The National Center for Family Integrated Churches welcomes R.C. Sproul, Jr. with the message, The Inerrancy of Scripture. Shall we begin with a word of prayer? Our good and gracious Father, we thank you for this gathering. We thank you for all the labor that went into it. But most of all, Father, we thank you for the inspiration for it. We thank you for your word, that it is true, that it is trustworthy. And we thank you, O Lord, for its power. We ask, O Lord, that we would be changed by the power of your word this morning. And we ask this in Jesus' precious name, amen. I hope that we don't have too many disappointed inerrancy junkies here this morning. Inerrancy is a doctrine, in fact, that does matter a great deal to me and it should matter a great deal to you. When Scott Brown contacted me to ask if I would be willing to participate in this event, Of course, I'd be happy to, and he gave me pretty much a green light to speak about anything that I wished at the time. And my plan was for us to talk about inerrancy and its importance. But in the providence of God, a decision was made yesterday to change what I would be talking about today. And there's a reason for that. We're going to be talking about the sufficiency of scripture. With respect to suffering, for two important reasons. One, because it's not covered elsewhere while we're here, and I think it needs to be. And two, as will become apparent as we move along, and as some of you already know, over the past week this has been very heavy on my mind and heavy on my heart because the church where I serve has been through a very difficult hardship which we will be talking about. Now friends, when it comes to suffering and the sufficiency of Scripture, these things tie together at least in this way. Everybody, to one degree or another, suffers in this life. If you heard Voti this morning talking about the implications that come about because of the fall of mankind, that when God comes into the garden and He speaks to Adam and Eve, He pronounces His judgment on them. And since the advent of sin, there has been necessarily, in each and every human being's life, suffering. And since the fall of man, when that suffering comes, just about every human being has struggled with trying to understand why that is. And foolishly, many have looked outside the Scriptures for their answers. One of the best-selling books of the last 20 or 30 years was a book written by a Jewish rabbi, not diligently checking the Old Testament for the answer, but rather with his own vain imaginations answering the question, why do bad things happen to good people? That's my own Freudian slip. Why do bad things happen to good people? I think it's Rabbi Kushner is the gentleman's name who wrote this book. which I think on its face is misguided in part because of that Freudian slip. When people ask me, R.C., why do bad things happen to good people, my answer is, well, it's only happened once, and he volunteered. It's only happened once, and he volunteered. There's only been one good person, and that is, of course, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And he did indeed suffer far more gravely than any of us have on this planet, But he volunteered for that job, and he had a very important reason that matters a great deal to us. So once we get that behind us, now we have the question of why do bad things happen to bad people? Well, the Bible not only tells us why things happen, it tells us how things happen, and it tells us what we're supposed to do about these hard things. It tells us how we're to think about these hard things. And it tells us how we're supposed to feel about these hard things. Well, I'm happy that in my introduction this morning, our host did the right thing. Usually when I go somewhere and speak, they ask me to send them a bio. You know what a bio is? A bio is a single sheet of paper with everything I've ever done that I'm not ashamed of. And I could fit it all in one piece of paper. And the poor person who's supposed to introduce me has to stand in front of you and try to persuade you to listen to me. And so they go through some of the important things and those include the degrees that I've earned and the books that I've written and the ministries that I've done and this and that. And I do, like a lot of the folks that are here, I wear a lot of different hats. I run a ministry, it's called Highlands Ministries. You can come and stop by our booth if you want to later on to find out what we do. But I also serve as a pastor at a church that I planted 13 years ago, St. Peter Presbyterian Church in southwestern Virginia. I'm a pastor there, I'm not the only pastor there, and I'm not anymore the senior pastor there, but this is the church that I planted starting in 1996. And I suspect that St. Peter Church may be an awful lot like some of your churches. You know the kind of churches I mean. On Sunday morning when you drive around southwest Virginia where we live, you will see any number of big 15-passenger vans. Half of them will have painted on the door the name of the church that owns the van. The other half will be coming to St. Peter Presbyterian Church. They belong to our members, their families, not our church. We have lots of large families, the families all homeschool at St. Peter Presbyterian Church. It's not a law, it's not a rule, it's just the way it is. Everybody does this there. Lots of large families and lots of closeness. Very, very closely knit church. And this particular church last week was devastated. It was Wednesday night. And in the providence of God, Wednesday night we had a special event for the elders and the deacons of St. Peter Presbyterian Church. Somebody took us all out to dinner. We went to a wonderful restaurant, we had an outstanding meal, and we all got in our cars to drive home. And every elder and every deacon made it safely home. It was a windy night, it had been raining for several days. And I remember driving down the interstate, part of the way, half the trip is on the interstate. And I remember thinking to myself, boy, when I get off the interstate, that'll be good because we won't be so exposed to this wind. I was afraid we could get knocked over, the wind was blowing so hard. And we got off the interstate and onto the smaller side roads, and I realized that I was better off on the interstate. because the whole way home, I'm dodging debris that is blown onto the road as I'm getting home. But we made it safely home, said goodnight to the children, went to bed, went to sleep. And at 1 o'clock in the morning, My phone rang. It's not good when your phone rings at one o'clock in the morning. I staggered out of bed, made my way to the phone, answered it, and recognized two out of three things I needed to recognize. I knew whose voice it was. I knew what condition she was in. But I could not understand what she was saying. One of our elder's wives was on the line, obviously in great despair. And after a few minutes, I got the story. Two of the moms in our church, one a mother of eight, the other a mother of nine, had that night had a ladies evening out. They'd driven into town, out from where we live out in the country, and they lived near us. They drove out into town, they did a little shopping, they had a meal together out as well, and they were driving home. And on that drive home, about eight miles away from home, a tree, 70 feet tall, two feet in diameter came crashing down on the roof of that van, killing them both instantly. Not the tree fell in front of them and the car ran into it, but the tree landed right across the front row of that van. Both of them instantly dead. I got off the phone, went back upstairs. My wife was awake and worried. And I had to tell her. Both of these women were the sweetest, kindest, gentlest women. In a body that's been blessed with only gentle, kind, gracious women. One of these women was my wife's best friend from the time that we arrived in Southwest Virginia 13 years ago. Her husband is our family doctor who cares for my children and brought some of them into the world. And I had to tell my wife, her friend was gone. And I had to go. I got dressed. I got in the car knowing that the wife, the husband of the wife who called, one of our elders was ministering to the doctor family. I had to go to the other family. I had to get dressed, and I didn't know if he knew. I got dressed, I grabbed my Bible, I got in the car, and I drove out to that house not knowing if I was going to be telling this man that his wife has died. 1.30, I pulled into their driveway, knocked on the door. He opened the door. And I knew he knew. Many of you have heard this story. Many of you have been praying for our church. And beloved, those prayers have been most effective. If you have been praying, please don't stop. If you haven't been praying, if you can, please add these families and the elders and the whole body of St. Peter Presbyterian Church to your prayer list. This, since Wednesday night, is what our congregation has been dealing with. Saturday evening, There was visitation for one of the moms. Sunday afternoon was her funeral. Monday evening, visitation for the second mom. And Tuesday morning, just three days ago, the funeral for the second mom. Friends, when I got in that car to go to see that one family, I knew that I was facing one of the most difficult challenges I would ever have as a pastor. And I knew the only thing I could bring with me that would give me what I needed, that would be sufficient to do what I had to do, was the Word of God. It is my habit when I make pastoral calls to bring my Bible. But I confess this morning that often it's a habit. Not this time. I needed it. I grabbed it. I went. The Bible, friends, answers sufficiently our questions about these kinds of hardships, about these kinds of tragedies. As hard as that night was, once I knew He knew, and I didn't have the challenge of telling Him, it was the next few days that were harder still. My challenge was, at the same time, to bless, and to minister to, and to comfort, and to guide these two families. And to do the same thing with the rest of the body of St. Peter Presbyterian Church. And I gotta tell you again, this may seem crazy. But my biggest fear is we're making the arrangements. We have many teaching elders and the rule is, you know, you get what you want. Next Sunday I'm going to the other church that I don't usually worship with because I'm going to do a baptism. So there are blessings too. I'm going to be doing a baptism there because the Father asked me to do the baptism. So you get who you want. Nobody has a proprietary interest in these things. And so it happened because of that in the providence of God that both men asked me to preach the funerals. And my biggest fear, my biggest concern was how am I going to honor both of these women who were so much alike? without preaching one sermon twice. How am I going to be able to speak God's Word about the life of this woman and remember God's grace in her life and then two days later speak God's Word to this woman's life and how God worked in her life and not have it be a rerun? And I tell people, we're praying for her, I say, would you pray about this? I am dreadfully afraid that I'm not going to be able to manage this. Here's what I did. My first text for the first sermon I got from one of our deacons. One of our deacons used to be a funeral director. He's participated and helped in over a thousand funerals, and he said to me something very profound. He said, R.C., it doesn't matter where you preach, every funeral has the same text. And he told me the text, and so I chose it. I preached last Sunday afternoon on John 1135. You don't need to look it up. You know the text. John 1135. Jesus wept. I began the sermon by telling all those who had gathered that since the fall of man all of us have been walking upside down in God's right side up world. That when Jesus comes and he says to us If you want to live, you have to die. You want to be first, you have to be last. If you want to receive, you have to give. He is not telling us that His world is upside down. He's telling us that we're upside down, that we have to reverse how we look at things in order to live uprightly before Him. And I went on to say this, that one of the things that the Scripture calls us to do in light of tragedy is to mourn. We're told in Ecclesiastes, there is a time to mourn. Now friends, if you don't know what this means, I hope you'll learn one day. I hope you'll learn soon. But those of you who do know should know this. I'm reformed. I am a Calvinist. You cut me and I bleed to five points. Okay? See this? Oh, I don't have it with me. I left it over there. Got a name tag. It says R.C. Sproul on it. That's not me. I'm R.C. Sproul Jr. But he and I have that in common. We believe in the sovereignty of God. And there are some within the camp that I come from who are so zealous to protect and defend the sovereignty of God, that when it comes to suffering, they will suggest that somehow mourning is out of place. But Jesus wept. Now I ask the question, why did Jesus weep? Jesus walks in, Jesus has gotten the report, Lazarus is sick. Jesus says, thank you, duly noted, and he goes about his ministry. And while he goes about his ministry, far away from this ailing Lazarus, Lazarus dies. And then Jesus shows up. And everybody's weeping, everybody's wailing, and you know Jesus He knows the future. He knows what he's going to do. In fact, he telegraphed what he's going to do in his conversation with Martha. He knows what's coming. This glorious manifestation of his power. And of course, the joyous occasion of the resurrection of Lazarus. And yet, knowing what was coming, knowing that Lazarus was not going to suffer anymore, that Lazarus was going to come back, he was going to be with him, there was going to be this reunion, all the happy stuff, yet Jesus wept. Why? Two reasons. A godly man, a faithful man, had died. Secondly, the Scripture calls us, it doesn't only tell us there's a time to mourn, but it tells us what that time is. Do you know what the time to mourn is? You mourn when those whom you love mourn. We're called to weep with those who weep. And so when Jesus comes into this event knowing what He's going to do, knowing about the power, knowing about the glory, He is yet surrounded by loved ones who are mourning, and He mourns with them. So should we. Then we went from there to what Jesus did. that Jesus did raise Lazarus from the dead. He did cry out, Lazarus come forth. And Lazarus walked out of that tomb alive. And then I told the gathered that Jesus is in fact here mourning with us. But Jesus is not going to approach this casket and call forth this woman. And the reason Jesus is not going to do that is not because He's too late, but because we're too late. We're living upside down in a right-side-up world. I told the people that were gathered there that with every drop of rain falling to the earth, with every gust of wind that the scripture tells us, obey Him. The echo of the crack of the breaking of that tree as it came tumbling down on that car, Jesus did speak, Dion, come forth. And she who had been dead walked out alive. I wanted us to know first that God did this. A lot of folks out there don't like that idea. But friends, we don't find our answers based on what we like. We find our answers from the Word of God, which is sufficient. The Word of God says this. You may know this text. It's in Isaiah chapter 45. This is a prophecy given to Isaiah that he delivers to Cyrus. And in the context of this prophecy, God is trying to affirm to Cyrus God's sovereignty. God is preaching a good reformed sermon through Isaiah to Cyrus. universe when that says the lord has anointed to cyrus whose right hand i have held to subdue nations before him and loose the armor of kings to open before him the double doors so the gates will not be shut. I will go before you and make the crooked places straight. I will break in pieces the gates of bronze and cut the bars of iron. I will give you the treasures of darkness and hidden riches of secret places that you may know that I, the Lord who called you by your name, am the God of Israel." For Jacob, my servant's sake, and Israel, my elect, I have even called you by your name. I have named you, though you have not known me. I am the Lord, and there is no other. There is no God besides me. I will gird you, though you have not known me. that they may know from the rising of the sun to its setting that there is none besides me. I am the Lord, there is no other. I form light and create darkness. I make peace and create calamity. I, the Lord, do all these things. Beloved, when we ask the question, why do bad things happen to good people? We answer rightly when we say there are no good people save one. But we also have to understand that things don't happen. God brings to pass his will. And that's what I preached Sunday afternoon. We gathered again together on Tuesday. And I had as my goal then to answer this question. Having established that God has done this, don't we want to know why? Why would God do this? Why would God leave two godly men who are laboring side by side with their wives as they're called to in the garden to make known the glory of the reign of Jesus Christ, who are exercising dominion, who are raising up godly seed? Why would God wrench these women from these men? And these children. I mentioned that one husband is our family doctor. The other husband is a lawyer and a CPA. But he doesn't do lawyer work and he doesn't do CPA work. He left all that behind. He took his family, he moved out to the country, he bought some land, and he's working the land. He's growing his vegetables. He's raising more pigs than he knows how to feed. He's chasing his goats that get loose. And he's milking his cows. He and his wife together had a vision to experience the providence of God in the provision for their family by going back to the land. There's a name for this perspective. It's called agrarianism. And this family, they were caught up and committed to this agrarian vision. God bless them. I've enjoyed the fruit of their labors over the years, eaten the food that they've grown. And in fact, I've tried it myself. Years ago, among the many hats that I wore, I became a chicken farmer. and proved to be the world's worst chicken farmer. I was like the mirror image of Peter. I would walk by the chickens and my shadow would cross over them and they would keel over and die. I bought a bunch of meat chickens, and I kept them alive for a while in the house with the heat lamp. And then they got big enough, and I put them outside, and I fed them. And we were going to have them lay some eggs for us, and then we were going to get the next batch from those eggs, and then we were going to kill them and eat them. But before they started laying eggs, they started dying. Before they started dying, they started just sitting there. We called the hatchery. We said, hey, we bought these chickens from you and we've been feeding them, but they're dropping like flies. What's the deal with that? They said, well, how long ago did you buy them from us? Oh, three or four months. They explained, these are meat chickens. They're designed to live six to eight weeks. They said, your chickens are dying of heart attacks. Miserable, miserable chicken farmer. And then a couple years ago, I tried sheep. which are a lot harder to bury when they die young. And I had my struggles there. But I told the folks that were gathered for the funeral, I said, one thing about being an agrarian, you can't be a squeamish person and be an agrarian. Because unless there's death sometime in the process, you're failing. You do want to take care of these animals to the point at which now it's time to eat them. And that's when they have to die, otherwise it's all kind of silly, isn't it? So you go through a lot of death in the agrarian circumstance, and I can handle that. When we butchered our sheep, I hired a fellow from the community, and he has a lot of experience with deer, and he knows you can do the sheep like the deer, and so he's going to come over and do the sheep at my house. And in the providence of God, he strings them up on a tree right outside the kitchen window. So there's my wife trying to prepare one meal while she's watching the sheep being butchered. The children look out the window, and they decide that's not a good enough view, so they go outside and stand right beside him and watch him. Not squeamish either. I can watch a lot of things. But I mentioned a weakness that I have. I can't watch children suffer. I confess before you that some of you might not like this, but I watch movies from time to time. My favorite movie of all time, which is the best movie of all time, and I speak objectively, ends with the brutal torture of a great national hero from where my ancestors hail. I've seen it a hundred times. I watch it over and over again. Some of you may have seen it as well. They drew and quartered his body eventually. This is based on a true story about that great hero. I can watch that. But show me a commercial shot at a children's hospital. Show me a child that's bald from chemo. Can't take that. And now here I am preaching a sermon and sitting in front of me. are nine children, 14 down to nine months, who are without their mom. How can you not ask why? It's good and right and proper that we should establish the sovereignty of God, rest in the sovereignty of God, believe that he did this, but of course you ask why. There's different ways to ask why. Job asked why. He took a long time to do it. God bless him. He stood strong, and he stood strong, and he stood strong. But when he failed, he failed miserably. Because he didn't just say, Lord, would you mind explaining to me your thought process in all of this? There's why that wants to know, and there's why that's an accusation. The one is perfectly appropriate, the other utterly presumptuous. Remembering that there are no good people. There is no accusatory why, but we may ask as children to a father, father, what is your goal? What are you trying to accomplish here? What is it that led you to do this? And that's what I dealt with in that second sermon. What possible reason could there be for such a hardship? And I suggested that in the end there were two reasons that ultimately reduced down to one reason. The first of which is this. God brings suffering into our lives First, for His glory. The thing that I detest so much about those sundry systems of theology that try to distance God from suffering, to try to acquit Him and say, oh, He has nothing to do with that. This is the work of the devil. This is perilously close. to blaspheming the Holy Spirit, to ascribe to the devil the work of God. God does this, friends, for His glory. It's there in our text in Isaiah. That my name might be known. Think about this. 400 years. God's people, His people whom He's chosen in Abraham, 400 years they suffer under slavery. Under the boot of the most brutal tyrant that the world had ever known until that point. And when God comes into that equation, God says to that tyrant, for this reason, I raised you up. Oh my stars, do we need to get this, friends? Back in 1999, I had the privilege of speaking at the nominating banquet for the convention of the Constitution Party. I sat up there at the dais, and I had right here beside me one Mr. Howard Phillips, one of my heroes, who was nominated to be their candidate for president that year. And I gave the address that night. Stood up and I said, ladies and gentlemen, we've picked the right man. We've picked a great man. And we need to be praying for this man, because now for the next year, this man is going to be traveling the country, trying to persuade people that it's possible for him to become president. He's going to eat 1,000 rubber chicken dinners, and at the end of each one, he's going to stand up and spew out scenarios. Well, if so-and-so gets in the race and divides up that vote, and so-and-so gets in the race and divides up that vote, and these people come alongside us because we've got the momentum, and if that guy gets caught in a scandal the day before the election, well then, you know, we could win. And I said, Even though we were sitting under the president who was elected his first term with what, 43% of the vote in 1992? So you're not going to get, Mr. Phillips is not going to be elected by having more votes than anybody else. It's going to take more than that. In order for Mr. Phillips to be elected president, he's going to need more than a majority. 51% will not do it. If we want to see Mr. Phillips president, it's going to take more than a landslide 65% every state vote to get an elected president. The only way Mr. Phillips could be elected president, friends, is if he receives 100% of the vote. Because there's only one vote. Jesus decides who will be president. Now friends, that doesn't make it right what the presidents do. But I want you to go to sleep tonight resting easier and remembering that was true in the year 2000, it was true in 2004, and it was true in 2008. Jesus chose our president. God does this. And God does what He does. He raises up Pharaoh. He raises up President Obama. He raises up President Bush. He raises up whoever He raises up. He tells Pharaoh, for this reason I raised you up so that my name might be known. Which is the same thing, the same to the children of Israel. You all have been enslaved for 400 years for the sake of the glory of my name. That's right. The God we serve, friends, is a glory hound. Everything that he does, he does for his glory. And we have got together. You want to know where this is in the Bible? Here's where you find it in your Bible. Genesis 1, 1. In the beginning, God. And everything from that moment forward is God making manifest the glory of His name, including two moms being taken from their children and their husbands. We're confused about this because we're upside down. We think the world exists for our sake. Indeed, we think that God exists for our sake. Something's wrong here, God. I'm confused, because here am I, right? And I'm me, and things are supposed to work well for me, because, well, I'm me. It doesn't compute because I think this equation is supposed to end with R.C. Jr. is incredibly happy, handsome and wealthy and everything else. That's not the way the equation ends. The equation ends with Another text in Isaiah. The equation ends with the angels crying out eternally, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. Heaven and earth is full of His glory. It is full of His glory, friends, because that's what it's all for. You know, you all knew this one time. If you ever had a conversion experience, go back to that day, go back to that night, and you remember where you were. You remember the consciousness you had of your own sin, the joy and the gratitude you had in the provision of Christ, And remember what you said to him, O Lord, whatever you want. Whither thou goest, I will go. And if he leads you through the valley of the shadow of death, you go with him. But I bet you didn't know then. when you were ready out of sheer gratitude to do whatever he said, to experience whatever he called you to, to follow him wherever he goes, I bet you didn't know then that he had promised you so much more than merely causing you to escape the wrath and the fire of hell. For beloved, the second reason that God sends suffering into our lives is for our good. What does that mean? Is it good where R.C. becomes healthy and wealthy and handsome and happy and all of that? Isn't that good? The good that I am promised The good that suffering brings into my life is that I would be more like Him. This is far greater than every other good combined. Far greater than merely escaping the wrath of hell is God's promise that He will make me like Jesus. Dion Brockmeier, Teresa Bullen. They walked into that promise. For when that tree struck them, they received the promise that they would see Him like He is and thus be like Him. Remember John says, see how very much our Heavenly Father loves us that He allows us to be called His children. Not merely forgiven, but we're allowed to be called His children. We've been adopted into His family. And beloved, we do not know what we will be, for it has not yet been revealed, but we know that we will be like Him, for we will see Him as He is. Those women received that blessing on that day. But we who were left behind, we too became more like Him. First, for this simple reason, the scripture in describing Jesus, one of the first things we're told about Him is that He is a man well acquainted with sorrow. When you read through your Bible, you don't see, and Jesus was happy and healthy and wealthy and all that other stuff. So if we're going to be like Him, we don't get that. We get acquainted with sorrow. There's still more. We who are left behind, also in this event, in this tragedy, we come to see Him as He is. and through Christ visible in his body. Beloved, you've heard Doug talking about Greek rationalism and the way that it's infected our thinking and our syncretism with Greek rationalism. Let me give you an illustration of this. Because we are the children of the Enlightenment, we don't know how to deal with literature. Jesus tells us in His Word that the church is His body. And we, enlightenment geeks that we are, pat God on the head and say, oh, what a pretty metaphor. What you really meant to say is that we're supposed to be nice to each other. We're supposed to treat each other as if we were united. That's what you meant to say. But because you're not as sophisticated and modern as we are, you were left with something weak and foolish like a metaphor. It's what we do. Instead of entering into the metaphor, It's absolutely true that when we're told in Corinthians that the body, that the church is the body of Christ, that there's a lesson there that says, you know, the eye doesn't say to the foot, what need do I have of you? It's absolutely true, getting back to weeping with those who weep, that when the foot hurts, the eye hurts. Absolutely true. But you know what else is true? If we can't see Jesus here, and the body is his body, then we do see Jesus here. Every now and again, I have the privilege of speaking at fundraising banquets for crisis pregnancy centers. If any of you are involved in one, I want to come. I have a rule about the honorarium for when I speak at one of these things. I don't take one, okay? So I'm cheap. So get me there. And this is how my talk goes. I preach from the road to Emmaus. And I talk about how the morning disciples who are walking with Jesus are like the girls who find themselves in a moment of crisis and they're confused. And how the counselors at the Crisis Pregnancy Center are like Jesus, speaking to these girls wisdom and giving them guidance. And then I end by reminding everyone gathered that while the Crisis Pregnancy Center and those who labor there are Jesus to these morning disciples who are the clients of the Crisis Pregnancy Center, I remind them as well, friends, that the clients of the Crisis Pregnancy Center are also Jesus. For the scripture says when you give water to the thirsty, you gave it to me. When you give food to the hungry, you gave it to me. When you minister to those in distress in my name, you do it unto me. And so we see the body of Christ as the church is ministering to this family and we see the body of Christ in these families. Those who need to be cared for and ministered to. Made the same point years ago when we had a widow in our church who we took care of all of her needs and she was uncomfortable with that. She has some pride in her. She didn't like the church was meeting all of her needs. And I said to her, Sarah, this church is happy to do this. We're delighted to do this. We find it an honor to do this. I understand your discomfort. I understand that it's hard for you. I don't envy you, your calling. But I want you to understand your calling, Sarah. God has called us as a church to be Jesus to you. Because God has called you to be Jesus to us. Do you understand about suffering? There is no giving water to the thirsty in Jesus' name unless someone's thirsty. The suffering is the opportunity to make known, to make visible, the glory of Jesus Christ. And I concluded this way. Maybe I haven't persuaded you yet. Maybe you still think it's unfair that God would ask us to go through this much pain and this much hardship. But I reminded them that neither those who are mourning that are left nor those who went before us to their reward, none of them have endured more than Jesus endured for our sake. When we come to the question of suffering, we cannot address it rightly without including the story of the good man who had bad things happen to him. If you want to ask the question, why that? By all means ask. And He did it, beloved, according to the Scripture, for the glory that was set before Him He endured the shame for the glory that was set before Him. What's the glory? You may think that the glory is dominion, power, and authority, but I've got news for you. You know what Jesus had before the incarnation? Dominion, power, and authority. You want to know what the glory is? You're it. His pride is why He did this, which is why in the end, God pursuing His glory and God pursuing our good is one and the same thing. We suffer that we would be like Him. that we as His bride would reflect His glory. Beloved, we do in fact mourn. We do in fact minister to those around us who mourn. But we hope And our hope is grounded in the cross of Jesus Christ. Our hope is grounded in the open tomb of Jesus Christ. And so in our hoping, in the midst of our mourning, we rejoice in all things. Let's pray. Our good and gracious God, we thank you for the fullness of your promises in Christ. And Father, we thank you that he not only died for our sins, but that he died for the sin of our grumbling against the glorious work that you're doing in our lives to make us more like him. And so, Father, we ask with boldness and with confidence that You would in each of our lives and in the lives of our children and in the lives of our churches, that You would do whatever it takes that we might reflect the beauty of Your Son Jesus. For we ask it all in His precious and powerful name. Amen. Thank you all for your attention. For more messages, articles, and videos on the subject of conforming the church and the family to the Word of God, and for more information about the National Center for Family Integrated Churches, where you can search our online network to find family integrated churches in your area, log on to our website, ncfic.org.