I do thank Reverend McMillan for the words of welcome here tonight. It's good to be with you. I do trust we'll know the Lord's help. And whatever the recording happens, it is only what the Word of God brings to your minds, and that's the benefit that it brings to the children of God, is the Scriptures, of course. That is what gives us the blessing and the help in all of the trials in life. And we're turning to Romans chapter 8. Romans chapter 8, we also thank your minister's kind words regarding the building. We do appreciate the prayers of the Lord's people here, and we appreciate that very much. I'm also glad for the availability of the newspaper. I searched quite late on in the week for a copy. I couldn't find one. I now know they were all in our brother's boot. If I had known that, I'd have asked him sooner. But I'm going to be able to get one tonight, and I'll take one with me with this permission. So please, make sure there's one left for me before you all leave tonight. In the word of God, we're in the book of Romans, Romans chapter number 8. Romans chapter 8. And let's hear the Word of God. We're going to break into the portion in Romans 8. And the verse number 14. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but ye have received the spirit of adoption whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. And if children then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs of Christ, if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was made subject to vanity not willingly, But by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope, because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first fruit to the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption to it, the redemption of our body. For we are saved by hope, but hope that is seen is not hope. For what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? Amen. We're going to break in to the end of the reading there. And again, we do pray that God will bless the public reading of his word to our souls tonight. Let's bow together in prayer and seek the Lord again for his help. Almighty God, our Father in heaven, We do give the thanks afresh for the tremendous gift of this book. We thank you for the inspired word, the inerrant word of the living God, a God who cannot lie. And though we look upon this scene of time, and though we look upon our own experience and times we wonder and we doubt, we thank you Lord we have this sure word of testimony. And we pray Lord you'd help us to even and look through your own experience through the prism of thy word. And that we examine ourselves in light of what the Scriptures teach. And that you, O God, will be our teacher tonight. Bless the word to every heart. You know those who are suffering. You know those who are caring for those who are suffering. And dear Father, you also know those who are outside of Christ. And who need, O Lord, that word of rebuke, that word of conviction. Be pleased, O God, to challenge souls and even save those as yet Unsaved bless our time together tonight and do us good now around thy word we pray in Christ's precious name Amen, amen David Brainard was born on the 20th of April 1718 and he died on the 7th or the 9th of October sorry in 1747 age just 29 years old He was a man with a passionate love for Christ and a tremendous burden for souls. You can read about him in some extracts of his diaries. He saw a great work done in North America among the native Indians in particular. Now you could well ask what a man who died in his late twenties has to say to such a meeting as this. But I mention him to you because he was a man who served God. A man who saw great things accomplished for God despite suffering constant and severe pain. He contracted tuberculosis in his early twenties, and it seems this infection spread through much of his body. In his own journal, he recorded this. In the afternoon, my pain increased exceedingly. I was obliged to protect myself to bed. I was sometimes almost bereaved of the exercise of my reason by the extremity of pain. You might say in our own modern parlance, he was out of his mind with pain. He died in the home of the great American theologian, Jonathan Edwards. And Edwards writes of his last days, he told me it was impossible for any to conceive of the distress he felt in his breast. He manifested much concern. Listen to this. Lest he should dishonor God by impatience under his extreme agony, which was such that he said the thought of enduring it one minute longer was almost insupportable. He is a tremendous testimony of what God can do in the life of a child of God, even in the presence of extreme pain. Your minister has already said that the presence of pain is a very challenging experience. It is wearying, it is demoralizing. It robs us of our appetite, physically. It robs us of our joy, of our concentration, of our very sleep. The book of Job in chapter 33, Job explains his own experience of this in verse 19. Speaking of himself, he is chastened also with pain upon his bed. Even upon the bed there was not rest to be found. It's interesting, one of the marks, one of the criteria for being put up the winning list when it comes to hip replacement is the absence of sleep. If your pain is such that it affects your sleep, well that's looked upon as a very significant factor in terms of your necessity of getting that hip replaced. And here we find someone, he is chastened also with pain upon his bed, and the multitude of his bones with strong pain. so that his life abhorreth bread, and his soul dainty meat, his flesh is consumed away that it cannot be seen, and his bones that were not seen stick out." A scriptural testimony of the endurance of real and genuine pain. But perhaps even more striking than that are the words of Psalm 22, prophetically looking forward to the pain of Calvary, where our Savior, through the psalmist, says, I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joints. My heart is like wax. It is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dread up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws, and now has brought me into the dust of death. And so we see again in this prophetic language that the God-Man, our Lord and Savior, in His true humanity gives us a sinless description of the awfulness of pain. He is One who was without sin. And thus we see immediately, and I mention this to you as a way of encouragement, it is not wrong, it is not sinful to find Living with pain, a real struggle. We ought never to think that our Lord's deity made the pain of the cross easy. Again, sometimes we struggle with our concept of who the Lord was. Very man, yet very God. And sometimes we think to ourselves, well, surely it was no real challenge for the God-man to suffer what he did. And that is very, very bad theology. Our Savior in His true humanity, with all of the pain and nervous system that you and I have, in such, He suffered greatly. And He felt every bit of pain and agony as He hung upon the cross. Thus, seeing that the experience of pain is not in of itself sinful, The question arises, well how do we deal with this pain? How do we know victory and how do we live in faith through this pain? I think this is a relevant subject to you all here tonight. All of you at some point in your life will have or will suffer from pain. Some of you perhaps already know the experience of constant chronic pain and agony. Others perhaps find yourselves in the position of being a carer. It's often the case in our society that those who have the caring responsibility are the ladies, and perhaps some in your family are going through great turmoil and great trials, and you are their carers. And thus we pray that the Scriptures will give you help as you seek to minister to them. The first thing, perhaps in light of this pain, may well be the simple advice that you ought to go and see a doctor. Again, we're here in a Christian meeting. We're here, of course, meeting around the Word of God. But the use of medication to deal with suffering again is not in itself wrong. Scripture clearly in various ways gives us accounts of the medicines of the day being applied to heal a particular problem. Famously, Hezekiah's lump of figs, perhaps the oil in James chapter 5, our brothers mentioned in the quiz also made reference to Luke as a physician. Again, not looked upon as a dishonorable task like the publican, but rather as a task that was used by God. Christ Himself alleviated physical suffering. Again, it's worth remembering that our Lord, as He ministered upon this earth, He healed those with painful conditions. Yes, they pointed forward to the spiritual lessons that would be learned. Yes, He heals all our spiritual diseases. But yet there was a pointing forward to the ultimate end of redemption. The redemption of the body here in Romans 8.23. All medication though is limited. And the best of medication will find an end in itself. And many of you will live with a degree of pain as a normal function of life. I remember meeting a lady up in Northampton. That's where I worked before I went to Bible college, up in Ballymunny. And a number of ladies you'd expect, and men also, who suffer from chronic pain. And you may ask, lady, well, how long have you been sore? And generally they would smile through the grimace, and they'd say, I'm always sore. But I'm here because it's really bad now. And for some people, that is their experience. Day by day, hour by hour, they have forgotten what it was not to know pain. Whilst tonight's message really is focusing upon the matter of physical pain, it would be wrong not to give some mention to the fact that pain is not always restricted to our physical frame. It may be emotional, it may be psychological, but our focus tonight is particularly that matter of physical pain. But how do we live with pain and yet, like Brainerd, and like our Savior, do something for the glory of God? How do we look and assess pain in a way that will lead us to going forward with God and not losing heart? Well, to do that I want to look at this really through the concept or through the focus of the benefits of pain. I want to show you from the Scriptures that pain can be under God a tremendous gift. And that you would not waste the gift of God. I'm giving you this experience of physical pain. Just four things that I want to leave with you very, very quickly. The first thing is this. Pain is a reminder to us that all is not well. Pain is a reminder to us that all is not well. That, of course, is true in the physical. Pain is an alert that there's something wrong. Again, must be understood in that God has made us to experience pain. One of the worst consequences of leprosy was that they lost the ability to feel pain and therefore they lost the ability to see something not right. If you're sitting here and you find yourself suffering severe crushing central chest pain, please don't sit there and do nothing. If as you sit there and that's how you feel right now, please stand up and if you can't stand up, call upon somebody and get out of this building. You need help. It's the nature of pain. It's a recognition that there's something not right here. If you suffer from arthritis, again, the pain you feel in your knee or your hip, wherever it may be, it's a recognition, again, that there's something not right with that particular joint or joints. I remember, just as a personal anecdote, I remember having the experience of appendicitis a number of years ago. Initially, not very strong, but I just thought, there's something not right here. I took myself off to Corinne Hospital and said, would you mind please removing my appendix? And that was the pain sorted out. But there's a recognition. There's something not right. Something is wrong. But you know, physical pain, and please listen to the words very carefully, physical pain is an indicator that all is not right spiritually. When we suffer physical pain, it is a recognition and an indication that there's something not right. in a spiritual level. Now, I did not say that your pain is a result of your personal sin. If you picked that up, you've got the wrong message. Remember clearly the words of our Savior when the Pharisees come and they say, well, this blind man, who sinned? Did he sin or did his parents sin? Of course, the Lord says, well, neither. It is that God will be glorified in this situation. But all pain is a consequence of the fall. No fall, no sin, no pain. Look what it says here in Romans 8, and that's why we've chosen this portion. We're going to draw the themes out of the text here before us. Romans chapter 8 and verse number 22. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. This portion is a wonderful treatment of how the very created order is going to benefit from the glorious liberty of the children of God in verse number 21. Creation itself is going to enter into the glories in the new heavens and the new earth when righteousness dwells. But we will note in the present generation that creation is groaning in pain. But not only the physical creation, and we see that in various ways, but look what verse 23 says, and not only they. Not only the physical creation, but we ourselves. We have the first fruits of the Spirit. Yes, we are the children of God, but we ourselves grow within ourselves. We're waiting for the redemption of the body. We're waiting for the day when this will be no more. Pain comes through the fall. Of course, you think back to the account of the garden. Remember how the Lord comes to the garden, speaks to our first parents, reminds the woman, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception. In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children. A direct result of the fall was of course the pain that ladies must endure in the context of childbearing. The word sorrow there. It isn't just talking about the tears, but rather the tears that does come through toil and from pain. But what is often neglected is the same word sore was used to Adam in verse number 17. Cursed is the ground for thy sake, in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. Pain, both to male and female, though different perhaps in its outworkings, was the result of the fall. So pain, in the physical, will tell you to get to the doctor, to get the problem diagnosed and, if possible, fixed. But I want to tell you that if you feel pain in the physical, Whether it be a sore tooth or a sore toe or something much more serious, I want to remind you that this pain is through the fall. And that's when you feel that pain, you're being reminded by God of the curse. And it must drive us to the great physician who suffered the pain of the cross bearing the curse for us. Think of the simplicity, the logic. The curse brings pain. And Calvary's pain was suffered by our Savior because He bore the curse for His people to free them from the suffering of the curse, namely pain. And thus, if it is your experience tonight and you find yourself suffering from pain, but yet you're not saved, If you're here in this meeting and you're in a children's or you're in a ladies' meeting, sorry, and you find yourself and you're knowing ongoing pain, but as yet you have not confessed your sin and turned from your sin, please see the great benefit of pain that will drive you to Christ, the great physician, not only for ease of your physical suffering, but ease of that which will take you to a lost eternity. Pain is a reminder to us that all is not well. But pain must also, in the second place, be noted to be a tool. A tool in the hand of God to shape the clay upon the potter's wheel. We must see pain as being under the sovereign hand of God. And perhaps if you were to imagine what somebody would say on this subject, perhaps this is something you would immediately have thought about. You see, the Lord God is either Lord of all, or He is not Lord at all. And all God works all things after the counsel of His own will, even our experience of pain. So your pain and your suffering is under the sovereign reign and rule of God. Romans 8, 28, of course, that famous text. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are called according to His purpose. All things for good. Note, it does not say that all things are good. It does not say that everything is good for us. For all things are not good. I've just said to you, made it very clear, I trust that every pain we feel is a result of the consequence of the fall in our fallen humanity. It's not good. But, it is good in that God works it for good. Again, just to encourage you, in case you read that text and you think, well, my love for God is so weak and so poor. Don't miss the fact that it is God's eternal purpose in your heart that is causing all things to work together for good, to them who are called according to His purpose. But what is His ultimate purpose? Well, we have that in verse number 29, that we be conformed to the image of His Son. It is that we would be like Christ. Now, P. M. Those three letters are crucial. Pain may be the chastening rod in the hand of a father who loves his children. It may be the case for some that when we come to know pain, it is God's rod. Yes, the hand is a hand of love, but the rod is a rod of chastening. And the psalmist in Psalm 119 says, Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now have I kept thy word. It is good for me that I have been afflicted, Psalm 119.71, that I might learn thy statutes. Psalm 119.75, I know, O Lord, that thy judgments are right and that thy unfaithfulness hast afflicted me. Jeremiah relates for us in Lamentations chapter 3 in the verse number 31, these words, For the Lord will not cast off forever, but though he cause grief, We don't like to read those words too often. We don't mind the text, great is thy faithfulness. It's of the Lord's mercies that we're not consumed. But in the very same chapter, the Word of God says, for lo, he caused grief. And at times our pain has come as a direct result of the chastening of God. But note how he does it. Yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies. For he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men. Our gracious God knows just the severity of the rod to apply to enable us who went astray to now keep his word. Pain may be the chastening rod in the hand of a loving Father, but pain may also be in the hand of the potter, being used to shape the clay upon the potter's wheel. Not this time in chastisement, not because chastisement isn't necessary, but rather because we all need to be moulded to be made more like unto Christ. Now I, freely confess, I know absolutely nothing about pottery. I can drink tea out of a pot, that's about the height of it. But I do understand that on the potter's wheel and the ways of pots being made of old, for the pot to be made, pressure had to be applied. There was a necessity of pressure being brought to bear upon the pot, molding it. That was Job's experience. But he knoweth the way that I take. When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. Gold, speaking of dead, he made more like Christ. One of the great challenges that we all face in this world is that our pain can lead to bitterness and not to betterness. I love the words of William Cooper who suffered great pain, mental pain, depression and great bowser-pression. Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take. The clouds ye so much dread are big with mercy and shall break, and blessings on your head. Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust him for his grace. Behind a frowning providence he hides a smiling face. Pain, a tool in the hand of God to make us more like Christ. In the third place, very quickly, pain provides an opportunity to prove the grace of God We know the truth. We know of God's grace. We hear of God's grace, and God's compassion, and God's succor. We read the text. But I think, if I look upon this gathering, I would think that most of you remember times in your life when pain came in some form upon you, and you had to prove the grace of God. And as you went through that particular trial, and again we're focusing on pain, but of course the application is much broader than that. But in the context of that particular trial, you knew an unusual measure of the grace of God. Perhaps others looking from the outside, they looked upon you and they saw your suffering. And they looked at Paul and said, I don't know how they get through that. I would just crumble under the weight of that affliction. I can't imagine how they get through each and every day. But you prove the grace of God. And in the context of suffering, Paul shows the people in Romans 8 again, and the verse number 23, that in the context of their suffering, remember, Verse 18, I reckon that the sufferings of this present time, in the context of suffering, it shows them that they have the Spirit of God, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit. And the Spirit aids us in our infirmities. Again, I know the context is in prayer in verse 26, but know what it says. Likewise, the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities. And again, I don't believe it's wrong to take that in a more general sense. Because Christ gives the Holy Ghost that blessed title. He is indeed the Comforter. The Spirit of God is our guarantee of glory, but He is the present giver of grace, and He is the Comforter to our souls. Our Comforter, the Lord used in John's Gospel, is derived from the legal word of a lawyer who came to give strength to a family at times of pain and crisis. So again, a family had some particular trial they were going through, and they would call upon the comforter. And the comforter, the advocate, would come along and draw alongside the family in their need. And thus the word comfort speaks more to us about strength than it does about a shoulder to cry on. We use the word comfort in terms of the tissues. I remember once, one of the things you're trained in general practice, we used to do videos. You had to submit videos to the college to get your final qualification. And one of the things the church would say to you is, well, if somebody starts to cry in the video, you make sure you grab the tissues and handle the tissues. And you make sure you comfort them. And that's how often we have that narrow view of comfort, but yet that's not the concept in the scriptures when it speaks of the comforter. Yes, it's included, but it's chiefly that God comes and gives us strength. No comforter at a human level can do that. But the divine comforter is able to strengthen us in our trials. Again, the quiz question, who had the thorn in the flesh, was of course the Apostle Paul. He describes it for himself, or for us in 2 Corinthians and the chapter 12. He discusses the nature of his experiences and how God was humbling him even through the thorn in the flesh. Now whatever that was, He describes it as a thorn, and he describes it in his flesh. Now if you've had a thorn in your flesh, I guarantee you'll suffer pain. So whatever Paul's affliction was and his various thoughts, I do believe at least it involved some measure of pain. So much so that he cries unto God three times that he might be relieved from it. There's a lesson in the very fact that he was not relieved from it. But what does God say to him? My grace is sufficient for thee. And again, please know what it says. For my strength is made perfect in weakness. In other words, the Lord God came and gave him the strength he needed at just that right time. The Comforter comes. The Spirit of God comes upon us. And He gives us the strength we need. Please turn over to Hebrews chapter 4. Just as we expand upon this, because we're thinking here about how pain gives us the opportunity to prove the grace of God. And in Hebrews chapter 4, I have the tremendous promise that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Grace at just the right time. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace. But don't miss the context. For it says in verse 15, For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin or saviour. In the previous chapters of Hebrews, it's described as being one who was tempted, one who was tried. And it says there, For in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is able to succor them that are tempted. He's able to give Strength! Strength to those who are in trial, because He Himself was in all points tempted like us. We are yet without sin. Again, I come back to the subject I mentioned in the introduction, and that is the nature of Christ's true humanity. Perhaps some night you'll find yourself lying in the bed, and you'll find yourself in the agony of breathlessness. Often comes in the middle of the night, If you suffer from heart failure or asthma or something like that, you may well find yourself in the agony, and it is painful. The agony of hardly being able to catch your breath. And you will lie there perhaps, perhaps even waiting for the ambulance, and you will lie there and you'll feel the agony of it, and you'll think, where can I get help at this time? Can I encourage you to go boldly to the throne of grace? For in glory, there's a man in the glory, and he was touched with the feeling of your infirmities at that point, for as he hung upon the cross, He suffered the agony of breathlessness. You lie on your bed at night, and as you turn, you feel the agony going through each and every joint. Where do you turn? You turn to the throne of grace, and you ask for the help in time of need, and you ask it from the high priest, whose bones were out of joint as he hung upon that blessed tree. He is our compassionate high priest. And He gives the gift of the Spirit of God as the comforter to strengthen us in our needs. He knows what it is to feel our pain. And we must pray to Him for the grace to suffer the pain. And then we see Him dispensing grace to help. Some of you have been there. Some of you can say the Amen to that. Others have not been there yet. But when you get there, Remember the man, the glory. So pain is a reminder that all is not well. It's a tool in the hand of God. It provides an opportunity to prove the grace of God. But finally, as we close, it produces in us a longing for heaven and for home. Ultimately, we long for heaven to be with Christ. If Christ is not in heaven, then heaven is no heaven at all. Our ultimate longing ought to be, as a child of God, that we would know and see Him whom our soul loveth. That must be our chief concern. But remember the promises in the Word of God that come alongside the meeting of Christ. Verse 18 of Romans chapter 8, For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. The present sufferings. Again, how important it is not to be blasé, careless in the words that you use to those who are suffering from pain. The suffering is real, it is deep, it is very severe at times. But compared to the eternal weight of glory, those sufferings and that weight of glory do not balance on the scales. That's what the Bible says. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain." The Bible puts that in there. I do believe it's a direct connection with the Garden of Eden. The sorrow of childbirth, the sorrow of the toil of labor. But here we find that in the glorified state, neither shall there be any more pain. For the curse was borne by our Saviour, and He suffered and bled and died and suffered pain, that we would know the joy of having no more pain. No more pain. And I believe that if you are suffering pain in your body, it can be used of God to give you a longing for heaven and home. A desire for the redemption of our body. Verse 23 You see, it is significant whenever the Bible describes hell. It says, "...and in hell he lift up his eyes, being in dormance." Or in Revelation 16, "...and the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast, and his kingdom was full of darkness, and they gnawed their tongues for pain." Thus, if your experience tonight and the days to come is constant chronic pain, long for heaven and for home, you will not always suffer pain, unless you die out of Christ. And then the pain you suffer now will be nothing compared to the pain that you will suffer for all eternity. Pain comes through the fall. Yes, God's grace, whenever sin abounds, grace does much more abound. But ultimately, when we look to the cross, and we see our Savior in agonies on the cross, and we see the hope that He died, that we might have no more pain. May God be pleased to bless His Word to our hearts tonight. Just a wee word of prayer, and then I'll hand over to your minister once again. I want to thank you for your attention to the Word of God, and I trust that something, something will benefit to your soul and help you as you go through the road the Lord has placed you upon. Almighty God, our Father in heaven, we do commit our souls into thy care. We pray, Lord, you'd take your word and whatever the need might be in this gathering, you'd apply it. And above all, may our eyes fall upon Jesus. We thank you for our great high priest. We pray that he'd minister grace to help in time of need. Bless us this night, we ask in his precious name. Amen.