Suffering is Not For Nothing | Full Movie | Elisabeth Elliot

when I was told that my first husband Jim was  missing in Auca Indian country the Lord brought   to my mind some words from the prophet Isaiah when  now passes through the waters I will be with thee   and through the rivers they shall not overflow  thee I prayed silently Lord let not the waters   overflow and he heard me and he answered me two  years later I went in to live with the Indians who   had killed Jim sixteen years after that after I  had come back to the states I married a theologian   named Addison leach he died of cancer three and a  half years later there have been some hard things   in my life of course as there have been in yours  and I cannot say to you I know exactly what you're   going through but I can say that I know the one  who knows and I've come to see that it's through   the deepest suffering that God has taught me the  deepest lessons and if we'll trust him for it we   can come to the unshakable assurance that he's  in charge he has a loving purpose and he can   transform something terrible into something  wonderful suffering is never for nothing Elizabeth is my wife and I would like to  pray for her and for you before she comes   to speak to us Father it is with grateful  hearts that we come together we come from   different walks of life and we all come  with needs that many times you alone know   about we're amazed that the word spoken can  be applied in different areas and different   circumstances but all according to your way  and working the best out for us so we pray   for this evening Elizabeth as she speaks  you've prepared her and given our words to   give to us we pray for your spirit over  at all that we might gain from this the   understanding and knowledge we need through every  circumstance of life in Christ's name we pray this series is entitled suffering is not for  nothing when CS Lewis was asked to write a book   on the problem of pain he asked permission to  write it anonymously permission was denied as   not being in keeping with that particular series  and this is what he wrote in his introduction   if I were to say what I really thought about  pain I should be forced to make statements of   such a parent fortitude that they would become  ridiculous if anyone knew who made them and I   would echo those sentiments when I hear other  people's stories about their own sufferings   I feel as though I know practically nothing  about the subject myself I'm in kindergarten   as it were compared to for example my friend  Jan who is quadriplegic and lies on one side   or the other 24 hours in a nursing home in  Connecticut or my friend Judy Squires in   California who was born with no legs or my  friend Joe Bailey my late friend Joe Bailey   who lost three children but if all I knew  about suffering was by observation alone it would still be sufficient to tell me that  we're up against a tremendous mystery suffering   is a mystery that none of us is really capable of  plumbing and it's a mystery about which I'm sure   everyone at some time or other here has asked  why and if we try to put together the mystery   of suffering with the Christian idea of a God  who loves us we know if we think about it for   as much as five minutes that the notion of a  loving God cannot possibly be deduced from the   evidence that we see around us let alone from  human experience I'd like to go back to some of   my own home training I grew up in a very strong  Christian home in Philadelphia where both of my   parents were what I call seven-day-a-week kind  of Christians we had a little brass plate over   the front doorbell that said Christ is the head  of this home the unseen guest at every meal the   silent listener to every conversation we were  taught that God is love I suppose one of the   earliest hymns that we were taught that was that  little gospel song jesus loves me this I know for   the Bible tells me so when I was nine years old my  one and only girlfriend almost my one and only I   lived in the neighborhood of 42 boys but I had  a friend who lived about six blocks away whose   name was Essie and se and I were both 9 years old  when she died when I was probably 3 or 4 years   old we had a guest in our home who was on her way  to China as a missionary her name was Betty Scott   and she went to China Mary her fiance john stem  and a few years later i'm not sure just how old   i was maybe six or seven my father came home one  evening with a newspaper telling that John and   Betty stam had been captured by Chinese Communists  marched almost naked through the streets of a   Chinese village and had then been beheaded you  can imagine the impression this made on the mind   of a young child in view of the fact that Betty  Scott's Tam had sat at our supper table and had   given us her testimony as she was on her way to  China I also remember very vividly the newspaper   stories of the kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh's  baby and I would go to sleep at night imagining   that I saw a ladder coming up by my window my  parents not knowing that I was concerned in this   way didn't think to tell me that there really  wasn't a whole lot of danger that anybody was   going to be interested in kidnapping a child like  me because we were not really what you might call   rich nevertheless I did have some experience  of death as a small child and just a few weeks   ago to bring it more up to date some friends of my  husband's and mine called to say that their little   4 year old child who was born with spina bifida  was doing very well but the mother was pregnant   and for various reasons had had some tests which  had revealed that the child she is now carrying   is also spina bifida and so they were calling  just to say we're hurting please pray for us and   when I hear stories like that it's what makes  me think that my own experience of suffering   is really very little at all but the question  is unavoidable for a thinking person where is   God in all of this can you look at the data and  believe and it's the question that was put to   Alyosha by Ivan kerim at South in Dostoevsky's  famous novel about the brothers caramel Soph   recounting the story of a little girl of five  Ivan said to his brother she was subjected to   every possible torture by her cultivated parents  they beat her thrashed her kicked her for no   reason until her body was one bruised then they  went to greater refinements of cruelty shut her   up all night in the cold and frost in a privy and  because she didn't ask to be taken up at night as   though a child of five sleeping its angelic the  sound sleep could be trained to wake and asked   they smeared her face and filled her mouth with  excrement and it was her mother her mother who   did this and that mother could sleep hearing  the poor child's groans can you understand why   a little girl who can't even understand what's  done to her should beat her little baking heart   with her tiny fists in the dark and weeper meek  unresentful tears to dear kind God to protect   her do you understand that friend and brother  you pious and humble novice do you understand   why this infamy must be and is permitted and so I  hasten to give back my entrance ticket Ivan says   it's not God that I don't accept Alyosha only  I most respectfully return my ticket tell me   herself I challenge you answer imagine that you  are creating a fabric of human destiny with the   object of making men happy in the end giving them  peace and rest at last but that it was essential   and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny  creature that baby beating its breast with its   little fist for instance and to found that edifice  on its unavenged tears would you consent to be the   architect on those conditions tell me tell me the  truth and what I want to share with you is what   I see to be the straight truth with no evasions  and no clear flat platitudes it's very fresh in   my mind just this week a picture that I saw in  Time magazine of an inconsolable newborn baby   whose mother was on crack cocaine just to look  at that picture brought down on my own head as   it were everything that I was planning to say to  you in this series I happened to be sitting on the   plane yesterday next to a woman who was reading a  book called master of life manual which according   to the cover was about metaphysics brain mind  awareness human potential principles and this   stunning statement create your own reality now  and I thought I would hate to be down to such an   extreme that I was having to create my own reality  in the face of the data of human experience and so   I would ask the question is there a reason to  believe that suffering is not for nothing is   there an eternal and perfectly loving expect  Lea loving purpose behind it all if there is   it's not obvious it doesn't exactly meet the eye  and yet if for thousands of years in the face of   these stunning realities this terrible truth  if for thousands of years people have believed   that there is a loving God and that that God is  looking down on the realities around us and still   loves us and these people have still continued to  insist that God knows what he's doing that he's   got the whole world in his hands then I repeat  the reason cannot possibly be obvious it can't   be because those thousands of people were all deaf  dumb blind or stupid and incapable of look clearly   and steadily at the data that you and I are  constantly having to look at what is the answer fwh Myers in his poem st. Paul wrote these words  is there not wrong too bitter for atoning what   are these desperate and hidden years hast thou  not heard thy whole creation groaning sighs of   the bondsman and a woman's tears the answer  is not obvious there must be an explanation   somewhere and it's my purpose in this series to  try to get at the explanation and then to see if   there's something that you and I can do about  this question of suffering I'm convinced that   there are good many things in this life that we  really can't do anything about but that God wants   us to do something with and I hope that by the  time I'm finished I will have made myself clear   now the word suffering may seem very high phlegm  and perhaps much too dignified for your particular   set of troubles today and I can look around this  audience and I don't know a person here I have no   idea who might be watching the videos later on but  if I knew you and if I knew your stories then I   would know that I can't possibly speak personally  to every need that's here to every kind of   suffering and I'm fairly sure that there would be  some people here tonight who would be saying well   I really don't know any such thing as suffering  I've never been through anything like Johnny   Erickson or Joe Bailey or even Elizabeth Elliott  and of course that's true and I could say the very   same thing if I knew your story I could say well  I've never been through anything like that so I   want to give you a definition of suffering which  will cover the whole gamut from when the washing   machine overflows or when the roast burns and  you're having the boss for dinner that right   all those things about which our immediate human  reaction is oh no from that kind of triviality   relatively speaking to your husband has cancer  your child is spina bifida or you yourself have   just lost everything I think you will find that  the definition that I'm going to give you will   cover that gamut and I think that the things that  I'm going to try to say to you will apply to the   small things those sometimes ridiculously small  things that if you're anything like me you get   all upset about and all bent out of shape about  that matter not at all by comparison with the big   things and here it is my definition suffering  is having what you don't want or wanting what   you don't have now if you can think of something  that does not come under one of those two headings   please see me later because I do want to hear  about it I think that covers everything now can   you imagine a world for example in which nobody  had anything that he didn't want no toothaches no   taxes no touchy relatives no traffic jams or  by contrast can you imagine a world in which   everybody had everything they wanted perfect  weather perfect wife perfect husband perfect   health perfect score perfect happiness Muggeridge  said Malcolm Muggeridge said supposing you   eliminated suffering what a dreadful place the  world would be because everything that corrects   the tendency of man to feel over important and  over pleased with himself would disappear he's bad   enough now but he would be absolutely intolerable  if he never suffered Muggeridge gets at the heart   of what i want to say it's not for nothing now  how do I know that the deepest things that I   have learned in my own life have come from the  deepest suffering and out of the deepest waters   and the hottest fires have come the deepest things  that I know about God and I imagine that most of   you would say exactly the same and I would add  this that the greatest gifts of my life have also   entailed the greatest suffering the greatest gifts  of my life for example have been marriage and   motherhood and let's never forget that if we don't  ever want to suffer we must be very careful never   to love anything or anybody the gifts of love have  been the gifts of suffering those two things are   inseparable now I come to you tonight not like  RC sproule who is a theologian and a scholar I   come to you not merely as one who has stood on the  sidelines and pondered these things but as one in   whose life God has seen to it that there has been  a certain measure of suffering a certain measure   of pain and it has been out of that very measure  of pain that has come the unshakable conviction   that God is love now when my little girl Valerie  was two years old her father had been dead for   more than a year and I was beginning to teach her  things like Psalm 23 the Lord is my shepherd I   shall not want he maketh me to lie down in green  pastures he leadeth me beside the still waters he   restoreth my soul and I can still hear that tiny  little baby voice saying he leadeth me beside the still waters and I realized when I heard her  say that again and I still have a tape of her   saying that I thought where did she get that weird  intonation and I realized that she got it from her   mother who was coaching her word-by-word she'd say  he lead us me and I would say b-side and she would   say beside anyway she learned it and things like  Psalm 91 one of my favorite songs you that live in   the shelter of the most high and lodge under the  shadow of the almighty who say the Lord is my safe   retreat my god the fastness or the refuge in which  I trust he will cover you with his pinions and you   shall find safety beneath his wings you shall not  fear the hunter's trap by night or the arrow that   flies by day a thousand may fall at your side ten  thousand close at hand but you it shall not touch   now I want you to think of how a mother who is  a widow tries to teach her little daughter whose   father was killed by a group of savage Indians  who thought that he was a cannibal what does psalm   means what the words of scripture mean she learned  jesus loves me this I know not because her daddy   was killed she didn't know it that way but jesus  loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so she   learned to sing God will take care of me and what  how was I to explain a Thousand shall fall at thy   side and ten thousand at thy right hand but it  shall not come nigh thee I tell you this because   maybe it'll help you to see that I've been forced  from the circumstances of my own life to try to   get down to the very bedrock of faith things which  are in frangible and unshakable God is my refuge   was he Jim's refuge was he his fortress on the  night before those five men who were killed by   the alkis went into alka territory they sang  we rest on the our shield and our defender what does your faith do with the irony of those  words there will be no intellectual satisfaction   on this side of heaven to that age-old question  why but I have not found although I have not   found intellectual satisfaction I have found  peace and the answer I say to you is not an   explanation but a person Jesus Christ my Lord and  my god and when I came to the realization that my   husband was missing not knowing for another five  days that he was dead the words that God brought   to me then were from Isaiah the 43rd chapter  when thou passes through the waters I will be   with thee and through the rivers they shall  not overflow thee when thou walkest through   the fire thou shalt not be burned neither shall  the flame Kindle upon thee for I am the LORD   thy God and I realized then that God was not  telling me that everything was going to be fine   humanly speaking that he was going to preserve  my husband physically and bring him back to me   but he was giving me one unmistakable promise I  will be with thee for I am the LORD thy God he   is the one who loved me and gave himself for me  and that challenge that Ivan karamatsu gave to   his brother Alyosha echoed a challenge that was  given thousands of years earlier the challenge   flung at Jesus when he hung on the cross you  who would destroy the temple and build it in   three days save yourself if you're the Son of God  come down and then you remember how the religious   elite in Division yelled he saved others himself  he could save he trusts in God let God deliver him   now he's a miracle worker let him prove it to  us now because he said I am the son of God and so we come back again to the terrible truth that  there is suffering the question is God paying   attention and thirdly why doesn't he do something  the title I've given to this talk is the terrible   truths and an answer to that third question why  doesn't he do something I would say he has he did   he is doing something and he will do something the  subject can only be approached via the cross that   old rugged cross so despised by the world the very  worst thing that ever happened in human history   turns out to be the very best thing because  it saved me it saves the world and so God's   love which was represented demonstrated to us and  his giving his son Jesus to die on the cross is   brought together into harmony with suffering you  see this is the crux of the question and those   of you who studied Latin remember that the word  crux is the Latin word crux for cross it's only   in the cross that we can begin to harmonize this  seeming contradiction between suffering and love   and we will never understand suffering unless we  understand the love of God we're talking about   two different levels on which things are to be  understood and again and again in the scriptures   we have what seem to be complete paradoxes  because we're talking about two different   kingdom we're talking about this visible world  and an invisible kingdom on which the facts of   this world are interpreted take for example the  Beatitudes those wonderful statements of paradox   that Jesus gave to the multitudes when he was  preaching to them on the mountain and he said   things like this very strange things how happy  are those who know what sorrow means happy are   those who claim nothing happy are those who have  suffered persecution what happiness will be yours   when people blame you and ill treat you and say  all kinds of slanderous things against you be   glad then yes be tremendously glad does it make  any sense at all not unless you see that there   are two kingdoms the kingdom of this world the  kingdom of an invisible world and the Apostle   Paul understood the difference when he made  this stunning declaration he said it is now   my happiness to suffer for you my happiness to  suffer it sounds like nonsense doesn't it and   yet this is the Word of God Janet Erskine Stewart  said joy is not the absence of suffering but the   presence of God it's what the psalmist found in  the valley of the shadow of death you remember he   said I will fear no evil now the psalmist was not  naive enough to say I will fear no evil because   there isn't any there is we live in an evil broken  twisted fallen distorted world what did he say I   will fear no evil for thou art with me thy rod  and thy staff they comfort me and when I stood   by my shortwave radio in the jungle of Ecuador in  1956 and heard that my husband was missing and God   brought to my mind the words of the prophet Isaiah  when thou passes through the waters I will be with   thee you can imagine that my response was not  terribly spiritual I was saying but Lord you're   with me all the time what I want is Jim I want  my husband we had been married 27 months after   waiting five and a half years five days later I  knew that Jim was dead and God's presence with   me did was not Jim's presence that was a terrible  fact God's presence did not change the terrible   fact that I was a widow and I expected to be a  widow until I died because I thought it was a   miracle I got married the first time I couldn't  imagine that I would ever get married a second   let alone a third God's presence did not change  the fact of my widowhood Jim's absence thrust   me forced me hurried me to God my hope and my only  refuge and I learned in that experience who God is   who he is in a way that I could never have known  otherwise and so I can say to you that suffering   is an irreplaceable medium through which I learned  an indispensable truth I am I am the Lord in other   words that God is God well I still want to go  back and say but Lord what about those babies   what about that little spina bifida child what  about that those babies born terribly handicapped   with terrible suffering to cause their mothers  we're on cocaine or heroin or alcohol what about   my little Scottie dog McDuff who died of cancer  at the age of six what about the Lindbergh baby   and the stamms who were beheaded what about all  that and I can't answer your questions or even   my own except in the words of Scripture these  words from the Apostle Paul who knew the power   of the Cross of Jesus and this is what he wrote  I reckon that the sufferings we now endure bear   no comparison with a splendor as yet unrevealed  which is in store for us for the created universe   waits with eager expectation for God's sons to  be revealed it was made the victim of frustration   all those animals all those babies who have no  guilt whatsoever the victim of frustration not   by its own choice but because of him who made it  so yet always there was hope and this is the part   that brings me immeasurable comfort because  the universe itself is to be freed from the   shackles of mortality and enter upon the Liberty  and splendor of the children of God where does   this idea of a loving God come from it is not a  deduction it is not man so desperately wanting   a god that he manufactures him in his mind it's  he who was the word before the foundation of the   world suffering as a lamb slain and he has a lot  of his sleeve that you and I haven't the slightest   idea about now he's told us enough so with  that we know that suffering is not for nothing I look upon suffering as one of God's ways of  getting our attention in fact CS Lewis calls   pain God's megaphone he said God speaks to us in  our conscience I think I've got that wrong so at   CS Lewis said God whispers to us in our conscience  speaks to us in our joys and shouts to us in our   pain pain is God's megaphone and I'd like for us  to think about some of the things which God needs   to say to us that he needs to get our attention  for first of all and it's interesting to me it's   of great significance I think that as far as  we know the oldest book in the Bible the book   of Job is the one that deals most specifically  and head-on with the subject of suffering you   remember that job was called a blameless man  that righteous man God Himself said that job   was a blameless man and if the morality of those  days was that a good man would be blessed and an   evil man would be punished then job's experience  seemed to turn that completely upside-down and   Joe lost everything you remember that there was  a drama that went on behind the scenes that as   far as we know job was never given a clue about  where Satan challenged God in heaven and he said   of course Joe trusts you but does he trust you  for nothing try taking away all those blessings   and then see where job's faith goes and God  accepted Satan's challenge and here we have   a mystery which we cannot begin to explain in  fact it was God who called Satan's attention to   that individual job and he gave Satan permission  to take things away from Joe and so he lost his   flocks and his her and his servants and his sons  and his daughters in his house and finally even   the confidence of his wife and as he sat on his  ash heap and his health had been touched by that   time and he was scraping himself with potsherds  and in utter anguish and misery he kept silence   for seven days as his friends as they were called  sat there and looked at him and apparently didn't   say anything either for seven days and when job  finally broke silence he howled his complaints   at God we hear Jobe called a patient man but  if you read the book of Job you won't really   find a lot of evidence that he was patient but he  never doubted that God existed and he said some   of the very worst things that could possibly be  said about God and isn't it interesting that the   Spirit of God preserved those things for you and  me God is big enough to take anything that we can   dish out to him and he even saw to it that job's  howls and complaints were preserved in black and   white for our instruction so never hesitate to  say what you really feel to God because remember   that God knows what you think before you know  and certainly knows what you're going to say   before you even think it so for some samples of  these dreadful things that this patient man Jobe   said to God how about Jobe chapter 3 verses 11 19  and 20 where he says why was I not still born why   did I not die when I came out of the womb why  should the sufferer be born to see the light   why is life given to men who find it so bitter  you see you see Jobe here dialoguing with God   there is no question in job's mind throughout this  entire book of the existence of God he knows that   it is God with whom he has to deal somebody is  behind all this he's saying and the question why   presupposes that there is reason that there is  a mind behind all that may appear to be mindless   suffering we would never ask the question why if  we really believed that the whole of the universe   was an accident and that you and I are completely  at the mercy of chance the very question why even   if it is flung at us by one who calls himself an  unbeliever or an atheist is a dead giveaway that   there is that sneaking suspicion in the back of  every human mind that there is some body some   reason some thinking individual behind this and  then Joab address is God directly in the tenth   chapter and he says can't you take your eyes off  me won't you leave me alone long enough to swallow   my spit you shaped me and made me now you've  turned to destroy me you needed me like clay and   now you are grinding me to a powder anybody ever  felt like that does that ring any bells out there   God is grinding me to a powder he doesn't give me  a chance to swallow my spit and then of course his   friends who were very Orthodox they never say a  word that is not theologically sound they begin   to accuse him of foolish notions a belly full  of wind they say Jobe is utterly lacking in the   fear of God and he is pitting himself against the  Almighty charging him head down like an angry bull   then Jobe calls elif as a windbag this is you know  the pot calling the kettle black but his friends   and enemies he says can't hold a candle to God  who has quote set upon me and mauled me seized   me by the neck and worried me he sent me up as his  target his arrows rained upon me from every side   he is pitiless he cut deep into my vitals he spilt  my gall on the ground now can you top that would   you dare to say such things aloud and then Jobe  asks God question after question after question   and at one point he says if I ask him a thousand  questions he won't even answer one of them and he   was right remember that when God finally breaks  his silence God does not answer a single question   God's response to job's questions is mystery in  other words God answers job's mystery with the   mystery of himself and he starts right in snowing  poor job with questions where were you when I laid   the foundation of the world have you seen the  treasures of the snow have you walked in the   great deep do you know where the wild-ass gives  birth have you presided over the dough in labor   and he goes on and on and on question after  question after question but what he's doing   is revealing to job who he is and as I said in  my first talk God through my my own troubles and   sufferings has not given me explanations but he  has met me as a person as an individual and that's   what we need who of us in the worst pit that  we've ever been in needs anything as much as we   need company just somebody perhaps who will sit  there in silence but just be with us Jobe never   denies God's existence never imagines that God has  nothing to do with his troubles but has a thousand   questions and so do we and let me just tell you a  story or two that comes out of my first year as a   missionary I thought of myself as being very well  prepared to be a missionary as I told you I came   from a strong Christian home my parents had been  missionaries themselves and we had dozens probably   hundreds of missionaries traipsing through our  house we had a guest room which always seemed   to be full we had suitcases bumping up and down  the stairs all the time and we listened from our   earliest memories to many many missionaries  stories at our own dinner table and I went   to a school for missionaries children which was  here in Orlando as a matter of fact and I heard   thousands of missionary talks I looked at tens  of thousands of terribly bad missionary slides   and sort of lived ate breathed drank missionaries  and turned out to be a missionary myself as were   for my other brothers and sisters there were  six of us in the family five of us turned out   to be missionaries of one sort or another and the  sixth is a professor in Christian colleges anyway   I thought that I was probably God's gift to the  mission field as a missionary and had all this   training behind me I went to a Bible School and I  had some home missionary work in Canadian Sunday   school mission etc etc but within the first year  God saw fit to give me three major blows to what I   thought was a very well founded and very sinewy  faith and the first of these was that a man by   the name of Macario who was my informant as I was  attempting to learn an unwritten Indian language   in the Western jungle of Ecuador the language  of the Colorado tribe a very small tribe who had   never had any written language and therefore had  none of the Bible in their language I had prayed   that God would give me an informant someone who  would be prepared to sit down with me and go over   and over and over what for him was the easiest  language in the world and have the patience to   deal with this apparently [ __ ] foreigner and  God answered my prayer by sending me this man by   the name of Macario who was bilingual which  was an enormous advantage he spoke Spanish   and Colorado and I had had to learn Spanish as  the national language of the country and so we   worked together very happily for about six weeks  or two months I've forgotten exactly what it was   and I was on my knees one morning in my bedroom  as was my habit reading my Bible and praying and   I happened to be reading in the third chapter or  the fourth chapter of first Peter and these were   the words think it not strange concerning the  fiery trial that is to try you as though some   strange thing happened it happens to give you a  share in the sufferings of Christ and at that very   point I heard gunshots there was nothing unusual  about gunshots in that particular clearing of the   jungle we were surrounded by Indians who hunted  with guns that they had bought from the white man   and there were white people also in that clearing  who hunted as well so we often heard gunshots but   these particular ones were followed by yelling and  screaming and horses galloping and people running   and general pandemonium so I rushed outside to  hear that Macario had just been murdered now it   would be very nice if I could tell you that I was  II easily found another informant but the truth   was that Macario was literally the only person  in the world who was capable of doing the job   that he had been doing with me nobody else knew  both Spanish and Colorado so I was faced for the   first time in my personal experience with that  awful why mic job I didn't doubt for a second   that God was up there that God knew what he was  doing but I couldn't imagine what he could have   possibly have in mind and God's answer to my why  was trust me no explanations just trust me that   was the message now if I had had a faith which  deep was determined that God had to give me a   particular kind of answer to my particular prayers  that faith would have disintegrated but my faith   had to be founded on the character of God himself  and so what looked like a contradiction in terms   God loves me God lets this awful thing happen  to me what looked like a contradiction in terms   I had to leave in God's hands and say okay Lord  I don't understand it I don't like it but I only   had two choices he is either God or he's not I  am either held in the everlasting arms or I'm   at the mercy of chance and I have to trust him  for deny him is there any middle ground I don't   think so and I thought of Daniel in the lion's den  I remember the picture that we had on our wall at   home a painting when I was a child I often gazed  at that painting and Daniel is standing in the den   of lions there's a light on his face and he stands  very tall and straight with his hands behind his   back and just very faintly in the dark you can  see these glowing eyes of the hungry lions and   I realized that the painting is telling me that  here's a man whose faith rests in the character   of God now of course I wouldn't put it in those  terms as a child but that picture spoke volumes   to me God was there in the pit he was not making  it unnecessary for Daniel to go into the pit any   more than it was unnecessary for Joseph to go into  that pit where his jealous brothers threw him or   to be put into prison as were Paul and Silas  and Peter and many other people in scripture   John the Baptist who got his head chopped off  it was necessary for shade rack and Meshach and   Abednego to go into the fiery furnace because God  had a message not just for shade rack Meshach and   Abednego but also you remember for the King he  said has your God whom you serve been able to   deliver you and you remember there his challenge  before he threw them into the furnace do you think   your God can deliver you and those ringing words  of faith our God whom we trust is able to deliver   us but if not be it known unto you O king that we  will not bow down or serve you but if not and that   is the lesson that has to come to all of us at  some point in our lives every one of us I'm sure   sooner or later has to face up to that painful  question why and God is saying trust me if your   prayers don't get answered the way you thought  they were supposed to be what happens to your face   the world says God doesn't love you the Scriptures  tell me something very different those blessed's   of the beat those blessed's of the Beatitudes  Paul's word it is my happiness to suffer for   you we don't know the answer but we know that  it lies deep within the mystery of the freedom   to choose when God created man Adam and Eve he  created them with the freedom to choose to love   him or to defy him and they chose to defy him Adam  and Eve abused that freedom and CS Lewis says in   his book the problem of pain man is now a horror  to God and to himself and a creature ill adapted   to the universe not because God made himself but  because he has made himself so by the abuse of his   free will and Lewis goes on to state this knotty  problem in its simplest form if God were good he   would wish to make his creatures perfectly happy  and if God were Almighty he would be able to do   what he wished but the creatures are not happy  therefore God lacks either the goodness or the   power or both so answering the question depends  upon our definition of good an ancient man thought   of goodness in moral terms modern man equates good  with happiness if it ain't fun it ain't good the   two things almost seemed to be mutually exclusive  they put it the other way around if it's good   it ain't fun you know that commercial for some  kind of cereal I can't remember what it is but   two little kids have heard that it's natural and  it's good for you so they said well let's get him   to try it he'll eat anything he doesn't know it's  good for you so the little kid eats it because he   doesn't know any better that the other two kids  wouldn't even try it because it's good for you   and you've heard that saying everything that I  like is either illegal immoral or fattening or   something like that a notion that the world has  that the two things are mutually exclusive if   it's good it's not fun it has nothing to do with  my happiness moral man was concerned primarily   with moral goodness if we learn to know God in  the midst of our pain we come to know him as one   who is not a high priest that cannot be touched  with the feeling of our infirmities he is one who   has been over every inch of the road I love that  old hymn from I think the 17th century by Richard   Baxter Christ leads me through no darker rooms  than he went through before I love those words I have some dear friends who are missionaries  in North Africa he was one of the many seminary   students who have lived in our house and I had a  letter from them about a year or so ago to tell   me that they had just lost their baby girl I think  it was either at birth or just within a few hours   after birth and their letter was filled with the  anguish that that cost them and of course I wanted   to answer the letter but I've never lost a baby  I only have one child who was 10 months old when   her father was killed and so I couldn't write to  fill in jannat and say I know exactly what you've   been through but I've read the wonderful letters  of Samuel Rutherford that Scottish preacher from   the 17th century who seems to have been through  just about every imaginable human mill and he   had lost at least one child and I had his letters  in my study and so I looked up one of his letters   to a woman who had lost a child and this is what  he wrote to her and I quoted these words to fill   in jannat after saying to them I don't know  what you're going through but I know the one   who knows and I sent them samuel Weatherford's  words he had lost two daughters I have here in   my notes this is what he said grace Ruda thought  out the affections of a mother but put him on his   wheel who maketh all things new that they may  be refined he commandeth you to weep and that   princely one took up to heaven with him a man's  heart to be a compassionate High Priest the cup   you drink was at the lip of sweet Jesus and he  drank of it and Janet wrote to me these words   the storm of pain is calming down and the Lord is  painting a new and different picture of himself and I saw in her experience that the very  suffering itself was an irreplaceable medium   God was using that thing to speak to Janet and  Phil in a way that he could not have spoken if he   had not gotten their attention through the death  of that little child now I don't mean to simplify   to oversimplify things as though that explains  it that God had to say something to those two   people because if I know anything about godliness  I know that Phil and Janet Linton are both godly   people and that raises another painful question  doesn't it we often say why did such-and-such   have to happen to her she's such a wonderful  person why did he have to go through this he's   such a wonderful person well again the word is  trust me and back when I was a college student   I was dabbling around in poetry as I suppose most  teenage girls do at some point but I wrote some   words that later on seemed to me to be almost  prophetic I wrote these words and I really don't   remember exactly whether there was any particular  reason why I wrote them at the time but something   had given me a clue that there could be some  loneliness ahead for me and so these were the   words that I wrote perhaps some future day Lord  thy strong hand will lead me to the place where   i'ma stand idly alone alone Oh gracious lover but  for thee I shall be satisfied if I can see Jesus   only I do not know thy plan for years to come my  spirit finds in thee its perfect home sufficiency   Lord all my desire is before they now lead on no  matter where no matter how I trust in thee I began   keeping journals back when I was about sixteen  or seventeen and so I've been keeping them ever   since that makes quite a few years and as I went  back to we read some of those earlier journals in   preparation for these talks I thought well you  know I really better go back and see whether I   know anything about what I'm talking about and  as I said in my first talk I don't think I know   very much by comparison with others but I found  a few little things in the journal and one of   the things which I did feel was significant was  the fact that again and again I quote hymns about   the cross hymns which were favorites at different  times one of them that I learned in college was   Oh teach me what it meanest that cross uplifted  high with one the man of sorrows condemned to   bleed and die one of the hymns that we learned as  very small children in our family prayers we used   to sing him every morning and family prayers  was Jesus keep me near the cross my daughter   has taught some of those hymns to her own children  and I don't think I will ever forget seeing little   two-year-old Jim violently swinging his newborn  baby sister Colleen in one of those little canvas   swings and singing in the cross in the cross be my  glory ever till my raptured soul shall find rest   beyond the river and here's this little boy just  violently swinging this infant who was having the   time of her life and singing this profound him  about the cross and I could go on and on with   hymns that I could quote beneath the cross of  Jesus has always been a favorite of mine but as   I came across those in my journals I thought what  did I imagine would be the answer to the prayers   that I was praying in those hymns what kind of  an answer did I really expect God to give me   did I expect some kind of a animate a miraculous  revelation perhaps some deep original insight into   the meaning of the cross did I expect God to make  some kind of a spiritual giant out of me so that I   would have mysteries at my fingertips that other  people didn't know anything about well I haven't   the slightest idea of what I really thought I  suppose it was all very vague and mystical my   mind and I didn't know what God would do by way  of answering that prayer but I can look back over   these 45 years or so and see that God in fact is  in the process of answering those prayers teach   me what it mean a--the that cross up lifted high  what is this great symbol of the Christian faith   it's a symbol of suffering that is what the  Christian faith is about it deals head-on with   this question of suffering and no other religion  in the world does that every other religion in   some way evades the question Christianity has  at its very heart this question of suffering it   comes the answer to our prayers teach me what it  means in the cross be my glory ever beneath the   cross of Jesus the answer comes not in the form  of a revelation or an explanation or a vision but   in the form of a person who comes to you and me  in our sorrow and he says trust me walk with me I have to insert in here another little  grandchild story and you're going to have   to bear with me you know grandmother's do tell  grandchild stories but they seem so appropriate   so often and in this particular case my little  4 year old granddaughter Christiana had had to   be spanked four times three times in one day  for the same offense she had not come running   quickly when she was called and my daughter like  my mother treated as as my mother treated delayed   obedience as disobedience Valerie tries to do  the same thing and so Christiana was spanked   three times on that particular Sunday so Sunday  night when it was time to go to church and she   was called she came charging out to the car tears  pouring down her face her arms full of a Bible a   notebook a pen four years old mind you on her way  to church had to have a Bible notebook a pen her   barrettes herbart her necklaces her bracelets as  her bracelets her hair ribbons and who knows what   else was essential all this stuff falling out  of her arms she was tripping over things tears   pouring down her face and she stopped and she  said oh mama if only had him and Eve hadn't sinned now that child was suffering because she lives  in a fallen world and you and I live in that   same fallen world we have to look at these  awful facts the fact of sin and suffering   and death the fact that God created a world in  which those things were possible the fact that   he does love us that means he wants nothing less  than our perfection and joy that he gave us the   freedom to choose and that man decided that  his own idea of perfection and joy was better   than God's and believed what Satan told him  and therefore sin and suffering entered into   the world and now we're saying why doesn't God  do something about it and the Christian answer   is he did he became the victim a lamb slain  from before the foundation of the world George   Herbert another 17th century poet wrote this  afflictions sorted anguish of all sizes fine   nets and stratagems to catch us in then George  MacDonald 19th century poet said this pain with   dog and spear hounds false faith from human  hearts two different expressions of what God   is up to fine nets and stratagems to catch us in  to give us this message and as the psalmist said   in psalm 46 though the mountains shake and be  carried though the earth shake and though the   mountains be carried into the midst of a sea  God is our refuge and I speak to you as one   who has desperately needed a refuge and in that  same Psalm he says be still and I'm told that   it's legitimate to translate that shut up  and know that I am God that's the message third talk in this series suffering is not  for nothing is on the subject of acceptance   and I want to tell you a little story which may  offend some of you I hope it will not be too   offensive but I have actually been accused  at times of being frivolous about the fact   that I've had two husbands who have died so I  don't want to seem frivolous but I'm sure you   all realize that the subject of these talks  is a very heavy one and here's a story which   does fit in very nicely under this particular  heading an incident happened a couple of years   ago Lars and I were in Birmingham Alabama  and it was a breakfast and Lars was setting   up his book table and there was a little lady  there setting place cards out at the various   tables and he and she were chatting back and  forth there was no one else around at the time   and suddenly she turned him and she said by the  way she said what's your name and he said well   he said I'm an Elliot - and she looked at him  and she said are you the speakers husband and   he said yes and she said well that's funny they  I thought they told me you had a different name   and he said well I have actually he said really  my name is grin but he said you know I'm the   third husband and her face fell and she said  oh my goodness but we only have one place card she was dead serious and Laura said I don't think  you need to worry he said the other two are dead   I don't think they're gonna show up and she said  oh well then it'll be all right then how does that   fit in with a subject of acceptance quite simply  I could not possibly talk this way about Jim and   add if it hadn't been for the fact that by the  grace of God I was enabled to accept their death   and people have come to me more than once in my  life and said how can you possibly talk about   your late husband's in that frivolous and flippant  way and I've even had some widows say to me how   do you keep from comparing your husbands and I  say I don't I've made all kinds of comparisons   between my husbands and you can be sure that I  would never have accepted Larson's proposal if   he didn't compare very favorably with the first  two although they are very different men at   least they had one thing in common and that was  that they liked me but the fact is that they're   men with very different gifts and one of the  things which God brought to my mind when I was   considering Lara's proposal before I had given  him an answer was a verse in first Corinthians   12 men have different gifts but it's the same  Lord who accomplishes his purposes through them   all acceptance I believe is the key to peace in  this business of suffering as I've said the crux   of the whole matter is the cross of Jesus Christ  and that word crux means cross and it is the best   thing that ever happened in human history as well  as the worst thing here in is love the scripture   tells us not that we loved us but that not that  we loved God herein is love not that we loved God   but that he loved us and gave himself here in  his love that Christ laid down his life for us   and when we speak of love as the Bible speaks of  love we're not talking about any silly sentiment   we're not talking about a mood or a feeling or  warm fuzzies the love of God is not a sentiment   it is a willed and inexorable love which will will  nothing less than their very best for us the love   of God wills our joy I think of the love of God  as being synonymous with the will of God young   people sometimes say to me this whole business  of the will of God is just so scary I don't see   how you can ever just turn over your whole life  to God because you don't know what he's going to   do well that's what faith is about isn't it if  you really believe that somebody loves you then   you trust them the will of God is love and love  suffers that's how we know what the love of God   for us is because he was willing to become a man  and to take upon himself our sins our griefs our   sufferings and love is in is always inextricably  bound with sacrifice any father knows this any   mother knows this you may have known it in theory  but when that baby is born if the mother has not   suffered before that during those nine months  which I didn't do certainly there comes the   time when she has to suffer and when that baby  is born and the labor is over with then we all   we mother's know that that's just the beginning  isn't it and no father or mother can possibly   imagine what changes there will be in their lives  no matter how much they may have red and how much   they may have observed but the presence of that  new little human being in their lives changes   everything and its sacrifice day in and day out  night in and night out but it's not something   that you sit down and feel sorry for yourself  about it's not something you moan and groan   about except once in a while but it's very real  isn't it it is my life for yours and that ladies   and gentlemen is the principle across that's what  Jesus was demonstrating my life for yours now as   I've said and I will probably say it again and  again before I'm through suffering is a mystery   it is not explained but it is affirmed and all  of Christianity rests on mysteries those of you   who belong to churches that use Creed's know that  you are articulating a set of statements about the   faith every one of which deals with a mystery is  there anyone who calls himself a Christian that   can explain the Trinity is there anyone who can  get at the gynecology for example of the virgin   birth is there any specialist in aerodynamics that  could tell us anything about the Ascension these   are mysteries creation Redemption Incarnation  crucifixion redemption these great key words of   a Christian faith are mysteries we stand up as  a body and church the church that I go to for   example and we say a Creed out loud together  we are not explaining anything we are simply   affirming and that's what Christianity is about  God is God God is a three-person'd God He loves   us and we are not adrift in chaos and to me that  is the most fortifying the most stabilizing the   most peace giving thing that I know anything  about in the universe every time things have   seemingly fallen apart in my life I have gone back  to those things which do not change nothing in the   universe can ever change those facts he loves  me I am not at the mercy of chance Mars and I   got to the airport last February for a flight  to someplace or other and I think our flight   was supposed to be at 11:30 in the morning or  something we got there about 10:30 and lo and   behold the airport was closed there were lines  all the way from the ticket counters out to   the sidewalk you couldn't even get through the  revolving doors into Logan Airport in Boston and   we were told that all flights have been canceled  that the airlines were taking no responsibility   for rebooking anything you had to get in line and  start over and your tickets would mean nothing as   far as bookings were concerned and it was a scene  of real horror and chaos I mean people were crying   I felt so sorry for those families that had little  children and they were headed for Orlando to go   to Disney World for their winter break and college  students with skis but there were fistfights there   were people so angry with the poor ticket agents  that they were actually coming to blows and we   heard that there was one plane load of people  on the runway when they told we're told that   the airport was closed they refused to get off  the plane no no you just wonder what kind of a   view of things people like that have but it was  such a peaceful thing to me to realize in spite   of the fact that I had people with the other  end of the line waiting for me that Lars and   I were not at the mercy of the weather let alone  of TWA we are not adrift in chaos we are held in   the everlasting arms and therefore and this makes  a difference we can be at peace and we can accept   we can say yes Lord I'll take it the faculty by  which I apprehend and God and who he is is the   Faculty of faith and my faith enables me to say  yes Lord I don't like what you're doing I don't   understand it you're gonna have to take care of  those poor people at the other end that thought I   was coming to speak on this particular day but God  you're in charge I know the one who is in charge   of the universe he's got the whole world where in  his hands and that's where I am so that to me is   the key to acceptance the fact that it is not for  nothing faith we might say is the fulcrum of our   moral and spiritual balance think of a seesaw the  fulcrum is the point where the seesaw rests and   my moral and spiritual balance depends on that  stability of faith and my faith of course rests   on the bedrock which is Jesus Christ now faith  like love is not a feeling we need to get that   absolutely clear faith is not a feeling faith  is a willed obedience action jesus said again   and again don't be afraid fear not let not your  heart be troubled believe in God believe also in   me accept take up the cross and follow he said if  you want to be my disciples three conditions give   up your right to yourself take up your cross  and follow and to me giving up your right to   yourself is saying no to myself and taking up  the cross is saying yes to God Lord whatever it   is you want to give me I'll take it yes yes yes  there's an old legend I'm told inscribed in a   parsonage in England somewhere on the Seacoast a  Saxon legend that said do the next thing I don't   know any simpler formula for peace for relief from  stress and anxiety then that very practical very   down-to-earth word of wisdom do the next thing  that has gotten me through more Agony's than   anything else I could recommend and when I found  out that my husband Jim was dead I had gone out to   the missionary aviation base in the place called  shell Mehta the edge of the jungle to be with the   other four wives as we waited for word about our  husbands and when the word finally came that all   five of the men had been speared to death and of  course we had decisions to make where we going   to go back to our jungle stations or what were we  going to do and I went back to my jungle station   I had never considered any other alternative  because for one thing I had been a missionary   before I ever married Jim Eliot before I was even  engaged to Jim Elliot so nothing had changed as   far as my missionary call was concerned but I had  to go back to a station where there was no other   missionary and try to do the work that two of us  had been doing between us so it wasn't as though I   was hard up for things to keep me occupied I had  a school of about 40 boys just sort of oversee   I wasn't the teacher but I was sort of in charge  of things in one way I had a brand-new Church of   about 50 baptized believers with no scriptures  in their hands and I was supposed to be the one   doing the translating I had a literacy class of  about 12 girls and I was teaching to read in their   own language so that eventually they could learn  to read the Bible translation that I was working   on at the same time I had a 10 month old baby  to care for I had thousand details of running   things on a jungle station like learning how to  run a diesel generator and also I was giving out   medicines right and left and delivering babies in  between times and what with one thing in another   I really didn't have time to sit down and have a  pity party and sink into a puddle of self-pity I   did the next thing and there was always a next  thing after that and I have found many times in   my life after the death of my second husband just  the very fact that although I was living in a very   civilized house I had dishes to wash I had floors  to clean I had laundry to do it was my salvation   last a couple of years ago now I lose track I had  the privilege and the fun of taking care of four   of my grandchildren while number five was being  born and no I guess she had already been born   and her parents went off for a weekend taking the  nursing baby along and I took care of the other   four and that was the only time when I've ever  had the chance to do that my grandchildren live   in Southern California and I live in the Northeast  so I'm one of the lonely grandmothers as opposed   to the exhausted ones and after the first day  my daughter had the thoughtfulness to call that   evening and she said well mama how are you doing  and I said well they're wonderful children and   they're very very obedient and everything but I  don't know whether I'm going to make it through   the next four days I was tired to say the least  and I had to ask the question that my daughter   really doesn't like me to ask how do you do it  because every minute of the day I'm thinking I'm   flat out all day long with things that need to be  done every second but my daughter has a nursing   baby which takes about six more hours in the day  and I kept thinking how does she do it how does   she do it so I had to ask the question I knew she  didn't want me to but I said Val how do you do it   and she laughed on the phone and she said mama  I do just what you taught me years ago I do the   next thing she said don't think about all the  things you have to do just do the next thing so   I took her advice and we got through the next  four days triumphantly not just somehow but it   is acceptance that enabled me to do that because I  really believed that this was not an accident God   had something up his sleeve something in mind well  about six weeks after Jim died I had a letter from   my mother-in-law I had been writing letters home  and trying to reassure my parents and I'm in-laws   that God was there everything was fine they were  not too worried about me they were both my in-laws   and my own parents were just dying a thousand  deaths as you can imagine and we parents I'm   sure suffer sometimes a hundred times more than  our children suffer although we think that it's   worse than it is what we never can visualize  is the way the grace of God goes to work in   the person who needs it and so my mother-in-law  wrote me this letter saying she was very much   afraid that I was repressing my feelings that  I it wasn't normal the way I was reacting and   just carrying on I was just trying to be busy and  maybe I was burying myself in my work and she said   eventually you're going to crack well then all of  a sudden my piece disappeared and I began to say   well is she right is there really no such thing as  the peace that passes understanding can God really   fulfill his word and I kept going back again and  again to the promises that God had given me and I   had them right there in my journal day after day  God was giving me promises which just enabled me   to get through Jesus Christ the same yesterday and  today and forever Jim died yesterday but the same   Lord was with me today and I didn't need to worry  about the next fifty years which is it imitation   for anyone who's lost sand when they love you  think well I guess I could make it through supper   tonight but not real sure about tomorrow or next  week let alone the next fifty years and in the   very same mail with my mother-in-law's unsettling  letter I got this poem from Amy by Amy Carmichael   of which came in a form letter from her mission  when stormy winds against us break establish and   reinforce our will Oh hear us for thine own name's  sake hold us in strength and hold us still still   as the faithful mountains stand through the long  silent years of stress so would we rip wait at thy   right hand in quietness and steadfastness well  that sounds pretty brave and strong doesn't it   but listen to the last stanza but not of us this  strength O Lord and not of us this constancy our   strength is thine eternal word thy presence our  security and this vital truth was laying hold   of my mind and my heart that God really did mean  what he was saying that he was right there and one   of the verses that God had given me before I went  to Ecuador was in Isaiah 50 verse 7 the Lord God   will help me therefore shall I not be confounded  therefore have I set my face like a flint and I   know that I shall not be ashamed and I was tempted  as all of us are to say well Lord you promised to   help me but you do have a kind of a funny way of  going about it it's not my idea of the way God   is supposed to help one of his servants who is  trying to be obedient and trying to be faithful   and what does God say to an argument like that  same thing he's always saying trust me trust me   someday even you will see that their sense in this  your suffering is not for nothing now my husband   Jim was a fairly good carpenter and he built a  very nice house in the jungle a very civilized   house with a cement floor and wooden walls and  any aluminum roof he even built a wonderful water   system by collecting the roof from the aluminum  collecting the water from the aluminum roof and   then piping it into the house so that we actually  had a flush toilet and a shower and a sink and he   said about filling the house with very serviceable  and not terribly beautiful furniture but while   Jim was building a piece of furniture if there was  one thing he could not stand it was for me to hang   over his shoulder and I would say well what's this  thing you know and what are you doing with that   tool and why do you do it this way and how in the  world you're gonna fit that thing into this and he   would say would you get lost when it's finished  you'll see a very simple analogy God is saying   trust me accept it now how many choices have you  got to go back to those alternatives you either   believe God knows what he's doing or he believe he  doesn't you either believe he's worth trusting or   you say he's not and then where are you you're at  the mercy of chaos not cosmos chaos is the Greek   word for disorder cosmos is the word for order  we either live in an ordered universe where we   are trying like the poor lady who sat next to me  on the plane yesterday to create her own reality   can you imagine a more desperate situation to  be in than to be creating one's own reality   acceptance is a voluntary and willd act God was  giving me something to do the next thing was yes   Lord accepted and that is the key to peace now  does it make sense to an ordinary human being to   say except this suffering isn't it contrary to  human nature and I want to make something very   clear here because I realize every word I say can  be distorted and twisted and misunderstood I want   to try my best to make very plain what I mean here  when I say except I'm not talking about things   which can be changed and or ought to be changed  there's some things which can be changed that   ought not to be changed for example a dear young  man that I know decided to unload his wife and two   children when the second child was one week old  and he went ahead and did that against all advice   to the contrary and a couple of years later I said  to him why and he said it wasn't working now I   hear this on all sides we all hear it don't we we  know that this is happening on all sides there was   a situation which he thought ought to be changed  and he was told by so-called Christian counselors   that's the thing to do you just have to get rid  of her because this is a case of incompatibility   so when I say that there are things which can  be changed but ought not to be that might be   one example there are many things which cannot be  changed and there are things which ought not to be   changed so I'm not I want us to be clear that I'm  not saying accept everything just resign yourself   and the worst things that happened you don't do  a thing about it that is not my purpose in this   talk the Apostle Paul remember prayed for the  removal of that thorn in his flesh and what was   the answer he prayed three times that God would  remove that thorn and the answer was my grace   is all you need my grace is sufficient for you  and it's very interesting it's very significant   I think that Paul says I was given a thorn in the  flesh to keep me from becoming absurdly conceited   and then he says it was a messenger of Satan now  that seems like a contradiction because obviously   it had to be God who cares whether he becomes  absurdly conceited Satan would be delighted if   we become absurdly conceited but he said in order  to keep me from becoming absurdly conceited over a   particular spiritual experience which he has just  described in that chapter 2nd Corinthians 12 he   said in order to keep me from that I was given  a thorn in the flesh so it was a messenger of   Satan he says so if you get all hung up thinking  now is this thing from God or is it from Satan   is this the voice of God or the voice of Satan  stop worrying about it you don't really need   to sort that out because here's a case where the  thorn was in a sense given by God as a messenger   of Satan and there's another at least one other  example in scriptures that I can think of the   same apparent contradiction where Joseph says to  his brothers that they that it was they who sent   him into Egypt but he says God sent me to Egypt we  know that Joseph's brothers were sinning against   him and yet it was God who sent him there so when  the answer was no about the thorn in the flesh and   the answer of Jesus prayer in Gethsemane if it be  possible let this cup pass we know that there's   nothing wrong with praying that God will solve our  problems and heal our diseases and pay our debts   and sort out our marital difficulties it's right  and proper that we should bring such requests   to God we're not praying against his will but  when the answer is no then we know that God has   something better at steak far greater things are  at stake there is another level another Kingdom an   invisible Kingdom which you and I cannot see now  but toward which we move and to which we belong   Anna verse which to me sums up just the things  that I've been trying to say under this heading   of acceptance is another seeming contradiction  which I found in the hundred and sixteenth Psalm   the psalmist says what shall I render unto the  Lord for all his benefits and I was reading this   one day when I was so overwhelmed with gratitude  for all the blessings of my life that I was just   sitting in a chair looking out over the ocean  we live on the coast of Massachusetts and I   was looking at this magnificent view in a very  comfortable room and just saying Lord I I don't   know how to thank you how can I say thanks and I  opened my Bible to this verse where the psalmist   says what shall I render and then I saw that the  next verse is I will take the cup of salvation   what shall I give you Lord and the answer is I  will take the cup of salvation now what is in   God's cup of salvation obviously the psalmist  in the Old Testament times was not thinking of   salvation and the somewhat narrow terms that we we  sometimes do but whatever is in the cup that God   is offering to me whether it be pain and sorrow  and suffering and grief along with the many more   Joy's I'm willing to take it because I trust him  because I know that what God wants for me is the   very best I will receive this thing in his name  and I hope you'll forgive me if I give you two   more lines of poetry from that poet George Herbert  or perhaps it's John Donne I have forgotten I need   thy Thunder oh my god thy music will not serve me  I need pain sometimes because God has something   bigger in mind it is not for nothing and so I  say Lord in Jesus name by your grace I accepted one that I have today is one that's very difficult  to distinguish very sharply from talk number three   that was on the subject of acceptance first we  talked about truth the terrible truth which is   the facts of life the twisted and the fallen  world that we live in and then the wonderful   facts which deal with another world another level  another perspective both are true we need to keep   them in perspective Abraham looked at the facts of  his life his own age and his wife's barrenness and   it says he staggered not at the promise of God  he looked clearly at the facts and Christians   ought to be people who are prepared to look most  steadily at the facts the awful facts and then   look at the other level on which those facts may  be interpreted and staggered not at the promise   of God so that was talked number one and the  second one was on the message God will go to   any lengths to get our attention long enough to  say I am the Lord I love you my will for you is   joy and so if we can remember those two aspects  the truth the message then it will be easier for   us to say yes Lord acceptance Paul accepted the  thorn even though it wasn't to his tastes and   preferences Jesus accepted the cup and said not  my will but thine be done and that same vision   and that same principle ought to characterize each  of us Christians as we received from the hand of   God the cup of salvation with whatever it contains  for our ultimate redemption and perfection there   will be nothing in that cup of salvation except  what is necessary so having said all that can   we then thank God gratitude is my subject today  and I'd like to give you three things to think   about under this subject I'm very gratified to see  that there are some note takers here and I know I   haven't been helping you very much with following  points 1 2 & 3 or anything like that so I'm going   to do my best to make that a little bit better  to this morning first of all I'd like for us to   think about three thing two things which ought to  distinguish Christians from the rest of the world   and to be quite honest as I travel around and  meet all kinds and varieties of Christians I'm   dismayed to notice that very often there doesn't  seem to be any difference in the way they live and   the way the rest of the world lives in the way  they respond to the experiences of their lives   and the way the world would respond in other words  if they were arrested for being Christians would   there be sufficient evidence to convict them  and I'm always asking myself the question what   kind of a difference would I expect others to  see in my life which would at least catch their   attention and make them say there is something  different about that woman I've said in my book   let me be a woman that I am NOT a different kind  of a Christian because I am a woman but I most   certainly ought to be a very different kind of a  woman because I'm a Christian do you know people   to whom you can point and say look at him there  is a Christian watch that woman's life she is a   Christian what kind of evidence would your friends  see in your life two things which certainly ought   to distinguish you and me and everyone who calls  himself a Christian our acceptance and gratitude   and it's very difficult to draw sharp distinction  between them if we can accept a gift then we can   say thank you now we all have the experience  of receiving all kinds of gifts from friends   and relatives and great-aunts and people for  which we have to say thank you but we really   aren't exactly tickled with their choice I mean  how many crocheted toilet paper covers kind of   woman use if that's aunt Susie's thing then you  receive it every Christmas and every birthday   perhaps from her and the only thing that really  is required of the recipient is to say thank you   but when we're talking about the gifts of God  we're talking about gifts who come from one who   knows exactly what we need even though it is not  necessarily to our tastes and preferences and he   gives us everything which is appropriate to the  job that he wants us to do and so understanding   that then we can say yes Lord I'll take it it  would not have been my choice but knowing you   love me I will receive it and I understand that  some day I'm going to understand the neset the   necessity for this thing so I accept it and then  I can even go the step beyond and say thank you   thank you lord Paul says that in everything we  ought to give thanks it's not the experiences   of our lives that change us it is our response  to those experiences and that should be a very   noticeable distinction between the Christian and  the non-christian I mentioned in an earlier talk   the responses of various people that I saw in  Logan Airport one day last February when the   airport was closed there was a great variety of  responses there from tears to anger to resignation   and peace we all know people who have gone through  terrible things and have turned out to be pure   gold I think every one of us knows somebody like  that who has been through awful things and yet   that hot fire has refined that steel or that gold  we also know people who have been through equally   bad things maybe not quite as bad but they  have turned out to be angry bitter resentful   qui realists and generally ungettable now what  was the difference it wasn't the experiences it   was their response and the response of a Christian  should be gratitude thank you lord I'll take this   I think we could divide the world into two classes  the people who make a habit of complaining about   what they haven't got or what they have got and  those who make a habit of saying thank you Lord   for what they haven't got and what they have got  and you remember my basic definition of suffering   having what you don't want and wanting what you  don't have which covers the whole gamut from the   smallest things like a toothache or taxes to a  tumor it was very unsettling for me when I lived   with that jungle tribe called al cos the so-called  Stone Age savages that killed my husband I had   the opportunity a couple of years after their  death to live with those people and to get to   know the people who actually did the killing and  I lived in a house with no walls everybody else   lived in a house with no walls so this gave me  an opportunity to observe very closely virtually   everything that went on day and night and I was  also under the most relentless and keen scrutiny   from them because I was a freak in their midst  and everything that I did was not only freakish   but highly hilarious and also worth imitating  so I got a lot of I got a lot of that I really   had never thought of myself as a comedian until  I lived with the Alka Indians and I discovered   that I was expected to be non-stop entertainment  but one of the things which stood out to me in my   observations of their family life was that they  never complained about anything and my daughter   of course grew up there in the jungle with Indians  and she was three years old when we went to live   with the alkis she had lived with other Indians  before that and we went back later and lived   with other Indians again but her husband made a  statement to me which I'm sure my husband maybe   I should say I'm sure none of my husband's could  possibly make about me Walt said to me one day he   said you know that woman never complains about  anything and of course my mother's heart just   swelled with pride and I suddenly realized that I  probably had nothing whatsoever to do with that in   fact it was in spite of me rather than because  of me that my son-in-law could say that because   number one Valerie is more an Elliot than she is  a Howard and the Elliot's were much more cheerful   people I come from a long line of pessimists  on both sides champions but I realized that   probably the major reason was that she had grown  up with Indians who never complained we lived in   a place where there was terrible weather we had  144 inches of rain per year which is 12 feet I   don't know what Florida's rainfall is but it was  a lot of rain and so when we traveled which was   always by foot to the trail and sometimes canoe we  generally got soaked we got mud sometimes splashed   from head to foot but at least up to your knees  and we were at the mercy of gnats and mud and   mildew and mosquitos and various other discomforts  and the Indians would come from maybe a four-hour   walk over the trail with say a 50-pound basket  of food on their backs the women anyway the   men couldn't carry 50 pounds but the women could  and I never once saw a woman take that tump line   offer forward and set her basket down and say  never they just didn't do that now these people   were not Christians and to my shame I say that  I saw among them a cheerfulness a gracious and   peaceful and serene acceptance of what we would  consider very hostile conditions which was taken   for granted no one was patting himself on the  back because he didn't complain so let's take   a lesson or two from those simple people and  make a habit instead of complaining of saying   thank you lord my daughter right now is dealing  with probably one of the most difficult questions   that parents have to deal with in training their  children and that's this business of Hawaiian her   children are obedient they've learned that they  know that daddy and Mama mean exactly what they   say but they don't necessarily do it cheerfully  they don't do it necessarily with a smile and   sometimes one of them has to get sent back to  his bedroom until he finds a nice a nice face   Val or Walt will say now we really don't like that  face we don't like that tone of voice you go back   into the bedroom and when you find a nice face  or a cheerful voice then you can come back and   Amy Carmichael missionary to India whose biography  I wrote called a chance to die tells how when she   was growing up in a little village in Northern  Ireland they not only had to immediately stretch   forth their hand for the spanking it was given by  a small paddle called a Pandi but they had to say   thank you mother well that's tough discipline  isn't it and I had a very charming young lady   staying with me a couple of weeks ago who told  me this wonderful story about the kind of differ   that Jesus Christ made in her own life when she  was probably about 18 years old and this is the   sort of story that I'm always looking for and it  thrills my soul to see that there is a practical   down-to-earth visible difference that Jesus  Christ has made in somebody's life and she said   she had been going to I think it was a young life  meeting where the speaker talked about honoring   your father and your mother and she said most  of the time it was going in one ear and out the   other and all of a sudden something clicked and  she said oh I'm supposed to honor my father and   my mother and my mother and I are like two cats a  lot of times and she said I went home and I began   to think about it and I thought hello I can't  do that this thing about being a Christian is   too much but she said I began to pray that God  would help me to do that whatever it meant she   said I really didn't know what it meant but I knew  that complaining and being grumpy and hard to get   along with was certainly not fitting to someone  who honors father and mother so she said I wanted   to go to a certain event and I asked my mother  if I could go now she was still living at home   and so although she was 17 or 18 she knew that she  was under their authority and she said my mother   said no and she said I said okay and she said I  couldn't believe my ears I couldn't believe it I   went into my room and I sat down and I said whoa  how these kids say I mean like whoa I just said   okay it's the first time in my whole life that I  haven't argued with my mother now that was step   one in that girl's obedience to Jesus Christ and  it's all very well to make wonderful professions   about being a Christian to do your praying and  your reading and your him singing and go to church   and do this and that and the other thing but when  it comes right down to where the rubber hits the   road what kind of a difference does it make and  that girl was able to say thank you lord my mother   said no it was my opportunity to obey Jesus Christ  so gratitude and acceptance should distinguish the   Christian number two gratitude honors God and I  got this idea straight out of the Bible from the   New International Version of some fifty verse  23 this is what it says he who sacrifices thank   offerings honors me and he prepares the way  so that I may show him the salvation of God   he honors me and prepares the way so that I may  show him the salvation of God let me go back to   October 25th 1972 that was rather a eventful day  in my life I found an apartment for my mother who   was moving from Florida up to Massachusetts to be  near three of her six children so that was a major   thing that happened that day then the clothes the  son of a very close friend of mine was killed in   an automobile accident I had a visit from a  young woman who had a three-year-old son with   a serious heart anomaly and we had sat down in my  living room and talked about the lessons that God   was teaching her through this one of which was  acceptance and gratitude the condition was such   that the doctors had told her you you never know  when you may find him dead in his bed or in his   playpen and there's nothing we can do until he  reaches the age of four but he may not make it   to four and then that very same day my hospital  my husband had to go to the hospital for a lump   on his lip and that morning I had written down  on just a little piece of scratch paper these   words how to deal with suffering of any kind I  didn't know all of the things that were going to   happen in that particular day and I don't know  where this came from except I suppose from God   how to deal with suffering of any kind number  one I wrote recognize it number two accept it   number three offer it to God as a sacrifice and  number four offer yourself with it and whether   I had a premonition that this thing was going to  be serious or whether I was just reviewing lessons   from other years I really don't remember but that  same afternoon we were told by the doctor that   my husband had cancer the next night there was  bleeding from another source which had nothing   to do with that lump we were filled with fear and  resentment and worry and it was all terribly real   for both of us and necessitating our coming  to christ for a refuge you can imagine the   dialogues that I began having with God at that  point lord we've been haven't we been through   this once before you took husband number one now  surely Lord you wouldn't take ad would you and It   was as if the Lord said I might trust me so I had  to begin all over again I thought learning lessons   which I really thought I had learned well enough  before I was saying Lord did I flunk the test we   have to go over this again and the answer was yes  you have to go over it again and where do you turn   what do you do cry you pray you ask why but then  there's a much better thing to do which is stated   in this verse that I read you he who sacrifices  thank offerings honors me and he prepares the   way so that I may show him the salvation of God  now there are a good many circuitous routes to   learning to know God but there are some shortcuts  and I'm here to suggest that gratitude is one of   those shortcuts just start thanking God in  advance because no matter what is about to   happen you already know that God is in charge  you are not adrift in a sea of chaos so what   is there to be grateful for while God is still  loved nothing has changed that God is still God   he's sovereign he's got the whole world in his  hands he knew that my husband was going to get   cancer on that particular day or that we would  find out about it before the foundation of the   world he knew that so he wasn't taken by surprise  and love still wills my joy now I can always thank   God for all of those things those are the facts  along with these other horrible things with which   we can hardly cope it prepares the way so that  I may show him the salvation of God so when we   went to the doctor again about the second problem  we discovered that he had a second kind of cancer   the two things were totally unrelated and as we  walked across the parking lot my husband's began   to quote from Gray's elegy the curfew tolls the  knell of parting day and I could see that he had   taken already a view of total despair his first  wife had died of cancer his father had died of   the kind of cancer which he had just discovered  he had and I went back praying that God would   keep me from tears particularly since I was going  to my brother's house for supper that night and   I thought I can't be sitting there dissolved in  tears I prayed that he would take my anxieties and   my fears and that he would deliver me from making  a career out of my troubles which is a lesson that   that young woman who had the little boy with a  serious heart anomaly had pointed out to me just   a week before she said I realized that I could  make a career out of my child's illness and she   said I began to pray that God would free me from  that in order that I might serve others and that   lesson had sunk deeply into my heart how little I  realized how desperately I was going to need that   and so I thought of a little Chinese song not that  I speak Chinese but I heard that this song was   sung by Chinese refugees in World War two I will  not be afraid I will not be afraid I will look   upward and travel onward and not be afraid and  God reminded me of the verse in the Psalms where   he says what time I am afraid I will trust and the  verse that says I will bless the Lord at all times   his praise shall continually be in my mouth now  that's a willed conscious deliberate obedience   isn't it I will bless the Lord regardless of  what's happening around here because there is that   other level that other perspective a different  vision the visible things are transitory it is   the invisible things that are really permanent  a doctor's verdict was fact I had to believe   it but God's Word was also fact and I was able to  write in my journal these words which I certainly   would have forgotten if they weren't there in  black and white good and peaceful all day that   was my feelings good and peaceful does that make  any sense from any other standpoint except the   perspective of eternity can't possibly make sense  to anybody else and that's why I keep saying that   it isn't explanations that we need it's a person  we need Jesus Christ our refuge our fortress the   stronghold of my life it takes desolation to teach  us our need of him I think of the list of miracles   in the New Testament that Jesus performed if  you were to go through the whole New Testament   and make a list of the situations that people  were in when Jesus arrived now some of them were   relatively trivial for example the embarrassed  host at the wedding of Cana where the wine had   run out now people don't really desperately need  wine all the time I guess back then it was pretty   much of a stable one of the staple foods but you  don't really need seconds at a party do you and   yet when the wine ran out the first miracle that  Jesus performed was to provide not only seconds   for the party but better wine than the host had  been able to serve on the first round so if the   wine hadn't run out the people would not have been  prepared to recognize Jesus in the way that they   did when those five thousand doors fifteen or  twenty thousand people were in need of food on   the mountain when Jesus had been preaching to them  the disciples said they've got to have something   to eat they probably could have made it home  I don't think they would have starved to death   between the mountain and their own houses it was a  relatively small thing but it was a miracle and it   was in that situation and I remind you of these  things because so often we can get completely   preoccupied with theory metaphysics invisible  principles up here which are very hard to put into   practice in our own lives so what is your place  of mean today has the wine run out are you hungry   is it something more desperate like the man who  been crippled for 38 years or the child who had   died or the widow who had lost her only son or the  baby born blind or the storm that came up when the   disciples thought they were perishing what is your  place of need where is Jesus putting his finger   in your life today maybe there is an unanswered  prayer that you have been battering away at God's   door for years about and it just hain't seems  as though he's not paying attention maybe there   is some deep resentment in your heart because  somebody has hurt you somebody has done something   which humanly speaking is unforgivable forgiveness  is for real offenses it's not like saying excuse   me when you step on somebody's toe by accident  excuse me is one thing but forgive me is for real   offenses and Jesus comes into our lives in these  places of need and if we recognize him because of   our need then we can receive whatever it is that  he's prepared to offer us whether it's the grace   of forgiveness or the patience to wait for the  answer to that prayer or healing or serenity in   the midst of the worst times of your life whatever  it is you can receive it and say thank you lord   now I personally have never thanked God for cancer  I have never thanked God specifically that certain   Indians murdered my husband I don't think I need  to thank God for the cancer and for the murder but   I do need to thank God that in the midst of that  very situation the world was still in his hands   the one who keeps all those galaxies wheeling and  in space is the very hand that holds me the hands   that were wounded on the cross are the same hands  that hold the seven stars the hands that were laid   on old John when he was there on that island of  Patmos and the voice that was like the sound of   many waters said to him don't be afraid I am I  have the keys now I told you I was going to tell   you three things and I don't think I've specified  what that third thing is but I've already said it   the first thing was that there think two things  which distinguish the Christian gratitude and   acceptance the second thing was that it honors God  and the third thing comes from the second half of   the same verse that I read to you Psalm 50 verse  23 it prepares the way and it is in these very   situations which are so painful having what you  don't want wanting with all your heart something   that you don't have that Thanksgiving can prepare  the way for God to show us his salvation 10 weeks   after that doctor's office visit I wrote in my  journal one down twenty nine to go and had his   first betatron treatment yesterday three and  a half minutes under the eye of a machine that   size of a freight car making the noise of three  motor boats danger high voltage signs in the   hallway nuclear medicine on the door alarm system  this morning snow on the ground the bared dogwood   trees against a blue sky at a little raggedy form  of Macduff he was my Scottish Terrier running in   the snow all these things in the action of the  betatron and we ourselves held in the hand that   held the seven stars the hand that is now laid  on us again with love and his loving words fear   not don't be afraid I am the one who died I am  alive and I have the keys remember Elijah and his   servant sitting there on the mountain and suddenly  the word is behold the mountain was full of horses   and chariots of fire round about Elisha they  hadn't been able to see them except with the eye   of faith and you and I have no idea of the things  that are going on in the unseen world except we do   have an idea that they are for our perfection for  our fulfillment for our ultimate blessing I close   with one verse again from Psalm 55 verse 22 cast  your burden upon the Lord and He will sustain you if God has given us a gift it's never only for  ourselves it's always to be offered back to him   and very often it has repercussions for the life  of the world Jesus himself offered himself to be   bred for the life of the world he said the bread  that I will give is my body and I give it for the   life of the world for a Christian the pattern is  Jesus what did he do he offered himself a perfect   and complete sacrifice for love of for the love  of God and you and I should be prepared also to   be broken bread and poured out wine for the life  of the world think of the gifts of others whom you   know which have been a great blessing and joy  to you I think it's a gift of music I have a   nephew who is a concert violinist as a tremendous  gift but he doesn't just play his violin all by   himself in his little apartment that gift is for  the sake of the world and I believe that that's   true of every gift that God gives to us in some  way which is not always apparent right at the   beginning among the great gifts of my life are my  husband my daughter my grandchildren and there are   times when I could be very selfish about those  gifts and yet I have to recognize that it's not   just for me but things also that I think of as as  my own must be held with an open hand and offered   back to God along with my body and all that I  am you're familiar with Paul's word I beseech   you therefore brethren by the mercies of God that  you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy   acceptable to God which is an act of intelligent  worship I particularly like that translation an   act of intelligent worship now if I present to God  my body as a living sacrifice then that includes   everything that the body contains my brains  my personality my heart my emotions my will   my temperament my prejudices my failings all  the rest of it is presented to God as a living   sacrifice God has after all given me a body to  live in everything in my life I begin to see as a   gift and I mean everything now that may seem like  sheer poppycock to some of you but I hope that in   the context of the things that I've been saying  you'll begin to see that everything can be seen   as a gift even my widowhood I began very slowly  to recognize after my first husband was killed   that it was within the context of widowhood that  God wanted me to glorify Him was not my idea it   was something which God not only allowed but in a  very real sense which I began slowly to understand   he had given me because he had something else  in mind and this was a gift not just for me but   for the life of the world in some mysterious sense  which I did not need to understand because I could   trust him now again let me help you with three  things and I'll try to tell you what I'm going to   say and then I'll try to say it and then I'll try  to tell you what I've said so that there may be a   little bit closer relationship between the things  which I mean to say and what you hear me saying   and what you've got in your notebook and what you  think I said when you talk about it tomorrow when   somebody says did you go to hear that woman  or what in the world did she say under this   heading of offering let's put down three things  number one everything is a gift number - there   are several kinds of offerings which I can make  to God let's shorten that down and just simply   say that we want to think about an offering as  a sacrifice and when I use the word sacrifice   with regard to my own life sacrificing my body  for example as a living sacrifice presenting   my body as a living sacrifice the emphasis is not  on loss and desolation and giving up the emphasis   is on the fact that God has given me something  which I can offer back to him we'll come to that   a little bit later and number three the greatest  the offering of obedience I'll stop with that   as the heading number one everything is a gift  number each number two offering as a sacrifice   and the offering of obedience when I get up in  the morning I do try to make it a practice to   do some of my praying first thing in the morning  it's a good thing to talk to God before you start   talking to anybody else and I try to begin my  prayers with Thanksgiving there's always a long   list of things to be thankful for and one of them  is that I can get up in the morning that I can be   in a comfortable place looking out over a very  beautiful view I thank God for the sleep of the   night for health and strength and for work to do  I'm very grateful for work I think about somebody   like John Erickson and what Johnny wouldn't give  to just have a chance to wash dishes maybe one   time or do the worst job that you and I might hate  thank God that you can get up I thank him for my   house and my husband and my health and the money  that we have and the food that we have and the   clothes for our backs and grandchildren and my  daughter and on and on and on and you all have   equally long lists I'm sure but then I don't  always find it easy to include on that list   the thorn in the flesh the word that my husband  spoke to me which hurt me as he does that once   in a while I'm married to a sinner I don't know  what you other married women are married to but   far as I know there really isn't anything else  to marry and it's always a good exercise for me   to remember that my poor husband is also married  to a sinner so I thank God for that husband with   his imperfections which are not very many but I  thank him for the particular set of gifts that he   has given me in that man which I can offer back to  God with Thanksgiving when Joseph was taken into   captivity he could not possibly have imagined what  God had in mind years later but in genesis 45 8 we   read Joseph's words to his brothers it was not  you that sent me here but God what looked like   a horrible thing jealous brothers hating their  younger brother wanting to get rid of him deciding   to kill him then realizing they could make some  money out of him selling him into captivity   he goes down to Egypt and is made a slave and  eventually ends up in prison and one thing in   another does that look like a gift from God and  yet he says it was not you who sent me it was   God Paul said there was given to me a thorn Jesus  refers to the cup which his father had given him   now all of these things represent great suffering  not trivial things at all and Joseph was able to   say when he named his son Ephraim God has caused  me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction it's not the experience that changed him it  was his response and Joseph trusted God now   what is God's intention when he gives you and  me something he is giving me something in my   hands to offer back to him with Thanksgiving  I remember when I was a little girl wanting to   buy Christmas presents for my parents and I had  no way at all of earning money my brothers had   paper roots and earned maybe 25 cents a week or  something like that back in the depression days   but I had to depend on an allowance so I would  have had absolutely nothing to give to my mother   for Christmas if my mother hadn't given something  to me first and that's the way it is with us with   God isn't it we are totally destitute everything  that we have comes from him and we have nothing   to offer except what He has given us there's  an old thank prayer of thanksgiving at the   offering time all things come a V O Lord and of  thine own have we given thee we receive it from   him we accept it in our hands we say thank you  and then we offer it back this is the logical   sequence of the things which I have been talking  about everything is a gift everything is meant to   be offered back and this lesson became a powerful  life-changing transforming lesson during the time   of my husband's illness and when I would awaken  in those wee small hours of the night which Amy   Carmichael calls the hours when all life's mole  hills become mountains my mind would be filled   with vivid imaginings of the horrible things that  were going to happen to my husband between now and   death now death was the unarguable conclusion of  what my husband had medically speaking there was   no possibility that he was going to survive so  I had faced that fairly squarely but the doctors   were predicting hideous mutilations that they  were going to practice on him between now and   death I felt I could not stand it and in those wee  small hours I began to cry out to the Lord and it   came to me with great clarity one night I suppose  about 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning that my agony   my anguish which was vicarious for my husband was  something which God had put in my hands to offer   back to him it was a gift now let's think about  this second thing the idea of sacrifice there   are many occasions in scripture where the word  sacrifice is used and it was a very important   part of the Hebrew life back in Old Testament  days blood sacrifice was a daily occurrence in   the tabernacle and the people's whole lives  were controlled by the rituals of sacrifice   but the Old Testament also speaks as a sacrifice  of Thanksgiving in the Psalms and the verse that   came to me in those hours of fear was a broken and  a contrite heart I will not despise the sacrifices   of God are a broken spirit a broken and a contrite  heart I will not despise I'm talking to people I'm   sure who have a broken spirit a broken heart God  will not despise that offering if that's all you   have to offer I felt as if I was destitute like  the widow of Zarephath remember the story of how   Elijah was fed by Ravens for time and then God  told him that the raid business we're going to   stop and that he was to go down to a place called  Zarafa swear there was a widow who would feed him   now I don't think we can begin to imagine the  absolute dereliction of a widow in those ancient   times but she was the most helpless and poor  of all now why in the world would God Almighty   who owns the cattle on a Thousand Hills choose a  destitute woman to feed his prophet Elijah and you   remember that when Elijah reaches Arafat he finds  this woman out gathering a couple of sticks and he   asks her for a drink of water and then he asks her  for the most unreasonable request imaginable and   he says bake me a cake well if she were speaking  modern English he would have said surely you've   got to be kidding I'm out here gathering two  sticks so that I can bake the last handful of   flour and the last few drops of oil into a little  cake which is the only thing that stands between   me and my son and death we are starving to death  and you asked me to bake you a cake but the woman   recognized that this was a man of God and so to  her it was a matter of obedience to God and she   baked him a cake she believed his word that the  cruse of oil would not fail nor would the barrel   of meal be empty what had got done in sending the  Prophet to a destitute woman he had put into that   woman's hands something to offer back but what  a pitiful offering one little handful of flour a   few drops of oil do you remember when the little  boy brought his lunch to Jesus or the disciples   extorted that lunch from him who knows we don't  really know whether that little boy gave it up   willingly or what happened I've often wondered  about that little boy but anyway he had five   loaves and two fishes which the disciples brought  to Jesus and he put it into Jesus hands and one of   the disciples said this what is the good of that  for such a crowd now I'm speaking to some of you   who feel as if you had nothing whatsoever to offer  to God you don't have any huge sufferings perhaps   you don't have any great gifts you were behind the  door when they gave out the gifts and poor little   me I can't sing and I can't preach and I can't  pray and I can't write books and I can't be the   hostess with the mostess so I really can't serve  the Lord if I had so as those gifts then it would   be a different story I don't know who I'm talking  to but I'm sure that there are some of you who   would be saying what is the good of my offering  for such a crowd you're telling me that I have   something which is going to matter for the life  of the world and I say yes that's what I'm telling   you because God takes a widow with nothing God  takes a little boy's lunch and he turns that into   something for the good of the world because that  individual let it go and I began to see again very   dimly and don't imagine that I was some kind of  spiritual giant to see this thing it was the Holy   Spirit of God that said to me give it to me let it  go offer it up a sacrifice something in your hands   to give me how does a mother feel when her tiny  little two-year-old comes into the house with a   smashed dandy-lion clenched in his little sweaty  fist and he offers her the smashed dandy-lion   it means everything in the world because love  transforms it that's what this is about suffering   and love are in extra godly bound up together and  love invariably means sacrifice we talked about   the sacrifice of fathers and mothers what about  the sacrifice of husbands and wives what about the   sacrifice of those who are prepared to be single  for the rest of their lives for the glory of God   I think of Amy Carmichael she believed that God  was actually calling her to remain single and   it scared her she felt that she might perhaps  be desolate with loneliness and God brought to   her mind the words none of them that trust in me  shall ever be desolate and out of that offering   that brokenness that living sacrifice which was  the life of Amy Carmichael came a great missionary   work which continues to this day Amy Carmichael  a single woman became the mother of thousands of   Indian children there was a time when the family  that she founded as the donor for fellowship   little children rescued from temple prostitution  numbered that family numbered over 900 people at   one time and she worked there for 53 years and she  wrote these words in one of her poems if thy dear   home be fuller Lord because a little emptier my  house on earth what rich reward that Gurdon were   you and I have no idea what God has in mind when  we make the offering but everything is material   for sacrifice again and again I've had people  say to me how do you handle loneliness and I say   I can't handle loneliness well didn't you spend a  lot of time alone in the jungle yes I did I spent   a good many more years alone than I did married  well how did you handle it I didn't I couldn't   I have to turn it over to somebody who can handle  it in other words my loneliness became my offering   and so if God doesn't always remove the feeling  of loneliness it is in order that every every day   perhaps I have something to offer up to him and  say Lord here it is I can't handle this I don't   know what your emotions may be that you can't  handle but I believe that every one of us knows   something about loneliness a single is always  imagined that the married people are not lonely   but I can testify that there are different kinds  of loneliness and they are just one example of the   offering that I'm talking about today I have never  forgotten what a missionary speaker said in Chapel   when I was a student we had compulsory Chapel  five days a week at Wheaton College so we heard   hundreds of speakers and remembered practically  nothing most of them but I have never forgotten   what this woman said she spoke about the little  boy bringing his lunch to Jesus and she said if   my life is broken when given to Jesus it may  be because pieces will feed a multitude when   a loaf would satisfy only a little boy what have  you got in your hand to give to him is it a gift   that you recognize as a gift a talent for example  is it the willingness to be a mother and to take   the criticism of the women who say that a woman  who's got half a brain will put her children in   somebody else's care and get out and do something  quote fulfilling is it the willingness to take the   flack from the rest of the world about something  which you've decided to do for Jesus sake is it   the willingness to be unrecognized unappreciated  you know we've got a very twisted idea of this   word ministry we think that a ministry means  just a very short list of things preaching or   singing or doing a seminar or writing a book or  teaching a Sunday School class of course those   are ministry their forms of service but the word  ministry just means service and service is a part   of our offering to God people would think of my  ministry as being my missionary work my writing   my speaking you know I don't spend most of my  life standing at a podium I spend most of my life   sitting at a desk standing at a sink standing  at an ironing board going to the grocery store   sitting in airports doing a whole lot of things  which are not anything for which I expect to get   medals they are moments to be offered to Jesus do  the next thing which brings me to my third point   the offering of obedience when my brother Tommy  Tom was a little boy about three years old one   of his favorite forms of play was to take all the  paper bags out of the drawer in the kitchen where   my mother kept them and spread them all over the  floor well my mother permitted that with Tommy he   was number five I was number two and I don't think  I would have gotten away with it but she'd learned   a lot of things by that time and I'm sure she was  tired but anyway she said you may do that on one   condition that you put the bags back in the drawer  before you leave the kitchen well he understood   that perfectly well children usually understand  far more than we think they do so she came into   the kitchen one day and there were there paper  bags all over the floor but no sign of Tommy so   she found him in the living room where my father  was playing the piano playing hymns and my mother   said Tommy I want you to come up with the bags  back in the drawer and he looked up with a smile   of the most innocent and seraphic sweetness  and he said but I want to sing jesus loves me my father stopped playing the piano and took the  opportunity to press home a profound lesson to   obey is better than sacrifice I'm sure he used  terms which Tommy could understand but it's no   good singing jesus loves me when you're disobeying  your mother and the highest form of worship is   obedience what do I have to offer to God which  is more important than my obedience and there's   a great lesson on this from the Book of Ezekiel  hidden back there in the 24th chapter God said   son of man I'm about to take the delight of  your eyes away from you at a stroke yet you   shall not mourn or weep nor shall your tears run  down sigh but not aloud make no mourning for the   dead bind on your turban put your shoes on your  feet do not cover your lips nor eat the bread   of mourners in other words forget all the ritual  signs of mourning and Ezekiel says this I spoke   to the people in the morning and in the evening my  wife died and on the next morning I did as I was   commanded very short description of some pretty  important things and in the morn in the evening   my wife died in the next morning I did as I was  commanded and I have discovered that there is no   consolation like obedience and when I was trying  to offer up my feelings to God in those wee small   hours of the morning I thanked God when it was  time to get up because they were all kinds of   just simple ordinary down-to-earth things to do do  the next thing God gave to the widow of Zarephath   and to the little boy and to Ezekiel something  to give back to him something which would matter   very much to others God enabled Ezekiel to give  his sorrow back to him and to get up and do what   he was commanded to do for the life of the world  it wasn't just Ezekiel that God was interested in   right there God wanted to make Ezekiel into broken  bread and poured out wine for the life of the   world let me ask you who are the people who most  profoundly influenced your life those who have   most profoundly influenced my life are without  exception people who have suffered because it   has been in that very thing that God has refined  the gold tempered the steel molded the pot broken   the bread and made that person into something  that feeds a multitude of whom I have been one   of the beneficiaries I had a wonderful letter from  a woman an older woman who told me that back when   she was a little girl in the depression her father  died none of his friends came to the funeral she   had to wear a borrowed dress the house was  mortgaged her mother was left a widow with   seven children and the lawyer who was supposed  to be handling her financial affairs stole the   inheritance and the lady said this when we went  back to the house after the funeral my mother   picked up a broom and began to sweep the kitchen  and she said I look back on that now and I had   realized that it was the soft swish-swish-swish  of that broom that he began the healing process   she said my mother was a destitute woman and when  people asked her years later how did you ever make   it she just said I prayed well she didn't just  pray she prayed and she did the next thing she   picked up the broom and so I say to you today  God has put something in your hand which you can   accept you can say thank you Lord and then you can  offer it back to him let me give you another verse   that encourages me tremendously psalm 119 verse  91 says this day as ever that I decrees stand fast   for all things serve thee what's happening in your  life today is it good then it's easy to thank God   for isn't it is it bad if you can remember that  this day like every other day his decrees stand   fast those eternal verities are unshakable they  his word is in frangible the world and all its   passionate desires will one day disappear the man  who is following the will of God is part of the   permanent and cannot die I encourage you to make  an offering of your sufferings ooh go bassy said   this measure your life by loss and not by gain  not by the wine drunk but by the wine poured forth   for love strength standeth in love sacrifice  and he that suffereth most hath most to give back in 1820 there was a little six week old baby  who had an inflammation of the eyes and the doctor   applied hot poultice and burned the corneas so  that the child was blind for life when she was   nine years old she wrote these words oh what a  happy soul am i although I cannot see I resolved   that in this world contented I shall be so many  blessings I enjoy that other people don't to weep   and sigh because I'm blind I cannot nor I won't  and that little girl grew up to write 8,000 hymns   among them to God be the glory blessed assurance  rescue the perishing face-to-face her name was   Fanny Crosby I had heard the story of Fanny Crosby  years ago but I hadn't come across that little   poem until just recently written at the age of  nine to weep inside because I'm blind I cannot   nor I won't I love that and there's a verse in  the 58th chapter of Isaiah which very nicely   links together what I said in my last talk on  the subject of offering with what I want to talk   to you about now transfiguration these are the  words if you feed the hungry another translation   says if you pour out your soul for the hungry and  satisfy the needs of the wretched then your light   will arise like dawn out of darkness and your  dusk be like noonday and the Lord will be your   guide continually and will satisfy your needs in  the shimmering heat he will give you strength of   limb you will be like a well watered garden like  a spring whose waters never fail it's that deep   principle articulated here that I want to talk  to you about I've given it the one-word title   of Transfiguration I've chosen that word rather  than transformation the two are almost identical   but I love the word Transfiguration because it  implies an aspect of glory which is not always   implied in the word transformation Transfiguration  you remember the story of Jesus on the Mount when   he was transfigured the two things suffering  and glory are brought into contact because it   was about suffering that Moses and Elijah were  speaking when Jesus was transfigured and this   verse from Isaiah speaks of pouring yourself  out for the hungry and receiving in exchange   the satisfaction of your own needs strength  of limb you will be like a well watered garden   like a spring whose waters never fail and I think  Fanny Crosby at the tender age of nine had begun   to glimpse the fact that there was more joy in  giving than there would ever be in receiving and   she was broken bread and poured out wine for the  life of the world and only God knows the ripple   effect Fanny Crosby's obedience in the offering  up of herself and in proverbs 11:25 we read he who   refreshes others will himself be refreshed and  I'm sure that all of us who've ever tried that   therapy have found it to be extremely effective so  the idea of Transfiguration follows very naturally   and logically from acceptance gratitude and  offering if we receive the things that God   wants to give us if we thank him for them and if  we make those things and offering back to God then   this is what's going to happen Transfiguration  the great principle of exchange which is the   central principle of the Christian faith Krauss  we know that the cross does not exempt us from   suffering how many times Christians have to answer  the question to their non-believing friends when   their friends ask well so you're a Christian and  you're supposed to be so good and you're going to   heaven and look what God lets happen to you and we  can say very plainly that the cross obviously does   not exempt us from suffering in fact the cross is  a symbol of suffering and Jesus said you must take   up your cross in fact there are kinds of suffering  which we would never have to endure if we were not   believers we read that through much tribulation  we must enter into heaven and Jesus said if you   if you are my followers then they are going to  arrest you imprison you drag you into court and   even the day will come when they will kill you and  think that they're doing God a favor so he said   I'm telling you these things now so that when they  do happen your faith in me will not be shaken your   faith rests in your idea of how God is supposed  to answer your prayers your idea of heaven here   on earth or pie in the sky or whatever then that  kind of faith is very shaky and is bound to be   demolished when the storms of life hit it but if  your faith rests on the character of him who is   the eternal I am then that kind of faith is rugged  and will endure I'm very keenly painfully aware of   the fact that this series of talks on suffering  is barely skimming the surface and I think of the   words of the one of the ancient mystics who said  that God is a mountain of corn from which I like   a sparrow pluck a single kernel that describes  what I've succeeded in doing if I have succeeded   in doing anything at all perhaps we've plucked  a single kernel just enough satisfy the hunger   of a tiny bird from this immense mountain of corn  which is the reality of God himself we've thought   about the truth the terrible truth the message the  matter of acceptance of gratitude and of offering   and now let us think about Transfiguration and  I'll give you three things and this time I can   help you with alliteration I don't work very  hard trying to get things alliterative but it   happens to be three P's this time the principle  the perspective and the paradoxes the principle is   that of the cross life comes out of death I bring  God my sorrows and he gives me his joy I bring him   my losses and he gives me his gains I bring him  my sins he gives me his righteousness I bring him   my deaths and he gives me his life but the only  reason God can give me his life is because he   gave me his death so these two things continually  work not only in the spiritual life Jesus used the   very simple illustration of a natural world in  the incident where just after his entering into   Jerusalem where he was hailed with palm branches  and hosannas two of the disciples came to him and   told him that there were some Greeks there who  wanted to see him because they had heard about   the raising of Lazarus from the dead well we all  love miracles and we all love a miracle worker and   if you want to be popular you perform as many  miracles as possible in as visible a medium as   possible and people will flock and people flocked  to Jesus he said not because of the words that he   spoke because of the loaves and fishes and in  this case it was raising Lazarus from the dead   which word had spread abroad and so people were  crowding into Jerusalem to see this man and the   disciples came and told Jesus that they wanted  to see him well Jesus took that opportunity to   turn his disciples idea into glory upside down the  world has an idea of what's important what really   is the glory of God do all the miracles that you  can get everything all sorted out and healed and   paid for and solved and that's God's glory and  of course I believe in a God who can make the Sun   stand still and he can turn water into wine and  make dry land out of rivers don't misunderstand   me but when I hear a preacher say what you need is  a miracle I want to say I might think that's what   I need but very often my prayers are really asking  for stones and what God wants to give me is bread   something that will not only feed myself but feed  the world as well so I can pray I might even pray   for a miracle I don't think I've done that very  often but when I was praying for healing for my   husband's cancer I knew that I was praying for a  miracle humanly speaking but the bottom line was   the Lord that I will be done so we do have to  have our definitions revised and the disciples   needed to have their definition of glory revised  and turned upside down and Jesus said I'm going   to show you what glory is he said now the hour has  come for the Son of man to be glorified except a   corn of wheat fall into the ground and die it  abideth alone but if it die it bringeth forth   much fruit now that is the principle of a cross  he was on his way to the cross is there anything   less significant and distinctive and a seed you  see in one corn of wheat you've seen seen of all   you seen one grain one seed one Appleseed you've  seen them all so there isn't anything terribly   distinctive noticeable about the seed and when  that seed falls into the ground it's gone it may   never be seen again but we know for sure that  nothing is ever going to come out of that seed   unless it falls into the ground into the dark  into the unknown into ignominy and death but   out of that seed then comes the great harvest  the golden grain so that is the principle of   exchange I give him my deaths and he gives me  his life my sorrows he gives me joy my losses   he gives me his gains this is the great principle  of the Cross some of you I'm sure know the story   of George Matheson the hymn writer who became  engaged and while they were engaged he went   blind and his fiancee not wanting to be saddled  with a blind man broke the engagement and it was   then that George Matheson wrote those wonderful  words oh love that will not let me go I rest my   weary soul in thee I give thee back here we are  with this offering I give thee back the life I   owe that ensign ocean depths its flow may richer  fuller be and I think of the words that my first   husband Jim Elliot wrote when he was 22 years  old he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep   to gain what he cannot lose he was paraphrasing  the words of Jesus if you lose your life for my   sake you'll find it he exchanges my weakness my  losses my sins my sorrows my sufferings when we   offer them to him he has something to give us  in exchange and that might feed a multitude so   the principle of exchange is the principle of  the cross and that principle goes all the way   back to before the foundation of the world the  lamb was slain the blood sacrifice was made in   the mind of God before there was such a thing as  sin sacrifice and suffering and glory there is   no getting away from them we live in New England  where we love September and October Lars always   groans about it because he's a southerner and  he thinks the winters are so long but when the   acorns begin to fall I love the season because for  one thing we do have the most spectacular colors   I guess in the country because we have those Rock  maples that turn blood red and salmon and move and   unbelievable colors but the glory of the autumn  is a symbol of death that blood red reminds me of   blood which is a symbol of death and if it weren't  for the oak tree letting go of all those precious   little seeds those acorns they would never fall  into the ground and die so that there would never   be any more oak trees and the squirrels would  starve to death everything that you and I eat   means that something has died in some way even  an egg even a glass of milk the chicken and the   cow have not died but they have given life have  a thing and practically everything else on the   table tells us that something has died whether  it's corns of wheat or animals so life comes out   of death it is the principle of the universe the  principle of exchange even stars die we're being   told more and more these fascinating things that  astronomers are discovering but there's a verse   hidden in 2nd chronicles 29 verse 27 that has been  a great courage mint and cheer to me ever since   I found that verse backed when I was a senior in  college and dying a thousand deaths over the fact   that I was in love with somebody that I didn't  think was ever going to be in love with me and   thinking that I was very foolish to even entertain  any hopes for this man and so I put my feelings   on God's altar as I mentioned earlier in one of  my talks that I can't handle loneliness I can't   handle a lot of my emotions and so I just say Lord  here it is you take it and you make something out   of it if you can if you can make something out of  a little boy's lunch and out of the widows cruse   of oil then maybe you can do something with this  so I turned over all those passions that veritable   tornado of passion that I felt for this young man  whose name happened to be Jim Eliot to God and God   gave me this first and second chronicles when  the burnt offering began the song of the Lord   began also is that terrific it works the burnt  offering began the song of the Lord began also   it's just referring to the actual ritual of  sacrifice and yet it has its implications for   our spiritual lives doesn't it now let's look  at this perspective our perspectives need to   be transfigured changed into something which has  glory in it and that wonderful chapter of Hebrews   11 tells me many things about perspective says  in verse 13 after going through the stories of   Abel and Enoch and Noah and Abraham and Sarah all  these impossible things that they did by faith it   says all these persons died in faith but they  were not yet in possession of things promised   they had seen them far ahead and hailed them and  confessed themselves no more than strangers or   passing travelers on earth those who use such  language show plainly that they are looking for   a country of their own if their hearts had been  in the country they had left they could have   found opportunity to return instead we find them  longing for a bed country and is there anything   that makes you long for that better country more  keenly than suffering of one sort or another even   as my poor little granddaughter was suffering  over the fact that she'd gotten spanked three   times in one day and she said oh if only Adam and  Eve hadn't sinned you know just when the washing   machine runs over with company in the house I  mean you do kind of at that point long for a   better country don't you there was 27 in the same  chapter speaking of Moses by faith he left Egypt   not because he feared the Kings anger for he was  resolute as one who saw the invisible God that's   a transfigured perspective by faith Isaac verse 20  blessed Jacob and Esau and spoke of things to come   a transfigured perspective now it's one thing to  get that perspective on other people's lives isn't   it do you find it easier to see the will of God at  work in somebody else's life and in your own would   you like to have the story of Daniel without the  lion's den of course we wouldn't because we know   the end of the story well we Christians we've  got this whole book full of wonderful stories   like that and the end of every single one of them  is the same its glory every time would you like to   have the story of Joseph without all his trials  and tribulations without his going into the pit   what would you know about Shadrach Meshach and  Abednego if they had never gone into a fiery   furnace the blessing of Fanny Crosby's life has  been enormous Lee increased through knowing that   these words of these beautiful gospel hymns came  from a woman who never saw the light of day or   at least never remembered seeing it from the age  of six weeks everything has been transfigured in   their lives because we we've know the end of the  story I remember when Jeanette Clift George was   playing the part of Corrie ten Boom in the movie  called the hiding place she was interviewed on   one of Billy Graham's programs and he asked her  what was the characteristic as you studied Corrie   ten booms life that most impressed you about her  and without any hesitation Jeanette's answer was   joy and those of you that saw Corrie ten Boom  either in the person in person or on the screen   saw a radiant old face filled with the joy of the  Lord now where did that come from was it because   everything in her life worked so beautifully  was it because she had had a happy life as   the world would define happiness of course  not her perspective was transfigured and she   herself was transfigured for the benefit of the  rest of us we were given a visible sign in the   face of Corrie ten Boom of an invisible reality  another country another level another perspective Paul was able to sing in prison and he wrote  those prison epistles which are filled with joy   the book of Philippians is called the Epistle  of joy and he wrote these stunning words in   the first chapter of Philippians words which to  me are loaded he said you have been granted the   privilege not only a believing in Christ but  also of suffering you have been given a gift   of suffering and then in Colossians also  the first chapter this even more stunning   and loaded verse it is now my happiness to suffer  for you sounds like gobbledygook doesn't it until   he goes on to say this is my way of helping  to complete in my poor human flesh the full   tale of Christ's afflictions still to be endured  for the sake of his body which is the church now   to me that is the most profound statement about  the subject that we have been discussing in all   of Scripture of human suffering we cannot come  close to the statements about the sufferings of   Christ but Paul is in prison and he says it is  my happiness to suffer for you because this is   my way of helping to complete in my poor human  flesh I understand that Paul was chained between   two soldiers can you imagine the discomfort of  that not to mention the lack of privacy 24 hours   a day but in his poor human flesh in some very  mysterious way which I can never explain to you   but I believe it he said I am helping to complete  the full tale of Christ's afflictions still to be   endured for what for the sake of his body and I  know that some of you are sitting there saying   but what has that got to do with my sufferings  my sufferings are not for the sake of the gospel   and for years I died a thousand deaths over that  one because I thought I've never really had any   sufferings that were directly for the sake of the  gospel and even the death of my husband Jim who   had attempted to take the gospel to some people  he did not get literally killed because of the   word of his testimony he had never spoken a word  to those Indians they didn't have any idea why he   was there and surmised that he was a cannibal  and so they thought they better bumped him off   in self-defense before they got eaten themselves  so for years and years I pondered this and I have   come to the conclusion and you can argue with  me if you want to and I will not argue back but   there is a mystery here much deeper than just the  fact that Paul was literally suffering in prison   because of his testimony this is my way of helping  to complete in my poor human flesh the full tale   of Christ's sufferings now take note of this  Christ suffers in me now if I suffer because I   am a member of his body I may be a sore member but  he suffers with me and former and in me and when I   suffer he suffers Christ suffered on the cross he  bore all my sins all my griefs and all my sorrows   and yet there is a full tale yet to be fulfilled I  don't understand it I simply affirm it I accept it let's look at the paradoxes we need a transfigured  view of these paradoxes scriptural metaphors for   suffering speak of pruning the best fruit comes  out of the most drastic pruning the purifying of   gold the purest gold comes out of the hottest  fires the going through deep waters and I have   certainly learned the deepest lessons of my  life through going through the deepest waters   and the greatest joys come out of the greatest  sorrows life comes out of death I think of Mary   probably just a teenage girl who in her humility  and her poverty offered herself her plans her   hopes her fears of what might be thought of her  if it appeared that she had been unfaithful to   her fiance Joseph her instant response to the  Word of God was Behold the handmaid of the Lord   let it happen as you say and it was out of this  sacrifice this offering of herself that the savior   of the world was born transfiguration she was  called the most exalted among women most highly   exalted that came from humility if you lose your  life for my sake you'll find it there is in fact   no redemptive work done anywhere without suffering  and God calls us to stand alongside him to offer   our sufferings to him for his Transfiguration  and to fill up in our poor human flesh if I'm   not given the privilege of being crucified if  I'm not given the privilege of being martyred   in some way some literal way for God I am given  the privilege of offering up to him whatever he   has given to me I offer to him all that I am all  that I have all that I do and all that I suffer   for his transformation Transfiguration exchange  for the life of the world that is what it's about   you may be suffering as a father because your  son has rejected you you may be suffering as a   son because your father rejected you 30 years  ago we have a young man living in our house   right now student who was rejected at the age  of 10 months by his father and his mother put   into a foster home where he stayed for 15 years  I made a list of these amazing paradoxes I have   to read it very quickly because my time is just  about gone but this is some of the things these   are some of the things that the scripture  tells me God transforms the wilderness into   pasture deserts into Springs perishable into  imperishable weakness into power humiliation   into glory poverty into riches mortality into  immortality this vile body into a resplendent   body by morning into the oil of joy my spirit  of heaviness he gives me in exchange a garment   of praise and beauty for Ashes in Revelation  7 16 and 17 we read they shall hunger no more   neither thirst any more neither shall the light  the Sun light on them nor any heat for the lamb   which is in the midst of the throne shall feed  them and shall lead them to living fountains of   waters and God shall wipe away all tears from  their eyes in closing I want to give you a poem   written by Grant Colfax Toller my life is but  a weaving between my God and me I do not choose   the colors he worketh steadily oftimes he we  with sorrow and die and foolish pride forget   he sees the upper and I the underside not till  the loom is silent and the shuttles ceased to   fly will God unroll the pattern and explain  the reason why for the dark threads are as   needful in the weavers skillful hands as the  threads of gold and silver in the pattern he   has planned everything that happens it's into a  pattern for good suffering is never for nothing you

Channel: Vision Video

Views: 433,836

Rating: 4.8412127 out of 5

Keywords: Christian Videos, Christian Films, Christian Movies, Religious Movies, Films, Movies, Entertainment, Feature Films, Grief, suffering, Elisabeth Elliot, Jim Elliot, death, intimacy with Christ, Suffering is Not For Nothing full movie, Suffering is Not For Nothing, Creator, religious journey, God, Jesus, religious film, religious movie

Id: CDxFPGHk9Vw

Length: 185min 28sec (11128 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 09 2020