Solving Problems God’s Way: Part 5 The Benefits of Problems
A minister was preaching about the benefits of living as healthy a life as possible. He decided that a visual demonstration would add emphasis to his Sunday sermon.
Four worms were placed into four separate jars.
The first worm was put into a container of alcohol.
The second worm was put into a container of cigarette smoke.
The third worm was put into a container of chocolate syrup.
The fourth worm was put into a container of good clean soil.
At the conclusion of the sermon, the Minister reported the following results:
The first worm in alcohol - Dead.
The second worm in cigarette smoke - Dead.
Third worm in chocolate syrup - Dead.
Fourth worm in good clean soil - Alive.
So the Minister asked the congregation - What can you learn from this demonstration?
A little old woman in the back quickly raised her hand and said, "As long as you drink, smoke and eat chocolate, you won’t have worms!"
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* That wasn’t the benefit the preacher was wanting to get across.
* It may sound impossible, but if we respond correctly to our problems we can actually benefit from them.
* Most of us want quick solutions to our problems, but God wants to make sure that all His disciplines for character development in us and those around us are accomplished before He removes our problems.
* People try different means to escape their problems – alcohol, drugs (legal & illegal), reading, workaholic.
* Some say “If I could just go somewhere else!” - circumstances are not the problem.
* God is also more concerned that the right procedure be followed in solving the problems than that the problems are actually resolved.
* We want to get out from under the pressure of our problems, but God wants to use that pressure to motivate us to a greater level of spirituality than we would otherwise have achieved.
* Often our present problems are the results of past disobedience. Now God is using these problems to apply the pressures we need for complete obedience.
* If we fail to gain these benefits from our present problem, He will only have to raise up new problems.
* “Benefits” of problems – it almost sounds like a contradiction!
* The word “problem” carries the idea of something bad or perplexing.
* Webster – 1) a question raised for inquiry, consideration, or solution. 2) a source of perplexity, distress, or vexation
* So you may ask, “How can anything good come out of this problem?” “What benefit is there to my problems?”
Let’s think about 4 benefits to our problems today.
1. The benefit of receiving more grace from God. James 4:6
* Nothing is more humbling than experiencing conflicts we cannot solve, especially when others know about our problems. But it is this very experience that God uses to break our pride and give us grace.
* Jas 4:6 But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.
* God "gives" more grace… implies something you didn’t have before.
* II Cor. 12:7-10 God did not change Paul’s circumstances but gave grace to enjoy problems.
* How many have given testimony to the fact that it was when they hit rock bottom,…when their problems came in upon them like a flood, that they looked to God and their lives were turned around.
* The success of our life is entirely related to how much grace God gives us. Grace is the desire and power to do God’s will.
Php 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
* Peter’s prayer was that grace would be multiplied to every Christian.
2Pe 1:2 Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
? How then do we get this grace? There is one primary way - by being humbled.
-- You can’t buy grace… you can’t earn grace
-- But you can get grace given to you IF you meet the condition of humbling yourself.
2. The benefit of self-examination. I Cor. 11:31-32
* There is something about problems that causes us to look inside.
-- We ask the question, "What did I do to make this happen?", "What did I do wrong?", or "Why is this happening?", …"Why now?"
* God desires that each of us examine ourselves.
1Co 11:31-32 For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. (32) But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world.
* If we would self examine our motives(our hearts) then we are NOT disciplined by God.
Heb 12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
* When things are going well for us we are not easily motivated to examine oursleves.
* But when a major conflict arises and our spirit is grieved, we have the most effective motivation to search out the inner motives, actions, words and attitudes of our hearts.
Pro 20:27 The spirit of man is the candle of the LORD, searching all the inward parts of the belly.
This is precisely what God meant when He said,
Pro 6:23 For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life:
Pro 12:1 Whoso loveth instruction loveth knowledge: but he that hateth reproof is brutish.
* All of these are verses that emphasize the importance of inner inspection.
* Problems motivate us to self – examination.
Illus - Mike Leiter – sermon central illustrations
Once upon a time a daughter complained to her father that her life was miserable and that she didn’t know how she was going to make it.
She was tired of fighting and struggling all the time. It seemed just as one problem was solved, another one soon followed.
Her father, a chef, took her to the kitchen. He filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire. Once the three pots began to boil, he placed potatoes in one pot, eggs in the second pot, and ground coffee beans in the third pot.
He then let them sit and boil, without saying a word to his daughter.
The daughter, moaned and impatiently waited, wondering what he was doing.
After twenty minutes he turned off the burners. He took the potatoes out of the pot and placed them in a bowl. He pulled the eggs out and placed them a bowl. He then ladled the coffee out and placed it in a cup.
Turning to her he asked. "Daughter, what do you see?"
"Potatoes, eggs, and coffee," she hastily replied.
"Look closer", he said, "and touch the potatoes." She did and noted that they were soft.
He then asked her to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard-boiled egg.
Finally, he asked her to sip the coffee. Its rich aroma brought a smile to her face.
"Father, what does this mean?" she asked.
He then explained that the potatoes, the eggs and coffee beans had each faced the same adversity - the boiling water. However, each one reacted differently.
The potato went in strong, hard, and unrelenting, but in boiling water, it became soft and weak.
The egg was fragile, with the thin outer shell protecting its liquid interior until it was put in the boiling water. Then the inside of the egg became hard.
However, the ground coffee beans were unique. After they were exposed to the boiling water, they changed the water and created something new.
"Which are you?" he asked his daughter. "When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a potato, an egg, or a coffee bean?"
In life, things happen around us, things happen to us, but the only thing that truly matters is what happens within us.
* Problems offer the benefit of driving us to our knees and to our God.
3. The benefit of new insight into Scripture. Psalm 119:71, Prov. 1:23
Portions of Scripture may never be meaningful to us unless we go through the experiences for which they give insight.
* Some of you can point to passages of Scripture that have a significance that other parts of scripture don’t have because God used that passage to speak directly to you during a particularly difficult time in you life.
* Notice that is during a time of trouble that God’s words are "made known" to us.
Pro 1:23 Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.
* Even though David knew his conflicts were a result of his own sin, he was able to say,
Psa 119:71 It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes.
* The Psalms have so much to say about us and the troubles we experience.
-- You will find the words of the Psalmist come alive when you hear him cry out to God as he goes through some of the same troubles that we go through in our lives. (Failure, sin, suffering, betrayal, sickness, depression, dis- couragement, aging, attacks by enemies, feeling forsaken by God & others)
Mat 4:4 But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
* The truth is that problems have a way of making the Scriptures come alive!
* The Bible becomes food for our hungry soul… sweet to the taste.
4. The benefit of growing in faith. James 1:2-4
* I learn that God can be trusted!
* Problems are opportunities for us to learn to trust God.
* I grow spiritually because problems press me closer to the heart of God.
* James 1:2-4 “2 My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations (trials, problems); 3 Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. 4 But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.”
* Trials (problems) mature us!
Illus –
Owen Bourgaize
There are some interesting facts about the sisal plant from which is made tough sisal twine. It grows in Yucatan, Mexico, in hard stony soil. Some Americans visited the area and decided that there might be good money to be made in growing it in richer soil under better conditions. So they started a sisal plantation in Florida where the plant found life no longer a struggle for survival and grew to enormous size. The business promised tremendous returns until the time came for reaping. It was then that the leaf from which fibre vital for the twine comes collapsed into a soft pulp. The tough fibre-quality was missing. They learned then that the sisal plant acquired its toughness by its battle with adverse circumstances - the wind, the heat and the barren soil. God doesn’t take pleasure in allowing the blasts of adversity to trouble His people but in His mercy and wisdom knows just what is necessary to foster the growth of spiritual character.
* Listen to Paul’s description of himself growing in faith:
Philippians 4:11-12 Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. (12) I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.
* The Apostle Paul learned contentment through the extreme experiences of life.
He didn’t say he received contentment through a one time supernatural experience with God. No, he learned over the process of time and experience to be content. God used both the mountain top and the valleys of life to develop in Paul a Godly contentment. Paul’s problems contributed to his spiritual development.
Through It All – Andrae Crouch
I’ve had many tears and sorrows,
I’ve had questions for tomorrow,
There’ve been times I didn’t know right from wrong;
But in every situation
God gave blessed consolation
That my trials only come to make me strong.
I’ve been to lots of places,
And I’ve seen a lot of faces,
There’ve been times I felt so all alone;
But in my lonely hours,
Yes, those precious lonely hours,
Jesus let me know I was His own.
Chorus:
Through it all, Through it all,
I’ve learned to trust in Jesus,
I’ve learned to trust in God:
Through it all, Through it all,
I’ve learned to depend upon His Word.
I thank God for the mountains,
And I thank Him for the valleys,
I thank Him for the storms He brought me through;
For if I’d never had a problem
I wouldn’t know He could solve them,
I’d never know what faith in God Could do.
Illustration - THE BLESSING OF THORNS
Sandra felt as low as the heels of her shoes as she pushed against a
November gust and the florist shop door.
Her life had been easy, like a spring breeze. Then in the fourth month of her second pregnancy, a minor automobile accident stole that from her. During this Thanksgiving week she would have delivered a son. She grieved over her loss. As if that weren’t enough, her husband’s company threatened a transfer. Then her sister, whose holiday visit she coveted, called saying she could not come for the holiday.
Then Sandra’s friend infuriated her by suggesting her grief was a God-given path to maturity that would allow her to empathize with others who suffer. She has no idea what I’m feeling, thought Sandra with a shudder.
Thanksgiving? Thankful for what? She wondered. For a careless driver whose truck was hardly scratched when he rear-ended her? For an airbag that saved her life but took that of her child?
"Good afternoon, can I help you?" The shop clerk’s approach startled her.
"I....I need an arrangement," stammered Sandra.
"For Thanksgiving? Do you want beautiful but ordinary, or would you like to challenge the day with a customer favorite I call the Thanksgiving "Special?" asked the shop clerk. "I’m convinced that flowers tell stories," she continued.
"Are you looking for something that conveys ’gratitude’ this thanksgiving?"
"Not exactly!" Sandra blurted out. "In the last five months, everything that could go wrong has gone wrong."
Sandra regretted her outburst, and was surprised when the shop clerk said, "I have the perfect arrangement for you."
Just then the shop door’s small bell rang, and the shop clerk said, "Hi, Barbara ...let me get your order." She politely excused herself and walked toward a small workroom, then quickly reappeared, carrying an arrangement of greenery, bows, and long-stemmed thorny roses. Except the ends of the rose stems were neatly snipped: there were no flowers.
"Want this in a box?" asked the clerk.
Sandra watched for the customer’s response. Was this a joke? Who would want rose stems with no flowers! She waited for laughter, but neither woman laughed.
"Yes, please," Barbara, replied with an appreciative smile. "You’d think after three years of getting the special, I wouldn’t be so moved by its significance, but I can feel it right here, all over again," she said as she gently tapped her chest. And she left with her order.
"Uh," stammered Sandra, "that lady just left with, uh....she just left with no flowers!
"Right, said the clerk, "I cut off the flowers. That’s the Special. I call it the Thanksgiving Thorns Bouquet."
"Oh, come on, you can’t tell me someone is willing to pay for that!" exclaimed Sandra.
"Barbara came into the shop three years ago feeling much like you feel today," explained the clerk. "She thought she had very little to be thankful for. She had lost her father to cancer, the family business was failing, her son was into drugs, and she was facing major surgery."
"That same year I had lost my husband," continued the clerk, "and for the first time in my life, had just spent the holidays alone. I had no children, no husband, no family nearby, and too great a debt to allow any travel."
"So what did you do?" asked Sandra.
"I learned to be thankful for thorns," answered the clerk quietly. "I’ve always thanked God for the good things in my life and never questioned the good things that happened to me, but when bad stuff hit, did I ever ask questions! It took time for me to learn that dark times are important. I have always enjoyed the ’flowers’ of life, but it took thorns to show me the beauty of God’s comfort. You know, the Bible
says that God comforts us when we’re afflicted, and from His consolation we learn to comfort others."
Sandra sucked in her breath as she thought about the very thing her friend had tried to tell her. "I guess the truth is I don’t want comfort. I’ve lost a baby and I’m angry with God."
Just then someone else walked in the shop. "Hey, Phil!" shouted the clerk to the balding, plump man.
"My wife sent me in to get our usual Thanksgiving Special....12 thorny, long-stemmed stems!" laughed Phil as the clerk handed him a tissue-wrapped arrangement from the refrigerator.
"Those are for your wife?" asked Sandra incredulously. "Do you mind me asking why she wants something that looks like that?"
"No...I’m glad you asked," Phil replied. "Four years ago my wife and I nearly divorced. After forty years, we were in a real mess, but with the Lord’s grace and guidance, we slogged through problem after problem. He rescued our marriage. Jenny here (the clerk) told me she kept a vase of rose stems to remind her of what she learned from "thorny" times, and that was good enough for me. I took home some of those stems. My wife and I decided to label each one for a specific "problem" and give thanks for what that problem taught us."
As Phil paid the clerk, he said to Sandra, "I highly recommend the Special!"
"I don’t know if I can be thankful for the thorns in my life." Sandra said. "It’s all too...fresh."
"Well," the clerk replied carefully, "my experience has shown me that thorns make roses more precious. We treasure God’s providential care more during trouble than at any other time. Remember, it was a crown of thorns that Jesus wore so we might know His love. Don’t resent the thorns."
Tears rolled down Sandra’s cheeks. For the first time since the accident, she loosened her grip on resentment. "I’ll take those twelve long-stemmed thorns, please," she managed to choke out.
"I hoped you would," said the clerk gently. "I’ll have them ready in a minute."
"Thank you. What do I owe you?"
"Nothing. Nothing but a promise to allow God to heal your heart. The first year’s arrangement is always on me." The clerk smiled and handed a card to Sandra. "I’ll attach this card to your arrangement, but maybe you would like to read it first."
It read: "My God, I have never thanked You for my thorns. I have thanked You a thousand times for my roses, but never once for my thorns. Teach me the glory of the cross I bear; teach me the value of my thorns. Show me that I have climbed closer to You along the path of pain. Show me that, through my tears, the colors of Your rainbow look much more brilliant."
Praise Him for your roses; thank him for your thorns!
-- Author Unknown
Closing
* You know how I know there are benefits to problems we experience?
Because God says , “And we know that God causes all things (problems included) to work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” Rom. 8:28
1. THE BENEFIT OF receiving MORE "GRACE" FROM GOD
2. THE BENEFIT OF SELF-EXAMINATION
3. THE BENEFIT OF NEW INSIGHT IN SCRIPTURE
4. THE BENEFIT OF GROWING IN FAITH
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