When Suffering Leaves Its Mark, Part 2

Today on Insight for Living, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way, and God the Father has laid on God the Son the iniquity of us all. He's referring to our sinfulness. So the Lord, in order to deal with our sinful condition, would send his Son to pay the price for our sins. Our sinfulness is part of the human condition. No one escapes it. In fact, the effects of Adam's original sin passed on to everyone. So here's the question. How do we know when our suffering is the result of Adam's defiance, or when it's the outcome of terrible choices that we've made?

Today on Insight for Living, and again tomorrow, Chuck Swindoll will address this relevant question. Along the way, he'll help us understand what the Bible teaches about suffering, sickness, and sin. Chuck titled his message, When Suffering Leaves Its Mark, and we begin with prayer. Dear Father, thank you for the reminder that you are at work around this world, that you are in the midst of languages we cannot speak, in cultures with which we are not familiar, in lands we may never visit, among people we will never meet. But you were there, and as your word penetrates and as prayers reach out to these in need, you are touching lives. You are reaching them with the good news of the Lord Jesus Christ. Thank you in advance, Father, for what you will be doing in the days and months and years ahead. As you fulfill the words of your son Jesus, to take the gospel to the ends of the earth, to make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that you have set forth in your word. Use our gifts for the purpose of making Christ known in these vast regions beyond us, as well as here in our own community and in our own vicinity around us. We commit to you these gifts we give today, gratefully in the name of Christ, our Savior and Lord, and everyone said, amen.

And now the message from Chuck titled, When Suffering Leaves Its Mark. What I'm going to share with you is worth remembering. I say that not because I'm giving it to you, but because it is all based on the word of God. And who knows but what you will need this information someday yet future.

We'll only get a little bit through this message, and I'll cover the other part next time. But at least I want to get these five foundational facts that all of us need to know down clearly in writing, most importantly, understood in our minds. Let me give you the first of the five foundational facts that I want you to remember. Number one, there are two classifications of sin. Original sin and personal sins, plural. Original sin and personal sins.

Original sin represents the condition in which we are born. We are sinners at birth. Our parents were sinful people. Though they may have been good people and moral people, people we respected, they were nevertheless sinful. They had a sinful nature that could be traced all the way back to Adam and Eve in the garden as a result of their eating the forbidden fruit.

When they fell into sin, they became our representatives for all humanity. As a result, all who are born into this world are born with original sin. And that is what prompts acts of sin or personal sins.

Think of it this way. Original sin is the root. Personal sins represent the fruit that comes from a sinful nature. We sin, we disobey our God because we have a nature that is addicted to sinfulness. It will never be different until we die and are in a glorified state in heaven, free of that sinful nature. But as long as we're on this earth, breathing earthly air, we carry within us a nature that's sinful.

Now the second statement. Original sin introduced suffering, sickness, and death to the human race. Original sin introduced suffering, sickness, and sin to the human race. I mentioned earlier Adam and Eve.

Remember the story. Genesis 2, God warned them against the forbidden fruit. Of all the other trees you may freely eat, but of the tree and knowledge of good and evil you must not eat of it. For in the day you eat of it, you will surely die. Telling us, had they never eaten of the forbidden fruit, they would never have died.

There would never have been death in the human race. But upon eating of the forbidden fruit, they immediately died spiritually and they began to die physically. Look at Romans 5 verse 12, and I'm illustrating this second point. Original sin introduced suffering, sickness, and sin to the human race.

Romans 5 verse 12. When Adam sinned, sin entered into the world. Notice the introduction of sin.

Think of it as a pollution. Adam sin polluted the human race. Adam and Eve sin contaminated humanity with a sinful condition called original sin. Adam sin brought death. So death spread to everyone for everyone sin. We have inherited a nature. We are sinners by birth, by nature, and we ultimately become sinners by choice as we carry out acts of personal sinfulness. So original sin introduced suffering, sickness, and death to the human race. Third statement.

Very carefully understand this. Sometimes there is a direct relationship between personal sins and sickness. Sometimes there is a direct personal relationship between personal sins and sickness. A person becomes sick because of sin in their lives on occasion that's true.

And I'll show you an occasion. Back to the Psalms. Psalm number 32. You were just in Psalm 51. Turn to Psalm 32.

Same writer, same subject. Oh, what joy for those whose disobedience is forgiven, whose sin is put out of sight. What joy for those whose record the Lord has cleared of guilt, whose lives are lived in honesty. When I refused to confess my sins, my body wasted away.

Look closely. Acts of sinfulness caused the body to suffer. I groaned all day long. This is a description of guilt that David lived with for months and months following his adultery. Day and night, he writes, your hand of discipline was heavy on me.

My strength evaporated like water in the summer heat. Finally, finally I confessed all my sins to you and stopped trying to hide my guilt. I said to myself, I will confess my rebellion to the Lord and you forgave me and my guilt is gone.

In this case, there was a direct relationship between sinfulness or sins, personal sins, and sickness. Look at Psalm number 38. Again, a Psalm of David.

Lord, don't rebuke me in your anger or discipline me in your rage. Verse 4, my guilt overwhelms me. It is a burden too heavy to bear. My wounds fester and stink because of my foolish sins.

I am bent over and wracked with pain all day long. I walk around filled with grief. I understand pain and sickness are not always brought on because of acts of sinfulness, but there are times that it is, that it is true. So there are times, that's why I began with sometimes, there is a direct relationship between personal sins and sickness. Psalm number 4.

Sometimes there is no relationship between the two. Sometimes there is no relationship between personal sins and an individual's being sick or disabled. Turn ahead to John chapter 9. Here is a story in the ministry and life of Jesus regarding a man with congenital blindness. He was born without sight. He's a man born blind.

What a disability. Jesus comes upon him as he's walking along. He sees the man who has been blind from birth.

Please observe the dialogue that follows. Rabbi, his disciples asked him, why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents' sins?

These young men who are his disciples had been taught in their synagogue schools growing up by faithful rabbis that sickness often comes from sinfulness. So they want to know as they see this man born blind, was it his sins or was it his parents' sins? Look at the answer from Jesus. It was not because of his sins or his parents' sins.

It was neither. Jesus answered, this happened so the power of God could be seen in him. I'm deliberately pausing there because that is a thought that rarely flashes through our minds. Often so caught up in the disability or the illness that is not relieved by healing, that we forget there is a purpose in the sickness or the disability. In this case, this man will become a living example of the power of God.

If you wish to trace this further, put in the margin of your Bible Exodus 4, verse 11, where the Lord makes it clear that it is he who sovereignly oversees disabilities. You may wrestle with the Lord all you wish with that. The statement is in the scriptures and your battle is with him, not with me. I'm simply referring you to what God has written.

Let me add here, and I want to be again careful. This is a delicate subject. This is controversial.

May I add, there's mystery wrapped up in this. I would certainly be unqualified to give you all the reasons individuals are disabled, or to name why some are healed and others are not, why God comes upon the case of the man born blind, and if you took the time to read the story, Jesus heals him of his blindness, but he left many others blind. Jesus healed the sick in a number of places, but he left many more sick. It is easy for us to make much out of one example and to smear it over all, and say, you see there, that's what all of us can claim. Stop. Stop. That's sloppy thinking. Which brings me to this fifth and very important foundational fact.

Get it down clearly. It is not God's will that everyone be healed. You won't hear that in a church very often. You will rarely, if ever, hear it from a televangelist. I have no bone to pick with televangelists.

I won't waste your time or mine going after one or the other. I simply will say, put your thinking cap on, get your Bible open, and screen everything you hear from what the Scriptures teach. Because the fact is, God does not heal most. It is not God's will that everyone should be healed. Now the reason those who teach that it is, they teach that, is usually found in Isaiah 53, verse 5, by his scourging, we are healed. And they take that portion of the verse and they smear it over all of life, and they then offer you healing if you will simply come to me, and I will make it happen for you. Please, always integrate every verse or part of a verse with its context.

That's only intelligent. Isaiah 53 is an entire section written 800 years before the crucifixion. And the prophet writes there, All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and God the Father has laid on God the Son the iniquity of us all. He's referring to our sinfulness. So the Lord, in order to deal with our sinful condition, would send his Son to pay the price for our sins. He was wounded for our transgressions.

Hear this. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement for our peace was upon him, and by his scourging we are healed. It is all in a context of the spiritual life, not physical ailments, otherwise all who believe in Jesus would be physically healed. But in fact, all who believe in Jesus are spiritually healed. All who trust in the Lord Jesus and claim him as Savior of their lives are cleansed. The Lord reaches in and washes away our sins, and in the words of Isaiah, we are healed because he paid the complete penalty for our sins on the cross. In that sense, there is healing for all who are sinful.

That's all of us. That's why when we offer the plan of salvation, we offer it to everyone. Everyone who will believe in the Lord Jesus Christ can be saved.

Everyone. Now, I go back and I say again, it is not God's will that everyone should be physically healed. If it were, we would all be healed.

But it is not. So our prayer must include, as we ask for the Father's power going through a time of sickness, Lord, if it is your will, if it would bring you greater glory, if it is your plan, and I don't know that plan, but if it is your plan, bring healing to my loved one. And then we wait. Our loved one may die. That's what pleased the Lord, not the healing. Otherwise, he would have healed. In my lifetime, in my ministry, I can count on one hand the number of miraculous healings I've known about, physical healings, and I would have a finger or two left over.

It's very rare, very rare. We're not told this by those who are on the stage promoting healing. And so people are disillusioned. . We know that today's message from Chuck Swindoll strikes a raw nerve for anyone who's asking God for healing. And here at Insight for Living, we're praying that this study in James will guide you, and no matter what God's answer is, that you would find comfort in Him alone. Chuck titled today's message, When Suffering Leaves Its Mark.

To learn more about this ministry, we invite you to visit us online at insightworld.org. Well, there's much more Chuck's going to say on this topic. Plus, he's written a brand-new book that goes into far more detail than we had time to share today. The book is called Clinging to Hope, and the subtitle gives you an idea of what you can expect to read, what Scripture says about weathering times of trouble, chaos, and calamity. Obviously, we're living in chaotic times. We've got to watch the news without feeling our emotions rise. Well, this book brings us back to the solid foundation of God's timeless word.

See, the chaos in our world may seem like a new phenomenon, but there's really nothing new under the sun. And Chuck helps us view our disappointments, our setbacks, and the scandals that shock us through the comforting lens of Scripture. Again, Chuck's new book is called Clinging to Hope. You can purchase a copy right now by going to insight.org slash hope, or call us. If you're listening in the United States, call 800-772-8888. These daily programs and our many other Bible study resources are made possible through voluntary donations from people like you. We're especially grateful for those who give on a monthly basis as a monthly companion. Through their consistent giving, our monthly companions are helping countless listeners around the world who may not be in a position to give regularly. To become a monthly companion today, call us.

If you're listening in the United States, call 800-772-8888, or go online to insight.org slash monthly companion. Take it from Chuck's window, there's nothing quite like the beauty of the great frontier. Wide open skies, pristine glaciers with various shades of blue and turquoise mingled within them, towering pine trees, and all manner of wildlife. I'll tell you, Alaska is truly a masterpiece of God's creation. I've been to a lot of places and seen a lot of things, but honestly, nothing compares to the beauty in Alaska.

God is awesome. Come with us on the Inside for Living Ministries Cruise to Alaska, July 1st through July 8th, 2023. When I'm in Alaska, I feel like I'm in an amazing painting created by God. Let yourself get lost in the majestic beauty. Spend quality time with those you love.

Allow God to refresh your soul as you reflect on his word and his goodness in your life. To learn more, go to insight.org slash events or call this number 1-888-447-0444. The Tour de Alaska is paid for and made possible by only those who choose to attend. I'm Bill Meyer, inviting you to join us when Chuck Swindoll continues his new teaching series called Clinging to Hope, Thursday on Insight for Living. Commercial use is strictly prohibited.