Several of my dear brethren and
they have been suffering trouble. Some have health trouble. Some have family trouble, being
rejected for the gospel sake. Some have employment trouble.
Some have sorrow from the passing of a dear believer. And when
suffering comes, I tend to read the book of Job. John Gill said
that Job is a preeminent type of our Lord Jesus Christ. Both
of them were great and rich beyond comparison in the beginning. And then both of them suffered
the deepest poverty and suffering, and Christ infinitely more than
Job did, even more than Job did. And then, in the end, they both
were blessed with greater riches than they had before. Christ
went back to glory. He came as the Son of God. He
went back as the God-man. He went back the head of and
anointed head of his church and with all his people. So he went
back with much more than he came with in that sense. So he is
a type. But I hope tonight not only to
speak of Job but of our Redeemer. And I hope this will be a comfort
to you as you hear it. Now I want to focus our attention
on this statement that Job made in verse 10. Job chapter 2 verse
10. Job says, shall we receive good
at the hand of God and shall we not receive evil? Shall we
receive good at the hand of God and shall we not receive evil? Our subject is receiving good
and evil from God. Now most people would have a
very strong objection to say that evil comes from the hand
of God. But this is so. This is what
the Scriptures teach throughout the Scriptures. And by God's
grace, the believer is brought to thank God for our troubles
just like we thank Him for the good things He gives us. That's
all by grace. We don't like to suffer. I don't
like it. You don't. and we don't want to suffer. And the only way we really go
through it is by God's grace. But He will bring His child to
thank Him, even for the trouble that we suffer. Now, I want to
show you three things. I want to first deal with God's
sovereignty, and then see how God brings good from evil. And
then lastly, try to look at a few reasons why believers suffer. evil. First of all, God controls
the good and the evil. God controls both the good and
the evil. Thy God reigneth. That means
everything's in His control. He has unlimited sovereignty
over all things. That's the essence of being God. Nobody's above Him. Nobody's
competing with Him. for sovereignty. He is over all. He created everything for Himself.
Revelation 4.11, He said, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive
glory and honor and power. For Thou hast created all things,
and for Thy pleasure they are and were created. Everything. He made everything. Satan was
an angel created by God. And he was cast out of heaven
with a host of angels because he rebelled against God. But
God created him, and he's going to work God's good pleasure.
That's all he can do. Look over at 1 Chronicles 29.
Look at verse 11. I can't turn to all these Scriptures,
but I want to show you a few of them. 1 Chronicles 29. And look at verse 11. Thine, O Lord, is the greatness,
and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty. For all that is in the heaven
and in the earth is Thine. Thine is the kingdom, O Lord,
and Thou art exalted as head above all. Both riches and honor
come of Thee, and thou reignest over all. And in thine hand is
power and might, and in thine hand it is to make great and
to give strength unto all." Look over at 1 Samuel chapter 2. God's not a
spectator. The government is on Christ's
shoulder. And our God and our Savior, our
King and our Savior is ruling everything and reigning over
all. His dominion is an everlasting dominion. And His kingdom is
from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth
are reputed as nothing. He doeth according to His will
in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth
and none can stay His hand And none can say to him, what doest
thou? That's Christ. That's our God. He rules everything. After tornadoes
and hurricanes and floods, you hear people say, well, God didn't
do this. The scripture says, the Lord
sitteth on the flood like a king sits on his throne. Scripture
says the Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm
and the clouds are the dust of his feet and Even the smallest
things he controls of a little tiny sparrow He said he shall
not fall on the ground without your father But of his children
of his elect. He says even the very hairs of
your head are all numbered from the least little thing to the
greatest thing. It's easy to see His sovereign
hand in a storm, in a tornado or hurricane. But even in minute
details like the hair of your head, He's controlling that too. He controls everything. Look
here in 1 Samuel 2 verse 6. The Lord killeth and maketh alive.
He bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up. The Lord maketh
poor, and maketh rich. He bringeth low, and lifteth
up. He raises up the poor out of the dust, and lifts up the
beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to
make them inherit the throne of glory. For the pillars of
the earth are the Lord's, and He has set the world upon them.
He will keep the feet of His saints, and the wicked shall
be silent in darkness. For by strength shall no man
prevail." Brethren, don't ever, don't just strike it from your
vocabulary or say anything like, I'm lucky or I've been unlucky. There's no such thing. There's
no such thing as luck or chance. God controls everything that
comes to pass. That's dishonoring to God to
say, attribute something to luck or chance. God's ruling it. He rules everything. And He rules
even the evil. He said in Amos 3.6, Shall there
be evil in a city and the Lord hath not done it? Shall there be evil in a city
and the Lord hath not done it? In Isaiah 45.7, He said, I form
the light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things. Now that's His Word, that's what
He says, I do all these things. Now understand this, the evil
that's committed is not from God, He's not committing evil,
no sin is going to come from God, He's just in everything
He does. The judge of the earth shall
do right. But Satan and sinners are the
ones from whom the sin comes, the evil comes. But see, God
controls Satan and He controls all sinners. So no evil is going
to come forth unless God, it's God's will and God's decree for
it to come forth. We can see that here in our text
if you want to go back to Job 1. You know, when Peter was talking
about the devil, he said he walks about seeking whom he may devour. He has to have permission. And then with sinners, you know,
it says, the kings of the earth stood up and the rulers gathered
together against the Lord, against His Christ. But what did they
do? Whatsoever His hand had determined
before to be done. It was wickedness that came from
their hands when they crucified God. But they only did what He
permitted them to do. They only fulfilled His will,
what He had determined before for them to do. Look here in
Job 1.8. I read that to you in the first of our chapter 2, but
here we see it again, verse 8. He said, The Lord said unto Satan,
Hast thou considered My servant Job? The Lord asked him, Have
you considered Job? There's none like him in the
earth. He's a perfect and upright man, one that feareth God and
escheweth evil. Then Satan answered the Lord.
Now listen to what Satan said. Does Job fear God for naught? Does he fear you for nothing?
Has not thou made a hedge about him? See, Satan couldn't touch
him. God had a hedge around him. And
about his house and about all that he hath on every side, God
was protecting him from Satan. Thou hast blessed the work of
his hands. And his substance is increased in the land. That's
how Job had everything he possessed. God gave it to him. But put forth
thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he'll curse
thee to thy face. And the Lord said to Satan, Behold, all that
he hath is in your power. I'm giving you permission. Only
upon himself put not forth thine hand. God drew a line. He said you can't go beyond this
point right here. You can't put your hand on it.
but you can touch his substance. And so Satan went forth from
the presence of the Lord. So God's the one that gave Job
everything he had. And God's the one that took it
all away, including his children. And he used Tornado, he used
Sabaeans, he used Chaldeans, he used Satan. God used some
second causes, but Job didn't attribute the glory to the second
causes. He attributed the glory to God.
Look in verse Job 121. Job worshipped and he said, naked
came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither
the Lord gave. The Lord did, and the Lord hath
taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
And all this Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly. Now
after this, God gave Satan permission to touch his flesh. And so now
Job's covered from the sole of his foot to the crown of his
head. He's covered in leprosy and boils. And he's got a piece
of a pot, a shard from a pot, and he's scraping his skin where
those boils are. Sitting in the dust. And now
his wife's coming. She's saying, are you still maintaining
this integrity? Why don't you curse God and die?
And with all this now, he still says, shall we receive good at
the hand of the Lord and not evil? You see what he says? Shall we receive all those good
things from God and not receive this trouble that I'm facing?
He knew where it came from. So we see here, brethren, everything
that comes to pass is from God. Now let me show you this second
thing here. I want you to consider the good things God's given you
who believe. The good things He's given to
you. And as you consider the good things He's given to you,
I want you to notice that these good things came from evil. They came through evil. God gave us His Son, His unspeakable
gift. Why? That's something very good
that God gave us, unspeakably good, His Son. Now why did He
give His Son? Well, Adam, Satan, entered the
garden, begot Eve. And Adam sinned. And when he
did, the whole human race was plunged into sin. All of us were. And because of that, God sent
forth the last Adam. The last Adam. We wouldn't have
known the last Adam. We wouldn't have known Christ
His Son if sin hadn't entered in. And like Job's wife, she
tried to save Job from that suffering. She's trying to stop him from
suffering this. Just curse God and die. Just
be done with it. Don't go through this suffering.
Peter did something like that with Christ. He didn't want Christ
to go to the cross. Remember he tried. Oh no! You're
not going to go to that cross. And you know who was behind Job's
wife and who was behind Peter's objection? Satan was. Christ
said, get behind me, Satan. And Job said, shall I receive
good at the hand of the Lord and shall I not receive evil?
Christ said, this cup which my Father has given me, shall I
not drink it? And so Christ went to that cross. Wicked men with
wicked hands did everything that they wanted to in their heart
to Him. God permitted them to do what
was in their heart. And He suffered greatly at their
hands. Greatly at their hands. And He
did that to declare the very righteousness of God to His people.
He did that to show forth the righteousness of God. Was it
evil in what was happening? Oh, it was extremely evil. But
God was bringing good from that. He was showing His righteousness
in that. Christ bore our sin and He bore
our shame. That troublesome, evil thing
that He hated, He bore that. Why? To carry them all away. To carry our sins away. Was that
a good thing? Yes, it was good. Christ went
to that cross and was made a curse for us. Why was He made a curse
for us? To redeem us from that curse.
Christ was forsaken of God the Father, left hanging there in
darkness. Why? So that none of His people
will ever be forsaken by God again. He arose from the dead and sat
down at God's right hand. And no greater good can you receive,
no greater good can you receive than to have eternal life from
the Lord Jesus Christ. And that came to us through much
trouble, through much evil. You know the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes
He became poor, that through His poverty you might be made
rich. Brethren, was God in control
when Satan entered the garden? When Satan beguiled Eve and then
Adam sinned and we fell in Adam, was that evil? Did it cause us to sin? Did it
cause us to become sinners? Was that troublesome to you and
me? Was that evil? Did God give that? Yeah, He gave
that. But you see, if it wasn't for
that sin, if it wasn't for Him giving that evil, you and I wouldn't
know the good of having eternal salvation in Christ our Redeemer.
We wouldn't know it. God worked it for the good of
His people. That's why He did it. Why He
did it all. The good news of God being in
control of all evil, the good news of that is He's in control
of all good. And He can, from that evil, He
can bring all good out of it. See, if He's not sovereign over
one, He's not going to be sovereign over the other. Isn't that good
news to know He's sovereign over the evil? He can bring good out
of it, because He's sovereign. He's able. He's able. What about
this? What about the fact that you
had temporal life? Where'd that come from? God gave
it. He gave you your first birth.
It was in your mother's womb. It was by God. And you came forth
by God. And yet, what were you when you
were conceived in your mother's womb? Nothing but sin. Evil. That's all we were. And we came
forth, and all we ever did during our days of rebellion, all we
ever did was evil. Remember when God looked upon
the children of men in Noah's day? And He said, the thoughts
of the imagination of their hearts is only evil continually. That's all we brought forth.
That's all we were. And yet, if it wouldn't have
been for that, we wouldn't know the greatness of God's irresistible
and preserving grace to us through Christ's blood. We wouldn't even
know about that if we hadn't been sinners. What about this? By His grace,
God gave us the gospel. Sovereignly sent you the gospel,
made you hear the gospel, gave you spiritual life, and gave
you faith in Christ. But I'll tell you this, when
He started that work, that didn't come as good news to you at first.
It came as trouble. Great trouble. A sovereign God
who does with His own what He will? You've never heard that
before. A God who can choose whom He will and pass by whom
He will and we can't question Him? That was foreign to us. A God who comes forth in human
flesh and lays down His life and redeems a limited number
of people, God's elect, and them only? That message is hated by
men. And that came forth as trouble
to us. To be told our will didn't help us and we weren't going
to be able to do anything to help God out, that God irresistibly
gives life and saves and calls us his son, to be told that all
we are is unwilling, and unable, and unprofitable, and none good,
none righteous, no not one. I'll tell you what that came
across as. Evil. It came to you as trouble in
the beginning. And when God started breaking that stony heart, I
guarantee you what happened. He starts stripping you of all
your righteousnesses, and all that you thought was good, and
all that you thought would commend you to God. That was trouble.
That was troublesome to us. It was to me. It brought you
down, brought you down, kept bringing you down. Every time
you'd try to think you found a loophole, He'd close it. And
it just kept on, kept on, kept on, until you didn't have anything
to hold on to. And then He showed you Christ.
But you see, you wouldn't have had that, you wouldn't have seen
the glory of His grace and the majesty of Christ and what He's
accomplished by His finished work, if God hadn't showed you
what an awful, horrible, evil, wicked sinner you are. We wouldn't
be able to say this. Who made Cathedra differ from
another? And what do you have that you didn't receive? We wouldn't
even have a clue about that if it wasn't for God saving us from
us, from our sins. Right now, all around us. Go to Romans chapter 9. Right
now, all around us, you see all this wickedness going on and
you see in religion and out of religion. You see these politicians
now. I just hate that we have to have
it on TV for another six months. But you see it all and you hear
this blasphemous, evil message of universal atonement. A message
of Christ who died but didn't accomplish anything by it. Man's
will has to make his blood effectual. That's blasphemy against God. That's evil. Why does God permit
that to be in the world? You know that's a gift to us
just like everything else is? Why did He do that? Why does
He permit that to go on? It's all in His control, every
bit of it. Why does He do that? Look here
at Romans 9 verse 22. What if God, willing to show His wrath and to make
His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels
of wrath fitted to destruction, that He might make known the
riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had aforeprepared
unto glory, even us whom He hath called, not of the Jews only,
but also of the Gentiles? They're there to show us this
great contrast. There's no difference in me and
you and the rebel that hates God. There's no difference in
our flesh. But God shows you the riches of His grace to you.
He calls you out. I had somebody the other day
call me after a message or wrote me an email after a message.
And they said, now, did I hear you right in the message that
the reason that God chooses some and passes by other. One of the
reasons is to show His child of mercy what great grace He's
shown them. I said, that's one reason for
what Romans 9 says. And I think they found delight
in it. I think this person was delighting in that for the first
time. I hope so. I hope they were. But they got
it. They understood it. And I didn't
even read that text or speak on that. They just got that from
what I was preaching. And that's so, that's why God
does it, to show mercy, great mercy to His people. By giving
Christ and giving His people all this great trouble, God shows
us so great salvation that He's worked for us. But you wouldn't
see it if it wasn't for this great evil. You'd see it in contrast
with it. Now let me show you lastly, why
does God give us evil and trouble to suffer? Why does He do that?
The physician will tell you, tell a believer that he's got
a disease and he's sick. And it's troublesome. That's
trouble. That's troublesome. Can't sleep. It's just trouble. You know, it's easy for you right
now to sit here and think, oh, he's slaving me, I'll trust him.
But you don't have that trouble right now, to you personally. It's come to a lot of my brethren.
It's come to my family. It hasn't come to me personally.
It's easy for me to say, though He slayed me, I'll trust Him.
But I do know this, when that time comes, when you need more
grace, He gives more grace. That's the only way you'll suffer.
When you know that loved one, when they've gone on to be with
the Lord, the believers, passed on to be with the Lord, and you
miss them, and you're sorrowful, you're troubled, or you... Incomes cut off, or you're rejected
by family because of this gospel. It's troublesome. Those things
are trouble to us. Why did God give that? Why does
He give that? And then you got your own flesh.
You got your sinful flesh that just, oh, it's troublesome. Why
did He leave us in this body of death? Well, first of all,
God sends trouble to humble us. To humble us. We get to thinking
You know, for instance, He's going to make you think. You
get to thinking that you've got something beautiful about you,
and He's going to show you what you are. He's going to remind
you again the ugliness of your sin. And you get to thinking,
you know, I'm patient. I'm patient. I've got some patience.
The Lord's given me some patience. Well, so He'll give you some
trouble where you need patience, and then you'll find yourself
murmuring. They don't have any patience at all. Or you get to
thinking you're strong in faith, you know. Maybe you wouldn't
dare say it. Maybe you say, I wouldn't dare
think something like that. But you would think, you know,
why doesn't that brother, why isn't he stronger? And all we're
saying by that is, why isn't he like me? I'm strong in faith. So God gives you some trouble
and waits until your faith just withers away. And you call out
on Him to help me. Lord, help me. You see, when
He does that, He makes you see your weakness. And when He makes
you see your weakness, there's really no place for a believer
to go except for down at His feet, humble before Him, asking
mercy from Him. That's what it's for. That's
what the trouble's for. God gives us trouble then also
to correct His child. to correct his child. He doesn't
chasten all men, just his children. Everybody suffers trouble, but
it's not all chastening from God. But he does chasten his child.
He's not angry with us. He doesn't do anything in anger
towards his child. He poured out the fury of His
wrath on Christ in the room instead of His people and satisfied His
justice so His people have no sin in Christ anymore. But when
we start going our own way and thinking our own thoughts and
walking to where we, if we were left there, we'd separate, we
separated from Him. And so He corrects us so that
we continue to be partakers of His holiness. That's what he
said in Hebrews 12. Whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth. Children, I know you don't think,
most of you are older now, but you still can be chastened by
your father and mother. And you think when they chasten
you, you think, well, if they loved me, they wouldn't do this.
No. The reason they do it is because they love you. Whom the
Lord loves, he chastens. and he scourgeth every son whom
he receiveth." If you endure chastening, God's dealing with
you as with a son, as a child. And we had fathers, he said,
that chastened us for their own pleasure, but God does it for
our profit, that we might be partakers of His holiness. Keep you looking to Christ, keep
you trusting Christ and not looking away. The worst thing in the
world you could do You start trying to clean a dirty floor
with a dirty mop, and He's not going to let you start trying
to sanctify yourself with your old dirty flesh. He's going to
keep you looking to Christ, our sanctifier and our sanctification.
Now, whatever the trial is that's come to you, don't start looking
at the second causes and going, well, you know, if I'd have done
this or hadn't have done that, or if this would have happened
or that would have happened. Well, all that might be true and learn
from it, but look to God your Heavenly Father who's correcting
you for your good and go to him and thank him for the correction.
You ever had a child after you've corrected them? You ever had
a child later come and thank you for that? That's a sweet
thing. Thank you for correcting them.
Go thank him. He's treating you like a son.
He's being a faithful father to you. Thank him for that. That's
not usually what comes to our mind when the trouble comes,
though. We're troubled by it. We start having questioning thoughts. Oh, go thank God for the trouble. And then He sends us trouble
to teach us to bow to Him, to His will, and to exalt Him. He
said in Psalm 46.10, Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the heathen.
I will be exalted in the earth. That's just so. We're never to
judge God with our finite reason. And that's what, when we have
trouble, real trouble, that's what we start doing. We start
trying, why did you do this God? We don't need to sit in judgment
of what God's doing. We got a limited understanding.
And God's doing things that we can't comprehend the wisdom behind
what He's doing. If it comes to pass, you can
rest assured of this. If it comes to pass, it's because
it is God's will. Men will say, this wasn't God's
will. If it happened, it's God's will.
That's just so. Or He wouldn't have permitted
it to come to pass. It's God's will. Even the wicked acts of
wicked men. Listen to Proverbs 19, 21. There
are many devices in a man's heart, nevertheless the counsel of the
Lord that shall stand. Surely the wrath of man shall
praise thee, the remainder thereof shalt thou restrain. If it's
come to pass and it's wrath and it's rebellion and you see it
and you think that's just evil, if it came to pass, it's God's
will. Well, I don't understand that. I can't figure that out
how He's working that for His people and for His glory. I told
Will on the way over here, I'm going to preach a message soon
just for him. Stop trying to figure out everything
and understand everything about God and believe Him. I'm preaching something right
now that I don't understand. I'm preaching something I can't
tell you how God can work things The wrath of man is coming to
pass, and yet He bring good at it. But I look at Calvary's cross
and see that He did it. He did it. And if He did it there,
I know He's doing it now too. To sum it up, here's the thing.
The Lord's place is on His throne. Our place is at His feet. The
Lord's place is to govern. Our place is to bow. The Lord's
place is to do as He will. Our place is to delight that
it's so. Aren't you glad God does as He will? Like I said, it's easy to sit
here and say it now, because I'm not in the heat of trouble
myself, personally. But I can tell you this, if you're
His child, I do know He gives more grace. You see believers
go through sickness and right up to the time they die. And
you see them just have this grace that they, you know, he's not
going to give you dying grace till you die. He's not going
to give you grace to make it through the cancer till you got
the cancer. He's not going to give you grace
to be rejected by men till you're rejected by men. But when you
need it, He's infinitely full of grace, and He'll give it. He'll give it. Now here's the
sum of it all. What I'm saying to you is, God
gives His child evil for our good. It's always for our good. Romans 8, 28. We know that all
things work together for good to them that love God, to them
who are the called according to His purpose. It's very common
now when something happens, people will say, everything happens
for a reason. That's man's version of what
I just read to you. God's version of it is, we know
that all things work together for good to them that love God,
to them who are the called. That's all. Just to them. According to God's purpose. according
to God's purpose. Look over at Job 42. I want to
end with this. The last thing that it says in
this book about Job. Listen to this. Job 42.12. So the Lord blessed the latter
end of Job more than his beginning, The Lord blessed the latter end
of Job more than his beginning. But you know what he had to do?
He had to go through that trial to get there. Isn't that what
he said? He that endures temptation, he
that endures trial, the Lord will give him the crown of life. And I tell you this, when the
believer comes to that ultimate trial, when we come to that final
ultimate trial where we have to We've passed through death. When we've come to the end of
that trial, I guarantee you what's going to be said of every believer,
every single one of us. When we've passed through death,
that trial's over, it's going to be said of us, the Lord blessed
the latter end more than the beginning. We're going to stand
before Christ complete, not one be lost, and hear that heavenly
host and praise Him and glory in Him. And for once, we'll be
able to praise Him and worship Him without any hindrance from
sin whatsoever. And we'll be able to say, the
Lord blessed the latter end more than the beginning. And I can
tell you this right now, it might be hard if you're suffering a
trial, if you just started into it, or if you're in the thick
of it, or whatever, it might be hard until you're brought
out of it, but I guarantee you this, That's so of the end of
this trial right now, whatever it is. I don't care. If you're
a child of God, whatever it is, the end of it will be in Christ,
by Christ, seeing Him, being drawn to Him, being brought into
subjection to God more, made to love Him more, and to be humbled
at His feet more, and to have all your care on Him more, or
to be in His presence. Whatever the case may be, you're
going to say, the Lord blessed the latter end more than the
beginning. I pray God will bless that. Let's pray together. Our
Father, we thank you. It's so difficult for us. We
don't like suffering and we don't like trouble. But Lord, we thank you that it's
in your hand, that you rule in everything and you're in control
of every single thing that comes to pass. Lord, that's great comfort for
your people. Just like You've always done
good for us in everything, everything Christ did at that
cross, all that wickedness, Lord, You brought glory to Your name
and good to Your people. Make us see that this trial is
for that. Make Your people be comforted
by Your sovereign, gracious hand. Make them to know, Lord, that
You You rule in the waves just like you rule the sunshine. Whatever you do, it will be right,
it will be glorious, glorifying the Christ, and it will be good,
so good for you people. Forgive us, Lord, of our sin
and our murmuring and our questioning. Make us now just rest in your
hand. So easier for a child to rest
than it is to kick against a father. Make us to rest, Lord. We ask
it in Christ's name. Amen.