Wisdom in the Midst of Trials

Dr. Charles Stanley: I don't know what you're going through, but more than likely, you've asked a couple of questions. Why has this happened to me? And God, why don't you remove this? And remember this, more important than God removing the difficulty, hardship, pain, and suffering is that you and I learn something. That we walk away from whatever we're going through in life, being able to say deeply within our heart, thank you, dear God, for all you've brought me through. Thank you, dear God, for what you're in the process of teaching me in this.
Guest (Male): It's normal to want to bypass hardship, but difficulty often can't be predicted or avoided. On this edition of In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley, we'll learn how to make the most of our seasons of suffering by understanding God's purpose for pain. Today's message, Wisdom in the Midst of Trials, centers us on First Peter, chapter one. Let's listen in to Dr. Stanley's message.
Dr. Charles Stanley: Are you going through some trial in your life that you don't understand? You don't know why it had to happen to you. You look back and you ask one or two questions, what did I do to deserve this? You can't come up with an answer. God, why have you allowed this in my life? Can't come up with an answer. And to be truthful and honest, what you want most of all is out of this. I want to escape it. I want freedom from it. I want all this pain and hurt and disappointment, and hopelessness, and helplessness, and all the things that I'm going through. Naturally, I just want out of all this as quickly as possible. Do you think that's the will of God? You say, well, sure it is, because He's a good God. Well, maybe in a few moments, you'll realize that God has something far more important from His perspective than simply getting you out of this difficulty, hardship, or trial. It may be something in your health. It may be in your marriage, or with your children, your finances, or on your job or whatever it might be. But what you want is to get out of this. It's a trial in your life that you can't figure out why, and you can't figure out how to get out. But if God is the God He says He is, why isn't He here and answer my prayer? I think you'll find there's an answer. Because what I want to talk about in this whole message today, I want to talk about wisdom in the midst of trials. How are we to respond? How does God respond? What is He up to in allowing all these things to happen? In other words, do you want to benefit from it, or do you just want to get bitter and resentful and hostile toward God because of it? There's a choice. I can benefit from whatever difficulty I'm facing, or I can get bitter, blame somebody else, blame God, and miss the whole point. And here's my thinking about this, why hurt and suffer pain, agony, hardship, and all the rest and don't benefit from it? If I got to go through it, I'll profit from it. And there are many things we're going to have to go through that we don't ask for. But we have the privilege of profiting from every difficulty, every hardship, every suffering, every pain. We have the privilege of benefiting from it. But it has to do with my attitude. Do I believe that God loves me enough that He's up to something good? So from the viewpoint of wisdom, what are the purposes for these trials in our life? And the first one is simply this, as He says in this first chapter of First Peter, listen to what He says. In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you've been distressed by various trials. For what reason? He says, look, right now you're going through a difficult time, so that, in order that, for this purpose, what is that? That the proof of your faith. And that is being approved. That's what that word means. Being more precious than gold which is perishable. He says, in God's eyes, look at this, your faith is more valuable as far as God is concerned than gold and silver and all the rest. So, He says, one of the reasons that we're going through it is for God to do what? He's going to strengthen your faith. One of your greatest assets is your faith. Because it's by your faith. And how many times we go to the scriptures and we find verses in the Bible about prayer and linked with that of faith, trusting God. And so one of the reasons He allows these things in our life, one of His purposes, is to do what? To test our faith. You won't know how much faith you have until it's tested. And so God tests us by allowing us to be persecuted, hurt, pain, suffering, all kind of loss, whatever it might be. And as He watches us walk through that, and He as He sees our faith growing, and we persevere, and we don't quit, and we don't give up. We don't grow bitter and resentful and hostile toward other people because of what's happening to us. What happens? Our faith grows. And the greater your faith, the stronger your personal relationship to the Lord. A second thing is this, the testing of our devotion. Do I love Him? Do I only love Him whenever everything's going my way? Can I honestly say that I love Jesus Christ as my personal savior? And oftentimes, we find out where we are. Test our devotion. When I feel pain more than I think I can bear, can I still say, God, I truly love you? It's those tests in which we find out who we really are. What we are like. Then, of course, there is the purpose of purifying our life. Now you say, you mean God would send you through suffering to purify your life? Yes, He would. You know why? He's not telling us He would. Here's what He said. In Romans 8:29, when He says, He predestined something, that means He predetermined for His children because Romans 8:28 is all about believers. That He causes all things to work together for good to those who love Him, to those who are called according to His purpose. He follows that up by saying, and He predestined. He put a circle around us. Every single believer, a circle around us. He predetermined that every single believer would be conformed to the likeness of His son. That is a predetermined act of the will of God. So, that's more important, and it takes precedence over how I feel, how much joy do I have, everything going my way. No. God says, I've predetermined to conform you to the likeness of My son. How many sins were found in the life of Jesus? None. Anything impure in His life? None. Anything imperfect in His life? None. Does that mean we're going to be perfect and absolutely sinless? No. But He says, He predestined us to be conformed to the likeness of His son. But if you'll think about it, He's already, listen, He knew before you were saved, you're going to be saved. So, when you were saved and you became a child of God, God predetermined that you would, your character would be like that of His son. And so that being the case, let me ask you a question. What is it that builds character in our life? Test, trials. What is it that builds purity in our life? Confession, openness, and honesty and being willing to acknowledge the truth about ourselves. So God's purposes are awesome. And when I think about God purifying us, think about this, there's something about pain that purifies. It reaches the depths of our soul and our spirit and brings us to the reality and the truthfulness about ourselves. And a person can go along in life and sort of get along as they would think, and I'm doing fine as a Christian, and a lot of things in their life that shouldn't be there. And all of a sudden the bottom drops out of their life. There's pain, suffering, heartache, troubles, and trials. And then what do they do? They want to cry out to God to help them. And most of the time, what is He going to do? He's going to start not with the physical ailment. He's going to start in the spirit, in the heart. What's going on in your life? And many people prolong the suffering because they will not acknowledge that God is in the process of purifying their life. Now, another reason is that God takes an opportunity to show Himself strong in our life. We go through trials and heartaches and we think, God, how am I going to handle this? And God steps into that situation and demonstrates His awesome power. And He demonstrates what He's able to do and what He's willing to do in your life if you're willing to listen to Him. So God has purposes. He doesn't let these things go by without specific purposes. And so that's one of them. Then His purpose is to provide Christ-like character in our life. So, if we stopped right there, we'd say, well, God having any purpose in all this? Yes, He does. And that's some of the purpose, I'll just add one more. And that's very clear in Second Corinthians chapter one verse four. Listen to this. Verse three says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves have been comforted by God. He says, one of the primary reasons He allows these things in our life is to do what? To equip you and me to be able to help other people through that difficulty. For example, let's say that you're going through some real bad difficulty in your life. Maybe it's a physical thing, some pain. Who do you want to talk to? Somebody who's in perfect health, never had a problem at all in their life, wonder why you're where you are. No, you don't. If you're going through something in your finances and you don't know which way to turn, you want to turn to somebody who has been there, who has wisdom and knowledge about their finances. You can take any aspect of life. God intends, watch this, He intends that you and I profit from all the hardships, disasters that happen in our life. He has something good in every single one of them. Now, if you believe that, and I certainly hope you do, and you can look at the scripture, lots of scriptures. Then I should be able to walk out of here saying, you know what? Enough of this complaining and moaning and groaning and feeling like a victim and blaming somebody else. God's up to something good in my life. Oops, I know it hurts, God. But I know you're up to something good in my life. It'll change your attitude. Now, watch this. Just physiologically, when your attitude gets right, it's amazing the effect that has on your physical body. I'm not saying you can think yourself into healing, but I know this. When I understand that God is up to something good even though I'm hurting, whatever the source of it may be, there's going to be a sense of encouragement. Because you don't see it as just isolated pain or isolated disease or isolated loss or somebody has attacked you for something. You see God working in your life in an awesome way. Now, we need wisdom to discern the proper response. How am I going to respond to these things? And as we said, you can be bitter and resentful and hostile. What's the right way? So let's think about it for a few moments. The scripture said, we read a few moments ago, we to rejoice. Now this is very important. Are you listening? Say amen.
Audience: Amen.
Dr. Charles Stanley: I am not to rejoice over my broken leg. I'm not to rejoice over a broken arm or anything on the inside. I am to rejoice over what God is doing in this process of whatever's going on. It would be foolish and the Bible doesn't say we're to rejoice over the broken leg. He says, we're to rejoice over these things, listen, the result of them. In other words, He doesn't expect us to say, oh, praise God, I love this pain. Jesus, thank you. He knows we're not going to say that. But I can praise God for how you're going to benefit me through it, Lord. And that's very important we make that distinction. Now, let's look at something else. We can rejoice when we are convinced that the following things are true. That God is in control of the time and intensity of my trial. Very important that I understand that. That He's in charge. He's in control of the time of it, and the intensity of this pain or disaster, whatever it might be. Secondly, that He has a specific purpose for allowing it. If I can really believe that He has a specific purpose for allowing it, then I'm going to be able to walk through it with confidence and assurance, and I'm going to be able to benefit from it. But I must believe that. Thirdly, whatever pain, suffering, heartache, hardship you go through, not only does God have a purpose, but it's part of His equipping. He's equipping you. So you can feel what the other person feels. When somebody else, for example, loses a child, who can understand that better than somebody who's lost one? Does God make all understanding limited to that? No. But what I want you to see is, watch this carefully. Today, whoever you are, wherever you are, and whatever you're facing in life, whatever's going on in your life, God will use that. When you respond properly, He will use that to be a blessing to somebody else, a help to someone else. You become a walking word of encouragement to them. Since you've walked there, and God's worked in your life, and you've been through the pain, the hurt, the disappointment, and the shame, or whatever it might be, you've been there, you know how that feels. Then somebody can say, well, here's what I'm going through, I don't know how to handle that. When you can say, I've been there. It is amazing. I have been there, four words, are powerful. You see, why do you and I go to Jesus when we're hurting? I have been there. Look at the cross. He's been there. Why do we read the epistles that Paul wrote in prison? Because he could say, I have been there. And when you and I go through those kind of times in our life, He is equipping you and preparing you to be able to say to others, I have been there. The trial is going to be to my benefit if I respond in faith. If I'm trusting Him. Lord, I don't understand it. I don't like it. But I'm going to trust you, Jesus, that no matter what, I know you'll work it out for my benefit. I can rejoice when the trial is an opportunity to demonstrate perseverance under pressure. You know a lot of folks who walk through something just quit and give up. Perseverance says, no matter what, I keep going. I'm going to trust Him no matter how I feel. I'm going to keep going no matter what they say. And I can tell you, if God had not taught me to persevere a long time ago, I would not be sitting right here today. If you listen to what other people tell you that you ought to do this, and you ought to do that, and you ought to do the other. You go back to these questions. What does God want me to do at this particular time in my life? We persevere. It hurts, but you keep going. You get knocked down, you stand up. You get clobbered by somebody, and you you just ignore it and keep moving. Perseverance is a very important part of the Christian life. Watch this carefully. God guards every aspect of our life, and He knows exactly when you can handle what He's going to put on you. Because remember, His goal is never to defeat you, but to develop you into Christ-likeness. And so He's governing every single aspect of our life. And remember also that He is equipping you at this point in your life to do what? To be a help, a blessing, as He says in Corinthians, a comfort to other people. And remember also, the right attitude is, God will walk with me through every phase of this trial. We talk about being in the presence of God all the time. And yet when we're hurting and in pain, sometime we forget that He's there. This is where most folks think about it. They say, I'm holding on. I'm holding on to God. No, no, no, no, no. This is the way it is. He's holding on to you. And you may let go. And you may you may find yourself weakening. But you know what? This loving heavenly Father, He will never let go. And here's what He said, I will never forsake you. I will never leave you. I will never desert you. No matter what you're going through in life. Hebrews chapter 13, verse 5. I will never. If anybody else said it, you could forget it. But this is the omniscient, all knowing, omnipresent, all powerful, omnipresent, all there, God, whose love cannot be measured. It's best seen and demonstrated at the cross. It's a loving Father, who has the best in mind for you, no matter what you're going through in life. Don't waste your sorrows, your heartaches, your pain, your suffering, your disappointment. Don't waste that by a wrong response, but just tell Him, Lord, I don't understand it. I don't like it. It hurts. This wouldn't be my choice, but Father, I'm going to trust you. You know what's best for my life. You know what you want to do with my life. If you'll just enable me, I will persevere and keep walking your path, no matter how deep in the belly it goes. I will be walking on the path, trusting you to take me through all the way to the other side. And Father, how grateful we are that we'll never be disappointed in a promise of yours. You know who's hurting almost to the point of death today. You know those that are so discouraged, they want to quit and walk away. But we know that you have the power to enable your children to persevere, to keep moving. And I pray that every person who hears this message will realize there's a loving Father who's not just watching, but who's there. Ready to see them through it. Ready to forgive sin, ready to strengthen them, ready to enable them, ready ready to do for them exactly what they need if they'll trust you with all of their heart. We just want to say we love you, Father, for being so good to us in Jesus name. Amen.
Guest (Male): You're listening to In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley. Instead of always looking for ways to escape the inevitability of adversity, believers can face hard times knowing with confidence that they never endure trouble alone. You'll find out more about how to give your burdens to the Lord at our website, intouch.org. And if you'd like to review what you just heard, look for the link to today on radio. And if you go to our store page, you can order a copy of Dr. Stanley's complete message, Wisdom in the Midst of Trials. It's also included in his Wisdom from Above teaching set. Again, you'll find these resources at intouch.org. To call or text, the number is 1-800-INTOUCH. And you can write to us by addressing your letter to In Touch, Post Office Box 7900, Atlanta, Georgia, 30357, or 1-800-INTOUCH. Do you feel like you're all on your own? Hear about the believer's constant companion coming up in today's moment with Charles Stanley.
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Guest (Male): You're listening to In Touch. Are you going through life storms on your own or with God? Here's a moment with Charles Stanley.
Dr. Charles Stanley: I don't know what you're going through in life. But if you've never trusted Jesus as your Savior, you're on your own, and that's not going to work. If you're willing to trust Him as your personal Savior, everything will change. You do that by confessing your sinfulness. Listen, you're a sinner. You've sinned against Almighty God. You've rebelled against Him. Acknowledge it. Ask Him to forgive you. Not because you're going to do better, but because when Jesus went to the cross, the Father placed all of your rebellion and difference and sinfulness on His son, nailed into the cross, shed His blood, and the shedding of His blood paid your sin debt in full. It'll transform your life. It's a decision you have to make. If you are a believer, you can respond in one or two ways. God, work in my life whatever is necessary to conform me to the likeness of your son. Or you can say, God, I'm bitter, I'm resentful, I'm hostile, I don't like it. That will be a disaster. I trust that you're wise enough to say, Lord, not my will, but your will be done.
Guest (Male): Once you receive God's gift of forgiveness through faith in Jesus Christ, you are His forever. Learn about persevering in the Christian life at intouch.org. And if today's program gave you renewed motivation to obey God, we'd love to hear from you. Coming soon on In Touch, are you struggling with the same old habits and attitudes? If so, be back with us again to hear biblical wisdom for overcoming temptation. On In Touch, the teaching ministry of Dr. Charles Stanley. This program is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia, and remains on this station through the grace of God and your faithful prayers and gifts.