Hope Builders: Confidence
(Please use however much or little of the following material as you feel is appropriate. Group questions are in italics, remainder are leaders notes to provide background, or to help guide discussion etc)
The word ‘hope’ in current use is often means ‘something that you’d like to happen’, like ‘we hope to visit Paris this summer’. Sometimes it’s even more of a wish, ‘shut your eyes, cross your fingers and, without any great certainty, hope for the best’. This is in contrast to the older English and Biblical use of the word hope which is much closer to the word ‘confidence’ and ‘certainty’.
Ice breaker (optional)
What do you think about when you use the word ‘confidence’? In what situations do we use the word ‘confidence’?
· Confidence in a statement – a sense of expectation, certainty, assurance and conviction that there are good reasons for what is said to be true.
· Confidence as a feeling - positive, upbeat.
· Confidence in ourselves - the expectation that the result of some action or event will be a good outcome - often used in the context of a challenge – e.g. a presentation, a task.
· Confidence in someone else – that they will live up to their promises
What is our confidence in a statement based on?
· Our experience – ‘I’m confident that train is going to London, because I went on the same train yesterday’
· The integrity of the person making the statement
Where does our confidence in ourselves or someone else come from?
· Our ability, our experience, our resources, our own ego(!), our message
When it comes to our faith – do we have confidence in it? Do we have confidence in God? Are there situations that have, or might, knock our confidence? Philippians Ch 1 provides a fascinating insight into Paul’s attitude and experience when things really didn’t seem to be working out great.
2. Background:
· Paul, originally Saul the persecutor, experienced a dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus, and after a period of time in Antioch, in AD50 travelled into what is today Turkey where he established a number of churches, including the one at Philippi. In Acts 16 we read how Paul and his companions first meet with Lydia, a businesswoman, and then two particular incidents are recorded, one involving the release of a slave girl involved in fortune telling. This resulted in a backlash from her owners and Paul and Silas being thrown into prison, and then while praising God in their cells, being dramatically released and the jailer being converted. The church at Philippi had supported Paul on his journeys, sending Epaphroditus (ch 2 v 25) to provide practical help and to deliver a gift from the church. Epaphroditus had been seriously ill while with Paul and was now returning to Philippi with Paul’s letter.
· The letter may have been written four or five years after Paul had founded the church and while in prison in Ephesus (not recorded in Acts), or later in his life (~AD62), when imprisoned in Rome. He refers to the Praetorian Guard and Caesar’s household – some of whom were stationed at Ephesus as well as Rome. In either case Paul has been a Christian for many years and had many challenging experiences.
· The first section of this letter (v1-11) contain Paul’s appreciation for all the church’s support, his confidence in God that they will continue to growth in their faith and his prayer for them. He then gives them an update on what has been happening to him.
Read Philippians 1: 12-26 What was Paul’s situation? (v12):
3. In prison
Not for the first time! Read 2 Corinthians 11 v24-26 for a summary of Paul’s experiences.
What was Paul’s response to this situation? v12-14
· It has advanced the gospel despite the difficulties, because (v13-14):
· The palace guard know I am in prison for being a Christian
· It has encouraged the church to be ‘confident in the Lord’ and ‘proclaim the gospel without fear’
4. Relationship tensions with other preachers
What other tensions was he facing? v15-17
Other preachers taking the limelight, some competitive – motivated by envy, selfish ambition, stirring up trouble, others as partners, recognising the opportunities.
What was his response to this challenge?
· Not a problem though – Christ is being proclaimed, and I’m glad about that
5. Our response
How would I respond to:
· My life work being apparently thwarted by circumstances?
· Others taking over my role? Taking advantage of my limitations?
· Conspiracy, false accusation, aggression, hardship, persecution, possibility of death?
6. Paul’s response
What was Paul’s overall response to his situation? v19-26
· I’m going to continue rejoicing, because, through your help, prayers and the Holy Spirit (i.e. human and supernatural input), these circumstances will result in my deliverance / salvation (freedom from prison, or being with Christ)
What is he sure about and what is he uncertain about?
· v20, I expect and am confident that Christ will be exalted, in the face of uncertainty, whether in life or death
· v21, ‘For me to live is Christ, to die is gain’. What do you think he means by this?
· v22-24, bit of a toss-up which is best. On balance, life means that I can be with you, see your progress and joy in Christ; v26, seeing you again, will raise your confidence in Christ and be a cause for celebration.
In what did Paul put his confidence?
· God’s purposes and sovereignty, overarching his circumstances and an uncertain future, v19b ‘what has happened will turn out for my deliverance’
· The Holy Spirit working in his life and through other Christians’ lives
· The certainty of life beyond death with Christ
7. Application
How can we build our confidence in God, whatever circumstances we face?
· Recognise God’s sovereignty and ask, ‘What is God doing here? How is God using this situation for his purposes and kingdom?’. Romans 8 28: ‘In all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.’, but recognising that there may be some aspects which we will never reason out until heaven, when we see ‘the other side of the tapestry’. See extract from Lectio365 under section 9.
· Remember God’s presence with us, now and in the life to come: Rom 8 v38: ‘For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus’
· Take encouragement from our own and other Christians experiences of God’s faithfulness, both today and in the past.
8. Digging deeper (optional)
What is the foundation for our confidence?
Christ – his life, death and resurrection demonstrate God’s love for us and show that God’s purposes cannot be thwarted. The cross provides the way for our sins to be forgiven and enables us to be accepted by God, and give us confidence that, beyond death, there is life with Christ.
9. Other material
Song: ‘Sovereign over us’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EufaligPigU or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lay-r2g52SQ)
Personal testimony – ‘For me to live is Christ’ https://youtu.be/OUKjtFnDZWQ
Extract from Lectio365 on 9th July 2020:
On 9th July, 1737, a 26 year old Moravian missionary, George Schmidt, arrived on the shores of Cape Town, South Africa.
George moved to Baviaanskloof, or ‘The Valley of Baboons’, and set up the first Protestant mission station in Southern Africa. He built himself a home and planted a pear tree in his new garden. George befriended and educated a small group of displaced Khoi people, and taught them to farm so they wouldn’t go hungry. After five years of educating the community and sharing his faith, George baptised the first new follower of Jesus.
News of the baptism upset some in the State Church. The scrutiny Schmidt came under, and the opposition to his mission that followed, led to his departure from South Africa in 1744, just 6 years after his arrival.
What must it have been like for George Schmidt to leave? I wonder if he felt like he’d failed? After all, what would become of those few Khoi Christians that he left behind?
50 years later, after Schmidt had died, a new generation of Moravian missionaries returned to South Africa to find out.
In his book, The Lord of the Ring, Phil Anderson writes, ‘On arriving back at Baviaanskloof in 1792, the three missionaries soon located the ruin of Schmidt‘s original house. In the garden, to their amazement, stood a giant pear tree - the results of the tiny shoot that Schmidt had planted. Even greater surprises were in store. They soon made the acquaintance of an old woman named Magdalena. On finding out who they were, she introduced herself as one of the original believers who had been baptised 50 years previously. The light of faith still burned in her heart, and for half a century this remarkable woman had nurtured and led the indigenous church which Schmidt had founded. She drew out a small leather bag and asked if her daughter could read something from the New Testament. They listened astonished as this second-generation native believer read to them from a Bible given by Schmidt five decades earlier.’