The Bible nowhere teaches that believers should seek out trials or difficulties. But today on Truth for Life, we'll learn how we might miss out on blessings when we attempt to avoid or power through. the challenges of pain or conflict or failure. Alastair Begg teaches us how we can face life's hardships. with confidence.
Paul has been very clear concerning the nature of weakness. And classically so in Second Corinthians and in chapter twelve. And again, if you like to turn to that, you will see that as he takes on, the false apostles of his time. who are arguing about how strong and wonderful they really are. he decides that he's going to tell them how unbelievably weak he is.
And as he reaches the Apex of his argument, he says in verse 7 of 2 Corinthians 12. To keep me from becoming conceited or from getting a big head. Because he said, I've had revelations of God that are so unbelievable that I couldn't even begin to talk about them. And that could give me a sense of dominance and priority, and so on. And God, recognizing that, to keep me from getting a big fat head.
He gave me a thorn in my flesh. We don't know what it is. If we needed to know, we would have been told. We know that it was a torment to him and something that he would like to be rid of. He'd ask the Lord three times if he would take it away from him, and three times the answer came back: no.
Because God told him, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect. And weakness. My power is made perfect in weakness.
Okay, he says. Therefore, deduction If that's the case, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses.
So that Christ's power may rest upon me. For, he says, When I am weak, Then I am strong. It's paradoxical, isn't it? It's ironic. Especially when you said it within the context of 21st century America.
Because the one thing that you're not supposed to admit to. is weakness. Everyone is a winner. In America. Peggy Noonan writing in The Wall Street.
2009, July 2009, she writes: For 30 years, the self-esteem movement told the young they're perfect in every way. It's yielding something new in history. An entire generation with no proper sense of inadequacy. I'm not talking about a wrong sense of inadequacy. We're talking about a proper sense of inadequacy.
The proper sense of inadequacy that comes when you jump rope with ropes and you realize you're a klutz. And you realize that when you saw Sugar Ray Leonard doing that thing, did it, and you tried it, you look like the village idiot. That's fine, you're not Sugar Ray Leonard, you're not going to be. Relax. He probably can't do many of the things you do.
But you see, the reason I mention this is because if we're going to read our Bibles. And we're going to allow our Bibles to speak into the world in which we live, then we need to identify the world in which we live and bring it into contrast or confluence. with the instruction of Scripture. John Thornton wrote to Charles Simeon, a very effective pastor. In Oxbridge.
in an earlier generation. And he wrote to him a word of warning that went like this. Charles Watch continually over your own spirit. And do all in love. We must grow downward in humility.
to soar heavenward. I should recommend you Having a watchful eye over yourself. For generally speaking. As is the minister.
So are The people. And we have on numerous occasions Turn to that classic position. Of expressed weakness in 2 Chronicles 20, which you can turn to for your homework, where Jehoshaphat assembles all of the people in the city square and he says before God. We have no power to face this vast army that is coming upon us. We do not know what to do.
And people could have stood on the sideline and said, you call that leadership? We have no power. We don't know what to do. You'll never get a job with that kind of thing. Really?
We have no power, we don't know what to do. You know what the very next phrase is? Then The spirit of God Kim. Then the Spirit of God Came. You know, when the Spirit of God comes to your life, And to her church?
When in your life and in mind, you are prepared to say, I Am Wait. Not, I am inherently sinful, because that's sinful. But I am inherently weak. And when we are prepared to get to that place. Then we're able to identify with the wonder of what we're told here, namely that the Spirit of God helps us in.
Our weakness.
So, when you wake up in the middle of the night, as I've told you before, and the bedclothes have formed up like the matter horn in front of you. And you're fearful? And you're sad? And you're lonely. And that's just for starters.
And you can only basically say Father. Here's the good news. The spirit helps us in Power. Weakness.
So That is why God brings into our lives, especially those of us who are smart, Alex. Or smart. Alex is. Those things which will show us All right. Ineffectual.
Dimensions. Not so that we can be beaten down. But so that we can discover the wonder of what he delights to do. in the lives of those whom he has made His children. We can justifiably recognize That as a father, He watches over us.
And he provides for us. And he gives us all things richly to enjoy. including the experiences Of pain? An illness. And marital Unsettlement?
and child-rearing challenges. And business Eventualities. In order that we might make the discovery. of Romans 8.26. It's Andre Crouch.
You know When he says, Because if I never had a problem. I'd never know that God Could solve it.
So I was like, oh, coming back to me now.
So I thank him. I thank him for the mountains, and I thank him for the valleys. And I thank him for the things he's brought me through. Because if I never had a problem. I never know that God could solve.
I'd never know. What faith in him? Good do. See, in shaman. Trials We miss blessings.
In telling everybody how strong we are, We miss the opportunity of discovering how wonderful is the strength that God provides. In suggesting to people that our marriage is entirely intact, and there hasn't been a better marriage since. Nineteen uh fifteen. We tell lies. And we fail to Make the discovery of God pouring His grace into the fragile nature of our relationships.
and fulfilling the promise that is here.
Well, we could go on generally and uh we daren't. Because we need to deal with this specifically. And what is he speaking about specifically?
Well, he's speaking about prayer. He's speaking about prayer. And I hope this is as much an encouragement to you as it has been to me. Because if there is one area of life That shows how weak we really are. Especially in our Christian life, isn't our prayer?
Will anybody stand up and say, you know, when it comes to prayer, I've got prayer. I've got it buttoned down. I pray all the time, I pray five times a day, I pray to the north, I pray to the south, I pray to the east, I pray to the west, I pray sitting, I pray standing, and so on. No, you're not going to do that. If you do, you're just silly.
Now you're going to be honest with me and you're going to say yes. I find prayer really hard. Why, here's the encouragement. God understands that. And he's made a provision for it.
In fact, he's made two provisions for it. In verse 34, we'll come to the fact that he has provided in the Lord Jesus one who intercedes for us in heaven. And here in verse 26 and 27, he tells us that he has provided for us the Holy Spirit, who does for us in our hearts what Jesus does for us in heaven.
So there you are, verse 26, sentence two. We do not know. That's where we start. We do not know. Yeah.
Until until we know what we don't know. We're in trouble. We do not know. How we ought to pray, or what we ought to pray for. But the Spirit himself intercedes.
And when you take this apart, you realize that the Spirit of God prays for us. He prays in us. And he prays through us. It's very hard to get your head around this. And it says Warfield, the desires are ours.
And the groans are ours. But not apart from the Spirit. They are his. Right in our By him.
Now, I could read that to myself three times slowly and still find myself saying. You what? And I think what Warfield is saying is That the Spirit of God When I say what I'm saying, when I think what I'm thinking, when I come before God when I'm driving in my car or when I'm sitting in my home or in my chair or wherever it is, or I'm kneeling in my study. And you say this is hopeless. I can pray I can I can pray.
The Spirit of God is at work saying, what Beg is trying to say is this. What bag is on about? He doesn't even know what he's on about himself. But I I'll tell you what he's on about, Father. That's a great encouragement to me.
And I hope it is to you. Because the Spirit of God helps us in our weakness. Not just generally, but specifically in the realm of prayer. He prays through us, says Calvin. The guarantee of the answer to our prayer is found in the nature of their origin.
Where does prayer come from? Prayer actually comes from heaven. God is the originator of prayer. That's the thing. We don't pray.
Be alone prey. Except for God. People do everything except pray. Oh, the plane drops a thousand or fifteen hundred feet in extreme turbulence over the Alps. They start praying then, crying out in all kinds of ways.
But by and large, as soon as it all settles down, We're back to where we were before. No, prayer. has its origination in heaven. And that's why God answers prayer. You say, This is even more alarming than I thought before.
This is so hard to understand. God thoroughly approves, this is still Calvin, our desires as the thoughts. of his own spirit. Our Heavenly Father will not refuse to satisfy yearnings. which by his own spirit He is put within you.
You see Apart from the Spirit of God, we don't know to pray, Your will be done. Apart from the Spirit of God, we don't pray, hallowed be your name. Apart from the Spirit of God, we even pray, your kingdom come. And what if people start doing that? And actually meaning it.
What's happened to you'? says the husband to the wife. That you're saying these prayers and you're writing these things in your journal. What in the world has happened to you? What do you think you're trying to do with all of this?
And the husband is alarmed. And justifiably so. And especially when you tell him. The Spirit of God has come to live in me. What?
I mean, it was bad enough that you started to go to church, but now you're telling me that God lives in you, that He actually indwells you? Yes. I don't know what to do with that, he says.
Well, we do not know. Verse 26, verse 27. But he knows. We do not know, he knows. You've got it all there, don't you?
He who searches our hearts is an interesting description of God, isn't it? It's one of the favorite descriptions of God. especially in the Old Testament. You remember when Samuel is going to look for the one who will be anointed king? And God says to Samuel, You look on the outward appearance, but I look on the heart.
When Solomon is praying for the dedication of the temple. He says, Oh God, you are the one who searches the hearts of all men. When the psalmist writes in Psalm 139, he says, Oh Lord, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit down and when I stand up. You know the words of my mouth before I even speak them.
This doesn't render prayer Irrelevant. This makes prayer effectual. The same God who inspires it and answers it is the God who asks us to do it. He does send us on a fool's errand. Don't fall foul of the notion that because God knows the end from the beginning, prayer is irrelevant.
The same God who has ordained the end is the same God who has ordained prayer as a means to bring about the end. And if you have nothing hard to think about, think about that for a little while this afternoon. But God is sovereign over all these things. We don't know, He knows. And I search in vain during the week for a meaningful analogy.
I can come up with an analogy for this. Even the closest thing that I can come to it is still no good. For example, mother with a tiny child. You meet little tiny child. Tiny child is in the bucket.
You kneel down to say hello to aforementioned child and the child says, And the mother says, She's saying she just loves to see you and be out here in the park. You're like, what? How do you know that?
Sounds like gibberish to me. Yeah, but you're not our mother. But even then the mother doesn't inspire that. But there is something there, there's no doubt there is. Or what about the spouse?
whose husband has had a major significant stroke. And it's paralyzed all down one side. And when you go to visit as the pastor and to pray, You're confronted by that saddest of scenes that our once vibrant, strong body is now debilitated as a result of the ravages of the neurological impact of these things. And his wife says, He says that he's glad that you've come. And he says he would like you to Read the Bible.
and pray with him. And you say to yourself, There has to be some strange, organic. intimacy between that couple. For her to be able legitimately to make sense of that inarticulate. Noise.
And when your prayers and mine sound like that. The Spirit of God. intercedes Elnum. Through them. For us.
And that is our confidence. And let me finish in this way. Think about this. in relationship to prayer and preaching. You remember the apostles in Acts 6?
They said, we will give ourselves to prayer and to the preaching of the word. Prayer and preaching. A congregation like this For good reasons and for ill. Maybe tempted to think. That the real issue is the preaching.
For after all, God has pledged to use the strange means. to open up the truth of his word. Fine. God gives gifts. to pastors and to teachers, as he's done within the framework of our pastoral team.
But actually Prayer. Is that which renders Preaching Effective. And when you read, for example, the words of Jesus in John 16, he says that it is the work of the Spirit of God to bring conviction. And it is the work of the Spirit of God to bring. Illumination.
conviction and illumination. No, I spoke in early on, didn't I? About uh how God's glory is marred in us. How by nature we're distanced from God. how he has made a great exchange in the gift of Jesus.
Some of you are distanced from God. You'd be honest enough to admit that. You've never come to trust in Jesus. You come to church. You're involved in different things.
But you have never, you couldn't speak in terms of a divine invasion. You wouldn't speak in those terms.
Well, let me ask you, would you would you today? Would you Would you be willing? Before you leave today. To admit that you're a sinner and that there is no other possibility of reconciliation with God apart from the work of Jesus on the cross. Have you, as you've listened to me today, had any inclination?
that actually the truth of this book is really the truth. Then if either of the answers to those questions are positive. Let me tell you why that is. Not because of my ability to speak. But because of the willingness.
of God's people. to pray. And So I urge you. to trust in Christ. And those of you who do trust in Christ, I urge you to pray.
That others will trust in Christ. For your pastors may preach the exact same sermons. to vastly different results. Not as a result. of a more effective means of articulation.
But as a result, of intercession. Your intercession My intercession. But you say I don't even know. How to pray. Or what to pray?
That's okay. The Spirit of God. Fills in. your weaknesses. Here's a closing thought.
Maybe parkside has yet to see. What will happen in reaching our communities with the gospel? When not only the pastors Take up the challenge. A proclamation. But when every member of the congregation takes up the challenge.
of intercession. Because then you see it's team. We're all in this. together. Committed under God.
to seeing unbelieving people. become His committed followers. Listening to Truth for Life without. Alistair Bigg. Most of you know our mission at Truth for Life.
It's simple, it's to teach the Bible. God's Word is truth that never changes in a world that can sometimes feel like shifting sand. His Word is a lamp to our feet, a light to our path. When you listen to Truth for Life's daily program or to sermons from the online library, you can count on teaching that comes straight from Scripture. In fact, Alastair often begins by saying let's open our Bibles.
And that's because everything you hear on Truth for Life is grounded in God's Word. It's reliable, it's unchanging, and it shines as light in these ever-changing and sometimes darkening times. That's why today we want to ask you to remember Truth for Life as you think about year-end giving. The Biblical truth we proclaim each day is entirely funded by your financial partnership. We rely on your generosity to close out the year with the resources needed to press into twenty twenty six, and to continue bringing the light of the Gospel to a world that needs it now as much as ever before.
You can give today online at truthforlife.org slash donate or call us at 888-588-7884 to arrange a future generous year-end donation. And when you give a gift, be sure to request the Advent Devotional by Charles Spurgeon titled A Wondrous Mystery. book is our way of saying thanks for your partnership with us. Each of the daily readings in this book is drawn from a Christmas sermon preached by Spurgeon, Meditating on his powerful preaching is a great way to prepare your heart. For Christmas.
Again, ask for your copy of the book A Wondrous Mystery when you donate to Truth for Life online at truthforlife.org/slash donate. Or by calling us at 888-588-7884. Thanks for studying God's Word with us today. Tomorrow we'll find out why being called by God. isn't an opportunity for boasting.
The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life. Where the Learning is for Living.
