Trials as a Means of Grace (2)

Introduction: The Purpose of the Church and Means of Grace

0:03 The following message was delivered on Sunday morning, May 9, 1993, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. Now, according to Ephesians 4 and verse 14, a passage we had occasion to study and refer to quite frequently in the adult class some weeks ago, one of the purposes for which God has instituted the Church and for which He furnishes the Church with pastors and teachers is that the people of God would no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about by every wind of doctrine by the slight of men after the wiles of error. And in pursuit of this goal of spiritual stability, within this congregation, we are continuing our consideration of those foundational truths which have supported and, by the blessing of God, have given stability to our life together during our first 25 years of existence as a congregation.

1:17 We are presently giving our attention to the ninth affirmation of these foundational truths. And I...

1:26 I have expressed it this way. We are determined to maintain a balanced New Testament perspective with respect to the biblical teaching concerning conversion, the Christian life, and the mission of the Church. And having given considerable time to the New Testament doctrine of conversion or the true beginning of life in Christ, we are now focusing our attention...

1:56 we are focusing our attention on the biblical teaching concerning the Christian life. And my method is that of stating some principles and stating them in a negative way because a negative statement is often more effective in preserving us from what Paul calls in Ephesians 4, 14, the slight of men and the wiles of error. At this point in our study, we are considering the fifth of these major principles of the Christian life, namely, that there are no effective substitutes for the God-ordained means of grace in living the Christian life. As we have examined this principle, we have seen that the means of grace are those activities, disciplines, and relationships ordained by God, to nurture the life imparted by God in our conversion. We have thus far considered the first two of those private or individual means of grace, namely the maintenance of the habit and the spirit of personal prayer,

Trials as an Inevitable Means of Grace

3:15 and secondly, the personal, mental, and spiritual assimilation of the contents of our Bibles. And now presently, we are giving attention to this third major personal means of grace, namely the effectual working of trials, tribulation, affliction, and divine paternal chastisement. In our initial consideration of this issue last Lord's Day morning, I attempted to accomplish but two things. Number one, I attempted to prove...

3:53 I attempted to prove from the Scriptures that trials, tribulation, afflictions, and divine paternal chastisement are an inevitable part of true Christian experience. And we looked especially at John 16.33, Acts 14.21 and 22, and Hebrews 12.6 through 8.

4:19 At the mouth of these three biblical witnesses, it is established that in the experience of every true child of God, trials, tribulation, afflictions, and divine paternal chastisement will be part and parcel of normal experience. And then secondly, I attempted to prove from the Scriptures that these very things are intended to function as a means of worship. That is, however they may come to us in terms of the second causes, whoever or whatever may be the instrument of bringing them upon us from cells that somehow for some unknown reason go into strange configuration and form themselves into a cancerous growth, from the movement of clouds and the movement... of the jet stream and the temperature and the movement of other factors in the physical realm that cause a tornado and a hurricane, whatever the secondary causes or factors may be,

5:40 I attempted to prove from the Scriptures that these trials, these afflictions, these tribulations, these divine paternal chastisements, are intended to function as a means of grace. That is, they are intended by God to advance His work in us, to nurture the life that He imparted in our conversion. And here again, we looked primarily at three courts of witness, James 1, 2-4, Romans 5, 1-4, and Psalm 119, verses 67 and 68. Now, in our ongoing concern with this unpleasant but necessary means of grace comprised of our trials, our tribulations, our afflictions, and divine paternal chastisement, I would urge you to consider with me the manner in which we must respond to these things if they are to be blessed of God to our spirit, having proven that they are part and parcel of normal Christian experience, having demonstrated from the Scriptures that they are intended by God as a means of grace,

Why Precise Definitions of Trials Are Not Given

7:07 now we come to consider how are we to respond to them so that their divinely intended purpose is actually realized in us. And as I attempt to pursue this, I want to say two things by way of introduction. Number one, the Bible does not give us precise, clinical definitions of these things which it designates as trials, tribulations, afflictions, and divine paternal chastisement. I would have, were I a betting man, have laid down good money that before this week was out, I would have heard in person or by phone, by note or by letter from some of you that I took no time to define what these various things are. What is a trial? Wherein does it differ from an affliction? What is a tribulation?

8:10 And wherein does it differ from a tribulation and a trial? And what is a divine paternal chastisement? And wherein, if in any area, does it differ from the others? And the reason I did not try to give even broad definitions is because my initial study convinced me that the Bible gives no such precise, categorical definitions.

8:36 And after spending a number of hours in my concordances, in theological word books, articles, in Bible encyclopedias, Bible dictionaries and trusted commentaries, that conviction was the greatest of all. Conviction has, or that tentative perspective has become a matter of deep and unshakable conviction. And whatever subtle nuances of difference there may be in what one Hebraist says are no fewer than eleven major Hebrew words to describe the things that I've lumped together under the words trials, tribulations, afflictions, and chastisement, among them being the more frequently used words anayasar and musar, and then among the Greek words in the New Testament, glypsis, pyrosmos, paideia, and pasco, suffering. Likewise, students of the Greek language have come to the conviction that we simply cannot command. We cannot come up with precise clinical definitions of these things. Now, to illustrate this very quickly, to persuade your judgment from the Scriptures,

10:00 let me just look very briefly at two passages of the Word of God with you. Please turn to Romans chapter 8.

10:10 By way of introduction, I want to give a rationale for my refusal to give you nice, neat little definitions, of these various things which together are intended to constitute a means of grace. In Romans 8 and verse 18, the Apostle says, For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed to usward. Paul speaks of the sufferings. The sufferings of the present time.

10:54 Everything that in this time frame between the first and the second coming of Christ that comes to the lot of any believer living in that time frame, he says, I reckon, I judge that the sufferings of the present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed. The glory. The glory. The glory that will break in upon us at the return of the Lord Jesus.

11:26 But now, what were his sufferings? Well, all we need to do is turn later on in this chapter where he lists some of them. Verse 35. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

11:41 Shall tribulation. Here, flipsis is part of our suffering. Flipsis is part of our poverty. Roscoe, tribulation is part of our suffering.

11:56 Or anguish is part of our suffering. Or persecution. Or famine. Or nakedness.

12:02 Or peril. Or sword. Even as it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long. We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

12:12 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. So you see the words, Suffering becomes a catch-all for all of these other specifics that are mentioned in these verses. And to try to put them into neat little categories is not to say the least artificial. It is unbiblical.

12:39 Where God makes clear distinctions, it's the responsibility of the responsible expositor and preacher to highlight those distinctions. But to make distinctions where God does not make them is to be guilty of handling the word of God deceitfully. 2 Corinthians 4.17 is another example.

13:05 This is why I read the passage in your hearing. When Paul says our light affliction, which is for the moment, what does he include under affliction? Well, go back to verse 8. We are pressed on every side.

13:25 There was the pressure of opposition. The pressure of heretics plaguing the churches, seeking to undermine Paul's credibility and his ministry. We are pressed. We are perplexed.

13:40 We are pursued. We are smitten down. We're bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus. And he lumps all of those things together and he calls them affliction.

13:51 So you see, any attempt to sort these things out into neat little packages is doomed to fail because God has not so packaged them for us. So I must say that by way of introduction and justification for what some of you had come to expect. You say, well, Pastor Martin always defines. Ah, I can define if the Bible defines for me.

Trials Do Not Automatically Function as a Means of Grace

14:18 But if the Bible does not define for me, I'm not about to make new decisions. I'm not about to make nice, neat little categories just so you have something that is a convenient handle to face your trials. But then secondly, by way of introduction, and this is crucial, not only does the Bible refuse to give us precise clinical definitions of these things which it designates as trials, tribulation, afflictions, and divine paternal chastisement, the Bible makes it clear that these things do not, automatically function as a means of grace. The Bible makes it clear that these things do not automatically function as a means of grace. As surely as the Scripture tells us in Hebrews 4, 2, the word preached did not profit from being mixed with faith. There is no automatic blessing from the ministry of the word. Some of you are living proofs of it.

15:22 The older I get, the more I marvel that some of you can sit under the same ministry that is making giant oak trees out of others and you are still a little bent over, half brown, stripling of a tree that I wonder if it's even alive. And you've been under the same ministry for the same amount of time. In one case, the word is mixed with faith and finds fruition in obedience. It is attended to in concentration while with others of you, you sit here, your mind wanders from Dan to Sheba, you go home on your TV, you sweep out before 2 o'clock this afternoon. That's reality. Likewise, as surely as the ministry of the word does not have an automatic benefit, the Bible makes it clear that these things, in any combination, trials, tribulations, afflictions, divine paternal chastisement, these things do not automatically function as a means of grace.

16:46 And I rest the whole case on Hebrews 12 and verse 11, the watershed passage on divine paternal chastisement. We could look at many other passages, but surely this underscores it to convince I trust the judgment of all reasonable people. Verse 11, All chastening seemeth for the present not to be joyous, but grievous. Any Christian who is always going around happy, happy, happy all the time, time, time, is either bluffing it, has somehow come up with the notion he must never manifest grief, or he is not a true Christian. Because God chastens all his children, and when his rod, of chastening is upon us, by whatever means it is being applied to us, for the present it is not joyous, but grievous. Yet afterward, now notice, it yieldeth peaceable fruit, not unto all who receive it, no, no, it says, unto them who have been exercised thereby. And the word exercise is gumazo, from which we get our word, gymnasium, gymnastics.

18:14 It yields fruit, the peaceable fruit of righteousness, unto them and only to them who have entered God's gymnasium with that trial, and have duly related to that trial, and come out of it in better shape than they went into it. The clear indication being that some are not exercised thereby, and the very context points to this. Look at verses 12 and following. Wherefore, here were people, instead of being profited from their chastisement, were becoming dispirited, and discouraged, and coming near, the border of apostasy, and ready to quit, and to bail out, and say, I want out of a life that is pressured with so much opposition. Wherefore, lift up the hands that hang down, and the palsied knees, it's a picture of a guy with his hands down, and his knees weak and shaking, and make straight paths for your feet, that that which is lame be not turned out of the way, but rather be healed. Dear people, there is no automatic, no automatic function as a means of grace

The First Required Response: Well-Informed Biblical Realism

19:43 with respect to these things. Well then, what responses are required of us if these commodities of trials, tribulation, afflictions, divine paternal chastisements are to be a means of grace? Well, according to my present light, there are five, there are five basic aspects of a godly, spiritually profitable response to these things. We'll take up only one this morning.

20:16 God willing, we'll take up as many more as we can cover tonight, and if we need to, God willing, we'll finish up the others next Lord's Day morning. And here's the first, and the most fundamental of all. If we would profit, if we'd enter God's gymnasium, with our trial, with our affliction, with our tribulation, with God's rod of divine paternal chastisement upon our behinds, we must, we must view these things with a well-informed biblical realism. Now, I've labored over how to express this in human terminology, and this, according to my present life, is the best way to state it. What I used last week, I spoke of something, I used the word intelligent, and someone spoke to me and were a bit fearful that maybe only people with high IQs could profit. And thankfully, they spoke to me at the door and asked what I meant by an intelligent response. So I've thrown out the word intelligent, lest it carry the wrong kind of baggage.

21:31 And in its place, I've put this, we must view these things with a well-informed biblical realism. Now, what do I mean by such words? Well, I'm simply attempting to express what is patent in the three passages we're going to study this morning, James 1, Hebrews 12, and Romans 5. And in each one of them, the common denominator is this.

22:01 If we would profit and experience as a means of grace our trials, our tribulations, afflictions, and divine chastisement, we must look upon them with a well-informed biblical realism. Let's look at the first passage, James 1. James 1. We looked at this passage last week seeking to establish that God, God's purpose in trials is that they be a means of grace.

Biblical Realism in James 1: Counting it All Joy

22:43 Now we come back to the passage to see precisely how, what are the mechanics that turn a trial into a means of developing and increasing the life of God in the soul of His people. Count it all joy, my brethren, verse 2, when you fall into manifold trials. Here's our word, . Count it all joy, my brethren, when you fall into all kinds of trials.

23:20 Now the command, count it all joy when you fall into manifold trials, note now, is not followed by the words, hoping some good will come by your trials. Or, believing that somehow or another as a result of your trials. That isn't what James says. He doesn't say, count it all joy, my brethren, when you fall into all kinds of trials, hoping some good will come of it all.

23:57 Believe in faith for His glory in that you rest. That isn't what the text says. It says, count it all joy knowing you can obey the command in so far as you know something. In so far as you have a well defining and understanding that reality as it is taught in the Bible. And what is the directive? Here it is. The command with this word is working .

25:14 So steadfastness have its perfect work that you may be perfect and entire lacking in nothing. You see, the duty of counting it all joy when we fall into all kinds of trials in the well purpose of those trials namely to prove or knowing that that varies the grace fastness or when in the revealed ways of God. And there is nothing but a cloudless sky above and the warm sun upon our head and the cool breeze upon our chipping and the flowers and the cool breeze and all the elektron and all the wonders that live in the world

26:43 until we are out of the earth. What is the law that is complying with the law of the universe? It is the law of them. The law is, you know, too harsh to drive and to It's a fair-weather faith.

27:05 As long as the gospel holds out things that bring joy, they receive a message with joy. But it says when tribulation or persecution arises because of the Word, then like the sun that causes the rootless plants to wither and die, they wither and they die. Their faith is put to the test by tribulation and affliction. But in the heart of one who has truly been converted, when God brings clouds over His sky and the birds retreat wherever they retreat in a vicious storm and we no longer hear the chirping of the birds and see the brightness of the sun, feel its warmth upon our head and a cool breeze across the cheek, but the skies are tumultuous and threatening and jagged lightning is moving vertically from heaven to earth and there are thunderclaps. Then are we going to hold to what we believe to be the path of duty according to Scripture, even though it leads right into the eye of the storm?

28:12 Ah, now faith is put to the test. And when God then brings the storms of trial, how can I count it all joy? Because I have a well-sent,

28:41 might be cultivated and deepened in my life. And as that grace of steadfastness or patience is allowed to work itself out, it brings me not to absolute perfection, but to a new level of Christian completion and entirety and maturity. It's been a means of grace. But you see, the hinge on which everything turns is knowing.

29:17 Knowing. I ask you to listen to, Mr. Johnstone, in his commentary on James,

29:31 taking the word knowing, he says, the spiritual helpfulness of afflictions, then we should count them all joy. And plainly, our measure of success in the discharge of this most difficult duty, that is, counting it all joy when we fall into manifold trials, our success in the discharge of this duty will depend on the clearness and fullness with which we know the usefulness of our manifold trials. Here, as everywhere in religion, it is by an intelligent apprehension of God's will that we become strong. It is the truth which makes us free. Then he goes on to say how this great, grace of steadfastness in turn fills up the hollow places in our Christian character and we become whole and entire, lacking in nothing. Johnstone comments, God's varied discipline is designed to produce a perfectly balanced completeness of character.

30:48 Now there are some elements of holy character which can be acquired only in trouble. The beautiful graces of resignation, and sympathy cannot grow, but in a soil through which has passed the ploughshare of affliction, and which has been watered by the rain of tears. Beautiful imagery. The graces of resignation and sympathy cannot grow in any other soil but that which has felt the ploughshare of affliction and been watered by the rain of tears.

31:28 Therefore it is that God scourges every son whom he receives and every branch in the true vine that bears fruit. He prunes it that it may bring forth more fruit. Let constancy under trial then, dear brethren, have her work perfect, that you may be perfect and entire, lacking in nothing. Surely then, when God brings us into a crucible, that we may be perfect and entire, lacking in nothing.

31:58 Surely then, when God brings us into a crucible, that we may be perfect and entire, lacking in nothing. Surely then, when God brings us into a crucible of an intense trial, what Peter calls in 1 Peter 4, 12, a fiery trial, or a cauldron of many lesser trials, we must learn to resist the temptation to say with old Jacob, as recorded in Genesis 42, 36, all these things are against me. Here he was surrounded with a veritable crucible of manifold trials, and he says, this has happened, this has happened, this has happened, all of the negative providences, all these things are against me. How foolish for him to judge the ways of God by what he could see. Because as Paul Harvey says, and now you know the end of the story, and you know the end of the story, the very things he says were against him, were all false. And he was not at that point the example to us, of the man of faith. We are to count it all joy, not because we have some kind of sick, psychological warped, personality that enjoys pain and affliction.

33:19 No, sent and controlled in order not to do something in me. Not because God's revealed it, and I will make the measure of my response the revealed will of God. Not my feelings, not my feelings, But my temperamental disposition, not even what I would choose did God give me the choice.

34:05 I will count it all in form, biblical realism. Isn't that what James says is the key to counting it all joy? When you fall into all kinds of testings or trials, you must know God's purpose in them. And it isn't something you learn once for all.

Biblical Realism in Hebrews 12: Divine Paternal Chastisement

34:34 You must call it to remembrance again and again and again and again. Then the second text, Hebrews chapter 12. You see that in dealing with the subject of divine paternal chastisement, we have a similar emphasis. Hebrews 12, verses 5 to 13.

35:02 The situations which had come upon them involved some of the things, as we saw very briefly last week, described in chapter 10, verse 32 and following. Call to remembrance the former days in which after you were enlightened, you endured a great conflict of sufferings, partly being made a gazing stock both by reproaches and afflictions and partly becoming partakers with them that were so used. You both had compassion on them. You both had compassion on them that were in bonds and took joyfully the spoiling of your possessions.

35:45 But you see, these very pressures were producing in some of them a temptation to turn back. This is why he says in verse 35 of the same chapter, Cast not away your boldness that has great recompense of reward. You have need of what? Patience.

36:03 Same word as James uses, steadfastness. That having done the will of God, you may receive the promise. For yet a little while in he that cometh shall come and shall not tarry, but my righteous one shall live by faith. And if he shrink back, if he shrink back, if he abandons the way of faith when it leads through intensified troubles that demand the grace of steadfastness, if we draw back, he says, shrink back, my soul hath no pleasure in him.

36:35 But? We are not. We are not of them that shrink back unto perdition, but of them that have faith unto the saving of the soul. We are not of those who are apostatizing, manifesting that the root of the matter was never really in them.

36:50 But we are those whose faith, whose clinging to Christ with a death grip, even when that clinging to Christ brings us into intensified afflictions and trials, we are those who continue to cling to him, regardless of whatever circumstances he permits us to undergo. And in so clinging to Christ, even unto the end, we cling to the saving of our souls. Now it's that setting, in that setting, that the writer now speaks to them, and after encouraging them to run with endurance, the race that was set before them, the same word in chapter, chapter 12 and verse 1, how central this word is in conjunction with these things, looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith. Verse 3, consider him, we'll have occasion to come back to that. Then in verse 4, he says, you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin. There's something you've not done.

38:02 And then he says, there's something you have done, and you have, you have forgotten the exhortation which reasons with you as with sons. What does he seek to do with these people who facing what he will call in this setting divine paternal chastisement, which in its specifics was not that God was directly dealing with them in a way of chastisement, the way he did with David, when he sent Nathan the prophet, and after calling David's sin to remembrance, and then seeking under God, bringing David to repentance, then he said, nevertheless, because what you did has caused the enemies of God to blaspheme, the child shall die. There was a paternal chastisement of a very severe nature. But there's no indication that that's what is envisioned in this passage. In the context, the writer to the Hebrews is telling them that the difficulties they are facing in this persevering adherence to Christ, which from the human side, people making fun of them, mocking them out, making them a gazing stop, taking their goods, afflicting them, persecuting them, this is what the things were in themselves from the human side.

39:32 But he said, you must face them with a what? A well-informed biblical realism. And the first thing he tells them in that biblical realism is, verse 4, you have not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin. When you became a Christian, you committed yourself to Jesus Christ, bound yourself over to him, to live for him by his word, in his strength, set your face against sin and the devil and the world, determined, condemned if necessary.

40:07 You would confess Christ even if it meant the giving of your life for him. Be thou faithful unto death and I will give thee the crown of life. Be not afraid of those that kill the body and after this have no more that they can do. Fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

40:22 Whosoever shall confess me before men, I will confess before my Father. Whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I deny before my Father. The terms of what it means to be bound, in faith to Christ, are clear. And he says, look, you've not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin.

40:43 Oh yes, you've had it rough. There's some people that call you names, taking your goods, opposed you, yes,

40:52 has watched your own life's blood pour out, striving against sin. If you had, you wouldn't be listening to my letter. The very fact, he says, that you're hearing my letter, you've not paid the ultimate price of adherence, to Christ.

41:10 Biblical realism, reminds them that if they're the real thing, they're ready to die for Christ. They're not going to contemplate turning away, because God doesn't seem to be a fair weathered God to them, doesn't seem to smite their enemies, and restrain their opposers, and put a chain around those that would spoil their goods, and wrench away their loved ones, and commit them to prison. He said, wait a minute, you've not yet resisted unto blood, and face it my friend, every true Christian is in the strength of Christ, prepared to resist sin unto blood.

41:50 Then he goes on to say, you've forgotten something. You've forgotten. He's going to inform their minds. You have forgotten the exhortation, which reasons with you, as with sons.

42:03 And verses 5 and 6, he says, you've forgotten the biblical exhortation, and teaching concerning, divine, paternal, chastisement. Don't ignore it. Don't regard it lightly. Don't allow yourself to be crushed by it, nor faint when thou art reproved of him.

42:23 Rather, he says, see it as your loving father's hand upon you, for whom the Lord loves, he chastens, and scourges every son whom he receives. Then he goes on in verses 7 and 8, and says, your chastening is a confirmation of your sonship. It is for chastening that you endure. God deals with you as with sons.

42:51 For what son is there whom his father chastens not? But if you are without chastening, whereof all have been made partakers, then are you illegitimate children and not sons. He says, you have forgotten of God's ownership of you. God doesn't have any children that run around being little spoilsheets, spoiled brats, not reflecting the family image.

43:20 He doesn't have any children that he's not working on to conform to the family of afflictions and tribulations and pressures that constitute divine paternal chastisement. You're not one of God's children. You have forgotten this. Remind yourself.

43:42 And as you do, then rather than seeking the first way out of those things that constitute God's rod of affliction and chastisement upon you, you'll recognize that these are badges to glory in. For they are the badges of your belonging to the family of God. Then in verses 10 and 11, he says, remember and understand the specific purpose of your father in these things. What is the father's purpose?

44:15 He tells us in verses 10 and 11. For they indeed, for a few days, our earthly fathers chastened us to seem good to them, but he for our profit that we may be partakers of his holiness. Keep that word in mind. He's doing this that we may be partakers of his holiness.

44:37 All chastening seems for the present not to be joyous but grievous, but afterwards it yields peaceable fruit unto them that have been exercised thereby, even the fruit of righteousness. Understand and remember the purpose of the father's chastisement. It's to make you partakers of his holiness. It's to produce the peaceable fruits of righteousness.

45:03 And you say, well, what's the big deal? Why is that so vital? Well, look at verse 14. Follow after peace with all men and same family of words as the word holiness, not the exact same word, but same family.

45:17 It's the Hagios family of words. Follow after the sanctification or the holiness without which no man shall see the Lord.

45:28 If we're not pursuing holiness, we'll not see the Lord. According to this passage, there's no way to pursue holiness and avoid God's chastening rod. So if you don't want the chastening rod, you don't want holiness, and if you don't want holiness, you don't want heaven.

45:46 If being happy is more important to you than being holy, you're on your way to hell. Say it again lovingly. I trust in the way it will bite into the consciences of some of you if being happy is more important than being holy. You're on your way to hell, my friend.

46:17 I don't care how clearly you can give an account of your so-called conversion. God has no undisciplined children.

46:28 He is determined to fashion us into the family like us. That we may be partakers of his holiness. The chastening, though it is not joyous, but grievous for the present, when it is properly embraced for the divine purpose to be accomplished in it and through it, it yields the fruit of righteousness. Greater conformity to the Lord Jesus and to the law of God.

47:01 Now do you see why? I've asserted that we must view our trials, our tribulations, afflictions, and divine paternal chastisement with a well-informed biblical realism. Without this, the temptation will be to turn away short of resisting sin unto blood, to misread the heart of God in what appear to be his negative providences toward us. The moment you become bitter and deceitful, discouraged with reference to God, you're getting dangerously near the lie that passes over into apostasy. You cannot cling to a God against whom you are bitter. You cannot cling to a God using all commodities of his universe at his disposal to make you into the image of his Son and a partaker of his holiness, and to produce in you and in me the fruit of righteousness. And how many professing Christians under sustained trial

48:24 have become bitter and cynical until finally they've turned away, saying, I trusted in Christ, I served God, and look what he's done to me. They had a mercenary spirit that never knew the grace of God. For when I've come to know the grace of God, then I will say to Job, though he slay me, yet will I trust him, because anything other than hell is all of grace. And though Job had lost his family and all of his possessions and his health, he knew he hadn't lost his God. That amazing statement made in the midst of his dejection and confusion, he could say, I know that my Redeemer liveth, and though the worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God. Job could say, when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. He was determined to cling to his God.

49:42 And he didn't have the materials we have even about his own trials. We know the end of the story. He didn't. We know what lies behind the story.

49:52 He didn't. We know that there were cosmic realities, God and devil and the sons of God coming before him. Job knew nothing of those things. We do.

Biblical Realism in Romans 5: Exulting in Tribulations

50:07 And then the third passage, more briefly, Romans chapter 5. All I'm trying to do is show you from the Scriptures that though there is no automatic growth in grace from trials, afflictions, tribulation, and divine paternal chastisement, there is profit if we respond as we ought. And the first strand of a biblical response is viewing these things with a well-informed biblical realism. We've seen it illustrated in James 1, 2 to 4, Hebrews 12, 5 to 11 in particular, and now Romans chapter 5. Romans chapter 5. Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we've had our access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and we rejoice, we exult in hope, confident expectation of the glory of God. Among all of the present blessings of the justified state, the Apostle says there is a glorious future blessing, and it is this,

51:35 we glory, that Greek word, , we glory in, we exult in hope of the glory of God. When we think of what we will eventually be, we exult in it, we glory in it, we anticipate that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him. For we shall see Him as He is. But then an amazing statement, and not only so, but we also, and he uses exactly the same verb, we rejoice, we exult in our pressured situations. Flipses in the plural. As much as we exult when we contemplate sharing in the very glory of God, in the consummation of our redemption, when we shall be like our Savior, seeing Him as He is, not only do we exult in what lies out there for us, but now think of the contrast, we exult in pressured, galling, irritating, withering,

53:00 tribulation. He says the same spiritual dash or slash emotional disposition we have when we think of going to heaven, we have when we think of our tribulations. That's what the text says. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God, and not only so, we exult in our tribulations.

53:28 Now how in the world can anyone do that? Have the same emotional cycle, emotional, psychological disposition toward tribulations, plural, that you have toward the contemplation of the glory to come? Well, he tells us. Look at the next word.

53:47 Knowing. Knowing. Knowing. Not feeling, not hoping, not surmising, not dreaming.

54:01 There was something he to experience the same exulting, exulting of spirit in the contemplation of the glory of God transferred, not theoretically, but to the reality of his tribulations. And what was it that he knew? He knew that tribulations were working. Here we go again.

54:31 Steadfastness. It was the stances and situations, however they came. The apostle, whether through his thorn in the flesh, the Jews that dogged his steps and opposed him in every city, whether it came from false brethren or the burden of the care of the churches, he says it was these pressures that were effectually working in him the grace of steadfastness. It was these pressures that were working in him this grace of bravery that hits to Christ and to God and to his ways. Knowing that tribulation works steadfastness and steadfastness in other words, when my faith is put into the surroundings of pressures that would make me doubt the goodness of God, the power of, to hold my knees at bay, to keep away thorns in the flesh and God be come in to the crucible of manifold trials. I know what he's doing.

56:00 He's putting my faith to the test. And so these trials work the grace of steadfastness showing I'm no fair-weather Christian. I am determined to trust my God when every nerve in my body is wracked with pain. When there appears to be no rhyme or reason to God's dark problems, dark, dark providences, I'm not going to make God answer them, my puny little mind.

56:29 How could I ever write later on, Who art thou, O man, to reply against? God shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? If I'm going to say that with any clout regarding God's decree of election, I better be able to say it with God with respect to God's decreeing my tribulations. And he said, I know that these things are working a steadfastness, a brave, determined adherence to the ways of God.

56:57 And what does that in turn work? That works a provenness. That shows I'm not a stony-brown hearer. That shows I'm the real thing.

57:05 And the more I'm convinced I'm the real thing, what happens? Look what he says. And the provenness works hope. Well, since I'm the real thing, and whoever has the real thing, God begins the good work, He's going to complete it, then that means one day I'll be done with the troubles of the world.

57:22 One day, no more affliction, no more tears, no more sighing, no more crying. All the tears and the crying and the sighing I'll know will be this side of the coming of Jesus. This side of my departing from the body, absent from the body, present with the Lord. I will never know the weeping, the wailing, the gnashing of teeth, the eternal tribulation that awaits the unconverted.

57:52 And it's called that in the Bible. In 2 Thessalonians, God will bring eternal pressure upon every unconverted man. The pressure of the fury of His wrath outpoured without any dilution. Tribulation and angry soul of man that doeth evil is the teaching of Romans 2.

58:16 And Paul says, I'll take my tribulation now from the hand of a God that loved me enough to send His Son to die for me. From a God who having spared not His own Son can order everything in His universe to make me more and more like His Son, to give me the grace of steadfastness, which in turn marks me more and more as the real thing which in turn tries to be glorified in the last day. Therefore, he says, I exult in my tribulations knowing it's what He knew that enabled Him to rejoice. That's the problem with some of you. You're still waiting for God to zap you bypassing an enlightened, well-informed judgment and you're doomed at best to a life of instability because you simply will not come to grips with these realities and say what God is the measure of my perspective on all reality. Not what I but what God has said. This is the man who when he speaks of rejoicing in tribulations at your leisure

Concluding Application: Get Beyond Childish Notions

59:43 reads such passages as 1 Corinthians 4 9 to 13, 2 Corinthians 1 4 to 10, or 2 Corinthians 11 23 to 30. You read what this man went through and yet he says when I'm going through these things I exult, I exult, I rejoice, I rejoice in my tribulations because of what I know the tribulations are doing in the will and purpose of the living God. And dear people of God with the full light of the word of God we are without excuse. In each of these key passages it is clear that trials, tribulations, afflictions, divine, paternal, disciplinary action are a means of grace only to the child of God who responds to them with a well informed biblical realism. Now you know why Paul prayed as he did in Philippians 1 9 to 11 he said I pray this for you Philippians that your love may abound yet more and more how? In knowledge and all discernment so that you may approve the things that are excellent.

61:12 That you may be sincere and void of offense until the day of Christ being filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God. My concluding application child of God is this get beyond the childish notion that your present happiness comfort and ease are the most important things in life. It's excusable in an infant it's sickening in an adult it's excusable to someone recently brought out of darkness into light filled with joy unspeakable and full of glory and being given a period of relative protection until the day of Christ when you will be in the presence of God until his root system goes down into Christ to think that God is going to give him nothing but cloudless skies and the sun on his cheek and the cool breeze at his back but some of you have been around too long to still chase

62:41 that dream. As Tozer one time said if you burn and scour you and he's going to do all that he needs to do to make you like his son. Child of God if your faith is to be proven to be the real thing it will be in the crucible of trial of affliction of pressure of paternal chastisement. If you come into manifold trials what do I know not what do I feel what do I know what do I know what do I know. My unsaved friend you may be relatively free of afflictions and trials and say I don't know what in the world that preacher's talking about all my bills are paid I got cash all my funeral and I'm all in my , all I need is to be a good father of God

Warning to the Unconverted: The Absence of God's Rod

64:04 and I don't to sin and self and the world. You're under the wrath of God. And God's goodness is intended to show you how beneficent and kind he is even to his enemies. But that won't go on forever. The time will come when God's fury will be unleashed upon you. And you'll wish you'd had afflictions and trials that showed you that there was a God to whom you were accountable. One of the old writers, I went back to Brooks, the mute Christian under the smarting rod in preparation for these messages. And this is what Brooks says. There cannot be a greater evidence of God's hatred and wrath than his refusing to correct men for their sinful courses and vanities. Where God refuses to correct, there God resolves to

65:13 destroy. There is no man so near the axe, so near the flame, so near to hell as he who God will not so much as spend a rod upon. None so near hell as the one upon whom God will not spend his rod. God is most angry where he apparently shows no anger. Jerome writing to a sick friend hath this expression, I accounted a part of unhappiness not to know adversity. I judge you to be miserable because you've not been miserable. Nothing said another seems more unhappiness than you. I judge you to be miserable because you've not been miserable. I judge you to be miserable because you've not been miserable. Nothing said another seems more unhappy to me than he to whom no adversity hath happened. God afflicts you, O Christian, in love. Therefore Luther cried out, Strike, Lord! Strike, Lord, and spare not. And while we should not invite manifold trials, when we fall into them, let us know

66:18 what they are. And by the grace of God, respond to them as we ought. Let us pray. We confess with shame that all too often we have judged you by feeble sense, failing to remember that behind a frowning providence you were hiding a smiling face. We're ashamed that we've been like little babies, wanting to be kitchikooed, wanting to have our comforters and our security blankets. Father, forgive us. We've been so quick to chafe when you've brought your rod upon us. We've been so quick to murmur as the children of Israel when you put them to the test. Forgive us, O forgive us. And

67:22 we pray that the things we have contemplated this morning from your word may be written upon our hearts, and that when intense trials come, that we may remember what we ought to know. And in your grace, react in the light of it. Have mercy upon those, our Father, to whom this is all so much religious gibberish. Open their eyes. Take them in hand now before they feel not the afflicting rod of a loving father, but the crushing rod of an angry judge. Have mercy. Have mercy upon the unconverted among us, we pray. May your blessing be with us.

68:09 May your blessing rest upon us as we leave this place. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen.