Page 5 - FLIP BOOK TOPICS (A)

A Worthy Expectation

By Joe Stowell
I recall asking a friend who is a counselor, “What is the most frequent cause of trouble in the
lives of those you work with?” His reply was surprising. He said, “Broken expectations.”
He explained that when life, friends, family and/or careers do not measure up to expectations,
it often causes a lengthy list of personal struggles.
From self-doubt to deep bitterness to a damaged view of life and relationships, broken
expectations pose a serious problem to life as we wish it could be lived.
This is why I’m so taken with the Apostle Paul’s perspective in the face of unrealized
expectations. You might expect that God would grant Paul—the leading apostle of the early
church—an ongoing broad access to the growing movement of Christianity.
However, as Paul writes to the Philippians and encourages them to walk worthy of Christ, he
finds himself restricted by imprisonment in Rome.
In addition, given Paul’s credentials, one could expect that people would like, support and
respect Paul and his ministry. Instead, some of the believers in Rome preached the Gospel
from a spirit of rivalry and strife, hoping to add afflictions to Paul’s bonds.

Yet Paul remains upbeat and not distressed. What is his secret? In Philippians 1:20 he says,
“According to my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that
with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by
life or by death”.
Paul had one pressing expectation in life: Regardless of the situation he found himself in, he
would seek to magnify Jesus. Regardless of where he was or whom he was with, he expected
to make Jesus evident through his attitudes and responses.

The best part of the story is in the concluding verses of Philippians, where Paul says, “The
saints in Caesar’s household greet you” (Philippians 4:22). Could it be that while in jail Paul
had led some of the guards to Christ through his testimony about his imprisonment for the
cause of Christ?
That God had restricted his life to a bad place for the purpose of carrying the Gospel into the
chambers of the royal palace?
Because he expected to magnify Christ wherever he was, Paul saw jail as an opportunity to
“bloom where he was planted” for Jesus!
Instead of focusing on his enemies in the Roman church, his expectation that Jesus be
magnified was fulfilled in that the Gospel was being preached.
And this fact led him to rejoice rather than get bogged down in a fight with cantankerous
competitive believers.

This all goes to prove that expectations matter … and that only one expectation matters most.

I must admit, making Christ visibly large through your life regardless of circumstances can
be a challenging expectation. Once I made reservations to fly from Kokomo, Ind., to Grand
Rapids, Mich., to speak at a conference.
Any time I flew from my hometown airport (affectionately called the Kokomo International
Airport); there was a chance that the weather would deter the small commuter plane I needed
to board from making its scheduled landing.