Telling the Truth

Announcer: Today, Jill Briscoe concludes her message, "Trusting in Trouble," and shows you Christ is your most compelling reason to trust God in the middle of your trials and sorrows. That's coming right up.

When life's storms suddenly come your way, how do you respond? Do you doubt God's presence, questioning his concern for you, or do you see storms as part of God's plan for your life and rest assured he cares for you and is in control of all things?

We want to help you trust in God's care and control in all the storms you face by sending you Jill Briscoe's message, "Weathering the Storms of Life," as well as a set of 12 beautifully designed scripture cards to encourage you in troubled times. "Weathering the Storms of Life" and the set of 12 scripture cards are our thanks for your gift to help more people experience life through the teaching and resources of Telling the Truth. So request your copy when you give today. 1-800-889-5388. That's 1-800-889-5388 or give online at tellingthetruth.org.

Now, here's Jill with today's message.

Jill Briscoe: And when God lifts the hedge, he puts his own presence around us instead. And that presence becomes more precious than his protection.

Yet not one sparrow falls to the ground apart from the will of your father, and in acceptance lieth peace. And I remember the struggle of saying, "I accept this trouble into our life for whatever reason this trouble has come into our life to accomplish." And learning a little bit, just a tiny little bit, about the sort of things I'm talking to you about. Now that's the start.

Now I want to take it a step further. And I want to give you another verse of Job's incredible faith. "Though he slay me, yet will I trust him. Though he slay me, yet will I trust him."

Now I want you to turn to Job chapter 13. And we'll read the context of this particular statement of his faith. His friends have been busy muddling him up, saying things that sound very scriptural but aren't very much help, which happens to all of us when we're in trouble.

And he's trying, in his pain and in his anguish, and in his trouble, to sort it all out. And verse 13 he says, "Oh, keep silent, that's to his friends. Let me speak, and then let come to me what may. Why do I put myself in jeopardy and take my life in my hands? Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him.

I will surely defend my ways to his face. Indeed, this will turn out for my deliverance. For no godless man would dare come before him. So listen carefully to my words, let your ears take in what I say. I've prepared my case, I know I will be vindicated. Can anyone bring charges against me? If so, I'll be silent and die."

And then he turns to God, "Oh, grant me two things, oh God, then I won't hide from you. Withdraw your hand far from me, stop frightening me with your terrors. Summon me and I will answer, let me speak and you reply. How many wrongs and sins have I committed? Show me my offense and my sin. Why do you hide your face and consider me your enemy? Will you torment a windblown leaf? Will you chase after dry chaff?

For you write down bitter things against me, make me inherit the sins of my youth. You fasten my feet in shackles and keep close watch in all my paths by putting branding marks on the soles of my feet. So man wastes away like something rotten, like a garment eaten by moths. Man born of woman is a few days and full of trouble. He springs up like a flower and withers away, like a fleeting shadow, he doesn't endure. Do you fix your eye on such a one? Will you bring him before you for judgment?"

And then go down to 13, "If you would only hide me in the grave and conceal me till your anger has passed. If only you would set me a time and then remember me. If a man dies, will he live again? All the days of my hard service I will wait for my renewal to come. You will call and I will answer you. You will long for the creature your hands have made.

Surely then you will count my steps, but not keep track of my sin. My offenses will be sealed up in a bag. You will cover over my sin. But as a mountain erodes and crumbles, as a rock is moved from its place, as water wears away stones and torrents wash away the soil. So you seem to destroy man's hope. You overpower him once for all and he is gone. You change his countenance and send him away.

If his sons are honored, he doesn't know it. If they're brought low, he doesn't see it. He feels but the pain of his own body and mourns only for himself." Job is telling us how he feels. And trusting and feelings sort of don't gel very well together.

We know that bad things do happen to good people, to righteous men like Job. And sometimes some of the worst things happen to the best people. Look at the cross. Think of the martyrs. Remember the Holocaust. Having read his story, I sort of get the feeling inside me that I'm a little scared of being one of his special people. Maybe the thing to do is not to grow too spiritual, if the worst things happen to the best sort of people.

I remember when I was a little girl, asking my mom a question, "Mommy, who are the Jews?" And she said, "They're God's people, Jill." And we had just been hearing what was happening to God's people in Germany. And I remember as a little girl of six, saying, "I'm glad I'm not one of God's people. He's not looking after them very well, is he, Mommy?" Mommy didn't answer, she didn't know what to say. But sometimes, that's what we feel.

You know, the person on the front line of the battle gets the most arrows. And I have known times in my Christian experience when I've thought, maybe I should just quit here, being the sort of Christian I am and not seek after God anymore, seek to grow, seek to know, seek to become dangerous for God and the faith and the kingdom. Because that means I might find myself on the front line of the battle. And that's the person that gets all the arrows from the enemy.

Job in this situation, trusts in such a way, that people that would be in his situation gain help. Because you know it's funny, when you do meet people that have suffered dreadfully, and then you can't relate, then something happens to you and you can relate, you get the empathy because the same thing happens to you.

What do you do? What I do is I either write to that person or talk to that person and say, "I could never relate to what happened to you, but now it's happened to me, and boy, I really understand." And we can have a real heart to heart, because the same thing has happened to us.

And I think one of the things that happens is trusting that God will take whatever trouble it is that's happened and you've accepted and it's come into your life. And start and pray, "Lord, may I minister out of this trouble into someone else's life. There is healing in that." To be able to take the trouble that has troubled you, and meet someone else with a similar trouble that is troubling them. Get the point, as the New Testament says, that God has comforted you in order that you might comfort somebody else with the comfort wherewith he has comforted you with. It's a mixture of KJV and Jill. Can't remember the verse off by heart.

But that's the idea, isn't it? You get into a trouble, maybe you have a divorce, and you struggle with it and you're in recovery, and then you meet a neighbor, you meet somebody else that enters the door of that particular trouble. And you say, "I know just where she is." And if you can even begin to minister out of your trouble, you find that that person really, you've got something going there. And they say, "Oh, you really understand."

Never have I seen this so much than in Joni Eareckson's life. Joni, the girl that dived into a swimming pool and broke her neck, and wrote a book that sold well over millions of copies, translated into nearly every language around the world. I see it everywhere I travel. Joni. And then she wrote a second book, "A Step Further."

And she illustrates this point very graphically. She was sharing her testimony at a country church. After the service, she sat chatting, and this handsome good-looking guy comes up, called Doug. And he says, "You know, Joni, it was incredible what you shared, but I can't relate. I've never known what it means to be paralyzed or face even a traumatic accident. I have a lovely wife, I've got beautiful kids. In fact, they're right here, let me introduce you." And so, they get introduced.

Riding home in the van, Joni and her companion, she drives, by the way, riding home in a handicapped van, she on the Los Angeles freeways, by the way, was talking together and praying together about the meeting that they had just taken and praying that God would use what they had said.

About a month later she receives a phone call from a neighbor of this family, this Doug family. And she said, "I've just got some bad news. He's a motorbike freak and he was out in the woods and he hit a log." "Go on," says Joni, hesitantly. "Well," says the voice on the phone, "from what we can gather, there was a quick turn in the path anyway, Doug came up suddenly on the log, front wheel of his bike hit it. He was thrown."

I was listening intently, says Joni, but my imagination ran ahead of what my ears were hearing, scared to ask but wanting to know. I interrupted her with a question, "Is he, uh, that is, has he?" Reading my thought, she answered me in mid-sentence, "His neck's broken." There was an awkward silence. The shock stunned me and made my eyes ears ring. I was glad she couldn't see my eyes filled with tears, my face becoming flushed and heated.

Getting hold of myself, I tried to speak but didn't know what to say. All I could do, finally, was to assure her I would call or write this family very soon and let them know I would be praying for them in this time of struggle. After we hung up, my memory desperately tried to scramble back and recall my brief conversation with Doug. "I've never faced a really traumatic accident, Joni. I have a lovely wife and beautiful kids. I wish I could understand what you're going through."

I later learned that this man was paralyzed from the shoulder level down, confused and frustrated. I grabbed the pen but what was I to say? Give advice? No, not just yet. Share some scriptures? Okay, but it sure would be good to say something more personal. What does a person really want when he's hurting? I guess he wants love, to be understood. That's it. He wants someone to know just what it is he's going through. I could do that.

Jill Briscoe: And Joni began a ministry to this young man, who in his own right has become a conduit of blessing to those who are in like circumstance. There is one thing about trouble, and that's it.

You know, years ago we had Joni, we've brought her twice to our city. Had citywide meetings with her, put her down the auditorium, fill the auditorium. We've had wonderful times with her. She has a, I'm privileged to count her a close personal friend. And one of those times we were, we put her in the Marriott, which was very frustrating because they didn't have the right rooms and they didn't have for a wheelchair and stuff and all that.

However, we eventually found a lift we could get her down in, but it was the, it wasn't very big, and there were a lot of businessmen staying there, and there were about 10 of us all crowded in around the wheelchair in this lift. And we were just sitting there and we were, we were not a very long ride, but as she got in the lift, she was going down to the auditorium to speak and to sing. She sings beautifully. She began practicing her song.

And she started to sing "Amazing Grace." "How sweet the sound." And I tell you, the atmosphere in that lift was something else to behold. Some of the men couldn't look at her. Some of the men were looking at her. All of us had tears in our eyes. And she sang it all the way through, radiant, joyful, oblivious to the fact that she was the center of attention.

"Though he slay me," she sang in essence, "yet will I trust him." I'd love to know what happened afterwards in those men's lives. I bet you some of them have come to faith. It's amazing when you see the grace of God in the midst of suffering. And I wonder if some of those men in the lift have had an accident. Maybe not as bad as Joni's.

If they have, I think they've remembered a business day in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and a girl in a wheelchair singing "Amazing Grace." You know, if you think of the words of grace, G.R.A.C.E., I've played with that a lot in an acrostic. God's Reality and Christ's Enabling. That's what grace is.

And we saw it that day, in the most incredible situation of suffering. Suffering in a wheelchair. And yet you know, Joni Eareckson is the most whole person I know. She is the most totally whole person I know. And there are many of us walking around on our two legs that are far more crippled emotionally, relationally, spiritually than Joni Eareckson is physically.

God's reality and Christ's endurance, grace, the grace of God in the midst of it. That's why McKenna called his book on Job, "Whispers of His Grace," because there's that little verse hidden in Job, that Job in the midst of the clang and clash of suffering, hears the whispers of his grace, here and there. And that's what we can do as well.

Stretched to the limits of his faith, he remained true to God when the answers were not forthcoming. You know something? When trouble comes, we will either curse God and die or trust God and grow. When trouble comes, we will either curse God and die or trust God and grow.

Suffering is sort of like a magnifying glass, and you see God in a way you've never seen him before. Even though the apparent injustice of God in the face of the disproportionate amount of evils that come to one person is a staggering, staggering mystery.

Now, coming back to our verses, let me just point one or two things out. Job wanted to connect with God. And in Job 23, he tells us that. Don't need to turn to it, let me read it to you. "Oh that I knew where I might find him, that I might come to his seat. Look, I go forward but he isn't there, backward but I cannot perceive him. When he works on the left hand I cannot behold him. When he turns to the right hand I cannot see him. Where is he?"

Now here in this passage, in 13, he asked the same question, "Where is your face, I can't see your face. I feel as though I'm hiding from you, I feel that you're hiding from me. Oh that we might talk. Oh that I might tell you my case, the state I'm in. Oh that you might tell me what you think about it all." God's presence has gone.

I have a dear friend who is in the midst of incredible suffering at the moment, in trauma. The worst. And I spent a very, a very traumatic day with her not too long ago. And over and over through the day she'd say, "But I can't feel him anymore. I've always felt him all my life. I can't feel him anymore. And my greatest fear is he's gone. He's abandoned me because I can't feel him anymore." That's exactly what Job is saying here.

And you know, when you can't feel him with your feelings, you've got to feel him with your faith. When you can't feel him with your feelings, you've got to feel him with your faith. And that feels different. One feeling, the feeling with your feelings is a feeling of the senses. Spiritual sense maybe, emotional sense maybe. The other feeling, the feeling of faith is the feeling of knowledge, of knowingness.

The Holy Spirit does not come into our lives to do his deepest work in the shallowest part of us, which is our feelings. He comes into our hearts to do the deepest work in the deepest part of us, which is our faith. And Job knows this is a test not of his feelings, but of his faith. Of his faith. God doesn't test our feelings for him, he tests our faith in him, our knowings. "I know you are there. I know you are good," whether I feel like it or not.

And Job begins to trust God. I want to talk about feelings, about our past, and feelings about our present, and feelings about our future. And how all these feelings get in the way of our knowings. And we come to believe he isn't there because we feel he isn't there.

You know, one of the horrors that I've always feared, the end of chapter 3 Job says, "The things I feared have come upon me." All his life he'd had it good, and yet he'd feared all his life something bad was going to happen. I feel like that often. I feel all my life I've had it good, and I'm waiting for the, you know, Monday to come.

One of the things I've always feared is getting very old and losing my mind. Seriously. Because then I think, well, if my faith is wrapped up in my knowings, and I don't know anymore, or my mind isn't capable of exercising the faith in God in my knowings, what will I do? And it's been a real scare to me.

And in my reading through and around this subject, David McKenna gives a personal illustration that has wonderfully released and relieved my mind of this. For I realize that even though we lose our minds, our spirit goes on knowing. Even though perhaps we know it not. What a comfort that is.

For the knowings I'm talking about are deeper than even our mind that will disintegrate, this physical mind of ours. My wife Janet and I have just returned from the funeral of her only brother who died unexpectedly at the age of 67. Their 92-year-old mother was in the nursing home, vegetating in a senile state. When my wife told her about the death of her only son, nothing registered.

So they debated whether to take her to the funeral or not. Would she get cold? Would it be any point? And they decided to. Entering a side door along a ramp for the handicapped, we were surprised to be ushered directly into the funeral parlor in full view of the mourners. Instantly we saw in the faces of the family the value of her being there. And we heard the audible gasp of surprise from our friends. For her, however, no sign of recognition let us know she was aware of being at her son's funeral, despite the flowers, open casket, organ music and tears.

Watching her closely, I detected no light of awareness in her eyes as the minister read the scripture, gave the eulogy, offered a homily. But then, to close the service, the pastor asked us to join in the recitation of the 23rd Psalm, which was printed on the order of service. At the sound of the first word, "The Lord is my shepherd," a strong and firm voice began to lead the congregation. It was Mom. Without missing a single word, she led us through the Psalm.

Awe swept over us as we realized that Mom's lifetime of reading, memorizing, quoting the Word of God, brought her back to reality and became her promise when her only son died. After dismissal, we took Mom forward to the casket. Squinting to see his face, she asked, "Is this my boy?" Janet said, "Yes, it's Elden." With full awareness now, Mom asked her next question, "Did he make it to heaven?" Again, Janet said, "Yes, he's in heaven with Joyce and Daddy now."

With that word of assurance, Mom lapsed back into her fog of senility and rode home without another word. In her, we saw trusting love at work. God's promise had been engraved on her heart, in her soul, and even after she'd lost touch with reality and her mind was disintegrating, it came back to her in the evidence that God had answered her prayer and fulfilled his promise.

Never again will I assume that spiritual communication stops when it appears as if the mind is gone. Despite the suffering of senility, a lifetime of love is holding Mom in communion with her Lord. "Though he slay me," said that Mom, "yet will I trust in him."

Announcer: Thanks for joining us today here on Telling the Truth. We pray today's message has helped you to experience life in all its fullness through Jesus Christ.

When life's storms suddenly come your way, how do you respond? Do you doubt God's presence, questioning his concern for you, or do you see storms as part of God's plan for your life and rest assured he cares for you and is in control of all things? We want to help you trust in God's care and control in all the storms you face by sending you Jill Briscoe's message, "Weathering the Storms of Life," as well as a set of 12 beautifully designed scripture cards to encourage you in troubled times.

In "Weathering the Storms of Life," Jill teaches from the Gospel of Mark, examining the disciples' experience in a sudden storm to address the issues of suffering and faith, challenging you to examine your belief in God in the midst of trouble. Her teaching and the scripture cards will encourage you as you discover how you can be sure of God's love for you and his control over every circumstance, no matter how sudden, severe, or unexpected.

"Weathering the Storms of Life" and the set of 12 scripture cards are our thanks for your gift to help more people experience life through the teaching and resources of Telling the Truth. So request your copy when you give today. 1-800-889-5388. That's 1-800-889-5388 or give online at tellingthetruth.org.

Next time on Telling the Truth, it's more from the Briscoes about how you can experience abundant life in Christ when you open your life to be changed by God. We hope you'll listen then.