Abounding Joy / Crushing Grief(transcript)

In this part of the sermon: The sermon opens with a prayer and an illustration from 'The Pirates of Penzance' to define a paradox. Martin then introduces the central paradox of 1 Peter 1:6-7: abounding joy…

The story of Frederick, 21 years old with only five birthdays because he was born on February 29th, is used to explain what a paradox is: a statement that seems self-contradictory but has a hidden truth. This sets up the sermon's theme of the paradoxical Christian experience.

Amen. Now in the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta entitled The Pirates of Penzance, with the subtitle A Child of Duty, there is a choral number in which the words are repeated again and again. A paradox, a paradox, a most amazing paradox. Now, you children, do you know what a paradox is?

2:56 - 3:25 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And to put it bluntly, fighting God is losing business. And being irritated with God will cut off all of your strength. will cut off all your ability to hold communion with God.

John Calvin's commentary on 'if need be' is quoted to emphasize that God does not try His people without reason, providing consolation that trials are part of God's design, even if the purpose is not immediately apparent.

The occasion of that grief is their trials, though they are temporal, he says, I want you to understand they are divinely ordered trials. Listen to John Calvin, the pastor, preaching to his people in Geneva on this very phrase, and he writes, his purpose was to show that God does not thus try his people without reason. For if God afflicted us without a cause, it would be grievous to bear. Hence, Peter takes another example.

33:13 - 33:43 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And to put it bluntly, fighting God is losing business. And being irritated with God will cut off all of your strength. will cut off all your ability to hold communion with God.

The analogy of 'fighting God is losing business' and 'being irritated with God will cut off all of your strength' is used to warn against resisting God's divinely ordered trials, as it hinders communion with Him.

What does it mean? But what is, is the revelation of God's will. So as Peter writes to them, he says, Yes, you who exult and rejoice in your glorious inheritance in Christ and your amazing salvation, you have been put to grief by means of trials that though they are temporal, you must remember and never forget they are divinely born. And to put it bluntly, fighting God is losing business.

34:51 - 35:18 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: He further describes trials as 'manifold,' referring to their diverse 'colors' or kinds, not just number. The fourth and most emphasized characteristic is that trials are…

The Greek word for 'manifold' is illustrated by describing a leopard's skin with many colors or the different veins in marble, conveying that trials come in a full spectrum of diverse kinds, not just a large number.

Wherein you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you've been put to grief, not just in trials, but in manifold trials. This is a fascinating word. It doesn't point to the number. It doesn't point to the number of the trials, but to the different colors of the trials.

36:45 - 37:01 Read in full sermon

Driving home: He's saying the immediate purpose of these trials is your faith may be put to the test and be validated that it's real.

The process of putting a lump of something that looks like gold into fire to see what is real gold and what is dross is used to illustrate how trials test and validate the genuineness of faith.

And that's why he can use the imagery of gold and fire. You see how he immediately goes into it? He said, now look, you know what gold is, this most precious metal. And though it will ultimately perish at the second coming of Christ, 2 Peter 3, 10, the world and all the elements will be dissolved in that conflagration at the return of our Lord.

39:52 - 40:15 Read in full sermon

Driving home: My professing Christian friend, untried faith is worthless.

The parable of the sower, specifically the seed that withers when the sun of persecution arises, is used as an example of untried faith being worthless and exposed as not genuine.

It will be proven to be real gold. Throw a lump of something in the fire that looks like gold and if for half an hour there's nothing there, it was fool's gold.

43:43 - 43:53 Read in full sermon

Driving home: It is in times when the reason for hardship cannot be seen that trust in God alone seems to become the most pure and precious in His sight, though He slay me. Yet, those are the words of Job.

A commentator (Grudem) is quoted to explain that God's purposes in grief may not be fully known in this life, but will be revealed at the final judgment, where trust in hardship becomes most precious to God.

I might then say, but oh Lord Jesus, it was all of Your doing and all of Your grace. One commentator has beautifully summarized it this way. He has said, he thus reminds Christians that God's purposes in present grief may not be fully known in a week, in a year, or even in this lifetime. Indeed, some of God's purposes will not even be known until believers die and go to be with the Lord.

49:30 - 50:05 Read in full sermon

Driving home: It is in times when the reason for hardship cannot be seen that trust in God alone seems to become the most pure and precious in His sight, though He slay me. Yet, those are the words of Job.

Job's statement 'Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him' is cited as the highest expression of faith, illustrating profound trust in God even in the face of ultimate hardship.

Some will only be discovered at the day of final judgment when the Lord reveals the secrets of all hearts and commends with special honor those who trusted Him in hardship, even though they could not see the reason for it. They trusted Him simply because He was their God and they knew Him to be worthy of trust. It is in times when the reason for hardship cannot be seen that trust in God alone seems to become the most pure and precious in His sight, though He slay me. Yet, those are the words of Job.

50:05 - 50:43 Read in full sermon

The point: Grasp that joy mingled with grief and grief tempered by joy will be the concurrent experience of every true Christian in this life.

Matthew Poole's words are quoted to explain the concurrent nature of joy and heaviness: heaviness doesn't wholly hinder joy, and joy doesn't wholly exclude heaviness, but they temper each other.

You have a new covenant Savior, a new covenant privilege, you'll have new covenant affliction, to test and to purify your faith. Listen to old Matthew Poole. If their heaviness did in any degree abate their joy, yet it did not wholly hinder it, and though their joy did overcome their heaviness, yet it did not wholly exclude it. So you have joy, that though it may be tempered with grief, is never swallowed up by grief.

53:56 - 54:29 Read in full sermon

The point: Pray, 'Lord, put me in circumstances that will test the reality of my faith,' if you are wrestling with whether Mom and Dad's God is truly your God.

The analogy of purifying gold, where the fire gets hotter to remove the last bits of dross, is used to explain why trials might intensify closer to the end of life, as God burns away remaining impurities in faith.

I'd have to be in La La Land not to wrestle with that question. I've known a concentration of physical, emotional, psychological, ministerial fires, the likes of which I've never known in 45 years as a Christian and 40 as a preacher. This is like God said, you dummy, isn't it plain? When you take that original lump of what seems to be gold, and maybe there's 20% dross thrown in the fire, in half an hour, most of the dross comes to the surface.

57:52 - 58:20 Read in full sermon

The point: If you are not a child of God, whatever joys or griefs you now experience, you will know nothing but grief in the day of Christ.

Psalm 73 is referenced as an example of unconverted people who may be insulated from life's ordinary trials, experiencing a 'piece of cake' life, but this will not last.

But sitting here as an unconverted man, woman, boy or girl, you may be like the person in Psalm 73. Your life may be a witness to the fact that God insulates some unconverted people from the ordinary trials of life. Life is nothing but one piece of cake for you. You have no physical afflictions, no economic pressures, your kids are well, your wife is well, you've got no debilitating disease taking one of you down to an early grave.

59:52 - 60:19 Read in full sermon

The point: Be made jealous to become a Christian by observing that no tested believer regrets serving Christ, but only regrets not serving Him more faithfully.

Martin challenges listeners to find an old man or woman whose faith has been tested who regrets serving Christ, asserting that such a person does not exist, thereby encouraging commitment to Christ.

Sanctifying griefs now that prepare us for heaven to come or griefs unsupported by God or a mesmerizing life of ease without God, both of which go to the lake of fire. Oh, my friend, I hope we've made you jealous to become a Christian. Tell me, dear children and young people, when did you ever find an old man and old woman who's been in the fire, whose faith has been tested and tried and proven, that ever put his hand upon your shoulder and said to you, you know, upon reflection, I really wish I could go back and do it all over again and never live a life for Christ.

61:11 - 61:55 Read in full sermon