Greetings to you my friend, I’m Mack Lyon. The program’s In Search of the Lord’s Way. There’s so much suffering in the world, the really big question we’re being asked is: “If God is in control, why so much suffering? That’s our study today. Glad you’re with us.
Welcome friend to our Bible study program. If you’re a first time viewer, you need to know we’re searching the Scriptures to know the truth about the Lord’s way of salvation and His way to live. We believe the Lord’s way of salvation is the only true way, and His way to live the better life is the best way that’s ever been introduced to the family of man. Oh say! We’re so glad you’ve joined us.
We’re presented here by some churches of Christ and some Christians in the viewing area of this station. We’re about to begin our thirtieth year, that’ll be on September the 6th, and we’ve never once asked our viewers to send us money. Neither have we sold anything on the air. We make no apologies for inviting you to attend one of these churches, though. That’d please them so much –and we’d like it, too. Say! Why not tell go and tell them “thanks for the SEARCH program?”
A long-time-viewer called and asked, "If God is in control, why is there so much evil in the world, the war in Iraq, for example? And why, does He permit so much evil?" Well, the problem of evil and suffering just won't go away. Everything hasn't been said or written on the subject yet I’m sure. Some people look to alcohol or drugs; some commit suicide. All that simply adds evil to evil. Well, we’re looking into the word of God for his answer. I'm glad you have joined our study today. Let us pray we'll both be blessed with a better understanding of the problem and be blessed by our study together.
If you think you might want a free written copy, or a CD or an audio-cassette tape of the message, write down our address now. They’re all free. The address is In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083 or by e-mail it’s searchtv@searchtv.org. Our toll-free telephone number for your use is 1-800-321-8633. The program’s streamed on our website at www.searchtv.org. They’re free and we promise not to add your name to a mailing list and solicit you for money that way. We don’t do that. Ken Helterbrand is going to lead us in a hymn, then I’ll be back and we’ll read from the Word of God, Hebrews chapter 5, verses 5-9.
We’re reading today from the book of Hebrews chapter 5 and we’ll begin at verse 5. “So also Christ did not glorify Himself to become High Priest, but it was He who said to Him: ‘You are My Son, Today I have begotten You.’ As He also says in another place: ‘You are a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek’, who in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death, and was heard because of His godly fear, though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him.” We read through verse 9 and we go to God in prayer at this time. Bow with us, please. Holy Father we are so thankful to You for the passage that we have just read about the sufferings of our Savior and we pray that since we know that He also suffered for us, and agonized on the cross and endured all of that suffering and shame, that we too must also bear those shameful things and those disappointments and discouragements in life. And we know that every one of us has endured them and we pray that we may study Your Word today together and learn how to bear up under them. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
Some of the very earliest writings of men, were on the subject that we are studying today. The Old Testament book of Job, for example, examined the question of suffering in depth and is likely the most exhaustive study ever made. Probably no one has ever written or spoken on the subject without a look at the book of Job. Men of every age and culture, philosophers, sages, religionists all have sought a suitable response to the issue. I suppose they have and I suppose also that we'll keep on doing so as long as the world stands. I'm sure it won't be until we get on the other side of death, when we can look in retrospect on it all, that we'll fully understand all the sufferings we’ve endured. We've had other programs addressing the subject in the past. Our only purpose and hope in this study today is to encourage some suffering soul to bear up and live victoriously in spite of their sufferings.
The first tendency many of us have when adversity strikes us or comes is to blame God. If God is all loving, why does He permit evil and suffering? If He is all powerful, why can't He do something about it? Well of course, we believe He is all loving and that He is almighty, so why doesn't He do something about it?
Dr. Bill Jones now retired from the Bible Faculty of Oklahoma Christian University, whose family has experienced a lot of suffering, has done a lot of study about it. He suggested that we do this program dealing with the idea of the necessity of suffering. "Is it realistic," he asked, "to say that people need to experience suffering?" Well, no single human being ever suffered as much as Jesus, so what can we learn from Him?
When, as it's recorded in Matthew chapter 16, verses 21-23, Jesus announced that "He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed," the apostle Peter took him aside and rebuked him saying these things would never happen. Our Lord's response to Peter was quick and strong: "Get behind me, Satan!" He said, "You are an offence to Me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but of men.” Peter didn't understand what Jesus was saying at the time, and that His sufferings at the hands of the elders, and the chief priests and scribes and finally his crucifixion, were all necessary to His doing the will of the Father which He was sent to do. Peter saw those sufferings strictly from the human point of view, and he would have prevented them if he could have. But, there was purpose in it all. It was divine purpose, friend, and had our Lord rejected the cross with all of its suffering, God would have rejected us in our sins.
As the hour of His crucifixion drew near, Jesus went with his disciples to Gethsemane, where --when they were in Jerusalem-- they had frequently gone to pray. Well, He took with him the “inner three,” Peter, James and John, and told them to watch with Him. Then He went a bit further, about a stone's throw into the shadows of the Olive trees, fell on His face and being in agony, the scripture says, He prayed, "O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt." Three times He prayed that prayer that night.
And the writer of Hebrews says of Him that, "Who in the days of His flesh, when He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears to Him who was able to save him from death, and was heard because of His godly fear”. You see, God did hear Him and He was able to save Him from death. But that the divine purpose of redemption would be accomplished, Jesus went to the cross. If we believe as we say we do that God is all-loving and all-powerful so that He would have and He could have done something about that and even our anguish, but He doesn't, then we may assume that there may be a purpose in it, and our suffering is necessary. Many years ago I committed to memory a little poem titled simply "Gethsemane." It always comes to my mind when I think of our Savior's suffering there in the garden. It says, "All who travel, soon or late, / Must pass within the garden gate; / Must kneel alone in anguish there / And wrestle with some deep despair. / God pity those who cannot pray, ‘Not my will’ / Who only say, / ‘Let this cup pass,’ / And cannot see the purpose in Gethsemane.” It says it well, don’t you think? I'd gladly give the author credit, if I knew it but I searched at length in my files and I could not find who wrote that little poem.
Another helpful biblical doctrine that sheds light on the necessity of suffering in God's world is the doctrine of the incarnation. "Incarnation" literally means "in the flesh." The Bible tells us that when Jesus came into the world, He was God in human flesh (John 1:13, 14). Again from the writer of Hebrews we learn, "Forasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14).
But, why is it so important that God became man? Well, look at it like this. If God had stayed in heaven and shouted down here to us, "I love you!" would you have believed him? Can He really help us in the time of suffering by shouting from Heaven, "I love you and I will help you?" Don't we need someone who knows what suffering's all about before we can really trust Him to help us?
The story's told of a father who was taking his son for a nature walk. The boy was quite fascinated with nature, but more than anything else, he was intrigued by an ant hill. He watched the ants as they were busily going about their work. Soon he spotted one in particular, trying to move an object that was much bigger than he was. It struggled and it struggled. After a few minutes, the boy said to his dad, "I wish I could help that ant; he's trying so hard to carry something too big for him." His father reminded him that if he tried to help, the ant would drop his load and scurry to cover, so he couldn't help him. After a moment of serious thought, the boy said, "Dad, if I could become an ant, I bet I could help him." Yes, God knew we needed someone like us to help us carry our load. So He decided to be man as well as God so He could help us and not frighten us. If Jesus can accept suffering, we believe that we should accept it, also. The Son of man is our proof that suffering is necessary in God's world.
Our Lord is proof that we learn obedience through the things that we suffer. Our text says, "Though He was a Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered;” He began that learning early. At age twelve He was learning obedience when He was found in the temple at His Father's business, as recorded in Luke 2:49. He was learning obedience when He lined up with the sinful Pharisees and Sadducees on the banks of the River Jordon to be baptized of John (Matthew 3 verse 15). Obedience to the Father was important to Jesus, --He even learning that obedience through the things which He suffered was necessary. He once said to the apostles, "My food is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish (or to complete) His work" (John 4:34). He "suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should follow in his steps" of obedience (I Peter 2:21).
Jesus is a reminder of the necessity of suffering to our completeness. "Though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which he suffered; and having been perfected, He became the author (or the source) of eternal salvation to all that obey him." That word "perfected" doesn't mean "sinlessness," though that could be said of Christ. It means that by His obedience even to death, "even the death of the cross," (Philippians 3:8), He became a complete Redeemer, lacking nothing. Something He could never have been without suffering humanly --even to the point of death.
The Scriptures teach us that tribulation or trouble develops patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope. Romans 5:3 it says: “We also glory in tribulation, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance [or endurance] and perseverance, develops character, and character, hope.” Oh, I like that! I’m glad to know that! Well friend, we ought to rejoice in suffering knowing when we have endured it, we have the promise of the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to all that love Him (James chapter 1, verses 2 to 12). Helen Keller is admired universally because of her victory over suffering. She once said, "Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of overcoming it." What a great thought that is!
Well, you have known families who have been strengthened by seeing some loved one suffer. Perhaps you are such a family. Perhaps your family is seeing that now. Perhaps you've known some good mother who devoted her entire life to an invalid child, or one afflicted from birth. A viewer called me sometime back and told me that she had cared for a quadriplegic husband and a quadriplegic son for many years and now she has a second son who was involved in an accident who was also left a quadriplegic and she's looking after all three of them. No, she wasn't complaining. Another viewer (81 years old) called to tell me that she never married because from her childhood, her mother had been an invalid and she lived to care for her. She had no regrets. She knew her mission in life.
We must be careful, though, when we talk about suffering, not to leave someone with the idea that all suffering is God sent. No, He's not testing us to see if we're strong enough to go to heaven? No, He's not punishing us for some terrible evil that we have committed. Some of our problems are home-made alright; I mean, that we’ve created them and we are created with a free will. We're free to act carelessly, or foolishly, or rebelliously, or even thoughtlessly or ignorantly, and we have to reap the consequences. Some people act maliciously and either bring suffering on themselves or other people. Well, James gives us a lot of comfort. "Where do wars and fightings come from?,” for example. “Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members” (That’s James 4:1)?
Let’s go to God in prayer. Holy Father, we are not praying that You would deliver us from those things that are uncomfortable and displeasing in our lives, from suffering. But, Father we pray that You will bless us with the strength of faith in You to bear them, to be victorious over them. And go to a place where there is no weeping or sighing. In Jesus’ name we ask it, Amen.
Augustine said, "God judged it better to bring good out of evil, than to suffer no evil to exist." Matthew Henry said, "Extraordinary afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins, but sometimes the trial of extraordinary grace." The apostle Paul spoke of his “thorn in the flesh,” which was a gift of God to keep him humble, he said. He didn’t say what it was. I heard one fellow say that he knew what it was; it was stomach trouble. I asked him how he knew that and he said, “Because all preachers have stomach trouble.” I said, “I don’t.” “Well,” he said, “you’re not enough preacher to count.” I suppose he was right about that. Anyway Paul said, “I pleaded with the Lord three times, I pleaded with the Lord three times, that it might depart from me. And He said, to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ ” Look at this great man’s response to all that: “Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecution, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then am I strong”. That’s 2 Corinthians chapter 12, verses 7-10.
God loves you and me friend, and He cares when we cry. He's never very far from every one of us, when we're ready to seek him and to do his will. If you're ready to come to Him in loving, tender obedience to His will, He'll receive you. Some people will never look up, though until they're flat of their backs. I hope you are not among them. Confess Christ now, today. Promptly put him on in baptism and, come what may, live for him the rest of your days. Then you can live with him in the eternal world where He shall wipe away all tears from your eyes; and there will be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for those things will have ceased to be.”
You may have a free copy of audio cassette tape or a printed copy or a CD of this message titled, “The Necessity of Suffering” simply by writing us, In Search of the Lord’s Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083. By e-mail the address is Searchtv@searchtv.org. You may use our toll-free telephone number if you like. It’s 1-800-321-8633. You need not fear that if you give us your name and address, we’ll hassle you for months by mail to send us a gift. You see, we don’t do that. This is a ministry for Christ. Oh yes, the message is streamed on our webpage at www.searchtv.org. We plan to be back next week. I hope you will, too. God bless you. We love you.
|