Comforted So We Can Comfort

In one paragraph

This message, preached from 2 Corinthians 1:1-11, was about suffering, comfort, and why God allows his people to go through both. Pastor Ray walked through Paul's letter to the Corinthians to show that the comfort God gives in affliction is not just for the one suffering, but is meant to be passed on to others who are in the same darkness. Paul opens nearly every letter he writes with the same...

Read together

1. Psalm 55:22 opening encouragement before worship: cast your cares on the Lord, he will sustain you, he will never let the righteous be shaken
2. Ephesians 2:4-6 shared after the song His Mercy Is More: God rich in mercy, gave us life when he raised Christ from the dead
3. 2 Corinthians 1:1-11 main preaching text on comfort in suffering and deliverance from suffering
4. 1 Corinthians 1:3 cited as parallel salutation to show grace and peace pattern across Paul's letters
5. Galatians 1:3 one of several letters cited to show Paul's consistent grace and peace greeting
6. Ephesians 1:2 one of several letters cited to show Paul's consistent grace and peace greeting
7. Philippians 1:2 one of several letters cited to show Paul's consistent grace and peace greeting
8. Colossians 1:2 cited to show grace and peace greeting extended to saints and faithful in Christ
9. 1 Thessalonians 1:1 cited as example of grace and peace to a church with no real sin mentioned
10. 2 Thessalonians 1:2 cited as repeated grace and peace greeting following up on confusing points in first letter
11. Romans 1:7 cited to show Paul wished grace and peace even to a church he had never met
12. Philemon 3 cited as grace and peace to a slave owner, with the plea to release Onesimus as a brother in Christ
13. 1 Timothy 1:2 cited as the instance where Paul adds mercy for Timothy who is in ministry
14. 2 Timothy 1:2 cited to show mercy remains in the greeting for Timothy in ministry
15. Titus 1:4 cited as grace mercy and peace to Titus also in ministry as a true son in the common faith
16. 2 Corinthians 11 Paul's list of sufferings: stripes, imprisonments, shipwrecks, stonings, perils of many kinds, cited to show he knew suffering firsthand
17. 2 Corinthians 4:7-12 treasure in jars of clay passage: afflicted but not crushed, perplexed but not in despair, struck down but not destroyed, death at work in us but life in you
18. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18 closing passage: do not lose heart, light and momentary affliction preparing an eternal weight of glory, looking to things unseen

Talk about it

1. Pastor Ray opened by asking whether you have ever felt so afflicted that it seemed like it might kill you. If you are comfortable sharing, what did that season look like, and what did you find yourself leaning on during it?
2. Paul's greeting of 'grace and peace' appears in nearly every letter he writes. What difference might it make to approach a difficult conversation or relationship by leading with unmerited favor and a desire for the other person's wholeness, before anything else is said?
3. Pastor Ray described the idea that 'comforted people comfort people,' the way someone who has been through a dark place can jump into the hole with another person and say, 'I have been here before and I know the way out.' Has anyone done that for you, or have you been able to do that for someone else?
4. Paul says in 2 Corinthians that the affliction he and Timothy experienced in Asia was allowed so that they would 'rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.' What does it look like in practice to shift that reliance away from yourself, especially when you are in the middle of the suffering rather than on the other side of it?
5. Pastor Ray closed with Paul's description of suffering as 'light and momentary affliction' that is preparing an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. How do you hold that long view when the affliction in front of you feels anything but light or momentary?