One of the things that is required of every graduating senior at my seminary is a meeting with your mentor and another professor. This meeting is designed to be an informal time where you talk about your readiness for the ministry. Your freshman year you are assigned to a professor, who is to serve as your mentor. You meet with him weekly throughout the seminary stint. And then at the end of your course of study you meet with him and another professor for a wrap up evaluation.
One of the questions that they ask is “What do you deem to be your greatest strengths and weaknesses?” I don’t remember what exactly I said for my strengths. Actually, I don’t even remember if we talked about it. What I do remember is that we spent an inordinate amount of time talking about my weaknesses. One in particular. I mentioned that I’m not a guy who is fluent in “chit-chat.” I think you all know and are quite familiar with the fact that I’m not the best conversationalist.
Well, my mentor, let’s just say that he was an expert in this area. He didn’t have any problems carrying a conversation. For the next 15 minutes he gave me a lecture on how this needs to change and I need to work on this. He said that talking with people is what a minister does and a pastor needs to be able to engage with his people, whether it be about the weather outside or sports or any other superficial topic. He went on and on about how a minister is a man of the word and he must use words and be able to connect with people. He’s got to be conversant and demonstrate an air of charm. If he isn’t able to talk, then he isn’t able to minister. He went on and on…and I just listened.
Let’s just say that wasn’t the most encouraging conversation to have right as you are ready to embark on your career which you just spent at least 10 years of your life preparing for.
I have tried to overcome this shortfall. I have studied websites on how to be a better conversationalist. My wife has tried giving me some tips on how to connect with people. I’ve listened to spots on NPR that focused on how introverts can make it in public life. One of the best things I came across was in my journalism class. It taught you how to ask good questioned in an interview. At least then you could ask a question and let the other person talk. At least you seem somewhat engaging.
But what I’ve found over the years is that this inability to carry on small talk has been one of the greatest assets in the ministry. While I might sit on the sidelines during fellowship times and seem a little awkward at times, it has opened doors for deeper, spiritual conversation. I’ve found that people will do the talking and my silence will often lead them to talk about things on their hearts. For some reason it frequently provides a pathway to conversations that deal with people’s need for repentance and faith.
My greatest weakness has been the greatest asset for my ministry.
I go through this because I want you to have hope for your weaknesses too. You will readily recognize that you have various deficiencies that make you feel inept or clumsy. There are certain defects of your character or skills that you lack that seem to be great faults to you. But the point that God wants to make is that these are his areas of expertise. That is certainly the lesson he wants you to learn from this passage.
In our times of weakness, that is when God is most active. You could say that God exploits our weaknesses, using them as moments to magnify the supreme excellency of his power. It is what he does. He features his competence in our incompetence.
I. Where is God’s power shown? [7]
It is shown in us. But note what this passage says about us. The verse opens by saying, “We have this treasure in jars of clay.” Paul uses an image to describe himself and the others whom God uses. And it is not one that is all that flattering. He uses the image of clay jars.
In ancient times people would store stuff in these clay pots. They were essentially the equivalent of our disposable plastic containers. They were very common and not very expensive. They were useful though. You could put your jewels in them. Some people put important documents in these jars to preserve the paper. If you are familiar with the Dead Sea Scrolls that were found years back. They were some of the earliest Biblical manuscripts that we have ever found. They were found in caves inside of these clay pots.
Typically, the thing that was in the jar was of more worth than the actual pot.
In using this image Paul expresses the kind of person God uses. It isn’t someone who is noble, powerful, or influential. The ones God delights to use are not necessarily the ones who are beautiful (present company excepted, of course) or socially savvy. Clay pots were common, ordinary. Most especially, they were fragile.
Maybe that was even the chief characteristic. They were the epitome of weakness as they were easily broken. God is pleased to use frail humans. Frail in physic, age, economic capacity, social aptitude, creativity, humor, even academic performance.
I often get calls from women who are interested in home education. One of their chief hesitations is typically their own perceived limitations. They will talk about how they weren’t necessarily a good student or that they didn’t graduate from college. It essentially boils down to an issue of their perceived weakness. I am tempted to say, “Well, it sounds like your just the person for the job.”
I assure you that the work of this church and its success in being a plant isn’t due to some tremendous prowess on the part of me or the other leadership. We are just as ordinary and filled with as many spiritual infirmities as anyone else.
It is in us that God demonstrates his power. Note the power that he displays. It is his “surpassing power.” The KJV says, “the excellency of his power.” Literally it means “to throw beyond.” Its baseball imagery.
Sometimes you’ll see that they have different people come to throw the honorary first pitch for a professional baseball game. I saw one a while back where a star singer was given the chance to take the mound. Of course, she didn’t stand on the mound. She couldn’t throw it that far. They had her pitch from about halfway. But if ever there was a woman who lived up to the “you throw like a girl” this was it. The ball seemed to go straight to the ground. It didn’t go but 10 or 15 feet. It was truly an embarrassing moment for this young lady. But the pitcher came up, grabbed the ball, and tossed it to the catcher. He took the pitiful efforts of this singer and used his own might to far surpass what she could do.
Where is God’s power shown? It is shown in you. It is sown in your weakness. It is shown in what is, for all practical purposes, your pitiful works, ways, and words. You are the occasion for God’s accomplishing his monumental plans.
But you might ask, “When does this happen?” If I am the realm in which God works, is there a particular time where I can see God working.
II. When is God’s power shown?
We might say that God is working all the time in us. His spirit lives within us and is always at work. There’s really no time when He is not active. But in this passage Paul mentions a particular time when God’s power is specifically shown. There is a time when God’s power is particularly highlighted. You might say, that it is most vivid—or most active at the point of our greatest weakness. God’s surpassing throw beyond power is most notably expressed in those times when we are at our most feeble.
Look at verses 8-9. He lists 4 of the most extreme cases of human suffering; likely cases that he himself has personally experienced. But in each case God’s power is there to sustain and keep them from being utterly destroyed.
He says, “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed.” Literally it says that we are pressed on every side. It is like we had been put in a garbage compactor and the walls are tightening down. The idea is that he’s been given the squeeze. Men have put him in a jam, both through conspiracies against him and physical attack.
But it is not just physical pain, but its mental anguish. For he is “perplexed, but not driven to despair.” Perhaps even the Apostle Paul found himself in situations where he wondered, “What are you doing to me, God? Why are you doing this to me?” Or he’s been in positions where he’s thought, “How are we going to get out of this one?” Remember that earlier in chapter 1 he said he’d received the “sentence of death.”
He is persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down, but not destroyed. All in all, he says he bears in his body the death of Christ. The language here is not sparing. It is expressive of some dire straits.
But why? Why is it that endured these terrible circumstances? It is because that is when the life of Christ is manifested. Do not miss what it says in verses 10-11. All of his pains were to reflect the death of Christ and ultimately show forth the life of Christ—that is to say the life giving power that Christ brings in forgiveness of sin, regeneration of the heart, new lives of obedience, and ultimately eternal life with God.
But the point here is that God’s grace and redeeming power are most vividly expressed not when we are at our strongest or most capable. To be sure, we just saw in the earlier point that there are few of those points anyway. But here we see that it is when we are at our weakest points. God uses the weak, clay pots, and he delights to display his power in them when these weak pots are at their weakest points. He loves to bring us to the end of our resources so that the resources of His might may be able to radiate the brightest.
Some commentators say that what Paul is saying here is that he re-enacts the life and ministry of Christ himself. I think that’s a good way to think of it. While on earth the Son of God was the epitome of human weakness. He achieved the goals God desired through poverty and suffering, through preaching and teaching, through fishermen and farmers.
And he does the same in us—poor weak as we are.
I think of Joni Erickson Tada. Here is a woman who has been a very effective instrument for the Lord. She has encouraged so many and helped to build up the body of Christ through her lectures and talks. But in it all she is confined to a wheelchair.
I also want to point out something here about the way we regard the ministry and those who labor in ministry. We live in a very blessed age where we have access to phenomenal spiritual resources. We can listen to sermons by the greatest preachers of our age, simply by the click of a few buttons. We are able to read sermons by the finest preachers from all of history (Spurgeon, J. Edwards, MacAurther, etc). And to be sure, we should avail ourselves to these resources. God has put them all right at our fingertips so that we can grow in grace and learn to fear Him.
But we should not forget that these greats are rare jewels. They stand out because God gifted them in special ways, either with great knowledge, eloquence, or piety. But we should never forget that those are the extraordinary ones. Most of the work of the gospel has been carried on by nobodies—ordinary men (weak men!) who have nothing extraordinary to speak of. They might not have been super intelligent. They might not have been the most dynamic speakers. But they were men who sought to feed God’s sheep and faithfully teach and preach the way of God. More than that they were men who were willing to suffer and endure various difficulties for the sake of the gospel.
As verse 12 says, Death was at work in them, so that life might be at work in you.
All this is to say, we should not think that the gospel is dependent upon our having it all together or our being perfectly fit. The Lord is pleased to minister when in the midst of our troubles. He delights to show His power and use us when we are at the pinnacle of our human limitations.
The last portion of our text elaborates on how God shows his power. He’s shown where and when God shows his power. It is in us and in those times when we are at our weakest. But verses 13-18 give us an overview of what exactly God’s power is doing in and through us.
III. How is God’s power shown?
A. It is shown in the faith we have [13]
Look at verse 13. It says, “Since we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, "I believed, and so I spoke," we also believe, and so we also speak.” Paul is quoting from Psalm 116 here. And that Psalm replicates something of the hardships that Paul himself experienced. And David, in the midst of all his difficulties, says, “I believe and so I spoke.”
And that is an expression of God’s power. That in the midst of life threatening persecution and trials that are so severe that we feel like we are on the brink of despair, yet there is something within us that urges us on to believe. And not just to believe but to verbalize our belief. To speak before these crowds that press down upon us and give voice to the fact that Christ is Lord.
It defies what is natural. It can only be a testimony to the supernatural forces of God at work within us.
B. It is shown in the kingdom that expands [13-15]
That’s what is mentioned in verse 15. It says that “Grace extends to more and more people and increases thanksgiving.”
We should never forget that it is during these times of persecution that the church grows the most. As they have said, the blood of the martrys is the seed of the church. As we are being squeezed by the different humanistic agendas and are seeing the culture turn against all that is Christian, we should see it not so much as a Post Christian era, but a Pre-Christian era.
C. It is shown in the obedience we gain [16]
Notice what is said in verse 16, “Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.” That’s talking about the spiritual transformation that is at work in us. We are becoming more and more like Christ. Our outer shell is wilting and wasting away, but inwardly we are gaining more vigor.
We might understand it as the most damaged part of us. The thing that has the greatest problem: our sinful hearts, the one thing that cannot be fixed by human power—that is being repaired on a daily basis by the supernatural power of God.
D. It is shown in the hope we have
These verses are full of references to the consummation of God’s redeeming work. In verse 134 it talks about the resurrection. We will be raised up and brought into the presence of the Resurrected Christ.
Then verse 17. This light and momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. Here is the demonstration of God’s power, that we are looking forward to and have a hope for something that is beyond this life. Something that far surpasses anything we expreince in this life.
The KJV might be a little more literal when it says “far more exceeding and eternal.” Earlier I noted that the power God displays in us is a “throwing beyond.” I used the illustration of the holywood star throwing out the first pitch. That same word is used here. But it is doubled. It is a double throwing beyond. The glory of the life to come is not just a little bit better than what we experience here. It is not even right to say that it is “greater” than what we experience here.
It puts all of this suffering in its real context. This life we now live is but a flash. But there is a life to come that is much different. The glory of it is incomparable.
One of the questions that they ask is “What do you deem to be your greatest strengths and weaknesses?” I don’t remember what exactly I said for my strengths. Actually, I don’t even remember if we talked about it. What I do remember is that we spent an inordinate amount of time talking about my weaknesses. One in particular. I mentioned that I’m not a guy who is fluent in “chit-chat.” I think you all know and are quite familiar with the fact that I’m not the best conversationalist.
Well, my mentor, let’s just say that he was an expert in this area. He didn’t have any problems carrying a conversation. For the next 15 minutes he gave me a lecture on how this needs to change and I need to work on this. He said that talking with people is what a minister does and a pastor needs to be able to engage with his people, whether it be about the weather outside or sports or any other superficial topic. He went on and on about how a minister is a man of the word and he must use words and be able to connect with people. He’s got to be conversant and demonstrate an air of charm. If he isn’t able to talk, then he isn’t able to minister. He went on and on…and I just listened.
Let’s just say that wasn’t the most encouraging conversation to have right as you are ready to embark on your career which you just spent at least 10 years of your life preparing for.
I have tried to overcome this shortfall. I have studied websites on how to be a better conversationalist. My wife has tried giving me some tips on how to connect with people. I’ve listened to spots on NPR that focused on how introverts can make it in public life. One of the best things I came across was in my journalism class. It taught you how to ask good questioned in an interview. At least then you could ask a question and let the other person talk. At least you seem somewhat engaging.
But what I’ve found over the years is that this inability to carry on small talk has been one of the greatest assets in the ministry. While I might sit on the sidelines during fellowship times and seem a little awkward at times, it has opened doors for deeper, spiritual conversation. I’ve found that people will do the talking and my silence will often lead them to talk about things on their hearts. For some reason it frequently provides a pathway to conversations that deal with people’s need for repentance and faith.
My greatest weakness has been the greatest asset for my ministry.
I go through this because I want you to have hope for your weaknesses too. You will readily recognize that you have various deficiencies that make you feel inept or clumsy. There are certain defects of your character or skills that you lack that seem to be great faults to you. But the point that God wants to make is that these are his areas of expertise. That is certainly the lesson he wants you to learn from this passage.
In our times of weakness, that is when God is most active. You could say that God exploits our weaknesses, using them as moments to magnify the supreme excellency of his power. It is what he does. He features his competence in our incompetence.
I. Where is God’s power shown? [7]
It is shown in us. But note what this passage says about us. The verse opens by saying, “We have this treasure in jars of clay.” Paul uses an image to describe himself and the others whom God uses. And it is not one that is all that flattering. He uses the image of clay jars.
In ancient times people would store stuff in these clay pots. They were essentially the equivalent of our disposable plastic containers. They were very common and not very expensive. They were useful though. You could put your jewels in them. Some people put important documents in these jars to preserve the paper. If you are familiar with the Dead Sea Scrolls that were found years back. They were some of the earliest Biblical manuscripts that we have ever found. They were found in caves inside of these clay pots.
Typically, the thing that was in the jar was of more worth than the actual pot.
In using this image Paul expresses the kind of person God uses. It isn’t someone who is noble, powerful, or influential. The ones God delights to use are not necessarily the ones who are beautiful (present company excepted, of course) or socially savvy. Clay pots were common, ordinary. Most especially, they were fragile.
Maybe that was even the chief characteristic. They were the epitome of weakness as they were easily broken. God is pleased to use frail humans. Frail in physic, age, economic capacity, social aptitude, creativity, humor, even academic performance.
I often get calls from women who are interested in home education. One of their chief hesitations is typically their own perceived limitations. They will talk about how they weren’t necessarily a good student or that they didn’t graduate from college. It essentially boils down to an issue of their perceived weakness. I am tempted to say, “Well, it sounds like your just the person for the job.”
I assure you that the work of this church and its success in being a plant isn’t due to some tremendous prowess on the part of me or the other leadership. We are just as ordinary and filled with as many spiritual infirmities as anyone else.
It is in us that God demonstrates his power. Note the power that he displays. It is his “surpassing power.” The KJV says, “the excellency of his power.” Literally it means “to throw beyond.” Its baseball imagery.
Sometimes you’ll see that they have different people come to throw the honorary first pitch for a professional baseball game. I saw one a while back where a star singer was given the chance to take the mound. Of course, she didn’t stand on the mound. She couldn’t throw it that far. They had her pitch from about halfway. But if ever there was a woman who lived up to the “you throw like a girl” this was it. The ball seemed to go straight to the ground. It didn’t go but 10 or 15 feet. It was truly an embarrassing moment for this young lady. But the pitcher came up, grabbed the ball, and tossed it to the catcher. He took the pitiful efforts of this singer and used his own might to far surpass what she could do.
Where is God’s power shown? It is shown in you. It is sown in your weakness. It is shown in what is, for all practical purposes, your pitiful works, ways, and words. You are the occasion for God’s accomplishing his monumental plans.
But you might ask, “When does this happen?” If I am the realm in which God works, is there a particular time where I can see God working.
II. When is God’s power shown?
We might say that God is working all the time in us. His spirit lives within us and is always at work. There’s really no time when He is not active. But in this passage Paul mentions a particular time when God’s power is specifically shown. There is a time when God’s power is particularly highlighted. You might say, that it is most vivid—or most active at the point of our greatest weakness. God’s surpassing throw beyond power is most notably expressed in those times when we are at our most feeble.
Look at verses 8-9. He lists 4 of the most extreme cases of human suffering; likely cases that he himself has personally experienced. But in each case God’s power is there to sustain and keep them from being utterly destroyed.
He says, “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed.” Literally it says that we are pressed on every side. It is like we had been put in a garbage compactor and the walls are tightening down. The idea is that he’s been given the squeeze. Men have put him in a jam, both through conspiracies against him and physical attack.
But it is not just physical pain, but its mental anguish. For he is “perplexed, but not driven to despair.” Perhaps even the Apostle Paul found himself in situations where he wondered, “What are you doing to me, God? Why are you doing this to me?” Or he’s been in positions where he’s thought, “How are we going to get out of this one?” Remember that earlier in chapter 1 he said he’d received the “sentence of death.”
He is persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down, but not destroyed. All in all, he says he bears in his body the death of Christ. The language here is not sparing. It is expressive of some dire straits.
But why? Why is it that endured these terrible circumstances? It is because that is when the life of Christ is manifested. Do not miss what it says in verses 10-11. All of his pains were to reflect the death of Christ and ultimately show forth the life of Christ—that is to say the life giving power that Christ brings in forgiveness of sin, regeneration of the heart, new lives of obedience, and ultimately eternal life with God.
But the point here is that God’s grace and redeeming power are most vividly expressed not when we are at our strongest or most capable. To be sure, we just saw in the earlier point that there are few of those points anyway. But here we see that it is when we are at our weakest points. God uses the weak, clay pots, and he delights to display his power in them when these weak pots are at their weakest points. He loves to bring us to the end of our resources so that the resources of His might may be able to radiate the brightest.
Some commentators say that what Paul is saying here is that he re-enacts the life and ministry of Christ himself. I think that’s a good way to think of it. While on earth the Son of God was the epitome of human weakness. He achieved the goals God desired through poverty and suffering, through preaching and teaching, through fishermen and farmers.
And he does the same in us—poor weak as we are.
I think of Joni Erickson Tada. Here is a woman who has been a very effective instrument for the Lord. She has encouraged so many and helped to build up the body of Christ through her lectures and talks. But in it all she is confined to a wheelchair.
I also want to point out something here about the way we regard the ministry and those who labor in ministry. We live in a very blessed age where we have access to phenomenal spiritual resources. We can listen to sermons by the greatest preachers of our age, simply by the click of a few buttons. We are able to read sermons by the finest preachers from all of history (Spurgeon, J. Edwards, MacAurther, etc). And to be sure, we should avail ourselves to these resources. God has put them all right at our fingertips so that we can grow in grace and learn to fear Him.
But we should not forget that these greats are rare jewels. They stand out because God gifted them in special ways, either with great knowledge, eloquence, or piety. But we should never forget that those are the extraordinary ones. Most of the work of the gospel has been carried on by nobodies—ordinary men (weak men!) who have nothing extraordinary to speak of. They might not have been super intelligent. They might not have been the most dynamic speakers. But they were men who sought to feed God’s sheep and faithfully teach and preach the way of God. More than that they were men who were willing to suffer and endure various difficulties for the sake of the gospel.
As verse 12 says, Death was at work in them, so that life might be at work in you.
All this is to say, we should not think that the gospel is dependent upon our having it all together or our being perfectly fit. The Lord is pleased to minister when in the midst of our troubles. He delights to show His power and use us when we are at the pinnacle of our human limitations.
The last portion of our text elaborates on how God shows his power. He’s shown where and when God shows his power. It is in us and in those times when we are at our weakest. But verses 13-18 give us an overview of what exactly God’s power is doing in and through us.
III. How is God’s power shown?
A. It is shown in the faith we have [13]
Look at verse 13. It says, “Since we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, "I believed, and so I spoke," we also believe, and so we also speak.” Paul is quoting from Psalm 116 here. And that Psalm replicates something of the hardships that Paul himself experienced. And David, in the midst of all his difficulties, says, “I believe and so I spoke.”
And that is an expression of God’s power. That in the midst of life threatening persecution and trials that are so severe that we feel like we are on the brink of despair, yet there is something within us that urges us on to believe. And not just to believe but to verbalize our belief. To speak before these crowds that press down upon us and give voice to the fact that Christ is Lord.
It defies what is natural. It can only be a testimony to the supernatural forces of God at work within us.
B. It is shown in the kingdom that expands [13-15]
That’s what is mentioned in verse 15. It says that “Grace extends to more and more people and increases thanksgiving.”
We should never forget that it is during these times of persecution that the church grows the most. As they have said, the blood of the martrys is the seed of the church. As we are being squeezed by the different humanistic agendas and are seeing the culture turn against all that is Christian, we should see it not so much as a Post Christian era, but a Pre-Christian era.
C. It is shown in the obedience we gain [16]
Notice what is said in verse 16, “Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.” That’s talking about the spiritual transformation that is at work in us. We are becoming more and more like Christ. Our outer shell is wilting and wasting away, but inwardly we are gaining more vigor.
We might understand it as the most damaged part of us. The thing that has the greatest problem: our sinful hearts, the one thing that cannot be fixed by human power—that is being repaired on a daily basis by the supernatural power of God.
D. It is shown in the hope we have
These verses are full of references to the consummation of God’s redeeming work. In verse 134 it talks about the resurrection. We will be raised up and brought into the presence of the Resurrected Christ.
Then verse 17. This light and momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. Here is the demonstration of God’s power, that we are looking forward to and have a hope for something that is beyond this life. Something that far surpasses anything we expreince in this life.
The KJV might be a little more literal when it says “far more exceeding and eternal.” Earlier I noted that the power God displays in us is a “throwing beyond.” I used the illustration of the holywood star throwing out the first pitch. That same word is used here. But it is doubled. It is a double throwing beyond. The glory of the life to come is not just a little bit better than what we experience here. It is not even right to say that it is “greater” than what we experience here.
It puts all of this suffering in its real context. This life we now live is but a flash. But there is a life to come that is much different. The glory of it is incomparable.