Reproaches and Tribulations (Hebrews 10:32-34)

Please turn, if you will, to Hebrews chapter 10. My voice is back, but not entirely back, as you can probably tell.

So I'm gonna attempt to preach without straining my voice and probably be a little bit less excitable than I normally am, more subdued, talk quieter and talk slower.

So if my preaching normally puts you to sleep, you might wanna just get comfortable because you're gonna get a jump on your mid -morning nap.

And I'm grateful for Cornell preaching for me last week. That was much appreciated. Hebrews chapter 10, we're gonna read together beginning at verse 32, and we'll read through verse 34.

But remember the former days when after being enlightened, you endured a great conflict of sufferings, partly by being made a public spectacle through reproaches and tribulations, partly by becoming sharers with those who were so treated.

For you showed sympathy to the prisoners and accepted joyfully the seizure of your property, knowing that you have for yourselves a better possession and a lasting one.

Let's pray together. Father, it is with great joy that we can always open your word and study it and learn, and we are thankful for your work through your word that you use your word to enlighten our hearts, that you use your word to instruct us and to teach us about yourself, that we know you and that we may be rightly related to you through Jesus Christ.

We thank you that you have made your word clear to us and we pray that you would help us to understand it today and that you would do the illuminating work by the power of your spirit in our hearts and in our minds so that we are able to understand your word and also to understand what obedience to your word looks like and what obedience to your word is going to entail in the world in which we live.

We ask this in Christ's name and your blessing upon this time, for his sake, amen.

We are back in Hebrews chapter 10, talking about reproaches and sufferings and affliction, trials and tribulations, which was,

I guess, the substance of Cornell's message last week. So if anything that I'm about to say sounds familiar, it's because Cornell took my message last week.

And as elders, we really need to get our stuff together and start figuring out how to put some variety in our preaching, because either we are really bad at that or the

Holy Spirit is really good about making sure that what we're preaching on is the same thing week after week. It seems providentially that whether Dave is preaching on his series in 1

Peter or Cornell is preaching through his series in 1 Thessalonians or I'm preaching this series in 1

Hebrews that the Spirit of God is using all of those books to give us the same theme and the same subject week after week.

So we are here in Hebrews chapter 10 and last time we were together, we just noted that scripture is describing here for us in this passage what suffering and affliction in the cause of Christ is going to look like.

It is describing the actual suffering and affliction that Christians in the first century faced for their profession of faith in Christ and for their commitment to the truth.

And scripture does not hide from us what suffering is going to look like. Scripture does not downplay at all the reality of affliction and persecution and suffering in this life for the cause of Christ.

We are told that having been enlightened, we should expect to endure a great conflict of sufferings.

And this is a truth that is often sort of overshadowed. It is a truth that is often neglected in today's modern pulpit.

As most Christian preaching today promises people the satisfaction for their every desire and supply for their every want and their best life and good times and unicorn rides and almost anything else that is fanciful in today's world.

And the truth about sin and the wrath of God and hell is neglected, but so is the truth about suffering and how it is that we are to endure suffering and what we should expect.

And the hard demands of the gospel are often overlooked. In coming to Christ, you're not just picking and choosing what you want spiritually speaking from him like you're walking through some sort of a spiritual buffet or smorgasbord where you get to pick what you like and leave what you don't like.

As Dave mentioned in his message a couple weeks ago, we're not offered a Christ where we can choose him as savior and neglect or deny him as Lord.

That is not how Christ is presented to us in scripture. I see I remember Dave's message and it was a great message by the way.

And one that you should listen to over and over again. I think it was an instant classic, something along the lines of like a sinner's in the hands of an angry

God. It will be remembered for months, years, and generations to come. There, I said it.

And when you come to Christ, you are pledging to die to yourself. You are saying

I am done with all of my attempts at my feeble self -righteousness and I have nothing to offer.

I am worth nothing. I am a slave. I am a servant. I am done with me and my agenda and you are signing on to become a slave of Jesus Christ.

And being a slave means that we are called, we are commanded to be obedient to him because obedience is the measure of our love for Christ.

Our emotions are not. Emotions can be manipulated. They can change like the wind. They can be created out of thin air.

Emotions are fickle and constantly in flux. So our emotions and our words and our feelings are not the measure of our love for Christ.

Our obedience is. Jesus said if you love me, you will keep my commandments. It is obedience. And so when we sign on as slaves of Christ, we are signing up for reproaches and trials and tribulations and the hostility of an unbelieving world because this world is not our home and it's not intended to be our home.

We are intended to live like we are strangers and pilgrims who are just passing through. We are not supposed to love this world or the things in this world because this world is not our home and the people in this world, well, they are the enemies of God and they have sworn to be at war against him and they are our mission field and we are ambassadors for Christ who are called into this world to plead with God's enemies, to be reconciled to him and to lay down their arms and to turn in repentance and faith to the

God with whom they are at war. That is our job. That message is not going to be well received and we shouldn't expect that it's going to be well received.

In fact, we should expect that, as Paul said in Acts chapter 14, it is through many tribulations that we must enter the kingdom of God and if we are going to live godly lives in this world in Christ Jesus, we will suffer persecution.

We should expect that what Jesus said in John 16, 33 is actually gonna happen. In this world, you will have tribulations but be of good cheer, he has overcome the world.

So our command from our king is to say to the enemies of God, lay down your arms and turn in repentance and faith and be reconciled against this

God or you will face his wrath. That is not going to be a welcome message and so we are going to expect in this world the very hostility and affliction that would come to somebody who goes to people with that kind of a message.

And enduring these afflictions for the sake of Christ is not easy. It's not easy.

It's going to be difficult and we should expect it to be difficult and scripture's honest about the difficulty of enduring afflictions for the sake of Christ.

The cause for which the world hates us are clearly laid out in scripture. In fact, in our world right now, the truth regarding the issues for which the world hates us is not difficult.

The truths regarding that are not difficult to understand or to comprehend from scripture. The world hates us because we understand and know the truth about gender and sexuality and homosexuality and the role of women in the church and in the culture and the exclusivity of the claims of Jesus Christ.

Those things in scripture are not difficult to discern. Scripture is not opaque about those issues.

It's clear. And so faithfulness to Christ is very simple in our day. It's very simple.

We obey what scripture says and we're gonna suffer for it. That is really, no, it doesn't mean it's easy.

It's not easy. It's going to be difficult, but even in its difficulty, it's just, it's refreshing to see how crystal clear and simple it really is.

Scripture is not confusing. There's no nuance regarding these issues. Scripture is clear about what it teaches concerning all of the things for which the world hates us.

And so we can know what the truth is and it is hard to suffer these afflictions and it is hard to take a stand in our world, not because we don't know what is true, but because the world hates what is true.

And as long as the world hates what is true, those who stand for the truth, believe the truth and love the truth are gonna face the hostility and opposition of the world and we should expect it.

The author in Hebrews chapter 10, verse 32, encourages them to remember the former days when after being enlightened, they endured a great conflict of sufferings.

This describes the struggle, the war, the contest, the difficulty of the sufferings.

It's just they're describing sufferings in its general sense, just generally speaking, the various kinds of suffering from various sources with various causes and we suffer in varying degrees.

And sometimes the difficulty with suffering is not just what it is that is suffered, but the weight of a multitude of sufferings.

Have you noticed that sometimes when people suffer, in fact, most of the time when we suffer affliction in this world, it's not any one thing that we suffer.

If it were just one thing, we could bear a great burden, a great weight of that one thing.

But often suffering in this world is not just one thing, it's a number of things. Like the author describes here, they had been made a public spectacle.

They had been reproached. They had faced tribulations. They had shared with those who were so treated. They had been imprisoned.

Some of them had loved ones who had been imprisoned and they had suffered the seizure of their property. There was a multitude of different ways in which they were suffering.

And if it had only been one of them, if they had just had to endure the seizure of their property, they might well have been able to bear that, we could understand that.

That would be difficult, yes, but seizure of your property. If I have everything else but I can lose my property, then

I could be happy with that. Or if they had just had to endure the reproaches, as difficult as reproaches are, or if they had just had to deal with some of the people that they loved in their own congregation being put into prison and having to share the burden of that and what that would have entailed, just that.

But when it's all of those things piled on at the same time, isn't it interesting that it's like the straw that breaks the camel's back.

It's not any one thing, it's the weight of all of these things. Paul describes it in 2

Corinthians chapter seven when he says, we came into Macedonia, our flesh had no rest. We were afflicted on every side, conflicts without and fears within.

Conflicts without and fears within. We had to deal with the enemies on the outside and we have to deal with the enemy that is on the inside.

And sometimes the opposition and hostility of the world, it's not just one enemy, it's not just one battle. Sometimes it feels like we have to face 1 ,000 battles with 1 ,000 enemies and 1 ,000 weapons turned against us and we're fighting on every front all of the time.

And that's just the external battles. And then we have to deal with the enemy within, our flesh. So we face hostility outside and then we face temptation within.

And Paul says we have no rest. When do you get to rest if all of the time you're facing 1 ,000 enemies outside and then just when you think that that is subsiding, you have to deal with the enemy within.

See how taxing that can be? See how honest scripture is about the struggle that we face? This is why the author of Hebrews calls it a great conflict of sufferings.

Now he goes on in verses 33 and 34 to describe some of the specifics of this suffering.

He notes two different kinds of suffering. Partly, that is, on the one hand, being made a public spectacle, verse 33, through reproaches and tribulations.

And partly, that is, on the other hand, by becoming sharers with those who were so treated. They had the individual and personal suffering and affliction that they had faced.

They had been made a reproach. They had become a public spectacle and they were facing tribulation. And on the other hand, they had to share in the sufferings of others who had likewise been treated in that way.

It is an interesting word, the word that is used, made a public spectacle. That word is used one time in its verb form here in scripture.

And it is the word theaterizumai. You can hear the word theater there in the beginning of it because it has the idea of something being put on public display, something put out in front of the watching eyes of the world, something open to view or sight, something made public.

It was used, the other forms of that verb are used to describe seeing something, observing it, beholding it, or looking at something.

And the idea here is that they were being openly and publicly displayed before onlookers and not in a good way.

Like, look at this guy, how faithful he is to Christ. Let's give him a round of applause. Not that type of public display.

But rather being put on public display and open to scorn and disgrace and reproach and rebuke and being so publicly displayed in a shameful way.

This describes them being put out publicly and openly mocked in some way that everybody was privy to it and everybody could see it.

And this was what their profession of faith in Christ had cost them. They were being publicly scolded in some way.

And it may not, doesn't necessarily have to do with this word or this description. Doesn't necessarily have to do with being harmed publicly.

This may, this description may call to your mind one time when Paul and some of his companions in the book of Acts chapter 19 in the city of Ephesus, when they were drug out into the amphitheater there in Ephesus, do you remember that?

And they were publicly, they wanted to bring Paul out there and they wanted, or Paul wanted to go out there and rescue his traveling companion.

And they wouldn't allow him to do that because they thought the crowd would tear him to pieces. That was kind of a theatrical display of Christians being publicly shamed and reproved and rebuked there.

That's not necessarily what was happening to these first century Christians, though it did happen later. After this book was written,

Christians were publicly executed and martyred in theaters and in coliseums. That happened centuries after this book was written.

So that's not probably what's being described here. This is likely describing a general exposure to disgrace.

Just the idea that publicly, in the court of public opinion, in front of people, when they were talked about, when they were seen publicly, they were shamed and reproved.

That seems to be the way that Paul uses the noun form of this in 1 Corinthians 4 and 9. For I think

God has exhibited us apostles last of all as men condemned to death because we have become a spectacle to the world.

The idea is that the apostles had in some way become just this thing that the world looked at and kind of scorn and reproach and reproof and disdain.

That's the idea here. They had become a cause of public reproach, public shaming, a public disgrace or ridicule in some way before the eyes of the watching world.

Of course, it's different today, right? Totally different today in our culture. Christians are never publicly reproved or rebuked, never publicly shamed.

You never see your theology or your morals or your ethics or your worldview publicly mocked, do you? On television, in the news media?

Actually, that's exactly what happens. Where only the worst examples of Christianity portrayed and paraded in front of the world.

When was the last time you saw on CNN an example of a Christian soup kitchen somewhere that was serving

Christ and giving out soup to people for free and helping people and sharing the gospel? When was the last time you saw an example of that?

And people publicly applauded for such behavior and sacrifice and service to Christ? When was the last time on any public news network you ever saw a

Christian portrayed in a positive light or in a sitcom or in a movie? Oftentimes, they're the villains.

They're the ones with the white collar and molesting children, and that's supposed to portray Christians in general.

This is how Christians are viewed in our day and in our world. Our beliefs are scorned in academia, in every corner of academia, on nearly every college campus in this country, except for a few public and private universities that I could probably count on one hand with fingers left over that rhyme with Billsdale.

On only a few public academic institutions are our beliefs not openly mocked and ridiculed and hated.

Now, you cannot, in the public arena, say anything even mildly critical of Islam, not even mildly critical, but you can openly rebuke and hate and mock and jeer against Christians.

In the public sphere, you are public enemy number one. An event like this is a super spreader event against public health or something.

Now, if we were here worshiping or celebrating a former president of the United States 60th birthday party, of course, this is entirely fine, but if we are gathering together like this to worship

Christ and help and serve one another, this is a super spreader event and it should be shut down in our country.

That's how this is viewed. You're not allowed to stand outside of abortion clinics or share the gospel publicly.

You can't mention Jesus, the Bible, or scriptures teaching in the public school system in almost any city in this country.

This is not the America I grew up in. Not that I'm pining for or longing for the America I grew up in.

I mean, I would vote for Reagan today if he were running for president, but things have changed, haven't they?

In the public sphere, you are mocked and jeered and Christians are the only, whether you call it cultural or religious or demographic in any way, that it is okay and not just okay, but actually encouraged to do that to.

We are not tolerated. We are called intolerant, hateful bigots by the people who call themselves the tolerance police, the ones who promote tolerance in our area, supposedly, in our world.

They are the ones who will call you intolerant and hate you. Truth is a hate crime. Speaking truth is now violence.

Standing up for the truth makes you an enemy of the state and the more that you resolve not to live by the lies of the enemy and of the world, you will be hated and Christian, that is unavoidable.

You being hated is unavoidable. You are haters, bigots, intolerant, narrow -minded, uneducated and unenlightened rubes.

That's everybody in this room if you pledge allegiance to Jesus Christ. That's everybody in this room. I'm fine with that.

I hope you're fine with that because you are gonna be treated in a way that nobody else would be allowed to be treated.

No one will dare criticize Islam. I've been online mildly critical of Islam in public forums and I have been called unloving, intolerant, divisive and needlessly offensive by Christians, people who call themselves

Christians. People who call themselves Christians who are trying to be apparently nicer than Jesus and not say anything bad against anybody.

This is nothing less than being made a public spectacle where Christians are shamed and disgraced and hated and spurned, rejected, mocked and ridiculed and that is okay, that is encouraged in our culture and in our society and it's not gonna get any better.

In every corner of society, you are mocked. In every government institution, you are considered an enemy of the state.

In every cultural institution, your worldview, your affections, your commitments and the one that you love is open to reproof and rebuke and you are hated for it.

And every social media platform wishes to de -platform you, to censor you and to silence you so that they do not have to hear anything truthful that might come out of your mouth.

This is a tale as old as time because it's the same thing that our brothers and sisters in Christ in the first century endured.

They just didn't have Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and all of those platforms to do it but they did have the local block party when everybody got together and when the

Christian wasn't there, they could slander him and speak behind his back and talk about that crazy commitment to that lunatic named

Jesus and they would disparage Christ and they would disparage the church and they would disparage Christians. They did have the office party where you had to sit in silence while everybody talked about things that were not a priority to you.

They did have the office party where the Christian had to sit there and listen to their entire worldview be mocked by all of their coworkers.

They did have that. They did have family gatherings where everybody got together and talked about the Christian when the Christian wasn't there and when they showed up, they pretended to like you.

They did have that. So the more things change, the more they what?

The more they stay the same, right? And this is the world in which we live. This is what it meant to be made a public spectacle through reproaches and tribulations.

What is a reproach? This is how we are publicly displayed or disgraced. We are made a laughingstock.

The word reproach here is a verb that means to insult or to cast a reproach or to throw an insult at somebody.

It's used five times in the New Testament, three times in the book of Hebrews and it's interesting how the book of Hebrews uses it, but before I get to that,

Romans, it's used two other times in the New Testament outside of Hebrews. I'll give you both of those references. Romans 15 verse three, where Paul says, "'For even

Christ did not please himself, "'but as it is written, the reproaches "'of those who reproached you fell on me.'"

That describes, that is a quotation from Psalm 69, which Dave read at the beginning of the service. The psalmist there is lamenting the fact that he had been ostracized by his family and his loved ones.

He says, those who hate me are more than the hairs on my head. They hate me without cause and they reproach me because of my love for Christ and my love for Yahweh, or sorry, not my love for Christ, my love for Yahweh and my commitment to God and his truth.

Those who are my friends and those who are my family, even my relatives and my brothers and sisters, they hate me and reproach me because they hate and reproach

Yahweh, the God of Israel. And Paul says in Romans 15, he uses that and describes the reproach there, the casting of insults upon Christians, particularly because they are

Christians and because they love Christ. And so because they reproach Christ, they will reproach us.

The second time it's used is in 1 Timothy chapter three, where Paul, giving instruction about selection of elders, says an elder must have a good reputation with those outside the church so that he will not fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.

And there it has to do with the idea of being publicly shamed or insulted because of something that the elder does.

And it's kind of used there in a bit of a different way, where the person who would do this, who would make himself to be an elder, the person who is reproached in that case actually deserves the reproach.

He has done something outside in the community to people where they look at him and they would cast an insult upon the name of Christ because this person would end up doing something that would bring shame upon the church or upon the

Lord of the church. And then it's used three times in the book of Hebrews, and this is interesting how it is used here.

Hebrews chapter 10, verse 33, where we have right here where it says, partly by being made a public spectacle to reproaches, then it is used in Hebrews chapter 11, verse 26 to describe

Moses, where he says, considering the reproach of Christ, greater riches than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.

And there Moses is held out to us as an example of faith because Moses anticipated the eternal reward.

And so Moses was willing to turn his back upon his reputation. He could have been called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

He didn't want that appellation. He didn't want that name, that title. So he turned his back upon that. And he gladly embraced the reproaches of Christ and joined himself with the people of God, that is

Israel, rather than enjoying all the treasures and the blessings that Egypt would have offered to him as a prince.

He could have been a prince in Egypt and been called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. And Moses turned his back on all of those treasures and upon that reputation so that he could be counted amongst the people of God because he knew that the reward of being amongst the people of God was better than anything

Egypt could offer him and anything that a good reputation could give him. And so he gladly embraced the reproach of Christ, Hebrews 11, 26.

And then it is used in Hebrews 13 in the concluding chapter of this book, where the author says, so let us go out to him, that is to Christ, outside the camp, bearing his reproach.

So after all these chapters that talk about what faith looks like and the hostility of the world and facing the hostility of the world, the author is saying this, currently, you are being reproached, but listen,

Moses was also reproached and he gladly embraced the reproach instead of treasuring the treasures of Egypt and the reputation of being called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

Moses turned his back on that and so you, like Moses, are to embrace the reproaches of Christ and go outside the camp, as it were, where the unclean things were taken and put, go outside the camp to Christ, who is also rejected by everybody else in the world, and there, gladly embrace and bear the reproach of Christ.

You can see, as we read through the New Testament, what some of the early Christians faced in terms of how they were reproached, the insults that were cast upon them.

We get some idea of that from some of the writings in the New Testament, I'll give you a sampling of it. First Peter chapter three, verse 15 and 16.

Peter says, sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asked you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame.

The world reviles your good behavior in Christ, because you see, what you think is good behavior, the world thinks is absurd and hateful and intolerant and bigoted and narrow -minded and not worthy of being included in polite society, not worthy of having your voice heard, but that's your good behavior.

That phrase, reviled for your good behavior, the world reviling you for your good behavior, that's worth a whole sermon just in and of itself.

And when Dave gets there, he'll do a whole sermon just on that phrase of how the world scorns and mocks your moral purity, your moral clarity, your gospel preaching, your worship, your commitment, your model behavior, those things which are good, the world hates that.

First Peter chapter four, verse three. For the time already past is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles, having pursued a course of sensuality, lust, drunkenness, carousing, drinking parties, and abominable idolatries.

In all this, they're surprised that you do not run with them into the same excesses of dissipation, and they malign you.

The world maligns you because you don't run into its sin with the world. So the minute you hit the pump the brakes and say, no,

I'm not gonna do that. I've spent enough of my life in dissipation and drunkenness and immorality and reveling and all of that nonsense,

I have wasted enough of my time. You pump the brakes and say, I'll have no more of that, and the world will malign you for it.

But Peter says, they will give an account to the one who is ready to judge the living and the dead. Listen, if the world approves of your morals, and it approves of your ethics and your lifestyle and your commitments, your affections, if the world approves of you, you have got something tragically wrong with you.

Fundamentally wrong. In Acts chapter 24, Paul was accused of sedition and sectarianism and sacrilege.

That's delightful there. Paul was accused of sectarianism and sacrilege and sedition because he didn't support, supposedly, the government.

And they accused him of this, saying he stirs up strife in every city he goes and he preaches and it goes against the custom of Moses and he's part of this sect that is not an official recognized religion of the state.

And the state disapproves of that. And they accused early Christians of being involved in cannibalism.

Imagine such a thing. You say, why would they do that? Well, because we get together and we say, this is my body, broken for you, do this in remembrance of me, and we eat it.

And we say, this is the new covenant in my blood, do this as often as you drink it. And the unbelieving pagans outside of the church heard that Christians were in there, saying this is my body, this is my blood.

They were eating and drinking flesh and blood. So they accused him of being cannibals. Early Christians were accused of being involved in incest.

Because we refer to each other as brothers and sisters in Christ, and yet I am married to my sister in Christ. So they took that designation and said that the

Christians were engaged in incest. And the Christians were accused of being atheists. Why? Because they wouldn't worship the emperor.

And if the emperor was the only one and true God, and Christians didn't worship him, well, they must be atheists. You see, today the slanders have changed, but the tactic has not.

John Owen said, the stores of reproaches and false accusations in the treasury of Satan and the hearts of wicked men will never be exhausted.

There will never come a point where the world says, you know what, we've slandered Christians enough. We've hated on them enough.

There'll never come a point where that happens. Oh no, hold on. There will come a point when that happens.

When the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ. Then that will happen. But until that happens, there will be no end to the calumnies, to the slanders, to the insults, to the reproaches that are heaped upon God's people just for being faithful.

And this can be extremely difficult to bear, and the reason is because we love the truth as God's people.

And reproaches and slanders, I think, are especially hard. I think that reproaches and slanders are more difficult for me to bear than the seizure of my property.

It's a more difficult thing. And here is why. Proverbs 22, one says, a good name is to be desired more than great wealth, and favor is better than silver and gold.

We know the value of integrity and honesty and uprightness and virtue. We know the value of truth, and so when you are accused of the opposite of those things, that has a particular sting to it.

When you know that the slander that is leveled against you is inaccurate, that it is false, that it is a damnable lie, that is a difficult barb to bear.

That is a difficult, that is painful beyond anything else, simply because we know the truth, and we know that it is not true, those things that are said about us.

And we want to make them right, we want to do something to correct the record, but that is not always possible. Sometimes there is nothing that can be done to correct the record of a slander that is leveled against the child of God.

And it is difficult because we carry the name of Christ wherever we go, and we know that when we are reproached, that they are in reproaching us, reproaching him.

And that should concern us, and it does concern us, because we want Christ to be spoken well of, we want to carry his name well.

And so as Christians, when we are reproached, and hated, and slandered, and falsely accused of things, and made a public display in that way, that is really painful, because we see it not just as an attack upon us, but also as an attack upon our

Lord. And we're sensitive to that. And we want to reflect him well, and we want to carry his name well, and we want to give honor and glory to him well.

And so then when we are slandered, of course that's just even more painful. So what do we do with reproaches?

How do we handle them? First, I think we have to, I know, we have to identify the cause of the reproach and rejoice if necessary.

Peter says in 1 Peter 4, to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing, so that also at the revelation of his glory, you may rejoice with exultation.

If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the spirit of glory and of grace rests on you.

Make sure that none of you suffers as a murderer, or a thief, or an evildoer, or a troublesome meddler.

But if anyone suffers as a Christian, he is not to be ashamed, but is to glorify God in that name. If you are, you have to identify the source of the cause of the reproach.

If you are being slandered and spoken ill of, because you are a thief, or because you are a busybody, or because you are a meddler, or because you are a troublemaker, or because you are just needlessly offensive, then you bear that reproach and you get no reward for it.

But if you are reproached and slandered for the name of Christ, because you do what is good, and you revile for his name, then you are blessed, and the spirit of grace and glory rests upon you, and so rejoice in it.

That's it. Identify the cause of the reproach and the slander and rejoice if necessary. Second, you should value your faithfulness to Christ over being adored by the world.

And this is something I think as Christians, you're gonna have to get used to this concept, that your reputation is dispensable.

The world's affirmation means nothing, and your reputation for faithfulness in the cause of Christ is a glorious sacrifice.

If people speak ill of you because you are a faithful believer, and you love the Lord and proclaim his good name, then welcome that, enjoy that, embrace that, glory in that, and be happy to sacrifice your reputation for that faithfulness.

John Owen said to have a good report amongst an evil multitude is no advantage. Jesus said, woe to you when all men speak well of you.

They said the same thing about the false prophets and the false teachers. If everyone speaks well of you, something is wrong, again, fundamentally.

And so if they love false teachers, and the world loves you, what does that make you? If the world loves its own, and the world loves you, what does that make you?

It makes you a worldling. Number three, focus on faithfulness and not the results. I think you and I are used to doing this in terms of evangelism.

We say we preach the gospel, and we leave the results with God. Ours is to be faithful, his is to bring results from our work and from our faithfulness.

So we can simply do what is right, and proclaim the truth, and then leave the results with God and trust them to him.

We have to be willing to do the same thing with our reputation and our faithfulness. It is ours to be faithful to the truth.

It belongs to God to secure our reputation or our name. And we have to leave it with him, and care nothing for our name and for our reputation.

Now there is a sense in which we can be concerned for our reputation, but we are concerned for our reputation and for our name only so long as it is connected to being faithful to the truth.

So if we lose our reputation and our name for being faithful, that is not up to us, and we have to be willing to gladly and gracefully let that go.

But we ought to guard our name and seek to have a good name so that we, because we do what is good and right and righteous, that's the extent to which we are concerned about our own reputation and avoiding slandering.

But having done what is right and what is righteous, and having been faithful, we can leave the results to God.

And if it costs us everything, then that is his to do with as he should please. And fourth,

Christian, you're gonna have to harden your resolve in these things. You're gonna be made a public spectacle.

Get used to it, anticipate it, expect it. Don't be surprised as some strange thing were happening to you.

The reproaches are going to bring, in the words of verse 33, tribulations. We are made a public spectacle through reproaches and tribulations, and tribulations, just another general word for suffering, for trouble, for difficulties, for afflictions.

These things are not gonna get better. The midterm elections are not gonna solve this.

And if you are waiting for the Republican Party to restore your name in our culture, your hope is sorely misplaced.

If you haven't realized that already, allow me to joyfully be the bearer of bad news to you this morning.

They are not going to restore this. The Republican Party is not going to change this. The Republican Party, as well as the

Democratic Party, they have been promoting this and going this direction for as long as I have been alive.

This has been the trend. They are not going to stop it. Our hope is not in elections. Our hope is not in political parties.

Our hope is not in a militia. Our hope is not in any kind of a political maneuvering or manipulation.

That's not where our hope lies. That's not, we are not going to reverse this. This is not going to get better in this world for us.

We're not going to Christianize the entire world and suddenly get the approbation and the love and the applause and the affection of worldlings.

That is not going to happen. So get used to this and expect it. The only answer is revival and reformation, and that starts with the church.

In the preaching of the word and the faithfulness of Christians in doing what is scriptural, in obeying the

Lord, in laying down their own self -interest, in serving and loving one another, in doing what scripture commands us to do, and in being faithful to him as the word is preached and we evangelize and share the gospel.

That is the only hope for a lost and dying world. And of course, when we share the gospel, all we're doing is we're asking people to sign up for the reproaches and the trials and the tribulations.

But we are promising them that the reproaches of Christ are better than the treasures of Egypt.

We're promising them that the reproaches of Christ are better than being called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.

We can look forward to the reward because that is what is promised to us. I'll remind you with two final,

I'll leave you with two final quotes. One from Peter, 1 Peter 4, 12, do not be surprised the fire ordeal among you which comes upon you for your testing as though some strange thing were happening to you.

It's not strange before you know what's gonna happen. How do you prepare for it? One final quote from John Owen.

He said this, and this indeed is for the most part the greatest difficulty in sufferings that many of them come upon us at once so that we shall have no rest from their assaults.

For it is the design of Satan and the world on these occasions to destroy both soul and body.

And onto that end, he will assault us inwardly by temptations and fears, outwardly in our names and reputations and all that we are or all that we have.

But he that knows how to account all such things but loss and dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ is prepared for them all, close quote.

What is Owen saying? The fiery trial and temptations that you face, the afflictions, the sufferings that the world might heap upon you, the scorn and reproaches that you are expected to bear, this is by the devil's design.

But if you are able to treasure the reproach of Christ as greater than all the treasures of Egypt and the reputation of being called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, if you can account all of these earthly things as dung compared to the excellency of knowing

Christ, then you are prepared for whatever the world may bring you. Count it all loss for the sake of knowing

Christ. That's what Paul did, turned his back on all of it so that he might know Christ. So I ask you, do you consider the reproaches of Christ more valuable than anything this world has to offer?

Let's bow our heads. Father, we are grateful for your grace and for the encouragement of your word.

These things, though difficult to reflect upon, they do encourage us to look forward to the reward and to look forward to standing strong and facing the hostility of the world.

For we know that your grace is sufficient and your goodness is infinite, your wisdom is perfect.

And so we can entrust ourselves, our reputations, all that we have and all that we are into your good hand, knowing that you have every right to dispose of your creatures and all that is in this world as you should will, and that you will always do so in a way that is infinitely wise and good and glorious for your name and for the good of your people.

And so we praise you and we ask you to give us grace to trust you in the midst of all that is ahead, whatever it may be, and strengthen us to be faithful in this world, whatever that may cost us, we ask in Christ's name, amen.

Let's pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.