Thank you, Bob. Perfect. Good evening. If you will turn
to John 16. Sorrow or labor. Prevail. Turn to joy. A handful of faithful men preach
from this passage, from this verse, and about everybody's
titled to the same. That's a pretty common experience,
isn't it? It's the same thing. John 16, several people had reached
out about both messages Sunday, and I'm thankful for that, and
I hope you're thankful for that, too, from around this country. Us preaching the gospel is blessing
God's people. And I hope that makes your labors
a little easier. I was just thinking about sorrows.
We're going to look at that for a minute. The Lord said, you're
going to have some sorrows and I'm going to turn them into joy.
And I thought of that, that time when the Lord come to his people,
there was 11 of them there. And one was 12 total. 11 of them
was his one was a devil. And he took bread and he sat
down with the 12 and he ate with them. And he said, verily I say
unto you that one of you is going to betray me. What if he said that here? What
if he came to me and said, Kevin, one of somebody in this room
is going to betray me. I'm going to before the sun goes down.
And you're lying to yourself if you think you ain't. And they went around the room
and he says they were exceedingly sorrowful. He said, you're going
to be sorrowful. Now I'm going to turn it into
joy. They were exceeding sorrowful and they began, every one of
them to say, Lord, is it I? Why? They knew what they were.
You hear me? That was a moment of sorrow,
isn't it? That's a moment of sorrow. Believers
have sorrow. God said you're going to have
sorrow. I made you sorrowful because of what I said. But I'm
going to turn it into joy. I'm going to turn it into joy. Judas is the one that betrayed
him. And he answered and said, Master, is it I? He said, you
just said it. Came out of your mouth. It's
so. There's times of sorrow and times
of joy. There was an old slave trader.
Some people call him a heretic. He wrote a song called Amazing
Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me, not a
soul like me, not a pretty good fellow like me, a wretch. I once
was lost and now I'm found. I was blind, now I see. That's
a moment of joy, would you agree? You'd agree with that? The same
man, you know the words, you know if I'm gonna quote to you,
don't you? "'Tis a point I long to know. "'Oft it causes anxious
thought.'" You ever been anxious? You ever had sorrow and downness?
"'Do I love the Lord or no? "'Am I his or am I not?' All right, John 16. Verse 16. "'A little while, and
he shall not see me again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because
I go to the Father. And then said some of his disciples
among themselves, what is this that he saith unto us? A little
while, and ye shall not see me, and again, a little while, ye
shall see me, and because I go to the Father. What is he saying?
They said, therefore, what is this he saith a little while?
We cannot tell what he saith. They don't understand what he's
saying, do they? Do you understand everything?
Some people think they do. The apostles didn't. There's a whole lot more. The
more I read, the more I study, the more the Lord reveals to
me, the more I realize I don't know much. I know whom. There's a whole lot of things
we ain't got a handle on, do we? Now, Jesus, verse 19, knew that they
were desirous to ask him. They just itching at, what do
you mean? And they couldn't get the guts up. And he saith unto
them, do ye inquire among yourselves? Of that I said, a little while,
and you shall not see me again in a little while, you shall
see me. I'm thankful as he says these are little whiles. I hope
I remember to tell you this at the end. If the Lord tells, if
you're just gonna have pain, and they say it's gonna last
30 seconds, and then you'll be fine. You say, all right, just
do it. Take a bandaid off, right? If
you know it's gonna be short, it makes it a little more bearable.
I'm going to have a birthday coming up soon. 43 years. I know
I'm a baby, right? Don't despise my youth. Like
that. And it's going to be that fast. I'm going to be 95 and
on a death bed or however old the Lord is pleased to let me
be. And I said, well, that was a vapor, wasn't it? That was
quick. Bob, how long ago was it when
you were 16? That fast? It's quick. Just a little while. A believer, a wise believer of
old said it ain't going to be as long as it has been. We're
on a downhill pull. You'll be all right. A little
while. Imagine God speaking that in your heart. A little while.
Just a little bit. You'll be all right. He said they wanted to ask him,
what do you mean by this? Verse 20, he says, verily, verily,
I say unto you that ye shall weep and lament. but the world's
gonna rejoice. What's coming up, this hour,
he keeps talking about this hour, my hour's not yet come, and he
said, Lord, Father, now's the hour come. He said, the world's
gonna rejoice. I think they won. You're gonna
weep and lament, and you shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow
shall be turned into joy. You're about to go through something
immensely painful, and when the Lord says you're about to be
real sorrowful, I don't think you're gonna go, It's not been
my experience or the experience of believers to go, well, I kind
of feel a little down about that. Uh, you're going to be crushed.
You're going to be crushed. Peter stood up and he said, I'll,
I'll die with ya. And then what happened? What
about good, faithful Peter, huh? A 13 year old girl made him cower. You think he's professing his
love to the Lord when he was like, you know what? I love the
Lord, but no, honey, I don't know him. What's wrong with you?
Cussed a little teenager. And then he mocked eyes with the
Lord and he wept. He was crushed by sin, wasn't
he? Sorrowful. That sorrow you're
gonna have, ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned
into joy. Now, if they didn't realize he's
going to the Father, they ain't gonna see him, and he's coming
back, and we're gonna see him, and you got a handle on that? So
he gives them an illustration. He gives him a parable, as some
would word it, some translations. Gives him an illustration, verse
21. A woman, when she is in travail, hath sorrow, because her hour
is come. My hour is coming. That's what
he's looking for, isn't it? He said, just like the same way,
a woman, when she is in travail, hath sorrow, because her hour
has come. But as soon as she has delivered
the child, she remembereth no more the anguish. For, because,
or joy that a man is born into the world. That's why. We'll be turning here in a second,
but why do women have, why does it hurt when you have babies?
Sin. That's it. That's it. When the
hours come, sometimes 37 hours, sometimes in the middle of the
night, sometimes in the middle of the day, when the hours come or hours, There's
travail because of sin. And when that is put away, life
is there. It's joy. It had to happen. You can't keep it from happening.
That baby's coming out one way or the other, isn't it? There's
going to be life. It's coming out. Pain's going to happen.
And then when it's over, there's joy. There's joy. The Lord bore our grief and our
sorrow and our pain and our sin and us Every tear he kept in
a bottle, and he bore it on that cross, and he died. For a wretch,
you're looking at him. Some people have a real hard
time finding out their pastor's a sinner. You know that? They'll
go through a series of name-calling. It ends up antinomy once you
really get to know them. You say, well, you ain't got no laws on
you at all. I've seen it happen over and over and over again.
And God came in this world to save sinners. I'm chief of them. That's good news, isn't it? Good
news for your sinner. He hung on that cross, and when
that sin was put away, that cause of the travail, life's there
in joys. I'm going to the end of my notes
first. You just get all the good stuff up front. There's no stillborns
from that travail on the cross. He didn't try real hard, and
well, that one ain't gonna make it. I will not lose one, he said. I will not lose one. These apostles
are already troubled. They don't understand what the
Lord's saying. We get it, don't we? We know exactly what he's
saying. He's like, I'm going away, and I'm gonna come back. You'll
see me as I'm walking, and then I'm gonna go to the Lord, and
then I'm coming back again. For everybody, right? We understand
that, but their whole spiritual life When the Lord looked at
him and said, follow me. That's the same thing as saying
live, right? Follow me. From that point until
right now, their entire spiritual life, they've had the Lord physically
in their presence. And he says, I'm not gonna be
with you. And we can't imagine a life without you. That's all we know. Other side
of the coin, us. We, since the Lord gave you life,
you haven't physically, the human body of the Lord Jesus Christ
be with you that whole time. He's with us always, but there's
gonna come a day when I'm gonna stand there and see him face
to face, and he's gonna speak, and I'm gonna hear him, and I'm
gonna worship him, and be in his presence. We're gonna sit
down and eat, and he's gonna serve us. Can you imagine that?
He served them, he washed their feet. They understood that as
far as the physical, what that looks like. We can't enter into
those things. We can't enter into it, can we?
It caused confusion, it caused sorrow for them because they
said, I'm going away. And it don't cause sorrow for us to
say we're going to be with him in glory and be made like him,
conformed to his image, holy and unblameable, unreprovable,
and there'll never be any more sorrow. I believe that, but that
causes confusion because my brain can't enter into it. It's so,
I believe it. We have a hard time understanding
it, don't we? Peter said, whom having not seen ye love, whom
now you see him not yet believing, ye rejoice with joy. And he gives
the magnitude of that joy. He says, unspeakable. Peter called
it unspeakable joy and full of glory. I hope I can, I'm gonna
try to speak about it. It's an unspeakable joy. Amazing grace. But we have to
tell somebody, don't we? I hope he'll let me. The context
of what we're looking at here in John 16, remember this is
all the same night, the Lord's speaking to his 11, that he's
gonna send out in the world, and he's bore the brunt of everything
up to this point, and he said, now it's your turn. He's speaking
concerning preaching. You're gonna go out, I'm gonna
leave, that's what I'm gonna do, but now you're gonna be left,
and you're gonna be here to preach, and you're gonna have some sorrow
while you're doing that. but I'll turn it into joy. He says
there in verse two, he said, they shall put you out of the
synagogues, yea, in the time cometh that whosoever killeth
you will think that he doeth God service. I could go down
a list of faithful preachers in our generation right now that
there's people lined up, said we can just get them out of that
pulpit, we'd be doing God a favor. It was legal, we'd kill them.
That's sorrowful, isn't it? It's not a surprise, the Lord
told us it was gonna happen, but there's sorrow involved,
isn't it? This is all the same night. And just like a father
does to his children. My dad did that. I think the
Lord laid it on his heart. He was going home soon. And he
tried to tell me everything he could before he left. I turned 18 and he was like,
I got to teach you how to mix gas to put in weed eaters. I
said, dad, I've been mixing gas to put in weed eaters for 15
years. I was four years old. I don't know how to do that.
He said, just hush and listen. Our Lord's with his people and
he's giving them a lot of instruction. And he says, you ain't going
to understand it now, it's going to sink in later. He says in verse four,
he said, but these things have I told you that when the time
shall come, you may remember that I told you of them. And
these things I said not unto you at the beginning, because
I was with you. There's going to come a time you don't understand
right now, but just wait, wait, and the Lord's going to reveal
it to you. He's going to teach his people. We always think we're
gonna be the ones that's gonna teach him. He has to. He's gonna
carry it out. Remember verse six, he says,
because I've said these things unto you, sorrow hath filled
your heart. Sorrow has. But remember, he gives that illustration
of a woman in travail. If you will, look back at Genesis
three. Look here in Genesis chapter
three. Here's the first mentioned these travails that
are going to take place. This is Genesis 3 verse 9. And
the Lord God called unto Adam and said unto him, where art
thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden. I was afraid
because I was naked and I hid myself. And he said, who told
you that you was naked? Hast thou eaten of the tree wherever
I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat? And the man said, the
woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave me of the tree
and I did eat. That ain't his wife, is it? He
didn't say, my darling beloved. He said, that woman, and you
gave her to me. And Lord God said unto the woman,
what is this thou hast done? And the woman said, the serpent
beguiled me, and I did eat. And Lord God said unto the serpent,
because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle
and above every beast of the field, and upon thy belly shalt
thou go, and thus shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.
And I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between
thy seed and her seed. It shall bruise thy head, and
thou shalt bruise his heel. That's the hour our Lord's getting
ready to come to, isn't he? Back in our text. But he says
unto the woman, verse 16, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and
thy conception. In sorrow thou shalt bring forth
children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall
have rule over thee. We know that Paul wrote to us
there at Church of Ephesus, there in Ephesians 5, and he says,
wives, submit unto your own husbands. Did he say submit to every husband
you can find on the internet? He said, submit to your own husbands,
didn't he? And then he says later on there in verse 32, he says,
this is a great mystery. His husband loves you, wives,
as Christ loved the church. He said, all this is a great
mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and his church. I speak
concerning Christ and his church. What was he telling those apostles?
He's talking to him about preaching, wasn't he? He said, they're going
to kick you out of the synagogues and you're going to have sorrow.
You're going to be sorrowful because I'm gone and now you got to preach by
yourselves. But I'm going to turn that into
joy. You're going to go out and labor and travail and life's
going to come of it and you're going to be happy about it. That's
what he's telling these apostles. We sorrow because of sin. when
life's formed in us, don't we? I mean, hey, we got caught before
the Lord works in somebody. We ought not do bad things. Everybody
knows that, right? But whenever life's put in us,
when life's formed in us, then we know what sin is. That's what
he just said earlier, we looked at last week, because we didn't
believe him. It's concerning him. We broke some rules written
down on a piece of paper. We sinned against the holy God.
And that new life knows that there's sorrow there, isn't it?
Oh, Robert Hawker got it right, concerning Rachel, when he said,
she said, if it be so, why am I thus? If there is life in me,
why is there a war going on? She asked other people, are you
having the same thing going on? And there wasn't a set of twins
ever recorded being on this earth, was there? And the Lord said,
I'll tell you why, there's two nations in you. just like there's
two nations in John Newton, and just like there's two nations
inside of every child of God in this generation right now.
Worrying, isn't it? It's sorrowful, isn't it? Turn
over to Genesis 21. That's only one third. The Lord
also told us there in John that the Holy Spirit's gonna come,
the Comforter's gonna come, and he's gonna convict the world
of sin. That's sorrowful. That's only one third of what
his job is, isn't it? What he declared in that section.
He's going to convict the world of sin because they believe not
on me. And he's going to convict the world of judgment and of righteousness. I got them
out of order, but you know what I mean? There's joyous things.
He's the one that's righteous. I can't be. He is. He was righteous
for his people. We're made him. And judgment,
well, if I mess this up, it's settled. Court case is over. There's no double jeopardy. It
can't be. Everything's been done. That's two joyful things, isn't
it? Is that sorrow and two joys? That's good, isn't it? Look here
in Genesis 21 verse 1. And the Lord visited Sarah as
he had said, and the Lord said unto Sarah as he had spoken.
For Sarah conceived and bare Abraham a son in his old age,
at the set time of which God had spoken to him. And Abraham
called the name of his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah
bare to him, Isaac. And Abraham circumcised his son
Isaac, being eight days old as God had commanded him. And Abraham
was 100 years old when his son Isaac was born unto him. And
Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear
will laugh with me. And she said, who would have
said unto Abraham that Sarah should have given children suck,
for I have born him a son in his old age? Can you believe
that? She laughed once before, remember
looking at that? She's outside the tent, and I said, Sarah's
gonna have a child. She snickered, and he looked at Abraham and
said, why is she laughing? She said, I didn't laugh. Yeah, you
did. See, he doesn't speak to her, did he? Well, she's laughing
now, and she said, who'd have thought it? There's life now. There's joy now, isn't it? Oh,
that sorrow. It went 89 years of my life,
and I haven't had a child. And I can't have children now,
I'm way past the time. And then she does have life in
her and nine months of travail and sorrow and uncomfortableness
and all that stuff. And she's of age, isn't she? We always
think it's so amazing that Sarah was given strength at her age
to conceive. That's amazing. And then she carried that child
to term all the way. And then guess what? There wasn't
no epidurals and nerve blocks and everything else. No laughing
gas. This 90-year-old woman gave birth to a child, naturally. The pain and the travail and
the sorrow that comes with that. And then, there was joy then,
but then she was given the strength to feed that child. She breastfed
this child. And then she was given strength
to raise the child. Imagine a 92-year-old woman chasing
a two-year-old around and teaching them. Stop that. What you doing?
Put that down. No, put that down. She was given all that strength,
wasn't she? Made to laugh, made to rejoice. And the Lord made
her have sorrow, and then he turned that sorrow into joy. That's a picture of what we're
doing here. God gave us a command. Go out
in all the world, preach the gospel, and wear his church,
and through his bride, Life's born. We see it happen sometimes,
don't we? A child comes in and the Lord
gives life to that bride, doesn't he? And then he has to give the
strength to conceive that because we can't do it by ourselves.
And he has to give strength to grow that child because we can't
grow them. And he has to give strength for us to use kind words
to them and not correct them all the time and not beat a little
baby to death. Because we'll beat one to death.
He has to give us strength to remember those things. It's all
of Him. I heard a man say one time, he
goes, I'll never forget the day the Lord saved me. And I said,
you might. You might. The Lord might take your mind
from you. What's His word say? He goes, can't a woman forget
her sucking child? Can Sarah forget her child? He
said, she sure can. He said, but I am not going to
forget you. You know what I bet old Brother
Newton read? After he said, do I love the
Lord or no? Herein is love. The other John wrote that. I
worked on an article for this weekend. Herein is love. Not
that we loved him, but that God loved us and he sent his son
to be propitiation for our sins. That's love. That's love. And when we see that, we decrease
and he increases. Or it's a math formula and a
theology, a seminary or something. I don't know what to tell you.
That's dead. Life that he gives decreases. We grow down and he
goes up. He has to do that, doesn't he?
All this amazing stuff physically that happened to Sarah, how much
more amazing is it that we're given spiritual life? Talk about the miracle of life.
That's amazing. That's amazing grace. How's that
take place? Well, you're going to have to
believe him. You're going to have to hear about him, ain't
you? And for somebody to talk about him, he's going to have
to give them a voice to speak and give you ears to hear. And
they're going to have to be sent, isn't it? And then what are they
going to do when they show up? Here's what Paul said. My little
children, got them children, didn't he? Of whom I travail
in birth again until Christ be formed in you. You get that? He labored. Laboring for a message
and laboring to care for people and laboring when to call and
comfort and when to leave them alone and get out of the way
and don't muddy up the waters when God's working. Because there might be life in
them. Maybe, just maybe. And if it be so, Lord, why am
I thus? And he says, hush, there's two
nations in you. You'll be all right. Take this
thorn from me, Lord. My grace is sufficient. You got
to trust me. That's what he says. I tell you what, God's taught
me that and teaching me that, and I think he'll keep teaching
me that. And when he does, I don't just clap my hands all day long.
It's wonderful. There's sorrow. and he turns
it into joy. You know what happened when Moses
and them come to that water at Marah as bitter? And they said,
we can't drink this water. And he took the wood and threw
it in the water. They didn't turn the dam on and
get rid of all the water and then put fresh water in there,
did they? He turned that water into sweetness, didn't he? Whenever
he went to that wedding at Cana, that first miracle performed,
he didn't say dump out all them barrels and put some wine in
them. He turned that water into wine. And when the Lord works
in his people, that sorrow you feel, that emptiness, and Lord,
your mercies are clean, gone forever, and I'm alone, and I,
where are you? And then he shows his son, the
sorrow you went through, boy, it's all joy now, isn't it? It's
all joy. And then same thing in Providence.
You go through this life, and this trial's so hard, and I'm
never gonna make it, and the boat's gonna sink, and ah! And
what's your experience if you've known the Lord more than six
minutes? You look back 15 years and say, oh, I'm thankful for
that. Even those times before the Lord ever revealed himself
to me, my entire life leading up to this exact point, he's
good, he's right, he's holy, and he's just. And I ain't, and
he come to die for a sinner. That's joyful. He's on his throne.
I'm happy, I'm happy. And us, like little tiny children,
shut the door, shut the door, shut the door. Give it three
seconds and then we're back to, oh no, another trial's coming,
what am I gonna do? And we learn our unfaithfulness
when we see how faithful he is. You see that? He ain't never,
whenever Peter said, I'm faithful, I ain't never gonna leave. And
then Peter told that girl that, right? And he looked over and
he said, right there, it says the Lord faithful. That's him, not me, not me, that's
self-righteousness. Him, him, he's all, A double
L. And you know what he did? His
father, before time, put me in him. And that's unbelievable. And that's a, what word you got?
Made one with him. And everything, all that evil
that I am, that I'm housed in right now, he was made that.
And all the preciousness, and the joy, and the sweetness that
he is. That's what we're made. God the
Father looks on us and says, wonderful. Coming to my presence, well done. That's amazing. That's unspeakable
joy. He reveals that to somebody's
heart, isn't it? Give yourself over lock, stock, and barrel.
It's all yours, isn't it? We desire to know him more. Speaking of gaining wisdom, Solomon
said, for much wisdom is much grief. He that increaseth knowledge,
increaseth sorrow. Lord said, you're going to see
a lot of joys in this earth, boys, but you're going to have some
sorrow. And all the time it turns into sorrow, I'm going to turn
it right back into joy again. He's going to prove his word
to be true to us. And Paul said, I said, this has involved
the preachers of the gospel and the Lord's church and conceiving
children. He told there in Thessaloniki, so we give thanks to God always
for you making mention of you in our prayers, remembering without
ceasing your work of faith, your labor, your travail of love. Hmm. Turn over first Corinthians 12
real quick. First Corinthians 12. Paul was writing the church at
Corinth, and he was describing the body of Christ, his church,
both in that location, in that generation, in that time, and
throughout time. And he was saying, we're many members, but we're
one body. And then, if everybody was an eye, that ain't gonna
do no good. If everybody was a big toe, that
ain't a body. It's just a bunch of big toes,
isn't it? He was explaining that to them. And he says in verse
22, nay, much more those members of the body which seem to be
more feeble, are necessary. Those sorrows, those going through
sorrows, those that's going through trouble, those going through
grief, the one that seems the weakest among you, he said they're necessary. They're necessary. And those
members of the body which think to be less honorable, upon these
bestow, we bestow more abundant honor. And our uncomely parts
have more abundant comeliness. He says, for our comely parts
have no need, but God hath tempered the body together. having given
it more abundant honor to that part which lacked. And there
should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have
the same care one for another." He comes to us and he gives us
personal sorrow, and he turns that into joy, and it works in
us. We're going to run to be with
those that have the same father, don't we? We
want to run to those in the same shit. And he says in verse 26,
and whether one member suffer, They have sorrows. All the members
suffer with it. And if one member be honored
and all members rejoice with it. That's what I, he was warning
those apostles. And he said, you're going to
kick you out of the synagogues. They're going to run you out
of town, excommunicate you and call you a heretic and whisper
like Satan into your ear and say, you ain't a child of God.
What are you doing? You ain't a preacher. Get out of here. And the whole body suffers when
that happens. If you know somebody to be a
true minister, I wrote down a bunch of names. I know several pastors
right now. They're trying to run them out of town and kill
them if they could. That hurts me. That hurts you
when you hear about it, doesn't it? Those things are sad, because
we're one body. And we share one another's sorrows.
And those trials that we go through, Paul says it so plainly, it's
for all of us. If somebody comes down with cancer
and gets ate up, that's for you, and that's for me, and that's
for them and their kids or whoever, the whole body. It's for the
whole body. And the Lord's gonna turn it
into joy. He's gonna turn it into joy. He said in our text,
verily, verily, I say unto you, that you shall weep and lament,
but the world shall rejoice. Everyone else have a good time.
And you shall be sorrowful, but your sorrows shall be turned
into joy. Why? What makes those sufferings
and sorrows so bearable? We see his sufferings, don't
we? He bore us. That's what makes
it so tolerable. Paul said in Philippians 3, that
I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship
of his sufferings. A servant's not above his master,
is he? He said that in John 15. They persecute me, they're going
to persecute you. being made conformed to his death.
Isaiah was sorrowful. He went to the Lord and he said,
who hath believed our report? And whom has the Lord, arm of
the Lord revealed? And he said, he shall grow up before him as
a tender plant, the arm of the Lord. And as a root out of dry
ground, he hath no form will come in us. And when we shall
see him, there's no beauty in him that will desire of him.
He'll be despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows. I think I got it rough. I saw a child of God one day
just crying because of their sorrows in this life. And they
said, if this hurts that bad, imagine how my Lord felt on a
cross when he bore me. He was the man of sorrows acquainted
with grief, and we, as it were, we hid our faces from him. He was despised and we esteemed
him not. It goes on in Isaiah 53, 11, he said, the father,
he shall see the travail, that's the labor, that's the sorrow,
that's the toil. He shall see the travail of his
soul and shall be satisfied. That propitiation because the
Lord loved us, that acceptable bloody sacrifice, that mercy
seat, he satisfied him, satisfied everything. Knowledge shall be
by his knowledge. So my righteous servant justify
many for he shall bear their iniquities. There's no stillborn
children from that labor on the cross. It's in Hebrews 12, where for
seeing, we also are compassed about so great a cloud of witnesses.
Let us here's what we can do. Let us lay aside every weight.
and the sin which does so easily beset us, that our unbelief,
this can't be real, could it? And let us run with patience
the race that's set before us. Looking unto Jesus, the author
and the finisher of our faith, who for the joy, didn't we just
read about all the sorrow and the travail of his soul? For
the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame and has sat
down at the right hand of the throne of God. When you get a chance, look in
Luke 24 and read about those that are walking that seven miles
back to a village called Emmaus. And they were real sad, weren't
they? And they said, this is it. We thought he's going to
sit on a throne. We thought for sure that was him and he died
and he's gone and we don't see him no more. And he said, what
manner of communication are these that you have one another? Why
are you sad? What's wrong with you? And they said, you're from out
of town. Don't you know what's going on? He said, Jesus of Nazareth, a
prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,
the chief priests, they went and killed him. They crucified
him. And we trust that he's going to redeem us. They didn't understand he just
did. And they were astonished. So those
women went there, they said, that tomb's empty, but I ain't
taking their word for it. He said, oh, fools and slow of
heart to believe all the prophets have spoken. I'll not cross to
have suffered these things and to enter into his glory. And
he began at Moses and he went through and showed himself. I
said, you know, that seed of the woman that she's going to
prevail and things. That's me. Yeah. Passover lamb. It's me. He's told him that's the Christ,
but that's the Messiah. The brazen serpent, that's him.
He's lifted up. The scarlet lion, that's him.
The kinsman redeemer, that's him. And then what happened?
They sat down and he blessed the bread and he broke it. He
broke the bread. What are we supposed to do when
that bread's broken? We remember his body broken, don't we? We
remember him. Why do you remember? Because
you forgot. And he said, do this in remembrance of me. And he
handed it to them, and they realized it was him. And he's gone. And they said one to another.
He vanished out of their sight and said one to another, did
not our hearts burn within us? You know what that's called? Worship. That's called worship. Somebody told me one time, I
said, I don't know what you're talking about, that ain't right.
I said, well, your heart ain't never burned in you. I don't want to tell you. You
might have had some sorrows or some down times, but when that
sorrows turned into joy, they were so down, and then they heard
Christ, and they heard Christ preach, and they heard Christ preach,
and then he was revealed to them, joy. Their hearts burned within
them while he walked. And you know what they did? They
rose up as soon as they had a work done in them, and they ran seven
miles back to Jerusalem to what? To the other 11. If He's turned our sorrow into
joy, I want to be with somebody, because He ain't physically with
us like He was with the apostles. I want to be with you, who He's
turned your sorrow into joy, too. I'm going to huddle up with
you. What would you leave in a mess?
I don't care. It don't matter. I'm going to go where the Lord's
people are, if it burns in us, don't it? Our hearts are made to burn.
We gather together with those whose hearts burn, too. One day, that's what happens
now, that preaching of Christ and the travail and the labor
that you all get up early in the morning and go to work so
you can provide for this work here and do these hard things. You stay up late at night and
you've got to get dressed to come to church on Wednesdays
and on Sundays and you pray and you ask the Lord to be with us
and bring a spirit and to call out his people and everything
he's promised to do. But we ask him, we inquire of him, don't
we? And then he does it. But this is a vapor. It's only
a little while, remember that? It's just a little while, it's
gonna be over. Then what? What about the suffering and
joy then? It said in Revelation 21, God shall wipe away all tears
from their eyes and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow. Neither sorrow, only joy. That's
a little while, isn't it? That's just a little while. It
might be this evening. Could you imagine if he come
now? We get seen but be made like him. And you talk about
your heartburn any then we worship him in pure innocence without
seeing as he ought to be worshiped. That's worship. And. Lord has
the day come nevertheless, Lord, come, come. I pray all of you
who suffer. And I know a lot of you do because
you tell me about it. You have sufferings in the body of the
mind, or the heart, or the flesh, or the family, or something.
All of you who suffer for his namesake, I hope it's turned
into joy for you, unspeakable joy. I know it will be. If you're
his, he suffered for you, it will be. I know it. I know it
to be true. I pray does it now. Let's give
you a foretaste, doesn't it? Make us see now. That'd be sweet,
wouldn't it? That's pretty good. Father, we're thankful for the
patience, unimaginable long suffering you
have towards your people and the mercy that makes us both
sorrowful and joyful at the same time. Lord, we know the cost
for you to be just and to justify them and how thankful we are. Well,
when the trials come and the suffering comes and sorrows come, Make us remember the words of
our Lord, our King, and his faithfulness, and forgive us our unbelief and
our sin. Carry us, Lord, as you've promised you will till we're
made like him. Be with our brethren that aren't
here with us, and be with our brethren you haven't made alive
yet. Mature us, Lord. Raise up men and raise up women
in this congregation That you, through sorrows given wisdom,
to speak rightly and comfortably and peaceably and make us patient
to deal with those that are so young and so tender, Lord. Use
us for your glory. We thank you and we ask you these
things only because of our Redeemer, his person and his work. Amen.