Safety can kill you.

Steve Brown:
Hey, safety can kill you. Let’s talk about it on this edition of Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
This is Key Life, here to let Christians know that God isn’t mad at them. Keep listening and you’ll hear that because of what Jesus has done, you’re welcomed home into the family of God because of His radical grace, free from the penalties of sin and never alone in your suffering.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. If you have your Bible and you’re in a place where you can open it. You might want to open it to the Book of Philippians. This is a part of our study in Philippians and we’re looking at verses 18b through 26. Now, Paul has just gone over in what we studied last week, the fact that he’s in jail. And the last thing you expect him to say is to start talking about joy, but that’s what he does, and I thought it would be good for us to pursue that and kind of see where it was coming from.

Joy is the flag that flies over the castle to show that the king is in residence.

I don’t know who said that, but that’s profound, because it’s true. Now, if you were listening, we talked about that you should always note that joy comes from knowing the powerlessness of isolation. You cry by yourself. You laugh when you’re with others. And that’s why Jesus created the church, Philippians 1:19, Philippians 1:26. I remember early on when I was a pastor of a church near Boston, and when I’d been there for two or three weeks, a prominent member of the church quit coming. And I went to see him, and I said, Look, I’ve missed you at church. He said, I’m not coming back. And I said, Why are you not coming back? He said, Because you tell jokes. Why do you do that? This is serious business. And I said, well first I tell jokes ’cause they’re funny. And he didn’t appreciate that and he never came back to church. But I know more than I knew then, I should have said to him, I tell jokes and we laugh because when we laugh, Jesus laughs. When we don’t, he leaves the building. And then we saw, if you were listening yesterday, the irrelevance of circumstances. And that’s an overstatement, it’s Philippians 1:19.

Through your prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance.

I don’t know what you’re going through right now, but I get letters, and e-mails, and phone calls, and I know for some of you it’s really hard. That will turn out for your deliverance, and not only that, the knowledge of that fact will give you great joy. When I said that it was the irrelevance of circumstances, I repent. Circumstances are important, they really hurt. Nothing worse than going to a Christian funeral and nobody ever mentions there’s a corpse there and there is loss there and there are tears there and there are broken hearts there. We talk about our beloved being in heaven, let’s rejoice and celebrate. Well, we can do some of that, but we’ve got to cut a slack for those who weep too, and taste the salt of each other’s tears. And so, circumstances are not irrelevant, but they’re not as important as we think they are. Then let me show you something else. You should be aware that joy comes from knowing the powerlessness of isolation and the irrelevance of circumstances. Joy comes from knowing the danger of safety, look at the 20th verse.

I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now, as always, Christ will be exalted in my body whether by life or by death.

Let give you that in the King James Version 1611, this is what it says.

According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness as always, so now also Christ be magnified in my body.

The New American Standard also uses the word boldness. And so, as you look at that, you see that Paul is in a place he didn’t have to go. He was doing things he didn’t have to do. He was, he was in chains, and he didn’t have to be there. People hated him and that didn’t have to happen, if he had just been safe. But if he had just been safe, he never would have known the joy of risk. And so, the strength of what is being said in this text is Paul wants the courage to risk, to stand up for, to be counted for Christ, to exalt Christ in things that are difficult, even as difficult as being executed. I love the comment of the farmer who was asked if he had planted corn for his crop. He said, no, I haven’t. The crows would just eat the corn. So, somebody asked him, well, then did you plant cotton? And he said, he didn’t plant cotton because the Boll weevils would eat the cotton. And then he was asked, well, what did you plant? He said, I didn’t plant nothing, I’m playing it safe. You can play it safe, and Jesus will still love you. But we live in a time when it’s risky to speak up. We live in a cancelled culture. And when you speak truth, some people are not going to like you. And especially when you speak Christian truth, people are going to think you’re weird and a fanatic. And so, you don’t have to do it. But you’ll be sad, but if you do it, if you speak up, if you risk, you’ll know joy. You think about that. Amen.

Sometimes on Wednesday, when I have a little bit of time, I take some time to answer one or two questions. As you know, Pete Alwinson will be in on Friday and we spend the entire broadcast answering questions. And by the way, we’d love to get your questions and you can call 1-800-KEY-LIFE anytime, 24 7. And you can ask a question and just follow the instructions and we’ll record your question and sometimes even use it on the broadcast with your voice. If you want to, you can send your question to

Key Life Network
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if you’re in Canada, it’s

Key Life Canada
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or you can e-mail your question to [email protected] and I promise, we’ll take you and your question quite seriously. And if you can help us financially, Please do. I have never in my life, and I have a perfect record here, I have never in my life turned down a contribution to Key Life. So, if you can help us financially, do. And I promise we’ll squeeze it for the glory of God. If you can’t, we understand. Do say a prayer for this ministry. Alright, let’s turn to a question or two.

This is a question about II Corinthians and I forget the exact verse. I’m not a navigator. But it’s a question about what was Paul’s thorn in the flesh? You’ll remember that he said that exalting too much, with the good things that God had done for him, had given him a thorn in the flesh. And then he goes on to say in that particular text.

That God said his power was made perfect in weakness.

So, what was Paul’s thorn in the flesh? Listen, if God had wanted you to know what Paul’s thorn in the flesh was, God would have told you what Paul’s thorn in the flesh was. Now, there’s scholars who surmise. You know, and we know, that Paul had bad eyesight, and he didn’t have an optometrist he could go to to fix it, because he signed one of his letters in big, big letters, alphabet letters, because of his bad eyes. Some people have suggested that he was a hunchback. But nobody knows because God didn’t want anybody to know. And do you know why nobody knows and God designed it that way? So that your thorn in the flesh, whatever it is, would be the place where God’s power is made perfect in weakness. Could your thorn in the flesh be a besetting sin you can’t get rid of? Yeah, it certainly could. You’ve really prayed about , you really thought that God would fix it, you’re a Christian you should not have that sin, it’s unconscionable that you do. And you told Jesus, if you really love me, you would take it away. And he hasn’t. Well, don’t waste it. That is there so you will know that God’s power is made perfect in weakness. Could a thorn in the flesh be a diagnosis you got from the doctor that scared the spit out of you? Yeah, it really could be. That’s no fun when that happens and you know that you got a rough road ahead and it keeps you awake at night. It takes a long time to absorb the reality of what you have been told. Can that be a thorn in the flesh? Yeah, because in that particular situation, you’re going to learn that God’s power is made perfect in weakness. What about a bad marriage? Yeah, that can be a thorn in the flesh. You’ve done everything you know to make it better, you’ve gone to counseling and it seems to get worse. Isn’t that awful? Well, not altogether. It may be your thorn in the flesh so that God will show you that his power is made perfect in weakness. And so, when Paul in II Corinthians talks about a thorn in the flesh, God does not tell us what it is. And he doesn’t tell us what it is simply because we need to know God’s power. Hey, I’ve got to go. But first, Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.