October 11, 2016 Show with Dr. Terry Burlingame on “When God’s Will & My Will Disconnect”

Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

Now here's our host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming.

This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Tuesday, and today is

October 11th, 2016. I kind of got distracted because a phone call was coming in at the exact same time

I was going to announce the date, but we are delighted on this gorgeous, breathtaking fall day here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, to have back on Iron Sharpens Iron, Dr.

Terry Burlingame, and I remember that I use a tool to remember the pronunciation of his name by remembering the 1936

Berlin Olympics, but unfortunately, whenever I have to use that tool to remember the pronunciation of Terry's name,

I have to have Hitler come into my head. But our guest is far from that odious figure from history, and by the way, he spells it with a

U, not with an E. Dr. Terry Burlingame is author and counselor with the

Biblical Counseling Center in Jennison, Michigan, and we are going to be discussing his book today,

When God's Will and My Will Disconnect, and this is a subject that we began back on June 21st of this year.

It's amazing how time flies, and we are going to pick up where we left off in the book because we only scratched the surface last time of this very deep, profound, and important topic for Christians, but it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron, Dr.

Terry Burlingame. And thank you, Chris. It's an honor and a privilege to be here, to be able to talk with you again and to be able to share

God's truth. Amen. And obviously, there are new listeners tuning into Iron Sharpens Iron regularly for the first time, so although you've already done this before,

I would like you to let our listeners know something about the Biblical Counseling Center in Jennison, Michigan.

Sure. The Biblical Counseling Center is a ministry in which we provide counseling to individuals, adults, young people, family members, families, groups, regarding all sorts of problems, difficulties, struggles they may be facing.

We are associated with the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors, and our goal is to help people through the

Word of God, believing that God's Word has answers for our problems, difficulties that we face, and that we look at God's Word and the principles

He places before us, that we'll be able to make right choices and decisions to help us through those difficult, troubling times of our lives.

Amen. And when we say that we believe in the sufficiency of Scripture, a lot of times,

Roman Catholic apologists and others will mock our belief in sola scriptura, that the authority over the

Church. They like to joke at times, depending upon who you're talking to, that we believe that the

Bible includes all information that you need to know about everything, including how a doctor is to perform brain surgery, and how you are to change the oil on a 1972

Volvo, or something. You know, I mean, the Bible gives us the principles for every single issue that we could face in life, but it is not an exhaustive collection of all facts.

Am I right? Oh, absolutely. If I rely upon the Bible to change my oil in the car,

I would be in trouble. Trouble anyway, someone. I'm a little challenged in that way.

But you're absolutely right. It's the principles we follow. How do we live? How do we respond to situations of life?

How do we react when the unexpected happens? How do we relate together as husbands and wives, as parents and children, as members of a church?

What does God expect in our relationships? And how do we respond to Him in worship, in praise, in obedience, in confession of sin?

And these are the things that mold and shape our lives. It's not the details of doing things, such as changing oil, but rather it's the details of living life in a manner that is honoring to our

Lord no matter what we happen to be doing, whether it be vocationally or in an activity or just in play.

What is our relationship with the Lord and how are we responding to those events, situations around us?

Are they in harmony with the Word of God or are they contrary to the principles of God's Word? And you also work with a ministry called

David's House. Explain that organization. David's House Ministries is a ministry here in Wyoming, Michigan, a suburb of Grand Rapids, Michigan, that provides home to currently 36 individuals with varying areas of disabilities, from those who are very high -functioning individuals with special needs to those who are lower functioning traumatic brain -injured individuals.

And in a Christian environment, we provide home and care, love, support for these individuals.

We currently have four homes with those 36 individuals living in them, and we're about to build six more homes, so to accommodate 36 more individuals.

It's a ministry really not just to the resident, but to family members, to those who love these individuals with special needs, to be able to give them confidence, encouragement, assurance that their loved one is being cared for, provided for, in a

Christian environment, a loving environment. Well, I know that the website for the

Counseling Center, where you are on the team there, the

Biblical Counseling Center of Jennison, Michigan, that is bccmi .org.

Do you have a website for David's House? I do. It's D -H -M -I -N.

David's House Ministries dot org. It's simply D -H -M -I -N dot org.

That will take you to the ministry website and talk about who he is.

I'm sure this will come out later, but we do have a son who lives at David's House Ministries.

Great. Well, I hope that eventually the Lord brings some new donors to both your counseling ministry at the

Biblical Counseling Center in Jennison, Michigan, and also to David's House. And that would be great. Yes, and perhaps even that some people who need both services or either service that those ministries provide will be able to be blessed by them.

Now, tell us about this book that we are revisiting, following up from where we left off in our last interview,

When God's Will and My Will Disconnect, a very prevalent issue that comes into the minds of Christians whenever we are disappointed, frustrated, depressed, impatient with things developing in our lives the way that we would like them to.

And this is quite an understandable and natural thing for us to experience.

And the sorrow and the sadness and the regret that we as human beings and fallen sinners experience and feel, and living in a sin -cursed, fallen world especially.

Tell us about what the genesis of this book was, and I know it has something to do with Joseph in the

Old Testament. Well, that's absolutely right, Chris. It really began in just my daily

Bible reading, reading through the book of Genesis and reading through the very familiar story of Joseph being sold by his brothers into Egypt and how that whole scenario worked itself out and God blessed and used it in an incredible way.

And I began thinking about the fact that Joseph is always portrayed as an individual who has made some very good choices and stayed true to his faith, living in some very difficult, hostile environments and times.

And so, I began to just put together in walking through and studying Joseph, what are some of the choices that he made, or likely made, or it seems that he may have made.

Obviously, we don't know for sure because every day Joseph made this choice and he made this choice. But from what we gather from Scripture, choices that he likely made in order to do what was right in a way that honored the

Lord, even when circumstances were so very contrary to what he had anticipated, expected, hoped for, the very difficult trials and situations of life.

How did he deal with all of that? And so, looking at some choices he very likely made.

So, that was kind of the beginning of how I put this together and just believe really the

Lord directed me in reading through here and thinking through these choices and then saying, you know, wow, these are choices

I need to make. I need to be so very aware of when those circumstances happen in our own lives.

How am I doing? Am I making choices that are pleasing to the Lord or am

I making choices on how I'm feeling and reacting to this particular situation that is a situation of horror or a situation unexpected or puts me in a whole different direction than I planned on.

And so, that's pretty much where it came from and how it began to develop. I'm going to give our email address out for anyone who would like to join us on the air with a question of your own.

For Dr. Berlingame, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. Well, you have a series of questions,

I believe 15 of them in your book, or decisions I should say, that you list.

And the last time that we had you on the program in June, we got through one through four of those decisions.

And let me just go through those. Number one was I choose to accept that I am not in control.

God is in control. Number two, I choose to confess sin. Number three,

I choose faithfulness. Number four, I choose purity. And we reached the point today where we are picking up the interview on choice.

Number five, I choose to trust God to use me. If you could go in further depth into that choice.

Yeah, absolutely. You know, looking at, and I'll begin with Joseph here.

Looking at Joseph, when he was taken to Egypt against his will, sold by his brothers, could have responded in complete ease.

But it seems to be from scripture that he looked at this point, that he said,

I'm going to, my life is not paying out as I anticipated.

I thought I was going to be able to do this. But situations happen, and I'm no longer there.

I'm now here. And I need to trust God to use me, even when

I don't understand how that's going to be. And I see that's where Joseph begins here.

I need to make that choice. And God did use him. It's an incredible way. We see him being used as he goes into Potiphar's house.

We see him used in prison. We see him used when he's brought out of prison and leads the people of Egypt.

We see him being used when his family comes to Egypt in varying ways.

And we need to be ready for that to happen, as opposed to when those situations happen in life, just quitting, or sitting back, or having a pity party, saying, no,

I need to think about now, what's God going to do? How can he use me in this situation, which

I didn't want, I didn't expect, and I don't understand? I want to be ready and willing for God to use me.

And so I go through there, and I talk about some steps in choosing to trust

God to use me. And the first one is just that simply being ready. I need to be ready.

I need to be ready to anticipate that God will use me and work through me.

And part of that is accepting my position. I need to accept the fact that where I am is where I'm at.

And not wishing for, hoping for, desiring something other than that, but accepting the fact that this is where I am.

And God has a purpose for me being here. And I need to be ready to have a heart, a mind, a desire for him to use me in this current situation that I'm in.

You might even have people who are driven to the brink of suicide, who because of any number of things that have occurred in their lives, perhaps some involuntarily, like a disease or a crippling accident or disability, or even a horrific sin that a person has committed where lives have been horribly altered around that individual.

And if this person is a Christian, they can never think that by committing the sin of murder against themselves, that anyone's life around them will be improved.

And sometimes that is at least the professed motivation for someone to commit suicide, is that I will make everyone's life around me happier and better.

But obviously God does not view it that way, because God does not want you to obviously disobey him and rebel against him in this sin of self -murder.

So therefore, if you are a Christian, there is indeed, even for you, no matter what you've done or whatever lot in life you are experiencing, there is indeed a profound way that God can and will use you in this life.

Isn't that true? Absolutely. And that's where I need to take the focus off of myself and what has happened to me and recognize the fact, and I go back to the first choice we make in the book, is

I need to choose that God's in control and I'm not. And that God being in control, he has a purpose in what has happened.

And I can trust him for that. And that my committing suicide, my going into isolation and removing myself from all people is not going to accomplish anything in a positive sense.

I need to sit back and remember the truth of God's word, the principles he's laid before me. One of the things

I say in the book regarding this is that I need to remember that he has provided for me everything

I need to accomplish his will. And even when that negative event happens that is so debilitating to me,

God will provide for me in this. And everything I need to understand, direction, what

I need to do next, he'll give to me. Everything I need to develop the necessary tools to serve him, he'll give to me.

Everything I need to be his child and be a representative of Jesus Christ and the gospel, he will give to me.

And it's not dependent on my situation. It depends on my faith and my trust that God will use me because I'm his child.

I'm his instrument. I'm the one that he has taken and redeemed for purpose.

And when I get a hold of that, I begin to understand then that there is hope in the midst of this situation of despair.

Yeah, and the matter is more complicated for individuals when the trial that they are experiencing is because of their own sin.

I know that when you have committed sins that have altered, or dramatically altered those whom you love and those surrounding you in horrible and negative ways, there is a feeling of feeling guilty at any point to reach a peace of mind, even to experiencing joy, can all be overwhelmed very quickly with guilt because of that.

Now, even if someone has committed horrific sins but they have repented and have been restored to the body of Christ, they have really been transformed and are seeking to live for the glory of God, even though others around them who are not believers, and perhaps even believers will struggle with this, but even if they say, hey, you know, you have no right to be happy because of what you did.

You have no right to be functioning as a normal member of society with a job and with a family and enjoying the blessings of marriage and fatherhood and all that kind of thing, or motherhood, that is really not true, isn't it?

Even if someone has committed horrible sins, as long as they have repented and are following Christ, they too should realize that God has, not to repeat a corny phrase, but God has a plan for their lives, and they should not be in a fetal position in a closet somewhere.

Absolutely. As long as we wear skin, we're going to sin.

We're not perfect people. And sometimes those very bad choices are made, either before salvation or after salvation, that has had a very negative impact on our lives and the lives of other people.

But like you say, Chris, God is a redemptive God. He is a God who wants to forgive, who wants to cleanse us of sin.

And if we come to Him in confession, repentance of sin, we need to accept the fact that God says,

I will forgive you, I will cleanse you, I will purify your heart. And when we hold on to that guilt of sin, we're really in a sense denying

God's gracious working in our lives. We're denying His mercy. Because if we come to Him honestly in repentance and faith, and He forgives us, there's no need for us to hold on to that sin.

We can return with joy and peace. The guilt that we had experienced, the regret that we have over that sin, there's nothing we can do about that now.

We can't change the past. We can't change that activity. But we need to recognize

I am still, now, as a redeemed individual, forgiven by God and by the blood of Jesus Christ, having been a recipient of His grace,

I have the rest of my life, however long that may be, whether it be a day or whether it be 60 years or whatever, how long it might be,

I have the rest of my life to make a difference and to be an instrument in the hand of the Lord, to be used by Him for His glory.

And so accepting the fact that God can use me and accepting the fact that, yeah, whatever may be happening, if someone else did it or something that I did,

I can't change that. That's past. But I can change and impact how

I respond to the future. And one of the things that's been helpful for me in this is remembering who

God calls me to be. Amen. And going through the passages of Scripture and thinking about the names

He's given to me as His child. You have these characteristics only if you're good, only if you never do anything wrong.

But no, the redeemed child of God, He has given us a new character.

And there's character qualities that He has given to us and there are ways in which He has blessed us and enabled us in order to use us, no matter where we are, no matter what's happening to us, to use us not for His glory.

There might be some limitations, might be things different than we anticipated, different than Joseph anticipated, but that doesn't mean we have to stop.

We can look forward with that expectation of what God is going to do. Amen. Amen. And of course, there are consequences to sin, sometimes that will even involve prison sentences, maybe even a life prison sentence.

But that still does not mean that you are not to live for the glory of God, even from behind bars in a maximum security prison.

Absolutely. You look at the example of Joseph here again. He was in prison unjustly.

But he didn't, from indication anyway, he didn't sit in prison and pout and mourn every day because of what someone had done to him.

No, he was what? He was promoted, we can say, to be in charge of the prisoners.

And he trusted the fact that this is where I'm at. No, I didn't have anything to do with being here, but this is where I am.

I'm going to trust God to use me here. And He did use him. And it's all through that process of how

God had a plan in design, and Joseph, in faithfulness, was able to see that come to fruition.

Yeah, I conclude, as you may remember, I conclude every Iron Sharpens Iron broadcast with a quote from the

Puritan Christopher Love, which is that Jesus Christ is a far greater

Savior than you are a sinner. And I think that it's amazing how many people from all over the world have commented how much they are blessed by hearing me say that every day as a reminder.

But that is more, that is to be, that precious, glorious truth is to be recognized for, not just solely in regarding to eternal life in heaven, but salvation even from the sins we commit on this earth, and the way that God restores us to fellowship with Him and transforms our lives.

Because that is a part of the salvific plan of God, even though obviously the most important aspect of that is where we spend eternity, because eternity is forever.

But isn't that true that when we think of Christ saving us, it is not just the afterlife that we have to consider, it's also this life here.

Oh, absolutely. And that should be our motivation. That having been forgiven through the grace of God, having been taken from eternal judgment, which

I so rightly deserve, and being brought into a relationship with the eternal

God, by which I'm able to call Him Father, through the redemptive work of Jesus Christ, that should be a motivator for me to say,

I have a life to live, and I'm going to live in a way that honors and pleases the Lord. You know,

Paul said in Philippians chapter 2, very familiar to us, he says, might you have the attitude of Jesus Christ, that regardless of what happens, what's your attitude?

And you can say, my attitude needs to be one which is going to be an example, or follow the example of Jesus Christ.

You know, when he was mocked, when he was bruised, when things happened to him, when all the negativities happened, and he was rejected and all of that, and you know, go through the trial and the cross.

What was his intention? His desire was to serve his

Father. He was motivated by a love for his Father, as well as a love for us.

And you know, in being a redeemed child of God, that can be my motivation to say,

Lord, here I am. I present myself to you as a living sacrifice today, holy and pleasing to you, which is my reasonable act of worship.

I want to serve you today, worship you, serve you, honor you in all that I do.

I don't want to be conformed to this world. I want to be transformed. By the renewing of my mind, that might be able to prove what is your good, your good, your acceptable will, that I might, in my life, serve you and demonstrate your holiness, your greatness, your mercy, your greatness.

We have to go to a break right now. If you'd like to join us on the air, the question for Dr.

Terry Burlingame, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com, c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com.

We have a few already waiting to have their questions asked and answered, so thank you for your patience.

We'll get to you as soon as we can when we return from the break. But if you'd like to join us, please give us your first name, city and state and country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. Don't go away. We'll be right back with Dr. Terry Burlingame. I'm Chris Arnson, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and here's one of my favorite guests,

Todd Friel, to tell you about a conference he and I are going to. Hello, this is Todd Friel, host of Wretched Radio and Wretched TV and occasional guest on Chris' show,

Iron Criticizing Iron. I think that's what it's called. Hoping that you can join

Chris and me at the G3 conference in Atlanta, my new hometown.

It is going to be a bang -up conference called the G3 conference, celebrating the 500th anniversary of the

Protestant Reformation with Paul Washer, Steve Lawson, D .A. Carson, Bodhi Bachman, Conrad M.

Bayway, Phil Johnson, James White, and a bunch of other people. We hope to see you there. Learn more at G3conference .com.

G3conference .com. Thanks, Todd, I think. See you at the

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This is Chris Arnzen. If you just tuned us in, we have as our guests today for the full two hours with 90 minutes to go

Dr. Terry Burlingame, author and counselor with the Biblical Counseling Center in Jenison, Michigan.

We are discussing his book When God's Will and My Will Disconnect following up on our initial discussion on that same topic back in June.

And we have some listeners on hold here waiting to have their questions asked and answered.

And if you'd like to join them, our email address is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com

Please give us your first name, city and state, and country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. And although this question from R .J.

in Westchester County, New York is somewhat off -topic.

It does involve Joseph and the Biblical account. So I'm going to allow the question.

R .J. wants to know, Do you think it was merely a miracle that protected

Joseph from being executed after Potiphar's wife accused him of rape?

Or do you think Potiphar actually knew deep down that Joseph was innocent?

I mean, obviously that will involve some speculation. But do you have an opinion on that?

Well, I'm not going to speculate an opinion on that. You know, I think that you asked a very good question when we think about what was actually happening.

Obviously we don't know for sure. You know, God had a plan.

God had a design for Joseph to be in Egypt, to bring the people of Israel there, to take them out of Egypt, and to demonstrate to us the freedom.

There was a design by God and all. This is not something that just happened. And so I would say, I don't know if it was a miracle.

I think that this is part of the design of God to work through circumstances, people's lives, events, in order to accomplish his purpose.

On the other hand, what did Potiphar know or think? Potiphar knew his wife.

He knew Joseph. He likely knew that Joseph was a righteous man.

That was obvious to him. He had seen that God had blessed his house because of Joseph.

And he no doubt knew this was out of character for Joseph to make an advance on his wife.

And so don't know if he put Joseph in prison waiting to see

Joseph justified, put Joseph in prison thinking that this is better than execution because I'm not really sure.

We can't determine that one for sure. We'd maybe like to know.

But I think we can say that God used Potiphar in a very specific way in order for Joseph to be in prison to bring him to the next event of life.

And whatever motivated Potiphar to send him to prison, we don't know. But we can know that God used

Potiphar, used Potiphar's wife, even though she was an ungodly person, used her in this process of fulfilling his design for his people.

By the way, RJ, if you give us your full mailing address, you are going to receive absolutely free of charge when

God's will and my will disconnect, compliments of Calvary Press, who have supplied us with some books, for listeners who have not won this title previously, since this is the second time that we've had

Dr. Terry Burlingame on the program. We had some listeners last time.

We had four, in fact. And so therefore, since you are not among those that already won a copy of this book, you are eligible.

So please give us your full mailing address. And we want to thank Calvary Press for supplying these books and for your information to find out more about what they offer.

You can go to calvarypress .com, calvarypress .com, and these are going to be shipped to you by our friends at Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.

cvbbs .com, cv for Cumberland Valley, bbs for Bible Book Service, .com.

And we thank Todd and Patty Jennings of cvbbs .com for being faithful sponsors of Iron, Sharp, and Iron, for shipping out all of our winners their free

Bibles, books, DVDs, CDs, and whatever else they're winning. We thank them for doing that for us at no extra cost to Iron, Sharp, and Iron.

We also thank Joe Bianchi, the president of calvarypress .com, for supplying these books today.

We have another listener, Tyler in Mastic Beach, Long Island, New York, who wants your comments on God's will for all

Christians ultimately being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ from Romans 8, 29, and 30.

Well, that is his desire. You know, you look at that passage in Romans 8,

Romans 8, Tyler, and it's a powerful passage of Scripture, and he does want us to be conformed to his will, conformed to the person of Jesus Christ.

And I quoted that passage later on in Romans chapter 12, that to be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

That's part of that conforming process, that we will think like Jesus Christ.

And this passage in Romans 8, that he calls us to be different.

He calls us that Jesus Christ, having redeemed us, is going to make a difference in our lives.

And believing, when he says in verse 28, that we know that those who love

God, all things work together for good, for those who are called according to him.

We see that beginning, that God is at work in our lives, having called us according to him.

He has redeemed us, he has desired, he has determined it for him, that we might be conformed to the image of his

Son. And we'll become like Jesus. And of course, that will happen eventually when

Christ comes, and we are with him in his presence and glory. And we can have that assurance at that time.

But in the meantime, we have a responsibility to seek in our lives, to live in a way that is being conformed to that image of Jesus Christ.

That we are walking in the footsteps of Christ, becoming more and more like our master every day, whether it be in our actions, our words, our thoughts, our attitudes, that we are becoming like him.

Hopefully, Tyler, that answers what you were looking for. Obviously, he may have been also tying that in with human suffering,

I'm assuming, since you were talking about Joseph being in prison and so on. Obviously, a

Christian is to view whatever we go through in this life as something that is going to be transforming us into the image of Christ.

As Romans 8, 28 famously promises, that all things will work together for the good for those who love

God and are called according to his purpose. And so we are to look at any human suffering we are experiencing, if we are a

Christian, as something that will conform us to his image. Should we not look upon all those circumstances that way?

Absolutely. This is what Peter talked about as well. In 1 Peter 1, when he says, you have been redeemed, a paraphrase of the first part, you have been redeemed by God's power, and this you rejoice.

So now, for a little while, if necessary, you've been grieved by various trials, experiences in our lives.

The tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold and perishes, is those who are tested by fire.

To be found results in praise and glory and honor in the revelation of Jesus Christ, that he is using these things in our lives for a purpose, and using them that he might use us, conform us to the image of his

Son, to work on us for his glory, in whatever those circumstances are. You know, one of the things that I just turned here in the book, that I mentioned,

I think references to this, Tyler, is that God never calls us to understand the fullness of his design for our lives.

He never tells us we're to understand all he's doing and will do. What he does call us to do is to be faithful.

And the circumstances of our lives don't have to necessarily fit perfectly into our expectations, but they are set in an arena for God to be able to use us, and to equip us and mold us and shape us as his children, in a manner that is going to be for our good, for his glory, and that can result in our joy.

And I love how we are blowing to pieces a stereotype about Calvinism, because here

I have a theologically reformed author using the word choose and accept very often in chapter headings, because we do choose and decide and accept.

It's just that we who are reformed believe it's the Holy Spirit that must regenerate us first, because a sinner dead in his sins is not going to do anything or cannot do anything to please

God. And this requires a work of God, a miracle of God in our heart, before we even can approach doing something that pleases him.

But you have the sixth choice in your book, I choose to accept

God's time frame, obviously dealing with our impatience.

Oh, absolutely. And we can be impatient. We want things, we live in an ancient society, we want things to happen now.

We want food quickly. We go out to eat. We want things to happen. We want the light to change quickly at the intersection.

We want things to happen in the time frame that we want to accomplish what we want to accomplish.

And we need to step back a minute and say, you know, it's not all about what

I want and when I want things to happen. It's more about the fact that God has a specific intention here that he's going to develop things in a time frame that is going to work best in the accomplishment of his will.

But it's not about me. It's not about my time frame. And so we go back to Joseph once again and just thinking about what had happened to him when he was in prison, the cupbearer and the baker.

And the cupbearer, in a sense, promising to Joseph, you know, when

I get out of here, you know, you interpret my dream and if it comes true and I get out of here,

I'll remember you. And he didn't. And Joseph sat in prison for a much longer period of time waiting, wondering, you know, what happened.

But it wasn't God's time frame for him to come out at that point in time.

It was a different time frame. And I need to accept that, that it's not about what

I think should happen, but what about is happening and that what is happening is not a surprise to God.

And therein I need to go back. I need to be faithful to what I know, what I know about God, what

I know about how God works. And trust him to use me in his time frame, not in my time frame.

Amen. Now I don't want to be a heretic here and add to the word of God, but there is a scripture that even most heathens, people who aren't even remotely

Christian, know that the Bible teaches that the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.

And of course there are different translations of that, and some are just mistranslations, such as people saying that money is the root of all evil.

But I have, and I'm sure you and most sane, rational people have witnessed, not only in their own lives, but in the world around us, that impatience seems to be the root of all kinds of evil, because when you think about it, people steal because they're impatient, earning a higher wage.

They are not satisfied with their current financial situation, so they steal or they covet their neighbor's goods.

People commit adultery because they are impatient with their marriage improving.

They're impatient with their spouse treating them in a more intimate and loving and even sexual way.

You can go on and on. People get drunk or high on drugs because they're impatient with their depression or their dissatisfaction with life.

They cannot wait for circumstances to lift their spirits and bring them joy.

They have to rush the issue by getting inebriated or stoned. And you could list so many different kinds of sins that we commit that can be traced right back to our impatience, can't they?

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. We don't like to wait.

We want instant gratification. We want things to happen the way we do, and we don't like to be in control.

And we have to learn. In fact, the person knows step one. God's in control.

I'm not. And I need to be able to accept that, that part of the fruit of the

Spirit is what? Love, joy, peace, patience. If I am seeking to be led by the

Spirit of God, I'm going to have the patience that God gives me through His Spirit to look at the situations and circumstances around me and say, this is purposeful.

It's not about what I want. It's about what God has designed here. And I put down some reminders in the book in regards to all this, and one of those is,

I'm going to have disappointments. I just need to accept that. I'm going to have things that don't go the way

I want them to go. But when that happens, I need to practice what I know to be true.

I need to practice patience. I need to practice faith. I need to practice trusting God that what is happening is

God is going to use in a very powerful way. And He's not surprised by what happens.

He's not surprised by the events of my life. Then I need to look at the fact that His timeframe is perfect.

And if I have to wait a little bit longer or think a little more quickly than I anticipate, God's going to use that.

He doesn't waste anything. God's going to use that. So it becomes a matter of, do I have faith to trust

God when things are not the way I want them to be?

And to wait for His working to take place and using whatever this might be in a way that He'll be glorified.

What's Isaiah say? Wait on the Lord. Those that wait on the Lord will endure their strength. With wings like eagles that run that query that we often not think, that comes after this beautiful portion of Scripture that highlights the character of God.

And as we learn of Him and know Him and love Him, we can wait for Him. Yeah, and a very obviously prime example of God's anger against impatience is with the

Israelites that He mercifully and graciously delivered out of Egypt. And the grumbling and complaining because of their impatience and not being satisfied with the manna and not being satisfied with the quail and so on.

A lot of impatience going on there amongst those whom He delivered from enslavement, and they paid a very serious price for that.

Absolutely, absolutely. And they didn't take the time to think.

I think that's such a key for us, Chris. We need to be able to stop and take the time to think, to remember what has

God done in the past? How has He worked in the past? How has He revealed

Himself to us in His Word? I take the time to think that God has been, always has been, and always will be faithful to His Word.

And His character demonstrates His love, His mercy, His grace, and those wonderful words that we use that show some of His character.

And I need to stop and think, okay. And the Israelites didn't stop to think.

They wanted certain things now, and they were judged for that. Now, God loved them 40 years in the wilderness, but yes, they did grumble.

Yes, they did complain, and that was a long time for some people. And all the adults died during that period of time because they had chosen to sin.

And they didn't enjoy the fruit of what God wanted so desperately to give to them.

He wanted to take them to the Promised Land. But because they focused on themselves, their situations, what they thought was happening, they missed out on some of the unique blessings that God had for them.

Don't you think that some of the patience that we need goes beyond our being patient for things to be better in this life now?

Coming dangerously close to quoting from the title of a very horrible book by Joel Holstein, Our Best Life Now, we need to even be willing to be patient for the afterlife, for eternity and glory, for things to get better in certain areas of our life.

You have Christians being tempted into fornicating because they don't have a spouse.

They don't even have anybody who has expressed interest in them. And they think,

I can't wait for decades for someone to marry me and have the pleasures of a marriage bed.

I'm going to act upon this now because of my sorrow and misery and discomfort, my lot in life.

I deserve to sin this way. And we trick ourselves into committing all kinds of sins.

But you may have to wait for an eternity to know that there are indescribable joys awaiting us that far exceed any pleasures a marriage bed could provide.

Absolutely. You know, I need to be very careful that I don't expect things that God does not tell me

I can expect. And it's critical, I think, for us to remember.

Because that will lead us to contentment as opposed to impatience.

And your illustration you just gave, that young man isn't promised in Scripture that he will have a wife.

Now there's that expectation, a young man, that God made us to be married. And so there's that expectation, but he needs to learn contentment.

I'm single. And see how God works in his life and who he might bring into his life.

You know, a wonderful example of this is Abraham. You know, and he was childless and God had promised him a child.

And so what happens? You know, Sarah's handmaid is given and Ishmael comes along.

And rather than waiting for God's timeframe, patiently anticipating that God would provide as he did on Mount Moriah, he took things into his own hands to try to solve the problem.

And because of that act of impatience, great problems have resulted since.

And so, you know, just to go back to say, I need to be content.

Anticipating what God tells me I can anticipate. I can anticipate eternity. I can anticipate he will give me everything

I need to honor him and to walk faithfully before him. I can anticipate the work of the

Holy Spirit in my life to fill me with the fruit of his Spirit. I can anticipate those types of things that he has promised me in his life.

But I can't anticipate I'm going to have a big bank account or a new house, a new car, or marriage, or children, or this kind of children, or whatever it might be.

I can't anticipate those things or fully expect them and become impatient when

I don't have them. I need to learn contentment with what God is doing. I can work towards some of those things as hard as I've been in that.

But that's my focus. I breed discontentment in my own life and impatience and miss what

God has designed for me. We have to go to another break right now. If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own, and we still do have a couple of people waiting, and we will get to you as soon as we can.

But if you'd like to join them with a question of your own to be asked of and answered by our guest,

Dr. Terry Burlingame, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Don't go away. We'll be right back with Dr. Terry Burlingame. Chris Arnzen here, and I can't wait to head down to Atlanta, Georgia.

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Bayway, Phil Johnson, Rosaria Butterfield, Todd Friel, and a host of other speakers who are dedicated to the pillars of what

G3 stands for, gospel, grace, and glory. For more details, go to g3conference .com.

That's g3conference .com. Thanks, James. Make sure you greet me at the

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Paul wrote to the church at Galatia, For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God?

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We have come to a next chapter in the book, the next choice.

I choose God's realities, if you could explain. I'll begin with Joseph and then

I'll share a personal part of where this comes in here. Joseph called the dreamer.

And the full choice is I choose to give up my dreams and replace them with God's realities.

Joseph had dreams. He was called the dreamer. And I don't know if there's other dreams that he shared with his brothers and family along the way.

We know the dreams that are recorded in Scripture. Don't know if he really thought about those dreams much as he was going through those earlier days of life before he was sold to Egypt or if he thought about those dreams much once he was gone.

But that brought me to think about the fact that he likely had what

I call dreams, expectations. It kind of goes with our last chapter when we talk about God's timeframe.

The one before then, we talk about trusting God to use us. These intricately fit together as they're interwoven into our lives.

But to say, you know, the dreams that he had, the expectations that he had in his life weren't fulfilled.

And he had to accept God's realities in their place. You know, he likely dreamed about growing up in Canaan.

He likely dreamed about maybe having flock of his own in order to raise and care for and living with his family, you know, as they grew into older age or however that worked.

But that was all smashed when he was sold to the caravan on his way to Egypt.

And he needed to accept the fact, okay, that's not going to happen. No matter how much

I wish, no matter how much I want, I'm not going to go backwards and change history.

That's not going to happen. On a personal note, I write in here, refer every once in a while to our son,

Jonathan, that our firstborn, and when he was born, we named him

Jonathan Haddon. Jonathan, meaning the gift of Jehovah. Haddon, after the famous English preacher of London, Charles Haddon Spurgeon.

And you can look at me, perhaps, as a young seminary student at that point in time, my wife and I anticipating going to ministry.

Here we have a son. We'll name him gift of Jehovah after Haddon Spurgeon, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, anticipating that he might be used by God in some incredible ways, maybe as a pastor, maybe as a missionary or whatever that might have been.

But as Jonathan began to develop or not develop, recognize there is something very different here.

And, you know, it wasn't until he was 7 at that point in time. He's 41 now. He was diagnosed and is severely impaired with autism.

He doesn't speak. He needs 24 -hour care, although he can do many things for himself, that a lot of his ability of reasoning and being able to do things is not there.

And had to come to grips with the fact that there's a different reality here. Our son has a very special need, special needs, and is not going to be used the way that I had maybe anticipated or hoped he would be used.

And I look at him now at 41 years old, and even though he doesn't speak, doesn't use sign language, and has difficulty communicating, though those of us who know him well understand some of his communication in his own way, really

God has used him. God has used him in our lives. God has used him in the countless lives of other people in a way that demonstrates

God's grace and mercy, demonstrating

God's love, and has used him, has used us in ways we would not have, but this is a reality, and so I need to accept

God's reality. Joseph needed to accept God's reality and then say, In the midst of this reality,

I need to reassess your desire for me, your expectation of me from what

I had thought. And being willing to be faithful to move forward in God's reality, not what

I thought, not what I wanted. Yeah, and isn't it so horrific that there are people who would prefer committing murder, even though they would never call it that themselves, or rarely call it that, when they think in their own very limited and fallible and finite brains that people such as your son would be better off not existing, and therefore if they are given advance notice of such a condition in the womb, they will immediately prefer to have an abortion, which is the murder of an unborn child, or they will adopt a view, applauding, celebrating, or even committing what has been called mercy killing, euthanasia, and other things like that.

Dr. Kevorkian comes to mind, who is looked upon as a great hero by many people.

But those circumstances, and of course, I don't mean to be glib or take lightly the suffering that people are going through, but either murdering oneself or someone else, because you think that either you or the other person are not going to be contributing to society, or even to your family, or you think they will be miserable living in this state, or perhaps that you are going to be living in misery beyond what you think you can bear, you decide to rebel against God and take matters into your own hands and either have an abortion or go somewhere where it's legal to practice euthanasia.

And I can remember not long ago going to see a movie that I thought was just an old -fashioned, clean, romantic comedy, and it started out that way, but morphed into a two -hour advertisement for euthanasia.

And I was very disappointed about that. But people actually believe that that is a more kind and compassionate and loving thing to do, and that actually comes right out of the newsreels of Nazi Germany before they were defeated by the

Allied forces and they were promoting the execution, although they weren't calling it that, of those who were mentally retarded and others, because it was really what's best for them.

This is really the height of wickedness, isn't it? Absolutely. Looking at what's best for them or what's best for the people they're killing or what's best for them, who are the murderers, saying,

I'm better off without them. And what we do with that, we place judgment on what

God is doing and we limit God's ability to work. We have this notion that God will only use or can use certain people with certain abilities.

And if I don't have this ability, if I can't speak like this person speaks or sing like this person sings or be confident before other people like this person does or have any other types of abilities,

I'm not useful. No. We have to recognize the fact that we are not to limit

God's ability. He who created with the very word of His mouth, He who holds all things together by His gracious power is not limited to work through a person because of what we determine to be inability or what we see as not what we want to have happen.

But God uses those things. Their trials in our life, tests if you want to call them that, to strengthen us, to help us focus on what

God wants us to focus on, to be able to use this in the lives of other people. And it comes really down,

Chris, in a great matter of where's my faith? Is my faith in what

I plan and what I think I can do, need, what

I want? Or is my faith in a God of glory who has revealed

Himself to us in a majestic manner, who is able, as we talked earlier from Romans 8 -28, to work these things together in a manner that's good and will bring glory to His name, even though we don't understand it.

We don't have to understand it. We're called to be faithful to what He's called us to in His Word, to be faithful to the people

He's called us to be. And so we need to step back and say, okay, what is

God's reality for me right now? What is happening right now? That's God's reality for me.

And I need to work through that in a manner in which is in harmony with the principles of Scripture.

By the way, if anybody listening would like to see a very moving tribute,

I can email you the YouTube link.

But many of you, if not most of you, are familiar with the name Andrea Bocelli, a world -renowned and celebrated opera singer who is blind.

And there is a very moving tribute he paid to his mother in the middle of a concert where he was performing, where he praised his mother for rejecting the advice of her doctors to abort him on the grounds that he would be blind.

And this is a man who has sold 70 million records worldwide and is considered one of the most gifted singers of our time.

So just keep that in mind when any of you may be contemplating an abortion on the grounds of a disability such as blindness or anything else.

You never know who you are removing from the face of the earth. And if you email me at chrisarnson at gmail .com,

I can send you that very moving video where Andrea Bocelli pays tribute to his mother for refraining from having an abortion.

Let's move on now to, I choose to accept God's blessings.

And this may seem like an absurd statement. People might chuckle at that like,

Oh, of course, I'm going to accept all the blessings I can get. Why is that even a question? If you could go further an explanation on that.

Yeah, absolutely. In the book, I amplify a little bit from the chapter title.

I say, I choose to accept and appreciate God's unusual blessings in his perfect design.

And we go back to Joseph here once again. He was repeatedly a recipient of God's unusual blessings.

Though sold to Egypt and a common slave, he was blessed by going to a place of prominence.

He was put in prison, but yet he was put in a place of prominence. He was taken out of prison, and he was put in a place of promise.

I call these unusual blessings. I want to accept these unusual blessings to be able to see how

God has been at work in my life and what God wants to do. Sometimes we, in those situations, those trials, those difficulties of life, we only see the negativity.

We need to stop back and think and say, okay, what is God doing? And how is he blessing me in this difficult situation in my life?

I need to step back and remember how he works, how he does things.

And yeah, it may seem a little strange. I need to accept God's blessings. I want to accept God's blessings. But sometimes we are blinded to God's blessings because of our frustration, our disappointment, our discouragement, despair, sadness, whatever words you want to put there, in life situations.

And when we focus on those things, we can miss what

God is desiring to do and the multiplicity of his blessings that he gives to us.

And so when I think about how he's blessing us in those negative situations, but then in real life...

Sorry about that. That was an accidental launch of a commercial there. It's a problem.

I just caught me off guard, but that's fine. As I say, when we think about,

I need to accept those blessings, those unusual circumstances, but then I also need to remember how richly

I am blessed just by being his child. And I forget that at times.

One of the things I did here in the book is look just at Ephesians chapter 1, verses 3 through 14,

I think it is, that I looked and said, look at the ways in which God has so richly blessed us.

And you put it in perspective to those negative circumstances, those unwanted things, those things when life seems to disconnect for us from what we had anticipated.

When I go back and focus on how I'm blessed with all the spiritual blessings and heavenly places in Christ, how

I've been chosen for the foundation of the world, how I have been made by him holy and blameless, who predestined and adopted as his child and so on, through all these things,

I just thought back and say, I might not be blessed the way I want to be blessed or thought

I should be blessed, but look at how God is blessing me.

And so that's the concept here. I need to stop and choose and appreciate his unusual blessings in those difficult circumstances and appreciate the blessings he gives to me just because I'm his child.

Because of his grace and his mercy, he is so richly poured out on me. We have an anonymous listener who wants to know,

I understand that the Bible always refers to children as being a gift from God to parents.

Can you please give me some guidance on how I can view rebellious children that appear to hate me and hate

God and are causing me great pain, especially in my fear of where they will spend eternity?

I do not believe in abortion and would never even consider such a horrible sin, but how can

I find the beauty of this gift in the midst of the misery

I am experiencing? Wow, that's a powerful question.

And thank you for asking it, Ash, because that puts us in a realm where, okay, this is a reality.

A child I'd hope for, whether that child has a special need or whether that child is choosing a very rebellious lifestyle and has total disregard for parents,

God calls them a gift. God calls them a gift. And we need to look at them in the sense of how

God sees them. If God sees them as a rebellious child, dishonoring parents, disobedient, sinners, who have chosen to walk away from the principles of His Word, that's absolutely right.

And that's the hurtful, anguishing part of a father or mother and looking at their child and saying, what's going to happen?

And that fear of them continuing down this path is going to lead to destruction.

The gift comes in when I look beyond an immediate relationship in a sense that I have, but take that rebellion and recognize this is rebellion against God.

And God has given them to me, placed me in their lives, placed them in my life for purpose.

And even though my heart grieves because of their choices and their actions, the gift is not a gift only if they are good, but they are a gift regardless.

That God wants to use in my life and wants me to be used in their lives.

How that's going to work out, I don't know. But I do know as a parent, and for you as a parent, calls you to be faithful, to love, to encourage.

No matter how old your children are that you're speaking of, your child is, to be able to teach, but to be an example before them of the grace of God and to see how

God might work in time, perhaps in your lifetime, perhaps not. How God might work to draw them to Himself.

We don't know. We don't know that. We don't know if they'll ever come to the Lord. We can't see the future.

But the gifting comes in and that God has given them to you for purpose.

And my response must not just be grief or frustration, but a realization that I am in their lives for purpose and my responsibility is to live before them in a godly manner, praying for God's gracious working in their lives.

They're your gift. Not the gift you had expected or hoped for, but they're your gift by God's design.

And I don't want to limit what God might do, but accept this is

His reality. I don't want to limit what God might do in them or in me or in those around me who view this relationship, but anticipate

God can use this relationship, experience, gift, and a manner to bring glory to His name, however that might be.

Hopefully that's helpful. Amen. And of course, where there's life, there's hope. And you don't know how this person's life could be radically, powerfully transformed, these children.

They may become mighty Christians and may become, in many ways, a blessing to their parents, both in spiritual and in physical ways.

And God has 180 degree reversed the lives of countless numbers of people that were living abhorrent and rebellious lives and destructive lives.

And He can do that if it is His will to do so. So there is that hope that you should always be clinging to.

And of course, even if that doesn't happen, we have the apple of God's own eye,

David, having to go through that horrible experience with his son Absalom, correct?

Mm -hmm. Who wound up being killed in the midst of his rebellion during the

Battle of Ephraim Wood. But the issue is that even somebody that has such a vital role in the unfolding of redemptive history in the

Bible had to cope with that experience. And there's something else with that too,

Chris, that we can learn from. Absalom was a gift to David. And he was that rebellious child.

But look what we have learned from Absalom. Look what we've learned from David.

What we've learned from those who surrounded David during that time of his great grief and mourning and he didn't stop.

You know, Absalom had been used by God in our lives, teaching us sometimes from a negative perspective, but used by God.

And I don't want to limit what God might do, even through a rebellious son, how he might draw others to himself through one who is rebellious, as he has used

Absalom in that way, I'm sure. And so this is a difficult thing. It is so difficult, but to be able to come back to the perspective that our responsibility is not to have our children be perfect in our thinking or be good and nice and all of that.

Our responsibility is to love them, care, nurture, provide, pray for, be an example before them as a godly individual and trust that God is going to do his work in an amazing way through their lives and our lives.

Amen. And by the way, anonymous listener, if you provide your full name and mailing address, you will also receive absolutely free of charge

One God's Will and My Will Disconnect by our guest Dr. Terry Burlingame, compliments of Calvary Press, and Joe Bianchi, the president of Calvary Press, and also the

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This is merely for shipping purposes, so send us your full name and mailing address and we will get that off to you,

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We were made to thrive. Welcome back.

This is Chris Arns. And if you just tuned us in for the last 90 minutes, we have been interviewing Dr. Terry Burlingame, author and counselor with the

Biblical Counseling Center in Jennison, Michigan. And their website is...

Well, actually, I just... I misplaced their website, but I'll get that to you in a second. Their website is bccmi .org.

B -C -C for Biblical Counseling Center. M -I for Michigan .org. Today we are discussing

Terry's book, When God's Will and My Will Disconnect.

And we have approximately 25 minutes or so left in our conversation. If you'd like to join us on the air, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

chrisarnson at gmail .com. And Harrison in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, brings up a very good point.

He said that it is interesting how often we lose our tempers when minor things occur in our life, like being stuck in a traffic jam or losing a job, which can be serious, of course, but we don't know what

God is sparing us from. There could be a horrific tragedy awaiting around the corner that we never knew about that he has delivered us from through this comparatively minor inconvenience.

How do you respond to what Harrison said? Well said, Harrison. And by the way,

Harrison, you are also getting a free copy of When God's Will and My Will Disconnect by Dr.

Terry Burlingame, so please just provide your full mailing address and your full name so we can have that shipped out to you.

I might make one other little comment here, Chris. Sure. And that's just part of the acceptance of faith of what

God's reality is, that we don't know what God is doing or what he's going to do.

You mentioned that delay in a traffic jam or the loss of a job, how that's going to lead you to something else.

I can very definitely look in my own life and say, you know,

I didn't think this was so great at that point in time, but looking back,

I can see how that interruption and what I thought was the way things were going to go,

God used it. And that's a perspective that we need to keep in mind, that there may be a thing he is keeping us from, preventing in our lives, and to be able to say, well, thank you,

Lord. You know, you sit in that traffic jam and you get angry rather than saying, okay, well, I guess

I have a little extra time here, you know, and to use it in a productive sense rather than an unproductive sense of being angry.

Use it to pray. Use it to think about what's to come and what you're going to do and how you're going to respond to other situations of the day.

So good, good, good comment, Harrison. Well stated. And we move on to something that may be involved in something that Harrison just said,

I choose to remember God's working. Yeah, and, you know,

I think this is just so important for us, Chris. And, you know, I don't always remember things well.

I have 3x5 cards, sticky notes, those kinds of things to remind myself of things because I tend to forget.

And I think, you know, I often say that we tend to forget the things that we should remember so we remember the things we would like to forget.

And we need to remember in those difficult situations and circumstances that God's been at work in the past.

He has accomplished great things in our lives. You know, we look back and say, well, what great things did

He accomplish in my life? Well, you say, are you a believer? And you say, yes. Well, He's accomplished a great thing in your life and bring you to redemption through Christ.

Yeah. He has accomplished great and what He has blessed you with as we've already talked about somewhat during this time.

And so I need to remember how

God has worked in the past knowing, believing, trusting that He's going to be at work in the future and not to doubt what

God can or can't do. And we go back to Joseph now one more time. And, you know, what

Joseph remembered about those dreams, we don't know. But I well expect when he saw his brothers and he saw himself in the position he was in, those dreams came vividly back to mind.

And he remembered, this is the plan of God. This is God's design for me to be able to be in this place to provide care for my family.

Now, Joseph had no idea of how he was going to use this in the future yet, although he did believe, honestly, that God would take his people out of Egypt and back to the

Promised Land. But how all that was going to come past, he didn't know.

But he believed God's working and that all those events and situations of life that he had, the uncomfortable, the difficult, the miserable times,

God was at work. And knowing that He was at work, made him believe that He was going to be at work in the future, that He's going to not stop working now in my life because I don't like what's happening.

You know, it's not what I want to do. God's going to continue to be at work. Amen. And one of the things

I'd like your advice or counsel on is that, and, you know, this goes for everyone who seeks to comfort those who are in pain or distress or in a trial, and also me as a talk host.

Sometimes I fear that I may come across as I'm being insensitive to the plight that someone is involved in, like, for instance, going back to the euthanasia issue, where, you know, there are people experiencing mind -numbing, horrific agony, torturous agony in whatever kind of disease they may have and so on.

And so they may say to someone like me and you, you know, you don't know what it's like to be, it's like, you know, we're being tortured in medieval times here and we just want to exit off this planet because we're suffering greatly.

It's not like we're just depressed or something. And obviously, no matter what kind of experience of pain someone has, it never legitimizes murder.

But of course, we also have to make clear that we are differentiating between injecting poison into somebody's veins or having an assisted suicide occur, and removing life support.

I mean, those things are different. But if you could comment on that, and also on, we as Christians have to make sure that we are not speaking glibly or tritely or without compassion when we are addressing issues like this.

That's so important, Chris. I'll start with a little story

I heard. The difference between minor surgery and major surgery.

It's minor when it's yours, it's major when it's mine. That's a good line.

I need to keep that in mind. I may look at someone else's situation and say, well, just get over it, or it's not that big of a deal.

I look at it and say, well, you'll be able to get through this.

I've got to stop and think, no. For that individual going through that situation, whatever it may be at that point in time, is heavy.

That is a huge weight on their life, on their heart. And I've got to remind myself that this is a person created by God in the midst of this situation that is struggling through a trial, a very difficult trial of life.

And God has maybe placed me in their life in some way. How can I be of encouragement to them?

You know, Paul says to the Corinthians that the God of all comfort has comforted you, that you might be able to comfort others who are in need.

And in 2 Corinthians 1, you know, that we have been encouraged, comforted by God for a purpose that we might see others and be sensitive to them and help them in the need that they have.

And I've got to be very careful. I think you're so right, because we can have a tendency to look at other people in their trials, and it's not ours, and say, it's not a big deal.

Or they should be able to get through this without any problem. But to realize for them, this is a heavy weight.

And you might even look at it and say, well, you know, in comparison, what they're going through is not as difficult as what this person's going through.

And that may well be true. But for them, it's a heavy weight. And I need to keep that in mind and be able to say to them, okay, how can

I comfort and encourage them with the truth of God's Word? And no matter what that circumstance is, to realize here's an individual created by God on their way of sanctification, waiting for the ultimate entrance into glory that God has promised to us, and they are too growing in their faith, how can

I be an encouragement to them? How can I look at them through their eyes and see them as through the eyes of Christ and be able to provide that help and encouragement to them?

And as far as the comment I made about differentiating between, for instance, removing life support and actually assisted suicide, those can be radically different things.

And I say that with a caveat that I'm not personally supporting by any stretch of the imagination what

I consider the murder of Terry Schiavo that you may remember where the feeding tube was removed.

I'm not talking about something like that, that just because of that will make our lives perhaps more peaceful and that we can move on with our lives and get remarried and that kind of thing.

But I'm talking about when somebody's on a respirator or something like that and there's just no hope.

The person has given their consent perhaps before they went into this situation or they may be totally unconscious and there is zero hope for any kind of consciousness being hoped for and that kind of a thing.

Yeah, and we go back and we think about the fact of, I've been placed in this person's life.

They are experiencing this agony, an agony of decision. And, you know, a horrific situation.

And the loss of life, a decision that they're making at that point in time, making the best decision that they can and saying, okay, is

God surprised that you're here? Is God surprised by this difficulty?

No, not by any means. I need to do what is honoring and pleasing to the

Lord. And, you know, Dr. Kevorkian, you mentioned, made the decision for people or helped people make that decision to say, okay,

I've had enough. Well, we don't know what God is going to do if that individual lived another year or six months or three months or whatever it might have been.

We don't know how God is going to use that. He was very, very careful whether it's being in the abortion situation or the

Dr. Kevorkian situation. And, sure, the people that are in those situations, their family members, are agonizing over this decision.

It's not easy for them. But to be able to say, okay, what's true here?

What's true? What is God's desire of life? And what do we need to do?

And very different from the person, like you said, that has been on life support, has maybe been determined to be brain dead and removing that life support rather than just continue to keep them breathing in a hospital bed.

That's hard to do. And you feel like a murderer, perhaps, in that kind of a situation.

But to be able to recognize, okay, I need to make a decision here and recognize that God is going to use this and my carefulness in a way that I don't begin to understand, using this life in a way that I don't begin to understand.

Those are tough things, Chris. I don't know if I responded in a way that's really helpful for you there or not. Oh, yeah, definitely.

And I'm not even suggesting that anybody rushes into removing life support, but I'm speaking about those cases where there's no debate about whether this person has any realm of possibility from coming out of a coma or has such a severe degree of brain damage or whatever the situation is that keeping a heart beating and lungs filled with oxygen is not necessarily the wisest thing to do or even the most merciful thing to do.

That is a completely different issue than actually poisoning somebody to death, just as if they're being executed for a capital crime or something.

For sure, for sure. And for that individual that has to make that decision when to pull the plug, for instance, their hope and they can rest in the comforting truth of God that this person has died.

And keeping the heart beating is not necessarily keeping the life going and maintaining a body warm, so to speak.

And that might sound a little harsh, but to come to that point and say, okay, I'm going to trust the grace of God and trust the mercy of God here, and I'm making a decision which

I believe is the right thing to do rather than prolong this life which is no longer living and choose to bring that to a close.

That's a tough, tough thing. And we'll move on to our final chapter for our discussion today, not the final chapter in your book, which we will pick up on,

God willing, in a future date. But the final chapter that we'll address today, at least in part, is

I choose to live above the fray. Okay.

And what we're talking about here is I can get caught up in the muck and mire of life, and I can become a complainer, disgruntled, dissatisfied with what's going on, with what

I'm doing, what other people are doing, and just be miserable.

There's a point, you know, I need to choose to live above that. I can have those situations happen in my life where I become very angry and someone else has done something to me, and all

I can think of is seeking revenge. What's that going to accomplish? I need to be able to live above that and have a heart that is desiring to forgive and be in a place where God can take me to use me in a way that is honoring for himself.

Now, looking at Joseph in this, he did not seek to bring revenge upon his brothers.

He did not seek to make their lives miserable. He didn't seek to go down and treat them as he was treated.

Not by any means. What did he do? He welcomed them. He loved them.

He forgave them. He blessed them. He provided for them.

He did everything that would be unexpected in a today's society or would not be condemned if he had done the opposite thing.

If he had seen his brothers and made them pay, if he had seen his brothers and put them in prison, if he had seen his brothers and told them how awful and miserable and wretched they were as brothers and what were they thinking?

No, he didn't. That wasn't the purpose. He had seen God at work, rejoiced in what

God had done, and lived above all that nasty stuff of his brothers and their language and talk and all of that and above what had happened to him in Egypt to say, what has

God done? What's God doing? What's he going to do? And live with an expectation of God's blessing.

And really, in part of that, desiring rather than revenge, desiring good for others, desiring what is best for others, not desiring to be their judge and put them in their place, but desiring something good for them.

I think that's what Joseph was doing. When he looked at his brothers, he wanted to bless and encourage them and not to make them miserable.

And I need to be very careful in the situations of my own life that I am not speaking evil upon others or meanness upon others.

That's not my position. That's not my responsibility. What did

Christ call us to do? Love your enemies and pray for those who despitefully use you to do

Zion's best. Joseph's brothers were sinning. They were sinners.

Well, aren't we all? And God had been gracious to replace Joseph. Should he not then be gracious to his brothers?

Should I not be gracious to other people who have sinned against me? They're sinners. They're sinners.

And if they don't know Jesus Christ, they're condemned to eternity in hell. Should I not be gracious to them and seek what is best for them and seek to bring them to Christ or to their believers to encourage them with the truth of God's word and demonstrate the forgiving grace of God in their lives?

Amen. Well, I want to thank you so much for being on the program today, brother. Thank you.

If you could hold on the line when we go off the air because I definitely want to set up another interview so we can conclude the following chapters still remaining that we haven't addressed in the book to give a summary of each on a future program.

So if you don't mind remaining on the line. Absolutely not, Chris. And I'd be happy to give my email address here if someone had no further questions and wanted to contact me.

That's great. You'd certainly be welcome to. It's certainly morningdesk,

M -O -R -N -I -N -G -D -E -S -K at comcast .net,

Morningdesk at comcast .net. And that is perfectly okay if someone wants to contact me.

I really appreciate that. Morningdesk at comcast .net.

Kind of like a news anchor sounding. There you go. Morningdesk at comcast .net.

If anybody who has not won a book today or even those who have won a book but want to buy more copies of the book, you can go to calvarypress .com,

calvarypress .com, and find out more information on how to order When God's Will and My Will Disconnect by our guest

Dr. Terry Burlingame. And you can also find out about more titles offered by calvarypress .com.

You could also go to the website of the Biblical Counseling Center in Jennison, Michigan.

And that website is bcc, for Biblical Counseling Center, miformichigan .org.

That's bccmi .org. And then finally, for David's House Ministry that our guest had mentioned earlier, where his son is a resident, that website is dhmin .org.

d -h for David's House, m -i -n for ministry, dot o -r -g. Thank you so much,

Dr. Terry Burlingame. We look forward to wrapping up this subject on a future date, and we'll put that on the calendar as soon as we go off the air.

Thank you. And I want everybody to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater

Savior than you are a sinner. We look forward to hearing from you and your questions for our guests tomorrow on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.