"The Test of Suffering Well"

These are my notes from this morning's sermon. Kristen Paulick was skyped in from Thailand where she and Hope are working with young girls involved in the sex trafficking culture.

James 1:1-4

Authentic faith will have opposition

In older culture, they were concerned about doctrinal fidelity
In recent culture we have been concerned with doctrinal authenticity
There was a chasm between preachers and the audience
Today...Are we real to the point that it's an idol? Is it authentic?
Sometimes churches who are "real"...bands,jeans,etc. can be less authentic than the church that has hymns and liturgy.

In the book of James it defines what real authenticity is.

Do you love God for what you imagine Him to be or for what He really is?

Are you pleased with his character and do you love every part of it?

Do you love holiness as well as grace?

Do you look at God for how he saves you or are you more concerned with how he can damn you?

Who do you love more than God?

Test of Enduring Trials

There are various trials ..all of us experience different trials at different degrees


1. Inward..our thought lives, our emotions

2. Circumstantial trials...work,school,

3. Relational trials..dissonance between us and family,friends,coworkers

We may experience all of these at once

It's not a question of if...it's when

How do we deal with trials?

1. Transpose it to joy. Acts 5:40; Acts 16
This can seem like "Pie in the Sky" theology. Really? joy? how do I do that?
Joy is never found in how trials FEEL to you...joy is knowing what it DOES for you

2. Understand the reason. Steadfastness=endurance
Matthew 5:10;12
Luke 6:22-23
Romans 8:18
Testing=stamping us with authenticity

3. Surrender to the process
We are to be transformed people
He wants to equip us so that we are lacking in nothing
When the heat gets turned up..we want to speed God along..the risk of this? Lowering our standards.
Job 23