#struggling with authenticity

¹⁸ For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. ¹⁹ For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. ²⁰ For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope ²¹ that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. ²² For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. ²³ And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. ²⁴ For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? ²⁵ But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. ²⁶ Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. ²⁷ And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.²⁸ And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. ²⁹ For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. ³⁰ And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified. (Romans 8:18-30 ESV)

I think we’re presented with a wonderful opportunity. I want us to think of this as day 0 and we’re launching something new. I’m not going to get into why this is day 0 and why we need to start all over. But I am going to tell you that we’re in this position because by the grace of God there is something new coming. To be transparent about what’s going on, there is a fissure at church and as a result we’re going to change how we do business. We’re not going to change businesses, we’re just going to change how we go about doing what we do as a church—loving each other like God loves us by sharing with people the good news of Christ salvation in our lives. It’s a little strange for me to be preaching from this passage today not knowing that when I was preparing these passages for sermons that we would be at that point in our lives where we need this the most. Not only for encouragement, but also as a form of grace upon our hearts, minds and souls. I want to go this passage we have up verse by verse. The reason I’m going to hit it verse by verse and honestly, we may not even get through it all today is because I feel today we will need to spend quite some time in prayer, just contemplating and searching the heart of God at this church. Let’s pray and begin. V18 – The promise of glory through suffering. If we read through verse 25, one thing is clear: there is real temptation for us to stop believing that there is something greater that awaits us when we are suffering. If this temptation wasn’t real, there would be no point to this paragraph. Moreover, I think some of us will write off the temptation as a non-sequitur because we know it in our heads that there is something better awaiting us, but we don’t really believe it in our hearts. We struggle with this. It is something we all struggle with. You can hashtag it as such. Most blatantly apparent is our fallen-ness to this sin when we react to situations wrongly. Honestly, we, as a collective group do not respond properly to most situations of suffering. Most of us will respond like idiots, and enraged morons in our suffering. I don’t even want to get into the realm of what counts as suffering because each person has their own barometer for that, but long story short—we need to stop sinning by falling victim of the temptation of not believing in something greater than the suffering we’re enduring right here and right now.

1. What is some time of suffering that we totally drop the ball and sin on? What is the situation or experience that causes us to fall like we do?

V19 – We fall to temptation because we expect glory now. When we think about it, I want you to grasp the reality of that thought. I know this is true—that we expect better right now. It’s the reason we get so upset over our suffering. It’s so funny because it can be the smallest thing we are suffering through, like a commercial, and we’re off cursing up a storm, at best, or we’re just lamenting being who we are and us because we want the recognition of being a prince or princess. It might be an American thing, but we’re so self-entitled and it causes us to fall victim to temptation because for some reason, even though Jesus, our Lord and Savior died horrifically on a cross in his time here on Earth, WE expect something more than what we’re living in right now. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t expect things because we should expect to receive glory. The glory that God promises, but this suffering that we’re living through that doesn’t seem to end, it will pale in comparison when we walk away from it and into the glory that we’re longing for—the glory of Jesus. The glory God promises us in Jesus’ life, death and resurrection is not our middle class lives. It really isn’t. I don’t want you to get confused by it either. Don’t get me wrong, I like my middle class, American life. I have everything and more than 90% of the world. Everything is within my reach, as it is for most of us; but that is not God’s glory. We have to put that into our hearts not to expect glory now in our situation. Vv20-23 – Its not just us who suffer, even though it feels that we—all of creation suffers. I want you to notice that all creation—everything suffers. This is the argument that the “save the planet” eco-freaks preach. It’s true though—the whole world is suffering every single moment we are walking this planet. That’s a true story you can take to the bank. When Paul is writing this, it is clear that he is not saying that only humans are suffering or yearning for the glory of God to come. All things in creation are yearning for it. I think this is important realize because it puts into perspective why there is nothing that is good. Moreover, why there is nothing that remains good. It explains why there are natural disasters, why there are accidents, why there are terrible things that happen to good people. It is that the entirety of creation suffers. Vv24-25 – Authenticity is the act of patience in suffering. Let me explain what this means for us because I think this is a difficult concept to accept due to the fact that we look at the word, “authentic” in light of being real or genuine. However, I want to look at the word “authentic” as a steadfastness—that is to say unchanging. As a result, what I’m saying here is that we all struggle with being authentic, especially in light of suffering. It is suffering that brings out from us an un-athenticity, a disability to stay steadfast. With that being said, I want to tell you that when we face situations where we struggle because we are suffering, we need to put it on our hearts and minds to remain unchanging in the hope of the glory that God wants to give to us. God wants to put His glory in our lives but the only way we can witness God doing that is by remaining authentic. The apostle writes that we “wait for it with patience.” Yes. How long haven’t we waited? Why do we live with disingenuousness? Why can’t we be authentic in an unchanging manner? Regardless, I’m not here to dwell on why not. I’m here to talk about what we can do about it. Let’s look at verse 26-27. Vv26-27 – We need to pray with the Holy Spirit. We hear this a lot in this church, but what does it mean? I don’t think it means pray in tongues and the reason I say that is because Paul writes that the Spirit “groans.” That word in Greek is steg-na-mas and what it means is “sighing.” The Spirit of God, when we are suffering or in a situation we are struggling to be authentic because we’re all over the place and we need God but we have difficulty crying out to God, is praying through sighing. It’s the sighs leaving our body that are prayers when we are searching those sighs through our hearts. This is so incredibly deep and so beautiful at the same time. When you are finding trouble with inauthenticity, then you need to put it deep into your heart that it is a heartfelt sighing to God—the act of thinking of God in exasperation which is the Spirit of God praying on our behalf to help us through our inauthenticity. I want to take some time praying after service today, but I want you to keep this in mind. There are sighs within us that we need to let out loudly. We are inauthentic because we are not allowing that intercession of the Spirit to happen. I’m not saying that it’s the only way the Spirit of God intercedes for us or that this is a better way of praying. I am saying that sometimes, if we don’t have the words to utter, we need to just sigh and spend that time sighing before God because the Spirit of God will intercede for us through those sighs. It is the act of being sincerely spending time with God—that steadfastness which allows the Holy Spirit to work within us. Vv28-30 – Glory is ours because it was always God’s purpose. Everything we struggle with comes to an end because God’s glory trumps our suffering. This is why we need to be authentic. This is exactly why when it hits the fan, that we need flip flop and flounder into hopelessness. There is hope. That hope is Jesus who redeems us for a purpose greater than our own or to our knowledge. What we’re going through as a church, it’s nothing. This suffering right now will lead to us being witnesses for the glory that God about to bring here for His purposes. When we despair because of what we see or don’t see right now, we need to write it on our hearts that it doesn’t mean anything. That we continue the course God has placed us on. Even if there is nothing in us to pray because we’re running on fumes due to all the situations we’re faced with, we spend that time that we always spent with God—be steadfast, which is authenticity. Let’s take some time to pray, first as individuals, then in groups. Let’s pray.