THE TRIUMPHANT TRIFECTA

HOPE REJOICING

Hope is a fixed good that God will do to us in the future. Such hope is the Christian's sure foundation of joy in the present. This present joy is independent of current circumstances, for it is a supernatural joy, a joy that can overcome this present evil world.

We Christians have mucked up this excellent teaching of Scripture with our sinful love of this world. Christian bookstores and Christian television provide overwhelming proof of this desire—preachers and publishers indoctrinating their listeners and readers into a cult of cheerfulness.

Paul does not tell us to put on a smiling face as that would be carnal rejoicing. Furthermore, he is not telling us to cultivate a hopeful outlook. He wants us to be sober-minded about this present evil world.

He doesn't want you to be nonchalant like Winnie the Pooh, overly optimistic like Tigger, or a fatalist like Eyeore. He wants us to be Owl wise and balanced.

Scripture teaches us that we live in a fallen world. Paul calls it "this present evil world." Christians have drunk deeply from a liberal theology that calls them to engage in earthly renewal, not heavenly redemption.

Christians should engage in work that fights against inequity, injustice, and the effects of evil in this present evil world. Our Bible is replete with commands for such involvement. However, these gospel works are not a means of earthly renewal. They are a means of validating our message of redemption.

This world will experience a future renewal at the hands of Christ, not Christians. Our message is not social reformation but soul redemption. We are here to proclaim hope ( a fixed assurance) of the new earth to come—one free of every evil intrusion that has infused itself into this present world.

True Christianity does not peddle a shallow earthly hope. We proclaim a substantive heavenly hope. A hope that produces rejoicing in every circumstance because it is rooted in a fixed assurance.

Can you not rejoice this morning? Have you become so earthly minded that you have no heavenly hope? Have you built your hope on nothing less than this world and all its promises?

Who sits among the ashes of their hopes this morning? O to realize that nothing in this world is strong enough to bear up hopes crushing weight is a grace of God.

Though this evil world and the deceitfulness of your heart have led you to this place, there is hope for you.

Obey Christ words in Matthew 16:23 and Paul’s words in

Colossians 3:1–4 ESV

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

Psalm 119:36–37 ESV

Incline my heart to your testimonies, and not to selfish gain! Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways.

TRIBULATIONS ENDURING

Paul writes more extensively concerning tribulations in chapter 5

Romans 5:1–5 ESV

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

The word for tribulation means something that puts pressure on you—a tribulum crushed corn to extract flour.

Trials and tribulations come in various ways. They may happen due to circumstances over which we have no control or through temptations and persecutions.

In all their forms, tribulations bring pressure to bear upon your spirit, mind, and heart.

No one knew more about tribulations than Paul. He gives pictures of the kinds of sufferings he endured in many places.

2 Corinthians 11:23–28 ESV

Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.

How are we to react to tribulations? First, we are not to be shaken or give way under tribulations. We must not grumble; we must not complain; we must not feel that things are unfair. In summary, we must never allow tribulation to do us any harm at all.

Don't allow tribulations to do you harm by enduring. It is not speaking of patience, which sits down and accepts things, but the patience which masters them. It is not some Disneyfied idea that gives us wings to fly over our difficulties.

It is a determination, unhurrying and yet undelaying, which goes steadily on and refuses deflection. Obstacles do not daunt it, and discouragements do not take its hope away. It is steadfast endurance that carries us to the end.

We don't let tribulations to harm us by expecting their occurrence.

1 Peter 4:12 ESV

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you.

John 13:16 ESV

Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.

2 Timothy 3:12 ESV

Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted,

We don't allow tribulation to harm us when we realize what is happening to us happens to the Lord Jesus himself.

Hebrews 12:1–3 ESV

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.

He has prepared us for tribulation. He said

John 15:18 ESV

“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.

Let us take His words to heart and work it out like this: to endure these events means that we are indeed following in His steps. We are being treated like sons of God.

We don’t allow tribulation to harm us when we realize this is our true path. Hebrews 11

Paul knows from experience that tribulations are a certainty for believers, so he urges us to persevere. For example, Luke, describing Paul's missionary travels to Lystra and Iconium, and Antioch writes that Paul (and Barnabas) were...

Acts 14:22 ESV

strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.

We don’t allow tribulation to harm us when we realize it is our teacher.

Romans 5:3–4 ESV

Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,

Tribulation teach us to be more sympathetic.

2 Corinthians 1:3–7 ESV

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.

Tribulation teach us concerning our sin.

Remember Job, his latter end was more than his beginning.

Job 1:1 ESV

There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil.

"Patience," Paul goes on, "produces character." Greeks used the word character to describe the process metal endured to purge its impurity. In the world of coinage, it was called sterling. When tribulation tangles with endurance, a man emerges stronger, purer, and better, and nearer God out of the battle.

Psalm 119:65–67 ESV

You have dealt well with your servant, O Lord, according to your word. Teach me good judgment and knowledge, for I believe in your commandments. Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep your word.

Psalm 119:71 ESV

It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.

PRAYER DEVOTED

The word for devoted means to be instant and constant. It is illustrated by hounds that do not give up until their game is found.

Paul to the Thessalonians to

1 Thessalonians 5:17 ESV

pray without ceasing,

Without ceasing is illustrated by a nagging cough that want subside. The idea of constancy.

This is not a type of praying. It is the only way to pray and Jesus gives us the reason why.

Luke 18:1 ESV

And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart.

Prayer is "A Wartime Walkie-Talkie, Not a Domestic Intercom. Prayer is the walkie-talkie on the battlefield of the world. It calls on God for courage (Ephesians 6:19).

It calls in for troop deployment and target location (Acts 13:1, 2, 3). It calls in for protection and air cover (Matthew 6:13; Luke 21:36).

It calls in for firepower to blast open a way for the Word (Colossians 4:3). It calls in for the miracle of healing for the wounded soldiers (James 5:16). It calls in for supplies for the forces (Matthew 6:11; Philippians 4:6). And it calls in for needed reinforcements (Matthew 9:38).

This is the place of prayer—on the battlefield of the world. It is a wartime walkie-talkie for spiritual warfare, not a domestic intercom to increase the comforts of the saints. And one of the reasons it malfunctions in the hands of so many Christian soldiers is that they have gone AWOL.

D. L. Moody made a visit to a local grade school in to Scotland where he asked this question, What is prayer?

To his amazement, hundreds of children's hands went up. So he decided to call on a lad near the front, who promptly stood up and said,

"Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God, in the name of Christ, by the help of his Spirit, with confession of our sins, and thankful acknowledgment of his mercies." This is the answer to question #78 in the Westminster Catechism.

To this Moody responded by saying, "Be thankful, son, that you were born in Scotland."

This morning be thankful you were born in a country with an endless supply of Bibles. A Bible with story upon story of the Father’s faithfulness to those devoted to prayer.

James 4:2 ESV

You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask.