Suffering and Sovereignty: John Flavel and the Puritans on Afflictive Providence (All of Life for God)

Brian Cosby:

Well, the topic I've been given is Suffering and Sovereignty, John Flavel and the Puritans on Afflicted Providence. Before we begin, let's open in a quick word of prayer. Heavenly Father, thy word is a lamp unto my feet. And we do thank you for that word, and we do pray your blessing upon us this afternoon as we consider the teaching of your word as exposited, as taught through your servants the Puritans. May we gain a greater desire for our savior who suffered for us, in whose name we pray. Amen.

Amen.

So the history of Christianity is a history of suffering. The history of Christianity is a history of suffering. I want to read something from 1 Peter, this has been referenced already. But 1 Peter Chapter 4, and I was thinking, and I was trying to actually make some notes on my notes, based upon things I've heard, because things that have been said, or were in my notes, and now they're not in my notes because they've been said. So what I want to do, I think, this afternoon, I think most helpful, is to do what the Puritans were wanting to do in their own day, and that was to prepare their congregants to suffer well. In fact, there was a book by John Flavel called Preparation for Suffering, and very few people even know about Flavel, much less any of his writings. But this is one of those books that if you were to read Preparation for Suffering, you would think it was written for today because there's some very direct parallels, not like it was then in the 17th century, but some very direct parallels to what we, I think, were heading today.

The 1 Peter 4:12 says, "Beloved, I think it not strange concerning the fiery trial, which is to try you as though some strange thing happened unto you, but rejoice in as much as your partakers of Christ's sufferings, that when his glory shall be revealed, you may be glad also with exceeding joy. If you be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye, for the spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. On their part, he is evil spoken of, but on your part, he is glorified. But let none of you suffer as a murderer or as a thief, as an evil doer or as a busy body in other men's matters. Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed. Let him glorify God on his behalf. The time has come that judgment must begin at the household of God. And if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? Wherefore, let them that suffer according to the will of God, commit the keeping of their souls to him and wellbeing as unto a faithful creator."

Certainly, timely in all seasons for us. There was, during the period of the Reformation, starting around 1560, you had this movement that sprang up, that we know today as Puritanism. And I may not hardly go into an introduction of Puritan history here, but it is important to look at the Puritan movement through the lens of a history of suffering, because so much of the Puritan cause ebbed and flowed with persecution. And of course they faced, you might even say, greater sufferings in their day compared to maybe we who live here in the United States. But I think at the outset, it's important to see this history that was ingrained upon their own minds as Puritans, primarily through books like John Fox's, he called it Actes and Monuments. We know it today as Fox's Book of Martyrs. And what made that book in particular so powerful in the minds of the Puritans and really, for many beyond just English Puritanism, was not just the stories of those who were persecuted down through the ages, it's written in 1563.

It wasn't just the stories, but the pictures. It was like one of those first books that really utilized the woodcut [inaudible 00:04:51]. And those pictures would be seared into the minds of the Protestant and reformed in England. And when you had those stories so fresh, and you got to remember that whoever... There was not the separation of church and state back then. And so when you had a monarch, and that monarch, let's say, was a Roman Catholic, then everyone in that monarch's kingdom was Roman Catholic. And if you were not Roman Catholic, then you would suffer, typically. And you also have to remember that there were wars going back and forth on the continent in Europe. There was great fear.

And so when Queen Mary, we affectionately know her today as Bloody Mary, but when Queen Mary became Queen in 1553, and you had a lot of ministers and others that fled England to the continent to find refuge and safety. And [inaudible 00:05:50] when she died, they would bring back all of those [inaudible 00:05:56] tenants and values, and statements of faith that they learned on the continent, back to England, and it was something of a revival.

And so when Queen Elizabeth I became Queen, she took a middle-way approach. And this middle-way approach is so important to understand the rise of Puritanism, because the Puritans wanted to purify this middle-way and make it a further reformation in England. So from the first days in the 1560s, you had this fresh on their minds, this seared on their minds, what happened during the reign of Queen Mary. And all those that were burned at the stake, Thomas Kramer famously looking out his jail cell and watching his friends Latimer and Ridley being burned at the stake 1555. And this was such a, always in front of them. For us, this is not where we typically are in our country here, but other places, yes, yes. I was just having lunch today with Paul Washer, and things that he's dealing with around the world. This persecution is right there for many, many people, and so we have to understand this when we come to theology of suffering from the Puritans, just a couple of dangers that we need to be aware of.

One is that today there's this perceived immediate need to simply escape suffering. That we just, as soon as it comes, our only thought is how do I get out? How do I make my suffering less? And we need not think that way, and I think the Puritans can help us in this. A second is a sense of entitlement, that if we think that we deserve health, wealth, and prosperity, we deserve life, liberty and continual happiness, that if we don't get that, then God is not treating us fairly or justly. A third danger is a false belief that joy is only found in the absence of suffering. Paul would write that he was sorrowful, yet always rejoicing. And then a fourth danger is that some seem today, to diminish certain attributes and qualities of God. They'll say, "Well, God, he's not there as he should be," or "He's not sovereign over suffering."

I was serving on a committee examining candidates down in Tennessee, and this one guy was coming through our committee. He had been through seminary, well-trained, and I asked him this one simple question, "Does God ordain suffering?" And he says "No." And you all would've gotten that right. Here is a minister who is about to go to be a gospel minister over a church, because he couldn't imagine a good God. He liked the goodness of God, but he would also be sovereign over suffering, or see any purpose of it. Of course, he didn't pass. He's not... We got to be careful because if God is good, but he's not sovereign, well then he can't do anything about it, suffering. If he's sovereign but he's not good, well he's just a divine bully. If he's sovereign and good but he is not omnipresent, well then he can't be wherever it needs to be, to help and to guide and direct that suffering.

So we need to uphold the full manifold attributes of God when we come to this topic. Why the Puritans? Why the Puritans? This has already been talked about here this weekend, so I'm not going to go into this in great length, but they did write a tremendous amount of literature on the subject of suffering. Why? Well, because many of them were persecuted. There was a moment, so King Charles was beheaded, the first, beheaded in 1649. His son goes into refuge, he's hiding, and Oliver Cromwell becomes of the commonwealth. Some people argue that he basically took on the roles of a king, even though he's called a protectorate. But anyway, so they called back King Charles II, the son, the restoration. When that happened, there was a great ejection, and they ejected a lot of people from the Church of England, nearly 2000 ministers August 24th, 1662. Flavel was one of them.

And then three years later, 1665, you could not be serving. If you were a Puritan minister, you could not be serving within five miles of your parish, your church that you were at. And so then you had all these Puritans, that at one point they would write that "Because we had no employment in the pulpit, we had to make more work for the press." Why is it that we have such a huge volume of Puritan literature? Because they were having to live out in the country. They were having to live out on farms. They could not be in the day-to-day ministry. They would sneak into towns oftentimes, but they could not be in the day-to-day ministry, and so they would have all this time to write. I think Dr. Beeke mentioned at one point in the 17th century, that nearly 20% of all books sold were Puritan sermons. Imagine this, today. I mean, are there any books of sermons being published today?

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Another reason why the Puritans, they had a unique place as those expositors of practical, or what Dr. Beeke likes to call experiential Christianity, applying Christianity, applying the truths of the gospel. And we do need to recover, I think, a biblical theology of suffering. Why John Flavel? Because this has his name in the title. Why John Flavel? And I do think it's Flavel by the way, not Flavel or Flavel, or something else. One of the reasons I know that is because I would call several places where he lived in Dartmouth, England, and that still bear his name, and they would answer the phone, the Flavel Center, the Flavel Church. And I was like, "Yeah, I'll go with that."

Let me give you three reasons why John Flavel. Number one, John Flavel personally experienced severe suffering throughout his lifetime. He personally experienced severe suffering. He's born sometime between 1627 and 1630, we don't know exactly. At one point, his parents were holding an unauthorized worship meeting. They were arrested, they were thrown in prison. They caught a plague, the plague in prison, and even though they were released, they died from the plague shortly thereafter. He was very fond of his parents. He wrote of his parents in his works, and it was difficult for him to bear. He was married four times, not at the same time, four different ladies, different times. Three died, three wives passed before he married his fourth wife who would outlive him. But imagine losing three spouses. And his first one died in childbirth, and they lost their only son. He would write, after that happened, "The Almighty," notice, "The Almighty visited my tabernacle with the rod, in a one year, cutoff from the root and the branch, the tender mother and my only son."

And of course the persecution, I mentioned the great ejection. After the Five Mile Act and he could not serve within five miles of Dartmouth in southern England. He moved out to a little town called Slapton, and there he would write a book called Husbandry Spiritualized. We don't use that word husbandry anymore. I have a farm, so we have goats and chickens in my house and kids, they're kind of grouped into that. But he writes, he sees the world through the lens of scripture. And as he's trying to do everything he can to minister to the people of God, and because he couldn't be in his home church, he would be out. And there would be always running from authorities. At one point, he was up in this upper room, holding a secret meeting in Dartmouth by the cover of night. And they hear about, "Hey, the authorities are coming. They found out where you are and they're coming to arrest you Flavel."

And his good buddy is there with him, John, another John. So Flavel gets out, and as a early biographer, one of his friends [inaudible 00:15:11] is that his friend, also named John, was trying to get out because he was also wanted by the authorities. But it says, quote, "Out of his too great civility, he let a lady pass before him going downstairs, but the long train of her robe, it took a while for her to get down. And by the time she got down, the authorities were there, he was arrested, he died in prison." It's those kinds of stories. And there's times where he would be being chased on a horseback and actually go off into the sea trying to get away. And so this kind of persecution, he was not riding as one from an ivory tower. I think a second reason why Flavel, he was very influential in his own lifetime, within his own lifetime, locally and nationally. A royalist historian, so this would be a historian, he taught at Oxford, who did not like the Puritan cause.

So anti-Puritan historian Anthony Wood, he said that Flavel, quote, "Had more disciples than ever. John Owen, the Independent or Rich Baxter, the Presbyterian." Another contemporary of Flavel and one of his friends, John Galpine said he was, quote, "Deservedly famous among the writers of this age." I remember reading about from Increase Mather, who was actually a president of Harvard at one point, early on, saying that Flavel was deservedly famous among the writers of this age, both in old and in New England, and it shall be so until the Lord returned. Well, that's not the case. But in his own lifetime he was very influential, and I think that's another reason why I think he is an ideal Puritan from whom to learn about suffering.

We also see how his enemies regarded John Flavel. They would create effigies and burn those effigies, in both Old England and in New England. One Church of England clergyman, Edmund Ellis, wrote in a letter in which he claims that there are three enemies, quote, "Three enemies of the church whose writings have made so much noise in the world, Dr. Owen, R. Baxter, and John Flavel." And in fact, we see those three names grouped together quite often in historical records. Those three seem to represent something of the Puritan element. I think a third reason why I think Flavel is an ideal candidate, person to learn about Puritan theology, is that it consisted of a large portion of his own writings, just a few titles, just from his works. You can buy his complete works, a six-volume set by Banner of Truth. Listen to these titles, three titles, A Token for Mourners, or Advice of Christ to a Distressed Mother Bewailing the Death of Her Dear and Only Son. You don't get much more practical than that.

Preparation for suffering. I mentioned this earlier, Preparation for Suffering subtitle, or the Best Work in the Worst Times. The Best Work in the Worst Times. I like this one. Number three, the Balm of the Covenant. The Balm of the Covenant Applied to the Bleeding Wounds of Afflicted Saints. People say theology is not practical. Flavel would disagree with you. The Balm of the Covenant Applied to the Bleeding Wounds of Afflicted Saints. Well, the types of suffering that they faced, you had plagues, you had things like the great fire of London in 1666, poverty, persecution. You had ongoing sickness, dysentery, affliction of conscience, loss of reputation, public calamities, loss of friends, confinement, exile, blindness, deafness, spiritual conflicts, many things that we deal with today.

But it is that element of persecution, if I can prepare you today, to be persecuted, to suffer well for the sake of Christ. Historian John Spurr says, "Persecution ranged from minor harassment through disruption and rough handling by constables, soldiers, or mobs, personal injury, destruction, to mass imprisonment." Gerald Cragg, historian noted that during the restoration period, the last half of the 17th century, persecution of non-conformists was the official policy of England's rulers. What was a non-conformist? So a non-conformist was one who did not conform to the prescribed worship of the Church of England. And they saw that through the use of the Book of Common Prayer. And so if you wanted to worship in a way that you felt was biblical and not go along with the Book of Common Prayer in your worship, you'd be considered a nonconformist.

And again, that persecution against you would ebb and flow depending on who was in power. But it's important to know that one of the reasons they're called Puritan, is because they wanted to purify the worship primarily. They didn't want to just go in and kneel at the bread and the wine, because they saw that as idolatry, because Christ is physically not there. He is in heaven. So they didn't want to do the sign of the cross. They didn't want to call it an altar because it's a table. Christ was sacrificed once for all.

But the enforcement ebbed and flowed. Flavel writes, "Though millions of precious saints have shed their blood for Christ, whose are now crying under the altar. How long Lord? How long, oh Lord? Yet there are many more coming on behind in the same path of persecution and much Christian blood must yet be shed before the mystery of God be finished. Thus you see, to what grievous sufferings, the merciful God has sometimes called his dearest people." So there are external sufferings, of course. You can find lists of these external sufferings in the Bible. Paul does this with his own life. You see this in places like Hebrews 11, in those that have been even sawn asunder, it says. But he says that the worst sufferings are internal, not external. In fact, this is interesting, if you go in order to read the Puritans on suffering, most of their writing to encourage and give comfort to people in regards to suffering, is not dealing with physical pain.

Maybe that's typically how we think of suffering. I was poked in the eye and I'm blind in that eye, or something. But they're dealing with internal pain, internal pain, grieving, sorrow, mourning, despair. And he says, Flavel would say that these are far worse. He refers to these, even the death of a loved one, quote, "The greatest of earthly sorrows." And of course he knew all about that. And even that title I gave you just a minute ago, the Balm of the Covenant Applied to the Bleeding Wounds, in the book, he's not dealing with physical blood. He's dealing with heart wounds, heavy wounds of soul, of conscience, and spiritual sufferings brought about by Satan. We miss this sometimes. Temptations, spiritual oppression, feeling removed from God, the overburden of guilt. Now we probably don't... We don't have enough guilt in some sense today, right?

But they had such a heaviness of their guilt before God, and they couldn't release it. They couldn't read Romans 8:1 and trust the promise, that there is no more condemnation. And he calls this spiritual suffering. Flavel would write, "Thou has more reason to lament thy dead heart, than thy dead friend. To lose the heavenly warmth and spiritual liveliness of thy affections is undoubtedly a far more considerable loss. And to lose the wife of thy bosom, or the sweetest child that ever a tender parent laid in the grave." Who could write that today? Who could write that? He says "Spiritual distresses are those afflictions brought about when sin lay heavy and helped by Satan's malice." Thomas Watson explains that some sufferings like the breakdown of family or suicide, the effects of addiction, those are all things that happened in the 17th century. Direct of result of temptation of Satan. He said "If Satan tempts some to do away with themselves and work some kind of inclination in the heart to embrace a temptation."

But this internal discouragement and sorrow, despair that they're beyond forgiveness, that God could not forgive even if I run to him in faith. That makes God simply a terror, and not a God that I adore. Well, we've already heard this weekend, on where suffering comes from as a curse, or a fruit of the fall is what Flavel would say. It's a fruit of the fall. You don't [inaudible 00:24:29] suffering and affliction and death and disease and dying, thorns and thistles before the fall. By the way, you can't have millions and billions of years stuff living and dying before the fall. But he wrote a book, his most famous book, Flavel, called Divine Conduct, or it's well known today as the Mystery of Providence. The Mystery of Providence. And if you know anything about John Flavel, it might probably be the book that you've heard about.

And Dr. Beeke has written that he calls it the best Puritan work on divine providence. He calls, if you're probably wondering about Stephen Charnock's book, he calls that the second best. Sinclair Ferguson writes that of all of Flavel's works, none speaks with more power than this spiritual classic. The Mystery of Providence, the Mystery of Providence. God's ways and thoughts are higher than our ways and thoughts, and when you bring that to the subject of suffering, there's great mystery to it. Why? He doesn't just allow it, but ordain it. Well, Flavel would write that sovereignty is an attribute of God. How do you see it? How do you experience the attribute of God's sovereignty? He says, "You see it or experience it in two ways." One is what we call eternal decrees. The eternal decrees of God. And the other is in the temporal providences of God, which are simply those decrees brought into time and space.

If you think about the eternal decrees, Isaiah 46, perfect example, "God has declared the end from the beginning." But then the providence of God is taking all of those decrees and saying, "Today is the day, today is the day of your salvation." I have decreed your election, from before the foundation of the world, but today is the day. I remember the story of R.C. Sproul. He was preaching, and a lady who had been visiting his church for a year, came up to him and said, "Dr. Sproul, today is the first time I've heard you preach the gospel." Of course he'd been preaching it for the whole past year when she was there. And he said to her, "Ma'am, it's the first time you had ears to hear the gospel."

Providence says today was the day for her. Eternally elected, decreed, today is the days, the idea that Jesus talks about, not even a sparrow can fall to the ground apart from the will of my father in heaven. And so this idea of providence is one that the Puritans stressed, why? They believe in the decrees of God. They believe in God's sovereignty, but why do they stress providence as a word? Because it was the practical application of God's sovereignty in our lives. Does that make sense? The practical application of God's sovereignty in our lives, is that, is why they would stress and use this idea of providence more. Flavel would write, "We ought to ascribe nothing to chance, but to the appointment of providence of God." And it's interpreted through scripture, through the word. Providence works in concurrence with the word, and no testimony of providence is to be accepted against the word. And so in these reasons, the Puritans would be very much against the ideas of deism, that God would wind up the universe like the clock maker, and let's let it all go.

There's been people who have argued that Flavel was a deist, and could be farther from the truth. He believed in, certainly, in the decrees of God, but providence. And he believed in, what we call today, the Doctrine of Concurrence. Maybe you've heard of this, and you know this well, this idea that God uses what Flavel would call this secondary means, or secondary causes. You know you have the laws of nature, of gravity, of weather systems. I got here last night, and I get checked into my hotel, and then all of a sudden get out and my phone's blowing up. There's a tornado coming through. And I hear that y'all had to go, I guess, down here in the basement. Did that surprise God? Did it surprise God? You think about hurricanes, things like that. So he's created even weather systems, and yet concurrently, the Doctrine of... Concurrently, governs them towards his very end, even specific ends.

One great example of this Job 37. In Job 37, it says, verse 6, "For you, say it to the snow, be thou on the earth. Likewise to the small rain and to the great rain of his strength, he seal up the hand of every man, that all men may know his work." And he goes on, in verse 9, he says, "Out of the south cometh the whirlwind, and a cold out of the north. By the breath of God, frost is given, and the breath of the waters is straightened. Also by watering, he wearieth the thick cloud, he scattereth his bright cloud, and it is turned around by his counsels that the may do whatsoever he commandeth them upon the face of the world in the earth." He causes it to come, whether correction, or for his land, or for mercy. He causes it.

And so sometimes you would have those big, like Katrina, wondering, and they'd have people on the, used to be an old Larry King show, have John MacArthur on there. It's always a breath of fresh air when he was on there. And he would just, who caused this? God. No question, no question. But I think we want to apologize for God when bad things happen. We want to apologize. Now that tornado came through, and we're thinking, we want to say, "Well God," no, he's not in this because bad things happened, bad things happened. I know we have to deal with, in some ways, the problem of evil. I'm not going to get into that, but let me just say this about the problem of evil here because suffering in itself is not evil, morally evil. Okay?

It'd be weird if Paul were to say, "I rejoice in my sufferings," if sufferings were evil. God permits evil and sin. He permits evil and sin. Case in point, Job. He permits it for his own purposes. In fact, Paul would write even in 2 Corinthians 12, about the thorn in the flesh, and he calls it a messenger of Satan. Interesting. But God sends it to keep him humble or so he is not inflated with air, literally, in the Greek there, so he could understand that my grace is sufficient for you.

He permits evil and sin, he restrains it. There's a story of Abimelech in Genesis chapter 20, and this is where Abraham and he's lying. And it says in Genesis 20:6, "And God said to him," Abimelech, "in a dream, yay, I know that thou did this in the integrity of thy heart, for I also withheld thee from sinning against me." He restrains, he overrules. We heard this earlier, didn't we? What you meant for evil, God meant for good. He overruled their sin, their evil, for his greater purposes. And he ordains all for his glory. All things work together for good, for those who love God and are called according to his purpose. But God is sovereign over suffering. If you're going to hear one thing, please hear that.

We'll get into the why in just a second. But just the fact that he is sovereign over suffering, he's not surprised by your suffering. Remember my mom died when I was 14, and I was an only child, and I remember my dad waiting for me out in front of the house. And I got home from a friend's house, and he came out, and he was in tears. And he told me, and I remember I ran to my room that night and thought, "I've heard so much about God and yet I feel that he's not here in this moment." And I wanted to think, "Well, maybe he didn't have anything to do with it, maybe this was Satan or something."

And over the years, I've seen so many countless ways that God has used that in my life and others, to shape and form me. And as we'd heard earlier today, that it's in those trials, those moments of affliction, that we tend to grow most. Even the details, Flavel would write "In all the sad and afflicted providences that befall you. I, God, see God as the author and order of them. God's hand is to be acknowledged in the greatest afflictions that befall us. Lift up thine eye to the sovereign wise and holy pleasure that ordered this affliction." And it's to the detail, for a purpose.

Thomas Watson would say, "Whoever brings an affliction to us, it is God that sends it." Why does God ordained suffering? Let me give you some basic principles on this. Because it is ultimately for God's glory, and we see it really in two ways. For the unbelieving world, suffering comes as raw effects of just judgment. In part, in this life, and in fullness in the life to come. Let me say it again. For the unbelieving world, those who reject Christ, suffering comes as raw effects of just judgment in part, in this life, and in fullness in the life to come. But for his people, his elect, those who are bought by the blood of Christ, suffering comes as good and loving discipline. We just heard this from Hebrews 12, God chastises, he disciplines those whom he loves. And so this is why the Puritans, Flavel and others, would distinguish between sanctified afflictions. You heard this earlier, sanctified afflictions and unsanctified. Sanctified being those afflictions for believers because they come to you as it were through the, I'm just quoting Flavel here, "Through the veins of Christ."

They come into to you through a different channel because you're not under the condemnation of God if you are in Christ. So how could you receive this kind of affliction in your life, only through the channel of Christ as believers. That's how you receive it. And so Flavel would argue from our standpoint as believers, these afflictions are sanctified, sweetened, and even turned into blessings. He would say, "Behold then, as a sanctified affliction is a cup, where into Jesus had the rung and press the juice and virtue of all his mediatorial offices. Surely, that must be a cup of generous royal wine like that in the supper, a cup of blessing to the people of God." Of course we heard this too, about the Gethsemane, a cup of wrath that he would drink to the bitter end.

The unsanctified afflictions, those for unbelievers. Again, raw effects of God's wrath and judgment. In fact, Flavel And the Puritans would argue that suffering, when it comes to those who are not in Christ, actually hardens them even more. In that way, suffering comes as a way to distinguish believer and unbeliever. So here's a summary. While affliction and suffering come upon the unbeliever as signs and effects of his judgment and wrath, they come upon the elect as loving discipline, with a design to produce greater godliness. You can think about the man born blind in John 9. Did this sin or did his parents sin that he was born blind? Neither one. But that the works of God might be displayed in him.

The other thing we got to be careful about is over-reading God's intentions in our sufferings. This morning, if you got up, you stubbed your toe and you thought, "Ah, that's because I didn't pray last night." This happens, this happens. Something bad happens and we think immediately, "Okay, there was something directly. I failed to open the door for the lady last week. That's what it is." It's over-reading God's intentions into your suffering. Suffering in your life isn't always a sign that you've just done something just immediately evil or sinful. And prosperity in your life isn't just a sign that you're doing everything great. We know this again, from the story of Job. Have you considered my servant job?

It wasn't because job was particularly wicked man, right? It's just the opposite. This is why they called suffering the school of affliction, because in it we learn. Well, let me give you five quick reasons, and I'll cut short and we can ask maybe a couple questions. Okay? Five quick reasons here why God ordained suffering for believers. Coming from Flavel from the Puritans, one, to kill sin, to produce godliness. One is to kill sin and produce godliness. This is why they also called them searching afflictions, because they would search out your sin and discover them unto you and to others. It's in the middle of the trial that's like, "Ah, I'm pretty impatient, aren't I?" Stuck behind cars in an interstate somewhere, and you realize I'm in this affliction and I'm angry about it.

We see our affliction through, I'm sorry, we see our sin through affliction. We confess it, we can repent of it. In that way, it's a cleanser. Suffering is a cleanser revealing to us our sin, deterring us from greater sin. It drives community, where iron sharpens iron. If you think about iron sharpening iron, it's not a soft kind of thing. There's something that sparks are coming off. There's metal that's being discarded. Richard Sibbes says, "We need bruising so that reeds may know themselves to be reeds, and not oaks." Even reeds need bruising by reeds and of the reminder of pride in our nature, and to let us see that we live by mercy.

Number two, reason that God ordained suffering for you and me as believers, to relinquish that we might relinquish the temporal for the eternal. I actually heard Dr. Beeke use this word earlier. To wean us, to wean us from a love of this world, that we would redirect our thoughts and affections for that which is to come, that we would have... He would talk about it's better to lose, pluck out an eye than your whole body, soul would be cast. We are sojourners and pilgrims here. Our citizenship, Paul would write, is in heaven. Instead of holding on to the fading things of this world, sometimes God will take those things that are too close to our hearts, good things even. Sometimes we can make an idol of the best things, and God will sometimes remove those best things, that we would redirect our affections after him.

Number three, to produce a sincere faith devoid of hypocrisy. Sometimes suffering will come. And for the Puritans, this is what Flavel would talk about, is that persecution would ebb and flow. And when it would come, that's what he called Jesus' summer friends would flee. Those that were just around him when things were bright and sunny. But when the fires of persecution came, those summer friends of Jesus would leave. And in that way, that's what I was talking about earlier. In that way, suffering comes to distinguish it. You see it all the more, those that in the midst of pain and suffering, by and large, I mean there are those times where we don't do this, but by and large, we want to cry out to God. We want to say Psalm 55:22, "I'm going to cast my burdens upon the Lord, knowing that he will sustain me." The void of hypocrisy distinguish the believer and the unbeliever.

Number four, when suffering comes, one reason is that it gives us the opportunity to bear witness to the world. Unbelievers watch how we suffer. There's been plenty of examples, plenty of stories where unbelievers are watching believers suffer and they suffer well, and it becomes a great witness and testimony to them, of the reality and truthfulness and the veracity of the gospel.

Number five, suffering comes to the believer to cultivate fellowship with God through his word, prayer, and the Lord's supper. So when suffering comes into our lives, that we are driven to his word, that we're driven to our knees, that we're driven to the Lord's table for that assurance. Does he love me? In the midst of this affliction, I just got a cancer diagnosis, let's say, or you just got some kind of disease, you just lost... Had a family in our church, they lost a daughter. Does God love me? And after considering their heart before the Lord and taking those elements, that assurance, sealing to them, those promises, yes. Tokens of love to you. Those promises, as Dr. Beeke was talking about earlier, those promises of God.

You're driven to drink deeply of those promises in his word, in the midst of suffering. He's our refuge and strength, the very present help in trouble. Cast light burden upon the Lord and he shall sustain me. Suffering does not give a justifying excuse to sin. I think sometimes, if we are in the midst of suffering, people say, "You know what? I'm just going to get drunk and just not even think about it." Or "I'm suffering because of that person, and I'm going to go take it immediately out on him." Of course we know what Romans 12 says, "Vengeance is mine, declares the Lord." Suffering does not give us a justifying excuse to sin, and we should not have excessive sorrow, grieve as those without hope, not to become the chronic victim, which is so common today. Flavel says, "The least sin is more formidable to you than the greatest affliction. Doubtless, you would rather choose to bury all your children than provoke and grieve your heavenly Father." I don't know if I could write that.

Sin increases. Hear this, sin increases the sting of suffering. We have this temptation and thought, false belief that if I just go and sin, it'll just make me feel better. But it increases the sting of suffering. But it is right and good to prepare to suffer. Jesus was always preparing his disciples to suffer well. Remember this, in the gospels, and again, if I can encourage you to read his book, Preparation for Suffering. But we respond to the suffering sometimes passively. And this is, I'm just going to trust the Lord. Your grace is sufficient for me. I'm going to trust the Lord. It's the old hymn, it is well with my soul, peace like a river, I am just going to trust passive response.

But there's active responses to suffering. Communing with God by reading and meditating upon his word, individual and corporate prayer, resting in the assurance of his promises in the Lord's supper, reading helpful literature on the subject, repenting of any particular sin that has become evident during her trial, serving others as followers of the suffering servant, being involved in the fellowship of your local church. The Lord has given and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. Let me just mention one final thing regarding Christ and then just a couple of takeaways. With Jesus, and we just heard this, what a wonderful message to consider a suffering servant. Consider Isaiah 53, "And what Christ has done in his suffering on our behalf," that even drinking that cup of suffering.

Flavel would write as it were from the father's perspective. Listen to this, from the father's perspective regarding his son, "I will now manifest the fierceness of my heart to Christ and the fullness of my love to believers. The pain shall be his, that the ease and rest may be theirs. The stripes, his, and the healing balm issuing from them, theirs. The condemnation, his, and the justification, theirs. The reproach and shame, his, and the honor and glory, theirs. The curse, his, and the blessing, theirs. The death, his, and the life, theirs. The vinegar and gall, his, and the sweet of it, theirs. He shall groan, that they shall triumph. He shall mourn, that they may rejoice. His heart shall be heavy for a time, if theirs may be light and glad forever. He shall be forsaken, if they may never be forsaken. And out of the worst miseries to him, shall spring the sweetest mercies to them."

How should we minister to suffering, those suffering? How should we minister to them? One, be quick to listen. Be quick to listen. Sometimes people in the midst of their affliction, they say things that are not theologically the most accurate. There's a time to talk about that. It may not be that moment. It's what Job 6 says, it's words for the wind. Words for the wind. Speak truth and love. Restrain the impulse for just empty platitudes. Don't apologize for God. Point them, and lead them to the means of grace. Follow through with community. We are great at the first two weeks, helping someone after they've gone through an affliction. You take the meals, care for the children, two weeks. For some reason, it's the two week number, and they were like, "You're on your own now." And sometimes it's those chronic afflictions that are most difficult

And apply the balm of the gospel. Oh, give them an eternal perspective. This is not the end. There will come a day when Jesus will return, and he'll make all things new, and there will be no more suffering and no more tears. And the one who is called the lamb, will be called our shepherd, and he will shepherd us. And we'll sing, worthy is the lamb, with the saints triumphant from every tribe and language and people and nation. And we need to give our people that balm of the covenant and apply it to the bleeding wounds of afflicted saints, but point them to the Savior, and to that time when he will come and make all things new. There's a wonderful hymn. I just want to close by just reading a couple of the verses from this hymn. How Firm a Foundation, maybe you've heard it.

From the Father's perspective here, when through deep waters I call you to go, the rivers of sorrow shall not overflow. For I will be with you to trouble, in trouble to bless, and sanctify to you, your deepest distress. When through fiery trials, your pathway shall lie. My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply. The flame shall not hurt thee. I only design your dross to consume and your gold to refine. That soul, that on Jesus has leaned for repose, I will not desert to its foes. That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake, I'll never, no, never, no, never forsake. Amen.

Here, let me close in a word of prayer and let you go to dinner. Okay? God, these are weighty topics. We do thank you for the Puritans. We thank you for their labors, their sacrifices, who have gone before us, that we can learn and grow in greater godliness, greater piety, greater love for you. God, I do pray that you would make us see that every aspect of our life is dependent upon you. That everything that we have from you, comes from your hand. God, we do pray that you would be glorified in us when we face times of affliction and suffering. Father, we thank you for the Lord Jesus, in whose name we pray. Amen.

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