93-57 Surprised by Suffering - Surprised by Suffering

In this very personal series preached shortly after the death of his sixteen-year-old son, Mark, Dr. Betters invites the congregation into his family grief journey. Dr. Betters acknowledges the “hell on earth” experienced by his family as he recounts the days before their son’s accident where God seemed to be preparing them for unexpected suffering. He shares specific scriptures God was using to help them get through each day of sorrow, where God promises the “hell on earth” would not last forever but after suffering “a little while” the Lord “himself will restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast”, as recorded in 1 Peter 5:10, Psalm 27. He draws attention to the questions of the Psalmist in Psalm 44 and the promise of Romans 8 that all things will come together for good for those who love Jesus. This series is a precious gift of hope in the midst of wrestling to walk by faith when suffering suddenly shatters our hearts.

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SPEAKER_03 0:29

This is my first sermon to this congregation after the death of our son Mark. I want to tell you that our family will never be the same.

SPEAKER_04 0:44

And I don't think this church will ever be the same. I'd like to kind of relive for you what has taken place in the last twelve days of our lives as a family. Our family is very much aware of the fact that although no one will be able to fully identify with our pain in exactly the same way, that all of you have entered into a grieving process with us as a family. We have felt your sorrow and your frustration over what to say to us and how to offer us comfort. We've looked into your tear-stained faces and read your minds as you feared. This will not be a sermon telling you all of the wonderful lessons that God has been teaching me and my family in the past 12 days, for I'm still not quite sure what they are. Our family has been rocked by the greatest test that our faith has ever been given. Everything that's happened to us in the past, from the turmoil of the care of the church, during a difficult time in our ministry, whereby when we seriously considered leaving the pastoral work, to the car accident of our daughter Heidi, to Sharon's battle with cancer, seems to pale in insignificance in comparison to the loss of our son Mark. To use a colloquial expression, the last twelve days for us have been hell on earth. But through it all, some of the fractured puzzle parts of God's master plan and design for the Betters family have been seen through the veil of death in some small but memorable ways that we know will in the days, weeks, months, and years ahead explode into a full-scale mural that displays his sovereignty in ways we never dreamed possible. I've entitled this message Surprised by Suffering. I remember as I sat down and began to review some of these things for myself, some of the questions that I raised, even from this pulpit, as I allowed you to enter into some of the chambers of my own doubts. A few weeks before Mark died, I shared with this congregation that while Sharon and I were down at the beach, we sat out on the porch while on vacation, just the two of us, and I began to raise some serious questions about the truth of the gospel. What if it isn't true? What if there is no heaven? What if there is no hell? What if there is no God? What if the Bible is a myth? What if? What if? Do you remember that message? You remember how I came to the point of saying that as we sat under the stars and looked up into the heavens and saw the order of God's universe, knowing that God has a purpose, knowing that God is a God of order, how he recounted for me the psalm which says, What is man? That you are mindful of him. Sharon kept a journal which I shared with you at Mark's memorial service. And in that journal, I believe God was preparing her. At first we thought it was Satan trying to take our child from us. At first, we thought it was a battle over Mark's spiritual life, a battle over making wrong choices or doing wrong things, never dreaming as parents that it was even possible that it was not Satan at all, but that it was God who was wrestling our son from us. And yet, even from the questions at the beach to the journal of preparation, there were still some other signs. Two weeks before Mark was killed, he was in a car accident. It was a nothing accident, one of those fender bender type of accidents. All of your teenagers have at one time or another threatened you with one of those. Maybe you've even been in a few yourself, but I'll never forget when he came home how his mother just broke down and started crying. And she grabbed him and she hugged him. And that fear, I didn't think anything of it. But somehow or another, she saw something there that maybe the rest of us didn't see. And then, right before Mark was killed, the Sunday before, I preached a sermon on suffering from the perspective of eternity. I stood up here and I told you folks that what we need to do as Christians is learn how to take a step back when we undergo suffering, and a step up and look at it from the perspective of eternity. I had an experience of blessedness in my backyard a few days before Mark was killed. I sat there as I was doing my devotions and considered the many blessings that I have as a person. I have a family that is made up of children who love the Lord and a wife who is faithful. God has blessed us with a congregation that many a pastor would give their right arms to have. The night that we replay again and again and again. I've wrestled with a few of the what ifs. What if this? What if I had said no, you can't go, which I had done on many different occasions? What if I had taken the young girl home myself, knowing that Mark did not know exactly the territory he was going to? That night of horror was something that I hope by God's wonderful erasure board he will take away from us someday. But it's still fresh. All of this to tell you that we were surprised by suffering. 1 Peter chapter 5, verse 10. I want to show you some scriptures that in some very small way God has been using in the past few days to help us to get from one day to the next. 1 Peter 5, 10 says, And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm, steadfast. Isn't that a wonderful promise? You know, if you're sitting here this morning, or if you're listening in by radio, or if you were here last week, you heard our older son say something very pointed and directed to you. If you don't know Christ, you are a pathetic fool. I want you to know that's totally out of character for him to say something like that. And he felt real bad after he said it. And so I'm going to help him out here a little bit this morning. And I'm going to tell you: if you're sitting here this morning and you don't know Christ, you are a pathetic fool. I say that more so today, and believing it more so today than ever before. I don't know how I could ever believe, 1 Peter 5.10, if I didn't know Christ, that God has promised to this family comfort after we have suffered a little while. And then he led us to Psalm 27, which, when I studied it, I realized that this was a psalm written by David upon the death of his two parents. And he says, The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? When evil men advance against me to devour my flesh, when my enemies and my foes attack me, they will stumble and fall. Though an army besiege me, my heart will not fear. Though war break out against me, even then will I be confident. One thing I asked of the Lord, this is what I seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple. For in the day of trouble, and that's where we are, he will keep me safe in his dwelling. He will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle and set me high upon a rock. Then my head will be exalted above the enemies who are around me. At his tabernacle will I sacrifice with shouts of joy. I will sing and make music to the Lord. Hear my voice when I call, O Lord. Be merciful to me and answer me. My heart says of you, seek his face. Your face, Lord, I will seek. Do not hide your face from me. Do not turn your servant away in anger. You have been my helper. Do not reject me or forsake me, O God my Savior. Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me. And then watch this. Teach me your way, O Lord. Lead me in a straight path. Literally, level path. You know, I can identify with what that man just said there. Any of you who have ever suffered the loss of a loved one know exactly what kind of roller coaster you go on. You can be laughing one minute and then in tears the next. You can be submitted to the Lordship of Christ and shaking your hand in his face the very next. You can have expressions of great faith one moment and wondering of the existence of God the next. And it's like a spiritual and emotional roller coaster. Up and down, up and down. I've watched every member of my family and they've watched me do that these past 12 days. And yet, what is the prayer of the psalmist? What is the prayer of his heart? Lord, make my path what? Level. He knew that feeling. He knew that emotion. He knew that in order to cope with life, those ups and those downs, those emotional trips on that roller coaster are a necessary part of the grieving process. But he could not stay there. Eventually, the Lord was going to have to level him out. We're on that roller coaster. Don't be surprised if you talk to us. And by the way, don't be afraid to talk to us. I was somewhere recently and entered a room with a group of people, and I thought I had leprosy. They just didn't know what to say or what to do. You don't need to feel that way. But I know that eventually God will bring us onto that level path. And look at the next verse. Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes, for false witnesses rise up against me, breathing out violence. I am still confident of this. And this is the verse the Lord gave me that day. I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord. Be strong. Take heart. Wait for the Lord. Look closely at that verse. It is not the land of the living the psalmist craves. It is the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living that the psalmist craves.

SPEAKER_03 15:56

Wait for the Lord.

SPEAKER_04 15:58

Be strong. Take heart. And then the Lord gave us Psalm 44. And I'm not going to read this entire psalm, but I want to touch on just its themes. Because it's a psalm in the first part where the psalmist speaks of all the wonderful, miraculous things that God has done in delivering Israel again and again and again. He catalogues, if you will, the goodness of the Lord. He says it was not by their sword that they won the land, it was by your right hand, your arm. And then he goes on in those first eight verses or so and speaks of how God had been faithful to them. But then he made this statement around verse 8 or 9. But now you have rejected and humbled us. You no longer go out with our armies. And for the next several verses, he talks about the fact that God had forsaken them. The fact that God had turned his back. We are considered as sheep to be slaughtered. Awake, O Lord. Why do you sleep? Rouse yourself. Don't reject us forever. Why do you hide your face and forget our misery and oppression? We are brought down to the dust. Our bodies cling to the ground. Rise up and help us. Redeem us because of your unfailing love. And so this psalm that begins with this glorious presentation of the faithfulness of God ends with the psalmist's face in the dirt, wondering, what have he done to be forsaken that way? And that's how it ends. And you have to stand back for a moment when you read that psalm and say, What's going on here? What is going on? Why would God do such a thing? And you don't hear any more about that 44th Psalm until you go over to the book of Romans. And I'd like you to do that with me. Go over to Romans chapter 8. And for those of you who might also be suffering this morning, take comfort in this. Romans chapter 8. Right in the heart of this despair, right in the midst of these doubts, with the psalmist face in the dirt, we see the Bible opening up a whole new horizon and perspective of thought as we come to Romans 8.28. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose, for those God foreknew he predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his son. Let me stop right there for a moment and tell you one of the cards we received was from a man who was a minister who also lost one of his children. He made two very brief statements in this very comforting card. It kind of brought some things home to us. We have prayed all of our lives that our children would be able to glorify God and enjoy him forever. From the time they were little babies, we prayed a hedge of protection around them. And in this card, this minister made these comments. He said, You can be sure of two things, and he did not know Mark. But he said, You can be sure of two things. He is with Jesus, and he is like Jesus. Isn't that what Paul is saying here? For those he predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. Those he predestined, he called. Our computer, where he shared his personal testimony. And he talks about his brother Dan. He talks about his sister and his older brother and the roles they played. It's a very short testimony, the roles they played in him coming to know Christ. And he said, you know, it was kind of like a team effort. He called. He predestined him. He called him. He justified him. He glorifies every believer. What then shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also allow? Along with him, graciously give us all things. Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns Christ Jesus, who died more than that, who was raised to life, is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness, danger, or sword? And right in the midst of all of that, he takes us back to Psalm 44. And he picks the psalmist left off. The psalmist you remembers, his face was in the dirt, wondering about the sovereignty of God. And right in the midst of this glorious pericophy of scripture, the apostle Paul says, What shall we say to these things? For your sake, it is written, for your sake we face death all day long. We are considered as sheep to be slaughtered. Now, here is where he picks it up. No, in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, angels nor demons, things present nor future powers, nor heights, nor depth, nor anything else in all of creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Isn't that amazing? What the psalmists could not comprehend, we who live on this side of the cross can. And even though our faces may be in the dirt, we haven't sunk so low that our sovereign God hasn't sunk lower to pick us up and to give us victory. And then he gave us another scripture, Colossians chapter 1. I'd like you to look with me at verse 24. Colossians 1 24. Confusing verse at first. But Paul says this now I rejoice in what was suffered for you. And I fill up in my flesh. Now underline these next words, what is still lacking in regard to Christ's afflictions for the sake of the body, which is the church? Lacking in what sense? Could he possibly be speaking of the sufferings of Christ as lacking in the sense of the atonement? Is it conceivable that Christ, when he dies on the cross, dies an insufficient death to atone for the sins of his people? Of course not. When Christ dies on the cross, he dies completely, once and for all, and suffers in such a way so as to pay the price for every single sin of every single one of his elect people. There is nothing lacking in the atoning work of Christ on the cross. So what's he talking about? You see, the only way in which we can be conformed to the image of Christ is to walk in those steps. The only way we can fully appreciate the suffering of Christ on the cross and thus bow in submission and worship and allow ourselves to be conformed to the image of Christ is to walk those steps. Not in order to atone for our sins, but to fully identify with the price tag of suffering that Christ paid for us on that cross. We can appreciate his love for us in a wonderful degree without intense suffering. And many of you do. That is what he is referring to when he says, what is lacking in the suffering of Christ, our identification with that suffering. Now listen carefully. This is what we do not understand. It is the cup of sorrow. And it is not given to everyone. It is a cup of sorrow that very few desire to pick up and drink. I can tell you as I stand here today, I do not desire that cup. But God gives that cup of sorrow to people within his body for one reason and one reason only, to conform them to the image of Christ in such a way that they may reflect the very image of God so that others within the body may be drawn more closely to the same image of Christ. I think that's what 2 Corinthians 11 is all about, which you don't have to turn to. The catalog of Paul's sufferings. You see, in the middle of that, he says, I was caught up into the third heaven. Theologians have debated what that means. I don't think there's any doubt about the fact that Paul was given a vision of glory. And he had this revelation and this insight that others had not received. So that I would not boast of the great revelations he's given. And he says, now if I'm going to boast, this is what I'm going to boast of. And he lists his sufferings. I'm going to boast of the fact that I've been shipwrecked and left for naked and left for dead, that I've been out in the deep for a day and a half, that I've been whipped and beaten, that I've been left to die again and again and again. I am going to boast in my sufferings. Why? Because in my sufferings Christ has been made strong, his grace has been sufficient, and that's what I want you to see. Not the glorious revelations that he's given me, but the suffering. So that in my suffering you may be drawn to the cross and see his suffering and glory in what he's done for you. There were over 1,500 people, we believe, here at Mark's Memorial Service. I can't tell you how many people came who said, I've gone through this. I remember hearing my wife remark to one of them, you belong now to an exclusive club that nobody wants to join. The psalmist speaks of life as a journey. We're traveling through a desert. A dry, barren desert. And it's a long walk. We've got to get from here to here. But we've got all of this desert to pass through. It's a threatening journey. It's a journey where you can become very dry. It's a journey where you become very thirsty. And so the psalmist speaks of traveling through life that way, but he also refers to certain brooks in the way. That as he's traveling through that desert and experiences the intense heat and pain and suffering of that kind of a journey, God miraculously provides for him certain brooks in the way. During the past 12 days, and I know in the years to come, God is going to continue to give us those brooks in the way. The man who came knocking at the door, it may have been a day or two after his accident, I don't remember. Who said, I saw the accident. I was there. I was the first one to your son's car. And he described him sitting in that car with his hands folded. And he said, And you know, there was a smile on his face. That man didn't know Mark. Nor did he know he was a brook in the way. But one thing anybody who knew Mark knew of him was that he always had a smile on his face. A brook in the way. To feel the intense pain on your face for us. The young lady who was killed with Mark in the car accident. Her parents called us on the telephone. They gave us a wonderful gift. They said to us, We want you to know we do not hold you or Mark responsible for Kelly's death. Because they too have experienced great tragedy. That was a brook in the way. Talking with the investigating officer, who himself, by the way, is an elder in one of our PCA churches. Who assured me that he's not going to give up until he finds out as much as he can, although he tempered it by saying, you may never know. Initially it was well, Mark was speeding and lost control of the car. And now we're finding out more and more details from different witnesses, different people, different evidence that shows that there's much more involved than just losing control of the car. He suddenly veers to the left. No break marks. Just suddenly is heading straight on a road that I went 110 miles per hour on the night of his accident and suddenly turns left. Nobody knows why. Somebody out there knows why. And we're praying that God would either show us or take away the desire to know. But that was a brook in the way. The many people who walked through this line that belong to that exclusive club nobody wants to join, how refreshing they were to us. The assignment of a Christian officer who will not give up until as many of these details can be filled in as possible. The first stories of testimonies that have trickled in about Marx's effect and the effect of his death on the Christian community. There was a time, friends, I would have stood up here and told you. Whenever somebody loses a loved one, please don't go up to them and say, so-and-so came to know the Lord because your son died. There was a time I would have said that to you. In fact, I have said that to you. That probably is something very cruel and very self-centered to say. But I want you to know I rescind that statement. I want to hear how the Lord has used this. I want to hear how this tragedy has affected your marriage. I want you to write it down. I'm begging you to write it down and send it to us. I want to hear how this tragedy in our home has brought somebody to know Christ. There are people, I am sure, that are sitting here today that otherwise would not be in this church unless you wanted to see firsthand how this family is handling this tragedy. I want you to come to Christ. More than anything else, I want to know if you do. I want to hear those testimonies of how young people have started to gain a different perspective of life because suddenly one of their own has been taken. I want to hear what he's doing in your home. I want to hear what he's doing in your walk with the Lord. I want to hear those stories. Because for us, it will help us to make sense out of the fact that a beautiful 16-year-old boy who had everything ahead of him has been taken from us within one second. It'll help us to see the wonderful sovereignty of God. We want those stories. You write them down and you send them to us. We want to know. They will become for us, Brooks, in the way. I got one of those this past week. I want you to listen to it. I'm not going to tell you who it's from. But it says, Dear Sharon and Chuck, you will not know this side of heaven just how many lives have been touched by God because of Mark's homecoming. I know this is true because I am one of the multitude that he has touched. The first touch came on Wednesday morning at 6 a.m. as I sat at my dressing table preparing to go to work. As usual, I was listening to the morning news on Channel 6 as I dressed. The newscaster let off the broadcast with the report of an accident on Route 1 in Newcastle County that had taken two lives and stated that no names had been released at this time. In that instant, I literally froze, and that deep inner voice that I so often failed to immediately recognize as the Holy Spirit said, You know, one of the victims, pray for the family now. Involuntarily I uttered, Oh no, Lord, who? God please be with them. Then I sat there and chastised myself for having such crazy morbid thoughts and tried to put the moment out of my mind. It would not go away, but I pushed it into the background until 3 p.m. that afternoon when I received a phone call at work. The voice on the other end of the line said, I'm sorry to bother you at work, but I know that you would want to know this if you don't know it already. Have you heard about Mark Betters? I sat there speechless momentarily as the experience from that morning played before my mind's eye like a video. Then I answered, No, I haven't heard, but I know you're going to tell me that he was killed in a car accident on Route 1 last night. Now the silence was on the other end of the line. And then a baffled voice said, But how could you know that if you hadn't heard about it? I told the caller what I just told you, and the wonder of it started to dawn on me. God loves you so much and cares for you so deeply that in your moments of deepest despair and unfathomable grief, he called on his people to lift you up in prayer, even those who did not know at the time who they were praying for. And even more wondrous to me is that he counted me to be worthy of this sacred privilege. The second touch came as I sat at a red light at the intersection of Route 72 and 40 on my way to Mark's memorial service on Friday night. As I drove, I was praying and asking God what I could possibly say to you face to face that would bring any comfort at all. Once again the Holy Spirit answered, saying, Quote, there are some wounds that only heaven can heal, and only my grace can sustain you until the time of that healing comes. I know that those preponderous words were meant to be shared with you, but in his miraculous way, God meant them for me too. I honestly do not understand why I feel so compelled to share with you now the thoughts and emotions that have burdened me over these past several months, but I know that I must, so please bear with me. Over the past several months, I have allowed myself to become more and more consumed by my pain and hurt over my husband's decision to end our marriage. Without consciously admitting it to myself, let alone anyone else, I have been falling deeper and deeper into a pit of despair and withdrawing more and more from all of those around me who care about me. My prayer life has become a single self-centered plea of God help me, get me through another day until I come home and crawl back into the shell behind the walls of my home. Even now, committing these words to paper, I realize that I am confessing this to God and myself for the first time. I don't know what lies ahead, but I know that a healing process that has been three years in coming has started. And I know that it started on Friday night at that red light when I prayed one of very, very few unselfish prayers that I've prayed in a very long time and asked him for words of comfort for you. A harsh and hurting reality. There are some wounds that only heaven can heal. A blessed hope and promise that can and will sustain us until that heavenly healing comes. Only my grace can sustain you. Mark's time here on earth was far, far too short. He never preached soul-changing sermons that touched my life like his father, or taught me God's word in insightful ways that opened God's truths to me like his mother. In fact, my only memories of Mark are snapshots in my mind of the mischievous little boy that always brought a smile to my face by his antics, to the handsome young man that I met again on the night that Chuck Jr. played with the Newark Symphony Orchestra. And yet in his death, Mark Nathan. Betters has touched my life and changed it in ways that I have not yet begun to comprehend and understand. I only know at this point that his memory has been indelibly stamped in my mind and in my heart. I look forward to thanking. Thanking him in person when we meet again, face to face, at the foot of our Savior's throne. My thoughts, my prayers, my love are with the two of you, with Chuck and Heidi and Dan, as you face the day ahead without the joyful presence of Mark in your home. A brook in the way. The worship experience last Sunday morning was incredible. And I got home, and that afternoon I went into a pit of despair. And I said, Lord, how could I how could I go from this to this so quickly? And God gave me another brook in the way. You know what worship is, friends? It's the collective energy of God's people focused singly upon glorifying Him. And I would say, out of all of the worship services we've ever had in this church, last Sunday's service was prefaced by intense prayer and people laboring before the Lord, begging God to speak clearly to us, that as a church, for the first time in our years of existence, we were focused on one thing and one thing only, and that is to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ and to put our hands before Him and say, We are submitted. And that's what worship is. And my thought at that point was, why can't we do that every week? Why does it take something like this to get us that focused? And yet in heaven, that's precisely what's going on. Not just 1030 on Sunday mornings, but for all eternity. A brook in the way. A brook in the way. The outpouring of love from this body. People who came into our home and washed clothes. I mean, this shirt hasn't looked so white. Somebody took this shirt home and washed it and ironed it and starched it and I mean I had no underwear in my drawer one day and it was filled the next, and I don't know how it got there. A brook in the way. The article in the news journal about Mark and Kelly's death. I thought was a wonderful article. I never thought I would say that the news journal ever writes anything good. But this time they did. A brook in the way. And then one afternoon I forced myself to do something that since Mark died I hadn't done. I turned on the TV to watch the news. Peter Jennings came on at 6:30, and I sat there for the first time. And in that one half hour of broadcast news, this is what he talked about. Floods in the Midwest, famine and war in Somalia, the earthquake in Japan. The new proofs, quote unquote, that homosexuals may be born that way. The Nazi hate group in California that planned the assassination of Arsenio Hall and Rodney King in order to purposely start a race war. The AIDS spread among women. The volatility of what is going on in the Middle East. The fact that in Bosnia, one tank load of oil was permitted to come in so that the lone bakery could open and feed the people and that the surgeons could operate without the use of flashlights, at least until the oil in that tank runs out. One after another. It looked like I was reading Matthew 24. It looked like I was reading a history of the signs of the time. A brook in the way. And then the insight into our son's character and personality. He wrote a paper on reproduction, part of a school project. And right in the middle of that paper, he quotes Psalm 139, 14, I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful. I know that full well. And then he breaks from his paper, and right in the middle, in big bold print, he says, Wow, praise the Lord. I readily confess to you that there were times where we did not know what Mark was thinking. I think you all have times like that with your children. We wondered whether or not stuff that we were saying to him was getting through. Every parent wonders that. And in his wallet there was a four by six card that had been folded four different ways. That we found out later from his friends was one of his favorite verses. We opened up the card and it was Proverbs 12:15. The way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice. We've entered into a new dimension in our lives. Somebody asked me, how's this going to affect you in terms of your preaching? And I made a statement to them that I'm going to share with you as I close. What is happening to us emotionally is one foot has dropped, but the other one's coming. We know that. What is happening in the invisible war behind the scenes is that Satan is going to try to take this tragedy and destroy my faith. So that in turn he can use what happens to us to help destroy your faith. That ain't going to happen. What is happening in the context of life is that God and God alone is the author of life and death. No matter how many answers we get about the accident, it all is going to boil down at that precise moment determined to take our son home. What is happening to us ministerially, I think, is holy boldness. If you thought I was outspoken about the gospel before, you ain't seen nothing yet. What is happening in the context of eternity, I can't understand. But another one of the brooks in the way, I think, helps put it into perspective. And I'll use this to close. Somebody sent this to me. It's called a conversation with the gardener. As you were tending the garden that is your world, did you notice we were losing our little boy? You could have kept that flower so sweet and small, yet you chose not to and allowed it to fall. What sense is there to it, this random pruning which allowed him to bud but kept him from blooming? Gardener, can you hear me? I want to know why the smallest new blossom was chosen to die. There must be a purpose in what you've done. You took not the blighted, but our perfect one. I've suffered and wondered as I wept. Why was his promise made, but not kept? And then the gardener. Many questioned the arrangements of a gardener like me, but you single flowers my bouquets never see. You anguish each time, whatever I choose. You see not what I am gaining, but what you lose. A garden is planted with gathering in mind. The loveliest bouquets require some of each kind. I must gather the perfect that you love so much, for only a perfect adds the perfect touch. Some are taken in the morning, some later in the day. Some are never chosen and just wither away. And remember, when you lose a precious new bloom, it is gone from the garden, but it's in the gardener's room. I have two things as we close in prayer to ask of you. First of all, are you here this morning and you do not know Christ? You say, well, wait a minute, I know about him, I know of him, I think I'm a Christian, I go to church, I, and on and on your list goes. Do you know him? Do you know Christ? You think you're here by chance or fate or mistake? You're here by sovereign and perfect will of God. Do you know him this morning? Have you ever put your trust in Jesus Christ? Are you trusting in him and him alone for your salvation? Has there ever come a time where you have said, I am a sinner, I need the Savior, I trust him right now to come into my life. I will live my life for him from this point on. You say, Pastor, that's never been my experience. I don't think I've ever done that. I'd like to pray with you right now. Would you bow your head? Those of you who aren't sure, would you bow your head right now and would you pray with me? Would you say, Lord Jesus, I need you? Would you say that in your heart right now, right where you're sitting? Lord Jesus, I need you. I am a sinner and I confess my sins to you. I trust in your provision, your son's death on the cross for me. I trust him and him alone right now to come into my life, to forgive me of my sins, to be my Lord and my Savior for all eternity. Could you pray that prayer this morning, right where you're sitting? Would you trust him now? If you're not sure, friend, please don't leave here. Please do not leave here until you have made that commitment. The second thing I have for you is as a believer, would you ask God to take your cowardice away? Would you ask him to give you a holy boldness? The days are short. In the moment that Mark died, 200,000 people died and went to hell. Would you ask God to break down all of the barriers so that you could share your faith with your family, with your friends, with your neighbors? Would you say, Lord, take away my shyness? Give me a boldness I've never had before. Help me to be a servant that will not let go until you bless me. Would you pray that prayer, friend? Would you ask God to give you that boldness to speak the truth of the gospel? Let's stand and join hands with those around you as we close in prayer.

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Now may the grace of God, the love of our Lord and our Savior, Jesus the Christ, the very presence, person, and power of his Holy Spirit, abide with each of you now until Christ comes again and forevermore. And all God's people said.

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Mark Ain't Ministries exists to offer help and hope to hurting people by pointing them to the promises of God and the comfort of his word. Through In His Grip, Ask Dr. Betters, Daily Treasure, and Health and Hope, we provide free, faith-based resources for those walking through suffering, grief, confusion, and seasons of deep needs. To learn more about Dr. Betters, explore our resources, or contact us, visit N A R K I N C dot org. May you rest today in the assurance that God can be trusted, even when we do not understand his case.