The Comfort of the Father
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THIS WAS NOT THE PLAN
THIS WAS NOT THE PLAN
This is not the interlude between Luke and Acts that I planned for us to have.
I read through a great book by Michael Reeves called, “Gospel People,” that dove into what defines an evangelical.
I thought that was a term that gets thrown around a lot—a label that has been placed on people who go to churches like this.
It might be good for us to stop and be sure of what it means since everyone calls us that.
And maybe we will do that at some point.
But much like we will see the Spirit moving the apostles around the map in the book of Acts in the coming months, I felt moved to go in a different direction.
January was a tough month for our church body.
On one hand, we have been celebrating because we got out of debt and we are so joyful and thankful.
But on the other hand, we have had a lot of suffering in our church.
So many people are going through so many things.
We have brothers and sisters who are nose to nose with cancer.
We have had people down and out with serious bouts of COVID.
We have had people in and out of the hospital.
And the medical challenges are always compounded by difficulties in personal relationships, stresses at work and potential struggles at home.
It reminds me of the old Christian folk-rock band, Caedmon’s Call’s song Trouble, which starts--
You say I’ve got trouble; I’ve got trouble all over me, I’ve got trouble since the day I was born. And it’s not just a struggle; It’s the blood running through my veins, it’s all the clothes I’ve ever worn.
So after talking with Pastor Ben and Pastor David, we decided on a brief sermon series on suffering and being sustained by the Lord.
And we wanted to focus on a different member of the Godhead each Sunday.
Today, we will see the comfort of the Father
Next week, the example of the Son
And then we will look at the intercession of the Spirit
Today, we look to 2 Corinthians for the Father’s comfort and purpose in our suffering.
THE SUFFERING APOSTLE
THE SUFFERING APOSTLE
Before I read the passage for this morning, I want to remind us of Paul’s history with the Corinthian church.
Paul planted the church in Corinth during an 18 month visit on his 2nd big missionary journey
And the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision, “Do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent, for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people.” And he stayed a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them.
He was rejected by the Jewish people in the city
When Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with the word, testifying to the Jews that the Christ was Jesus. And when they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his garments and said to them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am innocent. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.”
So he did just that. He took the Gospel to the non-Jewish people of city. Like immediately. He went right next door into a Gentile’s house and started witnessing to him.
And he left there and went to the house of a man named Titius Justus, a worshiper of God. His house was next door to the synagogue.
Now, I would love to tell you that Paul started the church, it grew steadily, they loved him as their pastor without fail and they all went to heaven.
But the reality is that Corinth caused Paul a lot of pain as a pastor.
As you read through 2 Corinthians, you find out that there was this time when Paul couldn’t even visit the Corinthians because there would have been too much relational pain involved
There were false teachers in Corinth attempting to discredit Paul. They claimed to be super-apostles who were more gifted in speech than Paul. They claimed Paul suffered too much to be an apostle.
So Paul writes them this letter defending his ministry and using his suffering as proof of his qualification to be an apostle.
So that gives you an idea of where Paul is at as he writes.
You find out toward the end of the letter that Titus has come to Paul with a report that the Corinthians had repented of their attitude.
This is a relief.
But as Paul writes, he writes from the heart as a man who has endured much suffering.
He writes from the heart as a Shepherd who is bleeding from the horns of some of the rams in church butting up against him
Paul writes as an apostle who, like His Savior, is well-acquainted with suffering
And since he knows suffering, we can trust he also writes with personal knowledge of God’s comfort.
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.
THE COMFORT AND MERCY OF THE FATHER (v. 3)
THE COMFORT AND MERCY OF THE FATHER (v. 3)
As we think about this passage this morning, I want to focus on this phrase, “The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,” to begin with.
Why does Paul use this term? He has just announced grace and peace in his greeting and he has identified the Father and Son as the Source of that grace and peace.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
But why take those titles for the Father and the Son and bring them together in this way in verse 3.
It isn’t on accident. It is purposeful—but what is the purpose?
To understand it, I think we need to look at the words that come after it.
“the Father of mercies and God of all comfort”
Paul is giving praise to God in verse 3, and as he does it, he is making a statement about God’s character and nature
God is the Father of mercies
God is the God of all comfort
Understanding God in this way is very important for how we understand God’s disposition toward us when we are suffering
We are about to see that
So it is crucial that Paul establishes why we can trust that our suffering has purpose
Why we can trust God even when we are afflicted
Paul is essentially establishing why we can trust in the character of God
In the phrase, “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,” He is establishing why God is trustworthy and praiseworthy
Let’s see how he does it.
He doesn’t simply say, “Blessed be the Father of the Son.”
He says, “Blessed be the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”
I think the use of Jesus’ title as “Lord” is vital here
How did Jesus get the title of Lord?
Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
The name bestowed on the Son is not Jesus. He already had that name.
As He was crucified, resurrected and then ascended to sit down at the right hand of the Father, He received the title of Lord.
So the Lordship of Christ is important here.
His Lordship is proof of His completed mission.
So then, in Paul’s phrase in verse 3, we are seeing that the Father has the sort of heart where He would give His Son.
Because if the Father doesn’t give the Son, the Son does not complete the mission.
The Philippians 2:9-11 title is not bestowed upon Him.
He is the Lord Jesus Christ because the Father so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, and the Son complete the task before Him for the glory of the Father.
So then I go to the 2nd half of the verse and the same terms of “Father” and “God” are repeated, calling our attention back to the first phrase— “God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Paul wants us to know that the same Father of mercies and God of all comfort who comforts us when we suffer is the Father who gave His Son.
We can trust that He truly is merciful and He truly is comforting because He gave the Son who completed the saving mission set before Him ascended as the Lord of all.
1. We know the Father is merciful and comforting because He gave His Son (v. 3).
1. We know the Father is merciful and comforting because He gave His Son (v. 3).
God has a quintillion causes and effects He is governing every millisecond. I cannot begin to comprehend how He does all of this in His perfect wisdom and power and it is not hard for Him.
He is not stressed. He is not panicked.
The nations are dust on his scales.
He stands outside of time.
The oceans are a drop in His bucket
He can roll up the sky like a scroll
I do not understand a thousand things that I see every month.
I do not understand why God has protected me from certain things and let me endure other things.
I do not know why He allows everything that He allows and permits everything that He permits.
I do not understand why He causes every event He causes and why He stops everything He stops.
But what I do know is that I can trust Him. I know that as a pastor I can sit in my office with a suffering saint and with all confidence I can look at them and say, “You can trust God.”
And I know this because He has proven His character to us in the most dramatic of ways—through giving His Son to die and resurrect.
By giving His only begotten Son to be mocked and murdered, that He would rise again and be made Lord
ILLUSTRATION: I remember watching Tim Keller speak to students at Colombia University in 2011. He was debating David Eisenbach, a well-known Atheist.
He was asked, “How can you believe in a God who would allow the Holocaust?”
Keller responded and said, “As a pastor, I understand your question. I have sat across from people who have had their two year old child run over by a car. They have the same question.”
And Keller goes on to say that when we look at God giving His Son in the Gospel, while we might not know why God allows everything, it can’t be indifference or hardness of heart.
We know God is not indifferent toward humanity or hard-hearted toward humanity because He gave His Son to die for us.
From eternal life to daily strength, the death of Christ does so much for us.
But one of the things it does is prove to us that God is indeed loving.
The Cross proves that God is loving.
So while I might not understand why He allows everything He allows, I know it is not because He is unloving.
Paul calls God the “Father of mercies.”
When we think of God being the Father of all mercies, a specific passage in Lamentations 3 comes to mind.
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
God’s mercies are new every morning.
Even on the mornings when my health is failing
Even on the mornings when my mental strength is weak and gloom and despair and worry are closing in
Even on the mornings when persecution is knocking at the door
Even on the mornings when my bank account is low
Even on the mornings when my job is in jeopardy
Our merciful God is there with mercy that is sufficient for the calling of the day
And the giving of the Lord Jesus proves that I can put my hope in that—that I should put my hope in that
He also calls God the “God of all comfort.”
Paul uses this Greek word for comfort 11 times in his NT letters. 9 of them are in 2 Corinthians.
It carries with it both the idea of daily comfort and eternal comfort.
But God, who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the coming of Titus, and not only by his coming but also by the comfort with which he was comforted by you, as he told us of your longing, your mourning, your zeal for me, so that I rejoiced still more.
So God comforted Paul by the coming of Titus, who reported that the Corinthians were repentant
There is an example of God’s daily comfort
But in 2 Thessalonians, Paul uses the same Greek word to talk of the eternal comfort we have in Christ:
Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace,
You see that in Christ, God our Father has not just given us daily comfort, but eternal comfort in the peace of being made right with God and having access to Him forever.
And I can trust that all of this is true because the Lord Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He was given to die. He did the work. He rose again. He ascended.
The love of the Father is proven in the Lordship of the Son.
Mercy and comfort belong to us in Christ. We can bank on it.
THE PURPOSE OF COMFORT (v. 4)
THE PURPOSE OF COMFORT (v. 4)
In verse 4, we find out that the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort comfort us in our affliction.
The Greek word for affliction is thlipsis.
It translates to affliction more often than not.
That is a very general word for hardship.
In other places it translates to tribulation, suffering, persecution, anguish and trouble.
I think we would do well to keep it general.
This is any sort of affliction that God allows to come into your life.
This is any sort of suffering we feel as a result of living in this fallen world.
COVID
Persecution at work
Mourning over the loss of a loved one
Being rejected by a family member after sharing your faith
A close friend being diagnosed with cancer
All of these things bring affliction into our lives
We could all stop right now, be silent for about ten seconds, and name the three or four things causing us the most affliction right now.
You wouldn’t need much time. You are well aware.
And God steps into our affliction and He comforts us.
Again—the greatest comfort He has given us is the eternal comfort of knowing Christ
But there are all these daily and weekly and monthly comforts that He pours out on us because we are His children in Christ.
The comfort of the words of Scripture
The comfort of the Spirit who dwells in us and consoles us
The comfort of intimacy in prayer
The comfort of a Christian friend who encourages you with their words
The comfort of someone who has been through what you have been through and you can tell they really understand
The comfort of a song that reminds us of the eternal truth of the Gospel
We could go on and on about the ways that the Lord comforts us in our affliction
The bottom line is that He does it
And He does it all for the purpose of making us more like His Son, Jesus
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.
We can rejoice in suffering knowing that God is using the suffering to make us into people who reflect the character of Christ in our living and the hope of the Gospel in our believing.
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
He is working all things together for the good of those who are calling according to His purpose.
And what is that purpose? To conform His foreknown and predestined people into the image of His Son.
But it doesn’t end there. Paul says that this comfort is to be parlayed into the comfort of others.
In other words—God is comforting us in order to make us comforters to others.
“…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”
And the comfort we pour out on them is the same comfort that we received from the Father.
Meaning, we are not to hoard the mercies and comforts that He pours out on us, but we are supposed to pass them along to others who are suffering and experiencing affliction.
2. We are comforted by God in order to comfort those who are around us (v. 4-6)
2. We are comforted by God in order to comfort those who are around us (v. 4-6)
To see exactly how this works, we can look to verses 5 and 6.
Paul says that as he and those who minister with him share in Christ’s sufferings, through Christ, they also share abundantly in comfort.
The nature of discipleship is to walk in the pattern of Christ.
And the footsteps of Christ lead to glory, but there is a Cross that precedes the final destination.
It is suffering, then glory. That is the pattern.
So when Paul talks about sharing in Christ’s sufferings, he is saying that as he preaches the message of the Kingdom in the same manner as Jesus, he is suffering for that message in the same manner as Jesus.
And this is how Jesus promised things would be.
In Matthew 20, James and John’s mother request for her sons to sit at his right hand and left hand in the Kingdom.
Jesus responds and asks whether or not they are able to drink the cup that He is to drink—referring to the suffering of the Cross.
They say Yes.
He said to them, “You will drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.”
The Philadelphia theologian, Charles Hodge, said that this drinking of the cup of Christ’s affliction belongs to all believers.
“Not sufferings on account of Christ…but such sufferings as Christ suffered, and that his people are called on to endure in virtue of their union with him and in order to be like him.” -Charles Hodge
Paul doesn’t just speak to this here in 2 Corinthians. We also see him talking about it in Philippians 3:10-11
that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
You see the same pattern I mentioned before.
Paul knows that to press on after Christ will land you in resurrected glory.
But the road to glory is marked with suffering—becoming like Him in His death.
Not just suffering on account of Him, but sharing in His suffering.
Peter sees it the same way:
But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.
Glory will be revealed, but first, we must share in His suffering.
The good news that we have already recognized is that as we share in His suffering, we share in His comfort as well.
The end of verse 5 is not a new truth for this passage.
It is a reiteration of the beginning of verse 4.
But what about the comforting of others?
To get there, we have to ask ourselves, what is the nature of Christ’s suffering?
We share in Christ’s suffering, but what is the nature of that suffering we share in?
Well if we look to the Cross again, we know that the nature of His suffering is sacrificial.
He is the offering for sin. He died to save.
even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
He came to redeem souls. To rescue people from sin.
He suffered in order that others would be saved and they would know God.
Well, Paul’s point here is that his suffering in ministry is in the same vein. He shares in the sufferings of Christ, and much like the suffering of Christ, Paul’s affliction is sacrificial.
That leads us to verse 6 where Paul does say something new.
He says, “If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation...”
If we are suffering like Christ, we are suffering like Christ for the benefit of your comfort and salvation.
Paul is more than okay with the afflictions because in his suffering, he is able to offer the comfort of the Gospel and the promise of eternal salvation to the Corinthians.
It was a sacrifice that was worth it.
In many ways, you could say this is the entire point of the book of 2 Corinthians.
Paul was willing to suffer for the Gospel. Paul knew that despite was his enemies said, his suffering qualified him to be an apostle because he was sharing with Christ in his suffering.
And not only did his suffering qualify him, but he rejoiced that his suffering put him in a position to be a faithful witness and pastor to the Corinthians.
Paul is circling this over and over throughout the chapters of the book.
And then, verse 6 ends with Paul rejoicing over the fact that if he receives comfort from the Lord, the Corinthians will share in that comfort, just like they share in Paul’s sufferings.
As they suffer for Christ’s name and for the sake of being molded into His image, believers are also constantly receiving the ministry of God’s comfort.
A comfort He means for us to pass on so that it would be shared by others.
What this does is provide an additional pilgrim’s purpose for our suffering.
We are pilgrim’s in this world.
We are journeying toward glory. We will be citizens there forever.
But Augustine said:
He who does not sigh as a pilgrim will never rejoice as a citizen.
Augustine of Hippo
For the Christian, the road to glory is paved with much sighing as we share in the sufferings of Christ.
As we deny ourselves and take up our crosses and follow Him
And along the way, He is molding our pilgrim hearts to be more like Christ as we represent Him in this world
We know those things right—He is leading us to glory. He is making us more like Christ.
But the additional pilgrim’s purpose for our suffering that see here is that we receive comfort from God that we then pass on to others.
That as we share in the sufferings of Christ, we share in His comfort and then we share that with afflicted around us.
He comforts us in order to make us comforters.
And in that way, our suffering truly is in the pattern of Christ because it is helping the people around us to be consoled in their pain and to be helped on in their walk with God.
When this happens in practice in the body of Christ, it is one of the most beautiful things that you will see in this life.
I have seen men with PTSD help other men with thoughts and feelings they thought no one could understand.
That is the comfort of Christ being poured out on His sheep by the Father and then those sheep are sharing it with those around them. It is beautiful.
Last year I had a woman outside our church call me and tell me she just found out her husband was blowing their marriage up.
I connected her to a woman in our church who had been through the same thing and she was able to help her sort through the thoughts and feelings.
That is 2 Corinthians 1:4 in action.
When I am feeling alone in ministry, I have men inside and outside this church who know the rigors of leadership and they console me with wisdom and prayer.
This is the Father of mercies and God of all comfort in action, through His people, who are sharing in His Son’s suffering
THE PRAISE OF THE FATHER (v. 3)
THE PRAISE OF THE FATHER (v. 3)
If we keep in mind that God works this way, it will change how we look at suffering and what our attitude will be as we endure it.
It is tempting to take the advice of Job’s wife when we are suffering:
Then his wife said to him, “Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die.”
But we don’t have to do that. We can hold fast to our integrity if we keep the purposes of our affliction in mind:
God is sanctifying us on our way to glory
God is allowing us to share in Christ’s sufferings so that the Father of comfort can pour His comfort out on us and we can pass it along to others
If we keep the purposes of our affliction in mind, while there are no promises it will be easy to endure, we will be able to keep God’s praises on our lips, as opposed to curses.
This brings us to our final teaching point for tonight:
3. We worship the Father of mercies and God of comfort, knowing our suffering is purposeful (v. 3).
3. We worship the Father of mercies and God of comfort, knowing our suffering is purposeful (v. 3).
We end by looking at the word that started our passage at the beginning of verse 3.
“Blessed be”
It was a Jewish way of saying “Praise be to”
It means that God is praiseworthy
That is certainly something that we believe, but we can’t just believe it when things are going well.
And we won’t if we have proper understanding of how God works.
Paul is being harassed by these enemies in Corinth, but he knows that his harassment is a sharing in Christ’s sufferings.
If he shares in His suffering, he shares in His comfort.
Then he can pass that comfort along to the Corinthians for the sake of their own comfort and salvation.
He sees the purpose in what God is doing—painful as it may be.
Therefore, he is praising God off the top in this letter.
People who understand God’s purposes in suffering do this—they keep on praising the Lord and finding joy in Him, even though they are hurting.
Those who understand God’s sovereignty have joy even in the midst of suffering, a joy reflected on their very faces, for they see that their suffering is not without purpose.
R. C. Sproul
And to bring us back to where we began, that praise is not just because God is not wasting our suffering, but because of who He is to us in our suffering.
He is the Father of mercies.
A bushel of new ones everyday, sufficient for the troubles that He knows lie ahead.
He is the God of all comfort.
Pouring it out on us, that we may pour it out on others
We praise Him for His character. For His heart.
For being a good Father who gives good gifts to His hurting children
A good Father who gave us the greatest possible gift in His Son, Jesus Christ
We say Blessed Be because He catches every tear and He doesn’t waste a single one
And one day, His Son will return on the clouds and wipe them all away for good
He is the Father of mercy and the God of comfort.
He wants to comfort you and use you as a vessel of comfort to the people around you.
And He is worthy of your praise in the midst of the most painful, comfort-rending affliction
We will look to the Example of the Son next week.
CALL UP BAND
GOSPEL INVITATION
CLOSING PRAYER
Father, You are infinite in power. But You are also infinite in wisdom and goodness. And this truth that we see in the Bible is precious to us today. You will only that which is good for Your children ultimately, and Your will is irreversible and irresistible. You are too wise to be wrong. You are too loving to cause your child a needless tear. Mold us according to your eternal purposes for us. And Father—comfort others with the comfort we receive. We pray this in Jesus’ name, Amen.