What the Bible Really Says About Suffering and Glory

Hello, and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Okay, now it's good to have everybody back, and we'll go right back into 2 Corinthians chapter 4. And again, I want to thank the studio audience for putting forth the effort to come in and being a part of all this with us. And we realize it does take some effort, it takes a time of mid-afternoon in the middle of the week. And then for those of you joining us on television, again, we'd just always like to thank you for your letters and for your comments, for your financial help, because all of this is what makes the ministry go. And we trust that the Lord is using it to reach hearts that have never really enjoyed the Scriptures before. I guess this is our favorite letter, when someone says, for the first time in my life, I'm reading my Bible and studying it and enjoying it. Well, that's the only reason we teach. We're not trying to bend minds, we're not trying to coerce people from one group into another, but we just trust that as you open the Word, you can get a better understanding of it. Again, remember that all the past programs are available on videos and books, and now the audios up to one, what, number 25? That's as far as we've gone. Because everything we do, you know, is limited by finances. We can only print so many books, and then we have to stop for a little bit. And we can dub a few audios, and then we have to stop. So as finances permit, we'll have all the audios as well. All right, now let's go right back where we left off in 2 Corinthians 4, and remember my opening remarks this afternoon, that was a couple of programs back, that the Apostle Paul had left Ephesus from when she wrote the first letter to the Corinthians. And I put a, what shall I call it, a caricature of a map. You know, I was thinking on the way up how these cartoonists can just, in a few lines, make somebody look ridiculous, and yet you know exactly who they are. Well, that's the way my maps are. See, they're just caricatures. They aren't detailed, and I don't intend them to be. But I'll bet you any schoolboy can tell you what part of the world I'm talking about, because at least we got the general outline. All right, now over here, of course, is the land of Israel and the Mediterranean Sea coast coming along under what is present-day Turkey, or which in New Testament days was called Asia Minor. There on the west coast of present-day Turkey is still the ruins of the ancient city of Ephesus from which Paul almost, I think, had to flee for his life. Because you remember at one point he refers to the beasts at Ephesus? Well, he wasn't talking about the beasts in the Colosseum. He was just talking about the population in general that had been so pagan, and in their fervor for Diana, the goddess of the Ephesians, he literally, I think, fled for his life. Well, up here is Troas, as we were speaking of it several programs ago, the ancient city of Troy where he had hoped to meet Titus, who had been down ministering at Corinth. Now remember, all these churches were founded at his first missionary journey, and this is his second. All right, so he missed Titus meeting him at Troas, and so he goes on up to Philippi, up here in northern Greece, where he was evidently on his sickbed nigh unto death, and then of course in time after he got well, he made his way on down and then finally visited Corinth a second time. All right, now that's the backdrop for these next few verses when he was evidently almost despairing of his life because of his tremendous sickness. All right, verse 7 of 2 Corinthians 4, but he says, "...we have this treasure." Now remember, he was talking about those things in verse 6 as we were in our closing moments, how that light that lighteth the whole world is already there for us to draw upon, and we who know the Lord can have the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. All right, now then verse 7, "...but even though this is such a magnificent knowledge and understanding, yet God didn't see fit to put it in the hands of angels, he left it in the hands of mortal men." Paul was just as human as the rest of us, but it didn't stop with Paul. Other men came along, and as we've come down through human history, and even today, every one of us have the opportunity to share the Word with whoever might listen. And so verse 7 says it all in that regard, "...we have this treasure." What treasure? "...the light of God, and we have this treasure in earthen vessels," well now he wasn't talking about a clay pot. What was he talking about? "...this body of flesh," see, "...made up of the elements of the earth. And so all of this that God has left for the human race is left in human instruments, that the excellency of the power may be not of us, but of whom? Of God." See, man can never take the credit for anything. It all has to be of God, or it's going to fall flat on its face. Turn back with me to 1 Corinthians. It's been a long time since we've even been that far back. 1 Corinthians chapter 1, verses 27, 28, and 29. I have to remind myself of these verses constantly, because I'm the first one to say, who in the world am I? Why did God see fit to even use me? What little ways He done? Well, it's not because I'm somebody, it's because I'm a nobody, and that's where it has to be. All right, verse 27, "...but God," see, "...God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound things which are mighty, and the base things of the world, and things which are despised." See, that's what God uses, and those are the things God has chosen, "...yea, and things which are not, to bring to naught or to nothing the things that are." In other words, what's all this saying? God uses that which mankind would never dream of using, and He uses it for His honor and His glory. All right, and what's the purpose? In verse 29, just like it is back here in verse 7 of 2 Corinthians 4, the same concept. All of this is for the one purpose, that no flesh should glory in His presence. No one, not a Dwight L. Moody, not a Finney, not a Charles Wesley, no one can ever glory that they accomplish something. It's all of God, or it is none of God. All right, back to 2 Corinthians 4. Now, here I think you can get the mindset of the apostle as he is now writing, having just gotten up from the sickbed in Philippi, actually thinking that his ministry had come to an end, and that God for some reason was taking him off the scene, but He didn't. And he goes on now, and look what he writes. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed, but not in despair. Perplexed, why? Why? He'd been doing so much. He had been set apart way back there in Damascus to go to the Gentile, and he knew he hadn't finished the work. He knew that Christianity was still in its infancy, and it was being attacked from every direction imaginable. And so he says, yes, he was perplexed, and I think it's the same thing that we are today. Sometimes we're prone to ask, well, God, why? Why? But He has His own purposes, see? And so even though he was perplexed, he never gave up. He didn't say, oh, well, I'm throwing in the towels. It's not worth it, all right? Verse 9, persecuted, absolutely he was persecuted. He was driven from city to city, but not forsaken. The Lord promised him what? When he was in Corinth, He says, Paul, don't you run from the enemies. I've much people in this city, speaking of Corinth. And so here again, he says, not forsaken, cast down, laid in a bed of sickness, disappointment, not having been able to meet up with Titus, who was like Timothy, a part and part of his whole ministry. What a disappointment. And yet he says, not destroyed. Verse 10, always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. Now, I think on first reading, most people just think he's making a reference that as Christ died, we died. Well, up to a point. But I think if you know the setting here, he had just gotten up from a sickbed that he thought was unto death. And so this is what he's making reference to, the fact that he was dying even in the midst of his service for the Lord, and the life off of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. In other words, as he was lying on that sickbed, which I think we can assume was up there at Philippi, even though he thought that his ministry had ended, what was he confident of? That he had done as much as the Lord intended him to do. You know, I always have to think of how he wrote to Timothy, which of course was at the end of his ministry. Turn back with me to that. Second Timothy, probably the last of his epistles that were written before he was finally martyred. Second Timothy, chapter one, second Timothy, chapter one, oh goodness, there's so many here, I hardly know where to begin. But beginning with verse nine, second Timothy, chapter one, verse nine, speaking of God in verse eight, who has saved us, called us with a holy calling, not according to our works but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus when? Before the world began, but is now made manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death and hath brought life and immortality to light, how? Through the gospel, whereunto I am appointed a preacher, and an apostle, and a teacher of what people? The Gentiles. But now verse 12, for the witch cause I also suffer these things. Now what's he talking about? Well number one, who was his chief opposition? The Jew, believing Jews as well as those still steeped in Judaism. But it wasn't the Jew alone, it was a satanic power from every direction, and so he says, I've suffered, because Satan didn't want the gospel going to the Gentile world. Satan hated it bad enough that it was going to Israel throughout the Old Testament, but now to go to the masses of Gentiles, that was the last thing Satan wanted, and so he says, I've suffered for these things, nevertheless, in spite of all, I am not ashamed. For I know whom I have believed. Isn't that something? That in spite of all his difficulties, and all of his sickness, and all of his sorrow, and all of his suffering, he never once doubted the God whom he served. He said, I know whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day. And then verse 14, I'm going to make a comment, we'll be studying Timothy someday, if the Lord tarries, I doubt if it'll be that long, but he may, and that is verse 14. Same chapter, 2 Timothy 1, verse 14, that good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Spirit who dwelleth in us. Now those of you who are real students, and now with the computers and everything, and if you want to chase down an interesting word, the word translated here, this good thing, in the Greek is the deposit, the deposit. Timothy, what I have deposited with you, keep it. Now I think I shared this in one of the classes here in Oklahoma this last week. When you deposit something, number one, what do you look for? Security. Isn't that right? You don't want to put something someplace and get back next week and it's gone. So number one, whenever you deposit something, you look for security. Secondly, especially in our age of investments and so forth, if you're going to make a good deposit, what do you expect? Dividend, interest, a return, see? All right, now the word means all of that. Timothy, keep the deposit, and let it earn dividends and interest. Don't just sit on it. Now that goes back to when Jesus gave the talents back there in the Gospels. Did He want them to just go home and bury it? No. Go out and increase, see? And so the same admonition, I think, is good for all of us. Well, I made comment on verse 15 in a previous program, and I've already had phone calls on that where someone said, I never knew that verse was in my Bible. He said, it just shocked me when you were reading it on the program. He said, what did the apostle mean? I said, it meant exactly what he said, that all those in Asia be turned away from me. Now you want to remember, like I've got here on the map, Greece was Europe. Asia Minor was the Asia of the New Testament. And here, of course, is where Paul had started umpteen churches. You remember Thyatira, and Pergamos, and Smyrna, all these little towns here in Asia Minor? And evidently they had already, by the time he is martyred, had turned away from his gospel. In which way? I don't know. But what a heartache to think that he had spent so much and had poured out his life, and yet those were the people that turned their back on him. And of course, I think the results are evident. None of those little cities are left anymore, not a one of them. Many of the areas in Greece are still valid. Philippi is still a valid seaport, Athens is still valid, Corinth is no longer the ancient city, but there's another city right next to it, and much of Greece refers to the journeys and so forth of Paul, but back there in western Turkey, nothing. It all faded off the scene. And I think that is the basic reason for it all. All right, come back to 2 Corinthians now, and we'll just skim through these verses because they're all just decrying the fact that he had suffered so much to get the gospel to these Gentiles. Verse 12, for example, Well, what's he saying? Well, as a result of him spending his physical life, his physical energies to get the gospel to these pagans, they were coming out of their pagan darkness, they were coming out of their spiritual darkness into the joy and the life of the gospel, but his body was suffering the consequences. And I'm sure that the old fellow must have been wracked with pain as he sat in prison in Rome waiting for the executioner's sword, because he'd been through so much all for the sake of the gospel. But verse 13, We have in the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I what? Believe. See? Doesn't tell us anything else that he did, but he believed. Oh, we were just talking about it at break time. Maybe it's a good time to rehearse this. Come back with me to Acts chapter 9. Acts chapter 9. I know a lot of our folks were with me when we studied this, but a lot of you weren't. And remember, this is where you have that tremendous change of direction in the book of Acts. Up until this chapter, it's Peter, and the 11, and Israel, and now all of a sudden, with just an exception in chapter 10, and Peter comes back on the scene momentarily, all the rest of the book of Acts covers this one man, and Peter is completely forgotten so far as the Acts account is concerned. But here in Acts chapter 9, verse 1, Saul of Tarsus, that great persecutor of Jewish believers. Now remember, he didn't go after Gentiles. There were none of them believing yet. But he was after the believing Jews who had supposedly followed the heresy that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah. And to this good Jew, Saul of Tarsus, nothing worse could have happened to Israel. And so he's trying to stamp it out by persecution, by imprisonment, by putting them to death. All right, read on. And as Saul was yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, he went to the high priest, and he desired of him letters to Damascus. See, he's not satisfied any longer with just working the small towns of Israel. Now he wants to go into Gentile territory and go to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, that is, that Jesus was the Christ, that whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound under Jerusalem. And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus, and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven, from above. And he fell to the earth, and he heard a voice saying, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? Verse 5, and this is what I want you to see. We always make this point. And he said, Who art thou now? Here's where we have to be careful. All the way up through the Old Testament, the word Lord was used by the writers of Scripture, by the Jews in general, in place of the name that they didn't even feel adequate to repeat. What was it? Jehovah. Jehovah. It was of such awe and such high esteem that the average Jew didn't even want to breathe it. And so what did they substitute? Lord. Now, all the way through the Old Testament, when you see capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D, it's Jehovah. And the same way here, when Saul of Tarsus addresses God, which he knows this light and voice is, in so many words he says, Who art thou, Jehovah? Even though he didn't say it, he was thinking it. Who art thou, Lord? Who art thou, Jehovah? And how does Jehovah answer, I am Jesus? And it blew his mind. Imagine. Here he thought he was doing the work of Jehovah by stamping out the name of Jesus. And then to suddenly realize that what he thought was his enemy was in reality the God of Abraham. See? Oh, what a transcending experience. And then he says, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? It didn't take him an hour to figure out who the Lord was. It didn't take him very long to understand who Jesus was. You know, I've shared on this program, a gentleman came to my home several years ago, and that was his first question. Who in the world is Jesus Christ? Oh, I wish more people would ask that question. Too many people don't know. People do not understand that Jesus Christ of the new is the Jehovah of the old. Jesus of the new is the God of Genesis 1. One and the same. The only difference was, as we saw a few programs back, he manifested himself in the flesh. But it's the same God. That's who Jesus Christ is. He's the God of glory. He's the God of creation. Well, all right, now then back to 2 Corinthians. And so this is where the apostle is now, after his years of taking the gospel to the Gentiles and still having a heart, of course, for the nation of Israel. All right, then we come down to verse 14 of 2 Corinthians 4, knowing. Now in the Greek, that's a much stronger word than it is in the English. Knowing that he who raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise us up also by that same Jesus, and we shall be presented with you. In other words, Christ will present us to you, with you. All right, verse 15. For all things, everything that has happened to this man are for your sake, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many redound or resound to whose glory? God's glory, not Paul. We don't elevate Paul to glory. He was just a common human being like the rest of us that God saw fit to use. But everything was to bring glory to the God of heaven. All right, verse 16. I'd like to finish the chapter in this program if we can. For which cause? We faint not, but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is what renewed day by day for our light affliction, which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. And then verse 18. While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are what? Temporal. They're earthly. They're not heavenly. But the things which are not seen, they're what? Eternal. Oh, listen, get the impact of that. The world today is only set on the temporal. What's in it for me? How can I enjoy life to the full? How can I make the most? How can I do this and how can I do that? But listen, that's not where it's at. The Lord said back in his earthly ministry, what? Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven and all these things. Now, there's nothing wrong with things. The Bible doesn't condemn things, providing we have our priorities straight. But if the believer gets hung up on things and more concerned about the temporal, then he loses the sight of the eternal. And don't be caught in that trap. Oh, especially as I feel we are in the closings, not moments, but seconds of this age. Now, I'm not a date setter. I will never do that. But I'll tell you what, the way I see the world rushing into the scenario that is going to be on the earth for the appearance of the Antichrist, it's coming. It's coming so fast. The more you see Israel pushed tighter and tighter by the Arab world till finally she gets to the place that either she'll do something rash and will precipitate, which I do not think is going to happen because God's going to do it in his time, not according to the Arab world's turn. But if Israel would be pushed to the corner to do something rash, which would be to use nuclear energy, and I don't think they haven't got it. They have. But the world is rushing, literally rushing to the time when the man of sin will make his appearance and will finally bring a semblance of peace to the Middle East. That's what everybody's waiting for. And while they're waiting for peace to come to the Middle East, they're forgetting all about the admonitions that when you see these things come to pass, lift up your eyes or our moment of redemption is coming near. And listen, the more you see technology explode, the more you see world politics move into a global format, the more you see global economics, the more you see the religions and the major denominations of the world coming in under one headship and they're doing it. Listen, then that tells us the time is short. And so coming back to our verse again, don't be concerned about the things that are seen. Oh, but rather look at the things that are not seen because they are what we turn. Thank you for watching Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a weekly Bible study. If you would like more information about the Les Feldick ministries, a Bible study in your area or about this program, write to Les Feldick Ministries, Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. That's Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick is viewer supported and your gift is appreciated. Thank you and be sure to tune in next time for Through the Bible with Les Feldick.