Two of my favorite hymns, Rock of Ages and Hiding in Thee. All right, 1 Peter 2 this morning. 1 Peter 2. As we continue going verse by verse through 1 Peter. While you're turning, I did want to mention this as a follow-up with the announcement earlier. I will be out of town Wednesday through Saturday, so I should still be reachable. But just FYI, if you're trying to get a hold of me for any reason, I will not be here. So that's in large part why we're maneuvering the services this week. But of course, we'll look forward to gathering together on Tuesday. 1 Peter 2, verses 18-20. 1 Peter 2, verse 18. Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward. For this is thankworthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully, For what glory is it if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently? But if, when ye do well and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God. Heavenly Father, open our eyes this morning to behold wondrous things out of your law. We pray that our hearts would be willing to receive the word this morning. And Lord, that the word would bear fruit in each life. And we ask this in Jesus' name, amen. If you've studied the Bible for any length of time, you've discovered that the scripture contains a number of tensions. These are truths that appear to be in conflict with each other, but in reality are complementary to one another. We saw that in last week's scripture reading concerning Judas, that Jesus makes this announcement that Judas, in his betrayal of Christ, is doing what the Father had determined in eternity past for the salvation of mankind. But at the same time, Jesus then says, woe to that man by whom the offense comes. You see, there's human responsibility there insofar as Judas is held completely responsible for his betrayal of Christ. But there is also the recognition that Judas is not the one ultimately in control here. And even Judas' evil, God was going to take and use it to bring about the salvation of mankind. What a glorious reality, but there's a tension there, isn't there? On a recent Wednesday night, some of you mentioned some other tensions that we see in the scriptures. Faith and works, law and grace, the humanity of Christ and the deity of Christ. One tension that is pervasive in scripture that has been identified by scholars is the tension between the already and the not yet. When we think of the salvation that we enjoy in Christ, there are blessed realities that are true right now, already. First Peter gives some of these. Let me just read some of these to you quickly. First Peter chapter one, verse three, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again. That's repeated in verse 23 that we are born again. That is a present reality. It's already true. Verse five of chapter one says that we are kept by the power of God. Again, a present reality that guards us, that guards our faith. 1 Peter 2, verse 3, if so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious. That's a present reality. We've already experienced God's graciousness and kindness. Verse nine of chapter two, ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood and holy nation, a peculiar people. All these realities are already true. We've been chosen by God. We're priests before God. We're a holy nation before God. We are a people that God possesses as his own. That's the already. But scripture also presents for us a not yet. While we are already saved, there are certain dimensions of our salvation that we are not yet experiencing. Peter gives some of these, verse four of chapter one. Peter speaks of an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you. And you commonly find, you can trace this through the New Testament, that when you see this language of inheritance, it is normally referring to something that we can anticipate in the future. Verse 7 of chapter 1, the trial of your faith being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. And we've mentioned before that trial there is the proven genuineness of our faith. And right now, of course, we have the faith. But we anticipate one day when that faith is going to be praised and is going to receive honor and glory when Jesus returns. That's the not yet. Verse nine of chapter one, receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls. Now, yes, we're saved already, but we are also anticipating in the future that there is going to be a salvation not only of you know, our spiritual life, but of our whole person, bodily resurrection, renewed body. And that's something we're awaiting the return of Christ for that to take place. It's a not yet. So as believers, we have an already. We are already saved, already born again, already being preserved by God's power, already experiencing God's graciousness. But there's also a not yet. We're not yet enjoying our eternal inheritance. We are not yet experiencing the praise and honor and glory that our faith will receive at the return of Christ. We've not yet experienced the full salvation of our whole selves that we will experience at the rapture of the church. So there's the tension between the already and the not yet. And this is closely related to another tension that we see in Peter. And that is the tension between joy and suffering. Isn't it striking that when you read in scripture about suffering, especially and really exclusively the suffering of God's people, many times in the same context you read of joy. Now that is something that in our contemporary context, people really have a difficulty digesting. Our whole worship theme this morning that we've listed in the bulletin, praising God in the house of mourning, those two don't seem to go together, do they? You might think of praising God when you get the promotion at work. Praising God when the chemo is effective. Praising God when your investment portfolio is doing well. Praising God in the house of mourning. Praising God that you're stuck in bumper to bumper traffic and you're gonna be late to work. Praising God that you're stuck in bed with a 103 degree fever. Praising God that your wife has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Praising God that your coworkers are mocking you for your faith in Christ. And yet, Peter presents to us the reality that we can have joy in Christ in the midst of suffering. Chapter one and verse six, wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations. Again, you see the tension, don't you? We're greatly rejoicing, but we're also suffering all kinds of different trials. At the same time, verse 8 of 1 Peter 1, whom having not seen ye love, in whom though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory. Again, same context that Peter is mentioning our trials and our suffering. He anticipates that we can have this unspeakable joy. And what we read last week in 1 Peter 4, 13, but rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's suffering, that when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. Now you might have difficulty processing all of this this morning. How can I have joy in suffering? I can tell you, friend, that suffering is one thing that is unavoidable in this world. I cannot give you a magic pill to avoid suffering as much as I might wish that I could. We mentioned last week Joel Osteen, his idea that you can just speak blessings into your life and then everything is going to go well. But of course, that has no scriptural foundation whatsoever. Suffering is a normal part of life and Christians, many times, can expect to experience greater suffering than their worldly counterparts. But what I can tell you, friend, is that the Christian can face suffering with joy because the Christian knows that glory is coming. Listen to this pattern that Peter sets out for us in 1 Peter 1, verse 11. Searching what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, did signify when it testified beforehand of the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow. Notice that pattern, the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow. And what we find in Peter is that this is not restricted to the person of Christ. This is the same pattern that God's people follow. There is suffering first and then there is glory. So the critical issue is not whether there's suffering in your life. We can grant that. The issue is, whether that suffering is going to be followed by glory. Let's take a hypothetical scenario. You're driving home from church today. All of a sudden, head-on collision with another vehicle. You're instantly taken into eternity. What would happen? Where would you be now if that were to take place? Would there be suffering followed by glory? or would you be in the torments of eternal fiery hell? Now that's not a thought that we like to think about. We would like to come to church to think about pleasant things, right? But even in that scripture passage that we mentioned in your bulletin this morning, Solomon attributes a value to being in the house of mourning. Because it is there that we can really contemplate the ultimate realities of life. Do you know Christ? Have you trusted Him as Lord and Savior, relying on the power of His sacrifice on the cross and His resurrection? There's a passage that Paul, it's just, I love this verse. I've contemplated this on many occasions, what he says in 2 Corinthians 4, 17. Listen to this. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." Wouldn't you like to be able to say that? And you think of everything the Apostle Paul suffered. He goes through much of that suffering in the book of 2 Corinthians, where he talks about being stoned and left for dead. He talks about being shipwrecked. He talks about suffering whippings and scourgings. And yet, Paul says, all of that is light affliction. How can that be light affliction? It's light affliction because of the glory that is awaiting Paul. And the same is true for us as Christians. That cancer diagnosis, that mockery that you experience at your workplace because of your faith, That debilitating injury, all of it is light affliction compared to the ultimate glory that awaits us. Friend, if you wanna know that, you have to know Christ. Friend, you know that even right now as you're seated there, you can call on the name of the Lord. You can, right where you're seated, you can just say, Lord, I'm a sinner. I deserve hell. but I know that Christ has suffered for me. He's risen again and I turn away from my sin and I put my full confidence in Jesus Christ. Friend, if you'll do that, you may not feel any different, there may not be lights shining from heaven or anything like that, but friend, you will be a new creature in Christ. And if you have questions about that, of course you're encouraged to come talk to me. Friend, this is so urgent that we have that foundation in place so that we know we can face suffering with joy in light of the future glory that we will experience as God's people. Now all of these tensions, the already, the not yet, the suffering and joy, all of this really informs the text that we approach this morning. Peter's instructions here are really at the nexus between the already and the not yet, Notice what he says in verse 16 of chapter two. As he's addressing his readers here, he says, as free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness. So Peter says to his readers, you are free in Christ. But then notice what he says two verses later in verse 18. Servants be subject to your masters with all fear. How does that follow? We're free and yet we're supposed to submit to our masters with all fear? That's the already and the not yet. The already is that in Christ we're already free. Doesn't matter what your status is in this life. Doesn't matter how much money you make. Doesn't matter what your position is in your company. You are free in Christ. But the practical outworking of that awaits the future. You see, it won't be until we reach glory that we'll all, in a practical sense, be truly free. But see, now we live in a sinful and fallen world. And Peter recognizes that just because his readers have come to Christ, it doesn't mean that if they're slaves, that that bondage is instantly going to be removed. In fact, in most cases it would not be. Most of his readers would continue to be in that slave and master relationship. And so there is a tension there. But when we think about How we respond to the fact that we're free in Christ, but yet we're still dealing with these earthly relationships, right? We still, in Peter's day, slaves and masters, in our day, employer, employee. Our response to all of this shouldn't be to despair. It certainly shouldn't be to rise up in rebellion. No, what Peter says is be subject to your masters. And he anticipates, of course, that we do this in light of all this glory that's coming in the future. Now, the point of the passage is this, that we can anticipate heavenly rewards as we submit to unjust leadership in the workplace. we can anticipate heavenly rewards as we submit to unjust leadership in the workplace. And there are three features of that statement that we have been in the process of considering. First of all, there is submission. Second, unjust leadership in the workplace. And third, heavenly rewards. Now, the last couple of weeks, we've considered the first word, the word submission. And in so doing, we asked four questions. First, we asked the question, who is called to submit? Peter identifies them here as servants, or literally, household slaves. Slavery was a reality in the ancient Roman Empire, a bit different from what we would conceive of, given our context of the Civil War in the United States. But in Roman culture, the Roman slaves were not always blue-collar workers like we think of, working in the fields under the hot sun, though that was a reality for many of them. But there were some that even worked in white-collar-type professions, education, management, medicine. Slaves earned wages, and they could actually buy their freedom if they saved up enough money to do so. But at the same time, we have to remember that slaves were slaves. They were considered the property of their masters. And so a slave's experience would depend on the generosity or the lack thereof of his owner. Even so, regardless of that fact, of course, the slaves are called to submit. That brings us to the next question that we asked, and that is, what does it mean to submit? Submission entails placing oneself under the authority of another with the intent of rendering obedience. Now, we no longer live in a society where we have slaves and masters, but we still have authority structures. Peter points to that more generally in verse 13 when he says, submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake. And in our context, when we think of slaves and masters, probably the greatest parallel that we can envision is the relationship between an employer and an employee. Now it's not exactly the same relationship, but certainly there are some parallels. God has placed us in positions where we are responsible to do the bidding of an employer. And so we submit to those that God has placed in authority over us. Not because those authorities are inherently wiser or better than we are, but it's simply because they are in authority by God's decree, by God's design. We submit because He's worthy, not always because the boss is worthy. There's a third question we asked. What is the proper attitude of submission? And Peter says that we are called to submit with all fear. It's not primarily fear rendered toward the master, but fear rendered toward God himself. The fear, as we mentioned, it's not a fear that God is going to hurl us into the lake of fire. If we are believers in Christ, we don't need to fear that. But this is a fear that we will displease the Father when our works are evaluated at the judgment seat of Christ. As we read in 1 Peter 1, 17, that the Father, without respect to persons, judgeth according to every man's work, and so we should pass the time of our sojourning in fear. You can think of it this way. If you have a loving, earthly father, you probably don't live in perpetual fear that your father would disown you. But probably there is a sense of fear that you would ever do anything that would reflect poorly on your father, that would make your father displeased. That's a much different type of fear than kind of this servile type fear that is fearing that God is just instantly going to condemn us. No, we have this healthy sense of fear that we don't want to incur the displeasure of our loving Heavenly Father. And then a final question we posed is what are the proper objects of submission? And Peter calls them here masters, slave owners in Peter's cultural context. In our context, we could call them bosses or employers. And Peter mentions that the character of these individuals can vary widely. Notice he mentions the good and gentle, but he also mentions the froward or the crooked, the morally corrupt. Regardless of the character of the master, submission is to be rendered. So that's the word submission. Now, in light of that, I want us to consider a second idea in this passage. There's submission, and the second idea that we're presented with in this text is unjust leadership in the workplace. So we've considered in verse 18 this prospect that a master might be froward, corrupt, corrupt, crooked. In verses 19 and 20, Peter expands on exactly what that means. Notice how verse 19 begins. It begins with the word for. For this is thankworthy. Verse 20 begins similarly. For what glory is it? And so Peter here expands on what he has already said. Now when we think of corrupt masters in Peter's day or corrupt employers in our own or maybe other types of corrupt leadership, often this type of corruption is oriented around the punishment that those leaders inflict. So we want to consider first of all that this is a punishment that brings suffering. Now right away we're dealing with words that we're not comfortable hearing on a Sunday morning. Punishment and suffering. I know, I wish I could give you more cheerier words that we could be using, but this is what we're confronted with in the passage. Now think of, first of all, the reality of suffering here. There are a number of words in this passage that point to suffering, and I wanna just run through these. Look at verse 19. This is thankworthy if a man for conscience toward God endure grief. Now that word grief, perhaps in our modern English context, sometimes that sounds kind of mild. But when you look at how this word is used elsewhere in the New Testament, you see it being used in very strong contexts. John 16, verse 21, this word is used for the sorrow of a woman's labor pains. Hebrews 12, 11, it is used for the grief that is brought about by the Lord's chastening on our lives. Listen to Philippians 2.27, what Paul says here. And you can see there that this is not a mild form of grief. This is tremendous emotional distress. There's another word that's used here that's worthy of our attention. Notice at the end of verse 19, suffering. wrongfully. That word that is translated suffering is a key word in 1 Peter. It appears 42 times in the New Testament and 12 of those uses are in 1 Peter. In fact, 4 of these uses occur in the immediate context. You have the verse we just looked at, verse 19, but notice verse 20. What glory is it when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently, but if when ye do well and suffer for it. Same word that's translated suffer in verse 19. Notice verse 21, for even here unto were ye called because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example. And then verse 23, who when he was reviled, reviled not again, when he suffered, he threatened not. And so we will see in the coming weeks that Peter connects our suffering with Christ's suffering. And of course that connects us to that great theme that we saw last week of being partakers of Christ's suffering. Now I want to draw your attention to one more word that appears in verse 20. Notice verse 20. For what glory is it if when ye be buffeted for your faults, Now this is something we may not like talking about, but what this passage construes here is a suffering that is physical in nature. Let me give you some instances of how this word is used elsewhere in the New Testament. Matthew 26 and verse 67. Then did they spit in his face and buffeted him, talking about Christ, and others smote him with the palms of their hands. Mark 14, 65, and some began to spit on him and to cover his face and to buffet him and to say unto him, prophesy. In other words, they're covering his face and then they're slapping him and hitting him around and asking him to prophesy who it was that hit him. First Corinthians 4, 11, even under this present hour, we both hunger and thirst and are naked and are buffeted and have no certain dwelling place. That's an idea that's hard to grapple with in our culture, where corporal punishment is largely off-limits in the criminal justice system. There are, however, countries where this is still practiced. In the country of Singapore, for example, there are many criminals that are still subject to canings. By the way, I would suggest that that is a remarkable deterrent against crime. That, among other reasons, is why Singapore is far safer than major U.S. cities. Now, we have difficulty construing such a thing, because we're so accustomed to thinking that this is a cruel type of punishment, but in that ancient culture, this is what often happened in a relationship between a master and a slave. There was the possibility of there actually being physical punishment that was inflicted. Now, you can praise the Lord that you don't experience that at your workplace, at least I hope you don't. But regardless of the suffering, the specific manifestation of it, whether it is a physical type of suffering, or it is simply a mental or emotional type of suffering, we know this, that work entails suffering. It's just, it comes with the territory. Isn't that what we saw in Genesis chapter three? That as Adam and Eve sinned, there was this promise that the ground was going to bring forth thorns, that Adam was going to labor by the sweat of his brow. That's what we can anticipate in a world such as ours. And one of the forms suffering takes is not just the labors of the job itself, if you work a desk job, the mental agony of sitting at that computer for hours on end. But many times the suffering that we endure is because of problems from our superiors. Now I wish I could tell you, we have these visions in our American culture that you should follow your dreams that your job should just be completely smooth sailing, you never encounter problems, you're just doing what you love every single day. There are a very small minority of workers in the United States that have it pretty good. I saw this advertisement not long ago. I think the advertisement was for one of these freelance, work-from-home type outfits. This guy is taking his laptop to all these exotic locations and doing his work. In between video conferencing, he'd take a dip in the ocean, or he'd take a walk out in nature. That sounds all nice, but that's not how life works for the vast majority of us. even those that work from home. I mean, I kind of work from home, I guess. I can tell you sometimes the pressures of that can be even greater, especially when you've got kids that are demanding your attention. There's no way to get around it. I wish I could tell you that there was some magic formula that you could follow that would just make you feel like everything is smooth sailing. You're just following your dreams each and every day. But I can tell you for most of us that we're going to experience significant suffering in our work. Now, that doesn't mean we shy away from that. Work is fulfilling. It's necessary. It's what puts food on the table. But yet, many of us need to reorient our expectations. The expectation is not that everything's going to go perfectly fine, but rather that in our work, we're going to encounter obstacles. There's going to be suffering. That's what Peter confronts us with. So there's the reality of suffering. There's also the cause of suffering here. Notice the cause of this in verse 18, or in verse 19, rather. This is thankworthy. If a man, notice the next expression, for conscience toward God. For conscience toward God. That word conscience can be used in one of two ways in the New Testament. First, it can be used, of course, in the Jiminy Cricket sense. Let your conscience be your guide. But it can also be used in the sense of consciousness or awareness. Hebrews chapter 10 and verse 12, for example, speaks of conscience of sins. And it's really the idea of consciousness or awareness of sins. And I would suggest that this is how the word is being used here. The idea is that this person is enduring grief because he is aware of God's presence. He's not primarily serving his master, he's primarily serving God. Now that of course ties in with verse 18, this idea of serving with all fear, because there's this fear of God's displeasure at the judgment seat of Christ. This idea of having an awareness of God means that the slave is always aware of the fact that God is watching. It takes great faith to do right even when no one else is observing you. It takes great faith to do right even when there's an opportunity to do wrong and it's not likely that anyone's ever going to find out that you did wrong. But listen to the general principle given to us in Proverbs 15 in verse 3. The eyes of the Lord are in every place beholding the evil and the good. Do you really believe that? Do you live like that's true at your workplace? Notice how Jesus expounds on this idea in the Sermon on the Mount. If you go back to Matthew chapter six, this is really where the rubber meets the road in terms of our faith. Matthew chapter six. And verse 1, really this whole section that begins here in chapter 6, that you have these related paragraphs that all deal with this particular theme. Notice verse 1, Otherwise, you have no reward of your father, which is in heaven. Therefore, when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. The issue here is not whether you're going to be rewarded. The issue is how you're going to be rewarded. And Jesus here, he presents two alternatives. You can be rewarded by men's applause, or you can be rewarded by the Heavenly Father. Notice what he says in verse 3. But when thou doest thine alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thine alms may be in secret, and that thy Father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly. Do we really believe that? Do we really have faith that God sees everything we do? And so we're going to live not just for what other people see, but we're going to live before his vision, who sees all things. Now, this idea of serving with a consciousness or an awareness of God contrasts with serving simply to impress other people. If you go over to Ephesians, Ephesians chapter six, Paul lays this out very clearly here. He gives very similar instructions to servants or slaves as Peter gives. But notice Ephesians 6 and verse 5. We've seen that before, haven't we? In singleness of your heart, what are the next three words? as unto Christ. Now notice what this contrasts with in verse six. Not with I service as men pleaser. So there's a difference between doing it unto Christ and doing it to please other people. And notice the word that's used in verse six, I service. Haven't we all been there? Ah, you know, we better stop goofing around because our boss is just around the corner. He's gonna come here at any time and see what we're doing. That's completely the wrong mentality. The boss may not see. The guy who's come over from corporate headquarters, he may not see. But God sees all. He sees the work that you're doing. So we don't do it to impress other people. We do all of this for Christ. who sees everything. If you go over to Colossians 3, parallel passage to this one. Colossians chapter 3, and in this context there's a verse here that probably many of us have committed to memory, but maybe we don't consider the original context of the verse. Notice verse 22 in Colossians 3. Servants obey in all things your masters according to the flesh, not with eye service as men pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing God. Similar to what we saw in Ephesians 6. Now look at the next verse. And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men. Now that's a verse, it's applicable in many areas of life. But the specific context here is slaves and masters. And if we think of our context, employees and employers. When you vacuum that floor, you should do it for the Lord. When you empty the garbage bin, you should do it for the Lord. When you scrub the toilet, you should scrub it for the Lord. When you fill out that paperwork, when you repair that broken piece of machinery, when you harvest the corn, you should do it all for the glory of God. That's the beauty of being a Christian, friends. We don't have to wait until somebody's watching us to do what's right. We don't have to wait until the boss comes around. No, we can do what's right at all times because we know that our Father is always watching us. Isn't that the confidence Joseph had with Potiphar's wife in that scenario when it was unlikely that he'd ever be discovered by anyone in the house with just him and her? And yet he determines to do what is right because he recognized that he wasn't just living in the sight of Potiphar, he was living in the sight of God. And that brings me to the fact that When we live with a consciousness or awareness of God, sometimes that consciousness of God may conflict with the expectations of our boss, our earthly master, in a sense. Your boss asks you to fill out a report dishonestly. Maybe a boss requires you to work on Sunday mornings and not at a job where it's a life and death type of thing. you know, fire or medical services. Nowadays, maybe your boss expects you to use another employee's preferred pronouns. Now, in all these things, we know that yes, we can expect to get hostility from our earthly masters, but we also know that God sees us and that he will reward us for our faithfulness. So yes, in the immediate term, we can expect to face consequences. by living in a consciousness of God. That's why this passage, we go back to 1 Peter. 1 Peter 2 verse 19, for this is thankworthy if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, notice suffering wrongfully. The idea there is unjustly. You are in the right. The boss is in the wrong. And yet you still have to suffer. You know, we are inclined in America to think in terms of our rights, aren't we? And we've been blessed that we have a Declaration of Independence that says that our creator has given us those unalienable rights, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That is a sacred truth, and it's related to the fact that we're made in the image of God. But so often, you just hear that as a rallying cry. My rights, my rights! What you consistently find in the New Testament when you look at the life of the Apostle Paul, for example, you will see that Paul is continually willing to set aside his rights for the sake of the gospel of Jesus Christ. You read through 1 Corinthians chapter nine, for example, you see that heartbeat of the Apostle Paul. He says to the Corinthians there, well, you know, those that preach the gospel should live of the gospel. I had every right to insist on financial remuneration when I was among you, but I didn't do it. because I had a greater goal in mind. And Paul knew in that particular cultural context with the Corinthians, that was going to be a stumbling block. And so Paul relinquished his rights in order to have a greater opportunity to share the gospel of Christ. Do we ever do things like that? Do we ever do things for the gospel's sake? Are we willing to put aside our rights for the sake of the saving message of Jesus Christ, for the sake of bringing greater honor and glory to God. Well, that's what Peter is envisioning here. We've seen the reality of suffering and the cause of suffering. And finally, I want us to consider here the response to suffering. A couple of words I want to draw your attention to. Notice verse 19. This is thankworthy if a man for conscience toward God endure grief. That word that is translated endure, it occurs only two other times in the New Testament. First of all, 1 Corinthians 10, 13, there hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man. But God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able, but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. The word bear, same word translated endure here. 2 Timothy 3.11, Paul speaks of the persecutions that he endured. One authority defines the word this way. They say it means to bear or carry by being under. to bear a burden. Let me draw one more word to your attention. In verse 20, what glory is it if when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently. Word translated, shall take it patiently. You see it again at the end of verse 20. But if when ye do well and suffer for it, ye take it patiently. This is acceptable with God. Now this verb is more frequent in the New Testament. Most often it is translated endure. I'll just give you a couple quick examples here. Matthew 10, 22. Ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake, but he that endureth to the end shall be saved. 2 Timothy 2, 10. I endure all things for the elect's sake. Hebrews 12, 2. Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that set before him endured The cross. Now are you getting the picture? This is a word that indicates the presence of a burden that must be carried. There is suffering that must be faced. We should not expect deliverance in this life because no such deliverance is promised to us. Certainly we shouldn't grumble or complain. We shouldn't envy others who seem to have better work environments than we have. You ever done that? We shouldn't go on strike. We shouldn't spend time on the clock circulating a petition. No, what we need to do is endure. We need to take it patiently. We need to bear the burden that God has called us to bear. Well, my boss is unreasonable. Well, you can certainly pray that God would open up other doors of employment. There's nothing wrong with praying for that. But until God does that, you have to endure. You've gotta take it patiently. It's true for masters and slaves, and it's true in the workplace today. I'd also suggest though that this really presents us with a greater reality for all kinds of spheres of life. There is all kinds of suffering that we face that we are not promised deliverance from in this life. There's no other solution than to simply endure it. Now, again, you can pray for deliverance. There's nothing wrong with that. But even more importantly, you should pray for greater grace to endure. You know, I know, as I mentioned in the pastoral prayer this morning, we have many in this church that are undergoing tremendous suffering in a number of different areas. And my hat's off to many of you who are willing to deal with that kind of pressure. We have serious medical needs that are represented in our congregation. We have those of you that have lost loved ones that are very close to you. Many of you have endured tremendous suffering. And I will tell you as pastor, I pray. I do pray that God will give you relief from the suffering that you're experiencing. But more important than that, I pray that God will use that suffering to mold you into the image of his son. Let me, as we close here, if you turn back to James chapter one. James chapter one, verse two. James says, my brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into diverse temptations. In other words, all kinds of different trials, right? Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience, or perseverance, but let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Now, praise the Lord if he heals your cancer. Praise the Lord if he relieves chronic pain that you've been experiencing. Praise the Lord if he sends an unexpected financial gift your way. The greatest work that God could accomplish in any of our lives is what is described in verse four. That we might be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Now that's not speaking of sinless perfection. What that is speaking of is our spiritual maturity. Isn't that what we all should want? It just, it grieves me that in so many churches, the prayer list is just nothing more than a list of body parts. You know, this person's toe, this person's back. And yes, these are legitimate concerns that we can pray for. But a million years from now, are you gonna be thinking about that? You know, the urgent priority that all of us have is that we would be described in the same way as James 1.4. that through these trials we experience that God would make us those who persevere. Those among whom patience has her perfect work. So that when we live our lives in this world, we live as those that are mature. We're whole, we're everything that God intends for us to be. That's what I pray for each of you as your pastor. That's my burden, and just many of us, I know we feel all these other strains in our life, but friends, let's not lose sight of the most important thing. The most important thing God can accomplish is not physical healing. It's not financial provision. It is a work of grace in your life that makes you more like his son. Heavenly Father, we thank you for wonderful truths that we've seen in the scriptures this morning. Oh, Lord, arrest our attention with these things. We know, I fear, Lord, that there could be many of us who are already just thinking about the meeting that's to come after this service, but Lord, give us grace to really reflect on our spiritual condition. Oh, Lord, give us grace to endure suffering. We need greater grace because, Lord, I know that many of us are experiencing greater and greater levels of suffering, whether it's emotional or mental or physical. Lord, with each increase in the level of suffering, we need greater grace. And we need more and more, Lord, for your son to be shown in our lives. And we pray that that could be a reality. And we ask this in Jesus' name.