but we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed, perplexed, but not driven to despair, persecuted, but not forsaken, struck down, but not destroyed, always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death is at work in us, but life in you. 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, knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and bring us with you into his presence. For it is for all your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people, it may increase thanksgiving to the glory of God. So we do not lose heart, though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. as we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen, for the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. Praise God for his holy word. Let's pray once more as we prepare to reflect on what we've read. Our blessed Lord, you have caused your holy scripture to be written for our learning and for our benefit, so that we may grow in grace in knowledge and in holiness and be comforted, grant that having heard and read that we may learn and that we may inwardly digest these truths and that we might also be encouraged and comforted. May we embrace and ever hold fast to the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. Now some of you may, when I say this, someone is probably going to come to the front of your mind here. You might know someone who has a one-track mind. There's only one thing that they're always thinking about, and they're always talking about, and they're always obsessing about. And no matter how the conversation begins, it always kind of somehow goes back to that one topic. Sometimes this might be work. I know for someone right now it's the Lord of the Rings. Sometimes it's our kids, sometimes school, our favorite toy or hobby, or perhaps those amazing now ranked number 14 Arizona State Sun Devils football. You know, I'm not in Arizona, but I had to work that in. But whatever it is, a hobby, even a toy, and it doesn't even have to be those things, but sometimes it's something that we're really upset about. Sometimes all we can think of is some kind of hurt that we have or some kind of, It's always coming back to some kind of bitterness that we have in our heart. And we must admit that when we find the singular mindedness taxing, even when it's our own singular mindedness, and when we find it in others, sometimes it's a little boring and obnoxious, but we deal with each other because we love one another. Well, the Apostle Paul is one of those guys. He had a one-track mind. There was one thing that he thought about that ruled his thoughts and that ruled his conversation and that inhabited all his letters throughout them. And that one thing that he's obsessed with is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The resurrection of Christ was everything for Paul, and he can't seem to go very far in his letters without mentioning it directly, and even when he doesn't mention it directly, it's always there, and it influences everything that he writes. For Paul, what happened in the past, Jesus being raised from the dead, and what will happen in the future, Paul's own rising from the dead, had everything to do and influenced how he thought, felt, and acted in the present. See, Paul's reality was rooted in the resurrection. And this passage challenges us to reflect on something and to ask ourselves a question. Where is our reality rooted? How we view the past and how we think about the future has everything to do with how we think, feel, and act in the present. So this evening, we want to ask ourselves, what's central to my thinking? What is it that's forming my thoughts and my feelings? Is it wrongs that are done to you in the past? that you just can't seem to shake, that are forming your thoughts and your moods even now, even today, even this evening? Is it past sins that you committed that you're still regretting and being tormented over? Is it just your hard life of the day-to-day struggles, whether those are spiritual struggles or health struggles? Is it perhaps your job or even your home, your hobbies, dreams for the future, retirement plans? We've already mentioned kids. Is all you think about is your kids and your dreams for them and how you want good things for them? What is it that you think about and obsess about all the time? What is it that is central to your thinking? What in your past influences how you think about things right now, including your relationships? And what consumes your thoughts when it comes to the future? What grid is it that you're running your thoughts and feelings through? What we think of most, especially when it comes to our past and to the future, that affects the way that we think, the way that we feel, and the way that we act in the present. This passage calls us to see that all Christians are called to root their reality, past, future, and present in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. A simple way of saying this is how is Christ being raised from the dead in my future resurrection? How should that affect the way I think about my life right now, today, this evening? We have three points as we are going to unpack this. If you want kids or adults, if you're looking for a key word to keep a tally mark, I think you could figure it's resurrection, and you probably want to put down at least six or seven of those already. But our three points are foundation in the past, focus on the future, and functioning in the present. Foundation in the past, focus on the future, functioning in the present. So in the previous verses before verse 13, Paul just spoke of the treasure that Christians have in jars of clay. He spoke of God's surpassing power as it's made known through our lives. He said essentially that we are squeezed but not squashed, bewildered but not befuddled, pursued but not abandoned, and knocked down but not knocked out. And Paul told us in verse 10 that we're continually suffering as we're always carrying in the body the death of Jesus. He explains that as Christians, one of the reasons that we suffer is so that the life of Christ and the work of Christ might be evident and made known to others through our suffering. And now in verse 13, he continues to explain how it is that Paul, in the midst of all his suffering, how it is that he can continue to preach the gospel. And his reason is in how he views his past. Verse 13. 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. So in verse 13, Paul is quoting Psalm 116, which we read in our Old Testament reading. Essentially by doing this, Paul's saying, since we have the same heart attitude as the author of Psalm 116, we believe and can also speak in the same way that he did. Now taking another look at Psalm 116 here, we want to see what this spirit of faith is. In this psalm, the author explains that every time he was near death, the Lord saved him because the Lord was faithful to keep his promises. Just a couple examples in Psalm 116. 116 verse three, the snares of death encompassed me. The pains of Sheol laid hold of me. I suffered distress and anguish. Then in verses four through six, the psalmist calls upon the Lord and he's rescued. Then I called on the name of the Lord. Oh Lord, I pray, deliver my soul. Gracious is the Lord and righteous, our merciful God. The Lord preserves the simple. When I was brought low, he saved me. And again, in verses eight and nine, the psalmist is rescued from the very grasp of death. For you have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling. I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living. So in the history of the psalmist's life, the Lord has rescued him from death over and over again. And this constant rescuing enables the psalmist with faith to cry out to God in the midst of all kinds of trouble because he knows that God will rescue him. And this is the cry of faith in verse 10 of Psalm 116. I believed even when I spoke, I am greatly afflicted. Paul has this in mind when he says, I believed so I spoke. This is what he's referring to. Paul identifies with the psalmist spirit of faith. The psalmist has confidence that the Lord will answer his cry for help because He's already done it. God has already proved that He is the God who rescues His people from death. God has demonstrated over and over again to His saints that He's a rescuing from death type of God or a resurrection type of God. Rescue from death is a picture of the resurrection. Israel was resurrected when the Lord came and saved them out of slavery, from bondage in Egypt, and they were made into a new nation. That's a picture of death unto life. And God's people have been experiencing rescue from death in every age. All rescues from death that we think point ultimately to our rescue from death, to the resurrection of Jesus Christ and us being raised in Him. This is the spirit of faith that Paul has confidence. He has confidence in God's saving power. And it's his foundation. The foundation of Paul's faith is what God has done to rescue his people in the past from death. His confidence is in the resurrection of Jesus Christ himself. And this resurrection is the center of Paul's theology. It's simply a way of saying it's the center of his world. He can't think a thought without thinking of how it stands and falls on Christ's resurrection. The resurrection is the foundation of our Christian faith. Resurrection is what Paul is constantly preaching. Just a few places, Acts 17, verse 18. When Paul gets into trouble, it's because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. In 1 Corinthians 15, three and four, we read, or I delivered to you as first importance that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures. And in 2 Corinthians, Paul's already referenced the importance and foundation of the resurrection several times. 2 Corinthians 1, nine and 10, Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death, but that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. 2 Corinthians 2.14, thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession. That's a triumph over death. That's resurrection language. And in 2 Corinthians 3, as Paul talked about the superiority of the ministry of the Spirit in the New Covenant, the work of the life-giving Spirit, well, that's resurrection work. Ultimately, this resurrection ministry culminated, we saw in 2 Corinthians 3.18, where we read that the glory of the Lord was being revealed as we're being transformed into the image of the resurrected Christ. The resurrection is everything for Paul and for the Christian, and this is just a small sample size of Paul's resurrection obsession. He views the resurrection of Jesus Christ, an event which occurred in history, as the very foundation of the Christian's faith and the foundation for the confidence that he has as he suffers in this life. Our Lord Jesus dying for sinners and being raised from the dead forms Paul's identity and gives him confidence for the ministry that God has called him to do. that ministry is proclaiming the gospel while he suffers along the way. So reflecting on this, it'd be good for us to think and to ask ourselves, what is most important in my history? How do I view my history? Where is my foundation and my confidence? Some of us place our confidence in past success, or in past, in our birth, because we were born into a certain wonderful family. Some of us think that, well, our family has done well, or we've done well in the past. So that means I'm gonna do well in the future. I'm a successful person. When I look at my past, that's what I see. That's some people, and that's where we're getting our confidence. Some of us are the opposite, and we're completely broken and destroyed by our past. We look at the past, and when we think of the past, all we see is pain, and all we see is our sin, whether it's caused by our own actions or the actions of someone else. Either way, we tend to look back at our history, and then that shapes how we think and feel and act in the present. So Christians, hear this. If Jesus is your Lord and Savior, then I have good news for you. The foundation of your past is not based on what you have done. It's not based on what you have not done. It's not based on what someone else has done to you. Your foundation is based solely upon the work of Jesus Christ. And if you believe in Jesus, then He has already paid for your sins. He has already brought you to new resurrection life if you have been raised from the dead and born again. Sin no longer has a claim on you and neither does anyone else. Your past no longer has claim on you. Your past is Jesus. Your past is His resurrection. You are now a new creation. When you look backward at the past, you must not see success or regret making up your foundation, but the surpassing power of God, God's glory on display through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, for Christ is risen, he is risen indeed, and he's risen in you. You are raised. This is now your history. This is now who you are. And because Christ is risen as those who are united to him, this also has a distinct effect on how we view the future, our future, because it's a resurrection view of the future. Paul talks of this view of the future in verse 14. He says this, knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence. The confident spirit of faith that Paul shares with the psalmist is knowing that the Lord has saved in the past, he continues to save, and that a blessed future awaits those in Christ. In this verse, Paul speaks about two future events that shapes his view of his current reality. He says Christians will be raised and that Christians will be brought into the presence of Jesus. Paul speaks about what will happen after we die. When the Christian dies, his soul leaves his earthly body and goes to be with the Lord. Our lifeless body is then buried into the ground, where the Shorter Catechism reminds us we're so united to Christ that even our body as it lies in the ground is still united to Him. But resurrection means that the body in the ground doesn't stay in the ground. That very same body is made brand new and our soul is reunited in our new creation body. This is what resurrection of the body means. It means taking something that was dead and making it alive again. And when Jesus comes again, all will be raised. But when Paul talks about the resurrection, He's almost always talking about the resurrection of Christians, as all in Christ are raised. And Paul gives us some more detail. He talks about this resurrection event in 1 Corinthians 15, verses 20 through 22. He says, but in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man also has come the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam, all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive." So Paul's future confidence is a resurrection confidence. It's also a confidence that's rooted in resurrection history. Paul speaks here in 1 Corinthians 15 of of a harvest of the resurrection. It's one harvest. Jesus is the first fruits of that harvest. He's already been raised, and now the rest of the crops from that same harvest will be raised when Jesus comes again. This is the one resurrection event. It's already begun with our Lord Jesus Christ, and it's going to continue in the future when we are raised from the dead. If you are united to Jesus Christ, then because He was raised, you know, you can know that you too will be raised. When Paul talks about our future resurrection, he also adds that the saints then will be brought into the very presence of Jesus. And the whole Christian church from all ages, the entire communion of saints will be together in the presence of our Lord and with each other, and we'll see him face to face in one giant worship service. We'll participate in this scene. In this scene, we get a preview of this scene in Revelation chapter 7. After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes, and peoples, and languages, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb. And all the angels were standing around the throne, and around the elders, and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever, amen. That's the scene we'll be participating in in our bodily resurrection with all the saints. I'm sure we're all familiar with the song, I Can Only Imagine. Well, we get some help imagining here what it will be like when we see Jesus face to face as we worship with all the nations. This is Paul's view of the future. the resurrection, and it's all that he can talk about. And Paul knows this future is for all in Christ, and that's why he's so excited. We can relate to being obsessed about something we're excited about. Children, if you've tuned out, tune back in. Have you ever looked forward to something so much that you couldn't sleep, and it was all that you could think about for days and days and days, and maybe even weeks? Some future event that you thought was going to be so amazing you could hardly wait, or maybe it was Christmas, or maybe it was a family member visiting, or maybe it was some kind of special trip that was coming up. We all know what it feels like to be so excited about the future that we can't help but let it consume us in the present, and it's all that we think about. Well, that's what we're called to do about our future resurrection. Although we know many times when we get obsessed about something about the future, we know that if we're honest, sometimes it comes, that thing that we're really excited about. And sometimes it's not as great as we thought it was going to be. Sometimes we've built up some false expectations and we feel a little bit or even very disappointed. Well, it's not possible for Paul, or for us to build up the event of our future resurrection too much. As great as you can think of it as it will be, of being with Christ and his people, it will be infinitely greater and more glorious. The greatest and best future that we can imagine with the Lord and with his people doesn't compare to the glories that await us. And in verse 15, Paul helps us to see them that focusing on our glorious resurrection future will help keep us focused on the things we should be focused on in the present. Our resurrection past and our resurrection future helps us to function in a way that's pleasing to God in the present. It helps us to glorify God now, especially in the midst of long-term trials and suffering. In verse 15, Paul says this, Paul begins this verse by saying, for it is all for your sake Paul can endure all sufferings, all trials of this life, because he knows that death for him means life for the Corinthians, that they will see God's power, his resurrection power, through Paul's suffering. He knows that Christ's resurrection power is on display through his own weaknesses, and that God is making his life-giving resurrection power known through him as he preaches and as he suffers for the gospel. Paul knows that this resurrection power of God on display, what it means is it means more glory for God. See, more suffering for Paul and for the Christian means more making Jesus known. which means more of God's grace being poured out on more and more people. It means more and more people seeing the resurrection power and glory of God on display in Christ. It means more thanksgiving. It means bigger worship services with more people, more grace, more people, more worship, means more and more glory to God. As we suffer in these jars of clay, We display the resurrection power of Jesus in the midst of our suffering. And as God delivers us, his power is on display through our weaknesses. Christ is made known, Christ is glorified. And we are glorifying God as we suffer in our weaknesses when we're bringing glory to God. We're doing what we were created to do. Bring glory to God. We weren't created to suffer, but we were created to bring glory to God. And as God's awesome power is being made known through your weakness, then it becomes a joy to suffer long. Then it becomes a privilege to be living letters that proclaim Christ and his resurrection power to the world through our very lives. As we conclude this evening and we think about this, let us seek to make Paul's resurrection obsession our own obsession. As Christians, we must view our past, our present, and our future through the lens of resurrection. We must go through this life, especially in our suffering, wearing resurrection glasses. Whatever we are going through, we must view the events of our lives through the power of Christ's resurrection. We're constantly called to look back and remember what Christ has done for us in history as he was raised from the dead. That's the past that matters. And then we're called to snap our heads forward to the future to see that glorious resurrection life that awaits us. And then after we've looked back and seen what Christ has done for us in history, and after we see and look forward to what awaits us, then our eyes can settle on the present. Then we can see things as God sees them. Doing this grounds our reality and what is true about us, and helps us to view our present circumstances properly, and helps us to put our hardships in perspective. The resurrection reminds us that our past, whether it be success or failure, whether it be painful or pleasant, is not what defines us today. What defines us today is that we are children of the resurrection, that Jesus has died for us, paid for our sins, and even now continues to heal our wounds. And our blessed future is a resurrection future, and that future is face-to-face with our Lord Jesus, with all the saints, in an eternal worship service before the throne of grace. May the Lord teach us to think like Paul, and may we root all of our reality in the resurrection of Jesus Christ and our resurrection as we are united to Him. Let's pray. Our God and Father, We ask that you would help us to see our successes, to see our failures, and to see our suffering in light of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and our union and guarantee of resurrection in Him. We praise you, our God and Father, for raising the Son so that the Spirit might work in us everlasting life, resurrection life. Amen.