Introduction:
Ephesians 1:11 – who works all things according to the counsel of His will
Romans 8:28 - And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
Three other factors:
- Sin
- Time
- Purpose
God doesn't cause the evil, but He brings something good from it.
When I Choose to Trust that God is in Control... (Genesis 50:15-21)
- I don't need to be in Control. (Gen 50:19)
- I can see the Good He has done. (Gen 50:20)
- I am free to just Love people. (Gen 50:21)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:28-00:29
Genesis chapter 50.
00:29-00:33
We're in week two of a sermon series called Bible Basics.
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And we're going to be, over these next ten weeks, looking at the Bible as a whole.
00:40-00:40
Ten weeks.
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And we're looking at ten people from the Bible that you need to know, and we will be looking at ten lessons that they teach us.
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You and I need to know.
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Last week, we talked about Abraham.
00:54-01:01
Abraham's faith was tested when God told him to sacrifice his son Isaac.
01:02-01:06
Well, we saw that God called that off.
01:06-01:08
It was a test of Abraham's faith.
01:09-01:13
And that Isaac grew up and he had a son named Jacob.
01:14-01:24
And Jacob had 12 sons, and each of those sons had families, and each of those 12 families represent the 12 tribes of Israel.
01:25-01:28
The Bible tells us that Jacob had a favorite son.
01:31-01:38
Now how many people here can totally relate to being the favorite kid in the family?
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How many people can relate to that?
01:40-01:42
Being the favorite kid in the family.
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Do you know? Do you know what it's like?
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Do you know what it's like to be the favorite kid in the family? Do you know?
01:52-02:01
Well, fortunately, we have an expert right here with us today. So, Darren, why don't you tell everyone what it's like to be dad's favorite?
02:07-02:16
Not bitter about that at all. But anyways, Jacob had a favorite son. The Bible doesn't even like sugarcoat that at all.
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It's like, yeah, Joseph was Jacob's favorite kid.
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And I'm going to give you an on-ramp to Genesis 50.
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You ready for a quick Bible study?
02:26-02:31
In Genesis 37, Joseph had these dreams of being exalted over his brothers.
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And how do you think that went over? Not good.
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His brothers hated him for that.
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And his brothers are like, "We've got to do something about it.
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Let's kill him." And maybe killing him is a little extreme.
02:42-02:47
So they actually sold him into slavery and faked his death.
02:50-02:53
And ended up going to Egypt.
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Genesis 39, while Joseph was in Egypt, he actually became very successful.
03:01-03:05
He went from being a slave to being overseer of Potiphar's house.
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Who's Potiphar? He was an officer of the Pharaoh.
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Right? And things were looking good for Joseph, until Potiphar's wife tried to seduce Joseph, and Joseph's like, "I'm not having any of that." And instead she accused him of trying to assault her.
03:29-03:48
Genesis 40, okay, Joseph's put in prison because of these charges against him, horrible charges, he's put in prison, And Joseph is forgotten by someone that he helped, who could have helped him get out of prison.
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Joseph never got bitter.
03:51-03:55
Eventually, chapter 41, he rose to power again, this time over Pharaoh's house.
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Genesis 42, a severe famine brought Joseph's family - you know, the brothers that hated him, tried to get rid of him - The famine brought his brothers back to Egypt, and they didn't recognize him.
04:14-04:23
In a million years, they couldn't have fathomed that little snotty brother that they got rid of ended up becoming one of the most powerful men in the world.
04:25-04:34
Well, in Genesis 45, Joseph revealed who he was, and note this, he forgave his brothers, and he provided for them.
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And we get to Genesis chapter 50, Jacob, Joseph's father, he dies, and now his brothers are worried about revenge.
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I mean, let's be honest here. Can we be honest in church?
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What would you do?
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What would you do if your family did that to you?
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They wanted you dead.
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They sold you into slavery, and you endured years of imprisonment and abuse, and now they're at your mercy.
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They came crawling back to you because they're in a desperate situation.
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What would you do?
05:16-05:18
Well, let's see what Joseph did.
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Look at Genesis 50, verse 15.
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It says, "When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, 'It may be that Joseph will hate us and pay us back for all the evil that we did to him.
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Now when it says they saw that their father was dead, that doesn't just mean they were like, "Oh look, dad's died." What it means is they saw the implications of that.
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Like maybe Joseph has been nice to us because dad's been around.
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But now that dad's gone, Joseph is like, "Here it comes.
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"Now, I'm not worried about honoring dad.
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I'm not worried about what Dad's approval is.
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I'm going to lay the hammer down." That was the thought process they had, despite the fact that Joseph treated them and their families kindly for 17 years.
06:16-06:23
So they sent a message to Joseph saying, "Your father gave this command before he died.
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Say to Joseph, 'Please forgive the transgression of your brothers and their sin, because they did evil to you.
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And now please forgive the transgressions of the servants of the God of your father." Joseph wept when they spoke to him.
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His brothers also came and fell down before him and said, "Behold, we are your servants." Does that sound familiar?
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Sounds like Luke 15, right? The prodigal son.
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I'm not worthy, I'm just your servant." They certainly had that attitude.
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"Behold, we are your servants." Look at verse 19.
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"But Joseph said to them, 'Do not fear, for am I in the place of God?
07:19-07:29
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good to bring it about that many people should be kept alive as they are today.
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So do not fear, I will provide for you and your little ones." Thus he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.
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What makes the difference between thirsty for vengeance and eager to bless?
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The answer is one thing.
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It's trusting God.
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Now the Bible makes this claim, okay?
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The Bible makes this claim that God is sovereign.
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What does sovereign mean? It means He solely reigns over everything.
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Do you realize God is in absolute, 100% complete control of every molecule in this universe?
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There's not a thing that happens that God is unaware of.
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There's not a thing that happens that God is unprepared for.
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And the Bible says that God actually, for His purposes, He is using literally everything in the world to accomplish His purposes.
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In control of everything.
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Ephesians 1.11 says God works, look at this, all things according to the counsel of his will.
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Note the word all.
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How much of what happens does God work to make sure that his will is accomplished?
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All of it, all of it.
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Romans 8.28, a lot of us probably have this memorized, but it certainly applies here.
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And we know that for those who love God, oh, here's that word again, All things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
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I actually don't like that translation of that verse because things don't work.
09:30-09:30
God works.
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God works the things.
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God works what things?
09:33-09:34
God works all things.
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There's not an event that happens anywhere in the universe that makes God say, "Whoops, what am I gonna do now?
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"Wasn't expecting that, wasn't planning that." He's on top of every single thing that happens in every life on this planet.
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Everyone who ever was, everyone who ever will be, God is absolutely in control of every event.
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And I could spend weeks just talking about this concept.
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The Bible says God knows how many hairs you have in your head.
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The Bible says God knows when a bird falls from the sky.
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The Bible says that God knows the words you're going to speak before you speak them.
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Isn't that awesome?
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That's our God.
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But as we're talking about Bible basics here, and we're looking at the life of Joseph, we need to address the most asked question as it pertains to Christianity, the Bible, theology.
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The most asked question is this.
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If God is sovereign, like you're saying that He is, and God is loving, like the worship team just led us to sing that He is, if God is sovereign and God is loving, then why is there so much suffering in the world?
10:58-11:03
As we talk about Joseph, we have to talk about that, right?
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If God is good and God is sovereign, why is there so much suffering?
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Maybe the answer is, maybe He's not good.
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Maybe He's not.
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Maybe God doesn't really care.
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Maybe God doesn't give a rip about what happens to me.
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Wow, the cross of Jesus Christ certainly speaks otherwise to that, doesn't it?
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Or maybe, and this is another idea that's been suggested, that maybe God is good.
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Maybe God sees the suffering, and maybe God's very sad about the suffering, He just can't do anything about it.
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God's just looking down from heaven, just like, "Oh, these poor people.
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I wish I could do something to help them." Well, I want you to hear this.
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Because literally every person at some point in their life wrestles with this question, and I know there are people in this room this question right now, trying to reconcile God's character with the reality of suffering.
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When we try to reconcile God's character with the reality of suffering, hear this, our line of thinking on the subject becomes too narrow because we only think about two things, okay?
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Are we clear here?
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When we approach the subject of suffering and God's character and what is your so much suffering?
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The problem is our thinking is way too narrow because when we think about this subject matter, there's only two things that we think about.
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The two things that we think about are God's goodness and God's sovereignty.
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That makes it a problem for us.
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If God was loving, he'd care enough to do something.
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if God was powerful, he's strong enough to do something.
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So something's wrong here.
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The problem is we're only thinking about two things.
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I want you to jot these down because there are three other factors.
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There's three other factors that I want you to consider when we talk about God's character and when we talk about suffering.
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There's three other things besides his goodness and sovereignty that we need to enter into this conversation because I feel that this is a gross misrepresentation of God when our thinking is too limited.
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Three other factors I want you to consider.
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Number one is sin.
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Number one is sin.
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Free choice.
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Free choice means that some people are going to make bad choices.
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Some people are going to make choices that hurt other people.
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All right?
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And somehow we blame God for them, right?
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Somebody made a choice to hurt somebody else, and our anger is towards the Lord.
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We need to consider sin in this discussion.
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Another thing that we need to consider is time.
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Time.
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We assume that God's doing nothing about suffering because it doesn't look like He's doing something right now.
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Maybe God will deal with suffering in His time, on His schedule.
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Maybe the whole answer to the suffering thing, Maybe God's resolution, the ultimate resolution, maybe that's still coming.
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And I have it on good authority that that is true.
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But come on people, you don't go to the movies.
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You go down and with your popcorn, you sit down and you watch the movie, like 30 minutes into the movie, you're like, well, this stinks.
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The protagonist has been cheated and beaten and the whole world's against him, and then you walk out of the movie 30 minutes into it, going, "Well, that stinks.
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That poor guy just, nothing good ever happened for him." Well, maybe if you make it to the end of the movie, you see things get resolved.
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Or, I know that that illustration's falling on some deaf ears, so I'm gonna use one that you'll get.
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You don't watch two quarters of the Steeler game And then turn it off and say, "Well, Steelers are terrible.
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There's no way they're going to win this one." But somehow, that's what we do with God, right?
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Listen, the story's not over.
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The story's not over.
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So you have to consider time.
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The third thing, and this is what we're going to be talking about today, the third thing you need to consider is purpose.
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When you think about God's character and suffering, another factor you need to consider is purpose.
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What if, what if, what if, what if God uses suffering?
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What if instead of removing suffering, which God could do, right?
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How many think God could totally remove all suffering without even a, yeah, without even getting up from his lazy boy recliner.
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God could remove all suffering from the world.
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But what if God says, "You know, I could do that, "but instead I'm going to do something more awesome.
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"And what I'm going to do is I'll use the suffering "to bring about something awesome and good." You know, that's exactly what he does.
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God doesn't cause evil.
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But He brings something good from it.
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And that's why, here it is church, that's why even when things are at their worst, you can trust God.
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Even when things look horrible, you can trust God because He's chosen to remove suffering, but to promise to bring good from it." Today we're talking about trusting God, right?
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When we talk about trusting God, I can tell you why.
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I can tell you why you should trust God.
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Why? Well, because He loves you.
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Why should you trust God? Because of His track record?
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I can tell you why you should trust God, and I can even tell you in what areas you should trust God.
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You should trust God with your finances, You should trust God with your health.
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You should trust God at the workplace.
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You should trust God in your marriage and parenting, if that applies to you.
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I can tell you what areas you should trust God, but you know, I really can't tell you how to trust God.
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I really can't tell you how.
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Because either you do or you don't.
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It's a choice that you have to make.
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It's the place you have to get when you look at the evidence, you have to choose.
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Either you trust God or you don't, but here's what happens when you make that choice.
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When you choose, when you say, you know what?
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I'm making the choice, I'm trusting God, no matter how things look, here's what happens.
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This is on your outline.
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When I choose to trust that God is in control, that God is sovereign, when I choose to trust God, Number one, I don't need to be in control.
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When I choose to trust that God is in control, I don't need to be in control.
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Look at verse 19 again.
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"Joseph said to them..." Look at his first statement.
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He says, "Do not fear, for am I in the place of God?" Joseph could have had them executed in very brutal and creative ways for all that they did to him.
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Instead, what he says is, "Hey, am I in the place of God?" In other words, Joseph was saying, "Look, he is God and I am not." That's what he's saying.
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You're like, "Pastor Jeff, you totally ripped that off of Joseph, didn't you?" Yeah, I did.
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Well, it's easy to get bitter and then you take it on yourself to make people pay for how they hurt you.
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When you trust God, you're free from bitterness, you're free from retribution, because you can say, "Hey, look, whatever happened to me, or whatever is going to happen to me, God is all over it." But sometimes during times of suffering, you think of a tragedy you see on the news, or maybe some tragedy that happened in your life.
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You know, sometimes people, well-intentioned people, but people try to rush to God's defense during times of tragedy.
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And I'd suggest to you that God doesn't need defense, right?
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But people try to rush to his defense and they say this statement, and we've all said it, but I want to challenge us to maybe rethink saying this.
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This horrible tragedy happens and we come along, this person that's been affected, and we want to encourage them by saying this, God had nothing to do with this.
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And it's almost like we're letting God off the hook.
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Like in case you're mad at God, don't worry God, I got this, I got this.
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I got this, God had nothing to do with this.
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Well, you know that statement's not really comforting, first of all, and it's not really true either.
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Yes, God didn't cause - let's just be honest - God didn't cause the tragedy or the evil that happened.
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He didn't cause it.
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Let's be honest. He could have stopped it, right?
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He could have stopped it.
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I'm not saying that God made those things happen, whether it's one of these terrible mass shootings, one of these school shootings, tragedies that we see.
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God didn't cause it, but you know, He could have stopped it.
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He could have done something.
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But the idea that something happened, some tragedy happened while God was off the clock, denies the very clear teaching of the Bible that He is sovereign over all things.
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And it leaves us to ask ourselves, I wonder what else he's going to miss, right?
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If he wasn't there for the shooting in Vegas, if he missed that, if he had nothing to do with that, what else?
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What else is he going to miss?
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What else is he going to be absent for?
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So he allows things to happen for some reason that you don't know at the time.
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Maybe some things happen to you and to this day you still don't know the reason, but trusting God recognizes the truth that God sees the big picture.
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And because God sees the big picture, the Bible says God sees past, present, and future all at the same time.
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He knows the future as perfectly as He knows the past.
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And if we trust God, we recognize that He sees that, and in seeing that, He's doing what is best.
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God doesn't cause evil, but He brings something good from it.
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You know, it's like when I was a baby.
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When I was a baby, when I say baby I don't just mean like a couple months old, I'm talking about being literally less than a year old.
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I'm talking about, and I remember this, I remember this so well, I was in the womb.
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I remember I was in the womb and I was safe and I was warm.
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My life was perfect in the womb.
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I didn't need a thing.
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You know, one day came a day of intense suffering for me.
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These people that I never met forcefully removed me from my home in the womb!
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They took away everything I've ever known!
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I was yanked, and I was poked, and I was prodded!
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It was awful!
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I cried.
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For months.
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But there was a bigger picture for that day of suffering, wasn't there?
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God used that day of suffering.
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And here I am.
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And now, I look back on that day of incredible suffering.
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I look back on that day, and I not only remember that day, I celebrate that day every single year by eating cake and getting presents.
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You get the point, right?
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I don't really remember that.
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But however I was able to process that in my zero days old mind coming out through the birth process, yeah, it's a brutal and painful thing and it was...
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It didn't make sense at the time.
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But you know, I don't need to be in control.
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Am I in the place of God? I don't need to be in control.
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What I've found, the further I go in life, is I can't really control anything anyways.
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And I don't need to punish people who wrong me.
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I don't need to be God.
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Number two, when I choose to trust that God is in control, I can see the good that He has done.
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Look at verse 20 again.
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"As for you, you meant evil against Me, but God meant it for good to bring it about that many people should be kept alive as they are today." You see, when you have eyes of faith, you can see how God uses hardship, and you can still find things to be thankful for.
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Some of you guys know this story, but one time we were, a few months ago, we were having a class in here, and the custodian of the building, he knocked on the door, and he said, "Hey, I found a wallet in the toilet." And he goes, "I'm just going to trust you to take care of it." So he gives me this completely soaking wet wallet that I...
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Many paper towels and gallons of bleach, I washed my hands, I dried this thing out, I took the driver's license and I found the guy on Facebook.
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And I said, "I have your wallet, we found it in the toilet." And he came to the church, found out he actually goes to the Jiu-Jitsu class up here.
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And he was changing clothes, and the wallet fell out of his clothes and into the toilet.
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So he came to get his wallet, and he's like, "Thanks, man, I really appreciate it." And he opened up his wallet, and he pulled out some cash, and he goes, "I want to give you something for returning my wallet." And I said, "You know what? I can't possibly accept that, because I know where that cash has been.
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Do you have a check?" I did not say that, that just came to me, but that would have been hilarious.
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So I gave him his wallet and I turned around, I walked back into the office and he followed me.
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He sat in my office and I get to share the gospel with him for an hour.
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And he was on this journey and he was going to a church that sort of believes that every religion that teaches anything is all equally valid, and he was really, really searching.
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I got to tell him why Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven, how Jesus Christ is the expression of God's love and the provision of God's holiness.
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And he comes to church here occasionally.
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A friend invited him to another church, and he's been seeking Christ in another church.
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I just spoke with a guy last week, actually, and he told me he's really been digging deep in the Bible and studying it.
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But when I met with him in the office and got to share the gospel with him and explain to him what it means to be a follower of Jesus and receiving Christ, I said, "Who knows, maybe, maybe someday in eternity, you're going to look back and you're going to say, 'You know the best thing that ever happened to me?
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I dropped my wallet in the toilet." That's kind of a funny story because no one was hurt.
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But we clearly see God's sovereignty in that, right?
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What about in Joseph's case?
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Because there's certainly nothing funny about his story.
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The harsh reality is innocent people suffer from the hands of wicked people.
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And at some point, that has happened to you, or it will happen to you, or it will happen to your loved ones.
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Wicked people are going to harm innocent people.
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Child abuse, assault of various kinds.
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I think of people who deceive and steal from the elderly, taking advantage of the very people that we should be honoring.
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Listen, trusting God means that even in times of suffering, you submit to His sovereignty.
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I want you to hear this very closely.
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If you are in an abusive situation, where you are being abused, I am not saying you don't get help. I am not saying that.
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You absolutely should get help.
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Come and see me, and I will do everything in my power to get you out of that situation." I am not saying, "Oh, if you're being abused, it's okay, just trust God." I am not saying that.
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Whether you get help or you do not get help, the point is the same.
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We submit to God's sovereignty.
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Whenever abuse happens, God's going to use it, and when you submit yourself to His authority, when you trust Him by faith, You're going to see it eventually.
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Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday, like Joseph, you're going to look in the rear view mirror of your life, and you say, "You know, that was so hard, but now I see why God allowed that into my life.
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I see how God used it." And right now there might be somebody, even at this point in the message.
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You're like, "What are you saying, Pastor Jeff?
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Are you saying that any time I go through suffering, God is going to use it for something good?" Well, let me tell you something, Pastor Jeff, I think that's a bunch of bunk.
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I think that's garbage. I don't agree with you.
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To that I would say, if that's what you think, then you're never going to see.
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Don't get me wrong, God still will bring some good out of suffering, but you're never going to see it if you refuse to look.
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Why would God allow this suffering that I'm going through right now?
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Oftentimes, church, we're just left trusting that God knows even if we don't see it.
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God doesn't cause evil, but He brings something good from it.
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I thought about this a lot this week.
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I'm not sure that we would understand it, or be willing to accept it, in the moment of suffering anyways.
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What I mean is, if God came to you in your moment of suffering, and explained to you what he was doing with it, I don't think we'd understand it or accept it.
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What do you mean?
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Let's just think about Joseph for a second.
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And could you imagine Joseph accused of trying to sexually assault this woman, put into prison.
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Could you imagine Joseph sitting in the dungeon, and the Lord shows up, and the Lord says, "Hey, I know it's a bummer that you were accused and imprisoned, but this is going to be good for your family." What would Joseph have said?
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What are you talking about?
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How is this good for anybody?
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Joseph had to learn, hey, even if I don't see it now, God's doing something.
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Down the road years later, Joseph, when we get to Genesis chapter, actually 45, he said it, and he says it again in chapter 50, he goes, "Now I see it, I get it.
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God used all of that suffering to put me in this place that he was able to save countless people." Ask God to help your unbelief and give you eyes to see what He's doing.
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And finally, when I choose to trust that God is in control, number three, I'm free to just love people.
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Look at verse 21.
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Joseph says, "So do not fear. I will provide for you and your little ones." Thus he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.
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This point sort of circles back to the first, right?
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You know, when you've been wronged, when you suffer, when somebody takes advantage of you, cheats you, abuses you...
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Well, they need to pay.
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They need to pay for that.
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It's not fair!
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What about everything that I've lost?
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They can't just get away with it!
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Who's going to teach them a lesson?
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And when you trust that God's in control, you're not worried about any of that stuff.
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You say, "You know what? I can just focus on the one thing That's what God wants me to do, and that's to love people.
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That sure simplifies things, doesn't it?
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So like Joseph, when you're suffering, and you need to trust God in a big way, I want to encourage you to take inventory.
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Maybe there's somebody right now, it's like, "I hear what you're saying, and I've heard this stuff before, Romans 8.28, God's going to use my..." "I've heard it all before, and I'm not seeing it.
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I'm not seeing it." I want you to jot some things down here as we close.
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This is how you can take inventory.
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How has God used this?
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That's the question that we're asking, right?
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Okay, God's going to use this for good, in His glory, in my benefit, in the benefit of others.
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How? How has God used this?
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You need to take inventory by asking some questions.
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I'm going to give you the question. I want you to jot them down.
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I want you to keep these handy, because you're going to need these.
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First question is this, "Has God given me something to be thankful for through this?" Despite the suffering, can I find something that God has done that I can point to and say, "You know what? I'm thankful for that.
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Life really stinks right now, but I'm thankful for that." Here's the next question.
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And to me, this is like the ultimate.
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It's number two on this list, but maybe like me, maybe you'll bump it up to number one.
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Has God taught me some things about Himself through this?
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Has God taught me some things about Himself through this?
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Some of you know the life circumstances that Aaron and I find ourselves in, and the struggles that we have the parental department, right?
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And I can tell you there are some things that the Lord has taught me about himself that I never would have learned otherwise.
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I guess that kind of goes back to number one, right?
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I can be thankful for that.
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Here's another question.
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Also kind of flows together, right?
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Has God made me a better person through this?
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Has God made me a better person through this?
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Yeah, this suffering is hard and it stings and I wish otherwise.
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You know, God's taught me to have compassion on other people that are going through things like this.
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God's taught me patience.
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God's developed a stronger work ethic in me.
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Then the fourth question.
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Has God equipped me and given me opportunity to help others who are going through similar things?
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As God brought this about in my life to equip me, and also open doors to use me, give me opportunity to help others who are going through similar things.
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Aaron and I have had so many opportunities to share the gospel, and love people, and meet people, because of the doors He's opened, because of our situation.
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That's a story for another time.
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The story today though is God doesn't cause evil, but He brings something good from it.
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So I'm going to trust Him.
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And right now somebody's still not convinced.
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And it was a full morning.
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If you're not convinced at this point about God's awesomeness and His sovereignty, This is the trump card here. This is it.
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Somebody could be really late to church and walk in now, and this would settle the whole matter just for them, even though they heard nothing else had happened.
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Here's the trump card.
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If you're still like, "I don't see it, Pastor Jeff.
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I don't see how God can take suffering and bring good from it.
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I don't see it." Here's the trump card.
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The cross of Jesus Christ.
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I would suggest to you, if God could take the worst thing that's ever happened in the world, and turn that into the best thing that's ever happened, He can do the same thing for whatever's going on in your life.
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Worst thing that ever happened, not open to interpretation by the way, not open to vote, the worst thing that's ever happened in the world was the fact that God came here, personally, We mocked Him, and we spit on Him, and we beat Him, and we publicly executed Him.
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That is the worst thing that's ever happened in the history of the world.
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But God used that to bring about the greatest good that's ever happened in the history of the world, because it was through the death of Jesus Christ that my sins are forgiven.
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It is through the death of Jesus Christ that your sins can be forgiven.
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So when I'm tempted, and oh, it happens a lot, I'm embarrassed to confess to you, and I have my own little pity party about whatever suffering I'm going through, I look to the cross.
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I'm like, if God can take the worst and turn it into the best, I can take my much lesser struggle and suffering that I'm going through and bring something glorious from that.
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Do you trust Him?
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Let's pray.
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Father in Heaven, so many times we're just like that dad that ran into Jesus with the sick son, and he said to Jesus, "I believe, help my unbelief, God." But when it comes to trusting Your sovereignty, when it comes to trusting how you can turn suffering into good, we believe.
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God, we ask that You help our unbelief, because it is hard to wrap our brains around it sometimes.
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Father, I thank You for the example that You've given us in Joseph.
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All of the horrible things that he went through.
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And You saved countless people through that.
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Father, we look to the New Testament of Jesus Christ, all of the horrible things that happened to Him, and You purchased salvation for all who would believe.
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Father, we stand in awe of Your sovereignty.
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Though you have the power to remove all the suffering like that, you have chosen to make your name more glorious by instead using the worst things to bring about the best things.
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Thank You, Father.
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Give us eyes of faith.
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We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Discussion
WHOLE GROUP
Read Genesis 50:15-21
Do you believe God is sovereign over all that happens, or just some of what happens? Do you believe man's free will can interfere with God's plan? Be honest. How do your beliefs line up with Joseph's in this passage?
God uses evil done to us - ultimately for good. How can a victim of abuse or rape honestly believe God can and will use that for good?
Name a time that you saw God use the actions of an evil person to ultimately bring something good.
BREAKOUT
Tell of the hardest time you've ever had to forgive someone. How did you do it? Pray for one another that you each can have a heart of forgiveness and trust in God's sovereign will.