I’m sure that many of you were doing the same thing that I was doing on Thursday evening. We had finished with the evening session of the pastors conference and I was planning on going back to the room and doing some studying. My laptop had other plans. It crashed. So I turned on the TV to catch up on the news. I’m sure that I was as shocked as you were when I saw what happened at Fort Hood. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It was very early in the coverage, so the details were very sketchy. The only thing they knew for sure was that somebody had shot a bunch of soldiers on Fort Hood. The reports were that 12 were dead and several more were injured. I flipped back and forth between several news channels to see if anybody was coming up with any more details. And as I did that, I was amazed at what was going on. Periodically the base leadership was giving press conferences which was the only real source of accurate information any of the media outlets really had. But each network had lots of airtime to fill up. So each of them did something fascinating with all of that airtime. Each of them took their preconceived notion of what was going on, and ran with it. They each had their template, and began to try to wedge the few details they had into that template. One network’s preconceived notion was that soldiers who come back from war are crazy people who are suffering from PTSD. So PTSD and mental health issues were all they talked about. One network was completely opposed to the war. So they turned the whole thing into an excuse to bring all of our poor, unstable, overdeployed troops home. Only one of the channels did so much as even ask the question about whether the guy’s Muslim background might have had anything to do with it. Never mind the fact that any time an abortion clinic is bombed, they immediately begin to call the crazy killer a “fundamentalist Christian.” Why do all the news outlets do that? Because they all have an agenda. Whether you agree with their agenda or not, you can’t argue the fact that they all have an agenda. That agenda shapes the way they cover the news. It shapes the stories they cover. And it shapes their reporting of those stories. But when you know their agenda going in, you know how to watch them. You know what to do with the individual stories. You know how they all fit in to what they’re trying to accomplish. Did you know that God has an agenda too? He created everything and is going to bring everything to the ends that He has determined. And the ends that He has determined will ultimately bring Him the most glory. That means that the ends that God is bringing everything to are good. A good God is actively bringing all things together for good. That is His agenda. When we begin to realize that, it can shape the way we look at all the individual stories of our lives. Even suffering.
The chapter we just read is Job’s first discourse in the book. And when he speaks, he is kicking off the dialogue section of the book. It kicks off a series of rambling back and forth between himself and his three friends. But I want you to notice what he keeps going back to in this chapter. In the midst of his grief and anguish, one thing is foremost in his mind. And that’s a question. He asks it in verse 11. He asks it in verse 12. He asks it in verse 20. And he asks it in verse 23. What’s the question he asks? He asks the same question we ask when we suffer or see suffering. He asks, Why? Notice what Job’s perspective is here. He is telling God that it would have been better if he had never been born. In other words, a greater good would have happened if something other than what had happened, happened. God, I know that you said that you are working all things together for good. But I think greater good would have happened if you had done it another way. So is your idea of good better than God’s? Of course not. But when you’re in the middle of suffering, it’s hard to see the good, isn’t it? It’s hard to figure out how God is going to make your suffering work for good. This week, I heard about a 15-year old young lady. One year younger than Katelyn. It was summer time and the girl walked over to the community swimming pool. Later on, it was getting late, so she started to walk home. Along the way, she was captured and brutally raped. She doesn’t know exactly what happened, because God mercifully blacked that from her mind. But despite the horror of the attack, with the support of her Christian mother, she trusted God. The girl was very naïve and had no idea what was going on with her body over the next several weeks—but she knew something was going on. So she went to the trusted family doctor. The doctor told her she was pregnant and needed to have an abortion. Of course he didn’t use those words. He tried to gloss over it and make it sound like some sort of benign clinical procedure. But that’s what he told her. So here she was… 15 years old, naïve, brutally raped, and now pregnant. She had always been a good girl. She hadn’t done anything wrong. She had a good family. What good could come from all of this? Well, she didn’t listen to the doctor. She trusted God. “God I don’t understand it. None of this makes sense. This is the blackest night imaginable. But I know that you are in control. And I know that somehow, you will work this together for good.” So she had that baby. And I met him on Thursday. And by God’s grace, I hope we can bring him here when his schedule allows. His name is Jason Lovins and his band led worship at the convention this week. And he leads worship in churches all across the country. He writes and plays songs that glorify and magnify Christ and the Lord has saved many people through his ministry. God brought that unimaginably horrible situation together for good. But that’s just the good that, by His grace, we’re able to see. The greatest good is yet to come. And we won’t get to see that till we see it in glory. Revelation 5 gives us a glimpse of the praise that will be going on in heaven. Except that the praise going on in heaven will be going on for eternity. Won’t that be boring? The only reason that it won’t be boring is because of what will be fueling that praise. You see, what will fuel our praise for all eternity, is the fact that we will get to see how God has worked everything together for good. We will get to see how He has worked our suffering together for good. Will we get to see it work together for good while we’re here? Maybe. Maybe not. Job didn’t get to. God gave him some good things in the epilogue at the end of the book. But I don’t care what kind of good things you get, nothing can replace your children. Yes, God gave him more children. But he still never got to see how the loss of his 10 children worked together for good. At least he didn’t in the book. But he does now.
So, the question is, how can I recognize God’s agenda? I might not ever get to see how my suffering will work together for good. But I can see God’s agenda. And when we see God’s agenda—when we know what He’s up to—we can begin to see His hand in everything. Even suffering. What is God’s agenda? In other words, what is His purpose in suffering?
First, suffering shows God’s affirmation of our significance. Are you significant? Do you matter? It seems like more and more Americans are asking themselves that question today. Do you know what God’s answer is? His answer is that you are eternally significant. You are so significant, that God is betting His glory on you. Now, if you take that phrase to its logical ends, there are some really big theological problems with it. But I don’t want you to take it to its theological ends. I just want you to see that you are so significant to God that He holds you up before His enemies as an example of His glory. That’s what He did with Job. If Job was not significant in God’s eyes, would God have told Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job?” Job was so significant in God’s eyes that He used him to display His image. And He used him to display His glory. Does God need us to show Himself off to the devil? Of course not. But we are so significant in His eyes that He uses us for that. And nothing shows off God’s glory more than a saint who suffers with grace. God allows us to suffer because we are significant in His eyes. We are not just a cosmic plaything or an overly developed monkey. You are suffering because you are somebody. We are created in God’s image and we bear in our bodies the suffering of His Son. Suffering shows God’s affirmation of our significance. But suffering also shows God’s sovereignty and our insufficiency.
Job had to go a long way before he realized this one. He knew that he was a good man. He was upright. He was blameless. He eschewed evil. Nobody could make a charge against Job. If evil was going on, Job went the other way. He knew that. And he repeatedly told God about it. Over and over and over again, he stated his case before God. His friends kept trying to invent different ways that Job was a sinner, but Job wouldn’t hear any of it. And as he went along, he became bolder and bolder in his defense. It seems that as Job’s friends were trying to convince him of what a sinner he was, all they did was convince him of how good he was. And it went on like this until God showed up in chapter 38.
JOB 38:1-3
And then God proceeded to ask Job a series of questions. And He did that over and over and over again for 2 chapters. Finally, in chapter 40, Job answers God.
JOB 40:3-4
In the midst of all of his suffering, Job finally saw God’s sovereignty. Once everything that he had was completely stripped away, he saw that God controlled things that he didn’t even think about. And as he began to see God’s sovereignty, he saw his righteousness a whole lot differently. He saw that all the righteousness that he could possibly accumulate was just filthy rags in the presence of God’s righteousness. Clearly seeing God’s sovereign hand in suffering clearly points out our insufficiency. Suffering shows God’s sovereignty and our insufficiency. It also shows God’s strength in our weakness.
Suffering shows God’s strength in our weakness. I think that here in chapter 3, Job is at his lowest point. I wouldn’t say that he was suicidal, but he certainly wished that he had never been born. And even though he wasn’t thinking about taking his own life, he was longing for death. He was a weak as he would ever be. But how does God present Himself to this completely frail, shell of a man? God spoke to Job two times. And both times, He spoke to him out of the whirlwind. As Job was presenting himself to God at his absolute weakest point, God came in a devastatingly powerful tornado. It is only at our weakest points that God will show Himself the strongest. What did John the Baptist say about Jesus? “I must decrease, He must increase.” There’s not room enough for the both of us in here. Why? Because if there is any way possible, I want to glory in myself. But when all of those things are stripped away, I can’t glory in myself. I can only glory in God. Paul said as much in 1 Corinthians 1:25-29: “Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. 26 For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: 27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; 28 And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: 29 That no flesh should glory in his presence.” When things are going great and everything’s going our way, it’s easy to glory in ourselves. It’s easy to credit our success to our own strength. But when we fail, then God can show Himself strong. Suffering shows God’s strength in our weakness. Suffering also shows God’s faithfulness in our frailty.
If you want to feel small, read through 38-39 where God began to speak to Job. Now remember what condition Job was in. He was about as frail as a man can be. He was emotionally frail from losing his children. He was financially frail from losing all of his stuff. And he was physically frail from losing his health. And then God spoke to him. When God spoke, He followed a pattern. And He didn’t start small to make Job feel more comfortable. God started big. He started with all of creation. The whole earth, stars, planets, constellations, galaxies. Try laying on your back on a mountaintop under a cloudless canopy of stars sometime. That will make you feel small in a hurry. Then God moved to other really big things like morning, and oceans, and weather, and light and darkness. Then he talks about some of the most powerful animals in the animal kingdom. And if God’s creation is that big, just imagine how big God Himself is. And Job stood there in all of his frailty as God showed him those things. Why? Because in each of those things, God showed His faithfulness. God created them and He was faithful to sustain them. Just like He was faithful to sustain Job in his frailty. In 2 Corinthians 4:8-11, Paul said, “We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; 9 Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; 10 Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. 11 For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.” Jesus’ faithfulness shined through Paul’s frailty. Just like the Father’s faithfulness shined through Jesus’ frailty as He hung on the cross. In verses 16-18, Paul went on to say, “For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. 17 For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; 18 While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.” With all of the suffering Paul went through, how could he say that? How could he call his horrible suffering a, “Momentary light affliction?” Because he knew that God was faithful. And even in the midst of his frailty, God would still be faithful. Suffering shows God’s faithfulness in our frailty.
Now, all of those things brings us to an interesting question. We’ve said that suffering shows God’s affirmation of our significance. Suffering shows God’s sovereignty and our insufficiency. Suffering shows God’s strength in our weakness. And suffering shows God’s faithfulness in our frailty. Our suffering shows a lot of things, doesn’t it? The question is, who does it show those things to? The answer is two-fold. In Job 2, we see that the results of Job’s suffering were shown to Satan. And when Job said the words he did in 1:21 and 2:10, God was glorified in front of His chief enemy. God showed Satan Job’s significance. But more than that, He showed him His sovereignty and strength and faithfulness. So, the results of our suffering is shown to Satan. But he’s not the only audience we have. Because a whole world is watching us too. I don’t know what you’re going through in your life right now. You might not be suffering at all. But then again, you might be. Let me ask you something. When you are suffering, do you show the world how significant you are in God’s eyes? In Acts 5, Peter and the disciples had been arrested and beaten for proclaiming the name of Jesus. They suffered tremendously at the hands of the persecutor. Do you know what their reaction was? Verse 41 says, “And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name.” They knew that they were significant in God’s eyes. And through their suffering, they broadcast that to the watching world. When you are suffering, do you show the world that God is sovereign and strong and faithful? What is God’s purpose for suffering? God’s purpose for suffering is for His Son to be glorified and magnified and shown to be the treasure that He is. He is the treasure that is worth more than our health. He is worth more than our stuff. He is worth more than even our children. Nothing shows the world that better than a saint who suffers well.
