HARD ROAD: This life is tough and we will need some comfort along the way.
- 2 Corinthians 1:3-7.
- Even if you were only half paying attention when I read the passage, you know the main word: “comfort.” It’s littered throughout the verses.
- Comfort is something that we all need from time to time. What truth does this passage have for us about what we can expect from God when we need comfort?
MORE ABOUT THAT COMFORT:
1. It’s part of who He is.
- 2 Corinthians 1:3 – “God of all comfort.”
- It’s in His nature. Verse 3 gives Him the title “the God of all comfort.” It also declares Him to be the Father of compassion,” which is encouraging.
- For those who have a vision of God as distant or indifferent, this is important. Providing comfort for the hurting is a part of who God is.
- How does God comfort us?
a. Holy Spirit.
b. Providential occurrences.
c. Friends.
d. Church.
e. Speaking in prayer.
f. Encouraging Scripture.
- Receiving comfort requires that we admit that we need it. Many are unwilling to acknowledge that.
- Our stubbornness and refusal to look to God leaves us without much of the help that God is willing to give.
- Think of how many are depressed, dejected, and demoralized today? It’s epidemic. Now think of the several things I just mentioned that God uses to comfort us and how underused those are. Just to cite one, the church is supposed to be a community of care and concern instead of a bunch of people sitting near each other weekly. How much more comforted we would be if we had a body of caring believers looking after us. For example, think of how much more care and concern has been shown since we started the card ministry. So many have expressed their appreciation for having people sending them notes of encouragement regularly.
2. He’s not selective in giving His comfort.
- 2 Corinthians 1:4 – “all our troubles.”
- It’s nice that Paul gives us an inclusive statement when he tells us how many of our struggles we can expect God to provide comfort in. Verse 4 tells us “all our troubles.” So when we’re going to through struggles we can be confident that God is willing to provide us with comfort.
3. We are to share the comfort we’ve been given by God.
- 2 Corinthians 1:4 – “with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.”
- We need God’s comfort and so we thankfully receive it. As we receive it, though, we are to share that comfort with those around us.
- What might that look like?
a. A sympathetic phone call.
b. A caring visit.
c. Going to the hospital.
d. A card in the mail.
e. Telling the person that you’re praying for them and then finding out how things went.
f. A church full of embraces and handshakes.
g. A small group that keeps up with what’s going in your life.
- If God offers comfort, why not just have God comfort them?
a. Some don’t know God.
b. Some won’t receive comfort from God.
c. Sometimes God uses us as His representatives to bring the comfort.
4. Comfort is essential because suffering is necessary.
- 2 Corinthians 1:5.
- The simple fact that we need to be comforted means that Christianity is something many wish that is wasn’t. Many want it to be a road of easy answers, quick fixes, and no suffering. That’s not what’s promised here.
- God comforting us does not mean that He will necessarily remove the suffering.
- Why doesn’t God just take away the suffering?
- Because we are in a world that does not share the vision and values of the gospel. As we attempt to pursue the expansion of the Kingdom, it puts us at odds with the world. The gospel is not a generic, safe morality tale. It is an indictment of the world and its leader. It is a repudiation of what the world holds dear. So there will be push back.
5. Being comforted is not the ultimate goal.
- 2 Corinthians 1:6.
- This verse can be a little difficult to understand at first. Let’s look at in halves.
- The first half of the verse tells us that Paul sometimes was distressed, but it brought them comfort and salvation. What does that mean? Paul went through struggles and distress in order to preach the gospel to them. He was “distressed” by all he had to go through the preach the gospel to them but going through that enabled him to bring them salvation, which in turn brought them comfort.
- The second half speaks of when Paul is comforted. Here he is speaking of the times when God comforts him through the struggles that he has to endure. When God does that for him, it gives encouragement to the Corinthians because they see how God is taking care of Paul and so they know they can be confident that he will take care of them too. Specifically, Paul says that it will give them a “patient endurance” when they’re in similar straights.
- In both cases, the comfort is not an end to itself. In the first case, the larger end was their salvation; in the second case, the larger end was their endurance.
- This is important to understand because, as alluded to earlier, we have the tendency to want God to focus His work on making our lives comfortable. Yes, He does comfort us, but only as part of His larger purposes. When our highest goal for our Christian becomes our comfort rather than His glory, we are way off track.
6. We’re in this together.
- 2 Corinthians 1:7.
- This is a nice point for Paul to end on. It’s a reminder that we are all are going to suffer and we all need comfort. So we need to be there for each other in both. We help each other when we suffer; we share in each other’s comfort.
- We’re all going to be at each point at some point. So we need to be there for each other, just as we want others to be there for us.
CONFIDENCE THAT GOD WILL ACTUALLY PROVIDE THIS COMFORT: Paul knows a lot more about suffering than you do.
- 2 Corinthians 2:12-13; 2 Corinthians 4:8-12; 2 Corinthians 6:3-10; 2 Corinthians 7:5; 2 Corinthians 11:23-33; 2 Corinthians 12:7-10.
- There are several places in 2 Corinthians where Paul shares various details of his sufferings. Those sufferings are far beyond what any of us have dealt with, with rare exception.
- I want to end on this point because it would be easy for us to dismiss Paul’s words about God’s comfort as being Pollyannaish. Because of that, we need to remember that he is the one with far greater experience with suffering and therefore he knows better than we do.
