Called To Suffer
1 Peter 2:21-23 · Miles Driedger · Sep 6, 2026
1 Peter, No. 18
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/96262024524794

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Well, PowerPoint's up and I think we've got the right heading this week. So, we're in Chapter 2, verses 21 through 23, and it's titled, Called to Suffer. So, I hope you're looking forward to this lesson. And this text falls into this section where Peter's giving what we may call practical applications for the Christian life, right, in these various arenas. So we've got citizens and governments, that relationship. We've got servants and masters, and that's the section we're in now, though, like we said last week, the application is a lot broader than that. It's really only verse 18 that references servants. And then we'll have wives and husbands coming up in chapter 3.

And all of this comes under the heading in 2, verses 11 and 12, where Peter says, "Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers," right? So this is not our home. As Christians, we are passing through. We are heavenly beings living in earthly circumstances, right? Which that's how that ties in. These are all earthly circumstances that he's getting into, right? But as the aliens and strangers abstain from fleshly lusts, because we still have this earthly fleshly body, so we still have fleshly lusts, which wage war against the soul.

Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, now this is really key to what we're talking about this morning. In the thing in which they slander you, hey Jim, as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds as they observe them glorify God in the day of visitation.

So verse 12, I really wanted to bring that up again this morning because that really ties in to the verses that we're looking at this morning. So as we said, verse 18 begins with this address to servants, right? Servants and their responsibility to their masters. But then in verse 19, Peter broadens the application to explain that God is pleased when you and I bear up under situations where we suffer unjustly. So there's a, there's really what this is, is there's a principle behind the command to servants. And this is what he's explaining in 19 and 20, that this is the principle upon which, you know, servants need to submit to their masters and, and even those who are harsh or unreasonable, right? And so it's, it's because this is a, this is a principle, that the application is a lot broader than just servants and masters.

And so we all find ourselves in these kinds of situations. This is not specific, right? So this is not specific to servants. You've all found yourself in a situation like this where you're suffering unjustly. And so we broke this down into two different ways that we can end up in a situation of unjust suffering. The first one is that you haven't done anything wrong. Um, but you're, you're falsely accused of some wrongdoing, right? That would be an unjust suffering situation.

Um, the other is that you disobeyed human authorities because, uh, they violated God's word, right? I mean, you could, perfect example, it's just, you know, always top of mind is those who harbored Jews during the Holocaust. They disobeyed the human authorities, uh, because the human authorities were violating God's higher authority and they paid the consequences. That was also unjust suffering, right? So disobeying the authorities can also lead.

And, and I think we could probably think of other things that maybe don't fit these categories really nicely, but that gives us kind of the two sides of it. You know, one, you haven't done anything wrong, um, but you're suffering because, you know, whatever false accusation or whatever. Two, you did do something wrong according to human standards or legislation, but according to God, it wasn't wrong, right?

So it's still unjust from God's perspective. And then in verse 20, I don't have, I should, I was, sorry, missed a slide, but in verse 20, Um, Peter stresses that he's talking about unjust suffering. Oh, that is the right side. Okay. So he's talking about unjust suffering, right? So God is not pleased when you've done something wrong, right? He's pleased to see you bearing up under harsh treatment that is unjust or unfair.

I was just reading last night in Matthew chapter 5 where Jesus is, this is a sermon on the mount, right? Jesus says, blessed are you when you're persecuted for the sake of righteousness, right? For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. So it's that same principle and we see this over and over.

This is suffering or enduring suffering, not for doing something wrong. God's not pleased with that kind of thing. But when you're beat when you're suffering for doing something that that wasn't wrong so just To make one clarification that kind of came up at the end of last week's class, and we didn't really deal with it very adequately, we want to guard against a possible misinterpretation of this. Because we could say a good misinterpretation would be to say that, well, a woman in a physically abusive relationship, she's got to stay put, because she's got to endure unjust suffering. But that would be a wrong application.

Bearing up under unjust suffering doesn't necessarily mean that you shouldn't get out of the situation. There are situations that you should get out. But if you think of that, even if a woman has to get out of an abusive marriage, that doesn't mean that she's not enduring hardship with patients. There's still hardship. It's not just that her husband violated his marriage vows. It's not just that he treated her that way. It's not just that she now has to take care of herself and so on and so forth.

You know, so sometimes removing yourself from a dangerous situation, you're still patiently enduring hardship and suffering that was unfair or unjust. So I just thought that's a way to clarify, don't take this text to mean that you never have to or never can remove yourself from a dangerous or threatening situation. So anyway, just one clarification. And also, as we said, we need to be very clear.

I think that God is not pleased to see you suffer. He's not sadistic. He's pleased to see the patient endurance of his children when they go through suffering. That's just an important clarification on this. He's not pleased about suffering. He's not pleased to see you suffer. He's pleased to see the kind of character in you that carries through this kind of a suffering situation.

So, that's a very different thing. Yeah, Bob. Is it that faith? Yeah, yeah. Okay, so now you jumped all the way to my last page. I was going to, okay. Wait, because the question is, what's behind that kind of patient endurance? What allows a person to do that, right? What's behind that?

And we'll come back to that at the end. But that's kind of review for last week. Any comments, questions, or thoughts before we get into today's text? Okay, so let's read today's verses. And they follow out of the previous ones very, very closely connected here. It just flows around.

So, because it begins with word for, right? For you have been called for this purpose since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in his steps. who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. And while being reviled, he did not revile in return. While suffering, he uttered no threats, but kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously.

This is just an astounding piece of scripture. This is really worth spending some time thinking about, right? And I'd encourage all of us to do that more in the coming week, because the time that we give it this morning is not adequate to the depth and the significance of this text. But let's see what we can pull out of it this morning.

You know, there are only a handful of places, looking at verse 21, there's only a handful of places in the New Testament where, where God's purpose for you is spelled out. His purpose for you as a Christian. Where do we normally think of when we talk about what's God's purpose for you as a Christian? What's the purpose verse? Anyone? Rome is 828, right? And we know that God causes all things to work together for good, for those who are called, sorry, for those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose. And then the purpose is in verse 29, right?

For those whom he foreknew, he also predestined to become. conformed to the image of his son so that he'd be the firstborn among many brethren. So God marked you out as a believer. The moment you put your faith in Jesus Christ, he marked you out to be conformed to the image of his son. Okay, but we also have God's purpose stated right here in 1 Peter 2.

And what is God's purpose for you according to verse 21? human call for this purpose now it doesn't say in verse 21 what the purpose is right it just says that he has a purpose but it's it's so that we have this uh this word this right this um uh what do you call that it refers back to something before right so the question is to what To what purpose? The Greek doesn't actually have the word purpose in there. It just says, for to this you were called. But the idea is you were called to this purpose. So what is it? Well, we have to look back to verses 19 and 20. What did it say in 19 and 20? What have we been called to?

Unjust suffering. Yeah. We've been called to endure patiently unjust suffering right patient and i just but in quotes as patient endurance of unjust suffering so that's actually something that you and i are called to as christians that's where my title came from called to suffer what a fun what a fun calling right romans five three did you read it for us yeah not only that but we rejoice in our sufferings knowing that suffering produces inheritance I think endurance produces character and character produces hope. Yeah. Yeah.

Thanks for, thanks for reading that Mike, because we want to think about how is this call to suffering connected with the call or the purpose to be conformed to the image or likeness of Christ? All right. Does, does learning to endure trials with patients have something to do with being conformed to the image of Christ? Yeah, that's something we really need to think about.

So, verse 21 continues with the word since, right? No. Okay. So, this is my, my, yeah. Sorry, it continues, sorry, I'm looking at, I don't have a pointer. It continues with the word since. So, for you have been called for this purpose since. Okay, that's where we're looking now. And that's the, the word hati, which we could translate because.

It's a, it's an explanation clause, right? For you've been called for this purpose because You know, so Peter's giving the reason that we've been called to suffer. So because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example to follow. The idea in that is that we must suffer because Jesus himself suffered on this earth. Right? Christ's life is the pattern to which we are being conformed. And we're to walk in the same path that he walked. The word here, for example, is the word pattern. Example gives us the idea that this is something for us to emulate.

But the Greek word here for pattern, or for example, it literally means under to write this is a you know the way greek work a compound word under to write and what you want a picture to be a white board marker uh... is is that do you remember elementary school kindergarten grade one what do you i don't know so he has a really old so i don't know i don't know if you have this in your day one of my kids asked me the other day were you did they have what was that alissa did they have lego when you were a kid anyway Way back in ancient history.

Chalkboard, yeah. Yeah, no, we could get into that. But do you remember writing sheets where the letters would be faintly drawn out, maybe in a light blue ink, maybe a dotted or dashed line? And what was your job? To trace over it with your pencil, right? And that's literally what it means to underwrite. It was used that way, that you would write it out faintly.

Too old, sorry, yeah. Oh, there we go. We could give a... Thank you. So, you know, so we have our Greek alphabet, right? We got... And that would be to underwrite. And so that, you know, the student has to come along and trace a path over, right? So that's the idea with... with this word, okay? Darby translated this word as model, okay? Another different variation of it.

So when we look at the gospels, when we read the account of Jesus' walk on this earth, we see the path that he traced for us. Hey, and where did Jesus' footsteps lead? Where were his footsteps? He was kind of steadily marching forward towards what? The cross.

That's where it was all headed, right? So when we read the words that Jesus left us an example to follow, this isn't WWJD. uh... copycat this is the idea that you and i as christians are walking along the same path that jesus traced out for us in his earthly life and and ministry and that we are being led along the same path the same path that he marked out and we can read about in the Gospels. And so if Jesus suffered unjustly all the way to the point of death on the cross, we really shouldn't expect anything different because we're being led in the same path. Right? He identifies himself with Christ.

And unfortunately, if you look at this, that's not what you take away. No. Yeah, there's been a lot. And this is where it's hard to teach something like this because we all come with a lot of years of baggage in just the ways that we think about these things. And a lot of Christian teaching is that WWJD model. Hey, you know, look how Jesus did it, and then try to do the same thing.

And that's not really what's being talked about here in context. It's just talking about the fact that he walked through a lot of unjust suffering, and you can expect to walk the same path as his child, as a Christian. Yeah, you're Exactly, and this is so this really isn't so much about you know Telling you hey, you know do this do that.

It's just saying Christ suffered that was you know his purpose was to come to this world to suffer and die Death on the cross your purpose mirrors hit that pattern your purpose follows that same pattern So Why would God do this, right? Why would God have this purpose for us? That, you know, yes, yes, because Jesus is the pattern, right? But what is his purpose in taking us along that same path? What is his purpose in you and I also suffering?

Do you know the expression, don't judge a man until you've walked a mile in his shoes? Everyone's familiar with that one. What do we mean by that? What's the thought behind that expression? Sometimes it's just used in terms of, well, you can't judge, you don't know his situation, but what's kind of behind that? It's the idea that it's hard, if not impossible, to understand someone without having a shared experience, right? And even then, it's still hard to understand, but you can't, did you have a comment?

I thought I saw a raised hand. Steve Martin says, the saying is, don't judge a man until you've walked a mile in his shoes. And then Steve Martin says, because then, when you're a mile away, you can judge. So he can't catch up to you. I noticed I actually even capitalized his by accident there, but that kind of fits.

You know, there's something special about walking along this path of suffering, which was marked out for us by Christ. So what does it do for us? Put that into your own words. What's so special about walking that same path that Christ walked? What does that do for us, right? If we understand that this is about understanding, about knowing, about sympathizing, would be the right word. And doesn't it build a trust? I mean, trusting him because this is our path.

Yeah. Yeah. Trusting him. Yeah. That there's a reason for this. It's going to have an outcome. positive for us, even if we don't see it at the time. And maybe also it teaches us dependence on God. Dependence on God, yeah. I'm focusing on, those are great comments by the way, I'm focusing on the aspect of what does it do for us to know that the path that we're walking in is what was patterned by Jesus Christ and others.

He went through this first. He went through this ahead of us, so to speak. you know my dad introduced me to the word trailblazer when i was a kid was it well he's a guy that walks in front holds up a stick to knock down all the cobwebs uh... through the bush uh... so anyway but he blazed a trail before us uh... and and and you know paul describes this in philippians uh... chapter three verses eight through ten right paul's talking about really awesome privilege of of coming into deeper and deeper intimacy with the Lord Jesus Christ.

And you can kind of feel his intensity when he says these words, right? That I may know him and the power of his resurrection and what? The fellowship of his sufferings being conformed to his death. This is what he's talking about. He's talking about the same thing we're talking about this morning, right? Why does Paul seem so excited to share in Christ's suffering? Well, it's because he knew that it meant coming to know Jesus, coming to have a deeper understanding of him.

And is there anyone that knows what it means to suffer unjustly more than Jesus? No, no one, right? He bore the guilt of the whole world when he went to the cross, right? And talk about unjust, right? I mean, we talk about the fact that he was satisfying God's justice, Yes, it was just that because he bore the sin of the whole world, justice was that he should die. But was it just that for him to carry the whole sins of the whole world? No, that was completely unfair, unjust. He took that upon himself willingly, not because he deserved it. That's what we mean, right? So that was unjust suffering.

And the Lord is walking you and I along the same path. And it's all designed to allow us to get to know Jesus better, to get to understand him. We're walking a mile in his shoes, so to speak. And so for all eternity, we're going to have a deeper fellowship with Jesus because we have this shared experience. And that's really a core thing, a central thing to the Christian life, gaining a deep fellowship with the Lord Jesus. And so the things the Father is taking us through and walking us through have to do with that, allowing us to come to understand and know the Lord Jesus better. God be the glory. Amen. It just reminds us of how unjust Jesus' death on the cross was, right?

This is a quote from Isaiah 53, 9, and it just says, who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. And so two parts, right? One, Jesus never committed a single sin, so he had nothing to suffer or die for. And two, no one could ever find any incorrect or misleading or deceptive word that you said ever spoken they couldn't they couldn't pin anything on it right uh... and uh... and and that's just to show us is his suffering the cross was unjust in the sense that he didn't deserve it because you've never done anything any senator And so then verse 23 describes the trial, really.

I think this is largely, if you read those words, it's like you should immediately picture the Jesus trial, right? Of course, there were other times where he was reviled, but when you read that, it's like, I think what we're picturing here is his standing before his accusers on that last night before his crucifixion. And so, we have this, and while being reviled, he did not revile in return, and while suffering, he uttered no threats, but kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously.

Now, what we're gonna do here, we're just gonna read some of the text. that we're just going to take it out of Matthew's gospel, and we're going to just read to refresh ourselves on what exactly happened, what did Jesus go through, what kind of accusations and threats and insults were leveled against him, and just observe his response. So we're going to start in Matthew 26. Now this is kind of small, but this one is the most text. I'm breaking this into chunks. This one I've called Jesus suffering before the Jews. So Matthew 26, 59 through 68. Now the chief priests and the whole council kept trying to obtain false, why did it have to be false testimony? Because he'd never done anything, verse 22, right? He'd never done anything wrong. He'd never spoken anything wrong.

So they had to obtain false testimony against Jesus so that they might put him to death. They did not find any. even though many false witnesses came forward but later on to came forward and said this man stated i'm able to destroy the temple of god and to rebuild in three days taking his words out of context in this misappropriating them uh... this is an example of stars Type one, right, where you've done nothing wrong, but they're falsely accusing. I'm able to rebuild in three days, verse 62.

The high priest stood up and said to him, do you not answer? So what's Jesus doing? He's not reviling in return. Do you not answer? What is it that these men are testifying against you? But Jesus kept silent. And the high priest said to him, I adjure you by the living God that you tell us whether you are the Christ, the Son of God. And this is the one spot where Jesus really says anything, right? Jesus said to him, he doesn't make this claim for himself.

He says, you said it. You said it yourself. Nevertheless, I tell you, henceforth you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven. Is he defending himself? No, he's really not. He's just stating the fact, well you said it, right?

Then the high priest tore his robes and said he has blasphemed. And did Jesus know that the high priest would take this, how he'd take it? Absolutely. He knew that, and so he wasn't defending himself, he actually He actually kind of gave him the piece of information that he needed. Oh, right, that's why we'll kill you, because you, you know.

He has blasphemed. What further need do we have of witnesses? Behold, you have heard the blasphemy. What do you think? They answered, he deserves death. Then they spat in his face and beat him with their fists, and others slapped him and said, prophesy to us, you Christ. Who is the one who hit you?

And what does Jesus do? He just, nothing. Moving down into Matthew 27, 11 through 14, now we've got Jesus before the Gentiles. Now Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor questioned him, saying, are you the king of the Jews? And Jesus, again, only responds, it is as you say. And while he was, so not defending himself, again, it's same response.

Well, you said it, right? And while he was being accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer. Then Pilate said to him, do you not hear how many things they testify against you? And he did not answer him with regard to even a single charge. So the governor was quite amazed.

Matthew 27, 27 through 31. Now we have the being reviled by the Gentiles, we could say. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the praetorium and gathered the whole Roman cohort around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him. And after twisting together a crown of Florence, they put it on his head and a reed in his right hand. And they knelt down before him and mocked him saying, hail, king of the Jews. look how similar this is. They spat on him, they took the reed and began to beat him on the head. After they had mocked him, they took the scarlet robe off him and put his own garments back on him and led him away to crucify him. And what did Jesus do? He just stood there and took it. And this was after he was whipped. Yeah, we're just getting some highlights here from that, yeah. And then we've got on the cross, right? Matthew 27, 38 through 43.

Even criminals being executed beside him mocked him, okay? At that time, two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. And those passing by were hurling abuse at him, wagging their heads and saying, you who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, notice they're still repeating the same line.

Save yourself if you are the son of God. Come down from the cross. In the same way, the chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were mocking him and saying, he saved others. He cannot save himself. He is the king of Israel. Right? Mocking. Let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him. He notices he trusts in God. Let God rescue him now if he delights in him, for he said, I am the son of God. Notice this. Now they're questioning or mocking the fact that he claims to trust in God, which is exactly what was going on. He was trusting in God. And they thought, well, if you're trusting God, then God's going to save you from the cross.

So through all of this, Did Jesus have a right to revile or to threaten in return his tormentors? Well, sure. I mean, they were dead wrong in all of their accusations. They were completely wrong in all of the ways that they treated him, right? But what was his response? Those words stand as a banner over the whole entire situation.

Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing. That's Jesus' response. And, And I just want to pause on that for a minute, because have you ever been in a situation where forgiveness was beyond your ability? Right? Well, notice what Jesus says. He says, he prays. He says, Father, forgive them. You know, sometimes we have to extend forgiveness to people, not because we're able to, and I'm not saying that Jesus isn't able to, right? Because he and the Father are one. But he's asking the Father to forgive them.

Um, and yeah, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely it was. Every sin that they were committing against him in that whole trial and in the execution, he was dying for. So that every sin was, stood forgiven. Right? That doesn't mean that everybody accepted that forgiveness. There are many people who have their sins nailed to the cross and have never accepted it, right? But Jesus, that's why I say it stands as a banner over the whole thing. Father, forgive them, right?

And sometimes we find ourselves in situations where forgiveness is just, I can't, I can't possibly forgive. And maybe that's true, maybe it's not. But I mean, at the same time, you can't force yourself to forgive. And I think we can actually use this as a model.

If we understand That the sins that have been committed against us were paid for on the cross. And if the father has forgiven them, well, if he's forgiven them, then they stand forgiven. I can forgive you in light of that fact, even if in my heart I can't work up some kind of forgiveness toward you. But we can offer forgiveness on this basis. like the questions that you're reading and like the things that they were saying, oftentimes that sounds exactly like the great accuser.

Those accusations. And that's the same thing we hear in our head as believers. Can you trust God? Oh, you say you believe in Christ and he has full power and authority. where's that power and authority, right? As the great accuser, and I think, forgive them, but they do not know what they're doing. I think it was Peter, it was Peter, I can't remember, he's like, Lord, we're gonna fight, and we're gonna fight behind you. This is the point to the cross, that was always the path, but the greater spiritual aspect that was happening there. They were, I mean, they're just, Yeah. Yeah. No, yeah. Thank you for sharing that. And we get accusations, yeah, from people, from the enemy.

And they are, you know, and that, that all, that all is all part of that path of suffering, right? And, and so Jesus laid down the perfect, the perfect example of that. Not for us, like I said, not for us to imitate so much as to, to understand that, that we, as we walk through life, are going to face the same, the same kinds of things, the same situations, same type of situations. Probably not going to be crucified on a Roman cross, but we are going to die. We are going to, as we read all throughout the pages of the New Testament, death works in us. It's amazing really what Jesus was doing on the cross, right? He was suffering the most unjust death imaginable.

And he had every right to defend himself, right? Would anybody have blamed Jesus for retorting at least just once, one little, do you know who, you know what I mean? Who did not have from the cross just one snuck in a little, do you know who I am? We probably wouldn't blame him for that, right? But he didn't.

Right Absolutely Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think that and in my mind the closest it comes is when they come to arrest him They say, you know, who do you see Jesus? Oh, I am right and they all fall down We kind of read over that really quickly sometimes but the entire this army falls over and they're scrambling to pick up their stuff No, you know And that's the last time that really there's any kind of indication that he really has power, because from that moment on, he just completely submits himself to this suffering situation. Right? Could he not have done the same thing at any of the beatings or any of the trials or at the crucifixion? Absolutely. But he willingly chose to go through. I think one thing as we think about applying this to our own lives, the flesh is incapable of doing this. That's exactly right.

And what I think is important, and I sound like a broken record, but you've got to return to your position. And when you return to your position, then the condition can be informed. You can't think about just the circumstances and your condition. You've got to think about being made righteous yourself in Christ Jesus.

And I think it's incredibly important. i know i appreciate having a broken uh... front left wheel because we need that uh... we need a petition we need to be recalled back to that over and over because as we look at as something like this and we're we're we're really focusing a look how jesus did it look how he injures suffering uh... you can't then tackle life is ok i'm gonna i'm gonna do that because i you know because i've got the same characters jesus well no you'd you don't not in yourself You have that life in you because of your position, your identification with Jesus Christ. Christ is our life. But yeah, we have to keep that in focus.

So Jesus didn't defend himself on the cross. He chose to willingly suffer. And look at verse 23, what was going on? The last part of the phrase there, he didn't vile in return, he didn't utter any threats, but what did he do? He kept entrusting himself to God who judges righteously. So rather than defending himself, Jesus was allowing God the Father to be his vindicator.

And the word for there that's translated entrusting himself is paradidomi. And it's a fairly common word in the New Testament. It's often translated handed over. In fact, you see it a lot in Jesus' betrayal. It's sometimes translated betrayal. That Jesus was handed over to his enemies, right?

And so here what Jesus is doing is that rather than hanging on to the right to defend himself, he handed that right over to God the Father. He was choosing to trust the Father to be just and to carry out justice rather than taking that into his own hands. deep, deep trust because the trial goes on and on and gets worse and worse and ends up in death.

And you're like, God, you're right. If we're in that situation, we're like, well, God, I'm trusting you to save me. Now, Jesus knew what was going on, right? But you can see yourself in this suffering situation that's just going on and on. And you're like, okay, Lord, I'm trusting you. I'm trusting you, expecting that eventually I'm going to get out of this, right?

And then it ends in death. I mean, how many people have suffered and died, Christians, have suffered and died in prison, trusting the Lord Jesus right till the end, trusting that, well, he's just, he's just. Here I am rotting in jail unjustly, but he's just, I'm trusting with that. And it goes all the way to death, well, is God still just? And that's what Jesus was doing. He was just, Lord, Father, I guess, Father, I am entrusting myself to you. I give up the right to defend myself, to defend my own honor. I hand that over to you. Right? That's what Jesus is doing.

And so, as Bob said at the beginning about faith, right? It's interesting, this all comes down to trusting the Father. It's all about trusting that He is good, kind of to Margaret's point, no matter what. That He is good no matter what happens, even all the way to the point of death, right?

And we may be in a situation wondering, well, God, why are you allowing me to be painted as the bad guy here? Why am I suffering for something that I didn't do? Or on and on, all these questions, right? Or why am I suffering for doing the right thing even, right?

But the Lord, often doesn't answer those questions for us. Because he's asking us to trust him without having those answers, to believe that he hasn't messed up, that his justice isn't flawed. He didn't drop the ball and his character didn't change. So he's asking us to believe that ultimately there's no injustice that will not be fully and finally settled and set aright.

And really, has it not already been on the cross? It has, hasn't it? Every injustice carried out against you was fully and finally settled at the cross. The question really is, are we willing to wait quietly And to let God work this out in his own time, to work out all of this in space-time history, so for the day that eventually we see, OK, I get it. He's not unjust. He wasn't wrong to let me suffer through that. His character wasn't wrong. He loved me all along. He knew what he was doing, and he was working it out for good and for the best.

And it's really just a matter of trust, right? That's the answer to the question, um, that, that we have back at the beginning, right? What, what is behind the patient endurance of suffering? What gives us the ability to endure that kind of thing? It's not our ability, right?

It's his ability and our job is to trust him about it. That really is, is what it is. If we, if we trust that God is good and that he is just, then we can, we can endure anything. If we don't, if we don't trust that, then we're always going to be trying to vindicate ourselves.

We're going to be trying to, oh boy, God's let me down here. I need to solve this problem myself. I need to get myself out of this. I need to defend my honor. Boy, I'm being unjustly treated here. I better start defending myself because God's not doing it.

But the reality is, just like Jesus could trust the Father with that, we can too. We can trust that He's good. We can trust that He's just. We can trust that he is working this out and he hasn't messed up. And I think the hard thing for us as humans is to realize that trusting him doesn't mean that everything is going to be what we think should be the perfect ending. Exactly.

And I think that's where we get in trouble regularly is we're going, well, Where is God in this? Because it's not what I thought it should be. In our minds, it's easy to think, well, if I'm trusting God, then it's going to work out this way. This is what the end result of God has got to be, because I can't see any other just end.

And then we look at Jesus' pattern and we're like, well, that wasn't just in the sense that, right, he suffered all the way through. But was it good and is it ultimately just? In the end of all things, right, There will be no outstanding questioner like, huh, I'm really glad to be here in heaven, but boy, God really messed up on a lot of stuff throughout history. There's a lot of unjust things that have never been finally and fully settled. We'll never say that.

We'll recognize that no, he knew what he was doing, he had a good plan of purpose in it, he was never unjust, and anything that he allowed wasn't allowed because he dropped off the attribute of justice for a moment. right it's not that way so usually a situation like that is designed to humble us amen all right let's let's pray heavenly father i thank you that you are so good at bringing the right situations into our lives to accomplish a very good purpose um and we often don't see that and we're often focused on well how can we be um How can we justify ourselves in this? How can we defend ourselves?

And Lord, your purpose is so much greater than that, so much greater than momentary justification before men.

Your purpose is to conform us to the likeness of your son, to create in us the same kind of nature and character that Jesus had in himself when he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death. even death on the cross that's far that's our new nature in the lord jesus christ and we've done we don't we can't produce it in our strength their energy we don't have the ability to do that but it but we can trust that because of the indwelling life of christ out that's the kind of life that that you can produce and live through us that humble kind of character that just trust you to do what is right, to provide what is needed in every situation, even if that means enduring injustice and hostility of men. And Lord, we just Pray that we would come to understand that more and more fully, that we would learn to appreciate what it is that you're doing, that you're not taking us through these things just to be hard on us, not because you're sadistic and you like to see us suffer, but because you have a really good purpose in mind. You want to conform us to the likeness of your son, the life that we have already positionally, and you want to make that real in our day-to-day walk, in our experience, as we trust you about it. So Lord, we pray that as we each face difficult situations, some at the hands of men, some at the hands of just circumstances sometimes that no person was at fault for doing wrong, but sometimes things just don't look right from our finite earthly perspective.

But Lord, teach us to trust you. Teach us that we can trust you, that you are good. And so I thank you for the things that you've taught us this morning from your word. In Jesus' name, amen.