Sermon Tone Analysis

By Pastor Glenn Pease

Paul Aurandt tells the story of one of the fastest rising young singers back in the early 50's.

He was called the Romantic Voice Of America.

Teenage girls would give anything to see him, but he never appeared anywhere.

He was not even seen in photographs.

He was strictly a radio voice.

Soon KFRC in San Francisco was flooded with teenage fan mail begging for signed photos, but none were ever sent.

The golden voice was heard, but the person behind it was never seen.

One day a young girl went into the studio looking for a glimpse of her idol.

When she saw him she was overwhelmed, and not with awe, but with laughter.

The Romantic Voice of America was 5 ft. 10 and weighed 260 lbs.

He was so embarrassed by her laughter that he went on a 4 month grueling diet.

Because of that embarrassment he became fit enough to be seen in public, and he went on to become popular on television.

By being crushed into despair he was able to rise to the heights of stardom.

This young man is the now well-known Merv Griffin.

His experience reveals that there is often a link between the lows of life and the highs.

The lows, or the failures, are often the motivating factors in our reaching for the heights and success.

Had he never been crushed down by that negative experience he may never have been moved to change and climb to new heights.

We see this process going on in the life of Paul as he records for all the world to see the depths of despair which forced him the heights of hope.

Paul has been as low as a Christian can get, and he has been as high as a Christian can get.

He knows the depth to which a Christian can sink in negative feelings, and he knows the heights in which they can soar in positive feelings.

Paul opens up and shares this intimate view of his own emotions, for he knows it will be a comfort to many, and God knew it would be a comfort to millions all through history.

Christians need to know it is not a sign of lack of faith, or that God has abandoned you, because you feel sunk in a pit of despair.

It has happened to the best of God's family, and is, therefore, an acceptable state of emotion event though it is not a state where you want to settle down and live.

The proper response to this low state is to be motivated to climb to a higher level of faith and hope.

We want to look at these two levels of life that Paul experienced so we can learn also to cope with the depths and climb to the heights.

Let's look first at-

I. THE DEPTHS OF DESPAIR.

The Greek word Paul uses here to describe his low point means-to have no outlet whatever.

Paul felt trapped with no way to escape.

It was a hopeless situation, and there was nothing he could do.

It looked like death was inevitable, and there was no other choice but to die.

Paul was at a dead end.

The enemy was bearing down on him and there was no exist.

The pressure was great that it was beyond his ability to endure it.

Paul was admitting that he had come to the end of his rope, and he could not longer hang on.

This is a terrible place to be, but God had Paul share this so that Christians might not be superficial in their judgments of Christians who reach this level of despair.

Many Christians who have lived sheltered lives, as many of us have, do not know the depths to which life can push the emotions.

We have all felt depressed but despair goes deeper than depression.

It is the feeling of utter hopelessness.

It is a very dangerous state of mind, for this is what leads people to take their own life.

It is the feeling that made Job wish he had never been born.

It is the feeling that made Solomon feel that everything was vanity and totally meaningless.

It is a theme very common in literature.

John Bunyan in Pilgrim's Progress has a scene where Great-Heart has a major battle with Giant Despair who had as many lives as a cat.

In other words, despair is a hard foe to get rid of.

John Milton in Paradise Lost has Satan cry out in despair, "Which way shall I fly-infinite wrath and infinite despair?

Which way I fly is hell; myself is hell; and in the lowest deep a lower deep still threatening to devour me opens wide, to which the hell I suffer seems a heaven."

The lost world has picked up on the despair philosophy of Satan, and it has become, in the words of Francis Schaeffer, the culture of despair.

He traces despair as one of the key ideas in art, poetry, and music in our culture.

If you think a lot of modern art, literature and music is meaningless, then they have succeeded in communicating, for that is exactly what they are trying to convey-that life is meaningless and absurd.

So when you look at a Picasso painting not knowing if you are looking at a male, female, or a chair, and you say this is absurd, you have gotten the point.

Despair leads to all kinds of absurdity.

But despair does explain absurdity.

The reality of despair helps us understand all of the mysteries of evil, and why people engage in atrocities so vicious and inhuman.

Despair means there is no way out, and so what do you have to lose?

Despair causes people to go and shoot fellow workers, or to kill strangers on the street.

Despair causes teenagers by the thousands to take their own life every year.

George Eliot said something long ago that fits our day as well: "There is no despair so absolute as that which comes with the first moment of our first great sorrow, when we have not yet known what it is to have suffered and be healed, to have despaired and have recovered hope."

Studies show that despairing teens take their own lives because they think the feelings they have at the moment are permanent.

The broken heart the feel when their boy or girl friend dumps them is what they think they have to live with the rest of their lives, and so they cut their life short to end the pain.

They do not have the ability to see beyond despair to a whole new life of joy.

Do not take despair lightly.

It is a very dangerous emotion, and it is what makes this a dangerous world in which to live.

But the point of all this is that Christians can experience it.

It is so negative, and the cause of such depths of evil in the world that many Christians refuse to believe that it is possible to be a Christian in such a state of despair.

Jeremy Taylor wrote, "It is impossible for that man to despair who remembers that his Helper is omnipotent."

The problem with making such a radical statement is that it ignores the Word of God, which is our final authority.

If a Christian can or cannot feel despair, it is not going to be settled by a survey, a vote, or by scholars doing research.

It is settled by the revelation God has given us, and Paul states it clearly that he and young Timothy despaired even of life.

They felt utterly hopeless with no way of escape.

Why is it important to accept the fact that a Christian can reach the depths of despair?

Because it is in assuming they can't that has led many Christians to neglect the ministry of comfort, and let Christians descend into a pit so deep they cannot get out.

Never assume that a Christian cannot descend to the pit of despair.

The Word of God and the record of history makes it clear that they can.

I have dozens of books by Charles Spurgeon.

He was the greatest preacher England ever produced, and many consider him the greatest preacher in history.

But he often had a battle with depression.

He once said, "I am the subject of depressions of spirit so fearful that I hope none of you ever get to such extremes of wretchedness as I go to."

I have many of the books of Dr. John Henry Jowett, another man who has been called the greatest preacher in the English speaking world.

Listen to his testimony: "You seem to imagine I have no ups and downs, but just a level and lofty stretch of spiritual attainment with unbroken joy and equanimity.

By no means!

I am often perfectly wretched and everything appears most murky."

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of such testimonies from Christian leaders through history.

Some feel these records should be hidden and not exposed to the public.

But this is folly, for Paul opens up his own life for us to see the depths to which even an Apostle can go.

And he does it to give comfort.

Christians who do not know that Christians can go so low feel rejected by God and man.

Those who hide these records from them for fear of hurting their faith rob them of the comfort they need to cling to their faith.

It is important for us to see Paul is in deep distress and despair.

He is overwhelmed by the troubles of life.

It is important for us to see that Paul prayed for the removal of his thorn in the flesh, and he did not get the healing.

It is important for us to see all of the negative experiences and emotions of Paul, for they are a source of great comfort for us when we suffer the same emotions.

Hide the negatives from people, and they feel alone as if they are the only Christian whoever felt like they feel.

This is to be a miserable comforter, and like Job's friends add weights to the crushing load that is already pushing down the suffering saint.

What does Paul do with his despair?

He shares it with the church.

He says in verse 8, "We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered."

And then he goes on to inform them of the awful pressures they feel that are beyond their ability to endure.

You would think Paul would keep quite about such a depth of despair.