2Cor.4:17,18
“For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;
While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.”
Why is it that a Christian person is able to endure the trials and the tribulations of which this life brings against us? The apostle Paul puts it very succinctly in this most glorious statement at the end of this chapter in 4 Corinthians. He tells us that as Christian people we are not so concerned with this “present evil world”(Gal.1:4), for we know that our life “is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.”(Jas.4:14), and that we are strangers, sojourners, and pilgrims in this world, “For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come.”(Heb.13:14) We look for a city not made with the hands of men, but we look for the City of God; and, we await the day of which shalt come, for, it most certainly will come — it has been promised to us by God Himself through the glorious blood and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The fact of the matter is this, — temporal things shall pass. We see it all the time, even the worldly man knows this fact; the second law of thermal dynamics expresses it; it says that all things are perishing, moving from a state of better to worse; the paint on a house fades, a hot drink becomes lukewarm, and man lives and then dies, this is a basic fact that even the heathen understand.
But, what the heathen cannot grasp is this, the eternal is far more real than the temporal. One might ask, “How can this be?” It is simple, things that are eternal do not perish; this is why the apostle here puts it this way, “the things which are not seen are eternal.” For, we are saved by faith, and we are told that “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”(Heb.11:1) and the apostle Paul in Romans 8:24, puts it this way, “For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?” The invisible things, these are what we hope for.
So, the question then is this — What is this substance, what is this hope, what are these things not seen? The answer to this question is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the substance, He is the hope, and the things not seen are His workings through the Holy Spirit, by which He commands everything in heaven and in earth; as He Himself said to His apostles, “All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.”(Mat 28:18) And, when Scripture tells us that we as Christians are “looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour, Christ Jesus,”(Tit.2:13) we realize right away that when we speak of hope, what we mean is, — that which is beyond certain. We understand that hope in Christ means absolute assurance.
When we read Romans chapter 8 and verse 30, we read, “Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.” This section is known as the golden chain of redemption, for this cause, — that in this verse every aspect of the Christians redemption is connected in a way inseparable; and, that all the individual parts of redemption, those being, predestinated, justified, and glorified, are spoken of as being in the past tense; even glorification which in time will be fulfilled in the future, but in reality it has already taken place in eternity by the decree of God Himself. Every part of the Christians redemption is so certain it is spoke of as if it has already happened; though in reality, many have not yet been redeemed, nor even born. And, for those who have been redeemed, lived and died, the glorification of their bodies has not happened in the temporal world, but it has, nevertheless, happened.
These are the invisible things, these are the things in which our faith stands certain. For, it is God, who, by His gospel has the power to save, and this He does by applying the blood of His Son to believers by the work of the Holy Spirit; all of this happens to the believer without his knowledge, it is an invisible act of God upon the ungodly man. Our Lord said this to Nicodemus in John 3:8 “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.” Like the wind, the Spirit is invisible.
There are other things that are not visible to us because they are beyond our comprehension. One of these incomprehensible concepts is the cost of our salvation. The blood of Christ and its value to God the Father is something far beyond our reckoning. And, since the price of salvation is so great, our assurance of this salvation should also be great. The apostle makes this very remarkable statement in Romans 8:32 “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?” God delivered His Son up to the cross, the cost of this is beyond our reason, so, the fact that God paid such a great price for the redemption of His creation is reason enough for any Christian to have full and complete assurance in the fact that, based on the life, death, and resurrection of the Lord of glory, all who are in Christ are eternally safe. There is not a single saint that will perish or ever be outside of Christ, but all shall live for all of eternity. And, this is far more real that life in this present evil world. God sent His Son to die for the ungodly, “made of a woman, made under the law, To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. And because (we) are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into (our) hearts, crying, Abba, Father.”
So, when the world is unrelenting, and, trials a tribulations come upon us, do we fret, do we ask why me, do we just grin and bear it? No, we give ourselves to the living God, in the Spirit, through Christ Jesus, and we praise Him for His mercy in delivering us from the pit of eternal darkness; for, compared to what we have been saved from there is nothing comparable that the world or the persecution thereof can bring against us. “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?”(Rom.8:35) We as Christian people ought to be fully “persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”(Rom.8:38,39) For, no matter how tough it might get, there is none good but Christ; and He suffered the cross for the redemption of all believers and creation itself. He is the only just man that ever lived in this fallen world, and except that He were God that would never have been possible.
So, when someone says that they are innocent and do not deserve the trails of which they are going through, they certainly have never seen the fact that they were born a sinner and an enemy of God; they’ve never seen the truth of this Scripture, “There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.”(Rom.3:10-12) The Christian should always be aware that “all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”(Rom.8:28) And, even if we must meet some seemingly terrible fate, as many a martyr has had to do, we know that God loves us and prepares us for that which we must endure. Even if we are to be burned at the stake, His glory will be extolled in us; and, we too, like the martyrs of the past, as the flames of martyrdom begin to lick the flesh, will be given the glorious tongues to sing something like:
“Tis my happiness below
Not to live without the cross,
But the Saviour’s power to know,
Sanctifying every loss.
Trials must and will befall;
But with humble faith to see
Love inscribed upon them all,
This is happiness to me.
God in Israel sows the seeds
Of affliction, pain and toil;
These spring up and choke the weeds
Which would else o’erspread the soil.
Did I meet no trials here,
No chastisement by the way,
Might I not with reason fear
I should prove a castaway?
Trials make the promise sweet;
Trials give new life to prayer;
Trials bring me to his feet,
Lay me low, and keep me there.
William Cowper (1731-1800)
“For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;
While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.”
May God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, be extolled in all of our thoughts, emotions and deeds.
Scripture Alone 