Triumphant Trials

Transcript

Alright, thank you very much. And hello again, radio friends, how in the world are you? Oh, I’m fine, thank you. I’m just feeling great. Praise the Lord. I struggle awake about 6 o’clock, it’s still dark, and I get on out and make a cup of coffee and I generally make myself a bowl of oats and I like the old fashion oats. Do some of you like it that way? I know they have the instant kind. You just pour boiling water in it and it makes up kind of a watery mush, but I like the old fashion oats where every grade is separate and you can chew on a little bit, as it goes down. And so then I come on downstairs, here and talk with you by a way of radio, and I cherish these times with you, beloved, we belong, don’t we, the miles drop away and it’s just as though I were sitting across from you at the table, or sitting beside you in the car as you drive to work, and I’m so grateful for the chance to share God’s Word. We’re looking at 1st Peter chapter 3.

The last time we got together, I was remarking that there is a dynamic connection between the experiences you and I have, which we often call troubles. Peter uses the word suffer. It is better if the will of God be so that you suffer for well doing than for evil doing. For because he says Christ also. This is a sublime and mind-boggling concept to take what you’re going through and put it right straight up alongside the shining sacrifice of the spotless Son of God. You see, part of the grace of God is not just that God saves you and me from going to hell, but then he adopts us as God’s children, and He places what we are and what we do alongside of all that he is, so that we shine in the reflective glow of His glory. We all with open face beholding as in a glass, the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. One of the miracles of the Christian life is that God takes your ordinariness and mine the ordinariness, the tawdry, tiresome, boring life that we think we’re living and because of the indwelling Holy Spirit, he places us up alongside of the glorious Christ, and so it is that in the same breath, Peter can say better that you suffer for well doing that for evil doing because Christ also suffered for sins. The just for the unjust, I can’t imagine the supreme nerve of anybody talking about himself and then in the next breath about Jesus on the same level, that’s exactly what God does for you and me.

He sanctifies human existence and places it next to his son, Hallelujah. You want to chew on that for a while, beloved? Think about that. Our lives are so ordinary, aren’t they? Get up, get dressed, get ready do what you have to do to get ready for the day, go on out to school or work or stay home and make home a happier place and a cleaner place, or whatever it is. Hey, it’s ordinary, it’s routine, lady said she didn’t mind housework, but it was so daily, never quits. You think about all of that and then place that in a package right next to Jesus, the crucified, buried, risen and ascended Lord of Glory, next to him. How do I say next to him? Paul said we’re seated in heaven with Christ. That’s how I know. Everything you are and all that you can become has now been permanently connected with your glorious savior, so that routine even that which is boring and dull that which is full of human mistakes and errors and that which is splashed with the tears of either sorrow or failure or both, all of that is wrapped up in the package of life and placed next to the glorious Son of God, and there you shine.

[chuckle]

Oh, hallelujah, can you take it in? He said that she suffered for, well doing rather than evil doing because Christ suffered for us, the just for the unjust. There is a connection between what you are and all that He is. Christ is made unto us. 1st Corinthians 1:30, “Christ is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.” Everything that He is can be taken by faith and applied to your life. How were you saved by faith? You asked Jesus to save you, and he did. How do you continue living? By faith, the Bible says, “The just shall live by faith.” Living is a process, not just a point action. And so you use that blessed divinely instigated process whereby the almightiness of God is funneled into your fallible and failing human nature, Christ is made unto us all that we need. Wisdom is knowing what to do with what you know. Righteousness is being spontaneously good, sanctification is being set apart for God to use. Redemption is wrapping up the whole package of living and making it an adventure with deity. Jesus becomes all of that to you. And you take Him by faith, so that ordinary living is touched with glory.

Well, I don’t wanna beat the subject to death, but oh, that is so important. Once you see that nothing will ever be dull again. Nothing will ever be routine again, everything matters because everything is touched by His grace. Praise the Lord. Now he said, “Because Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, never lose sight of the fact that the Lord Jesus never had to say, “Excuse me, I was mistaken.” He never had to ask for forgiveness, he never had to apologize for anything. They said of Him, He hath done all things well, He Himself said when confronted by the mob, which of you accuseth with me of sin, no one was able to point a finger at him. The sinless spotless Son of God, wearing during those 33 years, a human body, but he took on him as he emptied himself of that divine glory that was the source of light for all the universe and came down the stairways of the stars and lived in a human body, became obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross, This Jesus, this perfect Son of God, was suffering for somebody else’s sins.

I think one of the chief sources of resentment that one comes across in the business of living is that now again, one is blamed for somebody else’s misdeeds. Oh, how we resent that. Have you ever had that experience? You got blamed because somebody else did something wrong, frequently in any large family, that will happen. Jimmy broke the window, but you get blamed for it. That sort of a thing. And then later on in grown-up life, you find that when things go wrong, people who are expert at dodging the blame, finagle it in some way so that you get the blame and that just makes you so angry, doesn’t it? And I come over into this verse and look at it and see what he’s actually saying. Christ suffered for us, the just for the unjust.

See, we don’t bring anything to God, but our sin and our failure in our capacity to keep on failing, that’s all you have to offer to God. And the Lord Jesus took our place this perfect, sinless spotless Son of God, dying on the cross of calvary for our sins, he was indeed God’s passover lamb, slain from the foundation of the world. The Bible says, “God planned it this way that in the shedding of that precious blood, He would be the fulfillment of those millions of sacrifices that have been offered by God’s chosen people, through the centuries.” “Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins,” the Bible says. That was God’s picture lesson throughout all of the centuries before Christ. And now, there on the cross, He is the fulfillment of all of those pictures and types and Paul can say, “Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us now in the end of the age at he appeared by one sacrifice to perfect forever them that believe.”

Jesus, God’s Lamb. That’s how John the Baptist introduced him in John 1, “Behold the lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” He suffered for sins. The just for the unjust. Would you today bow and thank your Savior for suffering for your sins? Would you do that? Would your bow? Just thank Him for taking the punishment the divine punishment for your sins more now than the exquisite agony of spikes driven through the base of his hands and through his ankles. More now than the tearing of the spear into his side, more now than the jagged wounds of the great thorns that were pressed down upon his brow, more now than the back that was torn to ribbons by the application of the scourge. I know. It’s the infinite sickness and revulsion of a holy soul being made to bear sin. He hath made him to be sin for us, He who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him, that’s what the Bible says, He suffered for us.

Would you bow your head right now and say, “Thank you, blessed Jesus for dying for me.” Never forget that it was for you. The Savior died. For you was crucified. And that’s why the open door of salvation can be open today. Somebody listening to me has never opened your heart to Christ and invited Him in, as Lord and as Savior, do it right now, by faith say, “Lord Jesus, come into my heart, God be merciful to me, a sinner, save me for Jesus’ sake.” He’ll do it. I promise you that’s the way it works. Now there’s a purpose behind all of this that He might bring us to God.

Now, there’s a connection and the time is running out and I can’t develop this as I wish. There’s a connection between if so be ye suffer for well doing and it says He suffered that He might bring us to God. What is the basic reason for you going through any kinds of trials or sufferings? To bring the other person to God. The only reason God has well, I wouldn’t say the only, but the basic reason for going through your trials and sufferings, triumphantly is that other people might be brought to God. There is a dynamic effect upon people who watch you going through your trials triumphantly. Your motivation in mind must be not just to get through them, but to bring other people to our Lord as a result. I’ll come back to this briefly the next time we get together.

Dear Heavenly Father, thank you that Jesus died for us. Oh, may we live for Him, I ask in His name, Amen.

Till I meet you once again by way of radio, walk with the King today and be a blessing!