What if I told you that the most difficult situation
or person in your life right now is actually
a tool in God's hands to accomplish his biggest
and best purpose in your life? You want to learn
how this works? Stay with me. Welcome to this
edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram.
Our mission is to inspire Christians to be genuine
followers of Jesus and to empower them to be
active disciple makers in our world. And does
that idea Chip just posed sound strange? Maybe
even a bit hurtful that God would allow us to
experience pain and hardships? Well, today Chip
will help us get a better perspective toward
our toughest adversities by revealing a simple
equation that'll lead us to a more content, joy
-filled life. But before he continues our series,
I Choose Joy, if this is your first time listening
or you want to learn more about what we do, go
to livingontheedge .org. You'll find resources
there on tons of topics and countless programs
to enjoy. Or if you prefer, the Chip Ingram app
is also a great way to get plugged in with our
ministry. Well, if you have a Bible, go to Philippians
1, verse 12, for Chip's talk, Understanding the
Power of Purpose. What's a circumstance in your
life that's tough? Is there anything in your
life right now that you say, if God really loves
me, if He cares for me, and I'm obeying Him,
I'm doing all that I know, That is right. What's
going on? I don't get it. Well, you're not alone.
And so if you pull out your teaching notes, I
want you to do a little exercise with me. It
says sometimes the shortest distance between
two points is a zigzag line. Now, I want to say
that again. Sometimes the distance between point
A and point B, unlike in geometry where it's
a straight line with God. Sometimes the distance
between point A, this is where you're at right
now. This is where you're at in your life, in
your singleness, in your marriage, in your work,
in your health. Point A, God wants to take you
to point B. The way we think, and especially
those of you that were really good in geometry,
unlike me, is we think, you know, point A, point
B, straight line. That's how you get there. In
God's economy, mark it down. The shortest distance
between two points is a zigzag line. I will never
forget Dr. Sanuki and sharing that. I can't tell
you what the message is all about. I can't tell
you when and where I was, but what I can tell
you is a paradigm shifted in my mind. A paradigm
shifted, and I realized that when I'm at point
A and when I'm convinced God wants me at point
B, when I don't get there right away or when
I hit barriers and there's time issues and people
issues and health issues and struggle issues
and marriage issues and kid issues and at times
when I was single, just, God, am I ever going
to get married issues? It was beginning to say,
wow, this shortest distance. is a zigzag line.
This is going to be very, very helpful. I want
you to get out a pen right now. Come on, pull
it out. Okay, just really quick. And right underneath
that, where it says a zigzag line, I want you
to put a dot on one side, and then all the way
over on the other side of the page, put another
dot. And then I want you to actually draw a zigzag
line. And while you're doing that, let me just
give you a couple examples so that I'm not just
making this up. You know, we're studying the
book of Philippians, the Apostle Paul. Now, God
interrupts his life and reveals himself and takes
him to Arabia and says, okay, this is what you're
going to do. You are my man to the Gentiles.
Your mission is to take the gospel to the whole
world. And he goes on these missionary trips
and he plants all these churches. And I mean,
God is using him. It's an amazing story. And
so his point A, God has spoke to me. Point B,
take the gospel to the whole world. Now, do you
realize how many times years after year after
year, he was in prison? I mean, he's gotta be
saying, wait, wait, wait, wait a second. You
told me to take the gospel to the whole world.
Now I'm in prison for this. Now I'm in prison
for this. Now I'm in prison for that. How's this
ever gonna happen? Well, guess where Paul wrote
a great number of all the letters inspired by
the Holy Spirit that we read today while he was
in prison? The most strategic way that God's
word would go all around the world then and now,
this man wrote 13 books. You see, God had a zigzag
plan, but Paul couldn't see it. Or take David.
God calls David to be the king, and Samuel anoints
him, and this young man, and he says, David,
you're going to be the king. And Saul has been
cast aside, and he's turned away. And David,
I'm sure he's like, wow, I'm too young, but okay.
He's anointed as king, and for the next 10 plus
or minus years, he dodges spears, hides in caves,
loses his wife, has everyone turn against him,
and wonders, God, if this is what it's like to
be king, what's the deal? But you see, the zigzag
line he was preparing. David. And he was preparing
the circumstance. And you can look at Joseph.
You can look at Moses. You can look at the children
of Israel. You can look at your life. You can
study church history. You can look at the lives
of people that you really admire, that God has
greatly used and have great character. And I
will tell you this, the game plan was a zig.
Zach Lyons. What I want to help you do is learn
we can actually choose joy when we know that
these current circumstances, God actually is
using them. There is a purpose behind them. It's
not linear. It's not always the way we think.
You got it? Now, for those of you that weren't
with us in our last session, let me do a very,
very quick review. I have a question before we
move on. This is a pitcher of water. And the
question is, is it half full or is it half empty?
Now, you know, you don't necessarily need to
vote. Raise your hand. But, you know, is it half
full or is it half empty? And of course, you
know the answer, right? The answer is yes. It
is half full and it is half empty. And in this
series, what we're learning is that it's your
focus. How do you look at that? It's your perspective.
If this picture represents your life, your relationships,
all that's going on, there are some people that
spend their entire life focusing on what they
don't have, what's not yet. And they're down
and they're discouraged and they blame people
and they blame God and they're pretty negative.
And some of it just goes inside our heads because
we all struggle with this. And there's other
people who realize everybody's life is going
to have some big empty issues, some struggles,
some challenges, but their focus is, look at
what I do have. Look at what God has done. And
they focus not denying what's empty, not pretending
it's not there, not pretending there's not needs,
but look, it's half full. And so on your notes,
what I want to do by way of review is simply
say this, C plus P equals E. That's our little
formula. That's our formula for choosing joy.
Circumstances plus perspective equals our experience.
This whole series about choosing joy is learning
moment by moment, day by day, into everything
of life to get God's perspective, to look at
a lens. Lens number one was, you'll see in your
notes, key is focus. Jot that down, will you?
Your focus. The key question to ask when you're
sliding, when you get discouraged, when you don't
understand, when someone really ticks you off,
here's the question. Where's my focus? Key number
two is purpose. You see, when I look at life,
the ups and downs, the zigs and especially the
zags, I need to ask myself, what's my purpose?
I want to look at circumstances and challenges
and difficulties through the lens of purpose.
But what I want you to see is the structure of
this passage. Verse 12, he's going to give his
thesis. He's going to tell us, this is what I
want you to know. And then in each one of the
verses, it's like a lawyer. He's presenting like
his argument. And he has exhibit A, exhibit B,
exhibit C. I'm going to show you that he's going
to look at his life through the lens of God's
purpose and whether he's zigging or zagging.
He will end this section with, and I rejoice.
So follow along. Here's his thesis, verse 12.
Now, I want you to know, brethren, that my circumstances
have turned out for the greater progress of the
gospel, underlying greater progress and underlying
gospel. And then he's going to tell us how those
difficult circumstances kind of help the gospel
go forth. Exhibit A. He says, so that my imprisonment
in the cause of Christ has become well known
throughout the whole Praetorian Guard and to
everyone else. And that most of the brethren
trusting in the Lord because of my imprisonment
have far more courage to speak the word of God
without fear. And then he goes into some of the
challenges and some things that were happening.
Some to be sure are preaching Christ even from
envy and strife, but some also from goodwill.
The latter do it out of love, knowing that I'm
appointed for the defense of the gospel. The
former proclaimed Christ out of selfish ambition,
rather than pure motives, thinking to cause me
distress in my imprisonment. And then his kind
of attitude toward it all. You know, what then,
or literally, what's it matter? Only that in
every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ
is proclaimed. And in this, I circle the word,
rejoice. Okay, here's his thesis. This church
that loves him, that was birthed in Philippi,
has heard, Our beloved apostle, church planner,
our friend, our brother, well, he's in Rome now.
And we've heard that he's in prison and they
know what the prisons are like. And we'll learn
later in the book, this was the very little,
only the church at this time that was supporting
him financially. And so they had sent Epaphroditus
to go meet him and bring a financial gift. And
in that day, they didn't serve you food. You
had to have friends and people to take care of
you. And so they're concerned about Paul. And
this letter, he's writing back to reassure them
it's okay. And so here's his premise. I want
you to know, because you're concerned, I want
you to know that my circumstances, the difficulties,
the challenges you've heard about are turning
out for the greater progress. The word greater
progress, had you underlined? The word means
advancement. It's a military term. It was a term
that when an army was coming through and they
would have a barrier of trees, they would cut
down trees, they would get rid of all the brush,
but they would remove every barrier so that army
could continue to advance. And it says, I want
you to know that it's difficult for sure. I am
in prison, just as you've heard, but here's the
deal. It's caused the gospel, the good news.
And for some of us that didn't grow up in the
church, The gospel is not some formula, okay?
Can I pause just a moment? Can we park? I mean,
just for a second. The gospel is a compound word,
good news, or literally it's happy news. And
what it is, it's an announcement. It's not like,
here's how you ought or should to live. The announcement
is. All men of all time are in chains and bondage
to sin. And we fall short of God's holiness.
And God, the second person of the Trinity, came
to earth. He lived a perfect life. He died upon
the cross and he paid for my sin and your sins
and the sins of all people of all time. And then
he rose from the dead. And he demonstrated that
it's true. And the good news, the happy news,
the early church wasn't saying, you have to believe
this and you need to do this. And why don't you
start living this way? And your morals need to
be this way. No, they were just going to say,
look, there's happy news. We all know that we
fall short. We all know that we've sinned. God
visited the planet. He died in our place. Our
sins are forgiven. Will you receive it? I mean,
it was like just going around and telling people,
this is amazing. And so Paul says, my circumstances
have turned out for the advancement of this message,
this amazing, powerful message. The gospel he
would write to the Romans is the power of God
to salvation, to every single person who believes,
to the Jew first and also to the Greek. You're
listening to Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram,
and he'll be right back to continue our series.
But quickly, if you're eager to do a deeper study
of Philippians chapter one, check out Chip's
newest book, I Choose Joy. And right now we have
a special deal exclusively for you, our faithful
listeners. So stick around after the teaching
to learn more. With that, here's Chip to finish
this insightful message. Now, he's going to make
his point. So, Paul, okay, you say it's an advancement.
We're still concerned about you. How does it
advance the gospel? Exhibit A, the gospel goes
forth. Jot that word in. The gospel goes forth.
He says, so that my imprisonment in the cause
of Christ has become, put a line under, well
known throughout the whole Praetorian Guard and
to everyone else. Now, again, we've got to get
a little context here. We read this through our
21st century lens. The Roman Empire is in absolute
control. By this time, Nero happens to be the
emperor, and he is worshipped as God, and emperor
worship is very big. But it's a Greek culture,
so there's gods on every corner. Now, in the
midst of all these gods and emperor worship and
this heavy -handed, strong Roman world, there
was an itinerant preacher who came. He claimed
to be God. He claimed to fulfill all these prophecies.
He was rejected by his own people. He died. He
rose from the dead. And 500 witnesses actually
met him for 40 days in a resurrected body. And
he told them, I want you to go into all the world
and declare and proclaim that people's sins are
forgiven. And now the barrier between God and
man is... and you can have a personal relationship
with God. And so there's this little sect that
early they were called the way before they were
called Christians. In other words, the way, the
path, this is how you get to God. Now it's AD
62 or 63. Jesus has only been resurrected like
30 plus years in this huge Roman empire. And
there's all these religions. So how in the world,
how in the world does God give his key spokesman,
a platform. And he says, everyone, everywhere,
and especially this Praetorian guard, they know
I'm here for the gospel. This is the platform
of the known world. And after 30 years, God takes
these difficult circumstances so that Paul is
declaring the greatest truth that this planet
has ever, ever heard. And all people know is
they're spoken evil of because they're weird.
I mean, people are selling their homes and meeting
the needs of the poor. They touch lepers. They
meet secretly. They're absolutely committed to
one another. They're radical in their faith.
They keep talking about this dead man that came
back to life. No matter what we do, we can't
get rid of them. I mean, they were just a pain
in the rear. I mean, we march them into the coliseums,
and we let loose the lions. They sing praises
to God, and they're asking God to forgive us
as we do it. Nero actually took them and wrapped
them. This is a bit graphic, but he would wrap
these Christians who wouldn't recant in tar,
and then he would put them on poles, and he would
light them for his cocktail parties. They would
sing praises to God. Paul is saying, this little
30 -year movement, this sect, is getting global
coverage because I'm here. It's turned up for
the greater progress of the gospel. And by the
way, you talk about a viral movement. Here's
a viral movement. The Praetorian guards, every
six hours, one of these guards gets chained to
me. And you don't know what a Praetorian guard
is. If you were an emperor at this time, the
way that you normally lost your job is you were
assassinated. And it might be a military coup,
or it might be one of your sons, or it might
be someone competing for power. And so what the
emperors would do, they would develop what was
called a Praetorian Guard. And basically, it
was an army, an army of somewhere between 10
,000 to 20 ,000. And these were like the Green
Beret, the Navy SEALs, I mean, the greatest warriors,
the most gifted, the best trained. I mean, these
were the, you know, absolute... cream of the
cream of the cream. And their job was to be loyal
to the emperor. And I mean, they were esteemed.
And so every six hours, he has a different one.
So Claudius comes in, and he's chained to Paul.
So what are you in for? Hey, I'm glad you asked.
Have you ever heard of Jesus? Another six hours,
you know. Augustus comes in, then Bob, then Fred,
then Joe. I mean, can you imagine being chained
to the apostle Paul for six hours? He comes to
Christ. He comes to Christ. He comes to Christ.
He comes to Christ. He comes to Christ. He comes
to Christ. And what happens? What we find is
that the book of Acts will learn that actually
people in the household of Herod are coming to
Christ. And all I want you to get is sometimes
the zigzag line of difficult circumstances causes
the gospel to go forward. What are you going
through? What are you going through right now
that God wants to use so that other people, so
the gospel can go forth? How you respond to the
difficulty, the pain, the injustice, what's happening
at work, or what your ex is saying, or what's
happening with one of your kids, or a health
issue that everyone's going, wow, how do you
even get through this? God wants to use your
present circumstances, exhibit A, for the furtherance
of the gospel, but that's not all. Exhibit B.
Here's another good thing that happened. The
church grows stronger. Notice what he says. And
that most of the brethren trusting in the Lord,
notice the phrase, because of my imprisonment,
have far more courage to speak the word of God
without fear. See, when we step up, when he's
in the midst of this and he's being bold, the
rest of us go, wow, you know something? The Praetorian
Guard, the church was being persecuted. And now
they say, you know, Paul can do it in prison.
I can do it. Sometimes adversity and difficult
circumstances cause the gospel to go forth. And
sometimes difficulty, circumstance, you know
what it does? It builds the body. It causes the
church to grow. This is Living on the Edge with
Chip Ingram, and you've been listening to Part
1 of Chip's message, Understanding the Power
of Purpose, from our series, I Choose Joy. Chip
will be back shortly to share some helpful application
for us to think about. It's safe to say we all
want a little more joy in our lives, right? But
what does that look like? Is it just about finding
happiness or pleasure in something? Will those
feelings really sustain us through the hard knocks
of life? In this eight -part series, Chip explains
why joy that comes from God is more than just
an emotion. Discover how it can change your perspective
on life and profoundly strengthen your faith
in challenging times. To learn more about this
study in Philippians chapter 1, visit livingontheedge
.org or the Chip Ingram app. Well, our Bible
teacher, Chip Ingram, is with me now in studio
to share a quick word with all of you. Thanks,
Dave. You know, we're living in very uncertain
and at times volatile times. The stock market
goes up crazy and then down. We got social issues,
political issues, a lot of division. And then
you have an enemy who has darts of fear and uncertainty
that he brings to people's mind. There's an antidote
to that. Regardless of where you are and what
you've been through or what the people you love
have been through, you can choose joy. You don't
have to wait for it to happen. We're not a victim
of our circumstances, but we need to understand.
How do you really experience joy even when all
the external things are challenging? How do you
combat anxiety and depression and you don't measure
up and life's not worth living? Let me encourage
you. I just wrote a brand new book called I Choose
Joy. It's based on Philippians chapter one. And
if you know someone that's hurting, let me encourage
you to get it. Well, we are really excited about
this new book, Chip, which is why we're doing
something special for our listeners this week.
Absolutely, Dave, because we believe so strongly
in the life -changing power of choosing joy.
We want you, the Living on Edge family, to get
this new book before anyone else does at a discounted
price. Dave, could you take a minute and tell
our listeners a bit more of what we're doing
for them and why this is so important? Be glad
to. Well, like Chip said, we want you to truly
experience the joy the Apostle Paul talked about
through every circumstance of life. So to help
you do that, we're giving you, our faithful Living
on the Edge listeners, early access to this new
book at a special price. So visit livingontheedge
.org or call 888 -333 -6003 to take advantage
of this exclusive offer. You'll be glad you did.
Well, before we go, here's Chip to share a final
word. As we close today's program, I want to
remind you of the little formula that we're talking
about. I'd encourage you to, you know, put this
in the notes in your phone, maybe write it on
a three by five card, put it on the mirror in
the bathroom. C plus P equals E. C stands for
circumstance plus perspective equals your experience.
And we're going to learn four basic questions
to ask that will give you God's perspective.
The first question is, where's your focus? Remember,
that was from the early part of chapter one.
Is it inward or is it upward and outward? And
now we're asking, what's your purpose? It's amazing
how the lens of interpreting your circumstances.
alters radically when you think about God's purposes
for your life. What is he doing? The Apostle
Paul in this passage actually takes what is a
horrendous situation in prison, and he looks
at it through the lens of God's purpose and says,
wow, this is pretty cool. I'm here in the center
of the world. I'm chained to these guys that
have all this impact, and the gospel is going
to go forward. I mean, this is great. Instead
of, I'm in chains and God, where are you? And
this isn't fair and this doesn't work. I said
at the beginning of the broadcast that sometimes
the most difficult person or situation in your
life is actually a tool that God is using to
accomplish his best and biggest purposes through
your life. I'd like you to ponder and kind of
look backward in your own mind's eye and think
some really hard things or difficult things that...
Really, you wanted something to happen, but they
didn't, and now you look back and go, oh, thank
you, God. You know, like dating that person you
thought you would marry, but you didn't, and
you think of who you have now. Or in my case,
I remember, oh, I so wanted to be the pastor
of this one church, and I'd been at this tiny
little church for like seven or eight years,
and we went through the whole process, and we
got to the end, and they said no. And I was devastated.
Oh, God, I can't believe it. I think I'm perfect
for that situation. A year later, I went to Santa
Cruz Bible Church. And that was, I mean, a revolution
in my life. In the last few years, I've had a
back problem, and I had every treatment, and
then finally surgery. And it's like, this is
so hard. This is so difficult. Oh, God, I just
want you to know, whatever you want to accomplish
through this, will you do it? And I look back
now and it was my back that allowed me to see
I was overextended, that allowed me to refocus
my life. And God is doing things that I never
dreamed. Here's my question for you. What's God's
agenda or purpose in your life right now? And
what good does he want to bring out of what you're
currently experiencing? Ask him and he'll tell
you. Good word, Chip. As we close, if Living
on the Edge is making a difference in your life
and you'd like others to receive the same blessing,
we'd love for you to partner with us. Thanks
to the generosity of some ministry friends, every
gift we receive between now and June 30th will
be matched dollar for dollar. To send a gift,
go to livingontheedge .org or call us at 888
-333 -6003. That's 888 -333 -6003 or visit livingontheedge
.org. App listeners, tap donate. We'll listen
in next time as Chip picks up in his series,
I Choose Joy. Until then, this is Dave Drewy
saying thanks for joining us for this edition
of Living on the Edge.