How to Face Death Confidently Part 1

Pastor Mike will be speaking on How to Face Death Confidently Part 1. He will be reading out of 2nd Corinthians 5:1-8.

How is it that we pray in the spirit? It’s not magical. It’s not something that all of a sudden the heavens part and this great emotional experience happens in your life. But it is again the believer surrendering to God asking the Spirit of God to guide their prayer life.

Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders from The Open Door Church with Hope Worth Having. Welcome to our radio broadcast today. We’re excited about teaching the Bible. We’re going to be in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 1 through 8, and we’re talking about how to face death confidently.

There are many things in our life that make us feel very vulnerable, very insecure. And death is definitely one of those things that we don’t even like to think about, talk about. But the Bible teaches us how we can be ready to face death in a way where we have our confidence in the Lord.

So I want you to join me as we study the Bible together in 2 Corinthians chapter 5. We have been studying the book of 2 Corinthians, and it is such a powerful book because it is the letter of encouragement to God’s people.

And as we go through this book chapter by chapter, there’s no doubt that each of our hearts are encouraged. I can’t tell you the emotion that I feel as I study these scriptures and as I begin to dive into the words and the phrases and all that God is teaching us in this text.

The anticipation that I have every Sunday to come and to share these wonderful words for you that God has to his people. And so this morning as we come to 2 Corinthians chapter 5, we’ll be covering verses 1 through 8.

And I want to teach you this morning on how to face death confidently. How to face death confidently. Now you can go down to your favorite bookstore, and you can go and you’ll find all kinds of books and titles about confidence.

As a matter of fact, I recently just did an analysis of the difference between God and God. books that are out there that are about confidence and here’s just a few of these titles how winning streaks and losing streaks begin and end, how to develop self -confidence and influence people, ultimate success of total self -confidence, how to have confidence and power in dealing with people, the confident woman, raising confident boys and raising confident girls, 10 days to more confident public speaking, a guide to confident living, the confident coach guide to teaching soccer, a step -by -step guide to building a confident life.

There’s no doubt that the world has many principles on how to live confidently and they are encouraging us to live confidently. I want you to know it’s important for us even as believers to recognize that God wants us to be confident.

We are to tackle life with confidence. And we want that for ourselves. We want that for our children. Nobody wants a child that is unwilling to look at people in the eyes or unwilling to speak or is very shy and doesn’t know how to talk or do an interview or anything like that.

So these are things that we want. But what are the principles of confidence? In 2 Corinthians in this great letter, you are going to just in studying the whole book, you’re gonna learn about confidence.

Paul uses the word confident over 12 times in this letter. He certainly was a man who had faced rejection, ridicule. He was beaten, he was battered. He was criticized, he was vilified by others. He was betrayed by his own people that he had led to Christ.

But all those who had opposed him were unable to shake his confidence. And why is that? Because the apostle had confidence in Jesus Christ. I want you to look at chapter five, verse six, and just see two times that he mentions confidence.

He says in verse six of chapter five, therefore we are always confident. We jump down to verse eight. Again, he says, we are confident. The apostle was not disheartened by his afflictions. He was not at a point of giving up because of his problems, but he had great confidence and his confidence was not in himself.

His confidence was not in the world, but his confidence was in the Lord Jesus Christ. So I wanna share with you this morning some principles, just three principles on how to face death confidently that we see in these eight verses.

And the first principle that I want you to remember is this, that confident people think a great deal about heaven. Confident people think a great deal about heaven. Look at verses one through four. and note what the Apostle says, for we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens, for in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house, which is from heaven.

If so be that being clothed, we shall not be found naked, for we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened, not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life.

In life, you and I have momentary troubles. We learned about those light afflictions last week, but these momentary afflictions are like little weights. that are on one side of the scale of our life.

But when we think about as believers what we have, we have a new life in Jesus Christ. And in this new life with Christ, there is so much that we have, not only now, but what we have to look forward to.

And we have a new heaven that God has promised, that one day He’ll create a new heaven, and He’ll create a new earth. Everybody is working hard to save this earth. But what they don’t understand is that one day, God teaches us that He’s gonna allow the earth to be burned up, and He’s gonna create a new heaven, and He’s going to create a new earth, and there’s going to be a new Jerusalem.

You and I as believers are blessed with a new existence in Christ. But perhaps maybe the one thing that stands out to us, most of all as believers, is that one day we will inherit a new body. And you know, when you think about all the newness that is on the other side of the scale, compared to our light afflictions, it is no comparison.

And it is no wonder that the apostle was so confident, and he was so excited about what is to come for him as a believer. That is why we as believers fix our eyes on what is unseen. And our hope and our focus in our life is upon what is to come for those who love Jesus Christ.

We may be tempted to lose heart, and we may be tempted to be discouraged in this life. But when we begin to think about heaven, it is those heavenly thoughts, if you will, that lift our hearts and strengthen our faith.

We come back to our text, and right at the gate, the apostle says we know. This is important for you and I as we strive to live confidently in this world. As we strive to face death, the truth is that all of us face death every day.

It doesn’t matter what we may be going through or how young we are or how old we are. Death is no respect or a person. And so we all must be ready to meet the Lord Jesus Christ. But what he tells us is that we know, and this is in opposition to what we feel.

We feel so many different emotions. We feel so many things that are impacting our emotions and our thoughts and our minds. But the Apostle is calling us back to what we know to be true. The promises of God.

The truths of God. What do we know? He says in verse 1, we know that if our earthly house, referring to our body, this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God. A house that is not made with hands.

eternal in the heavens. God has a new body for all believers. He has a new, not only a new home in that we will live in a mansion with Jesus Christ forever and ever, the greatest dwelling place upon earth.

But we have a new body to look forward. How many of you would take a new body, amen? Yes, a few of us. Now what he does here is he makes a great analogy. And he reminds us that our bodies are tents. And that one day these tents are gonna collapse.

And at some point they are gonna be finished and we will have an eternal house in the heavens that is not made by human hands. And I know that as I mentioned a few weeks ago or maybe last week, I can’t remember, that we are all getting these different replacements to our body, but they are made with human hands.

But what God makes for you in heaven is made from him. And what he has designed for us is a new body that will never perish. The scripture says in 1 Corinthians 15 verse 53 that this perishable body must put on the imperishable.

And this mortal body must put on the immortality. What you gotta get and know in your heart is that your current body is not fit for heaven. And your current body is not designed to live eternally. Your body, our bodies are cursed with sin.

Doesn’t mean that everything that happens to us is resolved because of some action or lack of action, but it just means that we live in a cursed world. It is flawed, it is a world that is limited and these bodies are limited and they are decaying and they are corruptible.

They do not live forever. The apostle Paul reminds us that our bodies are temporary dwellings like tents. And at some point, point we have to loosen the cords, we have to pull up the stakes, we have to collapse the tent and we have to pack it away in order that we may have our new tent or our new body that God has for us that will be a part of our heavenly dwelling.

Paul was so excited, so motivated about this new body that was to come to him. He said to the Philippians in Philippians 1, 23, I am hard pressed between the two. Meaning what to? The two of should I stay here or should I go?

He said I am hard pressed between the two having a desire to depart and to be with Christ which is far better. Do you understand that church? That it is better to be with Jesus today? It is better to live in His presence.

It’s better to inherit your new body than all that this world has to offer. It cannot compare. to what God has prepared for those who love Him. When we think about heaven, we think about all the newness, we think about all that God is preparing for us, it certainly gives us confidence for the future.

Now, the second principle that I want you to learn this morning is that confident people draw on an inner resource in their life. And that inner resource is the Holy Spirit of God. So we jump down to verse five, and we note again that the Scripture says, “‘Now, he that hath wrought us “‘for the selfsame thing is God.'” Now, let me stop there, because in the King James, that’s a little bit difficult to understand.

But what He is saying to us, now, He, referring to God, who has prepared us, or who has destined us, for the selfsame thing is God, is that it is God who has designed us, prepared us, that He has brought about what is to come into our life.

It is God who has prepared us to one day we would be able to enter into the eternal heavens, and we would receive the new body that Jesus Christ has prepared for us. And so He starts out and says that God has prepared, or He has wrought us for the selfsame thing.

It is God who has done this, and what else has God done? Well, God also has given unto us the earnest of the Spirit. God has given us the earnest of the Spirit. So again, we’re not jumping on the first bus to go to heaven.

We’re not out there living recklessly, trying to hurry up and get to heaven. We would long to go to heaven. We think about heaven. We dream about heaven. We ponder about heaven. We read about heaven.

We reflect upon heaven in our life. life and we think about what’s it going to be to be in constant fellowship with Jesus Christ and all of our loved ones and to be able to wake up every day and to not have an aching bone, to not be tired, to not be frustrated with the things that we deal with in this life.

But what do we do until then? What do we do until God calls us home? Well the Bible tells us that God has given us a resource and that resource is the Holy Spirit of God. Now Paul has already brought this to our attention and I want you to just back up to 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 if you will just real quickly 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 you should hopefully only have to turn a page or two but 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 again I want you to see this theme that he keeps bringing up that is emerging in the text, in the letter because the apostle is trying to reaffirm to our hearts this wonderful resource that we have that helps us to abide and endure as we deal with the afflictions of life, as we are waiting for what God has prepared for us in heaven.

Look at verse 21 of chapter one of 2 Corinthians. Now he, which establishes us, with you in Christ, has anointed us as God, who has also sealed us and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. So what does he mean when he tells us that God has given us the earnest of the Spirit?

And you might know something very similar to that. When Terry and I bought our first house in Indiana, it was $35 ,000, our first house. Some of you could say, well, my first house was 10 ,000. And that’s probably true.

And we all have our wonderful stories. But when I think about what houses cost today, 35 ,000 sounds like a great deal, amen. But anyways, the realtor said now, you have to put down earnest money. And of course, Terry, we were in our 20s.

We didn’t know what earnest money was. What’s earnest money? Is that a special kind of money? Is that a money we haven’t tapped into yet? No, earnest money means it’s a down payment that you are sincere.

That what is to come, you are going to follow through on. And so we had to put down this earnest money. And so when the Bible tells us that God has given us the earnest of the Spirit, what he is saying is that God has given us the down payment of the Holy Spirit.

That the Holy Spirit is a down payment of the believer’s inheritance in the kingdom of God. That the Spirit of God, the Spirit of God has been put in the kingdom of God. into our hearts guaranteeing what is to come.

God Himself is preparing us for the experience of putting off immortality and embracing eternity as a down payment. He is guaranteeing the Holy Spirit in our lives and He has given us this inner resource that we might be sustained and to be able to move forward for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now let’s understand that because the indwelling of the Holy Spirit which indwells every believer, every believer that confesses Christ as Lord, every person that has put their faith in Jesus Christ has the Spirit of God living in them.

This indwelling Spirit in your heart and my heart is a foretaste. of what is to come when we live with Jesus Christ forever and ever and ever. Think of it in this way, that there have been many moments and times in your heart that as you have read the scriptures, that the fullness of the spirit has so captured your emotions and your thoughts, that you were overflowing with joy and that you were so illuminated with his truth and his promises.

That is a down payment to what is to come. That is that God is promising us through his spirit that there is coming a fullness that is incomparable in this world. There is coming a presence of God that is so full and delightful and joyful for the believer and that it’s not momentary, it is not just high points in your walk with Christ, but it is constant, it is consistent every day as you live in the presence of Jesus Christ.

So we have the treasure of eternity awaiting us in heaven, but until then, God has given us the spirit, the Holy Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come for every believer. Now the problem is we as believers don’t always live in the fullness of the spirit.

And the problem is not that somehow you and I need to go out and get more of the spirit because you have all the spirit that you need for the fullness of the spirit already lives in you, but it’s just a matter, does the spirit have you?

And the key to you enjoying the fullness of the spirit and walking in the spirit and being filled with the spirit. The key is your life being fully surrendered to Jesus Christ. So many believers are discouraged.

So many believers are ready to give up and quit because they are not walking in the Spirit. They choose rather to walk in the flesh. The flesh will let you down. The flesh will fail you. But you, as a believer, you have the resource of the Spirit of God.

And the Spirit of God will not leave you comfortless, but rather just the opposite. It is the Spirit of God who comforts us when we are grieving. It is the Spirit of God who guides us as we are seeking the will of God.

It is the Spirit of God who even prays for us that when we cannot articulate the right words. to Jesus Christ because our heart is so burdened or so overwhelmed with the emotions. The Bible teaches us that the Spirit of God takes our groanings from our heart.

It is not a special, special spiritual language, it’s just the Spirit of God knows our hearts and reveals our prayers and our hearts to an almighty God and an advocate named Jesus Christ who loves and cares for us and he reveals that request unto him.

The Spirit of God illuminates us. The Spirit of God helps me to understand the Bible. When you come to the Scriptures, you should open your Bible and pray. The first thing you should do is pray. People say, Pastor, I don’t understand the Bible.

Pray, my friends, open the Bible and pray. God, help me to understand your word. Help me to understand the insights and what you want me to learn. It is the Spirit of God that illuminates his truth so much that the Bible said, you don’t even need a teacher, not that you shouldn’t have a pastor.

I don’t wanna get rid of the pastor, amen? We don’t wanna get rid of our Bible study leaders, our Sunday school teachers, but the point is this, that it is the Spirit of God. You don’t have to always have a teacher.

You don’t always have to have your pastor there teaching you the Bible 24 seven because you have the greatest teacher already living inside of you. It is the Spirit of God. And if you and I would just seek the Spirit of God, if we would surrender to the Spirit of God, if we would pray and ask the Spirit of God to help us understand, he would illuminate our minds.

He would help us to understand the spiritual truths of God’s word. And I want you to understand the Bible teaches us also that the Spirit helps us not only as we pray into God, relating. to the burdens and the heaviness of life, but the Bible just teaches us in general that we are to know that we have the access and resource of the Spirit in general prayer.

The Bible teaches us to pray in the Spirit, to pray in the Spirit. Why do you feel that sometimes your prayer life is anemic? Why do you feel sometimes that your prayer life is so powerless? It is because, again, you are praying in the flesh, but time and time again God invites us to pray in the Spirit.

How is it that we pray in the Spirit? It’s not magical, it’s not even mystical, it’s not something that all of a sudden the heavens part and this great emotional experience happens in your life, but it is again the believer surrendering to God, asking the Spirit of God to guide.

their prayer life to guide their words as they pray in the Spirit that you would call upon the Spirit of God it is okay to pray to the Spirit of God and to pray that the Spirit of God would help you to pray what you should pray and how you should pray the Bible not only teaches us that the Spirit is a resource in relating to our prayer life and encouragement and helping us to lift our hearts to God but it is the Spirit who gives us an unction that is that He gives us a desire to want to obey God to want to live for God the unction of the Spirit the anointing of the Spirit sometimes the Scripture refers to it so in this life we need that unction we need that anointing because if you’re like me and maybe you’re a little bit different and now I guess we’re all a little bit different right but there are times we just don’t feel like doing the right thing or we don’t like feel like that we need to get out and do this for Christ and do that for Christ and that is only normal and natural in the flesh we get tired we get weary physically and sometimes even our spirit is defeated and deflated and we need the anointing and the unction of the Spirit of God to birth within us a passion for God and the energy to accomplish what God wants us to do so we seek the unction of the Spirit we seek the anointing of the Spirit we seek that He would drive us and move us and motivate us that we might be all that He has called us to be for the Lord Jesus Christ it is the Spirit that helps us as we are teaching the Bible whether we’re teaching it to our children or to a Sunday school class or a Bible study group, whatever it is, or one -on -one in mentoring and discipling others, it should be the desire of our heart that the Spirit of God would fill us and he would anoint us and give us the unction to articulate what he wants in our life.

To communicate to those who are listening and learning when we come to the pulpit, we are constantly praying that the Spirit of God would anoint us and fill us with his unction to communicate his word to you in such an effective way that you could understand it and apply it to your life and that it would be transformative in your life.

That is not just for the pastor. That is for every mother and father. That is for every grandma and grandpa. That is for every Bible teacher, that is for every person that God is calling us to communicate His word, whether one -on -one, small groups, but whatever the circumstance may be.

Now we’re learning how to face death confidently. We do it as we think of a great deal about heaven, and I would encourage you to read about heaven, study about heaven, learn so much about heaven, don’t be afraid.

There’s a great book out there that I want every one of you to get. It’s written by Randy Alcorn, and it’s just simply entitled, Heaven. Go to Amazon this afternoon, or go to your wonderful bookstore, and you find it, and you get it, and I’m going to tell you, it is so good.

It is so rich, as he cross -references every truth he teaches about heaven in the Bible. You will be blessed beyond measure, and you can even use that book as your devotion, teachers. You can use that book to teach about heaven in your classes, but I want you to know that.

But we are confident because we think a great deal about heaven. We are confident because we draw on an inner resource of what God has given us in the power of the Holy Spirit in our life. But thirdly, and finally, we are confident because we have a future hope.

Look at verse 6. Now, after teaching us about heaven, this new body that is to come, after teaching us about this great resource, the earnest of the Spirit, the down payment of the Holy Spirit of God living inside of every believer, he says in verse 6, therefore, we are always confident as a result of what God has for us, as a result of what God has already given us, we are confident.

Confident we are always confident knowing that while we are at home in the body We are absent from the Lord for we walk by faith Not by sight for we are confident I say and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord Christians live in hope Well the Apostle Paul teaches us that there are things that we know and one of the ways that we face death confidently is base it on truth We know not what we feel not what we think in the relation to what we may think we believe in but what is truth what is something that is concrete and definite and when you build your life on the truth of God then you’re going to be able to face death confidently knowing God has a great plan for your life.

So we encourage you to check us out on Facebook and all those other social media platforms, and we just wanna remind you that in Christ, there is hope worth having.