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Apples of Gold
Radio Script for
“Hard Pressed On Every Side”
Hello, I’m
“We are hard pressed on every side…”
Can you relate to that today?
That’s what the Apostle Paul wrote in Second Corinthians 4:8.
It says, “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed…”
That verse is found in a popular worship song by Darrell Evans entitled “Trading My Sorrows.” It says, “I’m pressed but not crushed, persecuted but not abandoned; struck down but not destroyed. I’m blessed beyond the curse for His promise will endure; and His joy’s going to be my strength.”
So do you feel hard pressed on every side today?
If so, this is a good test of your “compressive strength.”
We talk about the compressive strength of concrete. What you do is take a sample piece of the concrete and put it in between two “rams.” Then you slowly increase the pressure on the concrete until it breaks. When you know how much pressure was being applied at the “yield point,” you can figure out the “compressive strength” of the concrete.
So what is the compressive strength of a child of God? How much pressure can we endure before we are crushed?
Paul wrote in Second Corinthians 4:8 that they were pressed but not crushed.
Maybe they just weren’t pressed enough. Maybe they weren’t pressed to the “yield point.”
Paul wrote an interesting thing in Romans 5:3, and here’s what it sounds like to me. It sounds like the more pressure that is applied to the Christian, the more strength we are given to endure it! It’s as if the very presence of the pressure gives more strength to the Christian.
Romans 5:3 says, “…we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience…”
Listen to the last part from the Amplified Bible: “…knowing that pressure and affliction and hardship produce patient and unswerving endurance.”
Concrete has a finite strength, and pressure reveals that strength. But for the child of God, our strength is not finite. Pressure does not reveal the limits of our strength. It actually produces strength.
Not that the strength is ours. By ourselves we are weak earthen vessels. That’s the phrase Paul used in Second Corinthians 4:7, “earthen vessels.” He said, “…we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us.”
Alone, we crack under pressure. But we are not alone! We have the power of God working in us!
That’s the phrase Paul used in Ephesians 3:20. It says, “Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us…”
God’s power is working inside of us, and He increases our compressive strength to the point of not being crushed when the pressure is applied. Instead, the pressure actually produces more strength.
Paul describes a time in his life when the pressure was so great that he thought he would surely be crushed. In Second Corinthians 8 he wrote, “For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of our trouble which came to us in
Have you ever felt that much pressure? Have you ever felt “burdened beyond measure, above strength” – so pressured that you felt like you were going to die?
That’s where Paul was in
Why did God allow them to go through so much? Look at verse nine. He said it happened so “that we should not trust in ourselves but in God…”
In verse ten Paul came to this conclusion: God delivered us then, He delivers us now, and we trust that He will deliver us in the future.
Now here is another powerful, encouraging passage of scripture, written by Paul in Second Corinthians four. “Therefore we do not lose heart,” he said. “For our light affliction, which is bur for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”
Second Timothy 2:3 says, “…endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.”
Ephesians
As a Christian, you have the strength to do it because you have the Spirit of God inside you and He is giving you the strength. The more pressure you feel, the more God’s strength will rise up inside you.
The Bible talks about things like being filled with all the fullness of God, and He is able to make you stand, and strengthened with all might according to His glorious power that works in us.
Hebrews 12:1 says, “…let us run with endurance the race that is set before us…”
Second Timothy 4:5 says, “…endure hardship…”
There is no yield point for a Christian walking in the Spirit. Our compressive strength is infinite, because it’s God’s strength working and growing inside of us.
So if you feel like Paul did, like you are “hard pressed on every side,” then remember that Paul was pressed, but not crushed.
And as a born again child of God, you, too, have the strength of Almighty God working inside you.
He has delivered you in the past.
He is delivering you now.
And He will deliver you in the days to come.
Comments?
E-mail me: dougapple@wave94.com.
May God bless you today! With Apples of Gold…I’m
© 2010 The Arrow’s Tip
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(Proverbs 25:11 – “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.”)
Why “The Arrow’s Tip”? Each morning, after diligently seeking the Lord, I write Apples of Gold. Then before I release it to the public I pray one final prayer, “Lord, send forth your arrows.” I envision App
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