Why We Hate Trials (And Why We Love Them) - Part A

You got to know something. Grief is a normal and healthy human expression. Anybody that tells you, well if you're a Christian, you ought 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. The 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? We all go through times of great pain, but God can work through even your toughest moments to accomplish something beautiful in your life. Today on Connect with Skip Hyten, Skip shares how God can use the struggles you face to make you into the person you were created to be. But first, we want to share about where you can hear even more uplifting teachings from Skip.

Now I just want to let you know how we can stay connected on my YouTube channel. Just search for Skip Hyten, that's Skip, H-E-I-T-Z-I-G. You'll find in-depth Bible teachings and insightful interviews, and don't forget to subscribe. Thank you, Skip. We're in 1 Peter chapter 1 as we dive into the teaching with Skip Hyten. 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 they go, ah, 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. Political science are two words that don't fit. Pretty ugly.

Microsoft works, and there are several other examples. But rejoice and 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 six. 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. And 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 in 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 six. Characteristic number one, trials are diverse. Look at it with me, verse six. 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 colors. As many colors as are on a Pantone chart of colors, which are by the way 1,114 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 what we do. It's part of what we do. And as I was in the earlier years of my ministry, I decided to keep a little journal of trials. I mean just that 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. 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. First of all, there are physical trials. We know the reality of cancer, strokes, heart attacks, birth defects, automobile accidents.

We know the reality of cancer. 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 diseases, but 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, East 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?

He 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, where 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 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 ought 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. The 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, grieve. 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. It 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. There 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, goriest 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 what the text says. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a while, look at this phrase, if need be. 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. That'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 you 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. Peter writes a lot about suffering, 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.

Of 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 rebel soul. So that's why it's needful. It corrects us. So that's why it's needful. It corrects us. Here's something else it does. It humbles us.

I'll tell you, 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 is speaking to me.

No, no. God spoke to him. 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 puff you up.

I mean, you're having lunch with a guy at Flying Star and you take a bite of your sandwich or 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 by a trial. They correct us, they humble us.

Number three, they strengthen us. When James writes about trials, he said the testing of your faith produces patience. Now that's pretty needful, isn't it? Any of you struggle with patience issues? Yeah, your prayer is sort of like, God, give me patience now. Okay, you have an issue with patience then. Well, you know what gives you patience?

You know what gives you that kind of softening of the character? Storms, trials, hardship. They're also needful because they equip us. They equip us to deal with other sufferers. You are never equipped to comfort a suffering person until you become a suffering person. That's why support groups are so big and they work, is because you get people struggling with the same issues together, sharing their secrets, how they deal with stuff.

That's powerful. First Corinthians one, the God of all comfort comforts us in all of our troubles so that we can be a comfort to those who are in any trouble with the comfort we have received from God. So bare minimum, we go through trials so that we can help people who will go through very similar experiences later on. And you can say, let me tell you how to get through this and to do it right because you've been there.

A.B. Simpson wrote, you will not have any test of faith that will not fit you to be a blessing. I never had a trial, but when I got out of the deep river, I found some poor pilgrim on the bank that I was able to help by that very experience. So trials are diverse. Trials cause grief. Trials can be needful.

That's why we should love them, because we need them. Number four, trials reveal faith. Trials reveal faith.

Let me be more direct. They reveal what kind of faith you have. Verse seven, that the genuineness, mark that word, of your faith, being more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire. You know how a jeweler could always tell if the gold that was brought to him was real or fake? You know how he could tell? Put it in the fire. Heat it up.

You heat it up to the right smelting temperature in a smelting furnace. You can tell if it's fake or not. You can tell if it's furnace.

You can tell if it's fake or if it's real or how pure that gold is. You know how you can tell what your faith is like? Heat it up.

Put it in the fire. See what kind of purity or impurity exists in that person's faith. A faith that cannot be tested is a faith that cannot be trusted. So God tests it, tests it to strengthen us, but also to reveal to us what kind of faith we have. If you recall, Jesus gave a parable, a story about different kinds of people who listen four different ways to Him.

Not everybody listens to sermons or truth the same way. Jesus said, some of that seed that was sown fell upon stony places where it did not have much earth, and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth. But when the sun was up, they were scorched.

And because they had no root, they withered away. That's Skip Hyten with a message from the series Rock Solid. Now we want to share about a special resource that helps you look confidently in the peace of Jesus, even in life's uncertainties. So how is your stress level on a scale of 1 to 10? Stress is a thief, a robber of peace and joy. Here's Skip Hyten with a pointed observation. If you don't live with an anchor of faith, you're going to drift in a sea of anxiety. And most people in the world, they don't have anything to anchor.

They have no real grand scheme or purpose in life. We want to help you live with an anchor of faith so you can learn to lean into God in times of anxiety by sending you three powerful resources. Skip Hyten's new booklet, Overcoming an Anxious Mind. His teaching, Worship in the Uncertainty on CD. Plus, The War is Over Worship CD. This bundle is our thanks when you give $35 or more today to help expand the Bible teaching outreach of Skip Hyten.

Jesus as Savior brings peace with God, but Jesus as Lord brings the peace of God. Call now to request these three encouraging resources when you give. 800-922-1888 or give online securely at connectwithskip.com slash offer. Every day, listeners like you are growing closer to the Lord and you're making it possible. Just listen to this letter one person sent in. I learned of Connect with Skip Hyten in 2007 while scanning the radio dial on a visit to Northwest Georgia. I began to find myself searching for that station on each subsequent trip hungry to hear more. Pastor Skip has the gift of teaching in a way that is inspiring and convicting and encourages one to know God better. You make stories like this possible when you give to connect others with God's truth and you can help reach even more people today. Just visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. That's connectwithskip.com slash donate or call 800-922-1888.

Again, that's 800-922-1888. Thank you. Tune in tomorrow as Skip Hyssig shares how you can have a deeper, more intimate relationship with God that results in real transformation. At our very core, we want to see and touch and experience God. Isaiah the prophet said, truly you are a God who hides himself. Same sentiment is expressed. We want to see God to have a relationship with him. So once again, I ask the question, how do we have a relationship, a personal relationship with a being who is so different from us? Connect with Skip Hyssig is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never changing truth in ever changing times.