Today I'm Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Hope is the oxygen of the soul. when all around you is falling apart. and you feel the pressure squeezing the life out of you. Hope is the oxygen that sustains you.
So where do you get hope? How will you make it through these challenging times? That's today. Stay with me. You don't want to miss this.
We're hardwired to avoid pain. When trials hit, our first instinct is to run, hide, or ask, why is God doing this to me? Does it sound familiar? I'm Dave Druy, and today on Living on the Edge, Chip Ingram opens his Bible to James chapter 1, starting in verse 2. In this passage, we'll discover a truth that changes everything.
God isn't trying to crush us, He's building muscle. Those unwanted trials we all face?
Well, they're not signs that God has abandoned us. They're His training ground for building character. In this study, Chip poses three powerful questions that move us from victim to survivor and shows us how enduring hardship produces something beautiful. Oh, and good news! Today is Giving Tuesday, and we're excited to add a double your impact match to this special day.
It's one of the biggest matches in our history.
Well, more details later. Right now, the message from Chip Ingram titled, An Attitude to Embrace. I mean, if Jesus walked in the room where you are right now and you could look him in the eye in his resurrection body and you could say, Jesus, what do I do? What do I do with this situation with my family? What do I do, Lord?
I don't see my way in the future. Here's what he would say. He said there's an attitude. that you must begin with. Verse 2, Consider it all joy, my brethren.
When you encounter various trials, Knowing. that the testing of your faith produces endurance. and let endurance have its perfect result. that you may be perfect and complete. lacking in nothing.
Don't give up. Don't give in. Don't become a victim. You are more than a conqueror in Christ. But it starts with this kind of attitude.
And now what he's gonna say is don't ask why. Ask what? The first what question you need to ask in your world right now is this. What can I control when my world falls apart? What can you control?
Here's what you can control. Your attitude.
So the first question you need to ask and answer is where's my attitude? Second what question is what must I do to make it through today, okay? And the answer is one word, and I don't like it, and you don't like it, but it's endure. It's persevere. And I know what I'm saying is challenging and difficult.
But you have the Spirit of the living God, who, as you choose to count it real joy, He will give you just what you need, not for tomorrow. But for today. His grace is sufficient for you. Power is perfected in weakness. And so the one thing you can do to make it through today is choose, I will endure.
The testing of your faith will produce this endurance, this ability to hold up. And I know the moment you think about tomorrow, how will I do it? You don't know. Choose baby choices. I won't give up today.
I'll do what I can today. I may not have quite enough food today. I don't see how I'll make it tomorrow. But as you do that one day at a time, what happens is you're strengthened. And God will provide both within and within.
and without. I remember a most challenging time. where there was a total collapse. of money and the dot-com market and I just took over the leadership of an organization and we had people all around the world and the budget was millions and millions of dollars and like a faucet it turned off. And I was the new leader.
and we didn't have the millions of dollars and I wondered what in the world will we ever do? And I remember being in Psalm 34 and I would read it out loud over and over and over. And I would not just cry out to God, but I would just cry. Because I thought, Lord, what will we do? These people are depending on me and our organization in all these countries, and we don't have the money.
And it's very interesting as I look back, it was devastating. And yet A year, two, three, four. innovation happened. Those groups learned how to do the ministry without the same amount of funds. They innovated in new ways, and we went from about 19 to 100 countries in the next four or five years.
It's during times like this That God changes things, where crises are difficult, they're painful. I don't mean to minimize, but for those who endure, Those who pay the price. God will do something in you. and I will guarantee he'll do something great through you. Question number one is what can I control?
The answer is my attitude. Question number two is how do I get through today? And the answer is, I will endure. I will endure because I will claim God's promises. It was David who said, it's good for me that I was afflicted, that I may learn thy statutes.
If your word was not my delight, I would have perished in my affliction. What you find all through Scripture is the men and the women of God in the midst of difficulty. pain, devastation, and what's unfair. They cling to the promises of God. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
but my God will supply all your needs according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus. If God be for us, who can be against us? Jesus said, I will build my church and you're part of it, and the gates of hell cannot prevail against it. This is a time when you grab the invisible promises of God and you hold them dear. and you choose to obey and trust when you have no idea how it's going to work out.
And that is the story of how God has built his church throughout the centuries. The third what question you need to ask is what hope do I have for tomorrow?
Someone has wisely said that hope is the oxygen of the soul. Once you lose hope, you know, you're done.
So Where do you get hope? Here's the answer: God will take the worst that you're experiencing today. and use it for your best. God's going to take the very worst, the very most difficult, the most desperate, the most painful things in your life today. And here's the promise.
an all-powerful, good, kind, and sovereign God in the midst of a very fallen and evil world. is going to take whatever you're going through. And he's going to use it for good. And the first thing he's going to change is not your circumstance. I think we've lived in a world were some teaching about the gospel.
Some prosperity ideas that if you love God, If you are obedient, If you do what God wants you to do, then everything's going to go your way. And many people are disillusioned and very discouraged because When they do what God wants them to do, like many of you. and yet you find a relative has died. that you can't open your business, that you don't have any money, that there's not enough food. that Life is not going better.
And you say, God, why? I love you. This last portion explains, he says, Let endurance or perseverance. have its perfect result that you may be complete and mature lacking in Nothing. In other words, what God is saying in this passage is that as you attitude, choose to consider it all joy.
and as you choose to endure. just moment by moment, day by day. He says, cooperate with God. Let this endurance, let God have his way, cooperate with what he's doing in your heart and in your life, that you could be perfect. And the word doesn't mean you're going to be.
Sinlessly perfect. The word is teleos. In English, we get our word telescope. It's the idea of something that fulfills its design. God has a design for you.
And his design is more than to make you happy. His design is not that everything works out and wonderful in your circumstance. His design is to make you and to make me like Jesus. to conform you to the image of his son. What's that promise we quote in the most challenging of times?
For we know. that God works all things together for the good to them that love God, to those that are called according to his purpose. And we usually stop there. That's Romans 8.28. Verse 29.
says whom he called, he also predestined that he's going to conform us. to the image of his son. And so, what he's saying is, in this process, allow God to mature you, to have his way. And notice the promise that you'll be complete. lacking in nothing.
You know, sometimes in my weakest, most difficult moments, Um Lord, where are you? And I've asked why. Lord, I took a big step of faith, or I moved, or I gave a lot of money away, or, you know, like you, you do something, you say, I'm stretching, Lord, to do what you want me to do with all my heart. And this is what I get. No.
We'll hear more from Chip Ingram's message in just a moment. First, we're inviting you to multiply your year-end donation through an exciting match that's active right now. You know, when you give to Living on the Edge, you're not just supporting one ministry. You're creating a ripple effect. You begin to mobilize people who help other people, who help other people, and that makes a huge difference.
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Today, let's multiply God's ministry through Living on the Edge while there's still time. Go to livingontheedge.org. From his series called The Art of Survival in an Age of Chaos, Chip Ingram is teaching from James, chapter 1. I remember uh In my basement. When my world fell apart, And I had all these people around the world that I felt like I needed to take care of and I didn't have anything to help them with.
And I remember crying. just literally weeping. And I remember the Lord saying, so When is it your responsibility to make the world work out? Chip, I just want you to trust and obey me. I have a plan.
And my plans don't always work out in this life the way that some of you all think. And as I was literally crying, I remember thinking, Well, all the apostles, they obeyed God. They loved him with all their heart. They birthed the church. What happened to them?
And I thought they were obedient. And every one of the apostles except the apostle John was martyred. They were killed. And John was stuck on a rock so he could write the book of Revelation. And then I remember the last half of the book of Hebrews, and it talked about those that trusted God.
And the world was not even worthy of them because of their faith, and their dedication, and their commitment, and their loyalty to Christ. And it says they never saw the promise. They never got to see the big, wonderful answer. Could I remind you? that we do not live for a temporal world and circumstances of to day.
Our anchor. hope. Our promise. is heaven. Jesus said to his disciples, knowing what they would go through, He said, I'm going to prepare a place for you.
and if it weren't true I wouldn't have said it. But here's the heart. I want you to be with me where I am. And as painful and as devastating as death is, We need to get our New Testament highs. Precious in the sight of God, says Psalm 116, is the death of his godly ones.
This life is not all that there is. I would remind you historically That in the first three centuries of the early church, they were persecuted. They were viewed as atheists because they didn't worship the emperor. In the midst of all these gods, they were the ones that there were three major plagues in the first three centuries. I mean, pandemics that would wipe out hundreds of thousands of people, that took down whole metropolitan areas.
And the only people that stayed in the cities were Were Christians nursing people back to health? and those who were too sick to leave the city. And Rodney Stark, a sociologist in his book, The Rise of Christianity, looks at the lens of the growth of the church, not through maybe a spiritual view of the Holy Spirit and what God did through His Word, but just from a pragmatic sociological view. He says by 313 AD, when Constantine became the emperor. he said of the sixty million people in the Roman Empire, It's estimated that 33 million were followers of Christ.
And they were followers of Christ because of the early church's commitment through these pandemics to love people. to literally give their life. When you would serve someone who died in one of these pandemics, You are a martyr. Ye were among the most esteemed in the church. God wants us to know that there is an attitude that we're to have.
And the attitude that we need to have is we choose to consider it all joy. That we are going when we ask ourselves, you know, what can I control? My attitude. What do I do to make it through today? Endure.
How do I have hope for tomorrow? I can know for certain that an all-wise God, an all-powerful God, The God who brings about the best possible ends by the best possible means for the most possible people for the longest possible time. That's the wisdom of God. is on your side. and in this present life.
It may not work out the way we choose. But if we are faithful. If we trust. Regardless of what happens, God will take that. And at the end of this passage, verse 12, he said, Blessed are those who who endure in suffering.
and there is a great reward. There's a great reward in what happens in our life now, what happens in us and through us, and there is great reward that God has promised for all of us. We need to keep our eyes on the prize. fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of the faith, who blazed the trail so that we could come before the Father. the throne of grace to find mercy in our time of need.
As I wrap things up, I would just give you some perspective. And these are things that you can pass on. And there are things that will help you begin to think and ponder and respond to this passage. But there's five observations I have about diversity, difficulty, pain. And challenges like we're facing.
Number one, God uses adversity to make us mature because we're forced to depend on God at a new level. Left to ourselves, we tend to be self-sufficient. Proud. and insensitive to the Lord. In this time, we will depend second.
we are weaned from the temporal, the urgent, and the worldly affairs of life. And we're forced to re-examine our values, our priorities, our commitments. our future. You know, it's in times like this where God Says. Why are you really living?
What really matters? What are you giving your life to? And it's a time that can only happen. When things were this difficult, Third is trials allow us to witness firsthand the reality and the power of God. Our need becomes the vehicle of God's grace.
and our problems become the object of his power. You will see the supernatural power of God like never before as you trust Him. He is Jehovah Jireh. He is the great provider. He is the great protector.
Lean in. trust refuse to have self-pity. The Spirit of the living God that raised Christ from the dead dwells in you. He is your hope. And as you do, you will see his power working in you and through you.
And four, they serve as an awesome testimony to the unbelieving world. how we endure hardship. shows the world. how real God is. I spent an afternoon yesterday.
for about an hour and a half with a man going through cancer with his wife with every treatment under the, whatever they've tried, problem, problem, problem, problem, problem, problem. And he has been steadfast. And he was very, very concerned about, you know, if his wife dies, will that be a bad testimony? Or he said, I believe, I'm trusting. And I said to him, Your testimony is not whether your wife lives or dies.
Everyone's going to die sometime. I said the way that you and your wife are going through this. both for us as believers and your unbelieving friends, is a testimony of an unexplainable power. Your attitude is amazing. Your love for your wife is amazing.
Her attitude is spectacular. And you've been through things that I could never ever imagine. And God's going to use your life. in the lives of others. as they see how you endure and respond.
And you don't just respond with, I'm somehow going to make it through. You choose in the power of God to be the Paul and Silas. who you don't feel like it, but you start singing hymns in the prison. You say, God, you are a great God. You are the Lord.
You're the Maker of heaven and earth. You are my God. You are my hope. And as you sing and worship and thank God in the midst of things, you will see his power, and the world will see his power in you. and through you.
And finally, we become sensitive and caring. compassionate, Christ-like people. Those who have been hurt deeply. Love deeply. Those of you who will go through the most devastating and painful things in this season.
It won't last forever. you will become A tender kinder. More compassionate. more Christ-like person. as a result of this.
If. You choose. To ask what. And don't ask why. May the Lord Jesus fill you with His grace and His power.
Lord, thank you. that you promised to give us all that we need. For this moment. on this day. May your Spirit fill us with hope.
and encouragement. By the power of your word and your spirit. In Jesus' name. Amen. Bye.
This is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. He's talking about the art of survival in an age of chaos. And please stay with us, because Chip has an encouraging word coming up in just a moment. Living on the Edge is celebrating thirty years of God's faithfulness. And what started as one man's voice on radio has blossomed into a global movement.
Last year alone, this daily program has been listened to more than 100 million times, with active ministry taking place in 28 countries. Astounding. And none of this would be possible were it not for the generous support of people like you, visionary friends who choose to make an impact for God's kingdom through their voluntary gifts. Here's a snapshot of what that means. Chip?
I want to take a minute and paint a picture for you.
So, kind of lean back and listen, if you will. I want you, in your mind's eye, to imagine that you have a very close relative. You know, it's a cousin. You grew up, you played together, and right now they're in another country. I mean, another country that a lot has changed in.
They're in desperate circumstance. I mean, it's violent, it's scary. They've sent you text messages and FaceTime. Here's the question. Would you ignore them?
Well of course not. But here's the reality: you do have brothers and sisters, some that you've never met, and they're part of God's family just like you. But unlike you, they're risking their lives every single day when they gather to worship. They hide their Bibles, they whisper in their prayers, they live in constant fear because of the name of Jesus. I just came back from Dubai and they act like they're having parties when they're outside where they baptize people in the ocean.
We have teams in Nepal and in India. We have a huge movement that we've been able to equip in China. And right now, the persecution is intense. In the Middle East, multiple countries where we're doing training, they can't go public and say they're Christians or they find themselves in jail. Giving Tuesday is Living on the Edges statement to say, we are going to serve the persecuted church, and we're asking you to stand with them too.
And when you give to this match, you're telling believers around the world. And it may not be direct DNA, but it's spiritual DNA. You're saying, brothers and sisters, I'm not going to forget. I can let go of some of my daily luxuries to give you some necessities. Would you do that?
Would you give to this Giving Tuesday and help us help them walk with God in the midst of great persecution? You can respond to Chip Right Now by giving online at livingonthege.org. If you're among those who use our convenient mobile app, just click on the heart icon and follow the simple instructions. Or you can call right now, 888-333-6003. On Giving Tuesday, our collective gifts to Living on the Edge will bring biblical discipleship to more than 100 million people through our teaching ministry, equip hundreds of thousands of pastors for their kingdom work around the world, and accelerate the launch of critical new initiatives to reach a skeptical generation with the truth of the gospel.
Together, let's make an impact by giving generously to the match that's active right now. This means that every dollar you send on Giving Tuesday is automatically doubled in size, having twice the impact. To send your donation in the mail, address your envelope to LivingOnTheEdge, P.O. Box 3007, Atlanta, Georgia, 30024. You can also call 888-333-6003 or visit us online at livingonthege.org.
Ever feel frozen in fear? I'm Dave Drewy, inviting you to hear Chipping Room describe how to take your next steps tomorrow on Living on the Edge.
