Why Does God Allow Christians To Have Problems
1 Peter 4:12-13
Sometimes it takes a painful experience to make us change our ways. Sometimes God has to wake us up because we’re cruising down the highway of life headed in the wrong direction. Sometimes God has to light a fire under us and things become uncomfortable. As someone has said, “If we don’t change when we see the light, we change when we feel the heat.”
Introduction
Two peasant hunters were walking along a fence row a little before dark. It was getting pretty close to quitting time and they were thinking about calling it a day. Suddenly, one of them stopped and looked down at the ground. “Wow! Come over and look at this! I nearly stepped right in it!” The other hunter stepped through the fence and came over to see what it was that was so interesting. There, right in the other hunter’s path, was a hole about three feet in diameter. “It looks pretty deep I wonder how deep it is,” the first hunter questioned. “Let’s get a pebble and toss it in to see how long it takes to hit bottom.” One of them found a pebble and tossed it in. No sound of hitting bottom was heard. “Let’s get a bigger rock,” one of them said. They looked around until they found a rock about the size of a bowling ball, which they tossed in the hole. They listened as it crashed down, hitting first one side and then the other, but they never heard it hit bottom. “Wow, if I had fallen into that I would never have gotten out!” the first hunter said. “Here, let’s try this,” said the second hunter. He had found an old railroad tie, which he lifted up and pushed into the hole. They listen as the beam fell, crashing it’s way down. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a white goat came charging by them and jumped right down into the hole after the railroad tie. Both men were flabbergasted. “Can you believe that,” said one of them. “That goat jumped right down the hole!” As they stood there wondering what was going on, a farmer approached. “Either of you boys seen a white goat? I’ve been looking for him and can’t find him.” “Well, as a matter of fact, yes, a white goat just came running by us a minute ago out of nowhere and jumped into that hole right there.” The farmer replied, “Oh, well, that couldn’t have been my goat. I had him tied up to a railroad tie...” That goat had a serious problem!
I suspect that some of you might, from time to time, feel a bit like that goat must have felt - tied to a heavy weight, headed for the bottom of who-knows-what. Life’s problems can feel that way. All of us have problems and some of them can seem pretty hopeless and overwhelming when we’re in the midst of them. Though God hasn’t revealed everything there may be to know on the subject of problems, He does have reasons for allowing troubles to come into our lives. In fact, it could be said that He has given us problems for our good, both here and hereafter. Many people think that when they go through problems God is mad at them, or, perhaps, he has abandoned them. They think, “I must be out of the will of God or these things wouldn’t be happening to me.” That kind of reasoning is often wrong. Many times problems are exactly God’s will for our lives. If that statement perplexes you, stick with me. You’ll probably learn some things from this message.
Please turn with me to 1 Pet 4:12-13 and listen to the Apostle Peter on the subject:
12 Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal among you, which comes upon you for your testing, as though some strange thing were happening to you; 13 but to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing; so that also at the revelation of His glory, you may rejoice with exultation. (NAS)
Listen to these verses in one of the more contemporary versions: “Friends, when life gets really difficult, don’t jump to the conclusion that God isn’t on the job. Instead, be glad that you are in the very thick of what Christ experienced. This is a spiritual refining process, with glory just around the corner.”
(1) Sometimes it is within God’s will that we have problems. I cannot think of a single godly person described by the Bible who didn’t have at least some difficulties in life, can you? In a day when there are those preaching a misleading message that says, “Become a Christian and God will take away all your troubles,” this isn’t a popular word to speak, but it is true, nonetheless. Of course, God’s purpose is always greater than our problems, no matter what we’re going through. That is a critical point to remember. Someone says, “What is God’s purpose?” In this message, I want to share with you five ways that God uses problems in our lives for good.
1. Problems Give Us Direction.
Sounds strange, doesn’t it? God often uses problems to point us in a new direction. Proverbs 20:30 in the Good News Bible says, “Sometimes it takes a painful experience to make us change our ways.” When I was little I was fascinated by the embankment that was at the edge of our back yard. The only problem was, at the foot of it, there was a two lane roadway where cars sped by at full speed. My mom had said, “David, you stay back from that bank!” Of course, you can guess the direction I wanted to go each time I was in the back yard. I wanted to head for that bank. Then one day my mom caught me at the edge. I had dropped one of my cowboy boots over the side and was trying to get it back. I had a serious problem! To this day I have never forgotten the spanking she gave me or the lesson I learned. I never went next to the bank again, even though I continued to play in the yard. The painful experience caused me to change my ways. Saul of Tarsus was a Jew who hated Christians. He considered it his number one mission in life to crush Christianity. To make things worse, he thought it was God’s will. One day he was headed north, from Jerusalem, toward Damascus, with warrants for the arrests of some Christians who had fled there. Not only was his direction due north, he was also headed in the opposite direction of God’s will. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a bright light flashed in the sky and blinded him. He had to be led by the hand into the city of Damascus. He was blind for three days, perhaps wondering if he would ever see again. If you know the story, you know that God restored his sight and he became a champion for the Christian cause, the great Apostle Paul who wrote two-thirds of your New Testament. But God had to turn him around and he did it by giving him a serious problem. Sometimes it takes a painful experience to make us change our ways. Sometimes God has to wake us up because we’re cruising down the highway of life headed in the wrong direction. Sometimes God has to light a fire under us and things become uncomfortable. As someone has said, “If we don’t change when we see the light, we change when we feel the heat.” God told Jonah to go to Nineveh and preach. That was due east of where he was. Instead of doing what he was told, Jonah boarded a ship headed for Tarshish, which was due west. God had to redirect him, so he sent him on a little submarine cruise. When he got off that trip three days later, he was headed in the right direction. Paul told the Corinthian church after he had roughed them up a bit verbally, “I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance...”
Repentance is a change of direction.
A good question to ask yourself when a problem hits is “Where is this problem leading me?” Problems seldom leave you where they found you.
2. Problems Test Us.
Someone has said, “People are a lot like tea bags, you don’t know what’s in them until you drop them in hot water.” In Deuteronomy 8:2, God told Israel, “And you shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not.” (NAS) The key words there are “testing you.” It takes about two weeks to march from Egypt to Israel, yet it took Israel forty years to make that trip. God was testing them. Time and time again God tested them to see if they were ready to go into the promised land. Every time they failed the test He turned them back. They spent forty years because they never passed the test. Has God ever used a problem to test you? Surely He has! He may be doing it right now. Are you passing the test? Our text said, “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal among you, which comes upon you for your testing...” God sometimes uses problems to inspect us. James spoke of what our attitude should be during these times of testing when he wrote these words in James 1:2-3: “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.” (NAS) This testing by problems is a necessary part of our growth as Christians. You might notice in that verse that it doesn’t say if you encounter trials, it says when. We can’t always predict when these testing trials will come nor even what shape they will take. But we do know this: They will come and God does have a purpose in them. The Bible compares suffering with a refiner’s fire. To get the impurities out of gold and silver, it must be heated to a high temperature. It literally burns off the impurities. That is what Peter was referring to when he wrote, in I Pet. 1:6-7: “In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” (NAS) God uses problems to test us. Here is a question for you: If you’re having problems right now (remember they are for our testing), what are they revealing about you? Are you trusting God, that He knows best, or are you chafing and complaining and doubting and fearing? Believe me, I understand every one of those wrong responses. I’ve had them, too. But I know that God wants me to grow beyond them.
3. Problems Protect Us.
What? Now that’s a new wrinkle! Sometimes a problem is a blessing in disguise. Like the case of a certain man who had been asked to do some unethical business practice for the company he worked for. He was a Christian, so he told them he couldn’t do it. He was fired on the spot! He did the right thing, and now was suffering for it. Is that fair? Before you answer that, you need to hear the rest of the story. Two weeks later all the top management of that company were on the front page of the national newspapers and were sent to prison. Now what’s fair? Sometimes God uses a problem to protect us from a bigger problem. If you are one of His, he does that whether you understand it or not. The classic example in the Bible is Joseph. His eleven brothers hated him. His dad favored him somewhat and that made them hate him even more. One day they ganged up on him and sold him into slavery. Then they went home and told their dad that a wild animal had devoured him. But that wasn’t the end of the problem for Joseph. He was resold in Egypt to an owner whose wife tried to seduce him. When he refused on the grounds that she was married, she accused him of rape. As a result he was thrown in jail for two years for a crime he didn’t commit. From his perspective, it must have looked pretty bleak. Who would have blamed him for giving up on God? Of course, if you know the story, you know that God was positioning him to be raised up as second in command of Egypt. He would be put in charge of gathering grain for a coming famine that would force his brothers to bring their whole family to Egypt so they could survive. Most people with that kind of undeserved problems would probably have had those hateful brothers beheaded! But not Joseph. When he confronted them, instead of taking vengeance, he said in Genesis 50:20, “And as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive.” (NAS) Though all of Joseph’s problems, God was actually protecting him and his family from destruction. You will be hurt in life. Count on it. People (sometimes even those closest to you) are going to hurt you. When they do it, their motives may be evil. But God intends and allows it for good! He will turn it around and bring good out of it if you respond to Him in faith and trust Him in the midst of the problems. Is it possible that God is protecting you right now from something you don’t see? Only time will tell.
4. Problems Discipline Us.
Life is a school, problems are the curriculum, and eternal life is the diploma. David wrote in Psalm 119:67: “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep Thy word.” (NAS) Later in that same Psalm, in verse 71, he wrote, “It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I may learn Thy statutes.”(NAS) David saw that problems were just what he needed! The key word there is learn. We learn far more through suffering than we do through success. Charles Spurgeon looked back upon dark hours in his own life and said: “I bear willing witness that I owe more to the fire, and the hammer, and the file, than to anything else in my Lord’s workshop. I sometimes question whether I have ever learned anything except through the rod. When my schoolroom is darkened, I see most.” Why is that statement so common to all our experiences? I don’t know for sure, but I think it has something to do with being centered on ourselves and our own things while we tend to ignore God and His things. Many of us learned the meaning of the word “hot” by touching the stove. Mom’s warnings just weren’t enough, though they should have been. Some of us learned the value of money only when we got into debt over our heads and had to crawl out. We often learn the value of friendship only after we have mourned the loss of a friend. Some of us have learned the value of marriage only after going through a divorce, and the value of health only after we’ve abused it. Why is that? We’re stubborn. We just refuse to learn it any other way. The Living Bible paraphrases that verse I just read in Psalm 119:71 this way: “The punishment you gave me was the best thing that could have happened to me, for it taught me to pay attention to your laws. They are more valuable to me than millions in silver and gold!” (TLB) This kind of correction, the Bible calls discipline. The Hebrew writer referred to it this way in Hebrews 12:7: “It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline?” (NAS) This kind of correction or discipline is one of the proofs that you’re one of God’s children! He doesn’t let us sin and sin and sin and get away with it. I don’t discipline my neighbor’s kids because they’re not mine. I do discipline my kids because I love them and want the best for them because they’re mine. When we experience this kind of problem that is rooted in discipline, rather than thinking, “God must really hate me,” or “I must not even be one of his children,” we should take it as proof that we are His! The next time a problem chops you off at the socks, instead of starting the “Why me?” pity party, why not stop and think, “What is God trying to get through to me? What is the loving message He is trying to tell me in this?” Isn’t it true that the child who learns most quickly experiences the least discipline? It is the bratty, stubborn, selfish, inattentive child who gets the most spankings. The one who whines and cries and never gets the message. God may want to teach you something in the problem you are facing or may soon be facing. He may want to expose a weakness or a blind spot or show a character defect in you. In your problem, whatever it is, never forget that He corrects you because He loves you.
5. Problems Help Us Grow.
Romans 5:3-4 says, “And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope...” (NAS) Ken Taylor in the Living Bible, paraphrases that this way: “We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they are good for us—they help us learn to be patient. And patience develops strength of character in us and helps us trust God more each time we use it until finally our hope and faith are strong and steady.” (TLB) God uses problems to develop character in our lives. You are like a diamond on the rough. So God comes along with a problem, the same way a diamond cutter would with a chisel and hammer and works on that part of your life. If the rough spot doesn’t fall off, he just gets a bigger hammer or a sharper chisel. Who knows, it might even take a jackhammer with some of us! With some even an atomic bomb! Whatever it takes. God has one purpose in your life - He wants you to be like Christ. He’s preparing you to be a good witness here and a good citizen for eternity. He is far more concerned for your character development than He is about your momentary comfort! Let me repeat that: He is far more concerned for your character development than He is about your momentary comfort! The Bible says in Hebrews 2:10 that the Author of our Salvation (Jesus) was perfected through sufferings. What makes us think that we’re any different? God uses problems to perfect us.
Conclusion
Really, I guess we could say that this sermon is a test of your faith. A person just might say, after hearing a message like this, “Well. You certainly made it clear! And now that I know the way it is, I’ve decided I don’t want any part of it. I’m through being a Christian! I quit!” Or, perhaps a non-Christian might say, “I don’t want any part of that!” Yes, you can surely do it that way. But before you take off and leave God, consider the alternative. Are the lives of unbelievers free from problems? You know they aren’t. On any given day I could cite to you a half dozen people right off the top of my head who are unbelievers who are going through tremendous problems. The primary difference between them and us is that they are facing their problems alone, without God. All they have to depend on are human resources. Ask one of them what the purpose of his suffering is. He won’t have an answer. Ask him what hope he has and the only thing he’ll be able to cite is that he hopes it will be over soon. He can’t say, like a Christian can, “God is using this problem to give me direction” or “God is testing me right now to see if I’m ready for something bigger and better,” or “God saw that I, as one of His children, needed a little discipline, so that is what He’s doing.” The unbeliever cannot say, like the believer can, “God is protecting me from something down the road that I can’t see right now.” He cannot say, like the Christian, “God is making me grow in my character for life now and life to come.” No, the unbeliever can say nothing of the sort. He has no hope. He cannot trust, because he has no one in whom to place his trust. So may I ask you candidly, do you want to face your problems with God or without Him? If you say “with Him,” then I encourage you to stay faithful. If God isn’t a part of your life, you need to do something about it right away. You need to come to Him on His terms. You need to become a Christian. You see, beyond the problems of this life, there is one big problem looming in all of our futures. It is called judgement. You need the forgiveness offered through Christ if you hope to make it through. The scariest problem in the Bible is the one spoken of in Matthew 25:46: “And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” (NAS) Today is the day of salvation! Don’t put it off.