Deeper Than Our Deepest Need
Notes
Transcript
Preliminary:
Preliminary:
Invite to 1 Peter 5.
Read 1 Peter 5:10
10 But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.
Introduction
Introduction
Humanity is based on needs
Physical needs - we need water, we need oxygen, we need food proper exercise and diet
Emotional needs - Psychologist have determined there are at least 9 basic emotional needs
Security
Meaning & Purpose
Intimacy - friendship/connection
Attention - both given and recieved
Privacy
Status - Sense of status within social groups
Control - having autonomy and control
Community
Achievement
Spiritual needs - The National Institute of Health have condensed our spiritual needs to four main topics (Now please understand these are from a naturalistic and pluralistic perspective)
Religious Orientation (i.e., faith, praying, trust in God)
Insight/Wisdom (which is an existential issue, i.e., insight and truth, beauty and goodness, search for existential answers)
Conscious Interactions (i.e., conscious interactions with others, self, and environment, compassion and generosity)
Transcendence conviction (i.e., belief in the existence of higher beings, rebirth of man/soul)
As humans we tend to focus on only one or two of our basic needs and the others are just kind of hanging out there lonely and unmet.
Our text, let me remind you says
10 But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.
Speaks to this fact in a powerful way
I want to focus in on two words in this text - I will try to explain it fully as we go - but two words jump out at us this morning
Suffer
Perfect (make you)
A few years ago Tim Challies a prominent Christian blogger and speaker experienced first hand the idea of suffering.
His son who was studying for the ministry one day, out of the blue, with no warning signs or symptoms fell down dead
He wrote very transparently about his pain, struggles, darkness, unanswerable questions that “suffering” Peter is talking about
Recently he wrote a statement that I think speaks volumes about human suffering
We are so prone to make such a mess of our lives—so prone to be wasteful with the good gifts that God has given us. And then life in this world has its ways of grieving and harming us even apart from our own sin. - Tim Challies
Suffering is defined by Merriam Webster as:
“conscious endurance of pain or distress.”
Someone has said:
Suffering is wanting what you don’t have and having what you don’t want
In our passage this morning - we find Peter a disciple of Jesus Christ and a leader in the early church telling the Christians - whoever would listen that troublesome times come our way.
Now he isn’t just speaking plattitudes and sweet sounding phrases - he is talking to a people who are being severely persecuted because of their belief and faith in Christ.
He is telling them to hold on - to endure - that as hard as it seems right now - as unbearable as the pain is, as awful as the agony is - as unspeakable the sorrow - it is temporary
I love that little clause scattered throughout the Bible in different forms
“and it came to pass”
Peter uses the phrase “a little while”
I have often said, “a minute depends on which side of the bathroom door you are on”
But in reality our suffering though fully realized and acknoweldged when compared to time and eternity really isn’t that long.
Last night I was listening to an interview of Helen Roseveare a missionary doctor back several years ago found herself working in Congo in the midst of a political upheaval.
She was captured, beaten, abused, raped, and endured unspeakable things.
Years after the ordeal she told in this interview now at the age of 85
“suffering's so tiny-- to get in perspective for me five months and i've lived 85 years...what's five months it's terribly small”
I was blown away with that type of thinking. A lady who endured more pain and agony in five months than I probably will in my life time and to her it was “terribly small????”
Now she was not belittling suffering
I’m not attempting to belittle suffering
I’m trying to get us to see that suffering is temporary “it’s an a-while event”
The suffering is accompanied by a promise - I love that -
10 But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.
There are four verbs in the English translation of the Bible - you can define each one separately, they each have slightly varying meanings and technical nuances - but in reality the first word in the KJV sums up what it is about -
To make you perfect
Now I’m not meaning “perfect” beyond the ability to make mistakes - I’m talking “perfect” as maturing or growing from the pain.
George H Morrison on his writing of this verse translated the word “perfect” and rightfully so - the evidence is there as ...
“mending nets” So you could translate this “The God of grace, whatever else he may do, will mend your nets for you”
Morrison writes:
Nets are often broken through encountering some jagged obstacle—caught by some obstruction in the deep and, clearing themselves free of it, are torn. It may be a piece of wreckage in the sea. It may be the sharp edge of some familiar reef that has been swept clear of its seaweed by the storm. But whatever it is, the net drags over it, is caught and torn, and, tearing itself free, it gapes disfigured like some wounded thing.
Are there no human lives like that? Maybe a hidden and surprising sin does it, maybe a sudden and overwhelming sorrow; it may be the ruin of a cherished friendship or the wreckage of a love that meant the world or some swift insight into another’s baseness where we dreamed there was sincerity. In such an hour as that the net is torn. There is a tearing of the very heartstrings. Faith is shattered, and God is but a name, and life seems the shallowest of delusions. For always, when we lose our faith in people, there falls a shadow on our faith in God, so that the very stars seem to have no master, and goodness seems only the mockery of a dream.
The torn net entails missing the riches that are at hand on every side. And that was the pity of the useless net—all that was precious was so near at hand and yet might have been a thousand miles away.
We have sinned, and we have sinned greatly. We have done our very best to spoil our lives. We have wasted time and squandered opportunity and been unloving and utterly unworthy. Thanks be to God, in spite of all that—and of things that may be darker than that—the broken net is going to be mended. He forgives us completely, he is pledged to save us completely. Deeper than our deepest need are the infinite depths of his compassion. It is in such a faith that we give him our lives, which are so torn and ragged, assured that his grace will be sufficient for us and his power made perfect in our weakness. God’s hands are powerful and can grasp tremendously when the wind is high and the waves are raging. But his hands, too, with a delicacy infinite and with tenderness, can mend the broken net on life’s shore.
Peter is saying your nets have been broken and torn - but HE IS THE NET MENDER
THE HEALER OF BROKEN HEARTS
We carry around tons of emotional baggage and pain...
“Who decided it was called “emotional baggage” and not “griefcase”???”
Readers Digest July 22
We carry all of this around
hurt
sorrow
pain
unmet needs and expectations
but do you know just prior to this Peter says something even greater - he says we don’t have to carry it around -
7 Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.
He want to share the load, mend your net, heal your heart
It was Fanny Crosby the tremendous blind hymn writer, who had endured tremendous pain, abandonment, sorrow, loss
wrote that beautiful stanza...
Down in the human heart,
Crushed by the tempter,
Feelings lie buried that grace can restore;
Touched by a loving heart, wakened by kindness,
Chords that were broken will vibrate once more.
A chord here is not talking about a string, or the wires on the end of a device to charge or power it up
She’s talking in musical terms
Chords are made up of at least three tones or pitches
and if one of those pitches or tones are off - the chord is broken
Or if it is on a guitar or harp and some of the strings are missing - the chord will be off key, out of tune, incomplete - it will be broken
Broken Chords can vibrate again
Why because God is deeper than our deepest need
Our brokenness is within his power and help to heal
The God of all grace
The God of all help
The God of all healing
even though you suffer, have pain, scars, tears, sorrow, torn nets and broken chords
He can meet the need -
Often we assume that God is unable to work in spite of our weakness, mistakes, and sins. We forget that God is a specialist; he is well able to work our failures into his plans. - Erwin W. Lutzer
1 Peter 5:10 (KJV 1900)
10 But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, ...mend your nets