Before we begin, let's start with a word of prayer. Oh Lord, we love you. We love you because you first loved us, and in your Son you have drawn us to you. And you have loved us and given us the gift of your word. And so it's now that we turn our attention to the preaching of your word. We want to sit under its authority. We want to be fed fed and nourished on its truth. We want to have our hearts convicted and built up. So we pray that you would do these things as you promised to do in the preaching of your word through the power of the Spirit for the glory of your Son Jesus. It's in his name that we pray. Amen.
Well, Luke 11 is the text we were supposed to be looking at today, and before anyone freaks out on the PowerPoint thinking, "I don't have anything for Luke 11," we're not going to be in Luke 11 this morning. Where we were scheduled to be was actually a message in Luke 11 that would have been all about hypocrisy and whitewashed tombs. And so I will admit that as the week went on, I was kind of wrestling with, is that really a Mother's Day text? Is that really where we're going to go on Mother's Day? Try and make sure I'm making the connection. I'm not saying our mothers are hypocrites before we start the sermon. So I was already wrestling with that, and I would love to say that it was with that conviction that we are not going to be in Luke 11 this morning, but instead I'm going to be honest with you. The reason we're not going to be in Luke 11 this morning is because at 10:15 last night, I realized my sermon had disappeared. And so through some sort of error of my part, because we know an Apple computer could never lose something, right? My sermon vanished. And so we will be in James today, not looking at hypocrisy and whitewashed tombs, but instead, ironically, looking at trials and how they touch on faith.
Now, that might seem like a strange place to go as well on Mother's Day. But I want to recognize as we begin, we could be in Luke 11 and God's Word would be profitable for us, right? We could be anywhere in the Scriptures and there would be value. There would be wisdom and there would be help in the preaching of God's Word. Every verse and chapter addresses us, addresses God's people and needs the truth of God's Word into our hearts. But I have another motivation for preaching on trials this Mother's Day. As I scurried to the files at 10:30 last night, I felt like we should land here. And it's really quite simple. Motherhood itself, while we tend to look at all the beautiful aspects of it on Mother's Day, motherhood itself can at times be a trial. That might seem like a funny thing to say, but parenting for that matter can sometimes feel as though it's a fight for faith. Furthermore, recognize that for many women, this is a holiday in and of itself that can be difficult. The title of mother for some women is heartbreakingly elusive. Even the role of wife hasn't been something they've been given by God to experience. And so each Mother's Day, some of these women are left battling a mix of emotions: love for their own mothers, maybe joy and excitement for sisters and good friends who are celebrating on this day, but also tinged and colored with sadness that they're not celebrating in the same day. They are longing and fighting for faith on a day of profound joy for many of the people they sit next to and worship. For others, Mother's Day is a hard day, a bittersweet day. Sweet because they might be celebrating the joy of the children they currently have, but bittersweet because they're reminded of miscarriages and lost children.
We actually have white roses here that at the end of the service we will hand out, and we do this each year, but I wanted to just pull it into the introduction to our message today to recognize the reason we have these white roses is to recognize we know this is a day of mixed emotions and we want to celebrate with mothers. We want to acknowledge the beauty of motherhood and the beauty of this day. At the same time, Scripture says rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn. And the sense isn't that we do those things on separate occasions or at separate times. At times we hold those things together. And that's what these white roses are for. And so if you are a mother or someone who wanted to be a mother or for any reason is mourning or experiencing loss today on Mother's Day, we want you to feel free to take one of these white roses as our way of symbolizing as the body, as your body, we mourn with you and we love you and we support you in the midst of this.
There's a long list of things that could make Mother's Day difficult. And into all of these situations and countless others that have nothing to do with Mother's Day, James, in his letter, in the opening of his letter, speaks to us.
This is what James writes in James chapter 1, the opening verses. James, James, a servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ, to the 12 tribes in the dispersion: Greetings. Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. The word of the Lord. May He write its truth upon our hearts.
6 · Exposition of the historical context of James's letter: he is writing to Jewish Christians scattered by persecution, former members of his Jerusalem congregation driven from their homes for their faith in Jesus
Now this letter written by James, he says, is to the 12 tribes of the dispersion, which tips us off that James is writing this letter to Jewish Christians. That's what the 12 tribes language signifies, but also that they've been dispersed. They've been scattered to the wind. He's probably writing to Christians who were once a part of his congregation. You see, the James that we're talking about is the James who's the brother of Jesus. He's the same James who's the leader, in some ways the senior pastor, if you will, of the church in Jerusalem. It was a church of great influence early on, but also a church that felt the full force of persecution and blowback. And as that persecution continued to increase, eventually these believers, these Jewish Christians who had converted and recognized Jesus as the Messiah, they were scattered, they were dispersed. And so James is writing this letter to his flock. But it's a flock that has been spread to the wind because of their faith in Jesus. Their Jewish neighbors have driven these Christians from their homes.
7 · Application of the historical context to the congregation, drawing the parallel between scattered mothers in James's original audience and mothers experiencing loss today
So even in this original audience— so think of Mother's Day— there are mothers who are receiving these letters and they're reading it not in their home, not at the table, not in that place where their body usually met, but feeling a profound sense of loss. They've become refugees and immigrants, suffering in acute ways for their faith in Jesus Christ.
8 · Exposition of James's pastoral purpose: to encourage suffering believers and demonstrate how authentic faith expresses itself through trials
And so James takes up the pen under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and he writes to encourage them, and he writes to encourage us. He wants to bolster their faith. More than that, he wants to show them how authentic faith expresses itself in our lives through all the twists and turns that just come our way.
9 · Exposition of James 1:2 as a command to suffering believers, noting the pastoral strategy of beginning with an imperative about joy in the face of trials
And he starts by giving these suffering beleaguered believers a command. And that's an interesting way, like you're writing to people who are facing difficulty and the first word to them is a command. It's an interesting pastoral strategy. But James is a master pastor. And he starts with this command: "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds." Count it all joy. The first command James gives in a letter this letter is all about demonstrating righteousness, making your faith authentic, showing the world how your faith is real, how your faith is engaged. He starts out with a command related to the topic of suffering.
10 · Exposition clarifying what James does NOT mean by joy — not superficial happiness or denial of pain, but a deeper joy that coexists with real suffering
But the command and the tone almost sounds as if it's written by someone who's never been at a trial, right? "Count it all joy when you suffer." Big smile. There's this strange almost dissonance in what he writes. Your gut in the middle of a root canal is not joy. "Oh, that was a nerve! Hit me again!" Like, that's not what you think. Joy isn't how you respond. We're not serene in the midst of difficulties. And of course, serenity is not what James means by joy. Some translations read, "Consider it pure joy." Right? Consider it pure joy. Count it all joy. That pure joy is a helpful translation. The idea isn't that everything about a trial or a difficulty is joyful. Trials, James says, can be various, but they all have one consistent theme: varying degrees of hurt and hardship. That's what makes them a trial. There is nothing joyful about the actual death of a loved one. There's nothing joyful about the actual pain of chronic headaches. There's nothing joyful about being a mother who's watching a young child with terminal cancer slowly fade in front of your eyes. That in and of itself isn't where the joy is. Those aren't joyful things. And that's not James' point.
11 · Theological claim about the nature of joy in trials: it is pure, complete, and abiding when believers respond rightly because God has a purpose behind every trial
His point is, for believers, the joy that they experience in the midst of such trials is pure. It's unalloyed. It's complete, and it's abiding. James is offering pastoral wisdom to people that he knows are in difficulty. And he's teaching us to keep perspective and to protect our joy. He's reminding us that God brings troubles into every believer's life and that behind those troubles is a purpose. But the purpose is only fully accomplished if we respond rightly, if we respond with a joy that goes deeper than the trial itself. In the midst of those troubles.
12 · Transition to the sermon's main exposition, introducing the three-part structure: trials produce maturity, and that is the source of joy
To do that, he says, we must keep perspective. The reason Christians can rejoice in trials is this: facing trials, James will show us, produces spiritual maturity. And that's where the joy is to be found. Facing trials actually produces maturity. Facing trials is a part of what conforms us transforms us, changes us into the image of Christ. So let's explore how trials do this.
13 · Exposition of the original audience's specific trials — displacement, homelessness, economic loss, social rejection — providing concrete examples of the 'various kinds' of trials James addresses
First, trials test us. James goes right to the subject of trials because it's the main reason he's writing the letter. James is a skilled pastor and he's writing to help suffering believers, and so he goes right to the heart of their current situation. He knows they're hurting so that they walk in the door of the church. He knows the week they've had and he goes right up to them and says, count it all joy, my friend, my brother, as you face this trial. That's how James is talking to them. They've been displaced. They've lost their homes. They've lost their hometowns. They're pushed out of the city they've grown up in. They're facing all the issues that come with this. So there's homesickness. Some of them might really still kind of be homeless. They don't actually live in a place. They're nomadic now. There's economic repercussions. This isn't the day and age where you just pick up and do your job somewhere else. A lot of those things are tied distinctly into the community you live. There's social rejection that's happening. Why are these new people in our town? Oh, they're those strange sect of Judaism. Christians, I think they're called. All of those come with what these people are facing, what James calls trials of various kinds.
14 · Theological claim that trials are a normative part of Christian experience because Christ suffered, and all believers will suffer in various ways
James is careful to cast the net broadly because he knows two things. He probably doesn't know all the details of their suffering, and he knows the Christian life entails all manner of suffering. From severe persecution to illness to loneliness to brokenhearted mourning in a room full of people rejoicing, right? James knows that's what the Christian life involves. James assumes trials. It's not if, it's when you face trials of various kinds. When you face those trials, because you will. You are Christians, you are believers, and Christ suffered, and so you will as well. Everyone in this room has known a trial. Some of you are in the midst of one right now. One of the reasons why, when the computer somehow ate my sermon, two things eventually, once I recovered, recognizing God is sovereign over the eating of my sermon, Right? And I was reminded as I searched through the archives for the place to land, I think the Spirit reminded me of people in our midst who are suffering. And that's why we're here this morning. Everyone in this room has known a trial, and some are in the midst of one right now. And so James reminds us, this is normal for us. Because it was normal for Jesus. And it's normal for us now because it was normal for these Christians 2,000 years ago when the church was just this little beleaguered community.
15 · Exposition of the word 'testing' in James 1:3, tracing its use in the Septuagint to show that trials are a refining process like silver in a furnace
But we find joy in these various trials when we keep perspective that God uses them, the trials themselves, as a means of testing. Now, the actual word is pretty rare in the Scriptures. Listen to the only two times that word is used in the Septuagint, so the Greek translation of the Old Testament. In Psalm 12:6 and in Proverbs 27:21, "The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times." The crucible is for silver and the furnace is for gold, and a man is tested by his praise. Those are the places where the Old Testament captures the image that James is talking about. James would be steeped in the Septuagint. He knows this is the place where that word is used and he's using it carefully, strategically in this letter to these believers and in this letter to us this morning. The test is something by which a person is refined. It's something that tries you, that proves you. It's the proving ground of your faith.
16 · Direct application to those currently in trials, exhorting them to maintain perspective and protect their joy rather than expecting to enjoy the trial itself
So if you're in the midst of a trial right now, don't check out on James. He knows, as one who suffered, that hardship isn't pleasant. He's not saying enjoy the trial. He's saying keep perspective. Buttress your joy in the midst of the trials.
17 · Extended personal story of Aunt Arliss, who faced the trial of her husband's terminal brain cancer and now ministers to her daughter whose husband suffered a traumatic brain injury, illustrating the reality of various trials
I have an aunt, she is a godly woman. Her name is Arliss, and she in the last 5 to 7 years has faced various trials. The first was when her husband, godly, wonderful man, an artist, really gifted artist, was diagnosed with brain cancer. And as they did more tests, they realized pretty quickly that the brain cancer was terminal and there was very little they could do. The operation was extremely risky and probably had little chance of succeeding. And so he was put on hospice care. And if you know anything about brain cancer, one of the hardest things about brain cancer is it's not just that their body is dying, it's that as they're dying, you're losing touch with the person you love right in front of you. And she would tell us just the agonies of her husband. One day he's there mentally, and the next day he's lost. And then he's there, and then he's not. And just the fog and the anger that would come out of this man who had just been a sweet man. And the cancer is just changing even his personality. And one of my cousins, I remember he was pretty young when this was happening, and there were a couple days in a row where things were going well. So he came to his mom and he said, Dad's doing really well this week. Does that mean he's getting better? You just think of the trial, having to look your son in the eyes and say no. It doesn't mean he's getting better. It means we're getting a small gift from the Lord, that Daddy's normal today. And eventually she had to put her husband into the grave and now be a single mother with adult children and children still in the home, seeking to live that out. And I just remember, you know, seeing my cousins get married and that bittersweet, right? Her daughter, my cousin Janice, at the wedding, you know, she's, she's getting to celebrate her daughter getting married, and her daughter's father, her husband, isn't there. And that mix of emotion is present. I thought of Arliss again today because this last week, my cousin Janice, her husband Mike was riding his bike and was hit by a car. And he's had a traumatic brain injury. So this poor woman who lost her husband to terminal brain cancer is now ministering to her daughter as her husband, my aunt's son-in-law, is in ICU in critical care in a medically induced coma as they examine and figure out how severe the brain trauma is for this young vibrant mid-20-year-old man.
18 · Theological interpretation of the illustration: God is using these trials to fortify, prove, and refine Arliss and Janice, preparing them for exactly such moments
And yet in the midst of this, as you read the updates from Arliss and from Janice and your heart breaks for them, James speaks. Arliss is being fortified. Janice is being proven. They are being refined. The Lord is at work in their hearts. And on one hand, you look at it and say, "Why, Lord? Why have a woman have her husband die of terminal brain cancer and then have her son-in-law suffer a traumatic brain injury?" And on the other hand, you think, Lord, have you prepared Arliss for a day just like this, to care for her daughter in the midst of a time just like this? But that trial, and all trials, are the proving grounds of our faith.
19 · Theological claim that God uses trials to refine existing faith, not to determine whether faith exists, burning away impurities to sink believers deeper into Jesus
Believers find the grace to rejoice in trials when we recognize God uses them to refine and purify our faith. The crucible for silver, the refining of the furnace is a process that burns away impurities. We look at the silver ring and think it's so beautiful and we forget about the process that burns that silver, the heat of the furnace that burns off all the dross and all the impurities to leave just the silver or just the gold. God sends trials not to determine if we have faith. He sends them as a means of purifying the faith that already exists. And we keep perspective in trials. The way we make sense of the suffering is when we remember they test us purposely. They test us perfectly. The kind of pure joy James commands requires the perception of faith. If you're in the trial and you're more concerned about what's being stripped away than what God is trying to purify, you won't consider it pure joy. But what God wants you to see is the way that he is sinking you deeper and deeper into Jesus, even as he strips away the other things you might be tempted to put your hope in. God has a purpose, a refining, sanctifying plan in every trial we experience.
20 · Transition to the second point, introducing the exposition of James 1:3 and the concept of steadfastness produced by testing
So first, trials test us, but second, trials produce steadfastness. That's what verse 3 says. "For you know..." It's a reminder and it's an exhortation. It's a reminder. You know this. You've been taught this. Providence, you know this. You've been taught this. And it's also an exhortation. Know this. Call it to mind. Believe it. "For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness."
21 · Exposition of the word 'steadfastness' in James 1:3, explaining it as 'remaining under' a load, using the image of Atlas to show how carrying weight produces strength
James follows a logical progression. When faith is tested, when it's properly purified, it will produce steadfastness. It's another way of saying it will produce perseverance. Now, the etymology, the background behind that word that we get steadfastness from, it connotes this idea of remaining under something. That's what steadfastness is. You remain under. The image is of a person successfully carrying a heavy load for a long time. They're remaining under the load. They're carrying it. Right? In the Greek world with this word, maybe the image is of Atlas, right? Holding the world on his shoulders. He's steadfast. He's remaining under it. The pictures of Atlas are always of bulging muscles and strength because in the remaining under of it, what's happening? He's becoming strong. Because that's what happens when you carry a large load for a long time. Your steadfastness, your perseverance increases. You get stronger.
22 · Cultural reference to Captain America contrasted with the reality of physical training, illustrating that strength comes from consistent, repeated effort under resistance, not instant transformation
Every guy wants to look like Captain America, right? I was just reading on Facebook this week, one of my pastor buddies in Minnesota, he's not a movie buff and he's like a get-to-bed-on-time guy, but he's got a teenage son and so he's got a picture of a cup of coffee at night at 9:30 saying, "Crazy things you do with adolescent children getting ready to go to Captain America." So some midnight showing of Captain America and he's caffeinating himself for it. But we all want to look like Captain America. And in the story of Captain America, there's this puny little guy. I mean, they must have cast the skinniest guy they could possibly find, right? He's just no muscle on him, flesh and bone. And in the story, he gets put in this chamber and they just inject serum And suddenly he comes out and he's this, wow, Adonis figure. And we all think, wouldn't that be great? Where's the chamber? Where's the special serum? And all you do is just, you sit there and then you come out and, wow, look at this. I got muscles I didn't even know I had before. But in real life, it's not that easy. The actor who's playing Captain America wasn't in a chamber. He was paying really high-priced physical trainers to kick his rear end for a long time to get him buff. He's going through a training regimen to, to work those muscles. You've got to consistently put in effort, forcing your body to lift heavy weight after heavy weight. You've got to cut down on the rest. You've got to increase the reps. I was doing 100 pounds 3 times, but now because I want to be stronger and leaner, I'm trying to do 100 pounds 5 times and then 7 times. And now it's 3 sets of 7 and 3 sets of 10. And you're doing it because that's how it happens. That's how you get stronger. It doesn't happen because you lift one time, right? It doesn't happen because you lift once a month. Right? It happens because you do it consistently and your muscles have been put through the crucible time after time after time. And the result is endurance. It's steadfastness. It's strengthening. You're bearing up under.
23 · Theological claim contrasting prosperity theology with biblical theology: God sends trials to strengthen weak faith, not to prove strong faith
This is exactly what happens with testing. It produces steadfastness. Like a muscle that grows when it repeatedly faces resistance, Christians learn to be faithful to God, to have faith in the Lord over the long haul, only when they face difficulty. And like muscles that are never worked out, faith that is never tested atrophies. It shrinks. Gets flabby. This is the anti-prosperity gospel right in the middle, beginning of James. There is a poison and a warped theology that is diametrically opposed to the message of Christ that gets peddled in pulpits and bookstores and even on college campuses today. It's built upon a faulty understanding that our faith is naturally pure and naturally strong. And so it goes, if you have strong faith, you won't have trials. Or at least those trials won't last because your faith is strong. And so your faith, you can like pull out your faith and the trials come and it's— pew, pew, and you shoot them out of the air. They're gone. You don't have to endure them because you have faith. Isn't it great? But the Bible says because your faith needs to be made strong, needs to be made more pure, God sends trials to do their redemptive work. This outlook is impossible without faith in God's sovereign goodness that goes deeper than the affliction that we face. There is a providential undercurrent to these opening verses. The only reason James can buoy our joy in the midst of trial is if God is in control And if God is intending all the circumstances of our life, He's guiding them for our ultimate benefit. One of my favorite Spurgeon quotes— Spurgeon is one of my favorite historical Christian figures, one of my favorite pastors. A lot of people don't realize Spurgeon suffered throughout his ministry. He suffered slander, As his ministry grew and as his influence increased, people slandered him. Just massive public slander against him. He also suffered physically. He had just brutal bouts with pain and difficulty and was also living in the midst of rudimentary medicine and limited ability to treat it. And he also suffered emotionally. He had bouts of depression, massive spiritual depression. There was darkness that would just loom over him. He wrote this in light of all that suffering: It would be a very sharp and trying experience to me to think that I have an affliction which God never sent me, that the bitter cup was never filled by his hand, that my trials were never measured out by him, not sent to me by his arrangement of their weight and quantity. In other words, this man who's suffering much is encouraged. He has his joy fortified by understanding, I know I can bear up because I know that God is in this, that God is measuring this out. He's not stacking on too much on the squat rack and then watching me crumble below it. He's putting on just enough to push me and to stretch me, but to strengthen me.
24 · Theological claim that God's sovereignty over trials is grounds for thanksgiving, because all suffering is purposeful, personal, and designed for our good
So in the midst of trials, we thank God in a counterintuitive way that He is sovereign, that nothing besets us that isn't controlled and measured by His redemptive purposes. God tests us in personal, individual ways. My trials are not the trials that my Aunt Arliss, my cousin Janice are going through. Your trials are not my trials. But all our trials are designed by God. That is encouraging news. No Christian suffers needlessly. Or randomly. God sends trials to make us steadfast.
25 · Exposition connecting James's teaching on trials to his experience watching his mother Mary treasure up difficult things, having been shaped by her trials from the annunciation to the cross
As I was looking at this last night and praying and thinking about Mother's Day, I was struck in a fresh way. We think of James, right? And if you know who he is, he's, as an author, Jesus's brother. And so oftentimes we think of that in the context of, that's who James is, he's Jesus's little brother. And wow, how hard to have that as your older brother. I talk about the perfect older brother, like you can never live up to the reputation. There's even these tensions in the gospel, right, of Jesus's family rejecting him. I kind of wonder how much of that is just sibling rivalry. Can't stand this guy, he never does anything wrong. The crowds might be swarming to him, but I'm not gonna. But that also means that James has the same mother. And I just, I wonder as he's writing this, as the pastor James is writing to his flock, about considering it all joy, how much of that is shaped by the experience of watching his mother, Mary? There's this little phrase in Luke's Gospel, you probably, I'm sure you know it and you remember it. We looked at it months ago in our series on Luke. But it says in the midst of all the insane things that are happening at the birth of Jesus in Luke 2:19 that Mary treasured up all these things pondering them in her heart. And when we read that at Christmastime, we think, oh, Mary looked at the shepherds and the angels and she was so happy, and then the wise men came and they gave her gold and frankincense. Yeah, I'm treasuring all this up and pondering in my heart. God is so good. You forget this is probably a 13, 14-year-old girl who's traveled 9 months pregnant by donkey to arrive at a place with nowhere to stay. She births the Savior in a barn surrounded by smelly cows. She lays him in their feeding trough. She's going to flee with Joseph, her husband, to Egypt because the king of Israel, Herod, is trying to kill her baby. I think when Luke writes that passage, that little sentence, "Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart," I think he really means all these things. It's 13-year-old Mary going through the trial of having to tell her beloved Joseph, "I'm pregnant, and I know this sounds weird, but it was the Holy Spirit." What does Joseph's family think of Mary, like, through the rest of her life? And how have those experiences shaped how Mary mothers and raises her children? How is the experience of watching her son hang on that cross shaped Mary? And how has it shaped James?
26 · Theological claim that Jesus's care for his mother from the cross demonstrates his care for all who suffer, particularly mothers experiencing trials on Mother's Day
The early church has a reverence for Mary. It goes off the rails as church history develops and moves into worship, and that's not a place for it to go. But there is something special about Mary in the way that she is shaped and refined by her trials. And there is something special about the fact that Jesus, hanging on the cross, looks down at his mother and recognizes the anguish that is unique for her in that moment. And on Mother's Day, in the midst of all the excitement and joy, for those who are reminded of the bittersweetness of the holiday, The same Jesus who comforts his mother from the cross comforts us.
27 · Transition to the third point, clarifying the meaning of 'perfect' in James 1:4 as completeness and spiritual maturity rather than moral sinlessness
He does that because he intends for trials to perfect us. That's what these trials are meant to do. Perfect here doesn't mean sinless or morally pure. It's an idea of completeness. Trials, when faced with steadfast faith, they produce spiritual maturity.
28 · Theological claim using the analogy of Michelangelo sculpting David: God uses trials as precisely placed chisel blows to produce Christ-likeness
At the end of the day, James promises us that when we respond correctly to trials, the end result is that there is increasing Christ-likeness that lacks for nothing in our lives. So trials batter us, they hammer us, and they chip away at us. What happens? The trials hammer and they batter and they chip and the wind whips, but what's left is something that looks more like Jesus. I think the image is this: Trials are like tools in the hand of a master artisan like Michelangelo. He looks at the granite and he takes the hammer and he takes the chisel and he begins with that block and through 1,000 perfectly placed hammer blows he ends up with the sculpture of David. This beautiful, perfect image, right? That is how God uses trials. He chisels and He chips with perfect precision for just the right amount of time, with just the right amount of pressure, in just the right location. There's no excessive force, there's no misplaced blow, there's no unintentional swing. The artist sees the final product when no one else can see it. And as long as the hammer is in the master's hand, we can trust that the final result, painful though the process may be, that the final result will be a masterpiece. A master piece. A piece of art produced for the glory of its Master and Maker. The Puritan Samuel Rutherford, in a letter to a long-suffering friend, wrote this— such a poignant line: I dare say— and I think he's really saying, I'm going to be bold here— I dare say to you, friend, that God's hammering of you is only to make you a fair carved stone in the high upper temple of the New Jerusalem. I dare say to you, friends, in the midst of various trials, or when those various trials come, that God is chiseling, that God is hammering, so that he could make you a trophy of His sovereign grace.
29 · Personal story of Jim Mau, a neighbor who suffered from Lou Gehrig's disease for 30 years, illustrating the physical reality of a long, brutal trial
I had a neighbor growing up, his name was Jim Mau, and as a boy he seemed like the frailest, weakest person you've ever laid your eyes on. I only really knew him as a man who was more or less crippled and in a wheelchair almost all the time. The reason for that was because he had Lou Gehrig's disease. For most people, ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease comes and kills them within a few years. That was not the Lord's plan for Jim. Jim faced a slow trial of gradual death over 30 long years. So initially he walked slowly, carefully, and then he walked with a cane, and then finally when I knew him, he was resigned to a wheelchair. Day after day, week after week, his body betrayed him more and more. His muscles atrophied, they would spasm and twitch, and year by year he could literally feel himself dying. And the torture of Lou Gehrig's disease is that while his body was failing him, his mind was perfectly sharp. And so his body's failing and he knows exactly what's happening to him. Eventually, even moving his jaw to chew chew and swallowing are just a trial. In the end, his muscles are so weak that he couldn't even breathe, and that's how most people die from Lou Gehrig's disease. They eventually suffocate to death because they can't even take in breath. Their diaphragm is so atrophied.
30 · Theological interpretation of the Jim Mau illustration: what appeared to be physical decline was spiritual flourishing, producing Christ-likeness through 30 years of refining trial
What I saw was an old, frail man eaten away by a ruthless disease. Physically, Jim had wasted away. But through the trial of a 30-year death sentence, spiritually, Jim flourished. Every lost physical function brought Jesus into greater focus. With each subsequent indignity, the walker, and then the wheelchair, The bedpan? God was working. He was chipping. He was brushing. He was honing. If I could have seen Jim through the eyes of faith, I would have seen a different image. I would have seen a towering giant of a man, muscles of faith bulging because of the constant pressure to bear the load. Eyes sharper than an eagle's, trained through the fire to ignore everything peripheral and to focus with laser-sharp attention on Jesus, his treasure, and his hope. And with the eyes of faith, I'd have seen not a crippled, dying man, but a man who perhaps more than anyone else in my church growing up resemble Jesus. This is what brings greater joy in great trials: the knowledge that they make us like Jesus—perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
31 · Transition to closing prayer
Would you bow your heads?
32 · Closing prayer asking God to minister to the suffering, refine the congregation through trials, and produce Christ-likeness and love for Jesus
Father, I pray now that through these words you would minister to your people. Lord, I pray that they would be a balm for those who are suffering and those who feel as though the weight is too much. Lord, that you would graciously care for them, that you would graciously strengthen them. But ultimately, Lord, that for all of us You would do exactly as your word promises to do, that you would refine us in the midst of trials, that you would purify our faith, that you would increase our steadfastness, and that that would have its full effect, that we would be made perfect, that we would more closely resemble Jesus, and that we would have a greater love for Jesus. Pray that you would do all of these things in his name, for his glory, and for the joy of his people. Amen.