The Truth About Trials

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James 1:2–4 Justin Peters April 14, 2024

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I invite you to take your copy of God's Word and open to the book of James, James.
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You should find James nestled between Hebrews and 1 Peter. And as I have an opportunity to preach from time to time,
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I will be preaching through the book of James. If you're joining us for the first time, you've only missed one sermon thus far in the book of James, and that was just the introductory sermon that I gave a month or so ago.
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We just kind of laid some groundwork, talked about James and the book and origins of it, the author of it.
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So just briefly as you're turning, let me give you just who the author is basically. There's four different James in the
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New Testament, and this James is the half -brother of Jesus. This is the half -brother of Jesus, and of course we refer to James as the half -brother of Christ because Jesus was conceived of the
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Holy Spirit, Mary as a virgin, and then Jesus was conceived and born.
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But after the birth of Jesus, then Mary and Joseph had other children the old -fashioned way, and James was the half -brother of Jesus.
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And so let's look, James chapter 1, those of you who are able, I invite you to stand with me as we read
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God's Word. James 1, and we'll read verses 1 through 4 with an emphasis on verses 2 through 4 for our message.
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James, a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes who are in the dispersion, greetings.
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Consider it all joy, my brothers, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith brings about perseverance.
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And let perseverance have its perfect work so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
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You may be seated. May God bless the reading of His Word. And the first thing, briefly,
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I would like to bring your attention to is how James introduces himself. Now I said this in my first sermon a few weeks ago, but just for those who are new,
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I want to bring this out to you. Notice how James introduces himself. James, a slave of God, and that's one of the things
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I appreciate about the Legacy Standard is that it renders this word slave as slave.
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That's what the word doulos is. Bondservant is a little too weak. The word is actually slave.
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James says that he is the slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.
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Notice that James did not appeal to his familial relationship with Christ. James didn't boast about his familial bona fides.
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I am James. I am the half -brother of Jesus. No, he said,
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I am the slave, the slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.
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James knew that his most important relationship to Jesus was not as his half -brother, but as his slave, because he had been adopted into the family of God through the merits of Christ and what he accomplished on the cross.
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To the 12 tribes who are in the dispersion, the recipients of the book of James were believing
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Jews, Jews who had heard of Christ, heard the gospel, embraced the gospel, became believers, but then were persecuted by unbelieving
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Jews, viciously so, and so they fled and they dispersed, the dispersion, they dispersed abroad to find shelter from the persecution.
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So this is the author, these are the recipients of the letter of James. So now let us look at our primary text here, verses 2 through 4, and this is a sermon
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I've entitled, The Truth About Trials, The Truth About Trials. James says, consider it all joy, my brothers, when you encounter various trials.
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Notice first the inevitability of trials. James does not say if you encounter trials, but rather when you encounter trials.
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Trials in our lives are inevitable. Life is marked by times of tears, times of pain.
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Matthew 6, verse 34, Jesus says, do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will take care of itself.
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Each day has enough trouble of its own. Each and every day will have at least a little bit of trouble.
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Jesus said in John 16, 33, in this world you will have trouble. Job chapter 5, verse 7, for man is born for trouble as the sparks fly upward.
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Just as naturally as when you stoke a fire with a poker and the sparks fly upward, just as naturally as that happens, so is naturally you and I will face trials simply because we live in a fallen, sin -stained world.
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They are inevitable, they are unavoidable. Job 14, verse 1 says, man who was born of woman is short -lived and full of trouble.
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You won't see that verse on the front of a Hallmark card anytime soon. But this is the reality of living in a fallen world.
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The Apostle Paul was also troubled. If you can, flip over with me briefly to 2
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Corinthians chapter 11. I want to bring your attention to some of the trials that the
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Apostle Paul experienced. 2 Corinthians chapter 11, beginning in verse 23,
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Paul says this, are they ministers of Christ? I speak as if insane.
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I'm more so in far more labors, far more imprisonments, in beatings without number, in frequent danger of death.
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Five times I received from the Jews 40 lashes minus one.
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Do the math on that. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times
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I was shipwrecked. A night and a day I've spent in the deep. I have been on frequent journeys and dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the
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Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the desolate places, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren.
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I have been in labor, in hardship, in many sleepless nights, in starvation, in thirst, often hungry, in cold, and without enough clothing.
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And apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me of concern for all of the churches.
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Other than that, everything was going great. The Apostle Paul faced incomprehensible trials, suffering.
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Paul was troubled, Jesus was troubled. In John chapter 11, we see that Jesus was deeply moved in his spirit upon the death of Lazarus, and he was troubled.
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And then, just before his crucifixion, in the garden of Gethsemane, as he knew what awaited him, not only the physical agony of the crucifixion, but also that very soon the full undiluted fury of God's wrath that pours against, burns against the sins of his people would be poured out upon him.
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And Jesus was troubled. It is an argument from the greater to the lesser.
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If Jesus was troubled, dear ones, you and I will certainly be troubled as well.
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A servant, us, we are not above our master. James says, count it all joy, my brothers, when you encounter various trials.
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Trials are not only inevitable, but they are also varied. And here, the emphasis is not so much on the numbers, but just the sheer diversity of trials.
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We have all kinds of trials, all kinds of suffering, trials in our health, trials in our finances, trials in persecution, whether hard or soft persecution, abandonment, alienation by family and friends.
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When we become a Christian, oftentimes that will alienate us from family members and friends, so all kinds of different trials.
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Trials are inevitable and they are varied. So, if trials are inevitable, do they have a meaning?
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Is there a meaning for our suffering? Yes, there is. Some people think that misfortune should only come to the ungodly.
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This was the perspective that Asaph had in Psalm chapter 73. If you're not familiar with Psalm 73,
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I would encourage you to read Psalm 73. But Asaph, in Psalm 73, he looked around and he saw the righteous suffering and the wicked prospering, and it vexed him.
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Why do the righteous suffer and why do the wicked prosper? And it vexed him. It vexed him so much that in verse 2 of Psalm 73, he says, my feet came close to stumbling, my steps almost slipped.
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It bothered him so much when he saw the wicked prospering and the righteous suffering.
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He says that my feet came close to stumbling, my steps almost slipped.
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In other words, I almost lost my faith. That's what he was talking about.
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It troubled him greatly. In the age -old question, why does God allow bad things to happen to good people?
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You've heard that. I think that was coined first by some Jewish rabbi. Why does
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God allow bad things to happen to good people? That's the wrong question. The question is not, why does
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God allow bad things to happen to good people? The question is, why does God cause good things to happen to bad people?
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Because you know what, dear ones? There's no such thing as a good person. A good person does not exist any more than a square circle.
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There is none righteous, no, not one, Romans 3. There is none who understands. There is none who seeks for God.
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All have turned aside and have become worthless. There's no such thing as a good person.
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We're all sinners. We have all broken the laws of God. So the question is not, why does
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God allow bad things to happen to good people? Because there are no good people. The question is, how is it that God could be so kind and so merciful to cause good things to happen to bad people?
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That's the question. That's the question. Some think adversity trials means that God is somehow displeased with us.
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But oftentimes, dear ones, the opposite of that is the case. Job, the
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Old Testament character Job, he was upright, blameless, feared God, shunned evil, and yet Job suffered horrifically.
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God allowed Satan to come and to strike from Job everything that he had, his possessions destroyed, his family dead, his own health deteriorated, covered with open sores and boils.
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Job suffered horrifically, but he suffered because of his faith, not in spite of it.
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Stephen in Acts 6 is described as full of grace and power. This was a man who performed miracles, signs, and wonders, and yet he boldly preached
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Christ, and yet in Acts chapter 7, people turned on him and they stoned him to death.
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And right before the stones took his life, he looked up and he somehow,
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God gave him this glimpse into heaven, and he said, behold, I see the heavens opened up and the
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Son of Man standing at the right hand of God, a very tender scene. As the stones were pelting him, he looked up and had this vision into heaven and saw
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Jesus standing, not sitting, standing as it were, ready to receive him.
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Suffering is oftentimes because of our faith, not in spite of it.
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And as I read the Bible, particularly the New Testament, Old Testament as well, but I often find myself asking the question rhetorically in my mind, what is it in the lives of God's faithful servants in Scripture that makes so many professing
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Christians think that we are entitled to have our best life now? What Bible are they reading?
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I mean, read through Hebrews chapter 11. The faithful servants of God were imprisoned, they were beaten, they were stoned, they were sawn in half.
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What is it in the lives of God's faithful servants make us think we are entitled to have a cushy life?
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Jesus' words to Peter in John chapter 21, Peter's speaking to Jesus, this is after his resurrection, and he said to Peter, he said,
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Peter, when you were young, you used to gird yourself and go wherever you wished. But when you are old,
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Peter, you will stretch out your hands and someone else is going to gird you and take you where you do not wish to go.
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In this, Jesus said, signifying by what kind of death he would glorify
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God. Put that verse in your prosperity, secret sensitive, your best life now pipe and smoke it.
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What Bible are they reading? It is not that these kind of preachers today, the secret sensitive prosperity, it's not that they don't know what's in the
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Bible, oh, they know it. And it's not, they know the truth, they just suppress the truth.
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And the fact is, is these kind of happy, clappy preachers hate God. They hate
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God. Joel Osteen hates God. You maybe think, boy, that's a strong statement,
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Justin. It's the truth. He has the same Bible we do. He just refuses to preach it.
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He's made a God after his own image. He's made an idol. He hates the
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God of the Bible, and so he has made a golden calf. They are idolaters.
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Worshipping a God who promises a better, more comfortable life is no better than bowing down before a golden calf.
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Dear friends, if you have responded to a painless gospel, you have not responded to the true gospel.
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Salvation is free. Discipleship is not. Trials are often because of our faith.
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John 15, verse 20, Jesus said, if they persecuted me, they will persecute you. Again, an argument from the greater to the lesser.
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2 Timothy 3, verse 12, Paul writes, all those who live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.
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And dear friends, there are no exception clauses to that, unless you live in the United States of America. Now, we don't live in Iran.
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We don't live in North Korea. We don't live in a country like that, at least not yet. But if you live godly in Christ Jesus, you should be experiencing some persecution somewhere.
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Maybe not being in prison, not that kind of persecution, but soft persecution at least. Alienation by friends, family members, ridicule, something.
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And if you've never experienced any kind of persecution at all for your faith in Christ, then based upon the authority of God's word, you're not living godly in Christ Jesus, because all will face it.
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There was a Christian woman by the name of Amy Carmichael in the 1920s, and she wrote this poem.
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The title of it is, Hast Thou No Scar? Hast Thou No Scar? It goes like this.
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Hast thou no scar? No hidden scar on foot or side or hand?
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I hear thee sung as mighty in the land. I hear them hail thy bright ascendant star.
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Hast thou no scar? Hast thou no wound? But I was wounded by the archers spent.
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Leaned me against a tree to die in rent. By ravenous beasts that encompassed me,
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I swooned. Hast thou no wound? No wound?
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No scar? Yet as the master shall the servant be, and pierced are the feet that leadeth me, but thine are whole.
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Can he have traveled far who has no wound, who has no scar?
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If you have no wound, if you have no scar, you're not following the master.
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So trials are inevitable. Trials are oftentimes because of our faith. Let me here pause and offer a word of caution.
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Please do not confuse trials, which happen oftentimes because of our faith, with the suffering that comes about as a consequence of sin, okay?
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Trials that we suffer because of our faith is not the same thing as suffering as a consequence of sin.
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Sin always carries consequences, always spiritual consequences, and many times, physical consequences.
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Sins of gluttony or drunkenness carry with them physical consequences.
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Ladies, not submitting to the servant leadership of your husband, that's a sin.
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Assuming he's a believer, of course, that is a sin, and that will bring consequences. Men, not loving your wives as Christ loved the church, not being a godly leader for her, that is a sin, and there will be consequences to it.
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Sexual sins carry both physical and spiritual consequences. So don't confuse trials that come about as a result of our faith with suffering that comes about as a consequence of sin.
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I want us now to look at the purpose of trials. Do they have a purpose?
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Yes, they do. The purpose of trials, number one, trials serve to engender in the believer true humility, true humility.
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2 Corinthians 12, verse 7, the Apostle Paul says this. He says, because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations.
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What revelations? Paul had been caught up into the third heaven. He had this rapturous experience.
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He had been caught up into the third heaven, and he heard words that are inexpressible that man is not permitted to speak.
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So those revelations. Because of the surpassing greatness of these revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from exalting myself.
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And that thorn in the flesh, that thorn, that's a little bit of a weak word. The Greek word is scallops, and the better image there is a steak.
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It was a steak in his flesh. And that steak in his flesh was given to him to keep him from exalting himself.
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To keep him from exalting himself, because he had been given this magnanimous privilege of being caught up into the third heaven.
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And so, lest he exalt himself, God gave to him a thorn, a scallops, a steak in the flesh, to keep him humble.
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Dear friends, none of us is without pride. None of us is. If the
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Apostle Paul struggled with pride, rest assured, you and I will struggle with it as well.
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The Apostle Paul, the author of roughly a third of the New Testament, he struggled with pride, you and I will.
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We live in a fallen world, and none of us does anything with 100 % pure motives.
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I want to say that again. None of us does anything with 100 % pure motives.
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Simply because we live in a fallen world, that the stain of that sin, to one degree or another, affects every single thing we do.
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Your grandmother could be hanging off of a cliff, holding on to a branch for her dear life, and you run up and save her and pull her to safety.
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And even that, you would not do with 100 % pure motives.
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And I know this because I know it theologically to be true. Even as I'm up here right now preaching the word of God to you,
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I'm not doing this with 100 % pure motives. Because I'm living in a fallen world, and I do my best to put to death the deeds of the body,
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Romans 8 .13, take every thought captive, all of those things, but none of us does it perfectly.
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None of us is without pride. We all have it. All of us do.
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And so trials serve to engender in us real humility. They bring us to the end of ourselves.
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Trials conform us into the image of Christ. They conform the student into the image of the master.
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Psalm 119, verse 71. This is a good verse to know, Psalm 119, 71.
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David writes this, It is good for me that I was afflicted that I may learn your statutes.
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It is good for me that I was afflicted that I might learn your statutes.
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The affliction in and of itself is not good because affliction is a result of the fall.
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But it was good for David that he was afflicted so that he could learn the statutes of God.
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And all of us as Christians, we should be reading and studying the
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Word of God, filling our minds with the knowledge of the Word of God. But there is something about suffering that brings us into a deeper understanding of the
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Word of God and therefore a deeper understanding of God himself. There is an experiential element of suffering that helps us to learn
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God more deeply, to learn of him in ways that otherwise we would never learn of him.
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Suffering brings us into a deeper understanding of who God is. 2
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Corinthians 12, 7 and 9, the Apostle Paul asked for the removal of this thorn, this stake, this scallops.
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He asked that it be removed and Jesus did not remove it. Instead, Jesus said to Paul, my grace is sufficient for you for my strength is made perfect in your weakness.
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Strength is made perfect in weakness. Also, trials serve to test our faith.
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They test our faith. Look at verse 3, knowing that the testing of your faith brings about perseverance.
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Trials test our faith. The verb form of this word test, it means to investigate.
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It means to find out. And there's nothing like a good trial to investigate us, to find us out, to find out who we really are, to find out what we're really made of, our spiritual character.
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Oh, it's easy to be a Christian when everything's great, right? I mean, when our bodies are healthy and hitting on all eight cylinders and are plenty of money in the bank and everybody loves us, oh, it's easy to be a
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Christian then. But what about when the trials come? What about when the report from the doctor comes back as cancer?
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What about when the persecution comes? Then how easy is it?
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A true Christian will be driven to his knees in the face of a severe trial.
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Trials bring us face -to -face with our own frailties and our own weaknesses. It has been said that spiritual growth is a growth downward.
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Spiritual growth is a growth downward. It is only when we have a lower view of ourselves that we will have a higher view of God.
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There is an inverse relationship between how we view God and how we view ourselves.
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The higher we view ourselves, the more lofty estimation we have of ourselves, the lower view we will have of God.
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Spiritual growth is a growth downward. And trials serve to bring us face -to -face with how weak we really are.
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They test us. And the fires of trials will burn up false professions of faith.
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Not to pick on Joel Osteen, but to pick on Joel Osteen, he's the pastor, quote -unquote, of the largest or at least one of the largest churches in the
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United States of America. And when real persecution does come to this country, when we start as Christians facing the kind of persecution that our brothers and sisters in Christ in Iran face or Syria face or North Korea face, when that comes here,
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Lakewood Church will go from the largest church in the country to a ghost town overnight. You'll be able to hear a pin drop on Sunday morning in Lakewood Church because they have no theology for suffering.
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There's no theology there. The fires of trial will burn up false professions of faith.
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John 8, 31, Jesus says, if you continue in my word, then you are truly my disciples.
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What's the mark of a true Christian? Perseverance. And trials bring about perseverance.
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This is what James says in verse 3, knowing that the testing of your faith brings about perseverance.
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First John 2, 19, they went out from us. Why? Because they were not really of us. That's why they went out from us.
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They weren't really of us. Oh, they looked good at first. They played a good game at first. They said all the right things at first.
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But when the persecution came, when the self -denial came, they went out from us because they were never really of us to begin with.
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This is the rocky soil of which Jesus spoke in Matthew chapter 13. Some people, many people, upon first hearing the gospel, at least some version of the gospel, there might be an initial emotional response to it.
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And they spring up immediately, and they seem to even bear a little bit of fruit initially.
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But then what happens? The trials of life come, the sun comes out, and it burns, and it withers up that young fruit, young vegetation, withers it up.
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Why? Because there was no root there. There was no good soil there, and it burns it up, and it's gone.
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You see this all the time in many churches. You see this all the time in youth groups. I remember growing up as a kid in a
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Southern Baptist church, every summer, the youth would go on some trip, you know, some four - or five -day trip somewhere, and some little youth trip.
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And, you know, we'd go down to wherever it was, and we'd sing a bunch of Michael W. Smith songs, and cry and slobber all over one another, you know, and everybody come back just on fire for Jesus.
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But then after a few days, then what? It's gone. It's gone because it's not real.
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Emotional, that's it. No root. I want us now to look at our response to trials.
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Look back with me in verse 2. James says to his readers, consider it all joy, my brothers, when you encounter various trials, consider it joy.
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Remember, these were believing Jews who had accepted Christ, and they were being persecuted by the unbelieving
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Jews, and so they were dispersed abroad. And James writes to them, and he says, consider it joy, my brothers.
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Count it as joy. Now, notice what James did not say.
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James did not say, feel it as joy. He said, count it as joy.
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Friends, please don't fall into the hyper -spiritual trap that I've heard some people espouse.
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Well, if you're going through a trial, you need to enjoy it. No, that's not what
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James is saying. Trials are not enjoyable. That's why they're called trials.
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By definition, they're not enjoyable. So, please don't think that there's something wrong with you if you're going through a trial right now, if you're going through a time of suffering and you're not enjoying it.
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You're not supposed to enjoy it. Trials aren't enjoyable. He doesn't say, feel them as joy.
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He says, count them as joy. You can have joy in the midst of a trial, even though the trial in and of itself is not enjoyable.
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Okay, there's a difference between having joy and enjoying something. You know, many years ago,
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I said this in what I now understand to be false humility, but before I was truly converted,
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I used to say that my cerebral palsy is one of the greatest gifts that God has given me.
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And I don't call it a gift anymore because cerebral palsy is, I mean, in and of itself, it's not a good thing.
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It's a result of the fall. And I'm not going to sit up here as some, you know, super spiritual guy and say that my cerebral palsy never bothers me.
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On occasion, it does. You know, there's... Now, I was born this way. I've never known anything different.
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I don't miss walking like I don't miss flying on the space shuttle. I've never done it, don't know what I'm missing. But yeah, there's times when
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I, you know, I just...if I had my druthers, I'd rather not be crippled. It's not an enjoyable thing, but I can count it as joy.
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I can count it as joy when I remember who God is. I can count it as joy knowing that He is sovereign, knowing that He is in control, knowing that God not only will not, but cannot act towards me in any way that's outside of His character and His nature.
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He can't. So I can count it as joy the more
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I know who God is. We need to know who God is. And if you've never done a study on the attributes of God, we're kind of in a cursory way going through them in Sunday school, but I would encourage you, if you've never done a deep dive into the study of the attributes of God, please do yourself a favor and do a study on the attributes of God.
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There's a couple of good books, one by Stephen Charnock, C -H -A -R -N -O -C -K, that's a big, thick book.
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There's another one by A .W. Pink, Arthur Pink, it's a much more digestible book on the attributes of God.
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Do yourself a favor, do a study on the attributes of God. And when we know who
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God is, then we can count our suffering, our trials, as joy, even though we don't enjoy them in and of themselves.
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I can count it as joy, knowing who God is, that he is sovereign. I can count it as joy knowing also not only who
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God is, but who I am. And when I understand theologically the truth of God's word, when
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I understand that I am deserving of nothing but the wrath of God, when I understand that I am deserving of nothing but hell, anything short of that is the mercy of God.
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And so, if I have cerebral palsy for the rest of my life, okay, I deserve hell.
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And I've got all of eternity to live without my CP. Count it all joy.
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In 2 Corinthians 4, the Apostle Paul says this, we are afflicted, in verses 8 through 10, we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed, perplexed, but not despairing, persecuted, but not forsaken, struck down, but not destroyed, always caring about in the body the dying of Jesus so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.
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Dear friends, this is the Apostle Paul, and look at what he says about himself. We are afflicted in every way, but we're not crushed.
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We're perplexed, we're confused, we don't understand what's happening to us, but we don't despair.
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We are persecuted, but we know we are not forsaken. Paul went through suffering and trials like few of us can begin to comprehend, and it got to him.
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He despaired, but he knew he was not forsaken. He was struck down, but he knew that he was not destroyed.
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Have you ever heard someone say this kind of rather flippantly? You ask them, well, how are you doing?
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Oh, I'm too blessed to be stressed. What a stupid thing to say.
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Paul was stressed, we will be too, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.
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1 Peter 5, this is a wonderful couple of verses. 1 Peter 5, 6 and 7 says this, therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety upon him because he cares for you.
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Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God so that he will exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety upon him.
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Why? Because he cares for you. Now, ever since I was a little boy,
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I've always had a fascination with space, and I still do.
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And you may have heard some of these numbers, and I'll just throw some of these numbers out because I promise you I'm going somewhere with this.
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And believe it or not, it'll tie back to 1 Peter 5. The mass of the earth, this third rock from the sun on which we live, is 6 .6
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sextillion tons. You know how big that is? I don't either.
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I don't even know how many zeros that is, 6 .6 sextillion tons.
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The volume of the earth is 1 .08 quadrillion cubic kilometers.
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I don't know how to write that number either, 1 .8 quadrillion cubic kilometers. And as voluminous as our earth is, as this planet is, as massive as it is, you could fit over 700 earths inside the planet
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Jupiter. Our earth, our planet is not really all that big compared to other planets. You could fit 700 earths inside Jupiter.
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Do you know how many earths you could fit inside of our sun? 1 .3 million earths could fit inside of our sun.
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And our sun is just an average -sized star. There's some smaller, but there's some that are a whole lot bigger.
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There's one called U .Y. Scuddy. You could fit 9 .3 billion suns inside of this one star called
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U .Y. Scuddy. 1 .3 million earths in the sun, 9 .3
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billion suns inside U .Y. Scuddy, and that's just one star. And our
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Milky Way galaxy has over 100 billion stars. And our
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Milky Way galaxy is just one of we don't even know how many galaxies, trillions.
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There's galaxies out there that we haven't even yet discovered. The human mind can't comprehend of that kind of enormity.
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And so why do I say all of that? How does that relate to 1 Peter 5? This phrase, because he cares for you, cast all your anxiety upon him because he cares for you, the most literal understanding of that phrase in the
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Greek is basically this. Here's what it means. It matters to him about you.
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It matters to God about you. This great
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God who spoke all of the universe into existence with an enormity that none of us can ever comprehend, not only spoke it into existence, but upholds this entire universe by the word of his power.
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It matters to him about you. Whatever it is that you are facing,
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Christian, my brother, my sister in Christ, whatever the suffering is, whatever the trial is, it matters to him about you.
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Selah, what a great God we serve. James says, knowing that the testing of your faith brings about perseverance.
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Trials serve to bring about perseverance, endurance in our lives.
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This word perseverance in the Greek, it's the word hupomenai, and it literally means to remain under, hupo, underneath, monai, to remain.
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It literally means to remain under. Dear friends,
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I have no problem and no qualms whatsoever about praying for people that we know that we care for, praying that God would remove some suffering that they are going through.
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I have no problem at all with that. But more often than not,
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God does not remove the suffering. He gives us his sufficient grace to remain underneath the suffering, to endure the suffering, to hupomenai the suffering.
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I remember Wednesday night prayer meetings growing up as a kid. We would have
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Wednesday night prayer meetings, and when it came time to ask for prayer requests, or anytime you do, Sunday school, whatever, what are 99 % of the prayer requests for?
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Someone's sick, you know, someone's in the hospital, someone's got cancer, you know, we need to pray for them.
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And I'm fine with that, I am. But maybe instead of spending all of our time praying for God to remove suffering, maybe we should spend a little bit more time praying for God to help us to hupomenai through the suffering.
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Lord, if it would be your will, take this suffering away from me. But if it is not your will, Lord, use this suffering in my life.
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Use this in my life to engender in me humility, to bring me to the end of myself.
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Use this suffering, these trials in my life, to help me to learn of your statutes.
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Like David, it was good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.
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Lord, help me to come to that understanding where David was. Lord, bring me to the end of myself.
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And Lord, through this suffering, through these trials, help me to speak well of you.
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Help me to learn more of you. Help me to carry myself in such a way that brings honor and glory to you.
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And may Christ be glorified in my suffering. Maybe we should spend a little bit more time praying for things like that than always praying for the suffering to be removed.
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Listen to this verse, Philippians 1, verse 29. Paul writes,
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For to you it has been granted not only to believe in Christ but to suffer for his sake.
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Did you hear that? Paul says, it has been granted to you not only to believe in Christ but to suffer for his sake.
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It's not often we think of suffering as a privilege, is it? But it is. It is a privilege.
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It is something that is granted to us by our kind and sovereign God. It is a privilege that is granted to us to suffer for Christ.
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Because it is in our suffering that Christ is most often glorified.
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Not when the suffering is taken away, but when people watch us and they know that we claim the name of Christ and when they see us suffer, and yet through the suffering, through the persecution, through the trials, we remain faithful to Christ and we speak well of him.
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And Christ is glorified in that. And that is granted to us. That is a privilege that is granted to us.
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God oftentimes is most glorified in our suffering. And finally,
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James says, let perseverance have its perfect work, its perfect result, so that you would be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
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Trials help us to be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
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James here, of course, is not talking about some sinless perfection. That's not what is in view here.
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Salvation is not perfection. It is direction. Which direction are our lives going? But trials conform us as slaves into the image of Jesus, our master.
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They sanctify us. They grow us in spiritual maturity. And they give us opportunities to glorify
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God. They give us opportunities to glorify God. And we are lacking in nothing, dear ones.
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My brother, my sister in Christ, you are lacking in nothing. Christ has equipped us with everything that we need to endure our trials.
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We have his word. We have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And we have fellowship with the saints, local bodies of believers.
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We have the fellowship of the saints. Did you know, Christian, that when you became a
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Christian, you became a member of the family of God? And the moment you became a
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Christian, you got brothers and sisters, you got family members all around the world.
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We are thoroughly equipped, lacking in nothing. Recall Asaph in Psalm chapter 73.
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Remember Asaph, he said, my feet came close to stumbling, my steps almost slipped.
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Asaph got right to the brink of apostasy. The Apostle Paul got right to the brink.
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His suffering was so severe that he wavered.
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Asaph wavered. John the Baptist wavered. John the
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Baptist baptized Christ himself. He was the voice crying out in the wilderness.
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And yet John the Baptist was arrested, found himself in prison. Things weren't turning out the way that John thought they would turn out.
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And so John sent a question to Jesus through his own disciples. Are you the
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Messiah? Or should we be looking for someone else? How did
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Jesus respond to that question from John the Baptist? Did John the Baptist seriously ask you to ask me that question?
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What is he thinking? He said, no man born of woman is greater than John the
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Baptist. Even John the Baptist, his suffering got so acute that he wavered.
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Asaph wavered. The Apostle Paul wavered. And dear friends, sometimes our trials may become so severe that we find ourselves walking up to the brink of the abyss, as it were, peering off into the depths.
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But then God will always pull us back. He pulled
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Asaph back in Psalm chapter 73, verse 17. In verse 17 of this beautiful chapter, everything for Asaph changed.
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Because in 17, Asaph says this, until I came into the sanctuary of God, my feet almost slipped, my steps came close to stumbling.
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I was on the brink of apostasy, staring off into the abyss. But then everything changed in verse 17.
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He said, until, until I came into the sanctuary of God.
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In other words, once Asaph got God's perspective on his suffering, then everything changed.
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Everything changed. Seek God's perspective in your suffering.
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Recognize that he is sovereign, that he is good, and that he not only will not but cannot ever act towards us that is in any way outside of his character and his nature.
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Recognize that he has a perfect plan for everything in our lives. Recognize that he has a perfect plan for our suffering.
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Recognize that it is through our suffering that he himself is glorified. And when we get that perspective, when we come into the sanctuary of God, then everything changes.
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Everything changes. First Peter chapter 1, the
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Apostle Peter writes, in this you greatly rejoice even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials.
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So that the proof of your faith being more precious than gold, which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
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Our suffering results in the praise and honor and glory of the
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Lord Jesus Christ. We come into the sanctuary of God.
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As I close, I just want to close with the gospel. All of the promises that we've been talking about that are ours as Christians in the midst of trials and suffering, those are only for Christians.
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And so I just want to ask you this question this morning. Are you a Christian? Has there been a time in your life when you have been convicted by the
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Holy Spirit of God that you are a sinner? That you have rebelled against God, you have broken
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God's laws, you are a liar, thou shalt not lie, you're a liar. Thou shalt not steal, you've taken something that does not belong to you.
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Thou shalt not commit adultery, but Jesus says, if you look at a woman with lust, you've committed adultery already in your heart.
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Go through God's laws, his 10 commandments. We have all broken them thousands of times. We have sinned against God in word.
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We have sinned against God in deed. We have sinned against God in thought. And just like when we break laws on earth, there's a penalty to be paid.
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How much more so when we break the laws of God? But because we have sinned against God, who is of infinite value and eternal, the punishment of that sin is also infinite, and it is also eternal.
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And if you die in your sins, you will very rightly and very justly go to a very real place that the
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Bible calls hell. And in hell, in the lake of fire, the worm will not die.
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The fire will not be quenched. There will be wailing, weeping, gnashing of teeth. God's full fury that burns against sin will be poured out on you day and night, forever and ever, and it will never end because that's what your sins have earned, and you cannot work your way into heaven.
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You can't do enough good deeds to earn God's favor. In fact, that is an offense to God.
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God calls our works as filthy rags before a thrice holy God. Isaiah chapter 64, our works are as filthy rags.
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They're an offense to God. You cannot save yourself. So God has made a way for you to escape his own wrath.
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God sent his son, Jesus Christ, to this earth, and Jesus lived as the perfect person, the
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God -man, truly God, truly man, one person with two distinct natures. And as the
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God -man, Jesus lived a perfect life to the perfect pleasure of God. And then
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Jesus willingly gave his life on the cross. His life was not taken. He gave it freely.
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And on the cross, Jesus bore the full, undiluted fury of the wrath of God that burns against the sins of his people.
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And Jesus, this perfect person of infinite value, drank in the infinite wrath of God, drank in every last drop.
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Died on the cross three days later, was bodily raised from the dead. And if you will repent of sin, turn from sin, and place your trust in him, lay your works down, they will profit you nothing.
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But if you will trust in the work of Christ, in what he accomplished on the cross, who he is and what he did, if you will come to Christ empty -handed, confessing your sins before him, seeking not only a savior from hell, but seeking a savior from your sin, and if you will come to him in that posture, he will save you.
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Jesus says, the one who comes to me, I will in no wise cast out. Come to Christ, confess your sins before him, he will save you.
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You'll pass from death to life, and Jesus himself will be your reward. That's the good news of the gospel.