Fellowship in the Word

Bil Gebhardt: But he said all of a sudden God of all comfort intervened. We would not trust in ourselves but in God. Oh, and by the way, let me tell you God’s limitations: He raises the dead. So when you say God can't give you comfort, Paul says he raises the dead, I'm pretty sure he can give you comfort. You see, that's going to be much more up to you.

He said who delivered us from the great peril of death and he will deliver us. He says in he on whom we have set our hope, there it is again, and he will yet deliver us. Comfort is not only something for the present but comfort is something God promised us for the future.

Jason Gebhardt: Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bil Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bil Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's word meets our world.

Bil Gebhardt: Now understand, Isaiah is a pre-exilic, a pre-exile prophet. He's telling the nation that if you don't turn to God then you're going to be taken into captivity and they are by the Babylonians for 70 years. You're going to be ripped out of the land and taken into captivity. It's a very difficult time, but notice how God starts chapter 40. He says, "Comfort, oh, comfort my people," says your God. "Speak kindly to Jerusalem and call out to her that her warfare has ended and that her iniquity has been removed and that she has received from the Lord's hand double for all her sins."

God says ultimately, even if you’re going to be disciplined, there's comfort coming for you. As a nation, I will comfort you in the future. Now, then God decides he's going to do something here, and it's kind of interesting. He's going to brag a little bit. In fact, he's going to brag a lot. And it's not bragging if you can back it up, and God can. Now watch what he says in verse seven: "The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the Lord blows upon it. Surely the people are grass, and the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of God stands forever."

In other words, he's saying simply if I tell you something, you can take it to the bank. You see, it stands forever. There's never a time when it's outdated or obsolete; it stands forever. Now verse 12, he starts talking. He said, "Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand?" He's using an analogy. What are the oceans of the world like? He said, "Yeah, they're right here in the hollow of my hand."

Then he goes on and he says this, "or marked off the heavens," he said, "by span." What do you mean, the universe? He said, "How do you measure it? Oh, I just do it like this: one span, two spans." Now, we have an idea how huge the universe is. They didn't, but God tells them. He said, "and calculated the dust of the earth by the measure." That's an interesting question, isn't it? Hey, God, how many particles of dust do you think there are in the world? Let alone on your house? You see what I mean? How many? And at any moment God says, "I can tell you exactly."

What? You can? "Yeah, I can tell you. That's who I am. I want you to understand that." He says, "And I weighed the mountains in a balance and the hills on a pair of scales. Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord, or who as his counselor has ever informed him? With whom did he consult, and who gave him understanding, and who taught him in the path of justice and taught him knowledge and informed him of the way of understanding?"

"Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales. Behold, he lifts up the islands like fine dust. Even Lebanon, famous for their trees, is not enough to burn nor its beasts enough for a burnt offering. All the nations are as nothing before him. They are regarded by him as less than nothing, their meaninglessness. Even the Babylonians come and mean nothing to God."

He then says, "To whom then will you liken God and what likeness will you compare with him?" I'm not like anybody else. Then verse 21, "Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been declared to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he who sits above the circle of the earth and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. It is he who reduces rulers to nothing and makes the judges of the earth meaningless."

"Scarcely," he says, "have they been planted, scarcely they have been sown, scarcely they have their stock taking root in the earth. But he merely blows on them and they wither, and the storm carries them away like stubble. To whom then would you liken me that I would be my equal?" Now, what's he doing? He's telling them just what he's capable of. Okay. Now notice down to verse 27, this is their condition. "Why do you say, O Jacob, and assert, O Israel, my way is hidden from the Lord and the justice due me escapes the notice of my God?"

I can't tell you how many people in this church over all these years that I've been here have told me that exact thing in their own way when they're suffering. Where's God? Where is he? Why doesn't he do something? You see, why, why me? Why this? We talked about that some last week. That's what he says. Look how bad this is. He says the everlasting, he said God, the Lord, the creator of the ends of the earth. He does not become weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. He never stops.

How could I forget you? I never get tired. I never stop. My understanding is not even possible for you to understand. I saw a quote today in my phone from Spurgeon, and Spurgeon said something and I thought was interesting, like what I'm saying. He said God gave us the gift of sleep to remind us who we are. What's he mean? He never sleeps. We sleep. We need rest. God says I need no rest. There's never a time when I'm down, I'm out. I'm always there. He said, "I never become tired or weary."

He said, "He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might, he increases power." Then he says about our part in verse 31, "Yet those who wait on the Lord will gain new strength. They mount up with wings like eagles. They will run and not get tired, and they will walk and not become weary." So God is telling them, can I or do I have enough power to give you comfort? Do I have more than enough power? But God says, "But that's not really comfort."

You see, by his power when you try to answer the question, bad things, we're always thinking of his power, but it's not right. It's not right in any sense of the word. Ahead, this was given to Velma and I about 30 years ago. This is a picture of Jesus Christ and me and you. And you know what that is? That's comfort. Let me explain why. Now go back with me to verse 11 of chapter 40 and it says right there then: "Like a shepherd, he will tend his flock. In his arm, he will gather the lambs and he'll carry them in his bosom and he will gently lead the nursing ewes."

Wow. He showed you all this stuff he can do. "I'm not, I can't give you comfort because I can do everything." He said, "I can give you comfort because I'm your shepherd. You're my sheep." You see, when a little lamb is in really, in trouble, you just imagine he was threatened, he lost sight of the herd, a wolf was bothering him and a shepherd comes and picks him up and he holds them right to him. That's comfort. You see, that's the comfort of God. Don't miss out on the tenderness of the image.

You never notice with little kids who sometimes at the mall they get lost or some kind of thing happens and they get a little panicky? And they run to their mom. And the first thing they say is, "Hey, mom, are you capable of being...?" They don't do that, do they? What do they want? A hug. What do you do when you have a child who's really frightened? You pick them up and you hug them. That's what God says he does to you and me. I pick you up, I hold you to myself, like a shepherd with a little lamb. That's how I hold you.

And that image has come back over and over again. I've thought about that, no more than in the last year, but what an absolutely wonderful image that it is from God to us. Now, back to Second Corinthians. There's now another reason why he comforts us in the way that he does. He says who comforts us in verse four in all of our affliction so that, there is that's called a purpose clause, a hina clause, the reason for it: "So that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God."

Ah. You see what God does? Guess how God comforts a lot of his people. With his people. You see how this works? That's how he comforts us. Look at chapter seven. Keep your place here and go with me to chapter seven and verse five of Second Corinthians. And Paul is in distress and he says in verse five, he said, "For even when we came into Macedonia, our flesh had no rest. We were afflicted on every side. Conflicts without, fears within. But God, who comforts the depressed, he comforted us by the coming of Titus."

How did God deliver his comfort? Through Titus. You see, that's how he did it. So back to the beginning, he said so that we'll be able to comfort those who have comforted us. It's interesting to me that the greatest comfort I received and I received a lot of it from a lot of folks, but when Velma died there's two ladies in this church who had lost their husbands. I had conducted both of their funerals. And they gave me more comfort than anybody. You know why? Because they knew. Because they went through it.

You see, that, God doesn't waste our suffering. He wants to use that. You see, if I receive comfort, I want to give comfort to somebody else. That's the way this works. That's what's so wonderful about the body of Christ. It's the way that we should operate. It's an amazing thing when you think about it from that point of view. Now, let me say something here. I'm not picking out any individuals. I said to the first service, I won't look up at you so you'll say you made eye contact with me.

But you know some of us stink at giving comfort. We do. We stink at it. There's a lot of different reasons. I mean, maybe we've never experienced the comfort ourselves. Maybe we use the whole idea of the wrong words to try to comfort people. You see, and sometimes, by the way, if you think about this, maybe we use words when we shouldn't. You see, that word for comfort is used ten times in this passage and you may have heard of the word. It's called paraclete or parakletos.

That is exactly the word Jesus used to describe who? The Holy Spirit of God. The parakletos. The one who comes alongside you. You see, that one who comes close to you. That's the idea parakletos. It has a tendency of relationship. You see, sometimes what's the greatest way to comfort someone who is going through a really difficult time in life? Just sit with them. Hug them, hold them. Emote with them. That's comforting. That's not a time for theology 101. I know some verses I want to give you right now. These ought to help.

That's not the way it works. You see, that's the image again. What could Jesus Christ tell me about my comfort? He could tell me the whole plan of God. He could give me all the theology of Christ himself. He could do all that. But you know what he decides to do? He decides to pick me up and hold me. Because he wants me to have comfort. And that's what happens here. That's the way this whole thing works out. When I said some people are bad at it, just read the book of Job.

Job's wife, a comforting woman, right? Curse God and die. That made him feel a lot better, I'm sure, with what he was going through. But I want you to think about his friends. In 16:2, here's what Job said, "Sorry comforters are you all." He said, "Is there no limit to your windy words?" You didn't give him any comfort. And then in 21:34, he said, "How then will you vainly comfort me, for your answers remain full of falsehood?" You don't comfort someone with lies no matter how dogmatically you say it.

You see, that's how God uses us. Now he said in verse five, "Just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ." Christ, we can suffer because we're believers, but we also get our comfort from him. Then he says, "But if we are afflicted, it's for your comfort and salvation. And if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is effective in the patient endurance of the same sufferings with which we also suffer."

Understand that hupomone or meno, hupomone there is an interesting word, patient endurance. You know why we hate this so much? Because normally when we're suffering, that's our only option. Yeah, there's suffering that you have to patiently endure. Just imagine what that's like. You just have to endure it. And that's what Paul says. He said, "And our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are sharers in our suffering, so also you're sharers in our comfort."

Now he says some really amazing things now. He said, "We do not want you to be unaware." Six times, by the way, Paul says that in the epistles. It means listen up. This is important. That's what he says. "Brethren," he said, "of our affliction which came to us in Asia," which would be modern-day Turkey, "that we were burdened excessively beyond our strength so we despaired even of life." Last week I called that what Jonah, rock bottom. When you hit rock bottom. That's what Jonah did. He's in the great fish. What's he going to do? He's out of options. Nothing he can do.

That's what Paul said. He said, "Indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead." We had no answers. He's the great apostle. "Come on, Paul, give us some snappy verses here. Help us." He said, "We're going to die." That's what he said. But he said all of a sudden God of all comfort intervened. And he says, notice, he said we would not trust in ourselves but in God.

And he said, "Oh, and by the way, let me tell you God’s limitations: He raises the dead." So when you say God can't give you comfort, Paul says he raises the dead, I'm pretty sure he can give you comfort. You see, that's going to be much more up to you. He said, "Who delivered us from the great peril of death and he will deliver us. He says in he on whom we have set our hope, there it is again, and he will yet deliver us." Comfort is not only something for the present, but comfort is something God promised us for the future.

Under the worst conditions. Remember Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego? Okay. "Well, you're going to have to worship the..." "No." "No, you have to." "No, I'm not worshiping the idol." "Well, I’ll put you in the furnace." "Okay." What kind of nonsense is that? They just quietly said, "Look, king, if God wants to deliver us from the furnace, he will. But if he doesn't, we're still delivered anyway because we're with the Lord. Hope of heaven." You see, they had this hope of heaven. They're not bothered by this.

You see, they are able to utilize this because God ultimately is going to comfort all of us in a place where there's no more sorrow and no more tears. He then says, "You also joining in helping us through your prayers, so that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the favor bestowed on us through the prayers of many." He thanks them for their intercessory prayer work. He thanks them for praying for him as he does this. Notice, these are people that thought, "I don't know if Paul should be an apostle. He suffers too much."

Paul says, "Hey, that's a wonderful thing I've suffered. Because I've received comfort from the God of all comfort, and God's people have done all this to me." Now, remember early in the sermon I simply said this. I said God will always be there to comfort you if you let him. And I hate to say it, but many of you won't. And that becomes the problem. So I'm going to close with a little story. There's a workman who was involved in the building of a high-rise skyscraper. And they’re putting up the girders.

Now, because of the necessity they ran into of deadlines and very bad weather, they all had to work at night. And so they're all over this skyscraper and the girders, working at night together. And then one of the workers was over on one section by himself and on the girder he slipped and he fell. But when he fell, he grabbed the girder. So he's hanging there. It's pitch black. He's hanging there. Well, guess what he did. What would you do? "Excuse me, anybody?" No, no. He cries out.

He's yelling, "Save me, save me! Come on, help! Help!" Well, there's riveting machines and jackhammers and no one hears a word from him. Not a word. So he's just hanging there. Now all of a sudden his arms are shaking. He can't feel his fingers. And he just keeps hanging there. He can't even have enough energy now to even raise his voice much. And then his arms gave way. And he fell about three inches. You see, there was a scaffolding that he never saw right underneath him.

I'm telling you, the scaffolding is God. He's right there. He's right there. "I'm holding on! I'm holding on! I'm screaming for help!" Let go. Allow God to give you the real comfort. See, that's what happens to us. We get so overwhelmed by the event that causes us to suffer, we become preoccupied with that, and that's all we ever see. And all we ever feel is our pain. And because of that, we never get the comfort. But God says just let go and trust me.

And that's what happens to all of us. He is the God of all comfort, but we have to be willing to be comforted. Let's pray. Father, thank you that you're the God of all comfort. Some of us need it this very day. Some of us have had it in the past and all of us will have it sometime in the future. I just pray, Father, when those kind of things happen, that we can find comfort. We can understand that you are a shepherd who loves us as his sheep.

That you spiritually want to embrace and hug us. You want to give us comfort in the midst of the most difficult suffering circumstances. Father, we need to trust you for that. We need to allow this idea of comfort that gives us a heavenly hope that no matter what happens in this life, it's just as Paul said, a momentary light affliction because we'll ultimately be with you in total peace and tranquility.

Father, I pray for all of us that we don't waste our suffering and that we're able to find comfort that comes from you, which will create peace within ourselves. A peace that Paul called beyond all comprehension. That's my prayer for all of us, in Jesus' name, amen.

Jason Gebhardt: You've been listening to Pastor Bil Gebhardt on the radio ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts or maybe you'd like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called oneplace.com. That’s oneplace.com and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online. At that website, you will find not only today's broadcast but also many of our previous audio programs as well. At Fellowship in the Word, we are thankful for those who financially support our ministry and make this broadcast possible.

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