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Now, here's today's message from Pastor Skip Heitzig. 1 Peter chapter 1 verses 1 through 7. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ. To the pilgrims of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father and sanctification of the Spirit.
for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. Grace to you, and peace be multiplied. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope. through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled and that does not fade away reserved in heaven for you.
who were kept by the power of God through faith, for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials. That the genuineness of your faith being much more precious than gold, it perishes. though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise Honour and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Like most of you, I live my life by certain routines: things that I do on Monday, things that I do on Tuesday, and I keep schedules like you do.
There's predictable events that happen like in your life, but every now and then. A life sort of Hits you by surprise, it comes crashing down on you. You don't expect things to happen that happen. Um Are you going a direction, your day is planned out, but you get a phone call from a doctor or a friend? The news is not good.
The prognosis is not good. And you didn't see it coming. Yeah. Max Lucato uses those words in opening up a story in one of his fine books about a parakeet named Chippy. Chippy the parakeet never saw it coming, he writes.
On one second, he is peacefully perched in his cage. The next he's Sucked in. Washed up. and blown over. The problems began when Chippy's owner decided to clean Chippy's cage.
with a vacuum cleaner. She removed the attachment from the end of the hose and stuck it in the cage. Then the phone rang. And she turned to pick it up. She barely said hello when Yeah.
Chippy got sucked in. The bird owner gasped, put down the phone, turned off the vacuum, and opened the bag. There was Chippy, still alive, but stunned. Since the bird was covered with dust and soot, She grabbed him and raced to the bathroom and turned on the faucet. and held chippy under running water.
Then, realizing that Chippy was soaked and shivering, she did what any compassionate bird owner would do. She reached for the hairdryer. and blasted the pet with hot air. Poor Chippy never knew what hit him. A few days after the trauma, the reporter who initially had written about the event contacted Chippy's owner to see how the bird was recovering.
Well, she replied, Chippy doesn't sing much any more. He just sits there and stares. What a description. Sucked in, washed up, and blown over. That describes how events Hit our lives and transform us when they do.
There's two words in verse 6, and verse 6 and 7 is what we're going to look at today, 1 Peter chapter 1. There's two words in verse 6 that just don't seem to fit together. The word rejoice and the word trials, they're in the same sentence. Rejoice. Trials Is that even possible?
Should those words even be together? I mean, there are certain words that just, when you see them together, you go, dah, they don't fit. Airline food is an example. It's never worked for me. It's disputable as to whether it really is food or not.
Of course, you could say that with hospital food, I think, as well. Um political Science. or two words that don't fit. Pretty Ugly. Microsoft works, and there are several other examples.
But rejoice in trials? No, no, no. We rejoice when the trials are over. We get happy if we can avoid our trials. But the fact that Peter would write about these two ideas in the same breath.
These two life experiences in the same sentence. shows us it is possible. In the midst of great suffering, To have great joy. There's a couple of giveaway words that you need to notice in verse 6. Look how he begins the sentence.
In this you greatly rejoice. Of course, the question is, in what? And this is where you need to have been here for the previous studies to understand what this is all about. It's what he has written about in the previous verses. In this you greatly rejoice.
And if you recall, last week we noted that God has the power to save you, the power to secure you, and the power to send you to heaven.
So, as you look around, you can't rejoice much in what you see in your trials, but if you look ahead, You can.
Now, we want to examine your favorite subject this morning: trials. We hate trials. But we also love them. We love them because of what they produce. We don't love it when we're going through them, but we love it when it's all over, the pain stops, and we've learned lessons from it.
So, the name of my message is why we hate trials and why we love them. I'm going to give you five reasons, five characteristics of trials. Beginning in verse 6. Characteristic number one: trials are diverse. Look at it with me, verse 6.
In this you greatly rejoice. Though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by Various Trials. If you have an old King James, it says manifold. Trials. Did you know that the word actually means Many colored.
Variegated, many colored, manifold, various. Colours. As many colors as are on a pantone chart of colors. which are, by the way, 1114 because I checked. As many colors as you have on that chart.
Are kinds of suffering, kinds of trials that you can experience. Have you discovered the trials come in all shades and all hues?
Some are small, some are big, some are short, some are very long? And Peter just sort of sums all that up by saying. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a while. If need be, you have been grieved by various Trials. Because of what I do, I speak to people every single week, almost every single day, about some.
trial that they face. Death of a loved one, loss of a job, Emotional heartache, depression. It's it's what we do. It's part of what we do. And as I was um In the earlier years of my ministry, I decided to keep a little journal of trials.
I mean, I just said I'm going to do one week's worth of stuff that I am dealing with and encountering just to kind of. to get an understanding, a handle on that volume. And so I wrote a few things down that happened in a one-week period of time a few years ago, and I kept that in a journal. First of all, it was a Saturday evening phone call. A chaplain of a local hospital called me to come down to the emergency room.
There was a couple from our church that was there with their baby. By the time I got down there, the baby had died. and there was a mother holding that little infant in her arms. She didn't see it coming. None of us saw it coming.
But it was this huge weight. and heartache. During the same week, I got a phone call that somebody in my own family had died. During that same week, I was informed and got involved in a counseling session. for a child who had been molested by a family member.
During that same week, I spoke to Christian parents. whose daughter was arrested on prostitute charges. During that same week, I got a letter from missionaries I had just been with in the Philippines. They were burning houses around their house. Their lives were threatened.
During that same week, a couple in our church was going through a divorce who had been married 20 years ago. Years. During that same week, a Christian woman in our fellowship was in a serious automobile accident and was in the hospital in stable and recovering condition. Trials don't come in one shade. They come in a variety of colors.
Pain wears many faces. I suppose if we were going to categorize the various trials, we would say there are physical trials, there are mental or emotional trials, and there are spiritual trials. The Bible speaks about all three. You're listening to Connect with Skip Heitzig Weekend Edition. As we reach the end of 2025, generous support from friends like you is vital to keep Connect with Skip Heitzig strong and sharing God's unchanging truth around the world.
Your year-end gift helps more people hear the gospel and find lasting hope in Jesus. And to thank you for your generosity, we'll send you the Daily God Journal, Pastor Skip's new year-long prayer journal, together with the digital devotional, the Daily God Book. These resources will guide you through scripture day by day, helping you align your heart with God and experience His peace. Request yours when you give a year-end gift of $50 or more at connectwithgift.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888. Let's return now to today's message.
First of all, there are physical trials. We know the reality of cancer. Strokes. Heart attacks. birth defects, automobile accidents.
In the Bible, people suffered. Job suffered. He had a deteriorating, debilitating. Long-term skin condition. In the New Testament, the great apostle Paul had what he called a thorn.
in the flesh. Most scholars believe it to be a lingering eye disease. There was Simon who was a leper. There are chapters written about diseases and physical conditions. that affect God's people.
So there are physical trials. Then there are emotional trials. One of the reasons we love the book of Psalms so much. is we think that's in the Bible. This dude suffered like that?
Boy, I felt that same emotional trauma before. On one occasion, David even said, I make my own bed to swim in my own tears. That's an emotional trauma. Elijah the prophet, besides being a dynamic spokesperson for God. Experienced both exhaustion and depression, and when he ran away.
Down towards Sinai, he eventually cried out to God and said, It is enough, Lord. Take away my Life.
So absolutely distraught that he wanted to die. That's an emotional trial. I think that Dedicated believers are susceptible. To this, I think if you have a dedicated believer, somebody who has nose to the grindstone, kind of a work ethic, and Just pushes it and pushes it. They can get exhausted, and when you are physically exhausted, you open yourself up to all sorts of issues.
including depression. The great missionary to India, E. Stanley Jones, spoke of a minister who was preparing a 10-part series called How to Avoid a Nervous Breakdown. Before he finished the series, you know what happened? You got one.
He had a nervous breakdown. Minister of the Gospel. Pushing it, pushing it, pushing it. Nervous breakdown. Then there are spiritual trials.
We often don't think about those, but they are very real. That's when we struggle over our own sin, our own guilt. Or we wrestle with doubts about God. When we wrestle with Expectations we may have of God, spiritual expectations that are unrealistic expectations, and we feel let down. When they're not realized, John the Baptist, I think, was going through a spiritual trial when he was in prison.
And he believed in Jesus, and he thought Jesus was the Messiah, but Jesus wasn't making things happen like he thought they should happen.
So he sends a messenger to Jesus, and here's the question. Are you really the one? Or should we look for somebody else? Those are spiritual doubts. Those are spiritual expectations that weren't met.
Those were trials.
So trials are diverse. There are various trials. The second characteristic, and probably the reason we hate trials the most, is because trials cause grief. Notice the wording in the text. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a while, if need be, you have been grieved.
A better translation would be distressed, made heavy is the idea. It's like you're you're walking around. Life carrying you, your load, your burden, and somebody puts something on you, or something comes upon you, and it's unbearable, it's weighing you down. It's crushing you. You are grieved by it.
And when things happen to you, It grieves you. You got to know something. Grief is a normal. and healthy Human expression. Anybody that tells you, well, if you're a Christian, you want to put on a fake smile and march through life with a brave face so that you look more spiritual, they don't know what they're talking about.
You're only making the trial worse. Best thing to do is to be honest and say what the Bible says. I'm grieved. Jeremiah the prophet. Said, why is my pain unending and my wound grievous and incurable?
Even Solomon said, There's a time to laugh, and there is a time to weep. Mourn. Greave. In ancient times, The Hebrews, when they would lose somebody in their family or a loved one, They would have A public period of grief that lasted 30 days. In other words, society expected you for a month.
To show emotional grief, they gave you a month break. That didn't mean you get a month off. But it means you can publicly grieve with the wearing of sackcloth, ashes, the ripping of the garments. It was a public display of grief, 30 days. The Egyptians did it for 70 days.
I had a friend visit me from another country, and he said, You know, of all the things I notice in the differences between where I live and America is you Americans are like really low on the emotional scale. I mean, it's like at a funeral, it's like the weirdest, softest. goryest music and everybody's just like really quiet. He goes, in the country that I live in, We give full vent to our grief and our emotions when somebody dies. There's a wail that takes place.
So, trials cause grief. Here's the third characteristic. This is going to take you a little bit off guard. Trials Can be. Helpful.
They can be helpful. They can be so good for you. I know I sound like your mom, right? Take this medicine. It really, really tastes bad, but it's good for you.
Sort of like that. Look at what the text says. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a while, look at this phrase. If Need B Have you ever thought about this? Do you think Peter is actually saying that there are times when God knows you need?
A trial. Is that what he's saying? Uh-huh. It's exactly what he's saying. Listen to Philip Yancey, who writes a lot about suffering.
He said: if you pin them against the wall in the dark, In a secret moment, Many Christians would probably admit that pain was God's one mistake. He really should have worked a little harder. and invented a much better way of coping with the world's dangers. But Peter, by that little phrase, if need be, is indicating that there are special times when God knows we need trials. that they can in fact be the will.
of God Now, that is contrary to a modern faith theology that says it's never God's will for you to suffer. They have never read the book of Peter very well if they say that. Peter writes a lot about suffering, but more specifically, suffering according to the will of God. Here's two examples. 1 Peter 3, verse 17.
For it is better if in the will of God to suffer for doing good than for doing evil. Chapter 4, verse 19. Let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to Him in doing good. When we suffer, We have no idea. What need in our life is being met?
By a sovereign God, and you need to know something, Christian. God is in control. He is in control. He's got you covered. He has this wired.
He's been doing this a long time before you and I ever got around here. He is in control. He knows what he's about. A need is being met. You're going, need?
What need could I possibly have that suffering would help?
Well, let me answer that for you. It's quite simple, actually. Trials Correct us. A course correction. If you're a parent, you understand.
You get this. Your kids start growing up and exerting their own private will. They don't want to do what you want them to do. And if they get really hardened and really recalcitrant, if you're a good parent, at some point in their life, you're going to spank that child. If you don't spank that child, we need to spank you perhaps.
Because you need to correct the course of that child. You don't want to break the spirit. But you definitely want to change the will. And that comes through a course correction. Give that child a trial.
David said in Psalm 119, Before I was afflicted, I went astray, but now I keep your. Word. There it is, he said it. Before I was afflicted, before I got spanked by you, God, I went astray, but now I keep your word. Trials correct us.
C.S. Lewis eloquently said it this way: pain. plants the flag of truth. in the fortress of a rubble soul.
So that's why it's needful. It corrects us. Here's something else it does. It humbles us. Achaya.
Pain does something to just sort of get us right back down to the ground. Even Paul the Apostle was humbled by a trial. In 2 Corinthians chapter 12. Paul indicates that He had so many revelations from God that God needed to keep him humble.
Now just listen to this. According to the scripture, Paul had four Personal. Revelations From God. God spoke to Paul. I don't mean he had a pizza late at night and he woke up the next day thinking.
I think God. Speaking to me. No, no, God spoke to him. On one occasion, he was taken to heaven, the third heaven, and it was just so amazing. He said it was just so cool, I can't even tell you how cool it was.
And I've always hated that verse of scripture. It's like, come on. What was it like? I can't even tell you. It was just so great.
But this is what he does say: lest I should be exalted above measure, a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, was given to me. to torment me. For three times I asked the Lord to remove it, and he said, My grace is sufficient for you, my power is made perfect in weakness. It humbled him.
Well, I guess God talking to you could could puff you up. I mean, you're having lunch with a guy at Flying star and You take a bite of your sandwich, your salad, or your ice cream, or whatever it is. Oh, by the way, God has been speaking to me, and I got taken to heaven the other day. Really? Humble.
When I try him. They correct us, they humble us. We're so glad you joined us today on Connect with Skip Heitzig. And remember, before you go, your generosity today makes a real difference. As this year ends, your gift of $50 or more helps more people hear God's word and find lasting hope in Jesus.
And to thank you, we'll send you the Daily God Journal, along with the companion digital devotional, the Daily God Book. These resources will help you start the new year aligned with God's heart and growing in faith each day. Give your year-end gift now at connectwithgift.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888. We'll see you next time for more verse-by-verse teaching of God's Word here on Connect the Skip-Heitzig Weekend Edition. Make a connection!
Make a connection. Shouldn't Yeah. Of the crossing. Connect with Skip Heitzig is a presentation of connection communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.
