Receiving and Extending the Comfort of the Lord

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Ray Ortlund
For from his fullness, we have all received grace upon grace. Only grace upon grace upon grace upon grace is true grace. And that is exactly what he is filled to overflowing.

Sam Allberry
maturity in the Christian life is needing Jesus more, not the Jesus less believer. We don’t kind of graduate out of needing him

Ray Ortlund
Welcome back to you’re not crazy. Gospel sanity for young pastors. I’m Ray ortlund. I’m with my friend, Sam Albury, right. And here’s why we’re doing this. Sam and I believe in you. We believe in your future, we we value your ministry. And we are here to Jesus said to Peter, strengthen your brothers. And that’s what we’re doing here. And sort of the foundational commitment of this podcast is our reverence for both gospel doctrine and gospel culture. And gospel doctrine is the message of God’s grace for the undeserving gospel culture is the experience the shared experience in a church community, the experience of God’s grace for the undeserving. And Sam, we want in this episode to press into this area of since life is foundationally, painful and disappointing. Tears are inevitable losses. griefs, sorrows, a major theme in Gospel centered pastoral ministry is bringing the comfort of the Lord, to suffering people. So let’s, let’s just jump in what what has God taught you, Sam, about receiving and receiving the comfort of the Lord? And extending that sharing that turning that around and giving that to others as well?

Sam Allberry
Yeah, I mean, there have been, as you know, that, as is the case, for many people, there have been some some very dark seasons that I’ve been through over the years. And although I wouldn’t want to go through those again, or wish them on anybody else that they were sweetened by having a sense of comfort from the Lord, that I think those have been the times I felt closest to God, strangely enough. And the two main ways I’ve certainly felt myself receiving God’s comfort one is through his people, and one is through his word. So in terms of through his people, I can think of a very dear friends who’ve who’ve walked with come alongside, prayed with me, encouraged me, I remember Ray sitting in your, your living room, probably about three years ago, in a very, very dark season. And I don’t think we’ve known each other long at that point. But I remember you asking me a question that has stayed with me ever since. And I’ve, I’ve since asked others this question, and it’s ministered to them as well. I remember you saying to me, I was feeling nothing but condemnation, accusation, uselessness, failure. Everywhere I looked, all I could see in myself was was just failure. And use, you asked me the question. Do you think Jesus regrets getting involved with you? And it was such a helpful question because I thought the answer can’t be yes. Because then Jesus is an idiot. And whatever else I know about the universe, Jesus is not a fool. Which must mean Jesus doesn’t regret having got involved in my life, which must mean, I’m not a lost cause. And things aren’t hopeless. That one question I don’t know. Whether that was a question that just came to you in the moment or whether it’s something you had pondered yourself, but that really helped. That really helped. I’m so grateful. And a couple of scriptures in that season particularly helped us while I was reading through Romans eight and minding my own business as we do. And in that list towards the end of the chapter where Paul asks, What What shall separate us from the love of Christ? I had never noticed before, as he as he lists out some of the things that we might think could separate us from the love of Christ. He drops in the word distress. So verse 35, Who shall separate us from the from the love of Christ or tribulation or distress or persecution or famine? or nakedness or danger or sword. I’ve never noticed the word distress but distress was what I was feeling and distress of a magnitude that that could make me think everything must have gone profoundly wrong with my Christian life, if I’m feeling this way. Oh, God must hate my guts. So it was a great comfort from the Lord to think as you know, my experience of distress, can’t separate me from the love of Christ, that above the clouds and the storms as I’m experiencing them, there is the sunshine of the love of Christ. And then the other one is, is in Matthew 11 A verse we’ve we’ve mentioned before, but But Jesus saying, Come to me all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. And just thinking actually, what Jesus wants for me is, is restful, my soul. He’s not he’s not wanting to torment me. There’ll be times where he does allow me to go through trials, there’d be times when he does rightly discipline me. But he’s, he’s actually wanting me to find rest in Him. And that was a comfort even if it felt a little theoretical. To think now that that is, that is his goal for my heart is to is to find rest in him.

Ray Ortlund
When he sees high maintenance, sinful us coming toward him with yet more need. He’s not rolling his eyes. Thinking, look, you should you should get it by now. Yeah. Nor is he thinking, Oh, no, I feel overwhelmed. I feel outclassed. What do I do? When high maintenance sinful us move toward him. He lights up. For from his fullness. We have all received grace upon grace. Only grace upon grace upon grace upon grace is true grace. And that is exactly what he is filled with, to overflowing. Yeah, he’s not intimidated by our failings and shortcomings and portrayals. It’s amazing.

Sam Allberry
And I think one of the things I’ve learned in recent years is that maturity in the Christian life is needing Jesus more, not leaving Jesus less I believe that we don’t kind of graduate out of of needing him.

Ray Ortlund
So we’re pastors who sin and suffer, caring for people who sin and suffer. The Ministry of the comfort of the Lord lies at the center of our calling. Course Isaiah 53 says that Jesus is a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He is personally familiar with everything that we go through, yet without sin. And He so following Jesus inevitably means more suffering. Yeah. If we’re following the man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, we will become men of sorrows acquainted with grief. Hopefully, that’s not that’s not something to brace ourselves against. It’s a privilege. It’s a privilege to follow Jesus into suffering. But we also follow Jesus through suffering. He takes us there, but he doesn’t leave us there. For example, in second Corinthians chapter one, verse 10, 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. So this life is a story of suffering and deliverance, suffering and deliverance. Now, the reason why I lean into that is this. It’s the whole question of suffering and comfort. It’s another both and, and we never want to take one of God’s sacred both hands and break it apart into our own either or both and both. I am broken, and he has grace to deliver me. If all we’re saying is, Oh, I’m so broken. I’m so broken, I’m so unable. It becomes self focused and even self pitying. There is not only for example, sicker Second Corinthians one eight, this is a very honest verse. We do not want you to be unaware brothers of the affliction we experienced in Asia, for we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. That is raw, that is real, that is transparent. It’s not self pitying. He was they were pushed to the edge of their own capacities. So, we have biblical warrant for honestly facing the buffeting of life, the losses of life, the weaknesses we discover within ourselves. Let’s own up to it all.

Sam Allberry
It’s striking to me that that an apostle can can feel that overwhelmed. Yeah. And they can I think we sometimes think we’ve got to at least look like we’ve got things basically together.

Ray Ortlund
Yeah, he was he was not above it all. But he followed Jesus down into the depths of life. Yeah. So there’s that, and Philippians four, one, Rejoice in the Lord always again, I will say rejoice. That is not glib and shallow. That is a joyful defiance. In the face of sorrowful realities. When he says Rejoice in the Lord. He’s saying, as long as the Lord is the Lord to us, we always have a reason to rejoice. Yeah. So we might weep, and simultaneously rejoice. But it’s not an either or it’s not either, Oh, I’m so broken, or I’m so formidable. But I am being pushed to the edge, I am on the verge of despair. And Jesus is going to deliver me from this somehow, I can’t imagine how this is going to work out. But the one thing that cannot be is I’m being absented from separated from the love of God. That the one interpretive template I would put over this experience is not the hatred of God, the rejection of God, the abandonment of God, we’re never god forsaken. So what we do is we kind of put our foot down and, and say, I have no idea how God is going to redeem this mess. But he’s going to, yeah, so I’m going to put one foot in front of the other and see what the Lord is going to do with this. But I will not cave,

Sam Allberry
there’s a lovely look at one of CS Lewis’s letters where I think it’s just after joy has been diagnosed with cancer. And Louis’s writing to some, some friends of theirs, and he says something to the effect, and I’m paraphrasing here, we have no doubt that the Lord will be good to us. We just don’t know how painful that goodness is going to be. Oh, wow.

Ray Ortlund
That’s profound.

Sam Allberry
But it’s that sort of that lovely blend of confidence. And this is going to hurt. Yeah, but it’s not just going to hurt, it’s going to be hurting. Because the Lord is going to be in this in some way.

Ray Ortlund
So in your own life, and ministry, what is an instance of the painful goodness of God, a surprising gift that was packaged in a way that looked horrible. But when you opened up that package, there was something beautiful there. Tell us about how you’ve experienced that and seen that unfold in your own life in some way?

Sam Allberry
Yeah, that would be I think, a few instances I can think of, but one would be particularly times when I’ve gone through severe anxiety. That instance I mentioned earlier would be a case in point where it felt like, you know, I think one of the reasons we’ve called this podcast you’re not crazy, by the way is because you said those words to me at that very, at that very moment in my life. And I thought I was really losing the plot. But so much, I can see so much good that the Lord has done in my heart through going through that. It has made me more aware of the tenderness of Jesus than I would have been otherwise. And I hope it’s made me more tender towards other people. As a result, I think I’ve got a deeper awareness of, of the pain of other people than I would have had had I not gone through that kind of pain myself. I know I’m quicker to notice it than I would have been. I can still be sadly and shamefully oblivious to things that are going on around me but I’m, I’m less oblivious than I would have been. I think I’ve I’ve learned inconsistently and not fully and not exhaustively. But I think I have learned what you were saying earlier that that Jesus moves towards us in our greatest need and mess, not away from us. He doesn’t freak out and look for the nearest exit. He actually comes toward us in love and care. I think of Jesus and the leper in Mark chapter one and there there are times in my life spiritually when I felt like a leper. I felt toxic. And to think in those moments, Jesus isn’t withdrawing from us in disgust. He’s moving towards us in love and will even reach out and touch what looks to everybody else to be untouchable. And it’s not going to contaminate him. It’s going to bless us.

Ray Ortlund
That is so profound. And Sam, you’re great at conveying that you’ve conveyed that to me. We had a conversation last week that was very meaningful to me. I felt pulled back from having to relocate myself in my own self understanding as as just poisonous, and crazy. And you pulled me back, by the way, you responded to my disclosure to you, you put me back into calm and hope. That was very significant. I just, you know, all the young pastors listening to this. We all understand what you’re talking about, Sam, we revere the ministry of comfort. We are not there on Sunday mornings in our churches, to get those people to shape up. We are there to communicate to them the heart of Christ for them in their sins and their sufferings. Yeah. And that is a sacred privilege. And we can trust that the gentle and lowly grace of Christ is the only power in the universe that can deliver and save sinful suffers. We can let our full weight down on that conviction, that belief and serve accordingly. I remember Sam a conversation Jenny and I had with David powlison. In Philadelphia at the CCF Christian counseling and education foundation. David powlison was a gift from above, right when we needed it. In the worst year of our lives, we had the privilege of spending a day with David powlison of all people. And I wish I remembered more of what David said to us that day, but I will never forget this one thing he said. He said to us in effect, I don’t remember the exact words. He said, Okay, range any. You’re going through living hell. And it’s going to last for a while you’re not going to get out of this anytime soon. So here’s what I recommend. Why not ask the Lord for a promise in Scripture, some verse that is very strongly encouraging that deeply resonates with you right now. Ask the Lord for that verse. And when he gives it to you that promise, make it the theme of your life until you get through this. Wallpaper your reality with that verse. And God will be faithful to that verse. So we thought, okay, that’s a great idea. Let’s do that. So we were asking the Lord and you know what it’s like when a verse leaps off the page at you. And God speaks very personally through the Scripture. Well, about two weeks later, Jenny was reading first Peter five, and bam, there was verse 10, which says, and after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ will himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you Janee read that. She said, Ray, listen to this. And she read it nice. We both realized, okay, there’s our verse. So we wrote it out on three by five cards, Jenny, taped it to the inside of the kitchen cupboard, so that when she went to get a plate or glass, there it was, I put it on the visor of my pickup to remind me of that verse at red lights. I, memory, we’ve memorized it, we discussed it. And Sam, to this day, when we see an evidence of God’s wonderful grace in our lives, we turn to each other to this day, not a week goes by, we turn to each other we say, first, Peter 510. There you go. Yeah.

Sam Allberry
I mean, there’s so much in that verse that there is a conflict of the word himself and so loaded with meaning isn’t Yes.

Ray Ortlund
Yeah, he doesn’t delegate this to the angel Gabriel. He gets personally involved here himself will restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you. It’s very wonderful.

Sam Allberry
I was struck. A year or so ago, reading in Luke two when Simeon is at the table at the temple, and he meets the infant Jesus. Luke tells us that Simeon was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and then meets Jesus. And then we have the famous Dimittis. And I’d never noticed before the the coming of Jesus, whatever else we can say about it is a constellation. There’s a constellation in the gospel and part of our ministry in in church leadership is to embody and offer the constellation that Christ Himself gives us.

Ray Ortlund
The people that we preached to every Sunday. Many of them deeply fear or suspect. They are god forsaken. Yeah. And they’re living Plan B of their lives at best. And what if we make it our purpose, our sacred purpose and privilege? To go tell them every week? You are so not God forsaken? Yeah. And you are living Plan B, Plan A of your life, God’s plan, just clinked him go to God and just hang on.

Sam Allberry
And I think a lot of people, particularly in the in the depths of intense pain are in church thinking they probably not supposed to be there, that are not supposed to be someone who feels this amount of pain and distress, if I’m a Christian. And so part of our ministry is in the way that we lead services. And the way that we preach is to show people you are meant to be here, whatever you’re going through, this is the place to be,

Ray Ortlund
we deeply fear I’m I am uniquely flawed, and poisonous, and toxic, and other. I don’t belong here at these other people. They’re fine. They belong here, but not me. And we go into our own personal isolation. What if we pastors go and just, as it were, pull people together in our arms, through our ministry, through our message, through our words through our persona, and truly represent Jesus himself in that way. What if we do that this Sunday, man, great things to happen?

Sam Allberry
We are, we’re always grateful for for the ministry of, of crossway in their support of this podcast, but there’s a particular book ray that I have in mind, in the light of this discussion that is hot off the presses. Hopefully, by the time this episode comes out, it’s by your son, Eric, a book called suffering wisely and well, going through the book of Job. And I’ve heard Eric, teach on this a couple of times now and his his wisdom in particularly helping Christian leaders, but but all of us be people who aren’t just, it’s not enough to say don’t be Job’s friends, don’t be the idiots that they were. But actually, part of what Eric is training us to do is to make sure we are protecting the job’s among us. Wow, from the job’s so called competence among us. I think that book is going to help us profoundly

Ray Ortlund
Eric Ortlund, Suffering Wisely and Well, he teaches Old Testament at Oak Hill Theological College in London. I used to think the book of Job is in the Bible as an example of extreme suffering that almost nobody ever experiences. And so therefore, the message would be so what’s wrong with you guys? I mean, get it together, you’re not in that condition. And I completely changed my mind. I think the book of Job is in the Bible, because everybody goes there. And the way job, wrestles with God and the way God restores job is, it’s our own story. Eric takes that book. And as a man who understands suffering himself, gently, respectfully takes us by the hand on a sort of guided tour of suffering wisely, and well, we’re going to suffer, why not suffer wisely, and suffer? Well. We could be great at this. So thank you, so thank you.