Biblical Counseling - Trials & Suffering Part II

One of the things that we're going to be doing in this biblical counseling class is looking at topics, giving them some level of coverage, but also pointing you to other references and resources. And one of those is right here at the top of the front page.

And that is that there was a trials and suffering elective, my recollection was here, it was about six months long, And you've got the information on the website there for how to get to that. 25 audio messages. And those are all available online if you'd like to get them as a collection of some sort. I think see Bill about that. And then if you want the handouts, they'll go along with that. You can see Sue or Nancy or Sue Ellen and any of those ladies can help you extract one or all of those handouts from the file.

So that was done about four years ago but there's a big resource there and we're going to be touching on trials and suffering today and then again next week and then moving on to another topic. So anyway, just want to make sure you're aware of that resource.

For today, we're going to be looking at this book of James that we made reference to last week, verses 2 through 16. And the way I've kind of laid it out here is to go through a few verses at a time through this passage from the book of James, chapter 1, verses 2 through 16. Take a look at it a few verses at a time and then do something on the order of what we've come to call expanded and explained. So if that's puzzling to you, hopefully that'll become a little more clear. So let's take a look here at James 1, 2 through 4. Now, just as a little intro, who's this James guy? Pardon? Half-brother of Jesus. Half-brother of Jesus, right.

What else do we know about him? Yes, an elder and leader, an outspoken leader in the Church of Jerusalem. From any evidence we have, he just hung around even though there was all kinds of persecution and struggle, hung around with the Church in Jerusalem. Anything else that we know about him?

He wrote an epistle. Ah, he wrote an epistle. That's the one we're looking at. Yes. Okay. James is writing in this epistle to Jewish Christians that are scattered out because of the number of the Christians, especially with the persecution under Stephen, were scattered out around the world. Now think about it.

What did the Jews who are scattered around do with respect to Jerusalem and the temple? They just kind of say, hey, that's nice, that's over there. What did they typically do? Pardon? Pilgrimages. Pilgrimages, right. There was these basically seven Moses instituted festivals and then a couple more added on top of them. Purim and what we call Hanukkah. So those are added on. They would make pilgrimages to Jerusalem. And so some of them would come there, become Christian believers, and then go back. And at least two-thirds of the Jews during New Testament times lived outside of Israel. So a great number of them are coming. And he's writing to these people that are scattered out there.

And so as he does, he comes here just right after verse one where he says, Hi, my name is James, actually Jacobus. But we call it James. And then he just comes right out of the gate and says, Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. and let endurance have its perfect results so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in everything. No, nothing. So the expanded and explained here has it this way. So the believer must esteem it all, or ultimate joy, which is not the same as happiness that relies on circumstances, when those various trials of faith assaying come along.

This word they use for trials is the word that was used for taking something that was supposed to be metal, oftentimes a valuable metal, and then putting it through a fire test to determine, okay, what's genuine here? Is this for real? And how much is for real? And so that word that was used there for this fire test, this assaying test, to determine is this really what it's supposed to be made of, that's the word that James chooses here. When you encounter various fire tests, that word for various is the word where we get our word polka as in polka dots. Various. Little ones, big ones, scattered around, varying size. So, kind of to be a little bit folksy about it, polka dot trials.

Now, why would you possibly consider that all joy? How could you do that? I mean, isn't that weird? It's kind of like sharpening a sword. Sharpening a sword. Okay. All right. In order to sharpen it, it's got to go through this process of some grinding. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Taking away the part that's not fully sharp. Right. Okay.

And so what does he do? James could say that to these people because he and they knew that the faith assaying would be spiritually productive. It's not, oh no, I got another trial. How do I get out of this? I want to get past it and get it over and get done. I'm done with trials. I've had it up to here with trials.

That would be the typical human reaction. Why? Why is it the typical human reaction to look for the exits? This doesn't sound like a lot of fun. You go to amusement park. Typically, you know, get in line. This is really boring over here. You know, over here, this is really painful. They usually don't do too much of that. OK, this is this is not the kind of stuff you sign up for.

Right. You know, we got after church, we got a bunch of tables lined up in the red carpet room and you can sign up for whatever kind of trial you want. Right. You know, pick your trial. Right. Yeah. Jeremy. Yeah. Not understanding the purpose makes it like, well, this is senseless. How do I just stop this? Yeah. How do I make it quit?

When I was a kid, I had lots of fun as a kid, but I also did some things that were painful. Somewhere around four or five years old, my brother was riding this bike. And I thought, hey, it'd be fun to, you know, I'll ride on the back fender. So we get out there and, you know, of course, it's summertime, no shoes on or anything.

Well, I get my foot caught in the spokes. And my brother's noticing, hey, this bike is slowing down. I better pedal harder, you know. And this is really beginning to hurt, but I can hardly begin to say how much it hurts. Well, anyway, when it was all said and done, They of course took me to the doctor because my foot was a mess.

The problem was that I was this active little kid running around. We lived on a residential street, but everything backed up into orchards. Even our backyard was orchards. The poor guy that ran the orchard, he had a bunch of irrigation stuff and everything, and we'd go damn things up and reroute things. I'm sure he was exasperated.

But anyway the reason for getting so sidetracked is, that's to explain why I would get this bandage and this injury all messed up with stuff. Then every week I'd go back into the doctor's office, and they'd have a couple of nurses hold me down while they went and scraped everything out. Oh boy it was something. Well, as a little kid, it just seems like, man, what are you doing all this hurting for? I didn't know the purpose in it. It just seemed like those nurses and doctors were really, really mean. And so not understanding the purpose, it just seems bad. But to look at it from this viewpoint, there is every bit of purpose. This is not just some random pain in the rear, but it is instead something that God has in mind to use in our lives, actually for an eternal purpose, isn't it? For an eternal purpose.

So, the spiritual product, the spiritual productivity would be endurance. That's a character of patient endurance here. spiritual durability and resilience. There are two words for patience, primarily in the New Testament, and one has to do with patience with people. This is the one that's in Galatians 5, 22 and 23, love, joy, peace, patience. This one is patience with circumstances.

But that patient endurance is not the intended final outcome. The believer must allow that patient endurance under trial to have this result, maturity and completeness. That looks like spiritual maturity and completeness as defined by the character of Christ. Christ is the definition of maturity and completeness.

Now, it says there, this word let in verse 4, That sounds too passive. It's actually an imperative. You must allow. You must allow. How does a believer get in the way of allowing this trial to have the full result of maturity and completeness? How does a believer get in the way, how does a believer not allow that to take place? Pardon?

Yeah, do it myself. Yeah. Yeah, I I'll do it myself. I'll pull it out, you know, bite the bullet, you know, chomp on the rag, whatever it is. But I'm going to get through this and I'm going to do it myself. All right. And and that's that's one possibility. I can do it myself. What else? What else might happen? Opt out. How do we opt out of a trial? I don't like this pain, so I'm going to do what? How do people opt out?

One of the things we'll do is as soon as somebody gets in any kind of trial or difficulty, we go and get on the prayer chain and ask the Lord to stop it. I have to say that that isn't really what we do, but it's easy to develop that mindset. Yeah, whatever it is, let's stop it or blame Satan for it, right? How else do we opt out?

How do people bail out of the trial? Yeah, what do I do to assuage the pain through the middle of this thing and just kind of dull the nerves? And people do various things, don't they? Lots of different things will have some effect on numbing the pain. And it's just some way of escape, some way of exiting through the midst of it. All right? How else? Eat chocolate. Yes. I recommend dark chocolate especially. 3.5 ounces a day as a minimum. Okay.

It is possible for us to look also for some kind of an exit that is maybe a compromise of morals and ethics to try to get out of something. You know, essentially human tendency is to where's the nearest exit out of this thing. And it comes in various forms. So opting out is another possibility here. The classic definition is a long-term solution to a short-term problem.

But yeah, that can be another one. And what that ends up doing is causing everybody else to trial. Yeah. Yeah. How do I punish somebody? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's, you know, one way to look at a lot of these things is people can be of the mindset, well, God can't handle this. So I'm going to take my exit. God can't handle this, so I'm going to take my exit.

Let's look at James 1, 5-8 there. But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But he must ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, and being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways."

It's an interesting thing. In our language, we use if, and we don't necessarily always make it clear what we mean. A lot of times it can imply a doubt about something. In the Greek language that Paul wrote in, and James and the other authors of the New Testament, the use of if had four possible major constructs. This is the first one of those. Excuse me, the first one.

The if was not, you might lack wisdom, and so just in case. The if means, if and it's assumed to be true. If and it's assumed to be true. So, if any of you lacks wisdom, and you do, this is his statement there. The Greek has the idea of follow the logic, If any of you lacks wisdom, and we know that you do, then he must ask God for that wisdom. Here's the other point.

Why would he bring this up, except that remember we said earlier, how do we keep from the trial from having its full effect of maturity and completeness? And one of the things as we go through the trial, a lot of times we'll be in a spot where we're lacking in wisdom. Where do we go for it? Where do we go for the wisdom? The world has a bunch of wisdom to pass along. Worldly wisdom. And the worldly wisdom for how to deal with the trial includes a lot of these easy exits.

And he's saying, go to the Lord. If you lack wisdom, and you do, there's one place to go. Go to the Lord. Go to the Lord. And so he's making it very clear. He's not just saying, oh, incidentally, you might be lacking in wisdom. He's saying, no, you do. You do lack wisdom. But he's saying there's one place to go.

Go to the Lord for the wisdom. Has anybody had any experiences in life where they've gone to the world for wisdom? And what you find out after some time goes by is, boy, that was worldly wisdom. This was really great. I could have just shot myself in the foot and been a whole lot faster.

So what he also spells out there, though, is he cautions against double-mindedness. And what's the problem with double-mindedness? I mean, isn't that natural? What's the difficulty with double-mindedness? It has the lack of faith. And what's the problem with that? What is the difficulty with that? It's not a probability function. It is what it is.

Yeah, see, here is what this doubting is about, is it says, God's wisdom, I'm not sure I'm going to go there. I'll see if I want God's wisdom. I'll see if I like it. I'll see what God has to say, and then I'll kind of check it out and give it my own judgment call. Yeah? That's right. Yeah. If it comes down to it, I guess I would have to ask the Lord for wisdom, right? Yeah. Yes. That's right.

Yeah, it's really, you know, you're putting your feet on something that's not stable, you know. Having your foot on the pier and the other foot on the ship, you know, is okay if the ships dock, but once it starts taking off, that's a really rough way to go. You usually don't end up on either one. How about your position in Christ? Is that sort of a mixed deal? You kind of in price, kind of sort of a little bit once in a while. Occasionally, more or less. Not so much, huh? Norm? Water looks firm until you step on it. Yeah, until you step on it. Now, water looks firm until you step on it. Yes?

We kind of went last week over kind of four different cautions in terms of the ways that Christians look at these things wrong. And aren't those a double-mindedness? Because instead of, what does God say straight out? And not, hey, let's mix this so that the world's happy, or my flesh is happy, or something like that. And we can easily come up with things, if we're not careful, that sound like it's holy or spiritual in some way, and yet it ends up being double-mindedness. Yeah, Jeremy. What does James mean by wisdom? Okay, what does James mean by wisdom is his question. Thoughts on that? What's wisdom looked at as being? It's what God says about it. What's God's perspective on it? And why is that valuable and important to have God's perspective on things? It's the only thing that will work.

His perspective is the truth. He is wisdom. He is truth. Anything else is based on, it may not be all false, but it's a mixture. It's double-minded. Well, I think this means, and that's where you get into problems, is the I think. Yeah, the I think. And maybe it's not so much I think. Not so much thinking going into I think. Yeah. It really means my perspective on it. My human perspective on it might be. Right? Let's look at verses 9 through 11 there.

But the brother of humble circumstances is to glory in his high position, and the rich man is to glory in his humiliation, because like flowering grass he will pass away. For the sun rises with a scorching wind and withers the grass, and its flower falls off, and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed. So too the rich man, in the midst of his pursuits, will fade away." What is James doing?

He's starting to pick on some of the kinds of trials that people get into and what people typically think is the answer. Is it not a common thought, if I just had more money that would fix everything? If I just had more money it would fix everything. A person who wins the lottery never has any more problems after that. Right? Oh boy. All these billionaires that get listed in the magazines, you know, they've got double-digit billion dollars, right? They never have any trouble. Not a peep, right? What's that? Yes, what happens to people. I heard once of a recovery and support group for lottery winners. Yes, recovery and support group for lottery winners. No, the troubles just change. They don't go away.

And that's one of the things. He looks at this thing of material resources, the lack of it's a problem. Having the resources is a problem. And the one who has very little has one set of temptations. The one who has a great deal has a different set of temptations. But they both have temptations. And so he begins to put his finger on the real issue.

And also recognizing the person who thinks, oh, if I just had more money, that'd fix it. Or the person who says, I've just got to figure out how to keep my money. That'll fix it. I've got to figure out how to keep everybody else away from my money. And on and on. And so he puts his finger on it, and both of them, he's got this message, and what is it?

Money fades. money fates. There's an interesting circumstance that came about during the New Testament times. You know how you probably heard that salt was actually used for money and that's where we get like our word salary is from this idea of salt being used for money. Well, one of the ways that some guys tried to get rich was to actually get a corner on the salt market, go out and buy a bunch of salt and hoard it. And to hoard it, they put it in a house. They just filled this house with salt. Boarded up the windows and you know, board up the door and just filled this whole house with salt.

Well in those days, they didn't have any, you know, concrete on the floor, right? So the floor is made of what? Just soil, right? When it rains, the soil gets wet, right? So what happened is they had a wet season, and the guys came to get their salt and it was all in the ground. This plan to hoard the salt just disappeared. So the ground became very salty. But they had no more salt to sell. And their attempt to gather it faded.

So anyway, this is comparable. It's just an illustration. Money can go. Money will pass. And that's part of what James is trying to get across here. Just like everything that's seasonal, it can go. It can disappear. It's not the answer. Here's verses 12 through 16.

Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial, for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love him. But no one say when he is tempted, I am tempted by God, for God cannot be tempted by evil, and he himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust is conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. So blessed is the man who perseveres under the trial. Versus what? Blessed is the man who perseveres under the trial instead of, what are the other options?

Yeah, I'm going to escape. I'm going to take the nearest exit, whatever it takes. I'm going to blame God. Boy, I'm going to be ticked at God for bringing this about. This is not in my plans. I've made my plans for the year and nowhere is this on the calendar. How dare God bring this into my life? This isn't what I had in mind.

What else? Or you might say, yeah, I'm going to endure this trial, but, you know, as you suggested, people look, how do I numb it? How do I numb this? And so, he says, spiritually happy is the one who perseveres and remains faithful under the trial. This is consistent with count it all joy, consider it all joy. The one who has persevered is approved by God. There is testing with a view to approval. Testing with a view to approval. That's what he's looking at here. Having been tested with a view to approval.

He will on that day that he goes to see the Lord Jesus Christ face to face be rewarded with the crown of life. Which is an eternal capacity to glorify the Lord. Interesting that this crown of life is mentioned here and also in the book of Revelation to the church where the people will be martyred.

So he's saying, this is a crown for difficulties. And they can be sometimes extreme. Now, why would a crown be of interest to a Christian? Especially one that you don't get to wear here. Why would that be of interest to a Christian? It might be a wake-up call.

For example, Billy Graham went to visit this un-person who was declared off-limits to everybody else in China because he was a Christian and wanted to yield to the Lord in all facets of his life. And so he visited that Christian, and the Christian said to him, because he'd been through jail a lot and all this, be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life.

Yes, this is the quote out of Revelation. Be faithful unto death, and I'll give you a crown of life. Nancy? Okay, yeah. He was talking about a believer in China who was going through various persecutions. And what came across there, the guy says, be faithful unto death. This is the quote that's given there out of the reference in Revelation chapter 2.

Be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life, the same crown that's talked about here. Why faithful unto death? Why would that be put as the criteria? And why would that be the same crown that James is talking about here? Because that's the end of the race.

That's when we get to be with, physically get to be in the presence of Christ. Since we are in Christ, positionally, everything we do is in Him. The honor we gain is for Christ. It's not that we have more ribbons somewhere. He is glorified when we are faithful, not to our credit, but his credit.

And faithful unto death means that I don't have some exit prior to that death point. I don't say, you know, I'm going to be faithful under trial, but this is the point where I quit. This is enough. And basically the faithful unto death looks at it and says, I don't care what, there is no place where I take the exit. It is faithful no matter what. So it isn't some place where we say, okay, I'm going to be faithful and endure this up to this point and then I'm just going to bail because that's too much.

Yeah. What's the character of our love for the Lord? Is it just something that's, oh, I kind of have a love for the Lord? Or every Saturday afternoon I kind of feel that way? No, this is a love for the Lord that has a constancy and no limits. Because why? His love for me has that constancy and no limits. Yes, Norm? We must trust Him. Yeah. Yeah. Say thank you. Yeah. Yeah. We can say thank you regardless of what it is.

If there is a mindset of I've got an exit point and it's somewhere long before death. I'll be faithful, but boy, if it involves this, then I'm out of here. Enough's enough. If that's the mindset, then it's really not understanding. It's really not understanding what is God's purpose in these things. And it's also a question of... Because this really isn't about our adequacy, it's His adequacy.

That's the issue that Bev brought up with someone saying, I'm going to take my own life, Because ultimately it's saying God is not adequate for whatever there is. And the truth is God is adequate for whatever there is. God is adequate for whatever comes along. Jeremy?

That's why under this great system, it's really a shame to try to move a legalistic method. Because the law was intended to show our inadequacy and bring us to Christ. Now that we're in Christ, He wants us to acknowledge that, and us to live by that, because it's all His doing. And since we can't do anything, even if we wanted to, when we rest in Him, we rest in that. When we try and live by our own thing, first of all, our righteousness is still dirty rags, and it takes away from the Word of God, because it's not Him doing it, and it's not us resting in what He does. But do you get what he's saying? That there is a difficulty with legalism because it is our own self-effort, our own adequacy is the standard, not the Lord's adequacy.

And it is not by grace. Grace has no limits. Grace is of the Lord's very own character. and he is infinitely gracious. There is no limit to his adequacy in grace. We live and breathe grace. Grace is the reigning principle and there isn't a characteristic of the Lord's grace that goes so far and that's it. My grace is sufficient for you. Who is adequate for these things? He is.

The next thing that comes out of that passage here is there's nothing in God's nature that would allow Him to be tempted. How could you tempt God? You can't. Temptation is something that pulls us off track, away from the new nature, right? But the Lord doesn't have this old nature, new nature duality there. There's nothing to tempt him with. And he is not of a character to himself place a temptation in front of us. The Lord is not tempting us directly, but he allows us to go through these various trials and temptations as a testing of our faith.

One of the things that this part of the passage does is it puts the problem on the sin nature. He says the lusts that come out of the sin nature are where these things originate from. He says don't go blaming something or somebody else. It isn't my mother did this or my mother didn't do that when I was growing up or my father failed to do this or he used to do that or the devil made me do it. or the pastor didn't warn me. Any of those things.

It is temptation because the sin nature is the point of leverage to bring things to a place of temptation. Alright, let's take a look on page 35, top half, the big picture here. It's God's intent that we continue to look to the Lord walking in fellowship with Him as we encounter and faithfully endure every trial. It's God's intent that we look to the Lord, walking in fellowship with Him as we encounter and faithfully endure every trial. We are spiritually best off to see the trials as God's opportunity to grow us spiritually and to bring us to realizing the spiritual completeness and sufficiency that we have in Christ.

I can remember when the Lyme disease hit and at this point in time I had a diagnosis and I didn't know what it was. And poor Nancy had to endure with the doctor's theory as to what it was that I had. This week we think Vern's got cancer of the spinal cord, you know, and so running me through tests on that. And the next week it was, we think Vern has multiple sclerosis. And so Nancy's enduring all this stuff. A lot of the time I found it difficult to think and it was really painful. Lots of pain. It felt like a truck backed over my left arm and then went back and forth. It was really painful. But in the midst of that, I can remember at one point in time just lying on the couch thinking, man.

It doesn't matter if I can't do anything, because I was always into doing this and that and the other thing. It doesn't matter if I can't do anything. I'm just amazed the Lord loves me. And He doesn't love me because I do this and that and the other thing. But He just loves me. And it's astounding to have that in the midst of the trial, to see that.

If that trial had never taken place, I would never have that realization except perhaps a little more hypothetically. But to say no, I really can't do anything. Even the stuff I used to be able to do a few weeks ago or a few months ago, because my body doesn't work the way it used to. My brain doesn't work the way it used to. But to be able to go through those trials recognizing that the Lord loves me right in the midst of it. And the Lord has his purpose in this. That was a wonderful thing. Wonderful thing.

One of the things there that comes out here is faithful endurance through trials is eternally rewardable. It was brought up earlier, you know, one of the big problems with dealing with trials is you don't see the purpose in it. How wonderful as believers to see not only does it have a purpose, but it's got an eternal purpose. As Peter puts it, we'll see, this will hurt for a while. But the benefit is eternal. It just keeps going and going and going. Now that's a great payoff. That's a great payoff.

What we have here in this book of James is some pitfalls. And really, if you look at it this way, James gives some key pointers about, you know, this is what God has in mind, but a lot of what he has in this passage is looked at as what are the pitfalls.

And so summarizing those there, depending upon the sin nature as we encounter and proceed through the trial. If I'm a Christian and I go through the trial, what difference does it make whether it's depending upon the Lord or depending on the sin nature? I mean, isn't it just a Christian went through a trial? What's the difference? Spiritual growth, fellowship with the Lord. It's rewardable eternally. All right, more to places to speak, eternally rewardable. Jeremy.

The whole issue is not the trial. See, that's the human tendency. It's all about the trial. And the Lord says, no, it's all about dependence. It's all about my personal fellowship with Him. I was telling you about the Lyme disease experience where it felt like a truck was backing up, backing up, backing up, backing up, going back and forth over my left arm. And, I mean, that would be like through the night and things like that, so sleep was rare. But in the midst of that, to be drawn to a place of fellowship with the Lord. Boy, this is really not comfortable, but Lord, it draws me to you. So guess what?

It's worth it. It's worth it. I think this is a key thing. The trial is not about the trial. The trial is about fellowship and dependence. That's the key. Whatever it is. Okay? The trial is not about the trial. It's about the Lord. It's about our relationship with Him.

The next bullet there, trying to always exit the trial, not seeing it as the Lord's instrument for growth. This is another one of those perspective things, isn't it? If it's just, that hurts, how do I stop it? And that's the only thought, then we've missed it.

Again, the trial is not about the trial. The trial is about our relationship and fellowship with the Lord and our dependence upon Him. That's what the trial is about. Pure and simple. The trials are various. Our fellowship and relationship with the Lord is not various. Go ahead and have the polka dot trials. But our fellowship and relationship and dependence upon the Lord is there regardless of the trial.

That's the central point. Another thing that he has there is failing to seek out the necessary wisdom from the Lord. Notice that he wrote this if it's assumed to be true. If you lack wisdom and it's assumed to be true. is realizing that the wisdom that's of any value is the Lord's wisdom through the midst of this. It's the Lord's wisdom. Okay, we're going to have to cut it short here. But let's ask, we've got a question at the very last paragraph there. Why are we told about the pitfalls? Why are we told about the pitfalls? So we can recognize the issues when we get there.

Are the trials various? Yes! Are they going to be of all kinds of, you know, sorts and sizes? Yes! They'll be of all kinds. But the central issues and even the pitfalls, the cautions, you know, we can count on these as, yeah, these are truths from the Lord. This is the Lord's wisdom. This is the Lord's insight. We're given these because they're exceedingly valuable. spiritual insights.

The trials are the Lord's intentional process for our benefit and to His eternal glory, which, amazingly, He shares with us. Let's pray. Lord, as we go through these various trials, you know, folks who weigh polka dot trials, big ones, little ones, scattered about, We just ask that you would bring these truths home to us, or how valuable and precious these are. And what an amazing contrast to the world that we can look upon these various trials and consider them all joy. And we thank you, Lord, for these insights. We thank you for the trials, because we know that you have your purpose in each one of them, an eternal purpose, a glorious purpose that glorifies you. In Jesus' name, Amen.