Sermon Tone Analysis

Our Walk Through the Valley

STRANGE MINISTERS

Ron Dunn

 

 

        First of all, I want to thank Oscar for relinquishing the pulpit tonight.

I thank him for the opportunity to share with you.

I appreciate his sensitivity and graciousness.

This is the first time I have ever come out and asked somebody if I could preach.

Oscar has always meant a great deal to me but he has come to mean so much more to us personally since he has become our interim.

I thank the Lord for him.

I prayed much about this before I did it.

As I was flying to Anchorage a week ago Saturday night, the Lord was so real.

Jack Taylor and I were flying up together.

We had been in Kansas City where  Kaye went with me and  I preached Friday night.

She flew back here on Saturday, and Jack and I flew on to Anchorage.

The Lord was so real in blessing and ministering.

Jack said they could have turned off the engines, and we could have flown them on in.

It was during that flight that God began to overwhelm me with a compelling desire to stand here before you and share.

I asked Oscar if he would mind if I spoke tonight for three reasons.

First of all, I think you folks have a right to hear a report.

Most of you have known us and been a part of our lives, and a partner with us in all this.

It would be impossible for us to be able to share with you what your love and concern in the past years has meant to us.

Many a time I stood in this place trying to preach with wounds that some of you knew of, and I was always conscious of your prayers.

You've been so faithful, understanding and loving I felt like you, as a part of our family, had a right to the report.

I would not want to do this in any other church because it wouldn't mean as much to them, and it wouldn't mean nearly as much to me.

I am doing this not just for your sakes but I am doing it for mine.

By the way, let me say that I will be using the personal pronouns I and me but when I say that, I mean we and us.

The testimony I want to give tonight is not mine alone; it is the testimony of Kaye, Steve and Kim too.

I can't break the old preacher habit of I and me but you know who I mean.

I speak tonight for all of us.

Another reason I felt compared to share this is in the hope that somebody else might be comforted with the same comfort wherewith we have been comforted of the Lord.

That's a passage in 2 Corinthians, chapter 1.

I read that this afternoon in the New English Bible, and I want to share it with you.

It is a tremendous passage.

This is not the text—just introduction.

2 Corinthians 1:4ff:

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the all merciful Father, the God whose consolation never fails us.

He comforts us in all our troubles so that we in turn may be able to comfort others in any trouble of theirs and to share with them the consolation we ourselves receive from God.

As Christ's cup of suffering overflows and we suffer with him, so also through Christ our consolation overflows.

If distressed be our lot, it is the price we pay for your consolation, for your salvation.

If our lot be consolation, it is to help us to bring you comfort and strength to face with fortitude the same sufferings we now endure.

So the second reason I felt compelled to share this was praying that God would comfort you with the comfort that we have received.

The third reason is the greatest—the main reason.

Tonight we want to give testimony to the goodness of our God and the sufficiency of his grace.

This is my text.

Remember when Paul was languishing in that Roman prison, his future uncertain, he wrote this to that church.

He said in Philippians 1:19-20:

For I know that this shall turn out for my salvation through your prayers and the provision of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and hope, that I shall not be put to shame in anything, but that with all boldness, Christ shall even now, as always, be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.

That text has ministered to me greatly in the last two weeks.

For I know that this (whatever your this is—I know what my this has been) shall turn out for my salvation.

The salvation to which he refers here does not mean the initial act of salvation for Paul was already saved.

Nor does it mean his deliverance from prison because he goes on to say in the following verses that he is uncertain about that situation.

He thinks he may well die.

Yet he says for I know, and he uses a word that means to know with certainty.

I know that this shall turn out for my salvation.

I think here the word salvation indicates spiritual welfare—our well being.

He says I know that this shall turn out for my spiritual welfare.

I think this is Paul's own commentary on what he wrote in Romans 8:28:  For we know that all things are working together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

He did not say I know this will turn out to my satisfaction; he said I know this will turn out for my salvation.

Not all things turn out the way we want them to turn out, even when we pray and believe.

Paul does not say this will turn out to my satisfaction.

I used to think that my satisfaction was the greatest thing that could happen but I have discovered that my salvation is the greatest.

I have discovered that God sometimes withholds the good from us in order that he might give us the best.

God does not exist for my convenience so things do not always turn out for our satisfaction.

But they can always turn out for our salvation, regardless of what it is.

This is something that God has really been saying to me lately.

I don't know why I am such a slow learner; it's been in the Bible all the way along.

Some verses that I have read flippantly in the past have taken on new meaning for me.

In that verse in the Gospel of Matthew where Jesus is talking about the care of our Heavenly Father, it says he notices every sparrow that falls.

I've always read that and thought that was wonderful, great.

God takes note of every sparrow that falls.

But I notice that the sparrow does fall.

That never occurred to me before.

God doesn't keep the sparrow from falling.

It does fall.

It does not fall without his interest and concern and love but it does fall.

I read in Psalm 23 where David said though I walk through the valley of the shadow death, I will fear no evil.

He didn't say he wouldn't face any evil.

We both face and feel the evil but there is no reason to fear it.

You do face it.

The three Hebrew children in the fiery furnace—my what a sermon you can preach on that.

They said our God is able to deliver us.

That is about as far as I have ever read.

Our God is able to deliver us.

They went on to say but if not, that's all right too.

You see, it's but if not that you have to contend with.

Anybody can trust God when he is delivering us.

And, O King, our God is able to deliver us but if not, it doesn't make any difference.

We are still not going to bow down to your gods.

We are still going to trust the Lord.

I was brought again to Paul's thorn in the flesh.

He prayed three times for that thorn to be removed.

I don't why it surprises me when God doesn't answer my prayers.

He didn't answer some of Paul's.

Paul prayed three times that God might remove the thorn in the flesh.

God didn't.

He gave him something better; he always does.

I notice that Paul didn't regret having the third heaven experience.

I've known some folks who have done an awful lot of rejoicing when God would give them the third heaven experience, and then later on they would renounce it all when he gave them a thorn experience.

All of us want the third heaven experience, don't we?  Caught up into paradise, an ecstatic experience, just thrilled to death.

Friends, along with the third heaven always comes the thorn.