Worth It

Today on Summit Life with Jiddy Greer. Joyful sacrifice is when you give up something that you love for something that you love even more. That's what it means to rejoice in sacrifice.

I'm giving up something I love and I hate to be without, but it's because of something that I love even more and I have more joy in what I am gaining than I do in what I am losing. Hi, thanks for joining us here on Summit Life with Pastor J.D. Greer of the Summit Church in Raleigh, North Carolina.

As always, I'm your host, Molly Vidovitch. Have you ever considered the fact that every day you are most likely experiencing the fruits of the audacious faith of others who came before you? You are the fruit of someone's bold faith. Now then the question becomes, are you following in the footsteps of these people who put their faith first, or are you giving Jesus sloppy leftovers? An important distinction as we look to live lives marked by faith in Jesus. So let's get into God's word together and join Pastor J.D. Greer in Colossians chapter one. Colossians chapter one. Last weekend, we looked at a chart that profiled the differences between the first generation and the second generation in a movement.

And I asked you to consider which profile more closely resembled your attitude. I once heard a story about a grandfather who was sitting on this front porch out in this country home with his grandson underneath their porch were about 10 dogs that they had out in the country there when all of a sudden one of the dogs kind of perks up, lets out a single staccato kind of yelp, a bark, and then takes out across the field after something. Well, then all of a sudden after this one dog does, all these other dogs kind of jump and they all start barking and yapping and tearing out across the field after this dog.

So the grandfather looks at the grandson and he says, he said, boy, let me tell you what's about to happen right here. He said about 10 minutes, every single one of those nine dogs is gonna come back with their head hung down, with the tongue hanging out, with the tail dragging, and they're gonna resume their position here under the porch and they're gonna go back to sleep. He said in about 30 minutes, that first dog is gonna come back and he's gonna have a rabbit in his mouth. He said he didn't get the rabbit because he was in shape better or because he was a better rabbit dog, it's because he's the only one that actually saw the rabbit. All the other dogs are just running and barking because they just like to run and bark because other people are running and barking. He said, but the one saw the rabbit, that gives him the endurance to press on when the others have faded away. My hope in this series is that more of you will see the rabbit than just a handful of us because I told you that in a church like ours, what you end up having is a handful of people who have, so to speak, seen the rabbit. And so they are all in and they're engaged. And then you got a bunch of people who just come and sit in the audience and bark and yap with everybody else.

Cause it's fun to be around a group of people that seem to be like they're moving and they're going somewhere. I want all of you to see the rabbit. That's the goal in this series is for you to see that.

By the way, some of you have, some of you really have, and you are, you are all in and you are engaged. And I want you to feel very affirmed in this series. I don't want you to feel like I'm yelling at you.

I want you to sense that I'm getting other people to try to see what you've seen so that they will do what you are doing. I want all of you to be first-generation leaders today in Colossians one, you're going to get a peek inside of the heart of a first-generation leader to see what moves and motivates him. One of the questions that Paul addresses in this concise little fast-paced letter to the Colossians, one of the things he addressed was the Colossians concern about why Paul was suffering. They're like, Paul, if you really are the messenger of God, if God's really on your side, then why, why are you always in prison? Seems like God would be taking better care of you. And Paul doesn't that discourage you that God lets you sit in prison for so long.

Verses 24 through 29 of Colossians one is Paul's answer to that question. Now y'all, this is such a rich, incredible text. I really hope you have it memorized. It'd be a great one to put on your list to memorize, but I just want to walk you through it kind of phrase by phrase. It is really difficult to put this passage into a tight little outline because Paul just starts throwing out things and kind of a stream of consciousness that he's going to say, move and motivate him.

So rather than presenting this passage to you in the form of an outline, I'm going to just act like we're reading our Bibles together. And I get to be your tour guide. Like we're on one of those big, you know, big bus city tours where you just kind of go around the city and the tour guide stops it and just points out various things. There's no real rhyme or reason, right?

It's just a lot of cool stuff you don't want to miss. That's what we're going to do. Unfortunately, I don't have one of those little ropes that you can pull just to stop the bus on your own. And we're just going to meander our way through the passage. And then when we get to the very end, I'm going to give you some reflection questions based on that passage that I believe are really pertinent for us right now in this season. Okay.

Ready? Here we go. Verse 24. Now Paul says, I rejoice in my sufferings for you.

All right, stop. I know we just left the station, but this was really, really confusing to the Colossians and it should be to you as well. Paul, you rejoice in your suffering, not just you endure through the sufferings or you're going to make it through, but you actually rejoice in the sufferings. What's wrong with you, Paul? Was Paul some kind of sadist or was Paul just so spiritual that he no longer cared about the things the rest of us care about like creature comforts and a warm bed and hot food and freedom with his friends. Was Paul just so, you know, filled with the Holy Spirit that he was oblivious to everything that was happening around him?

No, no. Paul loved all those things just like the rest of us. And Paul hated to be without them. But here is the thing. Listen, joyful sacrifice, joyful sacrifice is when you give up something that you love for something that you love even more. That's what it means to rejoice in sacrifice. It's I can have joy in sacrifice when I'm giving up something I love and I hate to be without, but it's because of something that I love even more. And I have more joy in what I am gaining than I do in what I am losing.

Paul loves seeing people come to Christ more than he loved his personal freedoms and more than he loved his creature comforts. And he had, if he had to give up the ladder in order to get the former, he would do that all day, every day, because he loved that even more. You rejoice in suffering when you love what you gain through suffering more than what you're giving up in suffering. And I'll go ahead and tell you, if you don't love what you're gaining more than you love what you're giving up, then you'll never endure. Yeah, I might be able to move you through a little kind of like pressure and guilt and you got to do this, but it'll never last.

The only way for you to keep pressing on and keep going is when you're driven by something you love where you say, I'll rejoice in suffering. I've heard this compared sometimes to childbirth. Before the birth of our first child, people always told me, they're like, oh, childbirth, it's so beautiful.

And I think I know what they mean now, but they didn't really give me any context for that. So I went into that first birth thinking, oh, it's just going to be beautiful. And I got in there, I'm like, when does the beautiful part start? Because I'm looking at the doctors like, is this all happening the way it's supposed to happen?

It doesn't look right to me. You think about that and you're like, well, who would go through that voluntarily? Who would go through that voluntarily?

And who would even call the whole process beautiful? And almost every mom in here would enthusiastically say, I would, I would, they would give away, but just wave away the thought of suffering and say to their child, if this is what it took to bring you into the world, then I rejoice in my sufferings for you, because I look at you and I say, totally, totally worth it. Paul said to the Colossians, this is how I feel about you spiritually. I rejoice in my suffering because of what I know it is producing in you. I'll do whatever it takes.

I'll pay whatever price I got to pay for you to know Jesus. Joyful, joyful sacrifice is giving up something you love for something you love even more. So let me just ask you to consider, is this how you feel? Are you rejoicing in sacrifices that you've made because of what you see God doing through those sacrifices and people around you and people in this church and people in our community and people around the world, or be honest, are you dreading? Are you dreading even talking about this stuff? Cause you're like, well, what are you going to have to do now? What's God going to say to me now?

Are you one of those people who are like, oh yeah, Paul, you want to talk about suffering and sacrifice? I came to church today and it was so crowded. I had to walk like, I had to park so far away.

I had to walk like a hundred yards to get into the building. And the worship team did not just one, but two songs that I didn't like. And this after repeated emails. So the worship pastor telling him which songs I do and do not like. And my campus pastor had the audacity to ask me to come to a different service, to free up seats for somebody else. And then asked me to serve in the kids ministry.

And I don't even have kids. And I just, oh, the heaviness of gospel ministry. I think I'm going to go to a new church and I may or may not be putting together a compilation of emails that I have received, but maybe you're like, I hate this series when we talk about sacrifice, I just want to come to church. And I just want to hear an inspirational message and feel good. And I just want my kids to have a good time and I want to see some friends. And then I want to go home.

Is that too much to ask? When I hear that, I always think about one of our church planters over in central Asia, who lives in a very Muslim area in central Asia told me. He said, our church, little house church, Muslims that have come to faith in Christ. There was about five of us sitting around the room. We hadn't grown in like six months.

We hadn't added anybody to our church. He said, so I made him pull out a piece of paper and we all wrote down the names of five people in our life who we knew no needed Jesus. He said that I had them go back and circle the one out of that five. That was the least likely to kill them. If they told him about Jesus, he said, and when we circled that one, he said, that's who we're going to pray about.

And that's who we're going to go after. That's what Paul is talking about. That's the kind of suffering that he's talking about. Y'all we are so, so spoiled. The first generation means you expect personal sacrifice, not personal comfort.

And you rejoice in that because of what you see being produced through it. I think about the story I heard recently about a couple who were sitting around the table who were serving on the first impressions team. You know, they were just engaging in ministry and they're in the first impressions tent. They met a Chinese student who was visiting our church that was being hosted by another summit family.

All right. Well, they next week at lunch, they had the opportunity to lead that student to faith in Christ, along with two others. These students were only in the United States for three weeks on some kind of study thing. So when these students went back over to China, this couple felt like, man, we just want to go visit them, get established over there and make sure they're walking in their face. So they go over there on their own dime on this mission trip, get so moved by the lostness of the community that they were a part of, that they came back, resigned their jobs that are in the process now of going over permanently to be full-time missionaries in China.

And I say, I will gladly, I will gladly give to something like that because I'm more excited about what I'm seeing than what I would be holding. Or I think about a couple, they caught the vision for using their newfound wealth that they just have success in their business to purchase affordable housing, purchase affordable housing for whether it was homelessness or refugee families. So they bought two apartments and said, we're going to make these available. They had so much fun providing these two apartments to refugee families that they bought 32 more. So now they own 34 and they are just filling them up with refugee families.

One, they told me that has nine kids, many of them women in crisis, they've asked for a few summit families to come and live in this apartment complex, to be there to help reach and disciple these communities that are often overlooked. And I say, I want to continue giving to make stories like those possible again. So Paul says, far from being discouraged by these sufferings, I rejoice in these sufferings because of what I see it producing in you. In fact, in the next verse, Paul even takes it up a level. He says this, he says that I'm completing in my flesh, what is lacking in Christ afflictions for his body. That is the church.

Now y'all on the surface, what a staggering statement. It's almost blasphemous, right? I mean, what could possibly be lacking in Christ afflictions? What in Jesus's last words, it is finished. And now Paul saying, something's lacking in Christ afflictions.

What possibly could he mean? Well, in one sense, yes, the work of Christ is complete. When Jesus said it is finished, he was serious.

There's nothing that you and I need to add to the finished work of Christ. He has purchased our salvation. But in another sense, the work of salvation is not complete until people hear that message and respond. Martin Luther famously said, it would not matter if Jesus died a thousand times, if nobody ever heard about it, right?

They have to hear about it and respond in order for it to be good news. Paul says, Christ's sufferings are not complete in the fullest sense until you, that he died for until you hear and respond. And if it takes my suffering to bring that to pass, that is a suffering that I will gladly go through.

I love the way that one Romanian pastor explains it. He says, Christ's cross was for propitiation. That's a fancy word that means Jesus paid for our sin.

Ours, our cross is for propagation. Christ suffered to accomplish salvation. We suffer now to spread salvation.

Y'all listen, let me give you a very hard and rather unpopular teaching. Okay, this is not how you grow a church right here, but it's the truth. Suffering is the means by which God has ordained bringing salvation in the world. And I know what we're gonna hear is blessing and prosperity is the means by which God has ordained bringing salvation in the world. But it is suffering that God has chosen to bring salvation in the world.

And that's what Paul's talking about. And then Jesus told his disciples right before he ascended to heaven. He says, as the father has sent me into the world, this is the same way I'm sending you into the world. The father sent me into the world to suffer to purchase your salvation. I'm sending you into the world to suffer to bring other people the news of salvation.

In fact, write this down if you're taking notes. Life in the world comes only through death in the church. Life in the world comes only through death in the church. Here's a question you gotta ask yourself. Is that a price that you're willing to pay? Let me ask you to consider, what did it cost you? What did it cost you to receive the free gift of salvation? What did it cost you? Nothing.

You just received it. Christ paid it all. The question is, are you now willing to do what it takes for people all over the world to know, to hear, and to respond to that message? Is that not what we owe to the gospel? If Jesus paid it all, and all to him we owe, don't we owe it to him and to others that we give our lives to bring the gospel to them, just like Jesus gave his life to bring the gospel to us?

I often ask you to consider this. Where would you be without Jesus? Where would you be had Jesus chosen not to die for you?

Here's a really simple way of thinking about it. You would be at exactly the same place that millions of people in the world are without you, because it would not matter if Jesus died a thousand times if nobody ever heard about it. How can we receive the extravagant grace of the gospel? How can we receive the purchase that Jesus made for our salvation and then not do everything we can do, do or do nothing to get the gospel to those who have never heard? Isn't that what we owe to them? We owe an incredible debt to the world. So Paul continues, for this reason, I have become its, its being the church there and the future church, I've become its servants.

Stop there really quickly. Is that primarily how you see yourself to the church? You see yourself as a servant, would you mainly see yourself as a servant of the church or beneficiary of the church? By the way, the ESV translates this word as minister, which is not a great translation because you think minister and you think me, professional Christian.

This is servant here is it just, that's the better translation of the word just means anybody. Are you a servant of the church or are you a beneficiary of the church? Do you come into the church mainly saying, how can this church benefit?

What can it do for me and my family? Or do you come in primarily saying, what role am I supposed to play in this church and in the ministry going forward? By the way, by the way, I'm not saying this church should not do things for you and your family.

We want to. The question is, what do you primarily come in as? Do you come in as a servant looking to serve or as a consumer looking to benefit? Paul says for me, I'm the servant of the church, according to God's commission that was given to me for you to make the word of God fully known. That word commission there is really important because it means an individual assignment, something given specifically to you. God doesn't just have this great big global mission that he just hands to the church says y'all figure it out. He gives individual assignments to every believer. He's got an assignment for you. He's got a purpose, a commission for your time, for your talents, and for your treasures. And it's the kind of thing where if you don't do that, it won't get done because it wasn't given to everybody. It was given to you. This week in doing sermon research, I stumbled onto a collection of those. You had one job fails, right?

I was supposed to be doing sermon research and I stumbled onto this website and I kid you not 30 minutes later, I'm still giggling and chortling and snorting my way through this thing because they were just awesome. Somebody had a commission to do one thing and they didn't do one thing and so it didn't get done. The ESV, the ESV translates the word commission translates to stewardship. And that's actually a really good translation because stewardship means it's given to me, but I don't really own it. It's given to me for you. And so I am a steward, not an owner of the time, treasures and talent that God has given me.

And I've got to ask myself, why did God give me those things? In fact, in scripture, listen to this. If you do not use your time, treasure and talent for the purposes God gave them to you, then God considers it stealing. That's why Paul Romans 1 14 would say that I owe the gospel to people who have never heard, I am a debtor to them. Paul never met most of those people. So how was he owe something to a bunch of people he's never met? Well, the answer was he owed something to Jesus, his soul. And Jesus had given him a commission to take the gospel to these people. And Paul said, I'm no longer a free man.

I owe it to you. And if I don't bring the gospel to you, if I don't fulfill with my life and my time, treasure and talents, the purposes for which God gave them to me, I'm stealing from them and you and God. It reminds me of one of my favorite passages in the Old Testament where the prophet Micah, another one you should have memorized, the prophet Micah discusses the same concept. Micah 6 8. He has shown you, old man or woman, what is good and what the Lord requires of you.

Now stop there. If you're type A like me, when you see the word require, I'm like, oh, require. Like I got to know this is what God wants from me. This is what he wants from you.

This is like a summation of the Christian life. Three things. He wants you to do justice. I want you to love kindness or mercy, and wants you to walk humbly with God.

Let me real quick talk about each of those three. To do justice, to do justice. I've told you before, listen, that justice for us typically means that we're just being fair and not stealing. But in the Bible, listen, to be just also means that you are using what you have for the sake of others. Because you recognize that God gave you whatever prosperity he gave you. He gave it to you as a stewardship for others and for you not to use it and leverage it for them and to leverage it only for personal benefit is stealing. It is unjust. Y'all listen, poverty around us, poverty around the world requires something of us who are rich. And you're like, well, I'm not rich JD. Listen to this.

I saw this recently. If the population of the world, well, let me say it this way. Less than 5% of the people in the world are American. Less than 4.25% is the actual number. Yet we Americans, we control, we own 25% of the wealth.

Now I'm not trying to make you feel guilty about that. I mean, if anything, what that means is we produce more than anybody else. Okay? But what it means is that you and I are a very blessed group of, in fact, listen, if you make $34,000 a year in combined household income, 34,000 a year, you are in the top 1% of people worldwide, top 1%. And then you got to consider the fact that there are 2.5 billion people who live in substandard housing or without adequate nourishment or consistent access to clean water.

Every single week, every week, a hundred thousand kids die around the world of starvation or preventable hunger related diseases. And that requires something of us. Listen, American Christians have a combined annual income of $5 trillion. We are the richest faith community that has ever existed in history.

Right? What did God give us that prosperity for? That's what we have to ask. We're all part of it, regardless of where you are compared to your neighbors. We're all part of that. God has put everything necessary for evangelizing and transforming the world in the hands of the church. Don't miss the conclusion of this message titled, Worth It, tomorrow on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. If you missed any of today's message, you can listen again by visiting jdgreer.com at any time. Our entire teaching library is available free of charge. Thanks to our partners who give so generously. J.D., this month, we're featuring a 10-day devotional and a scripture guide about how our emotions reveal what's really going on in our hearts. How are we hoping listeners will use our new devotional and scripture guide? Molly, I would like to believe that everything we teach here on Summit Life coming from the Bible is relevant to all of us all the time. But there are a particular series like this one that I think are relevant to us in a very unique and, dare I say, even intimate way. And that is when in dealing with the emotions that come from our hearts that indicate the state of our hearts.

And rather than try to suppress our emotions or manage them, we really got to diagnose them. That's the idea of smoke from a fire is that I'm following the trail of smoke back down to the fire so I can see the altar that I'm worshiping at. So what we're doing is in addition to the teaching, we're wanting to give a tool, smoke from a fire, a study guide that will help you study some of these same passages and press into what's going on in your own heart that's creating these emotions. You know, faith starts with honesty before God, but it doesn't end there. It's got to press into the Word of God. And this God will help you be honest about yourself before God, but also look at what the Bible has to say about what's going on in your heart. We love making all of these resources available because they're helping people around the country dive deeper into God's Word with the life-changing power of the gospel.

And like I said, it's all made possible by listeners just like you. Give today or join the team of monthly supporters called Gospel Partners. And remember to ask for the Smoke from a Fire devotional workbook.

This resource of 10 devotionals and a scripture guide will help you call to mind the goodness of God and realize that His plans for you are ultimately good. Let us get it to you today. I am certain that it will be something you continue to come back to again and again. This is the new and exclusive Summit Life resource. So you'll want to get in touch soon. Give us a call at 866-335-5220. One more time, that's 866-335-5220. Or you can request the study when you donate online at JDGrier.com. Or if it's easier to mail your donation, write to JD Greer Ministries, P.O. Box 122-93, Durham, North Carolina, 27709. I'm Molly Vidovitch. Be sure to join us again Friday as we continue our series in Colossians on Summit Life with JD Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by JD Greer Ministries.