94-17 Suffering: Faith on Trial – Spiritual Snow, Sleet, & Freezing Rain

The following sermon by Dr. Chuck F. Betters is from a 7-part series on suffering.

In this scripture-packed sermon series, Dr. Chuck F. Betters walks suffering believers into the honest, holy language of the Psalms, where God’s people bring their doubts, fears, questions, and grief into the presence of the Lord. Beginning with Psalm 73, Chuck helps listeners wrestle with the questions pain often raises: Is God truly sovereign? Is He perfectly good? Why do the wicked seem to prosper while God’s people suffer? This series reveals the building blocks of a shabby belief system, like proof-texting, a lack of understanding of the omnipotence and goodness of God in an evil world, and then builds a theology of suffering that is more than a belief system. Such a strong biblical understanding of suffering equips God’s people to turn to Him when crisis comes. It points hurting hearts to the steady love of Christ, the purposes of God that cannot be shaken, and the comforting truth that in our weakest moments, we are held securely in His grip.

Transcript

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Welcome to In His Grip with Dr. Chuck F. Betters, produced by Marking Ministries. Each In His Grip message is designed to help turn your hearts toward Jesus and equip you to walk by faith. Let's join Dr. Betters as he preaches today's message.

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Take your Bibles, please, and turn with me to Hebrews chapter 12. We're going to continue our study in this series entitled Faith on Trial. That's the series title. We've raised the question: Is God omnipotent? We took a careful look at Psalm 73 and asked the $64,000 question: why does God permit pain and evil and suffering? We asked that question in the context of God's omnipotence. Is he omnipotent, all-powerful, all-good, or isn't he? We talked about some false assumptions that contribute to a shabby belief system. And as we studied that, we began to shape an understanding, I hope, of our worldview. How do we view life? How do we view the question of God's involvement in the affairs of this world? We talked about atheism or materialism, how it answers the question of pain and evil. We looked at the systems of doctrine that are taught even amongst Christians where God is portrayed as less than omnipotent. Dualism, for example, that talks about two opposing forces in the universe, one that is good and one that is evil. And since neither really completely masters the other, we say, well, neither God nor Satan is really omnipotent. We looked at a system of belief that we simply called free willism. That is, that God has purposely limited himself within the borders of man's free will. We looked at the error and fallacy of that system. Or we talked about deism, which says, well, God just wound up the clock and cut men loose. He just placed into order certain laws, certain governing principles, and we become subject to natural law. We become subject to the laws of creation and the laws of the universe. But God, who is transcendent, can never be personal, therefore, he simply winds up the clock and allows it to run its course, detached from any sort of personal involvement. Well, there are problems with each of those views. At the top of the list is they cannot be supported scripturally. The Bible clearly teaches us that God, who is transcendent, is also personal, that God is sovereign, which means that He's even sovereign over the evil acts of men. We looked at some of the very vital scriptures that talk about God's purpose and God's plan, that God is not one who simply winds up the clock and allows it to run its course, but is intimately involved in the details of the world in which we live. Believers could never ever be sure how the world is going to turn out unless we bow to the absolute sovereignty of God, to his absolute perfect goodness and his absolute all-powerful being. Any God short of that offers very little comfort or hope. The pantheists or the new agers, they go even one step further. They have created man as the center of the universe. That is self-discovery and self-image and self-fulfillment and self-purpose and self-actualization and self-realization. These are the ways, these are the means by which we can obtain peace and joy in the world. They talk about the brotherhood of man, the universal fatherhood of God, the absolute centrality of man's positive self-image. They talk about possibility thinking or the power of positive thinking. And the new agers have created man to be the center of his own universe. Well, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that that system's not working. We have a world that is more fractured today than it ever was, and yet pantheism and new ageism has invaded the globe as rapidly as cancer spreads, and we have seen that it has offered very little hope and very little comfort. You should have Hebrews chapter 12 by now. I want you to read this with me together. And let's read it out loud. We're going to read the first 13 verses of Hebrews chapter 12. We're going to begin today looking at the puzzle parts to human suffering, the principle of cross-bearing. And we're going to begin a careful look at some very key scriptures, key life principles. Hebrews 12, beginning with verse 1, and we'll end with verse 13. Would you read it with me together? Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons. My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son. Endure hardship as discipline. God is treating you as sons, for what son is not disciplined by his father? If you are not disciplined, and everyone undergoes discipline, then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. Moreover, we all have had human fathers who disciplined us and respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live? Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best. But God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees, make level paths for your feet, so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed. Father, open our minds to understand the principles of this passage and the many others we will be looking at. Help us to frame our suffering and crossbearing within the context of biblical thought. Help us, Lord, to see clearly what you have ordained as an omnipotent and all perfectly good God who has loved us with an everlasting love. In Jesus' name. Amen. There are some puzzle parts to human suffering. We talk about cross-bearing. The writer of Hebrews tells us that we are to follow an example, that we have not yet resisted to blood in our striving against sin. That we must look to the way in which Jesus carried his cross. And that in that crossbearing of Christ, we must find an example of how we are to carry our crosses. Now, in previous weeks we talked about the fact that we are to carry our crosses daily, that we cannot be a disciple of Christ without crossbearing. That crossbearing is part and parcel to being a Christian. But you know, when we stop and think about some of the suffering we endure, there are sufferings that are common to all men. You don't have to be a Christian to suffer now, do you? In fact, I've entitled this message Spiritual Snow, Sleet, and Freezing Rain. You like that, do you? Well, where did I get that from? Matthew chapter 5. Would you turn to that, please, and look with me at verse 43. Now I'm using Hebrews 12 as our jumping off point, and we will be returning to that periodically, but I want to take us on a tour of some of the issues that all men face. You don't have to be a Christian. And in future weeks, we're going to talk about targeted lightning. There is suffering, pain, and evil that is common to all men, but then there is suffering, pain, and evil that is targeted to the believers. Specifically, over and above that, there is spiritual lightning that is targeted to Christian leaders. And we'll talk about that in the weeks to come. But for now, I want to talk about the rain that falls on the just and the unjust. Matthew chapter 5, verse 43. You have heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. Now why? Because he causes his son to rise on the evil and the good. And he sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. In other words, there are evils that are common to all men simply because they are a part of a universe that is fallen. Now, up front, I want to say that it is the responsibility of the state. It is the responsibility and role of the state to prevent evil from oppressing its citizenry. We learned that in Romans chapter 13, verses 1 through 5, and you can study that when you get home. The Bible clearly tells us that it is the purpose of government to stop or to hinder the spread of corruption and evil so as to minimize the suffering its citizens will endure. Here's the problem. Many states are corrupt. We live in a state that is corrupt. Our government has become corrupt. But here's the flip side of the coin: God has a passion for justice. And that passion for justice demands that oppressors be punished. And states which fail to protect its citizens from the criminal and from the oppressor actually themselves become oppressive. You following me? We're talking about simply living in the world regardless of whether or not we're Christians. It is the responsibility of the state to protect its citizenry. Well, we have seen this oppression happen in America. And as the result, I believe honestly, as we stand here today, simply being human beings who live in this country, and our country, by the way, is not unique. This is going on all over the world. In fact, I don't know of any country that literally is protecting its citizenry from oppression. The states are failing again and again, but as the result, we suffer from the disgrace of God's hand being withdrawn from us as a nation, that same hand that I believe historically singled this nation out to be a beacon in a fallen world from this nation has emerged more missionary and evangelistic work than any other nation on the face of this earth. That was the purpose in God's blessing upon this nation when it was founded. That hand of blessing has been withdrawn. And as the result of that, we are going to suffer. We are ripping our babies out of the womb, sucking them, poisoning them, aborting them, all in the name of self-serving interest. And I suggest to you that we have a principle of cause and effect. And no matter which politician you hear stand up and talk about his or her crime bill, you can take it to the bank, they're inevitably going to fail until this country stops aborting their babies. You want to know why? We have cause and effect. If we are going to violently treat the most defenseless aspect of our society with such disregard as the babies in the womb are, we are going to reap that same violence in our children who then become adults, who then become crooks. We are going to watch cause and effect. You following me? If we are violent in the womb, and we are violent toward the most defenseless and weak dimension of our society, the stake then has become an oppressor, and the hand of God's blessing is withdrawn, and as the result of that, we become more and more and more violent. And since the Roe v. Wade decision was handed down, this society each year has become intensely more violent. We rape more, we kill more, we murder more, we steal more now than we ever did before, and there's no hope in sight. Our prisons are overloaded with people who have become violent, and I want to tell you that from the perspective of God, the reason that is happening is because we are violent in the womb. And until that stops, the rest of it is going to continue. And I don't care how many Clinton bills come down, I don't care how many Republican bills come down, we are not going to stop the ebb and the flow of violence as long as we are oppressing the weakest citizens in our country. And that's the baby. We have a lack of swift justice. Crime pays. It pays. And as the result of that, we are all going to suffer. The gay rights agenda has been handed down to us and jammed down our throats. They have infected our blood supply. We have people who are innocent people. Now you're not going to hear this on the news. We have people today who are contracting the AIDS virus who don't fit into any one of those so-called high-risk groups. Hundreds and hundreds of people are contracting AIDS and they are not having sex outside of their own marriages. They have not had sex with an IV drug user. They have not become involved in the use of IV drugs themselves. They do not fit the homosexual prototype. They are not in any of those high-risk groups, and yet they're getting AIDS. Nobody's going to tell you this, but it's the truth. My question is why? Why is this happening? Well, first of all, we're being lied to about AIDS. That's the bottom line. And the quicker we understand that, the better off we're going to be. You say, you want to start a panic? Yes! There is something to panic about. We are going to suffer as the result of that. We have political white-collar corruption. White water at the top of the list. You haven't heard the end of that. The press, I believe, will try to squelch it because their man is at the top of it. But we're going to see again and again this kind of thing emerging. We don't have any moral role models in government. Or I should say very few. Thank God for Christian politicians who really are making an effort to be light in the midst of darkness. But you know it saddens me when the President of the United States brags about the astroturf in the back of his pickup truck and then stands up and calls upon America's youth to return to so-called moral values. What a hypocrisy. These are the people who are supposed to protect us. Honesty and humility is viewed as abnormal. Show me somebody who's in public light who becomes honest and humble, and I'll show you people who drop their jaws. You remember just a little while ago, the basketball coach of Temple University, John Cheney, lost his composure and went after the head coach of the University of Massachusetts. All the TV networks broadcasted, John Cheney hollering obscenities and saying, I'll kill you, and I'll do this and I'll do that. And they physically had to restrain him. And it was broadcast all over the place, every channel covered it time and time again. A couple of days later, John Cheney stood up and he read an apology. Totally humbled himself. Took full responsibility for what he had done. Because he said, I let you down, I let the kids down. I let children down. I became a bad role model. You know what I watched as I observed all of that? I watched how the news media reported that. They didn't know what to do with that kind of humility. They honestly did not know what to do with it. In fact, what you heard is commentators standing up and saying, that's a class act. That's a class act. They're absolutely shocked at the humility and the brokenness of the man. Why? Because that kind of humility and that kind of brokenness is rare. We have a welfare system that fosters the dehumanization of millions, producing a no-work ethic. Well, who suffers? All of us who pay one-third of our income in taxes before we even begin to earn a living. We're suffering. We have a revisionist view of the history of the framing of the Constitution. We have these people standing up and telling us what the framers really meant. When in the words of the framers themselves, they say something completely different. We've been told that there is an amendment to our constitution called the separation of church and state. It doesn't exist. There is no such amendment. Never, ever in the history of this country was it intended by the fathers in the framing of the Constitution to separate religion from having a direct influence and a direct bearing upon the state. In fact, the framing of that constitution was established for one purpose and one purpose only. The state was not allowed to mandate to its people religion, not the other way around. We have a so-called free speech amendment. Right out of the kingdom of hell has been its revisionist interpretation. And in the name of free speech, look at what we have done. We have given license to such obscenities as we now have coming out of the present, coming out of Hollywood. Because of this corruption, God, I believe, has sent great delusion to this nation in preparation for judgment to come. Why? Because he clearly tells us in Scripture we are to pursue justice and we are to resist oppression. Righteousness, Proverbs 14 34, righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any. People. Proverbs 29:4 by justice a king or a president gives a country stability, but one who is greedy for bribes tears it down. I didn't say that. God said that. Whitewater is not something new. We're being oppressed. And as the result, whether you're a Christian or not a Christian, you're going to suffer. Why? Because it's the responsibility of the state to protect. Well, let's talk about poverty. This is another evil common to all men. Poverty. But see, I want to tell you something. There are different kinds of poverty. For example, there's poverty that's the result of tragedy. The Bible tells us the poor are always with us. But there's the poverty that's the result of tragedy. For example, if you read the story of Ruth, Ruth and Naomi were victims of a drought. And because of that, they became poor. That drought drove them to leave Judah and to go into the land of Moab. And then following that, there were three tragic deaths that resulted in Ruth and Naomi experiencing poverty as the result of tragedy. That's why Exodus 23, for example. If you read Exodus 23, verses 10 and 11, it talks about sowing for six years in your fields, but during the seventh year let the land lie unplowed. Why? Then the poor among you may get food from it, and the wild animals may eat what they leave. Do the same with your vineyards and your olive presses. In other words, minister to the poor, who are poor because of some tragedy. But then there's another kind of poverty. People are poor because, or as the result of, sin, specifically someone else's sin. This is the dehumanizing poverty that's the result of monopolistic greed. You have Proverbs 13, 23 says, A poor man's field may produce abundant food, but injustice sweeps it away. Someone else sins, and as the result of their sin, innocent people become poor. The poor man and the oppressor, Proverbs 29 says, have this in common. The Lord gives sight to the eyes of both. If a king judges the poor with fairness, his throne will always be secure. There's poverty as the result of oppression. Well, there's another kind of poverty. I call it the lazy poor. The lazy poor. Poverty is the result of one's own sin. Proverbs 13, 4 says, the sluggard craves but gets nothing. But the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied. Something very clearly is taught in Scripture that you need to teach your children from the time they're little babies. It's called a work ethic. A work ethic. Proverbs 13, 18, he who ignores discipline comes to poverty and shame. But whoever heeds correction is honored. You know what I see more and more of happening today? You who are living in this materialistic world have bought into it and you're teaching your children to buy into it. Some of you are absolutely convinced that your children's wants have to be met no matter what, because you have to make them happy. And you will give them whatever they want whenever they want it. You will buy and buy and buy and buy. You say, Well, I have the money to do it. Do you think that's right, even if you have the money to do it? Do you think it's right to teach your children not to work for a living? Having everything handed to them, even if you have the means to do so. You know what's even more sad? Some of you don't have the money, and you're still giving your children things and not teaching them how to work. You know what you're raising? Sluggards. Sluggards. And they will become the lazy poor. Proverbs 23, verse 20 says, Do not join those who drink too much wine or gorge themselves on meat. For drunkards and gluttons become poor, and drowsiness clothes them in rags. Laziness. Well, then there's another kind of poverty. The poor who are dependent upon the punished. You say, what do you mean? I'm talking about the man who's in prison. He commits the crime, he's being punished, and there's a poverty that results in his family or her family as the result of that. The spin-off effects of evil upon an individual, the spin-off effects upon a society as a whole. You realize what we're paying for in prison costs? Simply because we don't know how to punish the criminal? You know what I'm tired of hearing? Three strikes and you're out. Now I know, believe me, please, I know there are qualifying things to this statement. I have to make a qualified statement. I think when you commit a violent crime, one strike and you're out. Why are we talking about two strikes and three strikes? The problem with that is we are more concerned about the rights of the criminal than we are about the rights of the victim and upon society as a whole. Well, who's going to pay for that? The poor, the oppressed. The rich man's not going to pay for it. The poor man's going to pay for it. Then there are those who are poor by choice. Proverbs 11, 24 says, one man gives freely yet gains even more. Another man withholds unduly becomes the poverty. There are people who choose to be poor because they are givers. May I suggest to you they are rare? They are rare. I thought it was absolutely wonderful when Mother Teresa was speaking, and President Clinton and Vice President Gore were sitting there, and she began to point her crooked little finger at the real blight of abortion in this country. In essence, saying to the American people, you don't want your babies, give them to me, I'll take care of them. I'll take care of them. Here is a woman who could literally, in her lifetime, have made millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars just by going out and doing movies, being like Nancy Kerrigan and Tanya Harding, who I'm sick and tired of hearing about. Here is a woman who could have sold book rights and made millions of dollars, who has chosen to be poor. I thought it was wonderful when the whole place stood up and applauded when she said that, except two people. Except two people. Gutless wonders. I think it's sad. And then there's the poverty that leads to salvation. What a wonderful poverty this is. Jesus says, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. We know what that's speaking of. When a man becomes broken and contrite, when a man bows before the cross of Christ and says, There's nothing in me, there's nothing I can do to save myself. I bow with a broken, poor spirit, realizing that my faith and my hope in Christ is the only thing that can possibly save me. But you see, these kinds of poverty are common to all men. This is snow, sleet, and freezing rain that falls on the just and on the unjust. We have social evil as the result of political corruption. We have poverty. What about thirdly, wars and disasters? You know, the Old Testament and the New Testament are not surprised by war. And they're not surprised by natural disaster. Go over to Luke chapter 13. A passage hidden from us. Most people don't read this passage in the context of war and natural disasters. It's a key passage to understanding God's design in allowing war and natural disaster, which is rain that comes on the just and on the unjust. Luke 13, beginning with verse 1. Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans, whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. That was a war. Jesus answered, Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you no. But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or what about those 18 who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them? A natural disaster. Do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you no. But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Now, Jesus here is referencing two disasters, one that was the product of war, and the other that was a product of some sort of freakish disaster. And in this passage, Jesus does not assume that either group who suffered deserved their fate in one way or another. Ultimately, all death is the result of sin and is therefore deserved. Did you get that? Ultimately, all death is the result of sin and is therefore deserved. But what Jesus is saying is that such violent deaths that happen in war and natural disasters or freakish accidents, that such violent deaths do not mean that the victims are more wicked than others who escape such a fate. However, such disasters are calls to repentance by way of God's megaphone. He uses war and disaster and freakish accidents to call men to repentance. The people in California who died in the earthquake are no more wicked or less wicked than those of us who live in Delaware that were not killed by an earthquake. But that earthquake out there is God's megaphone to us here to repent. That's what he's saying. To enjoy, listen, to enjoy peace and tranquility is not a right. But it is an act of God's common grace that shows that he is a good God and a forbearing God, calling men to repent. Social corruption, poverty, wars and natural disasters common to all men. Fourthly, death, illness, and bereavement. You don't have to be a Christian. All we have to do is live long enough, and we will experience some form of illness, death, or bereavement. And we will ask the question: why is God doing this? Somehow we say, when we experience death, we reason that a hand has been dealt to us, listen, that is not proportionate to my sins. God, you dealt me something here that doesn't seem to justify or be justified by the fact that I am not as evil or as sinful as somebody else. My grief and my pain is so intense that we question God's faithfulness. We reason that He has abandoned us. But friends, when we talk about death, common to all men, we have to begin to frame our thinking around certain key principles. Principle number one when we talk about death is this. Listen, death is not a supreme act of God's cosmic failure. He didn't just wind up the clock and allow people to die. But death, listen, death is a well-considered sentence against our sins. There's a passage tucked away in Lamentations, which comes right after the book of Jeremiah. You don't have to turn to it, but I want you to listen. Listen to these words. Lamentations 3.22. He says, It is because of the Lord's great love that we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. You know what he's saying there? It is because of God's love and grace and mercy that he doesn't kill us all. That he doesn't destroy us all. But you say, but why death? Couldn't God have come up with some other form of punishment? Why death? I've thought a lot about that. You know what death does? If we go all the way back into the book of Genesis, all the way back when God placed the curse on man, you remember what the serpent said to the woman? He said, You will not surely die, for God knows that when you eat of the fruit, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. At the root of Eve's sin, at the root of Adam's sin was a desire to be self-sufficient and independent from God, which in essence makes you God. The moment we say we do not need God is the moment we become our own God. And from that time on, from that moment on, man has been pursuing in his lostness a desire to be his own God. You know what death does? It destroys any pretensions we have about being God, it destroys it. We are not gods. And by death, you know what we learn? We are merely humans. But we still cry out in our grief against this degrading limitation. Why? Because we still want to be gods. Created in the image of God means that we cry out for life, and anything or anyone who invades that desire for life is to be resisted, including death. Death is not something that simply happens to me. Death is something that happens to me because of sin. Ultimately, all death is traceable to sin. I am not only death's subject, I am also death's object. You with me? And so are you. In my sins, I have attracted something. In my sins, I have attracted something. And you know what that something is? God's wrath and God's justice. Therefore, in my sins, I must die. And so must you. I'm gonna tell you, to a grief-stricken person, he's going to see unfairness in the fact that somebody lives to be 70 while somebody is taken at 16 or 16 months. He's going to question that. Yet to both men, whether it's the child at 16 or the man at 70, to both men, the word of God cries out that death is the fair judgment to both of them upon sin, and it is by the Lord's mercies and grace that we are not all consumed. Yes, we are to rage against sin. Yes, we are to rage against death. Death is the enemy of man. It is ugly, it is disgraceful, it is to be denounced. Yet a thoughtful believer will see death for what it really is, justly deserved and the fruit of our sins. That's what Romans 1, 18 through 23 is all about. When God says, look around at the creation, look at what I revealed to you. What have you done? Instead of making the Creator your God, you have taken creation and erected idols out of it, so that one day my revealed person that you see in creation will call you up in judgment. You will justly be condemned, you will be without excuse. All of us must die. As the result of a well-considered sentence against our sins. But having said that, let me say secondly, this sometimes death is the direct result of some very specific sin. You say, well, now that's a cruel thing to say. By the way, I would not encourage you to say that to anybody. But it nonetheless is true. If you go over to John chapter 5, and you'll see the story in John 5, beginning with verse 5, of the man that was healed at the pool. There was an invalid there for 38 years. Jesus saw him, John 5, verse 5, lying there, learned that he had been in this condition for a long time. He said, Do you want to get well? Sir, the invalid said, I have no one to help me into the pool when the water's stirred. While I'm trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me. Jesus said to him, Get up, pick up your mat and walk. At once the man was cured, he picked up his mat and walked. And then there was a whole debate over whether or not Jesus had the right to do that on the Sabbath. But go on down toward the end of that passage around verse 14. Jesus turns to this man. Jesus finds him later in the temple, said to him, Now I underlined this, see, you are well again. Stop sinning, or something worse may happen to you. Remember the story in the fifth chapter of Acts about Ananias and Sapphira? The two who lied against the Holy Spirit, saying they bought a land for such and such a price and sold it for such and such a price, turned over part of the money to the church, and then lied about it and said they turned over the whole sum. What happened? God struck them both dead as a direct judicial act against their sins, even while they were speaking. Even while one of them was speaking, the other one was being carried out and buried. Or do you remember the story of Herod, how the Bible says that God judged Herod and killed him for specific sin in his life? Or do you remember the story in 1 Corinthians chapter 11 that warns us about how we're to come to the Lord's table? And specifically, Paul says to the Corinthian people, there are some who have taken of the bread unworthily, and because of that have died. Some have fallen asleep. Now there's clearly teaching in Scripture that God can effect death as the direct result of specific sin. But now stop and reason for a minute. We'll argue, well, certainly there were others who committed the same sins as Ananias and Sapphira. Certainly there were others who defiled the Lord's table. Certainly, next week when we come together and celebrate the Lord's table here, there will be some of you who eat and drink of the bread and the cup unworthily, and you're not going to die. Some commit the same kinds of sins as Herod, yet they continue to live 70, 80, 90, 100 years. How do we reason that? They're not afflicted the same way. Well, we have to go back to Lamentations 3.22 again. We have to bring that principle out and lay it out on the table and take a look at it. And the conclusion we draw is this although, listen, although sin merits such punishment, it is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed. Way. God does not owe us a full 70 healthy years. He would be perfectly justified taking everybody at 16. The fact that anybody lives to 70 is proof positive that you're on borrowed time every day of your life. Borrowed time. Well, thirdly, illness and death, now don't be confused, illness and death are not necessarily the result of specific sin and God's judicial sentence. Well, you say, wait a minute, Pastor, you just said that sometimes it is. Well, I'm now telling you that sometimes it isn't. That God doesn't necessarily take somebody in death as the result of specific sin. Now we've got a great occurrence of that in John chapter 9. He went along, he saw a blind man from birth. His disciples said, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus said, Neither this man nor his parents sinned, said Jesus. But this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life. Now Paul would later tell the Galatians. He would say in chapter 4, verse 13 of Galatians, he would say, You remember when I came and preached the gospel to you? You know why I came there in the first place? Because I got sick. I was heading north. And I got sick, probably with malaria, so that I was holed up for a while and detoured over here to you. Now God used specifically the illness in Paul's life to change the course of direction he was heading so that he could take the gospel over here to the Galileans. Paul would say to Timothy in chapter 5, verse 23, stop drinking only water, use a little wine because of your stomach and your frequent illnesses. Timothy suffered from frequent illnesses. What are we saying here? Death, illness, and bereavement may not necessarily be the result of direct sin in your life. And then fourthly, sometimes God's judicial sentence is passed not as a consequence of some specific sin, but as the natural outworking of cause and effect. Yet, now here's the key, don't miss this. Cause and effect, certain things are going to happen because you did certain things. But all of that cause and effect is under the direct, providential, sovereign, omnipotent care of a holy God who does all things and orchestrates all things according to a foreordained, preordained plan and purpose. I mean, if you're going to sit there and smoke those cigarettes, you're going to develop heart problems, you're going to have stress, you're going to be angry, you're going to be bitter, you're going to have health problems as the result of that. Some of you are going to eat yourselves to death, some of you are going to drug yourselves to death. Some of you are going to have sex outside of marriage. You're going to have sex with people who have AIDS. Some of you are going to get AIDS. You're going to have a cause and effect thing that takes place. And as the result of that, you are going to become sick. Some of you are going to die. But the key here is that God has ordered this cause and effect, not in a detached way, as the deist would tell us, but as a direct result of cause and effect by which, under his sovereign care, under his omnipotent hand, we see and experience these causes and these effects. For example, David never disciplined his son Absalom. Never disciplined him. Let the kid run wild. Absalom grows up to become David's enemy, and as the result of becoming David's enemy, thousands of people were killed and murdered because of Absalom. Here's cause and effect. David never disciplined his son. His son becomes his enemy. Cause and effect, thousands of people die. And yet we know that God was sovereignly in control of all of that as we study biblical history. Let me conclude by saying this: suffering and death, when mingled with faith, can indeed bring about a good end. I read the reformed pastor Richard Baxter. He made a very troubling statement. Something you ought to mark down in your Bibles somewhere and pull it out on occasion. You know what Baxter said? Suffering. I'm quoting him now, suffering so unbolts the door of the heart that the word of God has easier entrance. You get that? Suffering so unbolts the door of the heart so that the word of God has easier entrance. Clearly, clearly, suffering does not always have that effect. Suffering can either make us bitter or suffering can make us better. But rightly accepted, pain can cleanse us from all self-centeredness. It can help us actually to see the so-called measures of success that the world holds out to us for what they really are: fleeting and vain. Now we may not enjoy the process, but we will be transformed when we begin to see our pain as our friend. Pain gives us insight into the fallen world. It prepares us for death, makes us enter into the sufferings of Christ. And I've got to tell you personally, I have learned more about the sufferings of Christ, more about the nature of this fallen world, more about the intimacy of knowing Christ in the past eight months than in the previous 46 years of my life. You know why? Because suffering has unbolted the door of my heart and has put on to the test table all that I have ever believed or ever thought to be real about my God. And it's only after that door is unbolted that this word can penetrate. What are you experiencing this morning? Suffering is the result of social evil and corruption, poverty, death, illness, bereavement, war, natural disasters, freakish accidents, cancer. You see, spiritual rain, spiritual snow, spiritual freezing rain falls on the just and the unjust. The next time we're together, we're going to be zeroing in on targeted lightning, specifically to God's people. Would you stand together? Join hands with those around you. Let's close together in prayer. Father, unbolt the door of the heart of the person whose hand we now hold. Unbolt the door of my heart. Detach us from this world. Show us how fleeting and vain it is. Show us as you did in Hebrews twelve. That discipline is a friend, that suffering can be embraced, and that we can learn from the vantage of the end. We know we live in a fallen world, and as the result of that, we all will become victims of sin. But as we suffer, Lord, unbolt my heart because we desire more than anything else to see your word.

SPEAKER_02 52:55

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.

SPEAKER_01 53:18

You have been listening to infusing the preaching and teaching ministry of Dr. Just S. Betters and produced by Mark Ministry. Mark Ministry exists to offer help and hope to hurt people by force the promises of God and the comfort of his work. And help and hope we provide free resources for those walking through suffering.