Seeing Purpose in Your Problems and Pain, Part 9

in your problems and pain. It's really been an in-depth look at the first 12 verses of James chapter one, and it's been so good to be reminded of the sovereignty of God, to take a look at why he may be allowing those problems and pain, the suffering that we experience in our lives, how he uses that to refine us and conform us more into the image and

the likeness of His Son, Jesus. And so as we understand these truths and begin to apply them to our lives, it can strengthen our faith in such a way that we're able to totally trust the promises of God to lean into His Word. And as Pastor Ford said just a few moments ago, to live in are not yet, but to do so right now, to actively engage that faith, to choose through an active faith, to trust God, to know that he's going to use that pain and those

problems in our lives to accomplish his purposes. So if you can one more time, open your Bible to James chapter one and join us there as we wrap up the message seeing purpose in your problems and pain. Here is Pastor Ford.

the purple bag was. Crown royal? Yeah. Uh, but I remember in 1961, I was ten years old, and my mama gave me a piggy bank. Now I got this one. This is different. This one has a little thing on the bottom. You can pull it out and get the coins. But. But back in the day, is anybody had one like I used to have. It didn't have this on the bottom. How many of you had had a remember that. It didn't have that. How would you have to get the. Because you yeah you you'd have to bust it. But

see not from my family. You didn't bust it because mama paid for this. Yeah. So you don't bust nothing. Mama paid because then mama would whip your behind. So here's what you would do. You want to get some money out of it? What you do is you take it, turn it upside down, and you would shake it until something came out. See, you got to realize that God puts something valuable in every one of you. Everybody la di da di and everybody. He put it in you.

And it's not going to come out of you very naturally. So sometimes what God has to do is turn you upside down and shake it until it falls out, because God knows that unless you turn them upside down and shake them, what he put in them is not going to come out of them. And therefore, what needs to come out of you to prepare you for where God is taking you won't come out. And so God takes you and shakes you, and out comes more faith. God takes you and shakes you, and out comes more power.

And God takes you and shakes you, and out comes mercy and love and grace and peace and vision and you, you. Yeah. It comes out of you and you think I can't make it? And God says, oh yes you can, and it comes out of you, I can't take it. And you say, yeah, it's in. I didn't know all that was up in me. Come on, tell him. Shake me, Lord tell something come out that you put in that I can use to move toward what you have for me. Mhm. This thing getting gooder. But then notice not just test

our faith, notice, teach our endurance. So he says let patience. He's used the word twice now in chapter one the word patience is hupomone say hupomone. And it literally means hoopah. Under Monet abide to abide under. In chapter five he uses the word macro through me, say macro through me, and macro long through me are minded. Now here's what it means. He bookends it with patience. In chapter one he says, you have to be patient in problems. That's hupomone.

And then he says, I gotta take you to the bigger stuff. Chapter five. You gotta be patient with people. And so being patient with problems and patience with people he says to abide under, why do I need to abide under. Because some things that happen to you are actually happening for you. Sometimes when it looks like things are falling apart, things are really falling in place. But you must stand your ground. See, God wants you to hold out instead of giving out. You gotta stay under it.

Let me, let me just quote I'd like to read after Pastor Butler. Here's what he said. The old tongue in cheek adage I want patience and I want it now reflects the difficulty of developing patience. Patience doesn't come overnight and it doesn't come without tribulation. He's got book, chapter, verse. You know what it is. Anybody know that verse in Romans chapter six? That's right. Verse three. Tribulation worketh patience. If you've ever prayed for patience, what you said is

bring me some trouble. I just I read everybody's mind just then. I ain't never praying for patience again. Never, never. Yeah, that's what you're praying for. And so Hebrews 12. That's a powerful patience. Here's it says, wherefore, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us run with patience the race, that's why. Because it's not a 100 yard dash. It's a 26 mile marathon. And he's saying, listen. So. So you gotta go for

the long haul. Mhm. See here's what we do. We come up with all these excuses about why we can't stay under what God is allowing or authorized for us to go through in Romans 12, when it says, wherefore, seeing we compassed about with. You know what it's all about people who stood, people who stood their ground, who did not let any of their circumstances cause them to get out from under what God was doing. Okay, let me call the roll because somebody said, I'm too old

to serve God. You know, I'm to leave it to the young folk. I'm just too old to serve God. And Moses said, you're never too old to serve God. I didn't start my ministry till I was 80, and then I served him for 40 years and served him until I was 120. How old are you? You? Never too old. Somebody talking about. Well, well, see, I'm too young. You know God can't use me. I'm just too young. And David says I was 17 when the Lord used

me to defeat Goliath. And Daniel says I was 16 when I was taken into Babylon and and and, uh, became, uh, a president at an early age and and Josiah says, I was eight when I came to the throne of Israel and started revival. And Jeremiah says, I got all y'all beat. I was in my mother's womb. Hey, he called me hey in the womb. I gave him praise in the womb. I guess you could call that prenatal praise. Yeah, yeah.

And so here it is. Here it is. Somebody said I can't put myself on the altar like Romans 12 one and two says, and and Isaac says, I did. I did somebody saying, well, see, you don't have baby mama drama and baby daddy drama. And Jacob said, tell me about it. Mhm. Yeah. And, and so what's going on. I can't serve because I was a thought. Mhm. Yeah. And, and Rahab says look uh don't let that bother you girlfriend. I ran the Best little whorehouse in Jericho and I'm

in the genealogy of Jesus Christ. Mhm. Yeah. And somebody says I was too much of a player, and David and Solomon look at each other and say, wannabe. Somebody says, I talk too much and I can't back up my claims. And and Peter says, join the club. In other words, they could have given up. But they stood. They stood. They understood that the struggle that I'm going through is for the future. I'm going to. That the struggle is a part of making me who I'm going to become.

It's the old butterfly coming out of the cocoon. The man was jogging. He saw it, wanted to help it broke it out. Next day he came. He thought it would just be a chrysalis. He wanted to take it up and show everybody how he helped the butterfly to fly. But the butterfly was dead. He went to his entomologist friend. That's a bug doctor. And he said, man, what's going on? I helped this thing out and wow, it was dead.

The next day. And the entomologist, that's a bug doctor said, look, when you broke open the chrysalis, what you did was circumvented the process by which when he struggles, fluids leave his body go to his wings, which strengthens the wings to fly. When you circumvented the struggle, you circumvented the process where the fluid could flow, where he could fly. So he died. God wants to fill you with the Holy Spirit and anybody that circumvents that process, or helps

you out and brings you out of that struggle. What they're doing is circumventing the flow of the Holy Ghost through your entire being, that you would be filled with the spirit to have God's fruit in your life. I'm working hard. I'm working hard, I'm working hard. And so he says. Thirdly, he says to take us to maturity. Uh, so he says, listen, we need to know God wants us to be mature. He wants us to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior,

Jesus Christ. Now, uh, there's nothing that you're going through that Jesus can't see you through. Let me say it again. I said, there's nothing that you're going through that Jesus can't see you through. And so what's he saying here? To take us through maturity. Here's what the word means. Let me read it to you. Full grown, rounded out for a specific purpose. Wow. You have a specific purpose.

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Let's get back to our message. Here is Pastor Ford then entire.

But oh, the things I learned that day. When sorrow walked with me. Check this out. Check this out. Okay, let's take David. Let's take David. Now, now, what does God want him to do? Okay. David was. How old? Whenever Samuel anointed him. Okay, that's. That's close. He was 17. Now he anointed him. For what? To be the king. Okay. So you got a king anointing on a kid? God wasn't anointing him for where he was. God was preparing him for where he's going. Y'all still with me? So

now God's preparing him for where he's going. Now, for 13 years, he had this anointing on him. You know what most of us have done? Uh, Brother Strother, we have walked up to the castle at 17 and said, you sitting in my throne? Anyway, okay, so. So what happened? So, David. So, David, now, uh, has to do what? Wait 13 years. Now, when you read the story, I don't have time to tell you the story. You look at it. Look at all the things he went through. Everything was preparation for where he's going.

Let me say it again. Right over your head. Everything. What do you mean, everything? He shepherds sheep until he was 17. Why? Because God wanted to teach him as a shepherd how to shepherd human sheep by shepherding the animals and everything that he did for the animals he had to do for the people. As a matter of fact, he began to understand the correlation between Him and Yahweh and him and his sheep, because he said, the Lord

is my shepherd, I shall not want. And then he went down those other five verses and talked about everything. So he knew what a shepherd would do, how he learned that by being a shepherd. So look what he went through. He went through for 13 years. And remember this God gave him a foretaste of what was going to happen, because what he did was everything he went through. Okay. Goliath. Goliath wasn't a problem. Goliath was a platform. Everybody else looked at Goliath and said, he's too big to hit.

What did David say? Come on, come on. He's too big to miss. That's right. And so, you know, what did he do? You know, Goliath got stone. And David then was catapulted to the palace. Wait a minute, wait a minute. He got a foretaste. God said, let me show you where I'm taking you. And so Goliath got him into the palace. Now, remember, he ran from Saul for the rest of those years, and he had an opportunity to get out of that tribulation a number of times. Remember,

one time Saul was in a cave. David went in, cut a piece of garment off, and then said, I could have killed you, but I didn't. Why? Because he knew everything he's going through. God allowed it so he could be properly prepared when he took the throne. Doug cursed them and they said, I'm going to chop his head off one of his armor bearers. Oh, chop his head off, he said. Ah, how do I know? God didn't send him to say that to me, so I could analyze it and get myself together in areas where

I'm not ready yet. Man, maybe that's why he was called a man after God's own heart. Here's the last one. Verse 12. Here's the last one. Verse 12. Listen, blessed is the man that endureth temptation. For when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to them that love him. Get this now, because you know how you and I are. We want

full time benefits, but we serve Jesus part time. Verse 12 is a promise that there's something in the not yet, so that we can have the right mentality about the right. Now you get it, he says, blessed Makarios. I'm not going to take time to explain to you. Just here's what he's saying. He's saying, listen, when you go through it and you honor me through it, I am going to reward you. And so he said, listen, I'm taking you because it says at the end wanting nothing. That's

that's de come on. That that God wants us to understand and to recognize that he's transporting us to our destiny. And here now we are going to have the reward The promise. This is the last one. The reward. Promise. Verse 12. So where's the reward? In the. Not yet. Where are we? In the right now? So what is God saying? I'm going to tell you about the not yet, so that you can deal with your right now and know that you're right now. Don't cancel out your not yet.

So focus on the not yet and you'll make it through the right now. And that's what he's saying. He's saying listen you you need to understand it's a motivating factor. In other words, even though you're going through something live in your not yet right now. Call the things that are not as though they are and he's going to give us a reward. Wait a minute. You're going to give us a reward and all we're doing is obeying you? Yes,

that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to give you a reward, even though, uh, we're just obeying you. And there are five crowns. Let me give them to you. Since you won't come to Bible study, I'll bring Bible study to you there. There are five crowns that you can get. Six. Uh, if you have the crown of life. Twice. Uh, the incorruptible crown. First Corinthians 925 through 29. It's for those who master the old sin nature. Uh, that is, you walk in the spirit more. You walk in the flesh.

Number two, the crown of rejoicing. First Thessalonians 219. That's the crown that's given to soul winners. One plants, one waters. God gives the increase. So if you just planted a seed, God said, Imma give you a soul when it's crown. If you water the seed, God said, I'm giving you a soul winner's crown. If you were the one who actually led them to belief in Jesus Christ, you get a crown. Everybody that participates in soul winning gets a crown. Amen. Amen.

Then there is the crown of righteousness. Second Timothy four eight. It's for all of those who love the doctrine of the rapture of the church. You're looking for Jesus to come. You'll be so glad when he comes because you know when he comes, he's going to catch you in your own bed, not in somebody else's that you don't belong in. Hallelujah.

Number four, the crown of glory. That's the shepherd's crown that's given to all of those who work with their pastoral leadership, all of our elders and our deacons to fulfill the vision for which God has given this people. But here's the one he's talking about in here. Crown of life. He says it's the crown. What is the crown of life now? Revelation two seven talks about it as well. The crown of life is for all of those who honor God when they go through stuff. Who, who,

who go through stuff. And they, they lift up Jesus Christ in the midst of it so that people know there's something different about them as a believer when they go through stuff. See, they they they laugh at you on the job. If you live for Jesus Christ, but you're the one they look for when nobody's around and they need somebody to talk to. Hey, can I talk to you for a minute? Can I talk to you for a minute? Hey, this is what's going on. Can I, can I? Hey, man, what do you think? What do

you think? They're always looking for you. You want to know why? Because they see you honor God when you're going through something, they see you lift up the name of Jesus when you're in pain and when you're hurting. And they say, that's the kind of faith I want. And so here it is. Here it is. And you've been so gracious. I'm done. But but listen, here's what he says. You need to understand that what's going on here is what Jesus did. Here's what the Bible says. Who?

For the joy that was set before him. What joy! He's going to the cross. He's despised the cross. He's going to be whipped all night long. They're going to jam his head. What's so joyous about that? It's independent of the circumstances. Because Jesus could see you, you, you, you and me. You on Calvary, bearing our sin. And he said, this is going to be a happy day because Imma save James for junior in 74. Yes, I'm going to bring many sons to glory, because if a

seed doesn't die, it abides alone. But when I die, I'm not going to be buried. I'm just going to be planted. And when I come up, everybody who will receive me will be saved. Our problem is we want the power of Resurrection Sunday without the pain of Good Friday.

relationship with the Lord grew during that time. And if you've got a story like that, we'd be encouraged to hear it. Share your story with us when you come to Treasure Truth Radio org and click on the contact link. Again, it's just simply the contact link at Treasure Truth radio.org.

You know, pastor, there are a lot of places that we can choose to put our money and to expect some sort of return on investment, but when we give to Christian radio, to Moody Radio, and to treasure truth, really we're choosing to invest in something that really is Kingdom.

of those who win souls for Jesus Christ. And when you invest in Moody Radio, that's exactly what you're doing. I think there's going to be a surprise in heaven because we think, well, I didn't articulate to anyone the good news. And God says, you know, you get this crown because you gave so that someone else could articulate the good news.