1 Corinthians 2:3 (ESV)
And I was with you in weakness and
in fear and much trembling,
When
I think about discouragement I never think about Paul. I think of Elijah
sitting under a juniper tree crying out to God, “It is enough; now, O LORD,
take my life, for I am not better than my fathers,” (I Kings 19:4 NAS) or Job,
who cursed the day of his birth, but not Paul; not the Apostle who declared, “I
have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.” (Phil 4:11 NAS);
not Paul who wrote of the other apostles, “Those who were of reputation
contributed nothing to me.” (Gal 2:6 NAS); not the one who put these words on
paper, “In no respect was I inferior to the most eminent apostles.” (2 Cor
12:11 NAS) Surely Paul was never discouraged! And yet here it is, “I was with
you” he be reminds the Corinthians, “ in weakness and in fear and in much
trembling.”
Why
weakness, fear and trembling? There are at least two reasons. I will write
about the second reason in my next blog. The first is the most obvious. Nothing
about this second missionary trip of Paul had gone according to plan. It wasn’t
even so much that He had been beaten and jailed. That had happened on his first
trip. It was more than that. He had seen new believers on this trip, but he had
not had time anywhere to establish a church. Everywhere he went he had to flee
for his life as the work was just beginning. His greatest oratory, by all human
evaluation, had fallen on curious but largely un-responsive ears in Athens. He
had sensed a clear calling by God to this ministry but the fruit just wasn’t
there. He felt like a failure, but he didn’t feel free to quit.
Every
Pastor I have ever known has felt like that at times. Sometimes whole churches
feel that way. Everything they try fails. Their resources are slim to none.
Their energy is slacking. Their expectations have fizzled and their hope has
almost burned out. And to top it all off, there are no night visions saying,
“Hang in there! This time it’s going to work.” The first reason for Paul’s
discouragement was his experience. He was looking at circumstances and they didn’t
add up to great encouragement. That is why we must always go back to the Word
of God and his call on our lives. Faithfulness is more important than success.
Sometimes God uses apparent failure to get us where he wants us to be, and
sometimes he uses it to grow in us what he wants to grow. Circumstances never
define success. In a success oriented world it is hard for us to understand that faithfulness
is success.
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