How to Lift Up Those Who Are Down, Part 1

Chip Ingram: Are you tired of taking flak for your faith? Do you find that just because you're a Christian, you have an impossible situation with your family or your work? But what do you do? Don't give up. Stay tuned. God has a word of hope for you today.
Dave Druey: I'm Dave Druey, and this is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. In the series we've just begun called Building Authentic Community: How to Lift Up Those You Love, Chip tackles what to do when a friend's faith isn't just discouraged but genuinely under attack. Chip takes us back to his own freshman year of college when a professor made it his mission, week after week, to dismantle his brand new faith and shows us the Apostle Paul's four-part game plan from 1 Thessalonians chapter 2 for getting back on solid ground. Here's Chip with today's message titled "How to Lift Up Those Who Are Down."
Chip Ingram: I'll never forget the first day of sociology 101. I was 18 years old. I had just become a Christian about seven or eight months before. I had never opened a Bible in my life until I was 18, and so I'd been reading it now about six or seven months. I was overwhelmed with what I was learning. I had zeal, I was excited. The thought of forgiveness and peace and purpose, I was a zealous brand-new whistling-in-the-hall Christian. And then I went to sociology class. You've got to remember, this is 1973. The 60s are rounding to an end. Kent State is barely in the rearview mirror for those of the era. I walk into class and people are filing in and I notice there's an unusual guy sitting on the desk up front. He has, for the day, extremely long hair, which was really unusual then for a teacher at this school. He had frayed jeans, a rather unusual shirt, a headband, sandals, and he was sitting cross-legged on top of his desk. He was warm, he was friendly. He said nothing for the first five or ten minutes. We all sat down and he sat there bow-legged, crossed, looking at us, saying nothing. And then he began to open up, and we found out he was the teacher. Every textbook we studied, whatever you always thought or believed about life, about God, about America, about anything, he had a book to refute it. And he started for the next semester, week after week after week, to challenge every single thing that I believed, and I mean decimated the Christian faith. Now, I don't know the Bible very well. I don't know how to answer any hard questions. And at first, I just thought he's a little unusual, but he had a captive audience. And it wasn't long before he raised some doubts in my heart and the confusion in my soul began to grow. And then I felt inadequate and I couldn't answer the questions. And I wasn't ready to give up my faith because I didn't want to become like this guy, but he was dealing with a lot of issues that I didn't know how to deal with. And I just felt knocked down. I just felt like he took the air out of my sails, he took the whistle off my lips. Whatever joy I was experiencing, I spent most of my time semi-confused and insecure and struggling and just feeling kind of beat down. His arguments weren't good enough or strong enough to really cause me to question the depths of my faith, but they were strong enough just to keep me messed up most of the time. And my observation is it's only a matter of time before something or someone attacks your faith, that will raise doubts in your heart, confusion in your soul, and a sense of inadequacy in your mind. In fact, you might have a work situation where there's such a culture of unbelief that basically, day after day, it just assaults your faith and makes you feel lower or smaller because you're a believer. Or you might have an antagonistic family member. That works well. You know someone that just whatever you say, they have a little needle and their goal is to pop the balloon of your life whenever they get a chance. Or I've had a couple of quote "intellectual" relatives. And you get together three or four times a year and they just keep asking these questions that at this point in your life, you know someone has good answers, but you don't. Or you have the fellow student or teammate that just keeps looking at you: "You really believe that stuff? Are you kidding? Don't both brain cells work with you? I mean, I don't get it. I thought you were a reasonable person." Or finally, there's the old friends who just question your new-found faith and say, "How long is it going to last? How long are you going to go through this phase?" And so the question I want to ask and answer tonight is how do we encourage those people whose faith is being knocked down? That's what we want to ask and answer today. And God has a game plan. And the game plan at first sounds really kind of weird. You know what the game plan is? Remember, remember, remember. The Bible is replete with the importance of remembering. In fact, in the Old Testament, the Bible will say, "Be careful lest you forget the Lord your God." Moses, when he took the second generation in, you know what he named the book? Deuteronomy, the second law. You know what the key word in the book of Deuteronomy is? Remember, remember, remember, remember. Because you know what happened? The first group forgot. They forgot God's great acts, they forgot His great ways, and they didn't follow Him. Now, the Apostle Paul, as we learned, went into a Greek town of about 200,000 people, Thessalonica. Planted a church, it started to multiply, it started to grow, it started to mushroom. They were becoming well-known. I mean, they were on fire and making incredible impact. And then some people came along and started slandering Paul, slandering their faith, poking fun, just a little criticism. "Oh, you know that Paul? Yeah, we heard about him. He's just out for your money. Oh, all that new Christianity stuff? Oh man, it's dying out. Or we've heard this, we've heard that." And they kept poking and poking and poking, until by the time Timothy came back to give the report, he said, "Paul, they're really doing well. But man, they are taking it on the chin. Week in and week out, people are questioning your motives, they're questioning your message, they're questioning the validity of the Thessalonians' faith." And you know, I've got to be honest with you, Paul, they're having a great impact, but you know they're going through some hard times. And so in chapter 2, verses 1 to 12, 1 Thessalonians, guess what Paul does? He causes them to remember the most important things in their life in order to restore their perspective so that they grow through their faith being knocked down. How do you help? How do you encourage people whose faith is being attacked or slandered? Now, I'd like to read through the passage. And as I read it, here's what I want you to do. I want you to pull out a pen. I'm going to put you to work. We're going to do a little Bible study. Whenever you read a passage of scripture, words or phrases or concepts that are repeated are often the key to understanding the passage. Because if they're repeated once, twice, three times, they're important. If they're repeated five, six, seven times, they're probably the theme of what's being taught. So let's listen to what the Apostle Paul does. First, in verses 1 and 2, he reminds them of their reception of the message. He says, "For you yourselves know, brethren, that our coming to you was not in vain. But after we already suffered and been mistreated in Philippi, as you know, we had the boldness in our God to speak to you the gospel of God amid such opposition." Put a little box around "you yourselves know" in verse 1. And then verse 2, put a little box around "you know." First two verses. Isn't it interesting that he's "you know, you yourselves know"? He's bringing things back to their memory. Notice in verses 3 through 6, he reminds them of the character of the messengers: he, Timothy, and Silas. He says, "For our exhortation does not come from error or impurity or by way of deceit." "But just as we've been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak. Not as pleasing men, but God, who examines our hearts. For we never came with flattering speech, as you know." Put a box around that. "Nor with a pretext for greed, God is our witness. Nor did we seek glory from men, either from you or from others, even though as apostles of Christ we might have asserted our authority." Put a box around "as you know" in verse 5. Next, he reminds them of the ministry they received in verses 7 through 11. He goes, "But we proved to be gentle among you, as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her children. Having thus a fond affection for you, we were well-pleased to impart to you not only the gospel of God, but also our own lives. Why? Because you had become very dear to us." Verse 9, put a box around the next phrase: "For you recall, brethren, our labor and hardship." "How working night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you, we proclaimed to you the gospel of God." Notice verse 10: "You are witnesses." What's that do? It reminds them. Put a box around that. "You are witnesses, and so is God, how devoutly and uprightly and blamelessly we behaved toward you believers. Just as," verse 11, "you know how we were exhorting and encouraging and imploring each of you, as a father would his own children." Why? Paul reminds them of the results in their lives when they received the message. Resulting in "that you may walk in a manner worthy of God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory."
Dave Druey: You're listening to Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram, and we'll pick the message back up in just a moment. Quick question: Is Chip's teaching already on your phone? The Chip Ingram app puts his messages, video teachings, and daily encouragement right in your pocket. So you're never more than a tap away from something like what you're hearing right now. It's completely free and it only takes a minute to download, wherever you get your apps. Okay, now let's get back to today's message.
Chip Ingram: Now, just by way of doing a little Bible study, by the way, this is what I do. I'll read a passage over and over and over, and any concept that is repeated, then I'll circle it or underline it. Look at verse 1: "you yourselves know." Verse 2: "you know." Skip down to verse 5: "as you know." Skip down to verse 9: "for you recall." Verse 10: "you are witnesses." Verse 11: "you know." Are you getting the idea that possibly the Apostle Paul, writing to these people whose faith is being undermined, that he wants them to remember something? Could this be a possibility? Why? See, there's something extremely powerful about remembering. What we tend to do is see the problem on the horizon, and it doesn't have to be very big, but as that problem gets closer and closer and closer, what happens? We lose perspective and we lose sight of all of this, let alone all that happened behind us. And one of the great ways to get perspective is to pull that problem back in light of history and what God has done and who He is and what you've experienced. Then all of a sudden, it's just a little pebble to deal with. But when you're looking at it right through here, it looks pretty big, doesn't it? And so the Apostle Paul is going to teach the Thessalonians: remembering God's work in the past is the key to getting perspective for doing His will in the present. That's what He's going to teach them. And now what I'd like to do is I'd like to give you four key principles to help people who are faltering. Here's how to help them. First thing I think you need to do is help them remember the day. Just remember that phrase: remember the day. You've got a friend, you've got a son, you've got a daughter, you've got a mom, you've got a dad, you've got a brother, you've got a sister, whoever it is, help them remember the day they came to Christ. Notice what Paul says in verse 1: "For you yourselves know, brethren, that our coming to you wasn't in vain." It means it wasn't empty. It's in a tense of the verb that means we came and something happened and the results are continuing in prosperity. He goes on in verse 2: "But after we had already suffered and been mistreated." He said, "Remember, we were in Philippi." Man, we got our heads bashed in. They took the clothes off our back. They threw us in prison. We were Roman citizens. We were publicly humiliated. For doing what? For preaching the gospel. And yet even though we went through that, you know that we had the boldness in our God. I like the NIV's translation. It says, "We dared to speak to you about the gospel of God amid such opposition." Let me give you a couple of things as you try and encourage people about remembering their day when they were saved. First, help them remember their experience. Now, we're in a day where people take experiences to an extreme, but sometimes in the church, we go the opposite direction. When's the last time you just sat down and really pondered your experience? Where you were in your life? What would have happened if you hadn't trusted Christ? Think of all the things that have changed. When's the last time you really thought about that? Well, guess what? The way God wants you to encourage other people, He wants you to remind them through a letter this week or through a phone call or through an invitation to lunch or through an email. He wants you to do something to spur them on to remember the very day that they were saved. To reminisce, if you will. It will be a powerful experience and it'll give them perspective. The second thing you might want to do to help others is help them remember the price tag and the sacrifice of those who shared it. You know, sometimes we look at our salvation experience just through our lens. The Apostle Paul, in stirring up their memory, you know he does something. He says, "You know, this stuff preaching the gospel, it's not cheap and it's not easy." He said, "The last major town I did it in was Philippi. I got beat up, I got stripped publicly, I ended up in jail, and then I got run out of town." Now, thinking human beings realize that when that happens to you, keep your mouth shut next time. The Apostle Paul says though, a very interesting word. It has the idea of confidence and courage combined. And as you look at the translation, some of them translate the confidence and others the courage. "We had boldness or we dared to speak even though there was a lot of opposition." What do you think the message is to the Thessalonians? You matter. Hey, you really matter. Last time we shared this message, we got beat up. When we came into town, we knew it was going to be a rough situation, and we dared to speak. We boldly proclaimed the message because that's how much you matter to God. When's the last time you thought of the price tag of the people who shared Christ with you? The life lesson: you need to remember the day for yourself for sure. That's not the life lesson. You need to remember the day for others. But here's the life lesson: sow the seed wildly. Sow the seed of the gospel wildly. Past difficulty is not a prediction of future impact. We need to remember that. Jesus in his parable told us only 25 percent of the time people would respond well. In the parable of the soils, sow the seed wildly. Just every time, every opportunity, tell people. Tell them there's an answer for sin, there's forgiveness, it's Christ, He came, He loves them, He wants to give them peace, He wants to give them a new life, He wants to forgive them from the just wrath of God. Sow it wildly. That's what the Apostle Paul does. And then remember the day. Remember the day that you were saved, it will give perspective and encourage others. Whatever you can do to encourage them to remember the day they were saved. Second principle here is not only remember the day, but Paul says: remember the people. We need to remember the people that God used in our life. Because when our faith is a little shaky, bringing back to mind those people and remembering their character and remembering later their love will help us get perspective. Notice what Paul says in verse 3. He says, "For our exhortation or our appeal does not come from error," it means delusion, "or impurity." It had no sexual connotations. "Or by way of deceit." Now you say, "Why would he say sexual connotations?" In that day, every Tom, Dick, and Harry was roaming around the Roman Empire and they were doing their little tricks. And they did their little tricks either to hoodwink, they were charlatans, just like today. And they did it to get a following, to get self-promotion, to get money, and then most of the ancient religions had some sort of sexual deal hooked in with them. And the leaders were highly involved in it. And so the Apostle Paul, defending himself, he says, "When we came, it wasn't error, no impurity sexually, and no trickery or deceit." The word means literally a bait, like for a fish. He says, "But just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak." We've been approved by God. God's approval is on our life and we have been entrusted. We are stewards of the gospel, so we speak. How? Not as pleasing people, but God, and he says, "who examines our hearts." The character of the servants of the gospel message, he says, "we were straight shooters." Notice verse 5, he says, "For we never came with flattering speech." We would call it a con-man. It's the idea of leading people along, getting them to follow you, building into their confidence until the point you take them down a different path. And the whole goal of the different path is you fleece them, either emotionally, monetarily, or sexually. He says, "Not us. We never came with flattery, as you know, nor with pretext," or it's literally a mask, "no hypocrisy." "We didn't come for greed or money." He says, "God's our witness. Nor did we seek glory from men. This wasn't about self-promotion or making a name or trying to be a somebody. Either from you or others, even though, by the way, let's get this straight, as apostles, we had every right to exercise some authority, but we didn't even do that. We gave away our apostolic rights in order to serve you."
Dave Druey: You're listening to Living on the Edge with a message titled "How to Lift Up Those Who Are Down." Now, if you missed any part of today's teaching, you can catch up anytime at livingontheedge.org. Today, Chip pointed us back to the people who first modeled real integrity for our faith. People who showed us love in action long before we'd done anything to deserve it. That's really what love was always meant to be, not something we wait around to feel, but something we decide, on purpose, especially toward the people who make it hardest. That's the entire premise of Chip's book, I Choose Love: a clear, compelling case for treating love as a daily decision instead of a passing emotion. It unpacks what the Bible actually means by agape love and gives you a practical, workable way to live it out. Get your copy of I Choose Love at a special price today at livingontheedge.org/offers. This ministry runs on the generosity of listeners who believe teaching like this belongs on the air. Make that same choice today. Give whatever you're able and put your support behind a message that's reaching people who need exactly this right now. Every dollar helps keep this ministry going. Give online at livingontheedge.org or call our team at 888-333-6003. Or send your gift by mail to Living on the Edge, PO Box 3007, Suwanee, Georgia 30024. And by the way, if you'd like to catch every message as it comes out, subscribe to the Living on the Edge podcast wherever you get your podcasts. So a new lesson from Chip is waiting for you the moment it releases. No searching required.