He says “I Paul, [am] the prisoner of Jesus Christ” for the sake of exalting Him among “you Gentiles”.
Application: Every trial you endure, you ought to take heart, that it is a sovereign God who brings this trial to you. You are not a victim of catching some virus, or of having the wrong DNA, or of being at the wrong place at the wrong time! Get all of that thinking out of your head! That is pure humanistic thinking. Listen we do not live in a world of chance and circumstances. We live in a world of an Almighty God who “worketh all things after the counsel of His own will” (Ephesians 1:11).
2. He understood God’s sufficiency. Affliction and suffering will test what you have joy in! If you have joy in Christ, then you will be able to “Rejoice in the Lord” in every thing God gives you—including suffering.
Anything that happens after Christ can bring us joy. Paul could say, you know if I was still Saul of Tarsus I wouldn’t be in this prison, it is an absolute fact. I would still have my freedom. If everything is taken away from us brethren, we find out that Christ is sufficient! Christ was sufficient for Paul in prison and Christ is sufficient for you.
Paul said this many times over. Philippians 4:4 Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice. Rejoice in the Lord when? ALWAYS!!
We are more than conquerors!
You can have joy because whatever happens to a child of God is for the furtherance of the Gospel. Look at Philippians 1:12, “But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel;”
2 Timothy 2:12 If we suffer, we shall also reign with him:
Listen, you don’t just need to endure suffering. It’s not that God just wants you to be steady, to bite your lip, to take it. You need to find your joy in Christ during all your trials.
James said, in James 1:2-4, “My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; 3 Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. 4 But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.”
3. Paul’s Testimony.
2 Corinthians 6:4-10, “But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses, 5 In stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings; 6 By pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, 7 By the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, 8 By honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report: as deceivers, and yet true; 9 As unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; 10 As sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.”
Paul’s suffering was extraordinary. It boggles the mind! Think of the multiplied pain in his life! Think of all the hardship! He was close to death many times. Listen further in 2 Corinthians 11:23-28, “Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft.24 Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one. 25 Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep; 26 In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine 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; 27 In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. 28 Beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches.”
Let’s not pass over this to quickly. Paul received forty stripes save one It meant that he was stripped and tied to some kind of stake so that he could not run or fall. Then a person trained in flogging would take a whip, maybe with or without shards in the leather, and lash Paul’s back thirty nine times. Halfway through or earlier perhaps, the skin would begin to break and tear. By the end parts of Pual’s back would be like jelly. The lacerations would not be clean, as with a razor blade. The skin would be torn and shredded so that healing would be slow andd perhaps complicated by infection. They knew nothing of sterilization in those days and had no antiseptics. It would take perhaps months before his clothes could hang on his back again without pain.
Now with that in view, consider that this happened a second time on the same back, opening all the scars. It healed more slowly the second time. Some months later it happened a third time. Then it happened again, and then a fifth time. And this was just one of Paul’s sufferings.
Paul could do all of this because he was exalting the Name of Christ in his life.
Do you have that testimony?
But don’t just look at Paul. Look at Paul’s Lord.
B. Jesus. Paul in all of his suffering was simply following in the path of Jesus.
Jesus said in John 15:18ff, “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. 19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. 20 Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also.”
The world hated Jesus and they will hate you. Jesus suffered, and remember “servant is not greater than his lord”.
Think of Christ, when you suffer because you don’t have enough money to buy food, or pay rent.
Ø Christ went without food for 40 days and 40 nights
Ø Jesus said in Luke 9:58, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.”
Ø Christ knows what it is to suffer—to have no friends. All forsook Him. He looked at Peter on His way to the judgment hall, and Peter denied Him.
Ø Nothing was a greater endurance of suffering than the crucifixion. Even the Father forsook the Son. Finally Christ could cry out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Matthew 27:46
C. All they that Live Godly says Paul in 2 Timothy 3:12 Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.
III. Seven Reasons God is good to give us Suffering.
A. ONE: Suffering makes us Holy.
Heb 12:10, “For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit [good], that we might be partakers of his holiness.”
Job could say in Job 23:10 But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.
Job 13:15 Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain mine own ways before him.
Job could say in all his suffering: Job 19:25 For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth:
God must try you to make you holy. He must try your faith to make you like Christ!
B. TWO: Suffering prepares us for Heaven. It makes us long for glory!
A. Great is your reward in heaven
Matthew 5:11-12 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. 12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.
B. An eternal weight of glory
2 Corinthians 4:17 For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;
C. THREE: Suffering makes us dependent on Christ. (2 Corinthians 12:7-10).
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. 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. 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.
D. FOUR: Suffering prepares us for service
Comforting others
God comforts us in all our suffering so that we might comfort others.
2 Corinthians 1:4 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.
E. FIVE: Suffering creates unique evangelism opportunities.
1. Persecution: Because of persecution, you may lose a job and be in a new environment where you can give folk the Gospel.
2. Sickness: How many hospital nurses and doctors and even patients can hear the Gospel because God is sending you as a missionary to the hospital!
F. SIX: Suffering unites God’s people
A. to preach the Gospel (Stephen) Gives courage! If Stephen could face death with confidence…
Col 1:24 (Paul) Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church:
B. to pray (Peter released from prison)
G. SEVEN: Suffering transforms into the image of Christ! –Makes us Christlike!
Conformed to His image (Romans 8:28).
Conclusion: Don’t give up until glory! God is good ALL the TIME! God is good to give us suffering. That suffering will not end until glory. You can’t give up. You be a good soldier of Jesus Christ! Don’t give up! Christ will give you strength. Don’t you dare take a spiritual vacation in your suffering! God has a purpose in giving it to you.
I don’t know if you have been injured by someone.
God meant it for good.Genesis 50:20
I don’t know if you have a terrible illness.
Glory in infirmities.
I don’t know if you have been percecuted.
Rejoice! God’s making you ready for a greater portion of Him in Heaven!
I don’t know if trial after trial has piled up, and you don’t know how it’s going to work out…
I KNOW that all things work together for good to those that love God to those who are the called according to His purpose…conformed to the image of His Son!!!
Is God good when we suffer? God is good all the time. All the time… God IS GOOD!
Closing Hymn: 612 God is so good