Living on the Edge

Dave Druey: Today on Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram.

Chip Ingram: Billy Graham once said without dark clouds in our lives, we could never know the joy of sunshine. As true as that is, it doesn't make those dark times easier to go through. Today I want to suggest that when we're in those painful periods of our lives, God actually wants to do something very significant in us. Stay with me. I think this truth is really going to help you.

Dave Druey: Have you ever wondered if your hardest season could actually be serving a purpose? Paul's letter to the Philippians, written from a prison cell, answers exactly that. Today on Living on the Edge, Chip Ingram shows us what God is doing in us even in our most difficult circumstances.

I'm Dave Druey, and this is part of our series called Free at Last: How to Break Out of a Destructive Lifestyle. Now if you've missed anything, catch up anytime at livingontheedge.org. Now let's join Chip in Philippians chapter 1 for his message titled Understanding the Power of Purpose.

Chip Ingram: We're studying the book of Philippians, the Apostle Paul. So follow along, here's his thesis, verse 12. "Now I want you to know, brethren, that my circumstances have turned out for the greater progress of the gospel." Underline greater progress and underline gospel. And then he's going to tell us how those difficult circumstances helped the gospel go forth.

Exhibit A: He says, "So that my imprisonment in the cause of Christ has become well known throughout the whole Praetorian Guard and to everyone else. And that most of the brethren, trusting in the Lord because of my imprisonment, have far more courage to speak the word of God without fear."

And then he goes into some of the challenges and some things that were happening. "Some to be sure preach Christ even from envy and strife, but some also from goodwill. The latter do it out of love, knowing that I'm appointed for the defense of the gospel. The former proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition rather than pure motives, thinking to cause me distress in my imprisonment."

And then his attitude toward it all: "What then?" or literally what's it matter? "Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed and in this I..." circle the word, "rejoice." And so here's his premise: I want you to know because you're concerned. I want you to know that my circumstances, the difficulties, the challenges you've heard about, are turning out for the greater progress.

The word greater progress means advancement. It was a term that when an army was coming through and they would have a barrier of trees, they would cut down trees, they would remove every barrier so that army could continue to advance. And he says, I want you to know that it's difficult for sure, I am in prison just as you've heard, but here's the deal: it's caused the gospel, the good news, the gospel to go forth.

He says, "So that my imprisonment in the cause of Christ has become..." put a line under, "well-known throughout the whole Praetorian Guard and to everyone else." Paul is declaring the greatest truth that this planet has ever heard. And all people know is they're spoken evil of because they're weird.

The people are selling their homes and meeting the needs of the poor. They touch lepers. They meet secretly. They're absolutely committed to one another. They're radical in their faith. They keep talking about this dead man that came back to life. No matter what we do, we can't get rid of them. They were just a pain in the rear.

We march them into the Colosseums and let loose the lions and they sing praises to God and they're asking God to forgive us as we do it. So Paul's saying, this little 30-year movement, this sect, is getting global coverage because I'm here. What are you going through right now that God wants to use so the gospel can go forth?

How you respond to the difficulty, the pain, the injustice? What's happening at work or what your ex is saying or what's happening with one of your kids or a health issue that everyone's going, "Wow, how do you even get through this?" God wants to use your present circumstances, Exhibit A, for the furtherance of the gospel.

But that's not all. Exhibit B: Here's another good thing that happened. The church grows stronger. Notice what he says. "And that most of the brethren, trusting in the Lord because of my imprisonment, have far more courage to speak the word of God without fear."

When we step up, when he's in the midst of this and he's being bold, the rest of us go, "Wow, the Praetorian Guard, the church was being persecuted." And now they say, if Paul can do it in prison, I can do it. I have two or three friends that have very high-level jobs in the high-tech world and they're bold. They're out there.

And they're not asking, "Can I do this?" or "Can I say that?" They're loving, they're kind, they're great at what they do, but they are bold. They're not afraid to say, "Yes, I'm a Christian. I'm not anti-intellectual. I'm not narrow. I'm not a hater." And by how they're living and how they're treating people, it just makes me go, "I can do this. I can do this."

Sometimes adversity and difficult circumstances cause the gospel to go forth, and sometimes difficulty builds the body. It causes the church to grow. One of my deepest zigzags was God made it really clear, "Chip, you have to be back in local church." I had the privilege of leading Walk Through the Bible and what they're doing here and all around the world, great organization, but I wasn't teaching God's word anymore.

I was just creating some videos and then traveling all around the world and sharing it with a few people who would teach it to others, but I wasn't teaching God's word. And the administrative responsibilities got bigger and bigger, and that's not my strength. And so God said, "I want you to leave that and go back to local church."

I said okay. So I had this good transition plan. "No, I want you to resign." God, you don't understand, I don't have a job yet. "I know. So do you trust me or not?" Okay. So I thought, at that stage of my life, I bet there's a church somewhere. And some people said, "Hey, yeah, why don't you think about this or that?" And we came up with a profile.

Here's what I want to tell you. For two years, I was not pastoring a church. Living on the Edge was developing and growing and getting its feet as an independent organization, and I was in limbo. I mean, I woke up every day like... I went to a little makeshift office with a cardboard table with two other guys and two other employees, wondering every month are we going to even pay the bills to get Living on the Edge moving and where it needs to be.

And I wake up on Sunday morning and I'd visit this church and visit this church, and then I found a friend that I went to this church and... if you do what I do for a living and I love visiting good churches, but I mean when I'm sitting in this row over here and think, "Lord, what are you doing? Are you kidding? You said to do this. It's been two years, praying, processing."

And here's what I learned. God wanted to do some things in me. It was crystal clear that we were to come here. He was preparing this church so this church would be ready and I would be ready and Theresa would be ready so we'd all come together. And let me tell you something that happened. This is really cool. I never thought about this until this week and this passage.

I thought about, "Okay, that two years was wasted." Really, Chip? Yeah. So what happened those two years? Well, we prayed and the internet was exploding and there's so many good communicators. Maybe we're only on the radio in order to develop a platform for discipleship. And we took this huge step of faith, and I'm sure we couldn't have done it if I was teaching full-time.

We took this huge step of faith and we said, we're really not just a teaching ministry. That's never been our heart. It's a discipleship ministry. And so we went off three major morning time slots in top 10 cities in America to shift the paradigm to say, the issue isn't how many people listen, it's how many people are growing and becoming reproducing disciples.

And then we took that and we started building small group material and we decided we would launch small groups off the radio and then later digitally. And as I'm sitting here, I thought I wasted those two years. Nothing good happened. We now have 27, I think, different small group resources used all around the world.

We have over three million people that are either in or have been in small groups just in America alone. And all of that grew out of two years of limbo with a frustrated Chip going, "What's the deal? What's the deal?" And yet, those difficult times, it was a zigzag line. The gospel's going forth, yes.

Second, the church was being strengthened. More people are growing deeper than if I was at a church, if I could have been at 10 churches, 15 churches, 100 churches. Here's the deal: God knows where you're at. He knows what you're going through. Third, he takes our circumstances not only for the gospel to go forward, not only for the church to grow stronger, but Paul gets very personal. He says, Exhibit C is the man grows deep.

Dave Druey: There's more in just a moment here on Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Before we continue, if you've never been to Chip Ingram's YouTube channel, you're missing out on a whole library of teaching you won't see anywhere else. Series like BIO: Three Essential Practices to Becoming Like Jesus, and even messages like the one you're hearing today.

Whether you want to dig deeper into a topic or pass something along to a friend, it's all right there. Just look up Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram on YouTube and subscribe. Now let's get back to our message.

Chip Ingram: When these zigzags happen, and if it's cancer or losing your job or your mate walks out on you or one of your kids is going through a struggle, if you're clinically depressed, I don't know what it is with you. But we all have stuff, right? You were injustice, you were passed over for a promotion.

Where you thought you would be in your life is not where you are right now. And you wake up, you just wake up almost every single day going, "It's half full. I'm still single. It's half full. I still don't make any money. It's half full. I still don't own a house. It's half full. I've had this physical problem, this ailment. I've prayed, I've been to the doctors. Guess what? I still got it."

I want you to know that part of God's agenda is not just the gospel going out and not just the church getting stronger. Part of what he does is he transforms you and transforms me and sometimes pain, challenges, difficulty. I mean, I got a testimony of a couple years of my back that have drawn me to Christ in ways that... and I already thought I was pretty close.

Notice what Paul says. He says, "Some to be sure are preaching Christ even from envy and strife, but some from goodwill." Then he goes on to talk about the latter do it out of love, but the former are... they're messing with me. He's in prison. The rumors are... guess what? If Paul had more faith, he wouldn't be in prison. He can't be God's man.

And people out of strife and envy and ego are, "We're the new leaders in the church. We're God's spokesmen, it's not Paul." I mean their doctrine was right, but it was political, it was a power play, it was an agenda. And Paul's in prison and going, "Really, guys? I mean, are you kidding me?" Well, God blesses people, right? And if he's blessing you, you're in his will.

And Paul's in prison. We don't think he has enough faith. He's not the real leader, we are. And Paul said when all that was happening, his reputation's being attacked. He feels that some of the people that he probably discipled are betraying him now. I mean this is a really... where do you go with all that, Paul?

Notice what he says. He says, some good motives, right. Some bad motives. Are you ready? What's the purpose? What's his lens? What's my purpose? What did God tell me to do? Why am I here? I'm here to take the gospel to all the world. I'm here to disciple people to be mature so they're like Jesus. That's my mission.

So I'm being attacked, I happen to be in prison, yes these rumors about me are this or that. He said, "What?" Literally it's, "What does it matter to me?" if Christ is preached. He goes whether their motives are good or their motives are bad, my purpose and my mission is to preach the gospel and disciple people who disciple others. Guess what? That's happening. He grows deep.

Sometimes Apostle Paul or some of us that grew up in churches where these 12 guys were in stained glass or some of us grew up where the pastors or the clergy or the priests, they're way up here and we're all these just regular people. I got news for you: there's no superstars. Paul, you, me, everybody. He's got an ego.

He had to wrestle, he had to struggle, he had to feel like this isn't fair. But he had to come to the point where he would say, "God, what do you want to do in me?" And I think some ego issues, "My reputation. You have my reputation. What people think of me, God, it's what you think of me." In pain and difficulty, that's where God gets our attention.

I want you to know that when you're going through pressure and it's difficult and it's hard and you're angry and you want to give up, ask this question: God, what do you want to do in me? God, how do you want to use this to help other people? How do you want to grow your church? But what do you want to do in me? Don't miss out. Don't waste the pain. Because if you meet very, very godly people who have amazing walks with God, what you'll find is they've been through a lot of pain.

A very, very close friend. He has a physical issue going on right now that prevents him from driving. He runs a business. He's got... and I mean it is just... they've tried everything and there's no cure. And I am around this man and I will ask him, "So how's it really going and how are you doing? Are they... they've tried a couple things and they give a little temporary relief."

And I mean his attitude makes me want to just be like Jesus. His perspective, his attitude. "The Lord is teaching me a lot. Because of this, my wife is getting up at five in the morning and she's driving me to all the job sites. And it's great time together." He goes, "I've seen some things about myself I don't think I would have seen." And he's just saying, "God's purpose is to make me like Jesus. Do I like this? No. But he doesn't complain."

How about you? What's your purpose? And what if you started looking at what the half-full issues in your life were through the lens not just of focus, but of purpose? I want you to ask yourself three important questions. Three purpose statements for every single believer. This is true of all of us. Purpose statement number one: I am an ambassador or messenger of the gospel.

The gospel, the good news, won't go anywhere in your relational network where you live, where you work, if it doesn't come through you. Not just your life, but your words. The purpose is to reach the lost. The people out there aren't bad, they're lost. They're lost, they don't know. I grew up in America, I had no idea what the gospel was. Someone shared it with me.

Here's the question: how could God use a difficult circumstance in your life to advance the gospel? Are you taking advantage of that? Advance the gospel. Purpose statement number two: I'm called to encourage God's people to help them grow to full maturity. Every single one of us. Why we talk about getting involved in ministry and getting in groups and God using you where you're at.

Here's your purpose: it's to build the found. No one grows on their own. Someone came up next to my life multiple times in different stages of my life and in your life if you've grown, and they helped you. Here's the deal: who are you helping? Who are you discipling? Who are you mentoring? Who are you coaching?

Who do you care about that their spiritual growth, wellbeing, quality of life, walk with God matters and you're building them up? Question: how could your adversity, how could your circumstances, how could your current difficulty build up a brother or sister in Christ? I want you to really think about that.

Third purpose statement: I am a servant of the living God. A servant. Jesus called himself a servant. Here's your purpose: become like our master. I don't know what you're going through, but I can tell you the will of God for sure. You got this? Here's the will of God for sure: whatever you're going through, no matter how good or how bad, God's agenda is to make you like Jesus.

So here's the question: what might God want to do in me through my present circumstance? Some of you might learn to pray like never before. Some of you might learn to love God's word like never before. David in Psalm 119 said, "If I had not been afflicted, I'd have gone astray. But when I was afflicted, now I keep your word."

Some of us need the difficulty we're in to woo us, to make us dependent, and to bring us back into vital relationship with Jesus. Because it's not hearing God's word that changes things. It's hearing with a heart that says, "Lord, you see it all. You love me. I'm going to take a step toward you by faith. I'm going to take a step of faith. I'm going to believe you to the point of acting.

I'm going to believe your promises are true. I'm going to believe you're using the zigzags and the circumstances for my good and for your glory." And so the question I would ask you is whose purpose and agenda are you most eager to fulfill? When you look at your time and your schedule, your money, whose agenda? Whose purpose? Yours or God's? That's heavy, but God's work in our life, he is doing a great thing.

Dave Druey: You're listening to Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram, and a message titled Understanding the Power of Purpose, from Chip's series called Free at Last: How to Break Out of a Destructive Lifestyle. Stick around, there's more from Chip in just a moment.

Every message from this series is also available anytime on the Living on the Edge podcast. Find it and hit subscribe wherever you listen. And if you'd rather hear Chip's sermons in full and unedited, look for the Chip Ingram sermon podcast. Paul didn't need better circumstances to fulfill his purpose, he just needed to see the purpose that was already in front of him.

Well, that's the exact shift Chip's book, Yes, You Really Can Change, is designed to help you make: trading vague spiritual goals for the real practical process of becoming who God made you to be. And since today's message was all about the people right in front of you, we're sending a second copy with every order this week, so you can hand one to someone who needs that same push forward. Request your copies at livingontheedge.org/offers.

None of this reaches anyone without listeners who decide it's worth funding. Living on the Edge runs because people like you choose to give. If today's message stirred something in you, we invite you to partner with us. You can give right now at livingontheedge.org or by calling 888-333-6003. Prefer to mail a check? Here's the address: Living on the Edge, PO Box 3007, Suwanee, Georgia 30024.

Now let's hear Chip's closing thoughts.

Chip Ingram: As we wrap up today's program, I'm reminded of a quote by C.S. Lewis. He says, "Pain insists on being attended to." In other words, pain gets our attention. He says, "God whispers during the good times, but pain is his megaphone." And I think what happens sometimes is we're human and the Lord understands, and we get our agenda and our purpose and our dreams and our desires a bit ahead of his.

And we learned today that there's three statements that are true of every single believer. That God brings difficulty or allows difficulty in our life, but there's three purposes that we need to take and make these the lens of the troubled relationship or the health issue or the wayward child or the struggle in your marriage. So let me remind you of what we learned.

Number one is we have a purpose to reach the lost. So I'm an ambassador for Christ. So here's the first question: how could God use my current difficulty and circumstance to get the gospel out to people? They're watching you. They really are. They're watching me and how we respond.

The second is that God's will, his purpose for all of us, isn't that we reach simply the lost, but that we build up the found, that we disciple other people. And so here's the question: how could God use my present circumstance or difficulty to encourage another believer? Most of the people that have helped me the most are people that have been through what I've been through.

You understand the people that have been through a divorce can really help someone going through a divorce. A person who's been clinically depressed has wisdom to help others who are clinically depressed and it goes on and on. Could it be that God wants you to take what you're going through and reach out and help someone else?

And then the third thing we learned is that God's purpose is to make us more and more like Jesus. To make us more like his son. So let me ask you this: what might God do in and through your current difficulty or circumstance or relationship to actually cause you to be more loving, more kind, more joy-filled, more trusting, to have a deeper faith?

Is it that he could use all these difficulties to chisel away some of the carnality in your heart and my heart to make us more and more like his son? I think if you'll ask yourself those questions in the midst of your pain and your difficulty, what you're going to find like the Apostle Paul, that you can choose joy and that he will bring good out of the most difficult seasons and times in your life.

Dave Druey: Coming up next time, Chip Ingram shares the story of his friend Kevin, a young dad facing a diagnosis no one wants to hear. What Kevin taught Chip about facing the unknown may change how you think about hope itself. Next time on Living on the Edge.

Today's program is produced and sponsored by Living on the Edge.