Suffering Freshwater
Notes
Transcript
Why Do We Suffer?
Why Do We Suffer?
MI: The Purpose of Suffering is more contentment in God and Less satisfaction in self and world.
Intro:
Good morning church, my name is Zach Klundt, I am the associate pastor here at Freshwater.
Pastor Robert was suppose to preach this morning on the Bible has a purpose, at about 5:00pm yesterday.
Robert texted Aaron and I and said he was under the weather— To which I responded, do you need me to preach tomorrow.
If you know Robert then you may know the answer I got.
He said that he was 99% going to preach tomorrow— MJ flu game baby!
At about midnight he texted me and told me I was up to preach this morning.
I am thankful that I had a message in the back packet for just a time as this.
This morning we are going to shift gears a bit and talk about suffering.
And a question I often hear is “Why do we suffer?”
This question gets ask by believers as well as those who do not believe in Jesus.
This question of why do we suffer is often used by those outside of the faith as a reason to no have faith.
As some will state I can’t believe in a God who allows suffering— therefore I do not believe in God.
And the deal with suffering and the questions as to why do we suffer can be answered easily.
We may not like the answer but it is simple.
Suffering exist because sin entered the world.
As Romans tell us that Through Adam sin entered the world.
If you recall God created everything perfect and there was no suffering, there was no pain, no death, but when Eve took that bite of the fruit and gave some to her husband— through their disobedience sin entered into the world that was perfect and good, and it left it broken, painful and full of suffering.
And we are still dealing with the ramification of that choice today.
Suffering exist because sin does.
Now suffering is not a cause of sin, as that can be a common misconception.
I have heard it said that I am suffering because God is punishing me for sin in my life that I have committed.
We do understand that sin does have consequences that does cause us pain and agony and yes we may suffer because of what we decide.
But God is not punishing us because of sin.
While we could close the good book and pray and you could be on your way.
As we answered that question why do we suffer?
It’s Sin.
But this does not always help us in the midst of suffering.
This does not help the one who lost a loved one.
Who is just lost their job.
Who found out their spouse is addicted to porn or their spouse had an affair.
Someone who is hearing they have cancer
Or someone who is going through a divorce
By just saying its sin— good luck--
This does not help us wrestle with our suffering.
And we live in a world that is full of suffering and every single person goes through it.
We all suffer.
It does not matter your gender, your race, whether you are poor or rich.
It does not matter, suffering will hit our lives at some point
While you may not be able to control some of the suffering that you go through you can choose how you respond to it.
I want to share with you a story.
Me: Miscarriage of 2018:
In 2018 my wife and I were praying if we should have another child.
At that point we had two incredible kids and we thought hey let’s add one more the mix.
And it took us a month to get pregnant and we thought that this was 100% in God’s will for our life.
I mean it was so clear— we were overjoyed!
Then about 6 weeks later, we found out that we lost the baby.
And let me tell you that was really hard.
We felt like God was blessing and giving us this go ahead to have a child.
And when we realized that we lost the baby, our world just stopped.
It came out of nowhere and it took time to heal.
And as I was studying suffering, I came across wise words form John Piper who said this:
There are two ways suffering can be used:
1. Suffering can be used by satan to destroy your faith or keep you from having faith.
or
2. Suffering can be used by God to build up your faith.
I believe that Suffering is a battle for your heart.
And at the risk of sounding dramatic, we felt this:
We felt like out soul was hanging in the balance with how do we respond to this suffering.
I mean we did not choose this.
In reality I would choose to not suffer if that was the choice.
Anybody else?
We: We avoid suffering because we do not deem it as good.
If it was up to us none of us would choose suffering.
Why?
As As Paul David Tripp writes in his Book Suffering,
“When we suffer we don’t see it as any kind of good. So we begin to question whether God is good— as He is the one who allowed it in the first place.”
We don’t choose to suffer.
And sometimes you don’t get a choice it just happens, cancer hits, you lose a child, you get hit by a drunk driver and are paralyzed, and the list goes on but sometimes we do have a choice right and in that choice we always choice comfort over suffering.
Here is what I am talking about.
We move into safer neighborhoods.
We by the a/c unit and then we keep our houses at a comfortable setting.
We avoid dark streets.
We take aspirin when our body hurts.
When the rain hit we scatter inside because nobody wants to be wet.
We drink only purified water.
We do a ton of things to not suffer.
We choose peace, safety, and ease over suffering.
And while we can’t control the uncontrollable, how do we handle the ones we can control?
If we see suffering as a pain or not good then we fall into the lie that suffering is meaningless and is an inconvenience.
But church this morning I want to share with you that God has a purpose for our suffering.
God: God tells us suffering does have a purpose
Here is what I believe about suffering, that I want to show you today.
The Purpose of Suffering is more contentment in God and Less satisfaction in self and world.
Suffering is about us becoming more content in God and less satisfied in our self and the world we live in.
And this morning— I am not here to argue why there is suffering in the world.
But what I want to give us is wisdom on how we can suffer well.
And I know that sounds crazy.
Suffer Well?
You maybe are asking yourself why does that matter.
Because how we suffer carries more weight then answering the question of why do we suffer.
If you have been a believer for any length of time you can see suffering all over scripture.
From Genesis 3 on.
Suffering is not surprising to a believer and this should not surprise you when it happens to you because everyone suffers.
But how we handle suffering says a lot about our faith.
So this morning, I want us to look at 2 Cor 1.
And as we turn there.
Let’s get everyone up to speed on what is happening.
Paul is the author of this letter.
God has continued to use Paul in huge ways ever since he was blinded on the road to Damascus.
Paul is writing this letter to the chruch of Corinth.
And Paul and this church in Corinth had a complicated history.
Paul had a painful visit to Corinth.
The chruch was in open rebellion against him.
He leaves and writes a letter that we no don’t have that was said to be tearful and severe— He was calling for the church to repent and turn back to the Gospel of Christ.
And to Paul’s surprise many did do just that.
And As Paul turns to write this letter, it really is about suffering and the power of the Spirit in Paul’s life, ministry and message.
He was doing this because they were questioning his authority.
Some believed that Paul was a liar and because of his suffering he could not possibly be an apostle.
So that is what we are walking into here as we being to read chapter 1 starting in verse 3.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
The first take away from this passage is that while we are suffering God comforts in our suffering.
Comfort Comes From God.
Paul beings this passage with talking about God as the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort.
It is interesting to note that Paul does not call Him the Father of judgement and the God of all wrath, no instead Paul describes God using the words of mercy and comfort.
You may have noticed that Paul used the word comfort a lot in these first 2 verses.
And you may be thinking— see we are suppose to not suffer but find comfort.
But this is not what Paul is talking about.
You see we see this word comfort, and for us it means things are easy.
Things are not painful.
It’s a sense of well-being.
Freedom from pain or anxiety.
We love the idea of comfort.
For us comfort is painless.
Comfort is not suffering.
But that is not the way Paul is using the word comfort.
Instead he is saying this according to the New American Commentary:
2 Corinthians 2. Praise to the God of Comfort (1:3–7)
The comfort that Paul has in mind has nothing to do with a languorous feeling of contentment. It is not some tranquilizing dose of grace that only dulls pains but a stiffening agent that fortifies one in heart, mind, and soul. Comfort relates to encouragement, help, exhortation. God’s comfort strengthens weak knees and sustains sagging spirits so that one faces the troubles of life with unbending resolve and unending assurance.
So when Paul goes into verse 4 and says
who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
The God of the universe— he strengthens you in your affliction.
In the outward afflictions and the inward afflictions that hits your life— God is the one who is your stiffening agent.
In your suffering God is helping you— he is encouraging you— he is fortifying your Heart, Mind and Soul.
Why?
Why does God do this when we face affliction?
He wants your heart.
He is faithful and he wants to build up your faith so you become unbending in an unrelenting world.
He builds you up so that you may build up others who are going through suffering just as you are.
For we know that Comfort comes from God.
And we are to comfort others as well.
When Brittni and I had our miscarriage, we were able to lean on others who had just gone through it.
And because of the comfort God gave us we were able to comfort friends and family members who had also gone through it.
But it was only because of the building up the comfort that God gave that we were able to stregthen our faith in him.
Comfort comes from God
And we also know that suffering comes from God.
Suffering Comes From God
I know that may shock some people in this room but that is the truth.
We see this over and over again.
The clearest example of this comes from Job.
We may be familiar with this story of Job who lost everything.
And if you read the beginning of Job it seems like it is satan who makes Job suffer but if you recall it was satan that went and got permission from God to do it.
So Job lost everything and at the end of the book we read this.
Then came to him all his brothers and sisters and all who had known him before, and ate bread with him in his house. And they showed him sympathy and comforted him for all the evil that the Lord had brought upon him. And each of them gave him a piece of money and a ring of gold.
God brought the suffering upon Job.
Satan did the bidding but it was God who allowed it.
“Satan strikes Job out of malice.
The Lord strikes Job out of a loving concern for his glory.”
This is the difference between Satan who wants to destroy your faith and God who wants to strengthen your faith.
*It is a battle for your heart
And I know what you may be thinking— that does not sound very loving.
And if I can be honest, I feel that as well.
I mean we can look at our lives and recount all the times we have suffered and go, really God.
Like I really had to go through a miscarriage?
I really had to lose my home.
I really had to lose my family.
God why is this happening?
I understand why we may ask those questions.
And God can handle those questions.
But it leaves us wondering God are you loving?
Because we see and we hear about a God of love.
But we don’t see it or feel it in the midst of suffering.
But do you remember what that price of love looked like?
Let’s go back to verse 5:
For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.
Love cost something.
Love come from the suffering of Christ.
We share not just a little bit of Christ suffering but we share in abundance of Christ suffering.
Christ suffered.
The very son of God suffered greatly.
Now Paul is not saying that we have to share in the atoning of sin— no it is referring to that God did not spare his own son from suffering.
When Jesus was on this earth he suffered.
And we know that we will also suffer because of Christ.
Jesus told us this.
“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
This is what believers have signed up for.
You may not like it and I am not saying you do.
But when we get to verses like Romans 8:17 we love the first part but sometimes forget to read the rest.
and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
We love the children of a God part fellow Heirs with Christ.
We have to understand that suffering is what Christ went through and it means that we will as well.
Paul understood this and he wanted to share in Christ suffering.
that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
Paul knew that suffering was part of the deal.
There are many times in Paul’s life where he had to cling to the Lord because he had nothing else.
As Paul continues in verse 6 we start to see this.
If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.
Paul is addressing the church of Corinth and is telling them look, we have been afflicted and it was so they could be comforted and so they could experience the Gospel.
Paul was preaching and witnessing to the people about the Gospel of Christ.
It did mean that he suffered a lot.
But Paul did this so those who were lost could receive Christ.
When was the last time we leaned into suffering in order that someone could hear the Gospel?
I often wonder if this American Christian life looks anything like the believers in Paul’s day.
We have this idea that life is not good if suffering is present.
But it sounds as if Paul is saying you will not be strengthened in your faith unless you suffer.
Look at verse 8 and 9
For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.
Paul and his travel partners they have suffered.
And the people need to know this.
Why is this?
Because they could not go through suffering in their own strength they could not rely on themselves they had to turn and trust in God the one who brings hope in suffering.
Paul is pointing the people to God in their suffering.
This is where the hope comes from.
The hope that we have in Christ.
The hope that we have in the resurrection.
The hope that this suffering is only on this side of heaven.
It is temporary.
We know comfort comes from God.
We know suffering comes from God and lastly
Hope comes from God.
Hope comes from God.
He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again.
God was faithful to Paul over and over again.
Paul suffered.
But God delivered him out of situations.
Paul believed that God would rescue them.
Church when suffering hit us—Rest in that God will deliver you from that.
And it may not be on this side of heaven but know that we can place your hope in Christ.
When you are in the valley turn to the only one who can bring hope.
We see how suffering is unavoidable.
We see that comfort, suffering and hope all come from God.
So where does that leave us.
Why does this matter to us today.
I believe that how we handle suffering is a testimony to the world about who we serve.
You: How You handle suffering is a testimony to the world
Here is what I mean by that: Suffering is going to hit us.
This world is broken.
And there are some kinds of suffering that we would not choose or wish upon or worst enemies.
And when we find ourselves dealing with this kind of affliction in our life, the world will be watching how you handle yourself.
And you have every right to feel the emotions that God has given you but how you handle your suffering will impact others.
If we play the blame game— blaming everything and everyone, well that doesn’t make us much different then the world we live in.
But if we embrace it— and embracing doesn’t mean that we love it.
It means we are wrestling with it for we know that it is out of our control.
And when things are out of our control the best thing that we can show a broken world is that we may not have the answers but we serve a God who does.
We serve a God who cares for His people and we may not like what is happening but our only hope is found God.
I have heard people who go through suffering literally clinging on to God through it all and when they get to the other side they say, how could anyone go through life without the hope that God offers.
And honestly I have no idea.
I know what you may not choose suffering for yourself.
But as I was studying this passage and reading about Paul a question came to my mind about choosing suffering.
Should we choose suffering.
Not the type that hits us out of nowhere, but the kind that we knowing choose that will cause us to suffer.
Us: Do we choose suffering?
It is no secret that Paul choose to suffer.
In Act 20 we read this.
And now, behold, I am going to Jerusalem, constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me.
Paul is literally saying look the Holy Spirit would tell me that imprisonment and afflictions are waiting for me.
And Paul did not turn around.
Paul was beaten, left for dead, thought to be dead, shipwrecked, thrown into jail, he had the 40 lashes less one.
Which means that he got whipped 39 times because 40 was just too much.
I mean one time alone could have killed people.
But Paul endured it 5 times.
I imagine that Paul’s body at the end of his life was just mutilated.
And he suffered it all for the sake of the Gospel.
Paul believed and gave all he had for the Gospel of Jesus.
He choose suffering.
Do you choose suffering?
I believe that we follow Jesus but the cost is pretty low for us in America.
I mean understand that if you are Muslim and you become a Christian your whole family cuts you out.
It is like you died to them.
We can tell stories about missionaries and how they choose suffering.
They leaned into and went to a third world country where everyday they woke up and choose to suffer.
And some missionaries to the point of death.
And we can cheer them all on while we continue to live our Christian life here at a pretty low cost— we find ourselves safe.
What choosing suffering looks like to us here in Jefferson City, MO looks different in other places.
For us it may mean that you choose to live in a different neighborhood that is vastly different then yours.
I served with a guy at Harvest Bible Chapel in Davenport, who was going to plant a church in Rock Island, IL.
And he lived in bettendorf, and if you know the QC you know that Bettendorf and Rock Island are not the same.
Bettendorf a bit more higher class— its safe.
While Rock Island is rough, it is full of people who are struggling, some may call it dangerous.
And this guy he sells his house and buys one in the heart of Rock Island.
To be with the people he is serving.
I have often heard of us choosing areas that are safer— what if the areas Christians need to be in are the ones that hurting, that may be rough?
And please hear me, I am not telling anyone here to sell your home and do this.
Unless you feel God tugging at your heart to do it.
But What I am saying is there are all sorts of things we choose not to do in order to avoid suffering.
But what if the areas Christians need to be in are the ones that are hurting, that may be rough, and may cause a bit of suffering?
So what if today we just choose to suffer a bit.
What if today we hear the spirit go “look if you continue on this path— suffering is ahead” and we say bring it on.
What if today we leaned in.
And look you can’t do it on your own.
You can’t suffer on your own, but God will provide for you.
God will give you the strength to keep moving forward.
And Your faith will stregthen.
There may be some of you in this room that you may feel like you are at a standstill in your faith, Maybe you need to welcome in a bit of suffering.
Maybe you need to choose suffering which forces you to lean into God and trust Him.
My encouragement for you today is what when suffering hits your life whether it is unseen or something that we choose, suffer well.
The world is watching and when we suffer well we gain more contentment in God and less satisfaction in ourselves and this world.
Let’s pray
ADVERTISEMENT