Video Transcript: Session 35 Preaching in pain

Welcome back, I hope you have been reflecting on the last session and the  power of the Holy Spirit and your messages. I want to continue today, just  looking at what you see there practical considerations. And one of them is  preaching in pain. I want to imagine, put yourself in this situation for just a  moment. Imagine that your church is growing, you know, you'd be getting a  reputation as a preacher. And as a result, more and more people are coming to  hear you preach. And you decide that you're going to buy a new building, or  you're going to rehab an older building, large building, and you move into this  new building where there's room for 1000s of people to come. A couple of 1000s of people can come hear you preach. And it's a great moment you have that first service, you've been planning for it the instrumentalists and the musicians are,  vocalists are excited about coming together in this new place with where all  these new people are coming. And the place is packed, every seat is taken, and  there's some people standing up. And then all of a sudden somebody yells, fire.  And people scramble for the exits, and seven people are killed in the scramble  to get out. Imagine how horrible that would be. Imagine, you'll notice they're 27  years imagine that your wife becomes an invalid gets sick. And for 27 years  never hears you preach, except when you're practicing at home, she never can  come to church, she can never listen to you, she can never give you feedback  on how the audience took it. She's totally separated from church. Imagine that.  Imagine that you develop what used to be called rheumatism, you know a pain  in your joints that you move. You develop gout so that some of your joints swell,  and it's painful to hold a pen and write your sermons out because you write them are you developing inflamed kidneys. As a result, sometimes you are bedridden, then add to that the fact that you've got critics, critics or who come not only  because you've taken too many of them are your fellow pastors in town, but their critics, which is you've taken their people, they started coming to your church,  and so they criticize you. And some even suggested public and in print, that you  aren't even converted. And then some of your own church criticize decisions that are made and criticize you saying you're building your kingdom, you're not  building God's kingdom. And then imagine that you start experiencing  depression, depression so much that it crushes you. And sometimes you just  have to absent yourself from the pulpit because you can't get out of bed in the  morning. Imagine yourself like that, and preaching like that. Now, the person I'm  describing is real. This is Charles Haddon Spurgeon. I've spoken of him several  times during this class. He was known as the prince of preachers back in the  mid to late 1800s, in London. And that describes his life that describes what it  was like for him. And yet, in all of that stuff, he would continue to come back into  the pulpit and preach. And he preached not only in the pulpit, but he would teach he had a school for preachers where back then only men came, but men would  come to hear his wisdom about how do you preach? How do you preach? How  do you experience those things we've been talking about in this class, and how 

do you experience the power of the Holy Spirit's and did all that in spite of all  that pain in his life. Now, here's the truth that if you're a preacher preaching, I'm  going to end in the next section talking just about what an honorable task it is, to be presenting the Word of God. But here's the truth that you've got to know.  Every preacher must preach through pain, sometimes. Every one of us will  experience pain sometimes, and we're going to have to get up and preach.  While we are in pain. Now, there are a bunch of sources of pain, you know, this  physical pain, there's a kind of physical pain that will be distracting to you. And  you have to get up and preach. And it's just a few months ago, um, I have a  shoulder on my left here, that is a big bone spur in it. I don't need to tell you  about that. But I purchased a new massager that I'd seen in a thrift store and on  a Saturday night and decided to massage that shoulder at whole area back here with a deep tissue massage. And so I did that I woke up at 4:30 Morning, 4:30 in the morning on Sunday morning when I was supposed to preach it and my arm  was just throbbing in the pain. I couldn't get her under control for a while and I'm taking medications that I had trying to get the pain under control. And it came  time to get oh my God and be able to preach or not. And I think I can do this.  And I went to church that morning. And I could hardly move. And so my gestures were very, very limited. But it was a physical pain and it was so distracting that I  went home and I just I couldn't I had to sleep that day and that night in a recliner because I couldn't lie down on my shoulder. There are days like that when you  get up and physically, especially those of us who are getting older, the pains  increase. Now, I'll talk in a few moments about sharing your pain in an  appropriate way, and are inappropriate ways to share but just know that there  are gonna be times you're in physical pain, there are times you'll be in emotional pain. You know, I read some of the testimonies on Christian leaders Institute  website, and you know, the place where you can tell stories to each other. I'm  impressed at some of the pain, emotional pain, the scars that some people bear, you know, you hear stories about people there who you know, who are drug  addicted, and they sold themselves in order to pay for their addictions. And they  experienced God's grace and mercy and restoration. And now they're studying  for ministry. But there's scars back there, there's those memories, there's those  people. And sometimes emotional pain is what you're going to experience.  You're not immune from depression, just because you preach the Word of God.  Family stress can be a huge source of pain. It's hard to get up in the morning,  sometimes, when you're hurting because of something, my partner ministry for  20 years, one of my partners in ministry had a son, and there was an adopted  son, but beloved Son, and the son when he was in middle school just started to  get into trouble. And that trouble led to drugs. And the drugs led to crimes in his  life. And, you know, they've sent him to treatment, they paid a fortune out in  money for him to go into treatment in various places to try to get a hold of his  anger issues, tried to get a hold of some of the identity issues. As an adopted 

child, he was African American, and the family he was adopted into was white.  And so all that stuff. So they put them into counseling and put them into  treatment centers. They, they, they paid the price for this kid. And yet, you know,  what happened is he became an adult was that he would, he would get caught  committing crimes in order to get money to pay for a drug habit. And then he'd  go to jail. And in jail, he would have conversion again. And I remember visiting  this young man in jail, he would just be very sweet spirited, but he come out of  jail six months later to be back in, come out of jail. Six months later, he'd be back in. And he finally died at the age of 31 from a drug overdose. And during that  span of years, my partner had a regular preaching commitment that he had to  make in our church. How do you do that? How do that sometimes pain just  comes from a twisted world, you know, the world is twisted as a result of the fall.  And as a result, things happen, like accidents, a drunk driver will hit you. And all  of a sudden you are limited in what you're able to do on a particular day or a  particular week or month or the rest of your life. Friendly fire friendly fire, and  there's apathy. Now I want to look at a couple of things in more detail. When you are experiencing family pain, physical pain, emotional pain, world pain. What do  you do? Well, number one is you look for what God is teaching you in this time.  Here's a quote from from Spurgeon himself, this guy went through all this stuff.  He said, I'm afraid that all the grace that I've got of my comfortable and easy  times and happy hours might almost lie on a penny. But the good that I have  received from my sorrows and pains and griefs is altogether incalculable.  affliction is the best bit of furniture in my house. It is the best book in the  minister's library. Man, how could you say that? But the reality is, any survey  that I know of that's been done, what were the great times of spiritual growth in  your life, people will identify times of pain and uncertainty, that's when God  became real to them in a in a more powerful way. And Paul tells him on talks  about this. He says, Therefore he's talking about all the things he's seen all the  visions, he's had the fact that he's been up to the third heaven and center. So  therefore, in order to keep me from being conceited, I was given a thorn in my  flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me. Now, we don't know exactly what  that was. Some believe it was an eye condition because of the way Paul  describes what the Galatians did for him in the book was the letter to the  Galatian churches. We don't know exactly what it was, but it was something that hurt like a thorn hurts, it was something that put limitations on him. So Three  times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me, but he said to me, My  grace, excuse me is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in  weakness. Therefore, he says, I will boast all the more gladly about my  weaknesses so that Christ's power may rest on me. So what do you do when  You experienced the family stress, physical, emotional pain, what do you what  do you do? Well, the first thing you should do is look at what God might be  teaching you. Second thing. Number two, there is use all means for relief. I 

experienced three periods of clinical depression in my life, and I went to  counselors and I took anti depressive medications because we know that some  part of depression is physical. And as we get down, our brain starts producing  the improper chemicals or not, isn't able to take up the right chemicals. And so  there are medications, Use every means necessary. Use friends, use, escape,  use whatever. And number three, share your pain. Share your pain with your  church, don't try to pretend everything's right, but do it appropriately. The person I think of there is a Rick Warren and his wife. Okay. You'll notice the title there  after a sudden suicide. Rick Warren is the pastor of Saddleback Church in  Southern California. It's a mega church that has impact on 1000s upon 1000s of  people, and many, many, many of those 1000s coming to Christ through the  ministry of that church. Rick is known as a humble man. He's given away almost all of his money. He's written books that are received, and he's received a ton of  money. As a result, they've given almost all of it away, he's returned most of the  salary to the church as a result of money he received from his books. He's a  humble, generous man. And yet he has a son who is dealing with depression,  and finally takes his own life. How do you respond to that as a preacher? Well,  he took 16 weeks off from the pulpit. When he came back to preaching his wife  came, and they stood before their congregation. And they thanked the  Congregation for their support and their prayers and their love during this time.  And then he preached his first sermon. How do you preach that kind of pain in  your life? And his first sermon was simply this, why we continue to trust God,  even though he said if we prayed every single day of their son's adult life, they  pray for healing from that depression that he experienced. And apparently,  God's answer was no. But why do we continue to trust God, his pain became a,  an avenue for people to have greater understanding. And that day in the  audience, there were people who understood because there are things that  happened to them, that they've prayed for solutions that didn't come the way  that they wanted them to come. And so as a result, people learn to trust God  through the pain that's appropriate, sharing pain. Now, there's inappropriate  sharing of pain. John Maxwell has been one of my mentors once went to visit  and hear someone preach. And the person got up there complained about the  fact and I think I shared this with him before. In fact, his back hurts so much.  And he didn't know if he could preach today. And Dr. Maxwell went to him  afterwards, it says, you know, don't talk about that stuff. These people don't want to hear that. That's inappropriate pain, because it draws the attention to you.  And what makes people feel sorry for you, it doesn't direct their attention to God  and how you are dealing with this through your faith in God, and so share your  pain, but share it appropriately. Other kinds of pain that somehow very difficult,  and that is friendly fire. That's one of them as time was you're going to  experience critics. And the you know, you may think that people will say you're a great preacher. And there are times when you're going to have them figure out 

that you're not such a great person. And the reality is going to set in. There are  two predictable times whether it's going to happen once the honeymoon is over.  When you come to a new church, a new preaching station, there is going to be a honeymoon period, in fact people will just love you. And they will affirm you and  they will give thanks for you. But that honeymoon period, will last somewhere  between six months to a year, maybe for the best of us it will last two years. And then people begin to see your weaknesses. And people begin to maybe not  quite like so much how you present your message. And they will let you know.  Or maybe they've got a different agenda for the church. And they'll let you know.  And so what do you do then? You keep calm as the this banner says, the  honeymoon is over. But you keep calm. What do you do during those times?  You remember your call? Talked to a young man just a few weeks ago. He's  going through a difficult time in his church. And the critics have come out and  they accuse him of all sorts of stuff. And he says I'm there because God called  me here. God called me to preach here. Remember your call. We know the  vision with your leaders. Now One of those leaders are appointed leaders,  elders and deacons or whether they just are people of influence in your church.  Get together with them and renew where you're going in your church and why  you're going there so that you can be able to say to the congregation, this is not  just me here, we're trying to accomplish something, and my preaching and my  leadership are part of that whole process, renew the vision, remind yourself who gets the glory, that if you're getting criticized at a certain time or place, that's  been true for the prophets. In the Old Testament, it was proof for the truth of the  disciples and became apostles in the New Testament. It's normal. Remember  that God's got to get the glory for what happens and then find refreshment. Find  it where you can in people, good friend has been a friend for over 60 years. And  when I would get started getting down because the friendly fire was getting me  down on the honeymoon over I would call them and somehow we have a gift of  making each other laugh and was just a time of refreshment. And there are a  few people like that, that I would talk to, I would seek them out to say, you know,  hey, I'm just talking. Let's go for a walk on man just because I just want to share  with you, my heart, and places to go that are refreshing for you. Sometimes it's  escaped to, you know, a place with a pool. You know, we used to escape to  Palm Springs into the beach occasionally when I lived in Southern California,  are things that give you satisfaction you love to read, make sure you make time  for that you, you love to play a certain game you love to golf, make time for that.  Do the things that are refreshing to you. So that's it, there's friendly fire because  the honeymoon is over. There's another kind that's a little bit longer and more  difficult to deal with. And that's called the Pioneer homesteader conflict. Now  pioneers are refers to in our country, but in other places as well, when the West  was being conquered, and I don't want to get into the morality of that right now, I know that there are all kinds of abhorant things that were done with the Native 

Americans that were there and all that sort of thing. But pioneers came in, and  they settled. They built houses out of sod. They lived with dirt floors and no  windows, they tilled the soil and they they bought that land, which was just  rough under control. And they paved the way for the homesteaders to come  you'll notice the what is the Homestead Act of 1862, that in the Homestead Act,  land was given to people who would go out and settle there now the pioneers  after a period of time when the homesteaders began to settle around them, the  pioneers began to ask the question, who's in charge here? Now, that's become  a phrase, the whole pioneer homesteader conflict has been applied to the  church. And it happens when the number of new people since this pastor came  since you came, let's say, the number of new people who come together to  equal the number of pioneers who were there who has spent money to get that  church going, who gave it themselves to get it going. And now these  homesteaders are coming in these new people. And they're taking over  positions of leadership. And they're, they're getting involved in the ministry. And  the question starts to arise, who's in charge here? And it's known sometimes as  a pioneer homesteader conflict. Sometimes it's known as the whitewater period.  And I tell you, I've had people, I went through that when I was in California, and  it was not pleasant at all. It went for about two years. And at one point, I went to  the chairman of elders, elders were in the church and our structure are the  leaders in the church, who were my supervisors, and the ones who were  responsible for my care. I went to the chairman of the elders and I said, you  know, I'm going to be gone in a year if this doesn't clear up. I had people  criticizing the way I kept my house was a church owned home, and people  criticizing saying, we oh, we couldn't have a dog in our house, things like that. It  was it was just this nitpicking stuff and people saying, you know, you're, you're  trying to build your own kingdom, you're not trying to build God's kingdom,  things that were hurtful and painful. So I'll be gone in a year. And in fact, most  pastors in the United States leave when pioneer homesteader conflict starts  going. I want to encourage you to stay during this time. Look at this statement of Paul. He's writing to the Corinthians. He says, I hope to spend some time with  you if the Lord permits, but I will stay at Ephesus until Pentecost. Why? For why door for effective work is open to me. And there are many adversaries? Can you imagine saying I'm staying here because there are people who are really ticked  at me? Hang in there. What do you do during those times while you remember  your call, you renew the vision with your leaders, you remind yourself who gets  the glory, you get refreshment from those places and people that you get  refreshment and don't avoid the critics. I made it a practice to make sure I  approached them that I didn't reject them in the process. So there's sources of  pain, all of those the last one listed is apathy. Jesus made it very clear when he  gave the parable of the soils that the seed of the word is going to fall in different  kinds of soils and And then a couple of those kinds of is going to be 

unproductive, right? It's going to be the thorny soil where it will, you know, it'll, it'll spring up quickly and then it will fade away because the weeds and stuff,  destroy the soil beside the road, the rocky soil good. So all these different kinds  of soil are going to receive the word differently. People are going to receive the  word differently. And they're some of those will be just apathetic. Ongoing. Still  others like the seeds sown among thorns hear the word, but the worries of this  life, the deceitfulness of wealth, and the desire for other things come in and  choke the word making it unfruitful. And so there's going to be people who will  be unfruitful in your ministry, you'll want spiritual growth for them. You'll want it  for their church and it's not happening. And what do you do then in that time of  pain? Remember your call, assess the vision with your leaders. Remind  yourself, who gets the glory, refreshment from people, places things, pray, pray,  pray, and then watch for God's deliverance. And it will come you gotta hang in  there. But in the process, you're going to learn about God in ways that you never would have things were going smoothly. So preach, even when in pain. We'll  see you next time for the final session.