May 8, 2025
Finding Hope in Affliction
Have a question or comment for Pastor Plek or one of his guests. Send it here. 356: How does God redeem our pain? When affliction strikes, it often feels senseless and crushing. Yet within the Christian faith, suffering takes on profound meaning as we discover its redemptive purpose. In this vulnerable conversation, Pastors Plek and Pastor Holland share their personal journeys through grief, loss, and ministry challenges while exploring the powerful message of 2 Corinthians on comfort amid af...
Have a question or comment for Pastor Plek or one of his guests. Send it here.
356: How does God redeem our pain? When affliction strikes, it often feels senseless and crushing. Yet within the Christian faith, suffering takes on profound meaning as we discover its redemptive purpose. In this vulnerable conversation, Pastors Plek and Pastor Holland share their personal journeys through grief, loss, and ministry challenges while exploring the powerful message of 2 Corinthians on comfort amid affliction.
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00:06 - Welcome and Introduction
00:23 - Personal Experiences with Affliction
01:55 - Finding Comfort to Comfort Others
06:10 - Broken Trust and Misplaced Expectations
09:42 - Addressing Giving with Limited Resources
16:04 - Biblical Financial Wisdom
22:13 - True Security Beyond Material Wealth
WEBVTT
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and welcome back to pastor plex podcast.
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I'm your host, pastor plec, and joining me in studio is none other than pastor holland greg.
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Welcome back home hello, thank you so much uh, we are talking about, uh, second corinthians day, and how you are blessed in affliction.
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And so, holland, first question have you ever been afflicted?
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I have been afflicted.
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yes, how have you been afflicted?
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You know I've been afflicted in a couple of different ways.
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I've been afflicted with grief.
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Grief is a real affliction when I have lost loved ones.
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Before I lost my dad right after moving to Wells Branch and getting married, and that was one of the hardest.
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How long after you got married did he?
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pass away um for five, about five months, yeah he got married in june, got married in september, september and then.
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So it was, and then he passed away in february of 2013, and then my dad passed away that following september.
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Yeah, that's right.
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Yeah, so affliction happens and so that's hard, but the cool part that I think about our Christian faith is we have a higher floor than the rest of the world.
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That doesn't mean we don't have sadness, that means we don't have darkness.
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But what I love is that even when you despair, even of life which is what happened to Paul, or what he wrote about in 2 Corinthians, chapter 1, is that he had hoped that God would save them ultimately by dying, or that he would save their lives, and so I think that's one of the things that is a unique perspective that Christians have, although, to be honest, when I think about death, there's probably that it's probably like I can only attribute to things I know.
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Jumping out of an airplane for me was like very anxious, anxiety driving, and then it happened, and then it was like, wow, this is great.
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I mean, you're out in the sky, you're looking around, your parachute opened.
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It's pretty great, and that's the only thing I sort of imagine.
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I'm sure death, the fear of the unknown, is sort of like that, but a passing from this life to the next, but anyway, I think the thing that's the struggle is that Christians have an actual hope, we have a theology and an understanding of the life after this, which then should provide a comfort, even when things are hard currently, wouldn't you agree?
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Yeah, amen, okay.
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So Paul shared about the struggle that he had of just kind of life, but that he wanted to use the comfort that he'd been given to bless them.
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And I think all of us whenever we go through affliction, whenever we go through struggle, god uses our pain points and the comforts he's given us to then have a purpose to minister to others.
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And so I think you and I both have been able to minister to people in grief, minister to people in the struggle of loved ones making poor decisions and how we can best support and love our family and beyond, just through pastoring.
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And I think that's one of the things I feel like is probably not I don't know, I don't know if that's one of the things we tout Like.
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We're like be a Christian, you have hope when everyone else is in despair.
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I don't know if that's something like.
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I don't know if that's like part of our slogan, but it is, I think, a part of the reality of like where do you turn when you have sadness, and I think Jesus, ultimately, is the great comfort that we have.
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Any other thoughts on that, just from pastoring and kind of walking people through hard times.
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Yeah.
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I mean there's a different level of trustworthiness, reliability, confidence you know that you have when you're able to speak not only from theory but from, but from experience, right and so like, when you've walked through affliction, when you've experienced grief, when you face trials, when you've suffered, um, it's like your words carry more weight to the people you're ministering to.
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And so you know, in some sense, you know you, you should expect, okay, if I'm going to be in ministry, then the Lord is going to bring me through suffering and trial so that I can speak from a place of experience to comfort and encourage others with the hope of Jesus.
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And then, even for those who are not going to be a pastor or something like that, all of us have been given a ministry in the sense of ministering to others, serving the Lord and serving other people in His name, where suffering is just part of life and is part of following Christ.
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And if we can see it as the Lord preparing us to minister to others and you know the Lord using it, comforting us so that we might be comforters to other people, I think it helps you even in just like while you're in the middle of your own suffering, while you're facing affliction.
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You can even go like okay, I know like the Lord has a purpose for this and I'm going to be able to comfort someone else in this place at some point and that can even help you while you're going through it.
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Yeah, I agree.
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Here's the thing that I noticed in this is that Paul was a comforter, right, yeah, and obviously he knew that.
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And then he made plans to go to Corinth and then he doesn't follow up on them because he didn't want to have to come up there and be harsh with them.
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But then people got really upset at Paul and were like you're vacillating, you know, I can't trust you.
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All that and it kind of reminded me whenever, because Paul's like I'm going to, I want to comfort you, I'm coming to you, I want to help you, and here you are, sort of like you don't really care about us.
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It just reminds me of my kids going like you hate me when you take away the switch or like you promised them ice cream and then the plans change and you and ultimately, what I think can happen in the church is we have this great comfort in Jesus, but then all of a sudden, when a leader doesn't do what we expect them to do, then we lose our minds and instead of being comforted by Jesus, we kind of break it, we lose heart.
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And this is even when leaders have moral failures or even when they don't, even when they just had a change of plans, like in Paul's case, people start to go.
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They get crushed by that in some ways.
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Have you seen people's hope and heart get crushed because they put too much emphasis on a person as opposed to getting their comfort from the Lord?
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Yeah, man with planting a church eight years ago, or how eight years ago?
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I think 2017 to 2025 and not really knowing you know what all that was going to look like.
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Um, it wasn't just you know, me and my family that you know, didn't know what it's gonna look like.
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Everyone you know that goes in like on the original team right comes in with expectations about here's how it's going to go, here's what it's going to be, and no one really knows what to expect.
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And so when your expectations aren't met, yeah, there's frustration there.
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Sometimes people are very willing to shift.
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You bring up the example of Paul.
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Some people are like, man, totally get it, no big deal.
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And then there's other people who are really upset with Paul and with everything from planting a church to trying to get established.
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And when you make any kind of changes or ministry decisions that people weren't anticipating, right, even from some of the things that seem so minuscule or unimportant, trivial, whatever, they can be a really big deal to people.
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And so constantly, no matter what stage you're in in ministry, it seems like you're always dealing with disappointing people and people putting a lot of pressure on you to be something that sometimes you never even promised them to begin with, but they're carrying over expectations from a previous church or something like that, and so, yeah, that's just an aspect of being in ministry, and then even beyond ministry, I think, with husbands and wives.
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There's an expectation this is what wives are supposed to do, and then when the wife doesn't, do what?
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She's supposed to do.
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Then there is a real almost it's almost an idol of like your whole heart breaks and falls apart because you were supposed to do what you said, or a husband you were supposed to be or do something that I had in my mind or in my vision, and then it didn't come to fruition.
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and then you can kind of get shattered by that.
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As opposed to my hope is in the unchangingness of the lord and I'm gonna have to uh, respond, adapt, be resilient and take initiative in into ways to lean into marriage or to lean into parenting or to lean in whatever different part of life that you're at.
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Okay, yeah, I feel like those are all wise words because one of the things I mentioned on Sunday was like providing comfort is uncomfortable.
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Yeah, like if you're a comfort provider, you're, you're going.
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I said it's kind of like hugging a cactus, like you're.
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Sometimes, people they want, they want comfort, they want to be ministered to, but they have so many issues that leaning into that is going to be painful, no matter what.
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All right.
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So want to talk about um, about a question that came up through our podcast question line and, by the way, if you have a question, you can text us at 737-231-0605.
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And the question is this I know part of the preaching was the message around comfort and an example was not to spend money on things you can't afford.
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What if you want to give lots of money to like the church but don't have a lot of money.
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I've been asked this before.
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All right thoughts on that, holland.
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What do you think I love?
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that question.
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That's so awesome.
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As a big heart and they want to be generous and what would would first step?
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What do you think?
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So when we think about generous, typically we think about the amount of money being given.
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I think, biblically, generosity is the amount of faith required to give it Right.
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So the widow and the two mites right, Mark 12,.
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The poor widow put two small coins in the offering and Jesus praised her for more than the wealthy donors.
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She put in all she had.
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More generous.
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Yeah, Generosity is not about the amount given but the amount of faith required to give it.
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And so, you know, for this person, first of all, I would say I love that.
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It's like, man, I wish I had more money so that I could give more.
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That's awesome.
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And, like you know, it's almost like am I being stupid by giving so much?
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Like that's kind of what, where usually people are like, oh, I don't have very much, there's no way I could give.
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I need to.
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You know, wait until I have more to start giving.
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This person's like oh man, I want to give it all.
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So I think that's really awesome.
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But to be encouraged, for this person to be encouraged, knowing that generosity is about the faith behind the gift, more so than the amount.
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And you know, since you're in 2 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 9, you know gives a lot of encouragement about giving.
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Yeah, Says verse 11, or 10 and 11, he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.
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You will be enriched in every way, to be generous in every way.
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So I got desire to want to be generous, saying like, hey, you start giving what you can now with the heart of faith, and God will bless you that you can give more in the future.
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He who is faithful with little will be faithful with much.
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God doesn't bless you to raise your standard of living, but to raise your standard of giving.
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Boom, there you go, In fact, 2 Corinthians 8.12, for if the readiness is there, it is acceptable according to whata person has, not according to what he does not have.
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So I think your heart is exactly in the right spot.
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Your desire to give honors God, even if your capacity is limited.
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But guess who can increase your capacity?
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The Lord.
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And so I think, starting with praying, like God, I would love to give more.
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I would love to be able to I don't know reverse tithe, I don't know if that's the person's heart, but like what's?
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a reverse tithe so where you give 90 and you live off 10, so uh gosh rj letourneau, like that was like his big thing letourneau university, the guy that okay, he was a big inventor of earth movers, uh, and so he gave away 90 of his income and lived off 10 now granted when you're gazillion earth movers like bulldozers and uh like for construction sites.
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He's the one who invented the, the kind of like I thought this was like a movement like that we're the earth movers, like uh, like ministry or something like that.
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So and so that was kind of like rj letourneau like really inspired me and I'm like I would love to be able to do that.
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Yeah, and like I was like for me.
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I was like what if I just gave 1% more every year and just see what happens?
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And get to the point where it's probably not going to be realistic.
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And I'm still going.
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Love it, it's kind of wild, all right, so I think that's exactly what you should do, and I like this one, too, from Luke.
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But you can't spend money you don't have.
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Yes, so I mean that's an important part of it is like you don't want to go into credit card debt giving to a church right, you don't want to just be swiping your card, Then you'll be a part of the benevolence program.
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And then you're just paying interest on money that you.
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Are you going to make the church pay that interest?
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No, so I feel like, don't give what you don't have, but give what you do have, and then ask God to bless you so that you may give more.
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There, you go?
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Yeah, I think that, yeah, whoever can be trusted with very little can be also trusted with much.
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That's classic Luke 16, 10.
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Be faithful with the small resources and then God will be pleased and prepare you to handle more if he provides it.
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So I think that's let's talk about the giving in debt, because I think we had, uh, whenever capital campaigns come around and um, whenever we did our capital campaign for the revive the stones, which you still want to get to, that you are more than welcome to, for our new church building in breakaway.
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But when we did that, some people like had a.
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They looked at their finance that I can give this much over and above what I normally give, and then I want to give this much over and above what I normally give.
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And then I want to give this much and there's a faith gap over three years that God would somehow provide that and that you couldn't give it if you didn't have it.
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But there's a part of faith that you would, you'd lean into God, pledge that much and then give that much and then watch God show up and provide.
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And so you know we've saw a lot of people do huge faith gaps and then, through unforeseen circumstances that they couldn't have predicted, then God provided the money for them to give.
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It was kind of wild.
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That's awesome, yeah, so that part is very exciting to watch God work like that.
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One of my favorite stories from Tim Hawks, the former pastor at Hill Country Bible Church.
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He got us all together.
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Do you remember this?
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He said one of the best things you can do is have a capital campaign for your church.
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It gets at the very heart of materialism, even if all you do is raise a lot of money and then burn it in the parking lot and I love the picture of that because of course nobody would do that.
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But the point is you need to do capital campaigns to call people to give so that their security isn't in their 401k or their investments or whatever, but is in the Lord Anyway.
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I thought that was kind of a cool thought.
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What is your take on when people are thinking through their finances and giving, saving, you know, emergency savings what about you know?
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Proverbs says a good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children.
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You know how should someone if they're like okay, I want to be disciplined.
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I talked to some guys this morning in the men's study and we talked about finances and giving and what do we do if we don't have, you know, feel like we don't have enough to give, or I have, and so it's just a good conversation.
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I think a lot of people you know need some guidance on is how should I be divvying up what God gives to me in terms of spending, investing, bills, inheritance to my children's children, like what do you think about that?
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Yeah, I am a person who is a big fan of the give, live, save plan.
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And so give first, create a plan for what you're going to live off of and then save.
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So if I were to break it down, 10, 10, 80 would be give 10, save 10, and then that's very general.
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Some other people would say save 15 and live off the rest, but start somewhere with all that, start somewhere with giving, start somewhere with saving and start somewhere with a budget so that you know actually what you're spending, what's coming in, what's going out.
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I think for a lot of us and I think you can probably attest to this is that people don't budget.
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They just sort of money comes in, money goes out and they're like, ah, and if what happens?
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If you depend on credit card, if you're not intentional about where that money goes, then you're not building into an inheritance for your grandchildren, which I think that's obviously biblical to give an inheritance to your grandchildren.
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I'm a recipient of an inheritance from my grandfather and so I definitely want to continue that.
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It was a huge.
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That's how I bought our house.
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That was wild.
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So I think that that is a huge.
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it's really special and that's wise.
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I bought our house.
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That was wild, so I think that that is a huge it's, it's really special and that's wise living and wise investing.
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And, um, at the same time, you're not, uh, you know, I think, Warren Buffett.
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You know he wanted to give away like nine 9% of his wealth because he's a gazillionaire.
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All right, but I don't think any of us are in that realm of Warren Buffett.
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So I do think savings wise, because it's not like you're hoarding money, you are paying yourself when you don't have a job.
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You need to think through that.
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So what about the proverb of the guy with the barn storing up the stuff in his barn?
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And some people go to that and be like, yeah, you're not supposed to save, that's like worldliness.
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Right, yeah, well, I think there's a part of it.
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I don't know if that was like how much wealth we're talking about, but don't do that right, because you don't know what your life is, and so I think that is true.
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I think that you're having to hold attention, um, with both sides, that your hope can't not be in your money, because we all know that.
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Uh, let's just go to the 1920s.
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Banks were completely liquidated and there was, there was nothing there, and oh, oops, oh.
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But I'm now the fdic.
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Oh, you're telling me you're trusting in the government for your 250 000.
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Well, how long is that 250 000 gonna last you?
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Yeah, if everything you know, let's just say the government does come through.
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But what if the government doesn't come through?
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What if the government collapses?
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Well, we're in America.
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That would never happen.
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I'm sure that's what they felt like in Rome, you know there's a reality that, like the, thing that you trust in cannot be your wealth, because that is here today, gone tomorrow.
00:19:34.080 --> 00:19:37.425
as Proverbs says, is it gets wings and flies away.
00:19:37.425 --> 00:19:40.834
Is it gets wings and flies away.
00:19:40.834 --> 00:19:45.760
Or like, as some say, it's like a fake wall, like a fake castle.
00:19:45.760 --> 00:19:53.732
So you have this ability sort of like I'm okay, but it's an illusion of control.
00:19:53.732 --> 00:19:57.623
Anyway, Now is there some probably peace of mind that comes from.
00:19:57.623 --> 00:20:06.271
I have thought through this, I've biblically thought through my finances, I have planned as best you can, but your trust still cannot be in your plan.
00:20:06.413 --> 00:20:07.377
Yeah, that's a good way to put it.
00:20:07.377 --> 00:20:10.932
I think you know there's both of those realities are in the scripture of one.
00:20:10.932 --> 00:20:12.957
It's good to work hard.
00:20:12.957 --> 00:20:16.269
It's good to make money, it's good to you.
00:20:16.269 --> 00:20:19.053
Can't be generous if you're not making anything to be generous with.
00:20:19.053 --> 00:20:20.414
You know it's good to you.
00:20:20.414 --> 00:20:22.237
Can't be generous if you're not making anything to be generous with.
00:20:22.237 --> 00:20:23.878
You know it's good to save, it's good to save up for your children's children.
00:20:23.878 --> 00:20:24.880
It's good to be generous.
00:20:24.880 --> 00:20:30.425
All those things are good and at the same time you can't serve God and money.
00:20:30.425 --> 00:20:40.963
There's a temptation of the idolatry of wealth and materialism and you can't put your hope in it because it can't save you, and so, like all those, things are true at the same time.
00:20:41.003 --> 00:20:49.680
Yeah, I think Proverbs 18 something a rich man's wealth is like a strong city and like a high wall in his imagination.
00:20:49.769 --> 00:21:02.377
I think that if we have the view that my wealth is not guaranteed, that at any given moment you could have a house fire and you weren't covered insurance wise for two days or whatever.
00:21:02.377 --> 00:21:24.589
I think I just was talking to a police officer, um, a couple days ago, and a guy had like a a vintage stingray corvette worth over a hundred thousand dollars and his insurance ran out on 420 and he hadn't renewed it for whatever reason, and he was going to a car show and drove it straight into a telephone pole and gone like in one.
00:21:24.589 --> 00:21:35.778
He woke up five minutes before he was excited about going to the car show that's gone and or a tornado, and you you didn't pay up for your house insurance or whatever the situation is.
00:21:35.778 --> 00:21:36.021
There.
00:21:36.021 --> 00:21:37.913
There was COVID, I mean, who could predict that?
00:21:37.913 --> 00:21:44.751
And you had all your money invested in I don't know um something that COVID destroyed.
00:21:45.074 --> 00:21:47.911
Like there you go, you had a restaurant or something.
00:21:47.931 --> 00:21:53.352
Yeah, and or whatever, like there's anything could happen and so there's nothing guaranteed.
00:21:53.352 --> 00:21:57.582
Sometimes it's a wealth, is an illusion of control.
00:21:57.762 --> 00:21:57.923
Mm-hmm.
00:21:58.325 --> 00:22:01.446
But at the same time it's smart to it can be a useful tool.
00:22:01.446 --> 00:22:05.229
Yeah, it's a great tool to bless others to Others, to bless your children, your grandchildren?
00:22:05.249 --> 00:22:08.830
Yeah, so seeing it as a useful tool, but nothing to put your hope in.
00:22:08.851 --> 00:22:11.531
Right, and so I love the fact that somebody wants to be able to give more.
00:22:11.531 --> 00:22:13.133
Yeah, and I think, give what you have.
00:22:13.133 --> 00:22:17.154
I do think I'm a big fan of Malachi 3.10,.
00:22:17.154 --> 00:22:19.957
Bring the whole tithe in the storehouse, then maybe food in my house.
00:22:19.957 --> 00:22:29.182
Test me in this as a Lord of Hosts and see if I'll not open up the windows of heaven for you and pour down a blessing for you until there's no more need, meaning like there'll be no scarcity.
00:22:29.182 --> 00:22:34.686
It will be, you will have more than enough, and obviously that's an old Testament verse.
00:22:35.067 --> 00:22:42.986
And the whole tithe means, like you know, the 10% that went to the Levites, the 10% to went to national feast, the 10% over three years that went to the poor.
00:22:42.986 --> 00:22:47.152
You know, there there's a lot of different tithes and so you need to have a whole tithe.
00:22:47.152 --> 00:22:55.047
Bring everything, but I think, with Jesus, you know, bring expecting a financial provision from God in some way.
00:22:55.047 --> 00:23:00.659
In fact, what the Bible says when you give to the poor, you lend to the Lord.
00:23:00.659 --> 00:23:09.691
And so I think about benevolence giving there's a blessing that enables forgiving, there's a blessing that enables forgiving, and then you reap what you sow.
00:23:09.691 --> 00:23:14.354
And I think you mentioned 2 Corinthians, 9, 10, 11.
00:23:14.815 --> 00:23:20.999
So I do feel like there is clear scriptural backing, not for a prosperity gospel.
00:23:20.999 --> 00:23:23.601
God's going to bless me so I can have more for me.
00:23:23.601 --> 00:23:29.527
He's not going to raise my standard of living necessarily, but he will raise my standard of giving.
00:23:29.547 --> 00:23:37.768
Yeah, yeah, and I mean, if your standard of living is unsustainable, I think it's okay to raise your standard of living too.
00:23:37.768 --> 00:23:44.569
But you know the goal, obviously, that you see in Jesus like just to bring it back to the real gospel.
00:23:44.569 --> 00:23:49.867
You know the goal is a generosity that displays the heart of God, the love of God.
00:23:49.867 --> 00:23:51.613
Um, your trust is in Jesus.
00:23:51.613 --> 00:23:55.628
You know you can give, give in a way that demonstrates God's love to the world.
00:23:56.049 --> 00:24:02.951
Um, yeah, and I don't like I said, like I don't think you have to live like a pauper, yeah, like if you've got wealth, enjoy it.
00:24:02.951 --> 00:24:06.015
God has given, has blessed you with that so that you can enjoy it.
00:24:06.015 --> 00:24:14.067
But at the same time, the heart of raise your standard of giving, not your standard of living, isn't so that?
00:24:14.067 --> 00:24:16.387
It's so that you put that perspective first.
00:24:16.387 --> 00:24:21.132
I want to seek first to expand kingdom, give to the kingdom and God.
00:24:21.132 --> 00:24:26.836
It's your money, do with how God has entrusted you and how he's leading you, and I think that's the important part.
00:24:26.855 --> 00:24:35.423
I think sometimes people forget that every dollar, not just the money you give to the church, is what God is leading you to use.
00:24:35.423 --> 00:24:40.088
Well, it's how much money you put toward your house and how much money you put towards whatever and it might be.
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