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Romans 5:2b-5, And we exult in hope of the glory of God. 3 And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; 4 and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; 5 and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
WE ARE ONE BLESSED PEOPLE!
Romans 5:3a, “And not only this, but….
Last week we saw in Romans 5:1-2 how blessed and secure in Christ we really are. Not only has God declared us righteous in Christ, or justified us by faith alone, but as a result, we have peace with God. We are no longer God’s enemies. Christ has brought us right through the door into the grace of God and that’s where we stand, on grace ground forever. And then Paul says we are super-excited because we have hope or confident expectation of experiencing the glory of God. We know He will keep our souls until we see Christ face to face. We exult, rejoice, and are thrilled in our souls that we are glory bound, not hell bound anymore! Our status in Christ couldn’t be better. We are one blessed people.
So now what? Here’s where the false teachers step in with their promises of earthly prosperity and “You can have your best life now.” They would read verse 3 like this, “And not only this, but we also exult in health, wealth, and prosperity!” They declare, “God’s going to make everything go swimmingly for you. He’s going to make your life trouble-free. God will pay off all your debts and your investments will always have high returns. Your wife will adore you all the time and your kids will end up on the front page of Perfect Parenting magazine. You’ll find a knockout job and never lose it. You won’t struggle with lust and temptation anymore. You’ll feel great all the time, and you’ll die in your sleep.”
THEN TROUBLE COMES
Romans 5:3, And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance;
Then trouble comes. It’s not a matter of if trouble comes. Philippians 1:29 says God ordained trouble for us. A Christian offends you, someone lies about you, a drunk sails right through a light and T-bones you, sending you to the hospital with a ruptured spleen. Now you’re lying there thinking, “Where is God? What kind of God is this to let these awful things happen to me? I thought He was going to take care of me!” Oh, He is taking care of you, only not the way you thought! The great apostle Paul knew plenty of trouble in his life. People hated him, he was stoned and left for dead, he got 39 lashes five times, was imprisoned, shipwrecked 3 times, endured false rumors, false teachers opposed him every step of the way. Not to mention his beheading by the Romans.
And yet, Paul wrote Romans 5:3, “and not only this, but we exult in troubles!” Paul uses the same word “exulting” in troubles that he used earlier of exulting in hope of God’s glory. The Greek word for tribulations is thlipsis, meaning pressure. Have you ever heard of a pressure cooker? That’s the Christian life. God puts us in the pressure cooker of troubles. The word thlipsis was used of crushing olives for olive oil or grapes for wine. These troubles aren’t just piddly little things like the toilet stopped up or you dropped your brand new phone and cracked the face.These thlipsis troubles are things pressure our lives, either from the outside or from inside. They include any difficulties, but are mainly pressures that come because you confess Christ.
Jesus said in Matthew 5:11, “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.” Then He says exactly what Paul says here, “Rejoice and be glad.” James 1:2 says, “My brothers, count it all joy when you encounter various kinds of trials.”
These pressures may be a job termination because you refuse to lie about pronouns, marriage struggles, a nasty boss, a child that is pushing your buttons or requires a lot of your energy. They could include sudden tragedy, debilitating disease, family rejection because of your faith or taking a stand for God’s truth. Many Christians face family pressure, even accused of hating for refusing to affirm the LGBTQ+ lifestyle.
You may think, “But Paul, this sounds crazy. Exult in life’s pressures, life’s troubles?” I’m sure Paul didn’t mean something wacky like, “Praise Jesus, I just cut off my thumb with this circular saw,” as blood spurts all over the place. But he did say “exult” in the troubles of life.
YOU NEED TO KNOW SOMETHING
Romans 5:3, “Knowing…”
“Knowing.” This is the most important word in this text when it comes to handling all these miserable pressures and troubles. Rather than going into a deep depression or acting like a victim, “Why do these things always happen to me?” or blaming everything and everybody else, you must immediately stop and know something, remember something, reckon on something. James 1:3 says the same thing, “Count it all joy when you encounter trials of every stripe, knowing….” Remember something really important. This is how we face the trials and troubles and pressures and unexpected difficulties that come our way. Know something.
What do you need to know? You need to know that these trials have come because you belong to God. In every trial and trouble you face, you need to remember God is in that trial. God has a purpose for each trial, as difficult and grievous as it may be. Jerry Bridges in Trusting God wrote, “Every adversity that comes across our path, whether large or small, is intended to help us grow in some way.” As you face trials, know they come from the hand of a sovereign, loving God. And as we’ll see, God has put His Spirit within you. He loves you with an everlasting love, and He has a plan for your life that will be completed, nothing is going to stop it. This plan is to make you more and more like His Son Jesus Christ (Romans 8:28-29). We need to know this and to remember this when pressures increase!
William Carey sailed from England to India in 1793 as a missionary. He was a brilliant man. He spent endless hours learning the language and then translating the Bible, plus preparing dictionaries and grammars for future missionaries. He brought someone with a printing press to print all his materials. One day while he was away from his home in India, fire broke out and destroyed everything he labored for—printing presses, Bibles, manuscripts, dictionaries grammars, the entire building. What would you do if five years of information on your hard drive were suddenly lost in a crash – back before we had cloud services? Amazingly, without one sign of despair or impatience, Carey knelt, thanked God he had the strength to redo the work, and started right in, without a moment of self-pity!
William Tyndale, another brilliant scholar who spent years translating the Bible into English, saw three years of his translation work sink to the bottom of the sea in a shipwreck off the coast of Holland. One historian wrote, “Right there, he resolved to begin again.” A little later in 1536, after being betrayed by a seeming friend, they strangled and burned him at the stake for his “illegal” activity of translating the Bible into English.
The beautiful young English woman Ann Askew faced God’s pressure. Banished from her home by her husband for her faith in Christ, they captured her, tortured her, and carried her to the stake to burn for her Protestant beliefs. At the last minute a messenger brought a pardon from the king of England if she would only recant. She responded, “I did not come here to deny my Lord and Master.” On July 16,1546, she died for Christ in the flames.
Pressures and squeezings from the Almighty, right? In John 16:33 Jesus assured us, “In this world you will have tribulations.” Tribulations (thlipses – pressures) that will take you like a grape and squeeze the juice out of you, juice for God’s glory! Then Jesus continued, “Take courage. I have overcome the world.”
YOU NEED TO KNOW GOD’S PROCESS FOR YOU THROUGH YOUR TROUBLES
Romans 5:3-5a, And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; 4 and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope, and hope does not disappoint…
Notice the word “brings about” (katergadzo). It’s a vigorous word with the idea of producing or manufacturing something, going in one end rough and coming out finished and ready for use.
As a family we used to take vacations in Ocean City, New Jersey. There’s a wide boardwalk there along the beach, maybe a mile or so long, with all kinds of stores with good stuff to eat. One of those stores was Shriver’s where they make their famous Salt Water Taffy. Family tradition included stopping by and buying this soft, flavorful taffy. In the back of the store, we could watch the process of making the tasty candies. All the ingredients are cooked together in a large copper kettle. Then this huge hunk of taffy is pulled and stretched and twisted and rolled out and then cut into three inch lengths, wrapped and boxed, and ready to enjoy. That’s this word “brings about” or “vigorously working out.” That’s what God does to us – pulling and stretching and twisting us for a final product.
Paul uses several words to describe God’s process as He molds us into the likeness of His Son.
TRIBULATIONS. First there are tribulations or pressures. You’ve got to have these in order to grow in Christ’s likeness. God never promised you a trouble-free life. From the time He saved you until He takes you to glory, He’ll be sure to bring all kinds of circumstances and people to stretch and twist and pull you to make you like His Son. Sometimes your troubles get worse. But even then, you know God is sovereign and working through these pressures. 1 Peter 5:6 says, “Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He might exalt you at the proper time.” His mighty hand are all the people and circumstances He brings in your life to help you grow.
ENDURANCE. Second, God uses troubles to produce this quality of endurance or perseverance. The word means staying the course and hanging in there, regardless of how tough it’s getting. Jerry Bridges defines it as “press forward in the face of adversity.” You’ll never develop your muscles at Bob’s Gym unless you endure lifting those weights contrary to your feelings. You’re never going to be a Superbowl quarterback without enduring endless practice. To develop this quality of spiritual endurance, the determination to hang in there without quitting, you’ve got to have God-given pressures.
James 1:3 says the same thing, “Count it all joy, knowing that the trying of your faith works or produces (same word – katergadzo) endurance.” God is committed to producing endurance in your life. Sometimes people run from a hard situation, maybe a job where they think those people are impossible to work with. So, they quit and take another job. Guess what? God may raise up worse co-workers to produce the endurance needed. The key is to hang in there and learn God’s lessons with the smaller trials, unless you want God to turn up the pressure!
Endurance is a big issue to God. Hebrews 12:1 says, “Run with endurance the race set before you, looking unto Jesus, who endured the cross for us.” 1Timothy 6:11 says we’re to pursue endurance. And Titus 2:2 says we older guys are to be sound in faith, in love, in endurance. We can apply endurance on a very practical level in serving God. God uses the devil to send us a trial just about every Sunday morning. The pressure to stay in bed, or someone can’t find clean socks, or spilled the milk. And rather than enduring or persevering through these various trials, we “cave” and say, “Well, it’s just too tough to get out to SS this morning. Guess we’ll stay home.” This gets really practical. Got your steel toed shoes on? Someone may ask you to serve the church in some way and you feel the pressure of inconvenience, time infringed on, and rather than enduring you say, “I don’t think I could do that right now. We’re just too busy.” Or even if you do step out and begin to serve, someone may criticize you or say something nasty about you. How easy to react, to quit, or even carry bitterness with you. That’s the opposite of endurance.
Get the idea? God uses troubles, pressures, and even opportunities to develop endurance in your character. We have an adult class coming up entitled, “Pillars of Christian Character.” It might be a good time to develop endurance and make it a priority for your Sunday morning. Encourage others and allow time for personal endurance. Endurance means hanging in there for God, just like Christ endured the cross for us! Remember, God has promised never to give us a pressure too great for us to bear. Every pressure coming your way is one of God’s love gifts so you can develop endurance and become more like Jesus.
PROVEN CHARACTER. Third, God uses pressures to develop endurance that proves our character as growing, maturing believers. The word dokimen (proven character) was used of testing coins to see if they really were silver or gold or fakes. As you endure through the pressures God brings into your life, you and others begin to see the reality of Christ in your life. Job 23:10 says, “When He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.” Peter used the same word.
1 Peter 1:6-7, In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, 7 so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ;
Notice Peter says we’ve been distressed by these various trials. They aren’t easy. They may physically hurt or cause mental and emotional fatigue. Peter was talking about very real fiery persecutions coming to his generation. But Peter says they are “for a little while” and they prove the reality of your faith. Having enduring faith through fiery trials leads to praise and glory and honor when Christ returns.
UNASHAMED HOPE. Fourth, your pressures produce endurance that produces proven character, and your proven character produces unashamed hope! We had hope in coming glory back in verse two, but here your hope is a deepening, brightening confidence in God who loves you. Here’s what Paul is saying. No one will ever be put to shame, disappointed for trusting Christ and going through God’s pressure cooker saying, “It’s tough, but I’m hanging in there. God is faithful, loving, caring, purposeful. God is showing me His great love through these trials.” No believer ever died ashamed for taking a stand for Christ while under pressure. The trial may cost your life, but you’ll stand unashamed before your Lord. No one ever died disappointed that now they will go to heaven!
GOD’S LOVE POURED INTO YOUR LIFE
Romans 5:5, and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Here is the real reason you’ll never be disappointed or put to shame and why you can exult in the pressures God brings into your life. Because verse 5 tells you that God has poured out His love into your heart. Not dribbled or dripped, but lavishly poured out like rivers of living water, an inexhaustible supply. This is the first time “love” is mentioned in Romans. It’s not our love for God, but God’s love for us poured right into our hearts, the core and center of our being. And He pours out His love through His Spirit. Every believer has the Holy Spirit – God gave you His Spirit and this is what makes the practical difference in your life. You’re no longer like the world who curses God when pressures mount. You have God’s love in your heart through the Holy Spirit whom God gave you.
SO WHAT?
Martyn Lloyd-Jones says that how we respond to the trials and troubles of life in this world is the “acid test of a man’s profession of the Christian faith.” We don’t go looking for troubles and difficulties and pressures; God controls all that. But we control how we handle the thlipses (pressures) in our lives. Know and remember God is in the trials. Join Paul, who with godly courage and fortitude despite all the troubles he faced, says, “We exult triumphantly in all these pressures, because God has His loving purposes through them for us.” These are the evidences of His love in our lives. He is sovereignly using these pressures to help us grow to become like His Son, and to brighten our hope in His goodness in our lives.