(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Men, the title of my sermon this morning is Remember That You Were a Servant. If you would flip back to Deuteronomy 5, we're going to come back to Titus a little bit later, but go back to the fifth book in the Bible, Deuteronomy chapter number 5, the title of the sermon once again, Remember That You Were a Servant. And this sermon is about sympathizing with other people who are in bad situations because you've been in a similar situation yourself. If you would, look down at your Bible there in Deuteronomy chapter 5 verse 15. The Bible reads, And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm. Therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day. And so the Bible is saying, look, you once were servants in Egypt. He's talking to the children of Israel who are in the wilderness. They've come out of Egypt. They're about to go into the promised land. And he says, don't forget about the fact that you left Egypt 40 years ago and you were servants there. Therefore, God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day. What does that have to do with the Sabbath day? Well, one thing that it has to do with is the fact that the Sabbath day is not just for the bosses. It's not just for the wealthy. It was a time when everybody got to have a day of rest, including slaves, including the maidservant, the manservant, even including the animals. Everybody took a day off from work. And obviously if you're working really hard and you're poor and you're struggling and striving, that day off can be pretty nice when you're an indentured servant. Go if you would to Deuteronomy chapter 15 verse 12. Obviously there's another reason or many other reasons why they're commanded to keep the Sabbath day. One of the most important being that the Sabbath day pictures salvation because the Sabbath is rest. And the way that we are saved is by putting all of our faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ and simply resting on what he has done as our way to heaven. You see, we're not saved by works. The Bible says salvation is not of works, lest any man be saved. Salvation is not of works, lest any man should boast. And so the absence of working on the Sabbath is a picture of the fact that we don't do any work in order to enter into God's rest of salvation. We just trust and rely on what he has done. And that's a picture of the Sabbath as well. And so that's part of what's going on. But another just really practical reason is God's just giving people a day off in the Old Testament so they can just get a break every week. And he's saying, look, you know what it's like to be a servant. When you're working hard, physical labor, you look forward to that day off. You need that break for your body and for your mind and everything else. Look at Deuteronomy chapter 15 verse 12. And if thy brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, be sold unto thee and serve thee six years, then in the seventh year, thou shalt let him go free from thee. And when thou sendest him out free from thee, thou shalt not let him go away empty. Thou shalt furnish him liberally out of thy flock and out of thy floor and out of thy wine press. Of that wherewith the Lord thy God had blessed thee, thou shalt give unto him and thou shalt remember that thou was the bondman in the land of Egypt and the Lord thy God redeemed thee. Therefore I command thee this to do this thing this day. What is he saying here? He's saying that they should remember that they were servants, so therefore they should be generous with servants. They should be generous with those who are poor. They should realize, hey, wait a minute. You know, in another situation, that could be me in that situation that doesn't have any money, that's struggling to get started in life. And so that could be me. So I want to help you out because I remember that I was in a similar situation because I was a servant in Egypt. So I get it. I'm going to help you out. Go to Deuteronomy chapter 16, just one page over in your Bible, Deuteronomy 16, 10. And thou shalt keep the feast of weeks unto the Lord thy God with the tribute of free will offering of thine hand which thou shalt give unto the Lord thy God according as the Lord thy God hath blessed thee. Watch this. Thou shalt rejoice before the Lord thy God thou and thy son and thy daughter and thy manservant and thy maidservant and the Levite that is within thy gates and the stranger. What's a stranger? It's talking about a foreigner, the foreigner, the immigrant. He says the widow that are among you in the place which the Lord thy God had chosen to place his name there and thou shalt remember that thou was to bond men in Egypt and thou shalt observe and do these statutes. Say, look, don't forget that these people that are servants or foreigners, whatever, they are human beings and you yourself could be in that situation and in fact in the past you yourself have been in that situation. And I believe that many times the reason that God allows us to go through bad things in our lives as Christians is so that we will be able to sympathize with other people. You see if everything just went perfectly in our lives then we would be prideful, we'd be arrogant, we'd be big jerks because everything went well for us. We just looked down on anybody who's struggling, looked down on anybody who's doing bad financially and I've met people who've never struggled financially and then they just think every poor person must just be lazy, they must just be an idiot, you know, when in reality people are struggling for various reasons and but for the grace of God there go you and I. We could all be in that situation, many of us have been in those situations where we're struggling financially and let me just tell you something, if you are so high and mighty thinking that you could never have financial problems, thinking that you could never go through some of the things that other people are going through, you better be careful with pride because God may just put you in some of those situations just to teach you a lesson so that you can then remember that you were a servant and you can think back to the bad times that you've been through. We need to be able to sympathize with people, we need to be able to sympathize with poor people and understand that financial struggles could happen to any of us and that we need to sympathize with people because, you know, it could be us and in many cases maybe it has been us that have struggled financially. Even if we were working hard and doing our best, sometimes life can be difficult. Look if you would at Deuteronomy chapter 24. Deuteronomy chapter number 24 and verse 17. You can see this is a big theme in the book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy chapter 24 verse 17, thou shalt not pervert the judgment of the stranger nor of the fatherless nor take a widow's raiment to pledge but thou shalt remember that thou was the bondman in Egypt and the Lord thy God redeemed thee thence therefore I command thee to do this thing when thou cut is down thine harvest in thy field and as for God a sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again to fetch it. It shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless and for the widow that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands. So one of the ways that God had prescribed for the children of Israel to take care of the poor was that when they would glean their fields, when they would go through and I should say reap their fields, they would not go through and glean again afterward. And what does that mean? Well when you first are harvesting the field you're not sitting there and picking every piece of fruit or every bit of grain because you're trying to go quickly, you're doing a mass production of just an initial reaping, a lot's getting dropped, a lot's getting left behind, a lot's getting missed because you're trying to crank out the harvest because it's time sensitive, right, because it's going to get too cold, the crops could spoil, you got to get that stuff harvested before it's too late. So you're out there, you're harvesting, inevitably things are dropped, things are left, things are forgotten, you miss a fruit or maybe a fruit wasn't quite ripe yet and then it ripens after the others. Well what the Bible is saying is just you don't go back a second time and just pinch every penny and just make sure that you get every little last bit. He said just kind of leave that stuff in the field, leave that forgotten sheaf for poor people, the fatherless, the poor, the widows, they can then come and glean the field and it's a way for them because they don't own any property, they don't own any land, they don't have a farm, they don't have an income, they can show up and pick those fruits and pick up that stuff off the ground and actually have food to survive. And of course the book of Ruth is a great book to help you understand the system because Ruth, this is how she provides for herself and her mother-in-law because they don't have a man in the house, they don't have property, they don't have an income, she gleans in the farm of Boaz so that they can have food to eat. So this is a way for God to provide for the poor. He's saying don't be stingy and don't be just so miserly that you don't want people to get that stuff that was left behind, you just have to have it all for yourself. He's saying just leave that stuff, think about the poor, think about the widow, think about the fatherless. Why? Well remember you were a Bonaman in Egypt, you know what it's like to have nothing so therefore you should sympathize with people who have nothing. It says in verse 20, when thou beatest thine olive tree thou shalt not go over the boughs again, it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless and for the widow. Don't thoroughly get every olive out of the olive tree, leave some there for the poor and the fatherless and the widow. This is a great system because then you don't have people just refusing to work so that they can just get a free handout because they do actually have to go out and gather some of this stuff and they can't just shoot up on heroin all day. I don't think heroin was a thing back then but whatever the Old Testament equivalent of heroin would have been. It says when thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard, verse 21, thou shalt not glean it afterward, it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless and for the widow and thou shalt remember that thou was the Bonaman in the land of Egypt. Therefore I command thee to do this thing. Go to Deuteronomy chapter 8. Go back to Deuteronomy chapter number 8 and let me tell you something, pride is a major sin that the Bible just brings up over and over and over again and in fact you could almost make the argument that it's kind of just the quintessential sin or the ultimate sin or the sin upon which so many other sins are based because if you stop and think about what's the biggest reason why people aren't going to heaven, we go out and knock on doors of people who claim to be a Christian or are religious in any way, shape or form, what is the number one reason that they're not saved is because they are trusting in themselves. They're trusting in their own good works instead of trusting in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross, his death, his burial, his resurrection. They're trying to get it to heaven by being good themselves. What is that? That's pride because it takes humility to admit I'm a sinner. I deserve hell. I'm only going to heaven because of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's not anything good about me. It's everything that he did but you'll run into prideful person after prideful person who thinks they're going to heaven because they're a good person. Well guess what? There's nothing to do with good. No, not one. In God's sight, all of our righteousnesses are filthy rags and so by the way, I was out in public somewhere and I saw a trash can and it had a sign that said, dirty rags only. Every time I see that trash can, I just think like that's my righteousness in that trash bin right there. Dirty rags only it said and that's what people are trusting in because they don't think it's dirty rags. They think their righteousness is actually pretty good because they're prideful. It's pride that doesn't want to accept the free gift of salvation but instead wants to earn it for themselves. And so we need to guard ourselves from pride. You know the Bible says of the devil that he is a king over all the children of pride. It actually says about Leviathan but who pictures the devil. You know over and over again we have all these warnings in the New Testament and the Old Testament about being prideful. Deuteronomy chapter 8 verse 2 says this, thou shalt remember, Deuteronomy 8 2, thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee. These 40 years in the wilderness to humble thee, right, because the opposite of being proud is being humble. He said God has led you through the wilderness for 40 years in order to humble you. God wants to keep you humble because being prideful is a major sin. To humble thee and to prove thee, prove thee means to test thee, and to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldst keep his commandments or no, and he humbled thee and suffered thee to hunger and fed thee with manna which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know that he might make thee to know that man did not live by bread only but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live. He's saying look, God humbled you and fed you with manna, the reason that he had you on a bread and water type diet and he has you out in the wilderness and he has you struggling and he allowed you to be hungry and to be thirsty was because he was trying to humble you because when we're too full and we have everything that we want and life is just going too well for us, then we can tend to get puffed up and prideful and high and mighty. So God is saying look, remember how God led you in the world. You're about to go into the promised land. You're about to go into a land of milk and honey where you're gonna have all this prosperity. Don't forget though the time in the wilderness. Don't forget the struggles. Don't forget that you were a servant in Egypt and don't forget how God made you hunger in the wilderness. That'll keep you humble. He says in verse 4, thy raiment wax not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell these forty years. Thou should also consider in thine heart that as a man chasteneth his son, so the Lord thy God chasteneth thee. Therefore thou shalt keep the commandments of the Lord thy God to walk in his ways and to fear him. And so God allows us to go through lean times. God allows us to go through financial problems. I'm not gonna ask for a raise of hands right now who's struggling financially, but I guarantee you that there are people in our church right now that are struggling financially, right? They're struggling to make ends meet. They're struggling to pay the bills and you say why can I never seem to get ahead financially? Why is it always a struggle? Well I'll tell you one big reason is because God wants to keep us humble and so he likes to keep us a little bit lean and sometimes we have to just be living paycheck to paycheck so that we don't get too high and mighty and so that we don't look down on other people. Because guess what? People that are rich, sometimes they can tend to look down on other people wrongfully. And so God allows us to be poor and to go through financial problems so we can sympathize with the poor, okay? So that's number one. We need to sympathize with the poor. Go to Titus chapter 3 in the New Testament, Titus chapter 3. Number two is that we need to sympathize with the unsaved. Number one, we need to sympathize with the poor, but number two, we need to sympathize with the unsaved. And we've all been unsaved at some point in our life, but thankfully I got saved as a really small child. Many of you got saved as little small children, but the vast majority of people in our church got saved later in life. They got saved either as a teenager, an adult, or maybe even way later in life. And so you definitely remember what it was like not to be saved and what it was like before you were saved. So remember that you were a servant, remember that you yourself also were once unsaved, and remember that if someone hadn't have come along and given you the gospel or if your parents hadn't have brought you up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, you could be an unsaved hellbound heathen right now yourself. Don't forget that. Don't just think that you're somehow better, you're special or something. No my friend, you are a recipient of the mercy and grace of God and you should be very thankful that you were raised in an environment where you heard the gospel and you should be very thankful for whoever it was that brought you the gospel so that you could be saved. But look at Titus chapter 3 verse 1, it says, Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work, to speak evil of no man, to be no brawlers but gentle. And watch this last phrase, showing all meekness unto all men. Showing all meekness unto all men, what does that mean? Not go around being a blowhard, talking big, being a loudmouth, prideful, arrogant, you're better than everyone, talking down to everyone, condescending. No he says show meekness unto all men. Why should I as an ambassador for Christ, why should I as a child of God, why should I as a king and a priest who's going to rule and reign with Christ someday, why should I show all meekness unto all men? Well because even Christ himself, the very son of God, who being in the form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with God, he humbled himself, the Bible says. He humbled himself. I mean he took a towel and washed the disciples feet. That was a humble act and he said that he was showing us how we should act toward one another when he did that. Titus chapter 3 verse 3 says, Well showing all meekness unto all men, for we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another. In the past when we were unsaved, we were like unsaved people and the Bible is saying look you know what it's like to be foolish, disobedient, deceived, you've been there. Don't forget that he says, But, verse 4, after that the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that being justified by his grace, that being justified by his grace we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. And so it's not by works of righteousness which we've done that we're saved. And so why would we be prideful or puffed up with respect to unsaved people thinking that we're better than unsaved people. It's not because we're better than them, it's because of the grace of God that we're saved. It's just because we humbled ourselves and received that free gift of salvation. It's not something inherently better about us. And you know it could be easy for us as Christians especially in 2023 America when our country is getting so godless and so wicked to just get an attitude of just looking down on everybody and just thinking that we're so much better than everyone else because frankly as Christians our way of life is superior to the heathen way of life. It just is. By following Christ's commandments, by attending church and reading our Bibles and praying and bringing up our families in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, we are objectively living a superior way of life to the unsaved. But does that make us better than them? No, because that's all by the grace of God. It's really God that has made everything about us that is good to be so. It's not that we were just better or we were just smarter. We just figured it out. We've got life by the tail. Let me tell you something. If I had not been raised by Christian parents, I would be a failure in life right now. You know if I had not received Christ as my savior, why? Because I know that in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. And so if I weren't saved, I would be out there living a sinful and wicked life guaranteed. You say, well how do you know Pastor Anderson? Because I know. I know me. And I know that it's through the Holy Spirit. It's through being saved. It's through Christ that I am able to live a Christian life. It's not through some inherent goodness in me. It's only through Christ. And so if it's through Christ, if it's through the Holy Spirit, well then he should get the glory and I shouldn't go around thinking of myself above what I ought to think of myself or think of myself more highly than I ought to think. It's foolishness. It's not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us. And let me tell you something. There are two kinds of people in this world, and this is how we as Christians need to look at the world. There are two kinds of people in this world. There are people who are saved and people who are not saved. I mean that's really what it comes down to. That is the great dichotomy, saved, unsaved. That's what matters. And the devil, he wants us to get all aligned with other groups. He wants it to be white versus black or something, and he wants to try to separate us on grounds of race or rich versus poor. Karl Marx and the great class struggle between the haves and the have-nots. No my friend, the only haves and have-nots that matter is having the Holy Spirit and not having the Holy Spirit. Having Jesus Christ and not having Jesus Christ. That's what matters, my friend. And we shouldn't look at it as, you know, Mirka versus, you know, whatever the foreign country or, you know, it's Republican versus Democrat. You know, it's just, folks, we need to understand it's saved versus unsaved, and it's not even saved versus unsaved because the unsaved are not our enemies. The unsaved are their own enemy. They oppose themselves, the Bible says. They are their own worst savior. We're their best friend trying to pull them out of the fire, trying to get them saved, trying to show them they might think that we're their enemy, but we're actually trying to help them, trying to get them saved, trying to get them the Gospel. But my friend, we don't want to start looking at the world in terms of politics, nationality, ethnicity, demographics like poverty, riches, or whatever, you know, town versus country, blue collar versus white collar. I mean, you can name all these different divisions that have been significant throughout history and different causes and groups that people have rallied behind, you know, you know, those who are in the military and then there's the civilians. You know, no, no, no. There's two kinds of people, my friend. The main thing that matters is what? It's whether you're a Christian or not. You know, are you saved? Is Jesus Christ your savior? You know, that is the important distinction and there's no glory or pride to be taken in that because it's all through Christ and that's why the Bible says, him that glories, let him glory in the Lord. And what does that mean, him that glories? It means him that braggoth, him that boasteth, right? Because in God we boast all the day long. So I'm not going to boast about my finances. I'm not going to boast about living in Arizona. Well, I might boast about living in Arizona, but again, this is, whosoever will may come. Okay. But anyway, you know, I'm not going to boast about how proud I am to be an American or I'm so proud to, you know, have these finances or to be white or to be, you know, American or to be whatever the political affiliation, which I don't have one since I stopped voting 12 years ago. But anyway, the, sorry, but the point is that God wants us to see the world through spiritual glasses and to understand, hey, it's really about Christ. You know, there's our brothers and sisters in Christ and then there's the lost, right? But here's the thing about that. We should sympathize with the lost. Why? Because we were once lost. Or even if you say, well, I got saved when I was so young, you know, I don't really have much of a concept of being lost because, you know, like me personally, I got saved when I was six years old. So it wasn't like, man, before I was saved, I was, you know, I was on the streets living a rough life. You should have seen me on the playground. You know, I was snorting pixie sticks on the playground or whatever. Obviously I don't have that testimony of having lived a rough life, but instead of thinking about like, oh, well, you know, I used to be foolish, disobedient, deceive, whatever. I can think about what I would be doing, even if I don't actually have the history of being out there on drugs or whatever, you know, I can think about how I would have ended up or could have ended up had I not been born into a Christian family because let's face it, being born into a Bible believing Christian family is the greatest advantage that I ever could have been given. I mean, I'd rather be born into a family that's got a King James Bible on the shelf and taken me to a Baptist church every week than to be born into some royalty somewhere. You know, I, you know, Prince Stephen, you know, what would I be over there, Prince Stephen? What what, you know, and then what would that make me? You know, because, sorry, these royals are trash. You know what? When they're not on Epstein's Island, you know, they're not serving God. Okay. So it's like, oh, you know, you could be born as royalty. Oh, you could be born to this wealthy family, all born children of millionaires. Hey, I don't want to, I would, I'd rather be born to poor people who love Christ and it doesn't, and I wouldn't care what country they live in or what color they are. Hey, I would want to be born to God's people any day of the week than to be born into a heathen household. And so if you're born in a Christian home, you should be thankful to God for that. Everything was handed to you spiritually. That's a blessing. I understand. That's my situation. Other people who got saved later in life, man, you should just be so thankful to God that in his grace, he allowed you to hear the gospel that someone came along and gave you the gospel when you're in your twenties or thirties or forties or whatever. Man, it's such a blessing. It's God's mercy. It's God's grace. He gets all the glory and it's not by works of righteousness that we were done. Look, we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, right? But it's the kindness and love of God, our savior that came and saved us. And so we need to sympathize with the unsaved. Don't just have this attitude of just looking down on unsaved people, just acting like they're so wicked or stupid or whatever, because you know what, honestly, that's where we would all be in that situation without Christ. See, what you don't understand sometimes is that, you know, the Holy Spirit indwelling us really does a lot for us as Christians. You know, and not only that, how about just the new nature that we have in Christ? You know, the Bible says, therefore, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creature. Old things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new. You know, the new man, the new creature in Christ, that's pretty transformative, especially, and then you're indwelled by the Holy Spirit. I mean, you know, yeah, we're going through life making a lot of the right decisions. We have this massive advantage of the new man, the new nature, the Holy Spirit's indwelling. And then you wonder why unsaved people are out there doing the things that they're doing. They don't have the Holy Spirit of God. So it's not that you just have so much more willpower and you just have so much more character and you just have so much more discipline. You got the Holy Spirit if you're saved. And I'm hoping that, you know, virtually everyone in here is saved. The vast majority of people in here, of course, if you're not saved, you need to get saved. But those that are saved, man, we have this ability, achievement unlocked. But it's Christ's achievement that's been unlocked that now we have the ability to actually live a godly life. We can live a Christian life. We don't have to live in the ways of this world, foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers, lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another, right? We have transcended that through the power of God by getting saved. Not only does getting saved give us a home in heaven and change our eternal destination, it also gives us the potential to live for God, which we didn't have before because they that are in the flesh cannot please God. The carnal mind cannot be brought into the subjection of the laws of God. Now unfortunately, a lot of saved Christians don't take advantage of this new potential and they continue to live a worldly life by walking in the flesh. They're still saved. They're still going to heaven, but at least we that are saved have the potential to put on the new man, to walk in the spirit and to walk in newness of life. So number one, we should sympathize with the poor. We should remember that we were a servant. Number two, we should sympathize with the unsaved and remember, hey, we were once unsaved. We were once foolish, disobedient, deceived, or we could at least think that we could have gone that way if we hadn't have been blessed with the home that we were blessed with. But number three, if you would turn to second Corinthians chapter number one, second Corinthians number one, we should also sympathize with Christians who are going through hard times, right? We should number one, sympathize with the poor. Number two, we should sympathize with the unsaved and number three, we should sympathize with Christians who are going through hard times. The Bible says in second Corinthians one versus three, uh, and, and onward there it says blessed be God, even the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the father of mercies and the God of all comfort who comforted us in all our tribulation that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. So the Bible is saying we are comforted by God in the trials and tribulations and troubles that we go through and then we can turn around and comfort others. We've been comforted by God and now when other people go through those trials and tribulations we can comfort them. It says in verse five, for as the sufferings of Christ abound in us so our consolation also aboundeth in Christ and whether we be afflicted it is for your consolation and salvation which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer or whether we be comforted it is for your consolation and salvation. Now I'm not going to lie to you, second Corinthians is a difficult book. This is like, this is a lot of tongue twisters here in chapter one so if you're having a hard time understanding second Corinthians chapter one, number one don't feel bad because it's a hard book. The apostle Paul is one of the more difficult authors in the New Testament and second Corinthians is one of his hardest books. But number two, don't blame the King James Version. Don't say, oh the King James Version. Guess what? If you read the New Testament in the original Greek all the books that are hard in English are hard in the original Greek. All the books that are easy in English are easy in the original Greek. Why? Because it's not the translation that's the issue it's just the Bible has some hard things in it. The King James is not the problem. The only way to make this easy would be to not translate it accurately. Obviously you could just dumb it down and change it to something easy but if you're going to faithfully translate what's there in the original it's going to be difficult because the original is difficult. Ask any Greek student, hey what's the easiest book? They'll say, oh the Gospel of John. Well isn't that what we always say is the easiest in English? Hey start with the Gospel of John and then if you ask them, well which one's the hardest? They're going to say Hebrews, second Corinthians, right, why? They're hard in English too folks. No mystery there. So number one, don't feel bad, don't get discouraged if you have a hard time with difficult passages like this. And number two, don't blame it on the King James. Just understand that the whole Bible isn't just a Dr. Seuss book here. Some of the Bible is easy. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. Some of it's pretty easy but there are also difficult passages. You grow into the difficult passages and that's part of why you come to church so that the pastor can expound some of these difficult passages to you that are a little bit tough, that you have to slow down a little bit and second Corinthians is one of those books that's a little bit tough. And it says here that if we're afflicted, verse six, right, whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which also we suffer. He's saying look, the reason that we are able to comfort you effectively is because we've been through the same stuff that you're going through. And so because I've been through some of the stuff that you're going through, I can actually effectively comfort you with the comfort wherewith I myself was comforted by God. So I'm going through stuff, God's helping me get through it and then I can turn around and help other people get through that same stuff because I can sympathize with them. I've been there, I know what it's like and I can actually speak from experience helping them get through those things. Now obviously I haven't been through everything, right? First of all, I'm a man so I haven't been through what women are going through. I don't really have the same understanding of their struggle as women, right, because I've only gone through life as a man. Obviously even as a man I haven't gone through everything that other people have gone through and you might have gone through worse things than I've ever gone through. Obviously I've gone through some worse things but the bottom line is obviously we haven't been through everything but that being said, God has put me through some stuff in my life. I haven't lived a life on easy street. I've gone through a lot of pain in my life, physical pain and also just emotional pain and you know, I've gone through some stuff. And so that allows me to be able to relate to a lot of different people. I'm not going to be able to relate to everyone perfectly. I'm not going to be able to sympathize with every situation but at least God has put me through a diverse enough assortment of crap in my life that I'm basically able to help other people deal with some stuff. Not that I've been through everything but I've been through enough to where I can deal with some stuff and I know what people are going through about a lot of situations. And you know, the stuff that I went through and different experiences that I've had in my life, you know, things in my childhood, things in my teenage years, things as a young adult, things in just starting a church and the trials of that, marriage, child rearing, health, finances, I mean you name it, right? Those things that I've gone through, part of the reason why God has allowed me to struggle is so that I would be able to sympathize with other people and just not think like, oh, you're having marriage problems, you're an idiot. Money problems, you're lazy, you're stupid. Health problems, quit eating all the junk fast food, next. And just, you know, just assuming that everything that's happening to people is just their fault and you know, just not being sympathetic. Whereas when God puts you through these things, you know, if you're just like, oh man, I never get sick, people that get sick, it's just because, you know, it's just what they eat. It's like, well, wait a minute, is that really true? Because you could eat all the right things and still get sick, still get diseased, still have serious problems. You could eat the perfect diet and literally die of cancer, seriously, this is true. You could eat so many apricot kernels and you know, and it's still not necessarily just gonna guarantee that you're not gonna get these diseases and have these problems. You know, you could work hard and be smart and still end up messing up your finances. I mean, look at Job, I mean, God messed up Job's finances. He seemed like a pretty financially astute guy. God messed with his health, God messed with his finance, I mean, you name it, right? Obviously he allowed Satan to do it. Satan's the one who actually did the messing. But the point is that when you go through bad times, understand that if you're a saved Christian who loves the Lord, all things work together for good to those that love God. And even when you're going through horrible things, at least you have the consolation of knowing, you know what, I'm going through this for a reason. God's putting me through this for a reason and maybe that reason is that down the road, I'm gonna be able to help out other people that are going through the same thing. Or maybe God's putting me through this to keep me humble so that I don't get too high and mighty and destroy my life by being arrogant and proud. But man, if you don't love the Lord, if you're not following Christ and bad things happen to you, sometimes they're just bad things and they're just bad. There's no silver lining and there's no working together for good. It's just bad on bad. Hey, at least when bad things happen to us who love the Lord, we know good's gonna come of it. It's either gonna build character in us or God's gonna allow us to go through that so that we can then sympathize and help others that are going through the same thing. The Bible says, in our hope of you, verse 7, is steadfast, knowing that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so shall ye be also of the consolation. For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed, I love this part, we were pressed out of measure, which is off the charts how bad it was. We were pressed out of measure, above strength, in so much that we despaired even of life. I mean that's pretty bad, right? I mean Paul's serving God and it's not even just Paul, it's Paul and his associates. They're serving God, they love the Lord. God pushes them to the absolute limit, right? I mean they are just pressed above measure, just off the charts, above strength. They can't handle it, it's too much so that they're even despairing of life like they're just thinking like, just kill me now. They don't even want to go on living, that's pretty bad. But we had the sentence of death in ourselves that we should not trust in ourselves but in God which raised, which raisedeth the dead, who delivered us from so great a death and doth deliver in whom we trust that he will yet deliver. So he's saying look, you know the good thing about that though is that we got pushed so far to our limits and we got pushed over our limits and we didn't even want to keep living but now that we've gone through that, now that we've done that, now we kind of know going forward God can get us through stuff like that. We made it, we survived. So next time we're despairing of life and pushed to the limit, we realize hey, I've done this. I can hang on. I can get through it. Things are going to get better. Ye also helping together by prayer for us that the gift bestowed upon us by the means of many persons, thanks may be given by many on our behalf. For the gift bestowed upon us by the means of many persons, thanks may be given by many on our behalf. So the Bible's saying look, you know we were going through that stuff, you were praying for us, God got us through it and now you get the joy of having an answer to prayer. We now have an understanding that we can handle more than we thought we could handle because we thought it was above strength but we made it. We survived, right? And so we go through stuff so that we can help other people. We need to sympathize with other people who are going through bad times and look, if you're going to be a person who's just cold and unsympathetic and you're not able to put yourself in other people's shoes and put yourself in the servant's shoes, put yourself in the poor person's shoes, put yourself in an unsaved person's shoes, put yourself in the afflicted, the poor, the struggling person's shoes. If you're not able to put yourself in their shoes by sympathizing, then you know what's going to happen? God might actually have to literally put you in their shoes for you to actually go through that yourself. You know, it's better to just rejoice with them that rejoice, weep with them that weep, put yourself in the place of other people, think about other people, sympathize with other people so that God doesn't have to just put you through every single thing before you realize, okay, now I get it about financial problems, now I get it about marriage problems, now I get it about child-rearing problems, okay, now I get it about health problems, now I get it about church problems. You don't want to just have to go through all of it, right? Why don't you just be humble and just sympathize in the first place? And if you are going through those things, maybe it can help you feel a little better knowing, you know what, I'm going through this because God's going to use me down the road to help someone out who's going through something similar. You know, I'm a pattern for other people. You know, if I'm having these problems as a pastor, well maybe my pastor friends are going to need to lean on me down the road and I'm going to say, hey, I've been there, I've done it, let me walk you through this. Let me help you out. Let me give you some encouragement. There is light at the end of the tunnel because I've been there, I've gone through it and I came out the other side and so any time we suffer as Christians, if we love God, it's all going to work together for good. So let's just remember that we were a servant. Let's remember that we were unstable. Let's remember that we have been pushed to our limits and gone through some bad things as well. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord. Thank you so much for the promise that all things work together for good to them that love you and to them who are the called according to your purpose, Lord. Help us as we go through life to sympathize with other people, to love other people, to care about other people and not to become self-absorbed, arrogant, prideful braggarts and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.