DESERVINS GOT NOTHING TO DO WITH IT
Because you were in a hurry and chose not to wait another few seconds after the light turned green to go through that busy intersection, you were involved in a devastating car crash when another driver ran through the red light...
Because you decided at the last minute to stop at a convenience store on the way home after a late night at work, you were shot by an armed robber who was in the process of holding up the clerk when you walked in through front door
A category 5 hurricane makes a sharp right turn off of it s projected path and makes landfall just a few miles from your home, causing major damage and loss of electricity for 12 days
Luke 13:1-5 Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. Jesus answered, Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way?
I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will perish!
We can happen to be in the right place at the wrong time, and then suffer the consequences
Bad things happen to good people because we live in a fallen world, and none of us are exempt from suffering or death.
John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
We all have it coming... With the it being misery out of proportion to our failures and sins in this life
Deservin s got nothing to do with it
We live in a fallen world, and sometimes we re going to get what we don t deserve. We re going to suffer the consequences of cause and effect, whether as the result of, tragic accidents, human cruelties, or natural law
Job 2:4-8 Skin for skin! Satan replied. A man will give all he has for his own life. But now stretch out your hand and strike his flesh and bones, and he will surely curse you to your face.
The LORD said to Satan, Very well, then, he is in your hands; but you must spare his life.
So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD and afflicted Job with painful sores from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head. Then Job took a piece of broken pottery and scraped himself with it as he sat among the ashes.
Job 2:3 no one on earth like him: he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil. And he still maintains his integrity, though you incited me against him to ruin him without reason.
His wife said to him, Are you still maintaining your integrity? Curse God and die! You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble? In all this, Job did not sin in what he said.
1. Avoiding the cause of suffering is one thing, but knowing how to respond when we do suffer is more important.
2. Don t ever give up on God because he allows us to have trials in our lives.
Job 13:15 (NLT) God might kill me, but I have no other hope
Job 19:25-27 I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, Yet in my flesh I will see God;
I myself will see him with my own eyes I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!
Trials are not punishment for sin, but benevolent concessions to prove the quality of ones faith.
2 Corinthians 11:23-29 Are they servants of Christ? (I am out of my mind to talk like this.) I am more. I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again.
Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, I have been constantly on the move.
I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false brothers.
I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked.
Besides everything else, I face daily the pressure of my concern for all the churches. Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn?
Romans 5:3-4 Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.
We don t have to know the future to have faith in God We have to have faith in God to be secure about the future!
Romans 8:31, 35 38-39 What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
2 Timothy 4:6-8 For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.
Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.
We all got it coming
Romans 3:23 all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. and: Romans 6:23 the wages of sin is death
Isaiah 53:2-10 (The Message) The servant grew up before God - a scrawny seedling, a scrubby plant in a parched field. There was nothing attractive about him, nothing to cause us to take a second look.
He was looked down on and passed over, a man who suffered, who knew pain firsthand. One look at him and people turned away. We looked down on him, thought he was scum.
But the fact is, it was our pains he carried - our disfigurements, all the things wrong with us. We thought he brought it on himself, that God was punishing him for his own failures.
But it was our sins that did that to him, that ripped and tore and crushed him - our sins! He took the punishment, and that made us whole. Through his bruises we get healed.
We're all like sheep who've wandered off and gotten lost. We've all done our own thing, gone our own way. And God has piled all our sins, everything we've done wrong, on him, on him.
He was beaten, he was tortured, but he didn't say a word. Like a lamb taken to be slaughtered and like a sheep being sheared, he took it all in silence.
Justice miscarried, and he was led off - and did anyone really know what was happening? He died without a thought for his own welfare, beaten bloody for the sins of my people.
They buried him with the wicked, threw him in a grave with a rich man, Even though he'd never hurt a soul or said one word that wasn't true.
Still, it's what God had in mind all along, to crush him with pain. The plan was that he give himself as an offering for sin so that he'd see life come from it - life, life, and more life. And God's plan will deeply prosper through him.
Redemption can only succeed if the past doesn t haunt the redeemed
Psalm 103:12 (NLT) He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.
Deservin s got nothing to do with it.
1. If God stopped being fair and just gave us what we deserved, what would we get?
2. If we look back at what we ve done for God, do we really deserve Heaven?
3. Have we been so sinless that Jesus would say about us, That s one person I didn t have to die for?
4. Do we really want God to give us what we deserve, or all that he wants to give us His Grace in abundance?
DESERVINS GOT NOTHING TO DO WITH IT