I do want to thank Brother Kiger and the church for the invitation to come preach. We're thankful to come. Sorry I missed you last night. I had to work, but I'll catch it online, brother. And I do thank the church for your sermon audio ministry. It's a personal blessing to me. I like to listen to messages, so I thank you for that. Turn with me, if you would, to James chapter number 5. James chapter number 5. And we will read verses 10 and 11. Take, my brethren, the prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an example of suffering, affliction, and of patience. Behold, we count them happy which endure. You have heard of the patience of Job, and you have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy. And I'd like to preach to you on the subject of the patience of Job. We live in a cursed world. And that cursed world is a world of pain and suffering and heartache and injustice. It is a world of sin. We don't sin. We don't just merely sin. We are born sinners. And we live up to the potential we are born to. We are born sinners. And in this cursed world, sometimes it seems like we're caught continually between a rock and a hard place. Or that we're stuck with no place, no option, nowhere to turn. Or sometimes pain and suffering will come and it feels like we've reached the end of our rope. And we're hanging on for dear life. And then something happens and we realize there's quite a big distance between us and that end of the rope we thought we were already at. This pain upon pain and further suffering comes along. And what do we do as Christians? What do we do? What can we do? Well, when we've done all that we can and we can continue on no more, and the waves just keep coming, what does the child of God do? Well, the child of God endures with patience. Patience is the fruit of God's Spirit in us, and it's the attribute of the born-again child of God. That fruit can only grow, though, in the parched desert land. This is a fruit that doesn't grow in the flowery times and in the sunshine. This is a fruit that can only grow in the winter. It can only grow and be displayed in the coldest of nights or the parched desert land. But this is an attribute that God the Holy Spirit works in His people. And it is not something, you know, we think of patience as waiting in line at McDonald's when we have to wait for more than three minutes. We say, we're exercising patience. Well, that's not what we're talking about here, just this waiting to get something here. Octavius Winslow said, those patient sufferers of Christ are those precious plants in his garden, so dear to his heart and so beauteous in his eye, are only to be met in scenes of suffering and sorrow, shaded from all but God. He said, in this day of earnest action, when there is much action in the Christian communities, you know, you see people doing all these great things, and they're writing books and all this kind of stuff. He said, there are the passive act of graces of God as well. These graces of a Christian character, which are just as much of the fruit of the Spirit as those who are called to preach, or those who are called to do these things that people notice. that they require the skillful and diligent culture of God, and they are just as glorifying unto God as the apostles' zeal or the martyrs' heroism. So that dear saint who suffers in the hospital bed with godly courage and godly patience and with a godly attribute and a godly outset and witnesses to people lying on the deathbed is just as glorifying to God as a man such as Spurgeon or such that preaches to thousands and is famous. This patience that we find in God's people may only be recognized by God himself, but it is God glorifying. And we can worship God in that. James was writing to these Christians. Many were suffering. At the beginning of the chapter, some were rich and some were being hurt by the rich. And he tells them, it's like a farmer waiting patiently for his harvest. It's a long time from sowing and reaping and a lot to do in the meantime. But the farmer stays patient and enduring. I grew up on my dad's apple farm. And as soon as we got done picking the apples, we started working on next year. There was no time in between. People at school said, how long does it take to pick the apples? And we say, well, it takes about a month, six weeks. He said, that'd be nice to only have to work six weeks out of the year. Well, if you farm, you know that that's not the case. It's a 42-week-a-year job that as soon as you get done, you got to get ready for next year. And it's a long time until harvest comes. But the farmer must be patient. And whether there's a drought in the summer or whatever, you must be patient. The harvest will come. Well, James told him, you might not reap in this life financially. He said, you might be poor, but you might not reap in this life. But be patient. Be patient. In verse 8, establish your hearts for the coming of the Lord, Joel 9. The latter rain in this harvest might not be getting back what you lost or even getting more than what you had. In this life, surely Christ will set all things right. We look back in history and admire the men of faith. We admire, he was mentioned, I'll mention him again, we admire people like Charles Spurgeon. We admire men of the past and say they've done great things for God. But do we really want to live like that? You know, we want the trophies. We want to say, I'd like to live like that. I'd like to have the spiritual blessings that men like that had. Well, Charles Spurgeon suffered greatly with great bouts of depression. And he suffered greatly inwardly. And many of these great men of God and women of God we read of in the Bible suffered. They suffered loneliness and hunger and persecution and abandonment. Yet we count the prophets blessed, don't we? We look back, what boy doesn't look through the Bible and say, well, I want to be like David. David had a long, hard life. He was a, he was a hero of the faith, but he had a long, hard life. And even the part of his younger life, you know, his brothers, whenever he came on there, they, they didn't look like they didn't think too much of him and mocking him and calling names even as a young man. And we look at Ruth and Naomi, great women of faith. You think of the suffering that they went through. You know, no one says, after Sunday school, Mom, we went through a book of Ruth this morning. I want to be just like those women that came up and say, hey, aren't you Naomi? No one ever says that. They don't say, aren't you the lady that left? Why? Because we don't know anything about them. We admire the people of faith. We admire the prophets. But we forget why we admire them sometimes. We admire them because they are heroes in the midst of adversity. They show great patience. Say, boy, I'd like to have the patience of Job. Would you like to go through what Job went through? What about Job? When we talk about suffering, you have to talk about Job. It's a very familiar story, but I wonder if we hear what God has to say whenever we read that or just don't believe it. It's one thing to hear the story, it's quite another thing to receive the story. If you're not going through a trial this morning, well, you can be patient too because pretty soon you will be. It's just a matter of time. God would have us to think this morning, I believe, about Job's life and remember what happened to him and the fact that suffering has a purpose. One thing you have to remember about Job's life is that it was God who allowed this. Job suffered according to God's sovereign plan. God is the one who asked Satan, he said, have you been considering my servant Job? It was God that asked the question. Now, the devil didn't have to go and say, Job, let me look at my files here. He said, yeah, I've heard of him, and if you do this, this, and this, and you won't let me attack him, of course, but it was according to God's sovereign plan. So there was a reason for Job's suffering and there's a reason for your suffering. And there's a reason for all of our pain. If you are a child of God, you can rejoice in that it is for your good. So I want to look at two thoughts. You have heard of Job's patience and you've seen the Lord's purpose. You've heard Job's patience and you've seen the Lord's purpose. What is patience? Well, like I said, it's not waiting in line at the grocery store, but it is steadfast endurance. A person who does not swerve from his faith and remains loyal to his faith and to his Lord through the worst trials and afflictions. So it is someone who hangs on and clings to the Lord Jesus Christ. It is not those who fall away when things go wrong. They say, well, Lord, you didn't give me everything I wanted. That's it. I quit. And a lot of people do that. A lot of people get caught up in emotion and say, I'm going to join this church or I'm going to follow Christ. And as soon as the first hard trial comes or first affliction comes, they say, Lord, you've abandoned me. I quit. I give up and walk away from their profession. Patience is steadfast endurance. It is clinging to the Lord Jesus Christ and knowing that though everything in the earth points to the contrary, you know that you're a heavenly father that has saved you and redeemed you and that keeps you in Christ and you cling to the Lord Jesus. That is patience. Patience is a noble and virtuous attribute that all God's children should desire to have. James 10 says we know the prophets. We love the prophets. We admire the prophets. We want to be like the prophets. We count them happy. We count them blessed. We want to follow their lead. We just don't want to go where they went. We want to say, yes, I want to be like the Apostle Paul. I want to be bold. But we don't want to go where the Apostle Paul went. And we don't want to endure what the Apostle Paul had to endure to be the Apostle Paul. We want to say, boy, Elijah was bold to stand up there against the enemies of God and to stand against the prophet of Baal. That was boldness. But we don't want to have to live down by the creek for three years and be fed by the bird. We want the glory. We want the crown. But we don't want to have to go through the trial to get there. Patience is what we all want. But patience is only exhibited in trials and suffering. It's long-sufferingness. It's fortitude. It's the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5.22 where it talks of long-suffering. That is what Job had, and that's what we have if we are born again. People say, well, I don't want patience because you have to go through a trial to get patience. You're going to go through a trial anyway. It doesn't matter if you want patience or not. If you've got God's Holy Spirit, you have the fruit of the Spirit, which is patience. You just want your patience strengthened to endure those things. It's not that if you pray that God would grant you patience, you're going to get trials. It is that when you go through the trial, this God-given grace of patience will cause you to clean and endure through the trial. Don't be superstitious about the word patience and think if you have patience, then trouble is coming. It's coming anyway. And God is sovereign and will keep us through this fruit of the Spirit. In Romans chapter number five, It speaks of this stair step, as it were, to hope. These are the stair steps that we have to our hope. And we start out there at the bottom of verse number one. Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we also have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And that's pretty good, but not only so, but we glory in tribulations. Knowing that tribulation works with patience, and patience experience and experience hope, and hope make us not ashamed because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. You don't get to be a strong, loving Christian without trials. It just doesn't happen. Tribulation exercises us to put us stronger in the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. You've heard of Job's patience and his steadfast endurance and his loyalty to God through the worst trials and afflictions. Now Job was not perfect and he wasn't perfect in the book because the latter part of it, God has to come in and correct Job and tells him to stand up and answer him like a man. He's going to hold him account to some of the things that he said. But I like what Thomas Brooks said. He said, James doesn't say remember the murmuring of Job, or the cursing of Job, or the complaining of Job, or the impatience of Job, but it says remember the patience of Job. That God looked upon the pearl and not upon the spot that was in it. And that's what God would have us to look back on Job's life and to remember his patience, his steadfast endurance to cling to God, even though he didn't understand what was happening. And we can look back and read what Paul says. And we can look back and read about Job. And we can look back and read the word of God. But Job didn't have any of these things. Job didn't have the word of God to go to. Job had just had his faith and what God had revealed to him at that time. But Job never stopped trusting and knowing that God is good and that there was a purpose for it. Let's look at patience examined. You've heard of Job's patience, and we admire that. But to hear of his patience is to hear also of his suffering. Satan was considering Job because he was a godly man. And that's why. I heard one man say that the tallest tree in the woods is the one that gets noticed. So there's thousands of trees, but it's the tall one that gets noticed. And if you live for the glory of God, it is the tall tree. that's going to be noticed. And many times, not like the prosperity gospels preachers that said the closer you walk to God, the better things will go for you. But sometimes it's the opposite. Sometimes the closer you are to God, the worse things are for you in this life. So don't listen to the liars of the prosperity gospel. Look at what Job did. Job was perfect. He was upright. He was walking and doing everything. He wasn't perfect in the sense that he did not commit sin, but he was upright in everything that he did. And look what happened. He had a loss of property. There he was. A servant came and told him that enemies had robbed him of his oxen and his asses. He killed his servants. He said, I'm the only one left to come back and tell the story. The words were no sooner falling from his lips when another one says fire fell from the sky and consumed his sheep and his hired servants. You know what the reporter said? He said it was fire from God. He said it was God that sent that. So all these things were coming to his mind. He had the loss of his family. A wind came and blew down his house where all of his children were. Could you imagine? Losing everything like that. Losing it all, not over time. You know, I couldn't imagine losing one child, but all of them at one time. You know, if it had been the Sabians, he could have turned his anger and wrath towards them. If it had been the same people that robbed him, that killed his children, he could have turned his wrath and his anger towards them. But this was a windstorm. There was no one specifically to blame. And it looked like it was just, you know, there was nothing to do but look unto God. Because Satan said, he'll curse you if you take away everything that he has. Later on, after he didn't do that, he had the loss of his health. Boils from the top of his feet, from his feet to the top of his head. Not only that, but Job was not lying in the hospital bed. And he didn't have a bunch of nice nurses to come along to make sure that he was feeling nice and to pump him full of morphine and to put ointment on him. He was there laying by the fire and scraping himself with the pot sherds and lying in the ashes. He wasn't laying in the air conditioning bed, but he was out in the hot Palestinian sun suffering, lying in the dirt. Look in Job chapter number 7 and verse number 4. When I lie down, I say, when shall I arise? And the night be gone. I am full of tossings to and fro into the dawning of day. My flesh is clothed with worms and the clogs of dust. My skin is broken and become loathsome. That's the kind of physical suffering Job was going through. that he couldn't just lie down and take a few Tylenol and say, well, maybe I'll feel better in the morning. There was no sleeping. If you're covered in head to toe and boils, there's no lying down to relax and to rest. Think of the suffering this man endured. Then he had the loss of his helper. And this might have been one of the worst of his trials, that his wife wasn't there to comfort him and to point him towards God and to curse God and die. One man said, this is mean, I would never say it, but one man said he lost his kids, he lost his money, lost his job, and he kept his wife. And he said that was the worst trial of all. But like I said, I wouldn't say that because that would be mean. But there she was. She wasn't helping him. She just died, Joe. The loss of the comfort of his friends. Well, lo and behold, here his friends come along. So we're going to make him feel better. And by comforting Job, they decided they were going to tell him this was all your fault. And then they preached the law of falsehood to him. And then Job, there in all of his suffering, was trying to defend himself that he had not committed sin. That wasn't all Job lost. We find out a lot more in the book that he lost more than that. He lost his reputation. Look in chapter 29. Job was a rich man. But Job wasn't some Wall Street guy that lived up in the ivory tower that just lived there and fed himself and didn't look out upon anybody. But Job was a godly man. In Job 29, verse number 5, when the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were about me, when I washed my steps, But with butter and the rock poured me out rivers of oil, when I came to the gate through the city, when I prepared my seat in the street, the young men saw me and hid themselves in the aged rows and stood up. And the princes refrained their talking and laid their hands on my mouth. The nobles held their peace and their tongue cleaved to the roof of their mouths." So when Job walked into town, people paid attention. The old man would come to meet him. The young man would recognize his wisdom and his authority and his power. It was a good thing when Job came to town. And you read on in this chapter that in verse 16, I was a father to the poor. You read all these things, what he did. In verse 12, I delivered the poor that cried and the fatherless to him that helped me. If you read this whole chapter, he delivered the poor and the orphan. He used his money and his wealth to help the sick. He was the eyes to the blind and feet to the lame, it says. He would find evildoers and he would punish them. So Job not only was just rich, but Job went and helped the orphans. He helped the widows. He would find injustices and he would come and set things right. He was a judge. And whenever someone committed a crime, Job would come to the rescue of the downtrodden. He would come to the rescue of the broken and to the poor and to help them. He was a godly man. Job had the attributes of a godly man. He had the attributes of a Christian man. But now look what happened. Job said, whenever my steps were with butter and the rock poured out rivers of oil, he said, everything I touched turned to gold. And whenever that was happening, and I was helping everybody, boy, the people respected me. Look in chapter 30 and verse number 9. And now I am their song. Yea, I am their byword. They abhorred me. They flee far from me and spare not to spit in my face. because he had loosed my cord and afflicted me, they have also let loose the bridle before me. He was in the dark and he had felt abandoned by God. Job didn't know why all this happened. We know it was Satan, but Job didn't know why it was Satan. He didn't know. Job did not know why all this was happening to him. We know the suffering of Job. We know what he endured. But what about the patience? We know the suffering, but where's the patience in all this? We think of Job, and we think of the first two chapters, and we think of the last chapter. Job suffered. His friends were not very good friends, and at the end, God restores it all. But that's not what James wants us to remember, was it? It wasn't remember that if everything gets taken away, you get it all back at the end. What did James want us to think about, Job? Remember his patience. Well, let's look at some of his patience in chapter number one in verse 20. Naked, I came out of my mother's womb and naked shall I return thither. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. In all this Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly. In chapter 13. In verse 15, when all had been taken away, what did Job do? He looked to God and said, you gave it to me and you take it away. I hold on to these things loosely because you have given to me and I trust in your sovereign plan. In Job 13, verse 15, though he slay me, yet will I trust in him, but I will maintain my own ways before him. Though who slays me? Satan? No. He didn't know anything about Satan hurting him. He was looking to God. And though God slays me, I will trust in him. He knew where these trials ultimately came from. They ultimately came from God's sovereign, ordained plan. And he says, though God slays me. I'll just look past the secondary causes. And that's what we must do as the children of God. Look past the secondary causes. The secondary causes are the things that we're going through. And look to the first cause, which is God. And know that he has a reason for pain and sickness and tribulation. In chapter 19, look with me in chapter 19, in verse 25. For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth. And though after my skin worms destroyed this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God. There Job had lost it all. He's lying there covered in boils, covered in sores. And he says, I know my Redeemer lives. I know that he will stand and I'll be there with him. I know that I'm going to die and I might not make it much longer. He was thinking there. And he had every reason to believe that. But he said, I know I'll see him face to face. That was patience. That was steadfast endurance in the hope of God. Through all these trials and all these promises, he kept clinging to faith in God. He kept clinging on to his Redeemer who would redeem him, who would save him, who would deliver him. One more in chapter 23 and verse number 10. But he knoweth the way that I take. When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. My foot hath held his steps, his way have I kept and not declined. Neither have I gone back from the commandment of his lips. I have steamed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food." That doesn't look like one who just says, you know what, I'm done with this whole Christianity thing. I just want to walk away from it. This is one that says, I don't care what happens to me in this life. I don't care what trials may come. I will cling to God and I will cling to Christ and I will cling to his word and I will trust in him. For I will hold, I will not take my steps beyond left or right, but where he directs me to go. And he will see, he has seen those words of God more than his necessary food. You've heard the story of Job, and you know that Job suffered, and you know the end, and that God restored him. We count Job as one of the shining examples of a godly man who endured through great tribulation. But have you seen the truth? Too often we hear the words, but we don't see the truth. Our eyes scan past the words on the pages, and our eyes just flip past, and they go in our ears, and we don't consider them. You know, it's good to read through the Bible in a year, but if you're reading so fast that you don't even take anything in and you're just checking it off, it's not doing you much good if you're not even paying attention to what you're reading. Read and meditate and study and think and see the truth. We hear the exhortation of the messages, but we don't take heed of these applications, that these are not mere fables, but eternal truths. So you've seen the Lord's purpose was the second thing that James said. What's the purpose of Job? It is, well, one of the purposes of the suffering was the strength in his faith. I have this written down off the turn, but in James 1, 2, it says, My brother encountered all joy when you fall into divers temptations, knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience, but let patience have her perfect work, that you may be perfect and entire and wanting nothing. The suffering of Job strengthened his faith. It didn't weaken, it just strengthened it. Your faith is something that must be exercised, and it's exercised in the heat of battle. The shield of faith doesn't grow stronger hanging in the living room up on the wall as a showpiece. The shield of faith is taken into battle, and the shield of faith is tried and tested in the heat of the battle. And it's the fiery darts of the devil that bounce off the shield of faith that gives us more courage to press on. Because once you take a few blows from the sword against the shield of faith, you say, you know what? I'm still alive. And God is still God. And Christ is still Lord. And you press on. This is what happened to Job. It strengthened his faith. God's purpose in Job's suffering was to make Job more resolute in his faith. When something bad happened to Job, when this was all said and done, he lived a long time after that. Do you think he was more of a godly man after this or before? Do you think when one of Job's little grandchildren came up and was crying and said, Grandpa, I fell down and I skinned my knee. I think this is the worst day of my life. And just crying and blood. Do you think Job had a word of compassion for the young child? Or one of his daughters came and said, Daddy, of this boy down the road. He just broke up with me. And I just don't know why I do this. It's the worst day of my life. You think Job had the experience and the faith to set her down and talk to her about eternal things and talk to her about God and being resolute in your faith? See, that had strengthened Job. In all the years of his life, he was better because of all this suffering. He was stronger because of the suffering. Job went through the trials that God may bless him. And we know that at the end he blessed him. And we know that all those people that forsook him, they came back to bless him. He did have all those things that he got back. God gave him his friends back. He turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends. Gave him as much as he had before. They comforted him and God blessed him. God gave him more children and the best looking girls in the whole country. After this, Job lived 140 years, and his sons, and his sons' sons, four generations. Job died being a fool of days. Though our outward man perish, our inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction is but for a moment, but it worketh for us a far more exceeding eternal way to glory. God used us to bless others. I didn't write it down, Paul, but however many years ago that was, we're still being blessed by Job. I'm being blessed by Job this morning. And God used Job to help me. God used Job to help you, if you'll read it and study it. And think of how many people Job has lifted up from the side of a bed or how many people he's given courage to go on just one more day or just to cling to their faith and say I can't see it in my life because my life is so hard and my life is so I'm so besought with depression or whatever it might be but I can look to Job's life and I've served the same God as Job and if God delivered Job he will deliver me to instruct his friends. God used his trials to instruct his friends. And he did that, and he preached to them, and he brought them out of their heresy. He was a testimony of humanity. He used it to glorify his name. Most importantly, we glorify God in our suffering. Job was not the hero of the book. Job was confused. Job was upset. Job said some right things, and he said some things that were not exactly right. But Job was powerless through all this. He was just taking it. And the whole point of Job was Job was just trying to hang on. But who was it that kept him the whole time? It was God. God told Satan how much he could do and where he could go. He told Satan, you're not going to take his life. So we know that, as we're reading the book, we say, well, Job's not going to die because God told him he couldn't. Job didn't know he wasn't going to die. Job thought he was. And Job was just hanging on. And he's out like in a hurricane, hanging on like the weathermen go out and stand in the hurricane to prove that it's raining, I guess. I don't know. They hang on to the light poles. And their coats are flying and everything. That's how Job was hanging on with his life. But God said, you're not going to kill him. He's going to live a long time. Now, I've got the day of his death. That was never in the balance, but Job didn't know that. And Job was hanging on to this God that is the hero of the story. God is good. And even in tragedies coming, it's God that pities us. It's what James says. He has tender mercy towards us. And James didn't say, remember how awesome Job is. He said, you remember the patience of Job because it is the Lord who is of tender mercy. It is the Lord who is pitiful. You look to Job and you think of Christ is what you should do. It is God that is good. And we dare not ever say otherwise, and we would never be in the right to say any otherwise. People say a lot of bad things happen to good people. One man said that's only happened once in the history of the world, and that was Jesus Christ. Because he was the only good person, and more bads happened to him than any other. God is very pitiful, but this is who he is. He's full of tender mercy, and this is what he shows us. It is his nature. You go and read Exodus, read the book of Exodus, and you say, well, Exodus shows that God is hard. But you'll find where it says, the Lord, the Lord is merciful and gracious and long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands and forgiving iniquity and transgression of sin. That is the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament. So how do we take this? Well, we hope in the Lord. We put our trust in the Lord. When trials come, don't put your trust in yourself, put your trust in Christ. That just like the worry takes us to Christ, our afflictions should take us to Christ. Our joy should take us to Christ. If it's not leading you to Christ, then you're wasting this precious opportunity to strengthen your faith. You're going through a trial and not reaping the benefits of it. It's like you go run 15 or 20 miles for exercise and get home and eat two or three boxes of pizza. You've wasted the whole thing. You've just wasted your time. Don't waste your suffering. God takes pleasure in your hope. It says in Psalm 147, the Lord takes pleasure in them that fear Him and those that hope in His mercy. You want to make the Lord happy? Hope in Him and trust in Him. You want to please the Lord? Trust in Him. It motivates you to prayer. David said, Remember, O Lord, thy tender mercies and thy loving kindness, for they have been ever of old. David trusts in God, and in trouble, he prays according to God's tender mercies. It motivates us to Bible study. Some people, whenever they get in trouble, they say, well, I just need to take some me time. I need to get away from all this and take some me time. I'm going to get away from church. I'm just going to not read the Bible. And I'm just going to get away until I get back on track. Well, they're running from the very thing that will give them comfort. And they run from the very thing that gives them hope. And the only thing in this world that the Christian can have can help in times of trouble is God and His Word and His Church. And what do people do? I just need some me time. I just need to get away for a while. You're hurting yourself. You're hurting the situation, not helping it. What's it do? It makes you fruitful. It makes you fruitful, because when you go through these things, you add to your fruits, your virtue. As it says in 2 Peter 1, you add to your Christian life. It strengthens your faith. It adds to your faith. It strengthens your faith. It causes you to worship God. It causes you to see God as sovereign. It causes you to have compassion towards others. It causes you to trust Him in all things. Well, when God causes grief to His people, for a greater joy in him. Would you allow, if I said, I'm going to have some strange man come in here and drug you this afternoon to where you're unconscious, would you willingly allow that? Of course not. Well, how about if you fell over sick and they took you into a hospital, the ER, and some strange man comes in with a needle and said, I'm going to drug you. Would you allow him to do it? Yeah, that's a different situation, isn't it? You wouldn't allow some strange doctor to do that because you know what he's about to do is for your good. What if I tell you some guy's going to come out here and take a knife and cut you from the top of your neck down to down your belly, would you let him do it? Well, what if it was a doctor that said, you're about to die if you don't get your appendix out, we got to operate immediately. Well, you would willingly let him cut you open. We need to submit ourselves to the surgeon of our souls and quietly endure the cutting that with the hope that it will heal us. That God is the wise master surgeon and the great physician and he knows our sicknesses and he knows how to cure us and he will do it. And our suffering and our affliction and our pain and trials is brought about by the Lord God who bought us and brought the pain, but he is full of pity and tender mercy. God loves you, Christian, and does not allow your heartbreak to accept there is a purpose and a need for it to bring it to pass. He is not the surgeon who hopes, but he is the surgeon who heals. And this is the great physician that we trust and know that he can. May God add the blessing to his word.