I had a little time to think over my holidays of the changes that have taken place in the congregation over the last twenty years. There is much that has been encouraging – being joined by those the Lord is saving, witnessing His faithfulness as the Lord has generously supplied all our needs, seeing people, and our children, mature as followers of the Lord Jesus, and more. But I have also been conscious that for some these years have witnessed the accumulation of griefs and disappointments. Some longed to be married, but are still single; some longed for children, but remain childless; others have realised the hope of being married only to find yourself in an unhappy marriage, or have experienced its failure; had children, only to be grieved by their rebellion. You studied to get a job that would offer a satisfying career, only to find your progress blocked and work a drudgery. You practiced your passion but have had to recognize you will always be part of the chorus, never the star. And others live with chronic illness every day, clouding the mind and draining the energy, limiting plans and hopes.
How do we live with these disappointments and griefs so that we are not stuck – preoccupied with our sense that life is slipping away and we have not achieved what we desired; not languishing in grief; not embittered against God and resentful of those whose lives are easier, more successful?
I give thanks to God that many of you have grappled with that question and continue, in the midst of disappointment and grief, to live faithful and thankful lives, but I thought today I would talk about the truths of Scripture that will sustain us all in living as followers of Jesus in the face of the reality of this world.
The reality of this world
And that is the first truth we must grasp – the reality of this world. This is a disordered world, a world under judgment, subjected to futility, in bondage to corruption [Rom. 8:18-22]. Human relationships have been marked by tension and unease, human work by toil and frustration in achieving its goals, and human life by mortality, from the beginning [Gen. 3]. These things don’t get expressed as isolated instances of misfortune, but woven through the fabric of human existence in this world. The disappointments and griefs I spoke of above are not unusual even though we feel their not rightness, that this is not how the world was created to be. But the world is both created and caught up in Adam’s fall. Grief will mark every life in the end. Why should we have expected it to be different?
I know we live in a world where we are told we can triumph over any adversity if we set our minds to it, become whoever we want to be. In God’s mercy we do know advances in knowledge that can bring some relief to our lives, but in the end we all die, and too often the claims made about the power of our wills to change our lives are the rationalizations of the successful that allow them to take credit for what they have been given and compound the grief of the weak and poor and sick by making them responsible for their own suffering.
Better the wisdom of Ecclesiastes 9: 11 Again I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to those with knowledge, but time and chance happen to them all. 12 For man does not know his time. Like fish that are taken in an evil net, and like birds that are caught in a snare, so the children of man are snared at an evil time, when it suddenly falls upon them.
See your lives and the world and your disappointments through the lens of Scripture.
"See your lives and the world and your disappointments through the lens of Scripture."
Know God
Secondly, know God. Plainly there is a lot that could be said here. But hold on to the truth of God revealed in Scripture. He is almighty – all things serve Him and not a sparrow falls to the ground apart from His will [Ps. 119:91, Matt. 10:29], the will of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will [Eph. 1:11]. His wisdom and understanding are unsearchable, beyond our understanding. As the Psalmist says
Psalm 139: O Lord, you have searched me and known me!
2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.
3 You search out my path and my lying down
and are acquainted with all my ways.
4 Even before a word is on my tongue,
behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.
5 You hem me in, behind and before,
and lay your hand upon me.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
it is high; I cannot attain it.
Our God is the alpha and omega, the beginning and end. He knows the end from the beginning. Nothing escapes Him, nothing surprises Him. And He is thoroughly good, never tempted by evil [James 1:13], always just [Gen. 18:22-33, Ps. 145:8-9, 17], the God who does not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men [Lam 3:33]
And there is much God does not reveal to us of His plans and purposes. Again, as Ecclesiastes says
Ecclesiastes 8: 17 then I saw all the work of God, that man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. However much man may toil in seeking, he will not find it out. Even though a wise man claims to know, he cannot find it out.
It is under God’s mighty hand that we must humble ourselves 1 Pet. 5:6.
Believe the gospel
Thirdly, believe the gospel. That sounds so obvious. To be a Christian is to believe the gospel. But what does the gospel teach us of God’s relationship to believers? It tells us we are known individually, known by name, even the hairs of our heads numbered. It tells us we are loved, loved by the almighty God, with a love that is unwavering.
1 John 4: 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Believers in Jesus are loved by the almighty God, loved graciously, undeservedly, greatly.
Eph. 2: 4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—
To believe the gospel is to say we are loved by God. And We are forgiven by God, and so always treated by God as His children, not His enemies [Heb. 12:5-9]. And we are kept by Him, the One who having begun a good work in us will bring it to completion at the day of Christ [Phil 1:6, 1 Cor. 1:8].
These are things every believer can know about themselves, and believe whatever life may or may not bring, because they are grounded in God’s determination to save us through the death of the beloved Son.
And these gospel truths are a light that will guide us through the darkness of disappointment and grief. Where we believe them, and believe the truth of God revealed in His word and confirmed in the death and rising of His Son, we will believe that God will work all things, including those trials and disappointments, for our good, the good of conforming us to the image of His Son and so sharing in His glory [Romans 8:28-30]. And we will reckon with Paul that these things are light and momentary afflictions preparing us for an eternal weight of glory [2 Cor 4:17-18], that the griefs and disappointments of this life are not final, not the last word on our lives. We will know ourselves to be aliens and exiles whose lasting home is the heavenly Jerusalem, and be able by the power of the Spirit to live now as citizens of heaven, to live a life of love like our Lord, a life not paralysed but pressing on to the goal [Heb. 12:1-2], a life not bitter and resentful but thankful for the present experience of God’s love in the conviction of the truth of the gospel and for the sure hope of resurrection Jesus gives us.
“In this world” our Lord said to His disciples in the upper room “you will have tribulation.” And don’t we know the truth of that. But our Lord continued, “take heart, I have overcome the world.” John 16:33 And He will bring us to share in His victory.
