WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.480 So, but I want to look at this passage about Paul and his thorn in the flesh. 00:00:07.480 --> 00:00:13.400 Because I think it kind of hone in on the idea of persecution, but more to do with suffering, 00:00:13.400 --> 00:00:15.120 with Paul, the example in Paul. 00:00:15.120 --> 00:00:21.199 And then I think we broaden that to see some principles as well. 00:00:21.199 --> 00:00:25.719 Because none of us here want suffering. 00:00:25.719 --> 00:00:27.640 None of us like suffering. 00:00:27.640 --> 00:00:29.140 I hope not. 00:00:29.140 --> 00:00:31.640 I don't suppose any of us want it. 00:00:31.640 --> 00:00:36.160 And yeah, all of us suffer to greater or lesser degrees in different ways. 00:00:36.160 --> 00:00:39.799 And we must never belittle someone's suffering. 00:00:39.799 --> 00:00:45.240 However, inconsequential it might seem to us, even in the light of what other people 00:00:45.240 --> 00:00:47.240 are going through. 00:00:47.240 --> 00:00:54.960 But for us, there's not really any easy answers to the problem of evil and suffering. 00:00:54.960 --> 00:01:00.280 The Bible does give some very significant ones, but it doesn't give all the answers. 00:01:00.280 --> 00:01:05.319 So I think we're always going to be left, always going to be left with a degree of mystery. 00:01:05.319 --> 00:01:08.859 And as Christians, you're going to be left, and I'm going to be left with the importance 00:01:08.859 --> 00:01:14.920 of learning to hold on to Jesus' hand and trust Him, trust Him when we're going through 00:01:14.920 --> 00:01:22.719 difficulty or illness or loss or relational struggles or opposition at work or whatever 00:01:22.719 --> 00:01:24.400 it might be. 00:01:24.400 --> 00:01:30.400 Because all of us will have come this evening into our church service, having wrestled with 00:01:30.400 --> 00:01:36.800 suffering to one degree or another, it can be personal, at a very kind of individual 00:01:36.800 --> 00:01:38.280 level. 00:01:38.280 --> 00:01:43.840 And especially I'm thinking in context, because Paul's context here was in relation to his 00:01:43.840 --> 00:01:50.880 faith, was in relation to him being a Christian, believing, because you might have come to 00:01:50.879 --> 00:01:56.799 the place where you know and you understand the grace of God, you understand and rely 00:01:56.799 --> 00:01:58.959 on what Jesus has done for you. 00:01:58.959 --> 00:02:07.719 You appreciate his declared and expressed love for you as revealed on his work on the 00:02:07.719 --> 00:02:09.919 cross, his sacrificial work on the cross. 00:02:09.919 --> 00:02:16.280 You know you come tonight and you live your life as a Christian who knows you're forgiven. 00:02:16.280 --> 00:02:17.359 You know you're redeemed. 00:02:17.359 --> 00:02:19.400 You know you've got a great future. 00:02:19.400 --> 00:02:22.520 But doesn't the suffering stop? 00:02:22.520 --> 00:02:26.300 Doesn't the suffering stop for us then? 00:02:26.300 --> 00:02:28.680 Because of all these amazing things that are in our lives. 00:02:28.680 --> 00:02:31.680 Of what for us does happiness consist? 00:02:31.680 --> 00:02:36.680 What does it mean to be happy as a Christian when we're faced with all these difficulties 00:02:36.680 --> 00:02:37.680 in our ongoing? 00:02:37.680 --> 00:02:45.920 What does blessing look like for us as Christians as we face more and more battles in our lives 00:02:45.919 --> 00:02:49.679 and maybe more battles since you became a Christian? 00:02:49.679 --> 00:02:54.119 You may have been relatively suffering free until you became a Christian. 00:02:54.119 --> 00:03:01.239 And it seems that the difficulties of your life have become exacerbated and more real 00:03:01.239 --> 00:03:02.879 in coming to faith. 00:03:02.879 --> 00:03:07.799 And you wrestle with that idea of your Christian faith, your relationship with Jesus and the 00:03:07.799 --> 00:03:10.199 suffering that you're going through. 00:03:10.199 --> 00:03:16.679 Or it may be the kind of broader idea of global suffering and evil and difficulties. 00:03:16.679 --> 00:03:21.719 You know we would argue very strongly for a sovereign God. 00:03:21.719 --> 00:03:25.000 God who's sovereign over all things and a God who's a loving God. 00:03:25.000 --> 00:03:27.599 And you know the difficulty that that brings to many people. 00:03:27.599 --> 00:03:32.639 You see if your God is so loving and so powerful, why does He allow these things to happen? 00:03:32.639 --> 00:03:35.159 Why is there so many things? 00:03:35.159 --> 00:03:37.839 You say that evil has been defeated on the cross. 00:03:37.840 --> 00:03:40.479 Wait, certainly doesn't seem like that. 00:03:40.479 --> 00:03:43.879 It doesn't seem that that is the case. 00:03:43.879 --> 00:03:53.280 And if you would argue again focusing on the Christian suffering, 34, 340 million Christians 00:03:53.280 --> 00:04:00.599 are reckoned to be facing deep persecution and discrimination in their lives. 00:04:00.599 --> 00:04:08.400 How does that ring true for the Christian concept of God's love and God's grace? 00:04:08.400 --> 00:04:14.159 And that's before we even speak about all the overt darkness, evil and suffering we 00:04:14.159 --> 00:04:16.040 see around us. 00:04:16.040 --> 00:04:18.240 So it's a kind of big area, isn't it? 00:04:18.240 --> 00:04:23.439 I'm just going to look, focus very much for a few minutes on Paul and what Paul says here 00:04:23.439 --> 00:04:28.600 and what we can take from that for ourselves from God's living word. 00:04:28.600 --> 00:04:34.680 Because Paul's speaking here about suffering, he's talking about a thorn in the flesh. 00:04:34.680 --> 00:04:36.280 And he's explaining his situation. 00:04:36.280 --> 00:04:38.840 He's saying he's 14 years ago. 00:04:38.840 --> 00:04:43.120 Now we don't have all the details and we don't have the timeline and we don't know exactly 00:04:43.120 --> 00:04:46.000 when he prayed at what point for relief. 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:50.160 But he saw 14 years ago, he saw incredible things. 00:04:50.160 --> 00:04:54.200 He was taken up into heaven. 00:04:54.199 --> 00:05:00.759 He has ever seen what Paul has seen and he, it's so unique and so inexpressible that a 00:05:00.759 --> 00:05:09.079 lot of what he saw has not been repeated for us, although much of his epistles and his learning 00:05:09.079 --> 00:05:15.519 must have come at least in part from that journey into the nearer presence of the risen 00:05:15.519 --> 00:05:16.519 Jesus. 00:05:16.519 --> 00:05:20.360 So he's told, he doesn't know how exactly it happened himself. 00:05:20.360 --> 00:05:24.560 He doesn't know whether it was in his body or out of his body, but he was taken into paradise 00:05:24.560 --> 00:05:26.560 and he saw inexpressible things. 00:05:26.560 --> 00:05:32.480 Now as a result of that, it's utterly unique experience. 00:05:32.480 --> 00:05:37.319 He recognizes that he was tempted by that experience. 00:05:37.319 --> 00:05:40.080 He was tempted to take real pride in it. 00:05:40.080 --> 00:05:42.639 That, well, there's nothing like that. 00:05:42.639 --> 00:05:45.199 Nobody liked me and nobody's seen what I've seen. 00:05:45.199 --> 00:05:49.639 Nobody's been into Jesus nearer presence in the way I have. 00:05:49.639 --> 00:05:52.120 No one's heard the kind of things that I've heard. 00:05:52.120 --> 00:05:57.479 And he may have been tempted to be more, think of himself as more special, more important 00:05:57.479 --> 00:06:03.560 than other people, to take credit for being someone that God privileged in this way. 00:06:03.560 --> 00:06:09.479 And it could have made him proud and self-reliant and quite spiritually arrogant because of 00:06:09.479 --> 00:06:11.079 all that he'd seen. 00:06:11.079 --> 00:06:18.360 And so he realized that as a result of that, God allowed him to suffer. 00:06:18.360 --> 00:06:23.800 He said so that he wouldn't become proud, so that he wouldn't rely on his own strength, 00:06:23.800 --> 00:06:34.759 he says that God gave him a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass him, to keep 00:06:34.759 --> 00:06:36.960 him from becoming conceited. 00:06:36.960 --> 00:06:41.160 Three times he pled about that. 00:06:41.160 --> 00:06:46.360 But that is the reality of this very focused situation of suffering. 00:06:46.360 --> 00:06:49.080 And what did he learn from it? 00:06:49.080 --> 00:06:53.759 Well, he learned, didn't he, that he wasn't God. 00:06:53.759 --> 00:06:58.639 He learned that really important lesson, that he wasn't the center of the universe, that 00:06:58.639 --> 00:06:59.840 God was. 00:06:59.840 --> 00:07:04.319 And he learned that God gifted suffering to him. 00:07:04.319 --> 00:07:06.920 You'll not often hear that. 00:07:06.920 --> 00:07:11.560 You'll not often hear that phrase that God gifted suffering to him. 00:07:11.560 --> 00:07:16.280 But he says he was given this thorn in the flesh. 00:07:16.279 --> 00:07:20.759 Now there's great mystery in that, we know that. 00:07:20.759 --> 00:07:23.639 Because he says he was gifted a messenger of Satan. 00:07:23.639 --> 00:07:26.879 God gifted him a messenger of Satan. 00:07:26.879 --> 00:07:31.039 What a strange thing to say. 00:07:31.039 --> 00:07:40.039 But isn't it the recognition of God's sovereignty at work where he even harnesses evil against 00:07:40.039 --> 00:07:44.719 itself for a higher purpose? 00:07:44.720 --> 00:07:51.640 He harnesses evil temporarily against itself for a higher purpose. 00:07:51.640 --> 00:07:53.080 Now we don't know what that thorn was. 00:07:53.080 --> 00:07:56.160 There's been lots of conjecture about what the thorn was. 00:07:56.160 --> 00:08:00.760 I'm not going to go into that because God doesn't reveal what it was. 00:08:00.760 --> 00:08:05.880 And if He doesn't reveal what it was, I don't think we're really to guess what it was. 00:08:05.880 --> 00:08:13.200 And it makes it easier to apply at a more wide level if we don't know exactly what 00:08:13.199 --> 00:08:18.639 it was because it may be that each of us at different times in our lives may be given 00:08:18.639 --> 00:08:20.959 a similar thorn in our flesh. 00:08:20.959 --> 00:08:23.319 But it was by divine design. 00:08:23.319 --> 00:08:24.879 And that's what's really important. 00:08:24.879 --> 00:08:26.959 God gifted the suffering to him. 00:08:26.959 --> 00:08:28.959 Remember that is very important. 00:08:28.959 --> 00:08:34.279 And remember too that it wasn't what he wanted. 00:08:34.279 --> 00:08:39.559 Paul didn't want, three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave 00:08:39.559 --> 00:08:44.679 me, whatever this particular suffering was that he faced in his life. 00:08:44.679 --> 00:08:47.179 It wasn't what he wanted. 00:08:47.179 --> 00:08:49.479 And that's okay, isn't it? 00:08:49.479 --> 00:08:51.759 And it's good that he prayed about it, isn't it? 00:08:51.759 --> 00:08:56.319 And he asked repeatedly for it to be taken from him. 00:08:56.319 --> 00:09:01.839 He persevered in pleading that this thorn be taken from him. 00:09:01.839 --> 00:09:05.799 But then he stopped praying about it. 00:09:05.799 --> 00:09:08.759 He stopped praying for the suffering to be taken from him. 00:09:08.759 --> 00:09:20.200 Because he came to terms with God's answer, which was, no, it's going to stay with you. 00:09:20.200 --> 00:09:22.439 It's there for a reason. 00:09:22.439 --> 00:09:29.240 And it's there to keep you from becoming conceited and so that you recognize, and he gets this 00:09:29.240 --> 00:09:31.080 special answer, doesn't he? 00:09:31.080 --> 00:09:36.679 My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. 00:09:36.679 --> 00:09:38.080 That's the great lesson. 00:09:38.080 --> 00:09:39.639 That's what he comes to terms with. 00:09:39.639 --> 00:09:42.560 He stops pleading and he starts delighting. 00:09:42.560 --> 00:09:48.300 He starts being content and recognizing that God is the great craftsman who is at work 00:09:48.300 --> 00:09:53.920 in his life, working through some of his heart issues in order to bring him closer, to make 00:09:53.920 --> 00:09:58.639 him more dependent and to help him to recognize who he is. 00:09:58.639 --> 00:10:04.680 Therefore, I will boast, he says, more gladly about my weaknesses so that Christ's power 00:10:04.679 --> 00:10:08.239 may rest in me, because Christ's power is what? 00:10:08.239 --> 00:10:09.839 What is Christ's power? 00:10:09.839 --> 00:10:12.279 Is it muscles? 00:10:12.279 --> 00:10:16.159 Christ's power is his grace. 00:10:16.159 --> 00:10:20.079 Christ's power, Christ's strength is his grace. 00:10:20.079 --> 00:10:22.519 My grace is sufficient for you. 00:10:22.519 --> 00:10:27.279 It's my power and it's made perfect in your weakness. 00:10:27.279 --> 00:10:33.279 And so that is what Paul came to realize through this experience, that he got something better 00:10:33.279 --> 00:10:42.799 than healing or the end of the suffering that he was pleading for that it would be removed. 00:10:42.799 --> 00:10:44.519 He got God. 00:10:44.519 --> 00:10:48.799 He got God's grace, which was real strength. 00:10:48.799 --> 00:10:56.720 And because that grace was an ongoing taste of the glory he'd had in heaven for these 00:10:56.720 --> 00:10:58.039 times that he'd been in heaven. 00:10:58.039 --> 00:11:05.000 There's a puritan, I don't know which one it was, but he said, grace is young glory. 00:11:05.000 --> 00:11:06.000 And that's true. 00:11:06.000 --> 00:11:11.799 When we experience grace here in our lives, his touch in our heart, particularly in difficulty 00:11:11.799 --> 00:11:18.719 in suffering, it's the beginnings of understanding the beauty of what it means to be in glory 00:11:18.719 --> 00:11:22.319 and to be in Christ nearer presence. 00:11:22.320 --> 00:11:28.160 And it's only as we come to terms eyeball to eyeball with sometimes the darkness in 00:11:28.160 --> 00:11:34.240 our own hearts, sometimes the darkness of sin generally, but usually particularly in 00:11:34.240 --> 00:11:39.440 our own experience that God is working through and working out in our lives. 00:11:39.440 --> 00:11:45.240 When we're eyeball to eyeball with that, we begin to experience his grace and his forgiveness 00:11:45.240 --> 00:11:46.640 and his strength. 00:11:46.639 --> 00:11:52.799 Because very often what Paul was tempted to do was rely on his own strength, wasn't 00:11:52.799 --> 00:11:53.799 he? 00:11:53.799 --> 00:11:59.720 His own intelligence, his own experience, his own machoness, maybe. 00:11:59.720 --> 00:12:07.919 And yet he was encouraged to recognize that weakness, not relying on our own strength, 00:12:07.919 --> 00:12:10.360 is actually what brings us closest to God. 00:12:10.360 --> 00:12:20.080 Now we see that whole principle as well, don't we, of God using evil against itself for a 00:12:20.080 --> 00:12:27.200 higher purpose, using Satan and his angels to do his bidding. 00:12:27.200 --> 00:12:31.800 We see it most clearly and most powerfully in the cross, don't we? 00:12:31.800 --> 00:12:38.600 We see it in the garden, Gethsemane, where Jesus, he also pled three times, take this 00:12:38.600 --> 00:12:39.720 from me. 00:12:39.720 --> 00:12:41.960 Take it from me. 00:12:41.960 --> 00:12:44.960 But he added, yet not my will, but yours be done. 00:12:44.960 --> 00:12:50.519 And of course, the act of the deepest and greatest evil that humanity has ever seen 00:12:50.519 --> 00:12:59.440 on the cross also becomes the stage for the greatest good that has ever been revealed. 00:12:59.440 --> 00:13:10.520 Surely you've got in Colossians chapter 2 and verse 15 that Jesus desirmed the powers 00:13:10.520 --> 00:13:19.200 and authorities, making a public spectacle of them, triumphant over them by the cross. 00:13:19.200 --> 00:13:26.600 Paradoxical reality of the deepest, darkest, most evil event in history becomes that place 00:13:26.600 --> 00:13:32.519 where God's greatness is most revealed as He triumphs over the cross. 00:13:32.519 --> 00:13:38.440 And it's for us we recognize that when we recognize that in our own hearts and our own 00:13:38.440 --> 00:13:44.080 experiences and even through our own suffering, as Christians particularly, because we are 00:13:44.080 --> 00:13:52.240 Christians, then we find that that weakness that we experience throws us onto Jesus Christ 00:13:52.240 --> 00:13:57.720 and find there His safety, His love and His strength. 00:13:57.720 --> 00:14:04.759 And that changes our perspective on suffering and difficulties in our lives. 00:14:04.759 --> 00:14:13.120 So very briefly, I think what is God teaching us or saying to us through this experience 00:14:13.120 --> 00:14:18.519 of Paul and what he went through? 00:14:18.519 --> 00:14:23.720 I think he's reminding us tonight, whoever we are, whatever stage in life we're at, it's 00:14:23.720 --> 00:14:26.120 always good to turn to God. 00:14:26.120 --> 00:14:28.679 It's always good to turn to God. 00:14:28.679 --> 00:14:32.480 It's always good to be pleaded, especially if you're suffering. 00:14:32.480 --> 00:14:36.600 And I'm not going to go through a litany of what suffering you might be going through 00:14:36.600 --> 00:14:37.600 this evening. 00:14:37.600 --> 00:14:39.199 I'm not going to presume on that. 00:14:39.200 --> 00:14:49.120 But whatever it is that you're challenged with, particularly in relation to your faith, particularly 00:14:49.120 --> 00:14:55.879 because maybe you are a Christian and it's on Christian grounds that you're struggling 00:14:55.879 --> 00:14:56.960 and battling. 00:14:56.960 --> 00:15:04.200 It's Christian ground you're standing on and wrestling with about this suffering. 00:15:04.200 --> 00:15:10.240 It's good to turn to God, but please, not with a pre-packaged answer. 00:15:10.240 --> 00:15:16.480 Not with the answer you want Him to give you, as maybe Paul did initially asking that it 00:15:16.480 --> 00:15:19.440 would be removed. 00:15:19.440 --> 00:15:25.920 Or even if we do ask for that, that we're open to His answer being different. 00:15:25.920 --> 00:15:31.200 Because as Robyn reminded of this morning, it's very easy, isn't it, to misunderstand 00:15:31.200 --> 00:15:37.000 Jesus and to make Him like that political figure that he was talking about, that we 00:15:37.000 --> 00:15:41.000 want the political figures to do what we want, what we voted for them. 00:15:41.000 --> 00:15:42.400 And I've accepted Jesus. 00:15:42.400 --> 00:15:44.160 I want Him to do now what I want. 00:15:44.160 --> 00:15:47.640 I want Him to be the kind of Savior that's good for me. 00:15:47.640 --> 00:15:53.960 And the difficulty with that is that we come to the place of blaming God and asking Him, 00:15:53.960 --> 00:15:56.480 well, what kind of love have you? 00:15:56.480 --> 00:16:00.480 What kind of care do you have over me? 00:16:00.480 --> 00:16:05.000 And you know, it's a good question, but not if we've already given God the answer. 00:16:05.000 --> 00:16:10.039 Not if we already think we know better than God about who He is and why He loves and what 00:16:10.039 --> 00:16:11.420 He's doing. 00:16:11.420 --> 00:16:17.000 We need inner suffering to be prepared when we pray. 00:16:17.000 --> 00:16:23.159 We need to be ready for the answer to potentially be no. 00:16:23.159 --> 00:16:26.399 And we need to work out if that is what He's saying to us. 00:16:26.399 --> 00:16:28.480 Have you ever done that? 00:16:28.480 --> 00:16:31.360 I wonder if I've ever done that. 00:16:31.360 --> 00:16:38.639 Actually wrestled with God and accepted in my wrestling through suffering that the answer 00:16:38.639 --> 00:16:43.600 is no. 00:16:43.600 --> 00:16:46.800 But that He gives a better answer. 00:16:46.800 --> 00:16:52.879 You know, I've got this old Thompson Chain, NIV Bible that I've had for many years. 00:16:52.879 --> 00:16:53.879 It's a great... 00:16:53.879 --> 00:16:57.120 We don't use Thompson Chain anymore because you've all got computers. 00:16:57.120 --> 00:17:01.360 But Thompson Chain is great and it follows themes to the Bible and it's brilliant. 00:17:01.360 --> 00:17:05.960 And it's also got the words of Jesus in red. 00:17:05.960 --> 00:17:12.079 And this is the only place beyond the gospels, maybe in Revelation, that there's some red 00:17:12.079 --> 00:17:14.000 print. 00:17:14.000 --> 00:17:22.160 And there's red print here, 2 Corinthians 12, where Jesus speaks directly to Paul and 00:17:22.160 --> 00:17:25.799 says, My grace is sufficient for you. 00:17:25.799 --> 00:17:27.960 For My power is made perfect in weakness. 00:17:27.960 --> 00:17:28.960 Do you see the words? 00:17:28.960 --> 00:17:30.960 Do you see them in red? 00:17:30.960 --> 00:17:37.480 Maybe that is especially what you need to hear from Jesus Christ in your life. 00:17:37.480 --> 00:17:45.399 You know, God's answer, maybe to your prayer, is this answer that He gives to Paul. 00:17:45.400 --> 00:17:55.759 He's look, the power you're looking for is in My love and is in My grace. 00:17:55.759 --> 00:18:00.000 And that's what He continues to remind us of. 00:18:00.000 --> 00:18:03.600 We come to the place, I think we're always coming to the place. 00:18:03.600 --> 00:18:09.920 I don't know if we ever arrive, to be honest, where we appreciate that Jesus and His ways 00:18:09.920 --> 00:18:11.519 are not our ways. 00:18:11.519 --> 00:18:16.160 Again this morning, the link, the way of the cross was not what the people were expecting, 00:18:16.160 --> 00:18:20.039 it's not what they were wanting. 00:18:20.039 --> 00:18:25.920 But as we go on in the faith, we begin to understand that His ways are different from 00:18:25.920 --> 00:18:29.079 ours and they're higher than ours. 00:18:29.079 --> 00:18:35.160 And Isaiah 55 speaks about that, Romans 11 says, they're unsearchable. 00:18:35.160 --> 00:18:39.359 We just can't have all the answers and we can't have all the answers the way we want 00:18:39.359 --> 00:18:46.759 them, but that He promises that He is doing His work. 00:18:46.759 --> 00:18:53.719 Sometimes He's rooting out a selfish idol from our hearts that we need to face up to 00:18:53.719 --> 00:18:54.719 and admit. 00:18:54.719 --> 00:19:01.719 But often we want to just hold on to that idol and we want the blessing and we want things 00:19:01.719 --> 00:19:08.119 our way and we want Jesus because that's the battle that we're consistently facing as 00:19:08.119 --> 00:19:11.959 Christians. 00:19:11.959 --> 00:19:18.959 But the enjoyment of His grace is predicated on the confession of our need. 00:19:18.959 --> 00:19:21.959 It's on confession of our weakness. 00:19:21.959 --> 00:19:28.039 It's on confession of you and I saying we are impotent in the face of our own sin and 00:19:28.039 --> 00:19:30.639 that we need a Savior. 00:19:30.639 --> 00:19:37.359 And we need Him to deal with that insidious enemy of pride which wells up within us in 00:19:37.359 --> 00:19:41.240 a million different ugly serpent heads. 00:19:41.240 --> 00:19:47.159 And He wants to take that and make us like Himself. 00:19:47.159 --> 00:19:48.479 So it's good to turn to God. 00:19:48.479 --> 00:19:56.159 It's also great to recognize that pride is actually worse than suffering. 00:19:56.159 --> 00:20:03.319 Pride is worse than suffering because pride will always say, well, I don't actually need 00:20:03.319 --> 00:20:05.439 God. 00:20:05.440 --> 00:20:13.160 Because we autonomously breathe and have health and have gifts and have life from Him. 00:20:13.160 --> 00:20:20.840 It's easy for us as Christians to live with a shallow nod towards heaven with our Bible 00:20:20.840 --> 00:20:33.400 barely open from day to day with the pathway to prayer covered in weeds because we've allowed 00:20:33.400 --> 00:20:39.080 ourselves to think we don't need God in our lives. 00:20:39.080 --> 00:20:46.519 And the whole idea of suffering for our faith, suffering because we're Christians or maybe 00:20:46.519 --> 00:20:54.440 any bad things at all in our lives just leaves us angry and frustrated and we blame God and 00:20:54.440 --> 00:20:58.680 we say prayer doesn't work and we question Him. 00:20:58.680 --> 00:21:09.279 But He may well be saying to us this evening, it's you I want, it's your heart I want, 00:21:09.279 --> 00:21:15.759 it's the idols out of your heart that I'm looking for and my answer is no. 00:21:15.759 --> 00:21:25.680 It is good to ask and it's good to plead but there's also a time to stop and start boasting 00:21:25.680 --> 00:21:31.799 in our weakness and our suffering for Christ's sake and recognizing that His strength is sufficient 00:21:31.799 --> 00:21:37.600 for us and His grace enables us and takes us through. 00:21:37.600 --> 00:21:44.759 And again, I'm particularly focusing on the sufferings we face because we are Christians 00:21:44.759 --> 00:21:48.840 which broaden out into wider persecutions. 00:21:48.840 --> 00:21:55.640 So pride is worse than suffering because it says I don't need God but it also says I don't 00:21:55.640 --> 00:21:58.160 need others. 00:21:58.160 --> 00:22:01.640 Pride says I don't need others, I'm self-sufficient. 00:22:01.640 --> 00:22:04.680 I don't need God and I don't really need other people. 00:22:04.680 --> 00:22:10.160 A friend in need is a pain in the neck. 00:22:10.160 --> 00:22:14.720 We don't really want to be burdened by the sufferings of others. 00:22:14.720 --> 00:22:20.040 We shut out other people's sufferings because we know it's going to be costly for us to 00:22:20.039 --> 00:22:28.159 be involved and we can become because of that either overwhelmed by what we see or self-absorbed. 00:22:28.159 --> 00:22:34.799 We can become blind to the needs of those of our fellow Christians who are suffering 00:22:34.799 --> 00:22:46.240 and in pain and we can become content not to be a channel of grace to other people where 00:22:46.240 --> 00:22:53.120 we can be the answer to their need and we can be the one who begin to alleviate their 00:22:53.120 --> 00:22:58.240 suffering by coming alongside them and serving them. 00:22:58.240 --> 00:23:08.279 So there's an element in which suffering can have a great redemptive aspect in our lives 00:23:08.279 --> 00:23:21.599 as it drives us towards God and also helps us to recognize our love outward towards others 00:23:21.599 --> 00:23:24.440 for Christ's sake. 00:23:24.440 --> 00:23:29.960 We look around us, don't we, and we see the suffering of others and seek to help them. 00:23:29.960 --> 00:23:37.240 And this evening we pray for grace to be concerned about the persecuted church, our brothers 00:23:37.240 --> 00:23:42.319 and sisters, particularly this evening when we focus on Afghanistan and their needs and 00:23:42.319 --> 00:23:45.120 the reality of their suffering. 00:23:45.120 --> 00:23:47.519 Helen Keller wrote a great thing. 00:23:47.519 --> 00:23:56.519 She wrote many great things, but she said, believe when you are most unhappy that there 00:23:56.519 --> 00:24:03.960 is something for you to do in the world so long as you can sweeten another's pain. 00:24:03.960 --> 00:24:08.400 Life is not in vain, not a great quote. 00:24:08.400 --> 00:24:14.200 So long as you can sweeten another's pain, life is not in vain. 00:24:14.200 --> 00:24:22.840 And that's a great act of service to other people and it shows in that instance God not 00:24:22.840 --> 00:24:31.680 using a messenger of Satan but using one of his own children to bring alleviation to people's 00:24:31.680 --> 00:24:32.680 pain and suffering. 00:24:32.680 --> 00:24:42.039 So I'm not sure what is going to happen in Afghanistan and it may seem that prayers of 00:24:42.039 --> 00:24:47.400 a few people here in the middle of Edinburgh for that nation and for the Christians in 00:24:47.400 --> 00:24:55.279 that nation isn't going to make a great deal of difference, but I beg to differ. 00:24:55.279 --> 00:25:04.720 And it's a great recognition of our association with Christians throughout the world and our 00:25:04.720 --> 00:25:26.680 duty in our weakness and in our vulnerability and helplessness to pray for them.