This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

(upbeat music) This is day four of our look together at 2 Corinthians chapter
four, and we're going to begin to look at verses 16 to 18 today. Let me start this
day by reading those verses. 2 Corinthians four, 16 to 18.

Therefore we do not lose heart, though outwardly we are wasting away, yet
inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles
are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our
eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen.

For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. These verses,
verses 16 to 18, are at the center of the message of 2 Corinthians. So we're
going to take two days to look at these three verses, because they're verses that
are all about the secret of endurance in your life.

Endurance is the number one sign of success in a servant of Christ. It's not
talent, or intelligence, or even opportunity. It's endurance.

If you're someone who has been serving Jesus for a long time, whether you're
young or old, rejoice in that, because you're enduring. I would say that for
every one of you 10, sit at home, not serving anymore. Their service was
motivated by youthful dreams, or it was motivated by young adult energy, or it
was motivated by middle adult family needs, and now that those motivations are
gone, they think somehow, okay, now I'll just pass on the baton to the next
generation.

Some people do this at 40. Some people do it at 65. Some people do it at 80.

I'll pass on the baton to the next generation. The truth is, they failed to
endure. Why?

Why do we fail to endure? The love of Jesus is going to go through the rest of our
lives, so obviously we want to serve him the rest of our lives. Why do we fail
to endure in serving him?

It might surprise you to hear me say that it's not always our selfish attitudes
and our sin-filled hearts that keep us from serving him for a lifetime, from
enduring and serving him. We often fail to endure as servants because of our
misconceptions about servanthood. We don't endure because we never learned how
to serve correctly in the first place, and we're like a baseball pitcher with
amazing talent and strength, but no technique.

So you throw 120 mile an hour fastball for two innings, but then you find you
can't even pick up a glass of water because you weren't doing it the right way.
There is a right way to serve, and Paul talks about it in these verses. Now,
jealous people would say about that pitcher, he never had it in the first place,
but people with wisdom say, if only someone had taught him the right way to
pitch, what's the right way to serve?

Paul talks at the end of 2 Corinthians 4 about this servant who lasts, and it's
wise advice from a servant who lasted, who made it through everything, who
fought the good fight, who finished the race. It's wise advice from the apostle
Paul about the right way to serve. He talks about three things here, and we're
going to focus on the first one today.

First thing he says is, the right way to serve is to realize this. Servanthood
is not powered by my energy. It's powered by God's Spirit.

Verse 16, therefore we do not lose heart, though outwardly we are wasting away,
yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. In each of these pictures of a
servant who lasts, Paul really is drawing a contrast, and here is the contrast
between the self-powered servant and the Spirit-powered servant. The
self-powered servant oftentimes learned to serve at a younger age.

They had a lot of energy, so you have the servanthood of youth, and there's this
attitude that the more I do, the better a servant I am, and why wouldn't I want to
do more? Because that gives glory to God, and people see it, and good things
happen. The trouble is, what do you do when your energy runs thin?

Many of us have learned to serve solely on the basis of energy, and so when the
energy runs out, we stop serving. I've battled this in my own life. Even as a
younger man, I had back problems when I should have had the most energy in life,
and as those came from time to time, it was infuriating to me, because I wanted
to use all my energy to serve him, but God was using it to remind me, it's not
just about how much energy you have.

Down through the years, I've had things like tendons breaking and being laid up
for a few months, or heart problems to remind me of the foolishness of living
the self-powered life. Yeah, God wants to use your energy. No doubt about that.

God wants to use your strength, whatever he's given you, no doubt about that.
But whether you have a lot of energy or a little, a lot of strength or a little,
God wants to use you every day as a servant. And I still have to remind myself
almost every day, it's not about my energy, it's about God's Spirit.

You know who I have the greatest concern for in this? I have the greatest
concern for those of you who can do more than others on your own power. You have
more energy than others, just naturally.

Maybe more intelligence, maybe more opportunities to have grown and gotten
experiences. So just on your own power, you could do more than a lot of others.
And the reason I'm concerned for you is you could be satisfied.

You could be satisfied with the little you can do on your own power because it's
better than a lot of people around you, even people who are serving on the
Spirit's power. That's not what God wants for you. In the end, you end up losing
heart.

In the end, you end up doing far less for him than you could ever do through his
Spirit because Paul here is not talking about being a self-powered servant where
at the end of your life, you see that less and less and less you're able to
serve him. He's talking about the Spirit-powered servant. Now, someone has said
about this Spiritually-powered servant, the Spirit broadens and grows serene
while the body trembles and feels increasing pain.

Some of you that are older know what we're talking about. The
Spiritually-powered servant finds a greater source of strength as they grow
older because they recognize the power of prayer, the power of what God has done
in their life. You see, in your life, in my life, when we give out, when our
energy, our strength gives out, our human energy or intelligence or whatever,
when we give out, we've got a choice.

We're either going to give up or we're going to give in. You're either going to give up
on servanthood and think, I just can't do it anymore. God, how could you ask
that of me?

I can't do it anymore, Lord. That's a certain sign. If you're saying that, it's
a certain sign that you're depending on yourself as the power source.

You give up or you give in. You give in to God's leadership in a new way in your
life. And you recognize, Lord, you want to work in my life still.

And it's not a matter of how much I can get done in a day. It's a matter of
doing in each day what you want me to get done. It's not a matter of how much I
can impress other people with the amount of energy that I have.

It's a matter of listening to your Spirit and following you. That's the
Spirit-powered servant. If I'm self-powered, I'm depending on myself as the
power source.

And too often, I'm depending on myself for direction and leadership. When I'm
Spirit-powered, I'm depending on myself no longer. I'm instead depending on
God's Spirit for the power.

I'm depending on God's Spirit for the direction. Now, this is a lifetime
process. God weaning me of myself and getting me to a place where I'm depending
on his Spirit.

It is a lifetime process. You're in the midst of that process. I'm in the midst
of that process.

And the question I ask of you is not, are you perfectly Spirit-powered? I have
never met anybody, except Jesus. I never met him in this world, but he's the
only one who's been perfectly Spirit-powered in this world.

So that's not the question. The question is, are you depending on God's Spirit a
little bit more? A little bit more this month than last month?

Or maybe you need to look back a little further this year than last year. If the
answer to that is yes, then you're experiencing the exact experience that God
wants you to experience. The answer to that is no, this is a wake-up call.

This is a moment to say, Lord, thanks for the energy you've given me. Thanks for
the talent you've given me, but I don't want to depend on that. I want to live my
life depending on you.

I don't want to serve you for five years or 10 years or even 20 years or even 30.
I want to serve you for a lifetime. So let your Spirit be the power source in my
life.

Let's pray that very thing. Let's ask him for that right now. Jesus, thank you
that you sent your Spirit into our lives.

And you've taught us, you're the vine, we're the branch. We gotta stay connected
to you to have the power. So forgive us for those times when we've relied just
on our own strength to get us through.

And give us a new sense today of your willingness to work through our lives
because of who your Spirit is, of your willingness to power our lives, to power
our decisions by your Spirit. We, in a new way, present ourselves to you,
willing to serve you. We want to serve you for a lifetime.

And we ask that you help us to serve in ways that that would happen. We ask it
in Jesus' name, amen. Tomorrow, we're going to look at two more qualities of the
servant who lasts.