SPEAKER_00: So we're working our way through the book of John.
SPEAKER_00: And so just the next passage in the book of John is this story about a boy born blind.
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, this is the thing about just working through a book of the Bible, right?
SPEAKER_00: Here's a great idea.
SPEAKER_00: There'll be a lot of visitors this Sunday.
SPEAKER_00: So preach on suffering.
SPEAKER_00: That'll be a great topic, you know, for infant baptism.
SPEAKER_00: It's so hopeful, and we're going to go after suffering.
SPEAKER_00: But I believe that God has so much in store for us this morning.
SPEAKER_00: As you've probably picked up with that song, this idea of though you slay me, though we come face to face with just the world be taken out from under us, he's still in it.
SPEAKER_00: He's still in it.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what we all know.
SPEAKER_00: We are all, and maybe we've already been there, maybe you're here right now, we are all going to come to a place where we feel like we cannot take another step.
SPEAKER_00: That's coming, or you've been through it, it's coming again.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not talking about, you know, the dryer eight-year favorite shirt.
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking about when life is going good and everything's going great and the kids are great and the kids are selling, they got into college, or you got into the college you wanted, you got the senior superlative, and the marriage is great, and there's extra income at the end of every month, and then you know what I'm talking about is I'm talking about the kind of trouble when that phone rings and all that good life has been going on, and then that phone rings, and that email comes.
SPEAKER_00: And it is it's like a brick wall.
SPEAKER_00: It is like you're not quite sure if you can take another step.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's deep disappointment with your work, maybe that's deep disappointment with your loved one or with your child, maybe that's disease or disaster or death.
SPEAKER_00: Those are the big D's and some of my families here and Christy's family, and not to air all of our dirty laundry, but just to kind of show you a picture of a family.
SPEAKER_00: Uh death, betrayal, divorce, abuse, addiction, cancer.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is your family too.
SPEAKER_00: This is life.
SPEAKER_00: And when this happens, isn't it easy?
SPEAKER_00: We've all been there just to wonder, like, God, are you even are you even there?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, what I mean, what is going on with this?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I thought you loved me, I thought, and and then there's just there can be so much anger and there can be confusion, and a lot of times just like just apathy?
SPEAKER_00: I don't even care.
SPEAKER_00: Numbness.
SPEAKER_00: The why questions?
SPEAKER_00: Why me?
SPEAKER_00: Why this?
SPEAKER_00: Why now?
SPEAKER_00: Why not somebody else?
SPEAKER_00: And there's two typical responses.
SPEAKER_00: The first is kind of the religious response, and this is this is moralism.
SPEAKER_00: If only I had been a little better, God would have given me better, or he would have protected me, if only I had prayed more, or like been a little more diligent, or a little more active in my church, or that's moralism.
SPEAKER_00: No hope there.
SPEAKER_00: A secular person might move more towards cynicism.
SPEAKER_00: And the response is as well, if you know, if that's going on, then there must be no God.
SPEAKER_00: Or if he's there, he's incompetent.
SPEAKER_00: No real hope there, no real answers there with that line of thinking.
SPEAKER_00: But us moralistic people, religious people, don't get too judgmental because moralism is just as bad.
SPEAKER_00: It offers no hope.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what we're gonna see in John chapter 9 this morning, is we're gonna see how moralizing suffering, it actually is just more suffering.
SPEAKER_00: There's no hope.
SPEAKER_00: I have three, I've a three-point sermon this morning.
SPEAKER_00: What I was figuring is the Presbyterians and the Episcopals were real happy about the infant baptism, the three-point sermon.
SPEAKER_00: The Baptists are gonna be very excited about the three-point sermon, and later we can have sword drills and drink sweet tea.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know what Presbyterians will be drinking, they'll be drinking something else, but uh we can be drinking sweet tea.
SPEAKER_00: So, three points, here's the points.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, Jesus is in suffering.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is in suffering.
SPEAKER_00: Number two, Jesus dismisses the moralizing of suffering, and then number three, Jesus uses suffering.
SPEAKER_00: And so we can jump in in verse one, as he, I mean Jesus, he was going along and he saw a blind man who's blind from birth.
SPEAKER_00: His disciples asked him, so his disciples, they see the blind man, he's been blind since birth, and the disciples turn to Jesus and say, Rabbi, who sinned?
SPEAKER_00: Who screwed up that this man, this man or his parents, who screwed up that he was born blind?
SPEAKER_00: Because they see somebody blind, they see suffering, and so, well, if this is going on, then somebody must have, somebody must have messed up.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus responds and says, Neither.
SPEAKER_00: This man nor his parents sinned.
SPEAKER_00: But this happens so that the works of God might be displayed in him.
SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus does this really odd thing where he he on the ground.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's what the blind man heard.
SPEAKER_00: He spits.
SPEAKER_00: And he gets that dirt together with that spit.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what the blind man's thinking at this point.
SPEAKER_00: You've heard that, and you're in front of Jesus, you've heard of this rabbi, he's kind of famous, he's been doing some really cool stuff.
SPEAKER_00: But he spit, he's down there, and he's he's kind of caking up that mud, and then he moves toward the blind man and he he just he just smears it on his eyes.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Go and wash in the pool of Siloam.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be healed.
SPEAKER_00: And so the man leaves.
SPEAKER_00: And the man goes to the pool of Siloam and he gets down to that pool of Siloam and he gets the water and he gets it up on his eyes, and he's washing away the mud.
SPEAKER_00: And you can imagine as he's washing away the mud, he's starting to see, he's starting to see that light even through his eyelids, and and and wondering what's going on, you know, does this really happen?
SPEAKER_00: And then and then opening his eyes and getting that water out of his eyes, and you can see.
SPEAKER_00: And don't you just wonder, I mean, can can you even imagine have never seen before?
SPEAKER_00: And then you see all of a sudden and you wonder, I mean, what was his picture of a tree, and then he saw a tree?
SPEAKER_00: Or what was his what was his picture of blue, and then he looks up and sees the sky.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, what actually what just blew his mind because all of a sudden he could see the mud was off, the darkness was gone.
SPEAKER_00: And we see point number one, Jesus is in the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the Christian faith definitely is not a t-shirt, a bumper sticker, you know, it's not a slogan, it's not an equation, it's not something we can just kind of pre-package and say, oh, we become a Christian, you know, sort of like an endless ladder towards like wonderful things, you know, always kind of smiling, happy, shiny Christians.
SPEAKER_00: Life's always gonna be.
SPEAKER_00: That's not the Christian life.
SPEAKER_00: That's not reality.
SPEAKER_00: It is not a ladder to endless success.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, life usually feels a little bit more like a rope.
SPEAKER_00: I was thinking about it this week, and I was thinking about, I can remember being sixth grade, and maybe you remember this.
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember gym class?
SPEAKER_00: And in gym, they had that rope hanging from the middle of the gym, and there's a bell at the top.
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember?
SPEAKER_00: You know, you had fitness stations, we had fitness stations, so you went to the stretching station, you had the pull-up bar station, you had maybe a basketball shot, maybe a maybe a speed, you know, run the length of the court, and then there was the rope in the middle of the gym, the most daunting thing, and like three kids could do it, right?
SPEAKER_00: They could shimmy up that, you know, like Chuck Norris style all the way to the top, and they could ring that bell, and everybody was amazed.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that kid, I remember Timmy could do it.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you were like, Timmy, that's incredible.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody loved Timmy.
SPEAKER_00: And I just I knew, I mean, I mean, look at me.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not getting up that rope.
SPEAKER_00: And I can remember getting up about eight feet and looking down, and you know, coach had put about a six-inch mat down there at the bottom.
SPEAKER_00: Appreciate that a lot if you're 35 feet up.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm about eight feet up.
SPEAKER_00: It's just not gonna happen.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm just not strong enough.
SPEAKER_00: Weakness overcoming and starting to slide back down and hoping everybody was busy in their other fitness stations to notice the failure.
SPEAKER_00: And life often becomes the rope, but here's the good news.
SPEAKER_00: The good news is God is not just at the top, at the bell, at the success, at the achievement.
SPEAKER_00: We actually see God a lot better at the bottom.
SPEAKER_00: The weakness and the failure.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe you're here and you would just say, well, can't he just stop it all?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he do the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: Can't he just stop it all?
SPEAKER_00: Yes, he can.
SPEAKER_00: He absolutely can.
SPEAKER_00: And he will.
SPEAKER_00: But not for now.
SPEAKER_00: I've been studying this week, I'm gonna press you with a term.
SPEAKER_00: Uh asymmetrical relationship.
SPEAKER_00: That's the relationship God has with suffering.
SPEAKER_00: An asymmetrical relationship, meaning this, he permits it while he hates it.
SPEAKER_00: He's control over it, and he'll use it.
SPEAKER_00: It's an asymmetrical relationship, and part of this is just mystery to us.
SPEAKER_00: Part of this is we just don't get it.
SPEAKER_00: But what we do know is it wasn't a part of creation, it wasn't a part of his design.
SPEAKER_00: That the brokenness of the world, the falling apart of the world, that is that is us going our own way and creating the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: The unraveling of the world is humanity turning from God's design and him coming alongside us and saying, I'm going to bring redemption back into the suffering, and there will be a day when it's no longer.
SPEAKER_00: So that verse too is fascinating.
SPEAKER_00: Rabbi, who sinned?
SPEAKER_00: This man or his parents, that he was born blind, who's screwed up?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I mean, somebody's born blind, somebody's born with a disability, there's some suffering, a loss of job, cancer, a death, an addiction.
SPEAKER_00: Who screwed up to bring this on me or on these people?
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus just immediately, he just says, neither.
SPEAKER_00: Don't moralize it.
SPEAKER_00: Don't moralize the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: And that's number two point number two.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus dismisses the moralizing of suffering.
SPEAKER_00: So this question's so natural.
SPEAKER_00: We just run to it over and over again.
SPEAKER_00: If I'm good enough, if I do good enough, then God will give me good things.
SPEAKER_00: God will sort of owe me.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what this is?
SPEAKER_00: This is Hinduism, it's karma.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's just like a westernized, Christianized version of karma.
SPEAKER_00: If I do good enough, I pray enough, I'm a better person.
SPEAKER_00: The problem is it exhausts you because it doesn't end.
SPEAKER_00: And then when something bad happens, and it will, no matter how good you are, or holy you think you are, or what you're doing, it will happen to you, and then that equation, it condemns you.
SPEAKER_00: Because what it means is it means you screwed up and God's punishing you.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't pray enough.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't do good enough.
SPEAKER_00: I I I've got to get back to that.
SPEAKER_00: I've got to I've got to do more, I've got to get back on that treadmill.
SPEAKER_00: If you have friends or family, right, Book of Job, remember the book of Job, Old Testament?
SPEAKER_00: This is a righteous man, a family man.
SPEAKER_00: He's done well in the world, he's accumulated a lot of success, and and there's this great conversation between God and Satan, a huge theological breakdown there.
SPEAKER_00: It's so great for us to understand.
SPEAKER_00: And the friends come along and they say, Well, you must have screwed up for this to happen.
SPEAKER_00: No, he didn't.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't.
SPEAKER_00: They were moralizing the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: God's not punishing you.
SPEAKER_00: See, Jesus took the punishment of your sin.
SPEAKER_00: If you're at rest in Jesus, he already took the punishment of your sin.
SPEAKER_00: He's not punishing you.
SPEAKER_00: Don't moralize your suffering.
SPEAKER_00: We like to moralize it, it makes us feel in control.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we like to do it.
SPEAKER_00: But don't fall for it.
SPEAKER_00: It'll exhaust you, it'll eventually condemn you.
SPEAKER_00: And just as cynicism offers no real hope, moralism doesn't offer any hope.
SPEAKER_00: Twenty-three years ago, I'm in science class, Mrs.
SPEAKER_00: Goodenough's class, and I meet my friend Kyle.
SPEAKER_00: And Kyle and me became good friends through middle school and through high school.
SPEAKER_00: We shared a locker, and then we were later, we were roommates in college, and and Kyle was an athlete.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he played basketball, we played basketball together, but he played baseball.
SPEAKER_00: He'd play anything he wanted to, and he went on and he played baseball in college.
SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, somebody like that, you're always, as he gets married and he moves on, you're you're just kind of going, well, you know, he's man, I bet he can't wait to get a baby boy.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you're just kind of thinking that.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he wouldn't say that, maybe he wouldn't say it, but you're kind of thinking that.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he was a baseball player in college, you know, he wants himself a baby boy.
SPEAKER_00: And last year, after having two girls, a baby boy comes along and he calls me last year sometime, and the baby's maybe six months old, and the baby's been having seizures, the little boy.
SPEAKER_00: And they they don't even they don't know what's going on.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, and and and they're exhausted.
SPEAKER_00: He's exhausted.
SPEAKER_00: He can't fix it.
SPEAKER_00: He he doesn't know what to do.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, little baby boys having seizures, I mean, they don't know what to do, and they're going doctor to doctor to doctor.
SPEAKER_00: And it's just exhaustion and it's fear and it's anger, it's confusion, and it's beginning to be kind of numbness to God, and and he just wanted to talk, he just wanted to be get honest, be able to be honest somewhere about it, and and get prayed for, and and he's just sort of kind of over it.
SPEAKER_00: Uh what's interesting is I talked to him this week as they've been going doctor to doctor to doctor, and and now they're understanding that the child's brain, the little boy who's now a year old, his brain wasn't formed correctly in the womb, the the right hemisphere.
SPEAKER_00: And it's just it's I'm I'm no I'm no doctor.
SPEAKER_00: It's misfiring, it's it's not working right, it's messing everything up, and doctors are starting to say we need to do brain surgery and sort of shut down part of the brain, and they're not even sure what that means, the repercussions of that into the future.
SPEAKER_00: And and Kyle says at the end of the conversations, he says, Man, God has been so good to us in this.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll be honest, I'm on the other end of the phone going, dude, this sounds horrible.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, and he's saying, God's been so good to us.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there are times when I'm going, I don't get it.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's not always some feeling of great resolution in the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: But what's clear is suffering points out we're not in control.
SPEAKER_00: We can't control it all.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what we hate, but this is actually what's good for us because what it helps us see, it helps us see that we actually are not at the top of the rope ringing the bell, we're actually at the bottom of the rope.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where we see God, and we find God, and he finds us, and what we see there is that he actually chose to suffer also.
SPEAKER_00: Those hands that spread the mud on that blind man, they were nailed to a cross, that that mouth that that spit.
SPEAKER_00: It was so dry on the cross he couldn't swallow.
SPEAKER_00: We see that that God himself chose to be betrayed and imprisoned and stripped and beaten and murdered.
SPEAKER_00: And he did this, and he suffered for you to be in our suffering, to begin to redeem the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: And he took your sin on the cross, he took all your sin, this is called imputation, your sin put on him, and then his righteousness put on you, so that when God looks at you, he doesn't see your sin, he doesn't see your rebellion.
SPEAKER_00: That's why it's not punishment.
SPEAKER_00: That's why the suffering's not punishment.
SPEAKER_00: The sin's already been put on Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: When God sees you, he sees a righteous, beloved child.
SPEAKER_00: That's what put gives us rest, it gives us peace.
SPEAKER_00: And we can know with certainty, as we look at the cross in the midst of suffering, we know with certainty that while we experience suffering, he comes into our suffering to love us.
SPEAKER_00: So back to John chapter 9.
SPEAKER_00: So the neighbors bring the man, the blind man, to the Pharisees.
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees heard about this and they want to know what happened with this blind man and how did he get healed, and Jesus was involved, and we're still trying to catch Jesus because we're religious people, and Jesus is upsetting the system, and so we want to catch them, we want to kill them or get rid of them, and so they're going, okay, somebody got healed again on the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: You know, Jesus keeps doing this and breaking that rule, and they're very upset about this, and so he uh the neighbors bring the blind man to the Pharisees, and they say, How are you healed?
SPEAKER_00: What happened?
SPEAKER_00: And the man says, Well, he put mud on my eyes, I washed, now I see.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was kind of a pretty simple thing, actually.
SPEAKER_00: He just spread the mud, went and washed, now I see.
SPEAKER_00: And the Pharisees are upset all over again about this.
SPEAKER_00: And the Pharisee is actually a little division of the Pharisees at the point.
SPEAKER_00: Some Pharisees are starting to wonder, like, okay, this is kind of interesting.
SPEAKER_00: He keeps healing people, this is not normal.
SPEAKER_00: Um, maybe, maybe he is who he says he is.
SPEAKER_00: The larger group's kind of, no, it's still not.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he's breaking the rules, he's broken the law, and they can't see that he is the Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: And so they asked the man, which was very interesting that the Pharisees, the religious kind of hierarchy, would ask this blind man, who probably they thought was a horrible sinner, wretched, far from them, mind you, because he was blind, because they had they were probably moralizing the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: Who do you think he is?
SPEAKER_00: Blind man says, Well, he's I think he's a prophet.
SPEAKER_00: Pharisees still sort of don't believe.
SPEAKER_00: So they go get the parents.
SPEAKER_00: Bring the parents in.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, and you can imagine what the parents' life may have been like at this point.
SPEAKER_00: Because they gave birth to a blind boy.
SPEAKER_00: And everybody's moralizing suffering.
SPEAKER_00: So that means that the parents screwed up, so there's probably some judgment towards them, a little banishment, right?
SPEAKER_00: Churches never behave like this.
SPEAKER_00: You know, sort of judgment and banishment towards the parents.
SPEAKER_00: So the parents come before the religious hierarchy and they are they're they are nervous, they're scared.
SPEAKER_00: Jumping in and verse 19, is this your son?
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees asked.
SPEAKER_00: Is this the one you say was born blind?
SPEAKER_00: How is it that he can see?
SPEAKER_00: Parents are going to play it cool.
SPEAKER_00: We know he's our son.
SPEAKER_00: And we know he was born blind.
SPEAKER_00: But how he can see now or who opened his eyes, we don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Ask him.
SPEAKER_00: He is of age, he will speak for himself.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, they're just staying out of it.
SPEAKER_00: Staying out of it.
SPEAKER_00: His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that great?
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that how the relationship should be between a religious leader and people who already had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 25, he replied.
SPEAKER_00: Pharisees are saying, no, that Jesus he's a sinner.
SPEAKER_00: We know he's a sinner.
SPEAKER_00: And then the blind man replies in verse 25, whether he's a sinner or not, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what I know.
SPEAKER_00: I was blind, the guy put mud on my eyes, now I see.
SPEAKER_00: And they replied to him, What did he do to you?
SPEAKER_00: How did he open your eyes?
SPEAKER_00: They can't let it go.
SPEAKER_00: They can't see, they can't just take the truth for what it is.
SPEAKER_00: And he answers that, I've told you already.
SPEAKER_00: You didn't listen.
SPEAKER_00: He's starting to get a little fed up.
SPEAKER_00: Or why do you want to hear it again?
SPEAKER_00: And then he takes a little leap of faith and probably the wrong leap.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Do you want to become his disciples too?
SPEAKER_00: Are you actually interested in him?
SPEAKER_00: Or do you still want to catch him?
SPEAKER_00: And then they just hurled insults at him and they put him down and belittled him more and eventually they threw him out.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus finds out about this, and Jesus goes a little bit later and he goes and he finds the man.
SPEAKER_00: And he says to him, He says, Um, do you know who the Son of Man is?
SPEAKER_00: A term for the Messiah, a term for the Son of God.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know who that is?
SPEAKER_00: And he says, No, I don't know who that is.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, It's me.
SPEAKER_00: I am.
SPEAKER_00: And then the blind man says, Lord, I believe.
SPEAKER_00: And he worshipped.
SPEAKER_00: So point number three, Jesus uses suffering.
SPEAKER_00: So what we see in this man is we see blindness, we see sight, and then we see belief.
SPEAKER_00: See, God is not waiting at the end of your rope to go, you better get better, get back up the rope.
SPEAKER_00: If only you're a little moral.
SPEAKER_00: I'll love you when I get a little more.
SPEAKER_00: When you get your act together, that's when you can come.
SPEAKER_00: When you can climb your way to the top with all of your effort and your resilience, then I will love you.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: Not at all.
SPEAKER_00: That's moralism.
SPEAKER_00: He's at the bottom and he's saying, Do you see it yet?
SPEAKER_00: Do you have sight for it yet?
SPEAKER_00: Do you have sight that you can you can't?
SPEAKER_00: Do you see that you need help?
SPEAKER_00: Do you see that you can't deliver yourself out of your shame, out of your guilt, out of your inadequacy?
SPEAKER_00: Because if you see it, you're ready to believe, and you'll be set free from shame and guilt, from moralism, perfectionism, cynicism, all the isms.
SPEAKER_00: Just go ahead and be rescued from all the isms.
SPEAKER_00: And you'll be set free into a theology of grace, which says the world is broken, it's not as it should be.
SPEAKER_00: I'm broken, I'm not as I should be.
SPEAKER_00: Yet, because of Jesus, I am loved in all of this suffering, and I don't always understand it.
SPEAKER_00: The suffering comes, and I still get angry, I still get confused, I still get numb, but I can look to the cross and I can know with certainty he came into the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: And he's hanging on the cross saying, I love you even though, even though you're not as you should be.
SPEAKER_00: We can so easily think of this passage as the end of suffering.
SPEAKER_00: You know, the blind man who's given sight, and then he's gonna go on and have a wonderful life.
SPEAKER_00: How do we know that?
SPEAKER_00: We don't know that.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps the eyesight created more fear, more anxiety than ever before.
SPEAKER_00: It's possible.
SPEAKER_00: Suffering keeps happening for this man.
SPEAKER_00: He's not relieved of suffering.
SPEAKER_00: The rescue here is not the eyesight.
SPEAKER_00: The rescue here is belief.
SPEAKER_00: The blindness and the eyesight were used for belief.
SPEAKER_00: See, all of it.
SPEAKER_00: The job loss, the divorce, the betrayal, the car wreck, the cancer.
SPEAKER_00: When that car didn't see your little girl in the cul-de-sac, none of it's meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: He will use all of it.
SPEAKER_00: I know we can't see that.
SPEAKER_00: I know you can't see that.
SPEAKER_00: But he will.
SPEAKER_00: He will use it.
SPEAKER_00: It is not meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: When the test comes back, when the phone rings.
SPEAKER_00: It's not meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: It hurts, right?
SPEAKER_00: It hurts like hell, it hurts.
SPEAKER_00: But it's not meaningless.
SPEAKER_00: We look to the cross, we rest in the cross, and what we know is we know a suffering God who will love us and he will care for us.
SPEAKER_00: And there is grace beyond our imagination.
SPEAKER_00: And what he's saying to you this morning, he's saying that suffering, don't moralize it.
SPEAKER_00: Wasn't your fault.
SPEAKER_00: You may not understand it, but I love you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm enough for you.
SPEAKER_00: Look to the cross.
SPEAKER_00: I'm a suffering God waiting to meet you there.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: God, there's so much mystery when it comes to suffering, so much we don't understand, and I pray that you would give us a gift of humility now.
SPEAKER_00: We're not the creators.
SPEAKER_00: We're not redeemers.
SPEAKER_00: You are.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we think about our suffering and we can get so angry.
SPEAKER_00: We can get so apathetic.
SPEAKER_00: Would you turn our hearts and minds to the cross that we would see that you too came into our suffering?
SPEAKER_00: To say to us that though you are not as you should be, and this world is far from what it should be.
SPEAKER_00: I love you.
SPEAKER_00: And in some mysterious way you are sovereign over all of this, and in that we take some hope.
SPEAKER_00: God, would you give us the gift of faith to believe when everything around us, in the situation, the circumstance, says, ah, shouldn't believe.
SPEAKER_00: But what we know is there's only hope.
SPEAKER_00: There's only hope in you.
SPEAKER_00: And we do have certainty.
SPEAKER_00: When we look to the cross, your great objective statement to the world and to all of humanity.
SPEAKER_00: And that you're hanging up there, not demanding us to get better, but you're hanging up there to say, I'm at the end of your rope.
SPEAKER_00: And would we hear you?
SPEAKER_00: And we'd be relieved to know that you love us as we are.
SPEAKER_00: Not as we should be.
SPEAKER_00: We pray this in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.