Alive and Well VII, How to Gain From Pain

Out of your outline and we're going to close this series off today And as we're about to end this series I'm wondering how many of you have been able to put your finger on one area of your life that is Honestly unmanageable we began The very first message by saying that parts of our lives every one of our lives is unmanageable I have a hunch after just watching and listening and talking to folks over the last weeks that Some are still a little bit oblivious to the whole point of these messages I Mean do you honestly find with the Apostle Paul that you do things that you don't want to do and That you don't do things that you wish you would do I mean one of the things that I have purpose to do through the course of preparing for this series was Just to work on my words a little bit I've discovered how powerful words are and I wanted to determine to speak encouraging words and to Allow God just to minister life through me and my words and that's why it was just so strange a few weeks ago I went home and Carol been working all Saturday She started early in the morning and she was working to clean the house And I knew she was still in the process of that when I got in about 3 in the afternoon and Saturday And you know their buckets were on on the counters and cleaner and all that stuff And I walked in and the first thing out of my mouth first thing was Why is the carpet have those three or four phases of brown in it over there with a dirty look and the stuff? She said cuz your dog rolls there That's your dog. I mean I was our dog. It was your dog rolls Sorry about that first thing was something not encouraging let's turn off a second Marty So better What about you have you discovered some things that aren't now I mean my microphone is obviously not manageable in my life But how about you? I mean just just to be clear before we end the series Have you blown up at least once when you should have been calm Have you procrastinated when you should have made a commitment have you eaten or drank something you shouldn't have Have you turned over a new financial leaf only to find yourself at the mall the next day Have all the horizontal planes in your life been piled up with stuff cleaned up and then piled up again Have you judged someone when you should have been accepting have you driven like no forget that how many of you have had at least? One of these one of these in your life huh going now All right, can we just have a mass confession say all right? I this you know I struggle we all do if we're really honest. I just I mean I just that was a short list We all need to grow and the application of the grace of God in our life, but in some cases This pain is very great. I mean it really is If we took the time to let everyone just open up a bit We all have painful parts of our lives And I want to just share a few kind of serious things as I close this teaching because some of you need serious answers for your pain People will often ask me. Why does God allow my pain? Why does God allow my pain and the first thing? I think we need to know is that all suffering? Is part of life because of sin jot it down Suffering is part of life because of sin all the way back in the beginning when Adam and Eve fell and they chose to Disobey God loved ones it was a lot more than just a little mistake. It was more than a bad day They released into the human race this propensity to do the wrong thing and as a result suffering followed Eve suffered through childbirth Adam suffered through the process of making things work in his life and Suffering has been with us ever since look at Jesus said in John 16 33 in this world you will have Tribulation or eucalyptus means pressure or suffering or stress it's going to be part of life, but remember these two important truths All suffering can be redemptive All suffering can be used by God in a purposeful way That's why Romans 8 28 says I know God works all things together for good for those who love him are calling for his purpose So there can be redemptive purpose in your suffering and number two you never need suffer alone One of the saddest things that happens to people is that when they suffer they withdraw and they feel like the world collapses in on them You need to understand the reason why you needn't be alone is that the chief sufferer in the universe Has come to live with you You see it would have been one thing if God would have said okay You made a mistake now you're gonna suffer for it and it's gonna be but you know Here's the astonishing thing about Jesus in case you need to know another reason to follow him and to receive him and to love him The Bible says I put the ally in your notes in Revelation that the Lamb was slain from the foundation of the world that means this it means that before creation was God knew what men would do and he Created anyhow knowing that in order to redeem it He would have to enter in fully to its sin and suffering and pain and so Jesus the Bible says on the cross and the reason Why the cross is the centerpiece of the Christian faith is because on the cross Jesus bore all of our suffering All of our pain all of our sorrow all of our sadness That's why Isaiah says he was a man of sorrows And in a way, I can't fully begin to explain to you today when Jesus suffered it wasn't just a few people's pain and It certainly wasn't for anything that he had done He suffered to accept it himself the pain of the human race Paul Bilheimer in his little book don't waste your sorrows writes this when God conceived the plan of creation and redemption he knew of the fall of mankind in advance and accepted the necessary fact of infinite suffering Not in duration but in magnitude of suffering himself the total consequences of the cumulative sin of the world with its result in sickness sorrows suffering and pain He knew he could not make a full atonement for sin without actually Experiencing in his very own being the full need of suffering which eternal justice would demand for the transgression of the universal moral law You needn't suffer alone because Jesus Has suffered with you second God allows pain because he has given me a free will He's given me a free will To be made in the image of God means to have a choice you can choose good or evil you can choose right or wrong You can choose life or death now. God could have made us all puppets How are you glad that you have a choice you have freedom? See God wants to create what he's doing is he's raising up a bride to spend eternity with him in the heavenly places But he knows that love can only be voluntary I don't know you someone you can't force someone to love you some of you here today have tried to have someone love you You can't force him to do it You can't trick them into doing it You can't compel them to do it love has to be given and God knew that and so he had to in order to make love Voluntary he also had to allow for the possibility that you would reject The possibility of love there have to be options there have to be choices that might be bad choices Have you ever made a bad choice? Ever had pizza at 1139 I Have ever taken Substances that you shouldn't have have you ever gotten involved with a person illicitly that you shouldn't have All of us make choices it seems and sadly Someone else's free will can affect you profoundly You might not even have anything to do with it I remember years ago when Jonathan was about two years old We were sitting in an intersection on McKnight. We're just sitting in front of the post office and our little Subaru station Well, you're sitting there and a drunk driver at 1130 in the morning came down Just in a stupor and plowed right into the back of our little station like and knocked us 300 yards down McKnight Road He had made a choice to drink and drive We suffered because of that And I could say well God limit the ones who are gonna do bad Limit their will but let me have Lord says if you're to have free will then free will has to be an option for everyone And some of you have suffered pain because of other people's choices, but in the end The option is to be a puppet And God loves us too much for that By the way before I leave this let me just say this hell is a choice people make I hear people say You know somewhat piously. I can't believe and I love in God who would send people to hell And they roll that out is that's their rebuff of any kind of inquiry about their spiritual Condition let me just say God does not send people to hell people choose to go God says here's the way of salvation. Here's the path of life. You can choose life or you can choose death Bible says he created hell for the devil And his angels not for mankind, but man can choose to go there also God allows pain to get our attention as Jeff so Personally shared with us it woke him up out of his lukewarmness Pain tells us that something's wrong pain isn't our problem by the way Depression anxiety fear there's honor. That's not our problem is deeper than that Those are just symptoms CS Lewis writes pain is God's megaphone to rouse a sleeping world look at Proverbs 20 30 on your outline Sometimes it takes a painful situation to make us change our ways. I mean, you know, that's true Sometimes we just need to feel some pain before we'll get something done Ever have something go wrong in your mouth and a tooth starts to hurt or something starts to pain. I mean I'm no one anytime. No offense. I know we have dentists in courage, but any day do you have to go to the dentist? It's sort of a bummer day, you know, because he's just oh Man, what are they gonna do and they get in there and you certainly love the outcome. It's kind of the process, right? Remember not long ago I had something my tooth started in this side and I didn't know what it was Finally with the dentist and there was a little teeny piece of seed or something I got between my tooth and my gum and it was bad. He just got it out. No problem And in the end see what was wrong with me wasn't the pain It was that little teeny seed and if I hadn't dealt with it, let's see what if it had gotten infected and I would have a problem Okay, so pain used to gets our attention to do something about a situation next God uses pain. Oh, by the way Keep this in mind there are times that you're just real resolved to be going a certain way and God will use a painful circumstance to change direction. Remember Jonah. I Mean Jonah had a course he was I want to head this way and Lord said no I really want you to go to dinner, but Jonah said no I want to go this way Lord said well let's go on a Mediterranean cruise and They did and Jonah went down to the bottom of the sea and God got his attention for the pain of being in the belly Of this monster whale for three days and Jonah says by the way in his little story He says when I had lost all hope I once again turned my thoughts to the Lord He sometimes the pain has to be so great that the only alternative is to turn to the Lord And there's some people who won't break their addictions until they really lose all hope of being restored any other way It's a fact Next pain is allowed by God to teach me a goth a love I'm gonna just refrain from getting into this too much except to say this The Lord has your best interest at heart and sometimes as this beautiful song that Katie sang reminds us It's a painful thing to have God's Churning in our lives, but we need that because he wants to make us more like himself more given to love Less given to being selfish and self-centered How many parents know that you sometimes have to discipline your kids in ways that they just flat don't like? You could ever say thanks mom and dad for grounding me They ever say, you know when you have to move to the place of giving him a spank and they say, you know I really appreciate that mine never did and when we turn them and say honey, we're just we have to this is You have to be disciplined because we love you and we just don't want this to to mess up your life and they'd say But in the end you see we know the bigger picture and God knows the bigger picture with our lives and that's why he allows some things because he's trying to bring about a Full release of his love in us and finally today. Just let me touch on this. God allows pain to give me a ministry to others Second Corinthians 1 for in the top of your outline praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort? We ourselves have received from God You see there's something powerful about you ministering to someone else out of the thing that you've experienced Who can better help an alcoholic in their pain than a person who's in recovery from alcoholism Who can best help a person with an eating disorder that it's than someone who's been through an eating disorder Who can best help someone that's been abused? and going through the recovery of that than someone who's Been set free from the pain of that Who can help a couple whose child is rebelling more than someone who's? Been through the pain of watching a child go through that but you have to be a little bit open with it You have to recycle it. You have to lean into it because if you keep it to yourself You waste it You just end up burying it instead of allowing it to become a blessing That's why I'm so just so proud of the alive again people They you see they've come together as a leadership team many of them with lots of pain in their lives But now they're recycling it and sharing what God's done in their lives through their pain to help others Get free from their pain and it's a powerful thing to observe The Bible's full of stories like this think of Joseph I mean Joseph didn't deserve to be abandoned by his brothers and that well sold off into slavery I mean they went back and told his father, you know, he was eaten by a lion We think what a dysfunctional family that was, right? Joseph rose above that and end up loving his brothers in the end and setting them free Look what it says the end of your outline on the first page. They intended it to harm me, but God intended it for good God wants to use your pain for good How does God use my pain flip your outline over to help others well Look at the next verse says always be prepared to give an account to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope Circle the word hope that you have but do this with gentleness and respect Listen people out there. There's gonna be thousands of contacts that we're gonna have collectively speaking After today, you're gonna go out and run into people who need some hope in their lives And the question is are you available will you move in I mean even beyond that God's gonna nudge some of you to step more proactively to help somebody Just three ways to suggest that you share. First of all Be humble Galatians 6 one says it very clearly humbly help him back Don't stand even if you're healed and doing well, don't point the finger at someone and say well You know, I was there once but I'm really all over that now Rather be humble about it because you know that but for the grace of God you too would be stuck second be real What you've heard here the last seven weeks has been just authentic real sharing Hearts that have many times I'll tell you these people they're not just thrilled to get up here. They say to me, you know, I That was the toughest thing I've ever done And I want to encourage you to do this write out what you're gonna share take a few moments And process I mean I say moments It could take you a couple of hours to process some of the experiences you've had and write down what God's taught you It's important I mean these these Testimonies that are shared we ask the people to write them out and and some people Happily do that and some people say I don't want to do that or I don't need to do that or I can talk and you Know what? We found is it's much more effective when they allow their thoughts to coalesce just a bit and write it down That will be the same with you and your testimony write it down And Then when you share with someone you'll have already Put in order how God touched you and how he used it and you'll be able to be much more effective in your witness And finally listen, well don't lecture People don't need for you to tell them all the things that they need to get corrected They don't need for you to spell it all out and they don't need to listen to you. Tell this elaborate long, you know Three-hour sort of summary of your life. Just listen to them Don't try to argue them into the kingdom or into help just listen and share briefly what God's done for you I want to close with one more story as I end this series This isn't on your outline Kind of came to me late in the week But it's a point that I want to leave you with because I think it's critical for you to be a part of this In this series, in fact, you can just turn your outline or put it back in your Bible just I Want to read a verse for you out of the book of James James chapter 1 James writes in his epistle this he says Therefore get rid of all moral filth and the evil It is so prevalent and humbly accept the word the Word of God planted in you which can save you Therefore get rid of that's the Greek word that was used for the shedding of a snake skin in the original Greek Get rid of it. No, we're just just peel it right off of you all moral filth. He says and the evil all the evil that is so prevalent in our culture and Humbly accept the word planted in you which can save you and reminded me of a story that I'd come across about a man who worked with snakes named man named Gary Richmond who Lives out in California and this is what he writes. He's a zoologist. He specializes in snakes. He says, don't you just hate King Cobras? Because I know I do and I came by my feeling honestly Our zoo had a 13-foot giant that seemed to me to be the embodiment of evil He had a scar over his left eye to make him look mean and more significantly kept him from shedding his skin in a normal fashion At least twice a year we would get the dreaded phone call from the reptile house the Cobra shed his skin last week But the eye cap didn't come off. It looks infected. Do you suppose you and the doc had come down and cleaned it up a Snake skin includes a clear over the clear scale rather over the eye to protect it from foreign objects snakes Have no eyelids no way to blink for protection But this snake scar prevented the normal shed of the eye cap which had to be surgically removed We had a guy last night. He said I raised snakes. This is exactly right. I Looked at him real strange. That's okay We went the next day Arrangements were more critical because of the extreme danger only two people the zoo could take responsibility for grabbing the more deadly snakes And this was the most deadly This snakes venom glands contained enough poison to kill a thousand men Is properly administered a fact that seemed to come up every time we did this procedure The curator of reptiles was assigned to grab the head and two reptile keepers were to study the body when the snake was subdued the Veterinarian would begin the delicate surgery His arena kept him inches from a lethal injection and my job was to furnish him scalpel sponges and hemostats anything to help to expedite the procedure The capture of the Cobra was as follows now Just picture this sort of make make a mental image here The five of us took our positions the two keepers on either side of the cage door The curator in front of the door about six feet back the vet and I at either side of the curator ten feet from the door The keepers only defense were sheer bird nets with two-foot handles The door was open seconds later. The Cobra appeared as soon as it saw us it stopped Spread its cape and raised to full stature. So we were all looking at the snake at eye level The Cobra was trembling with excitement as it in turn stared at each of its five enemies It seemed to be choosing who would be its prey The curator was chosen and with shocking quickness at lunge forward hissing and growling with malevolent rage The skilled keepers placed the sheer nets over the snakes head as it pushed to get through the curator firmly grasped its neck just behind its venom sacks The keepers grabbed the writhing body and the curator nodded said let's get this over with Well, the pressure was incredible. He writes the vets hands were trembling and the beads of sweat began to run down the curators forehead The curator turned to me and said do you have any cuts or scratches on your hands? I Looked and said no Get paper towels quick. He followed in a strange voice. I did so now put them in the Cobras mouth The King Cobra watched the paper towels as they were carefully positioned to allow him to bite into them He bit down violently and began to chew The towels became yellow with venom so they so much so that they began to drip The curator continues. Did you know that several elephants die every year from King Cobra bites? A man could never survive a bite with a full load of venom That's why I'm having you drain his venom sacks. My hands are sweating and my fingers are cramping And when I let go it may not be quick enough And here it is. He went on to say more people are bitten trying to let go of snakes than when they grab them More people are bitten trying to let go and trying to grab You get weak quickly when you grab a big poisonous snake and when you say that there are many situations in life that are just like that easy to grab and Hard to let go I Want to end this series by saying this if you've not grabbed the snake if you've not taken a hold of alcohol or drugs if you've not gotten involved in promiscuous sex if you've not gotten into pornography if you've not begun lying or cheating on your taxes or doing any of the kinds of things we've talked about then don't start and Your life will be so much better because more people are bitten trying to let go And trying to grab do the right thing don't start let's stand together What I thank you for the power that is available to us to help us to say no to temptation I thank you today Lord that even as we conclude this series You're here to bring us closer to freedom and More in touch with your spirit help us now to take a step in Jesus name.