Defined by Pain

Last Week, Pastor Fred started our series of key moments for the people of God. He read the story about Joshua & the Israelites crossing the Jordan River, finally entering the Promised Land after a generation spent wandering in the wilderness, and how God's presence with them defined who they were and enabled them to defeat Jericho and see the walls of the city crumble. From the OT to the NT to 2011, the reality of God's presence defines who we are as the people of God.

Today, we are going to look at how PAIN shapes the people of God and discuss the three keys to surviving and thriving through life's pains which will inevitably come our way.

We pick up the story where Fred left off last week: the nation of Israel has entered the Promised Land. The OT revolves around the story of Israel and many people wonder how this story relates to us today. It's important to consider the role that God intended for Israel to play as His chosen means of bringing blessing to all the nations of the world. God's covenant with Abraham in Gen. 12 included a promise to bless Abraham, increase his descendants into a large nation--Israel, and to bless all the nations of the earth through Abraham/Israel.

Throughout the OT, Israel repeated the pattern of times of faithfulness & obedience to God resulting in God's blessings and fighting battles for them to times of unfaithfulness & disobedience to God's laws, commands, and decrees resulting in God withdrawing his blessing and even bringing punishment--all in an attempt to move Israel back into its intended role as the people of God, living out faithfulness and God's blessing as a testimony to all the nations.

Ultimately, Israel's role was fulfilled through Jesus Christ--the model of "true Israel" in terms of faithfulness and bringing the possibility of God's blessings to people from every ethnic background and walk of life. As followers of Christ, we identify with Christ in His task living out the role of faithfulness to God and blessings for all people everywhere--first intended for Israel in the OT and finally fulfilled by Jesus in the NT.

The lessons of Israel in the OT matter to us today, because they help us understand the significance of what Jesus accomplished in the NT, AND because we are also the people of God in OUR day, called to live out faithfulness and blessing to our world.

Upon entering the Promised Land at the beginning of the book of Joshua, Israel is at one of the cyclical "high points" in their history. They are faithful to God's laws, commands and decrees and experiencing His blessings through victory over enemies and provision. But the seeds for the next "low point" are already planted: Israel fails to obey God's instructions to drive all the wicked Canaanites from the land. This eventually leads to worshiping false gods and defeat by warring enemies. The book of Judges is a roller-coaster of ups & downs: faithful judges leading the nation to victory over enemies and in worshiping & trusting God to repeated times of apathy or trusting in false gods.

In the books of Samuel, King David emerges as the "right kind of king" for God's people--a humble king who leads the people in covenant faithfulness and in trusting God to fight the battles, and in 2 Samuel 7, God promises to establish David's throne for all time. The NT Gospels tell us that King Jesus is descended from the line of King David.

David's son Solomon succeeds him on the throne in the book of 1 Kings and early in his reign, Solomon sets out to build the impressive Temple of the Lord in Jerusalem:

• 1 Kings 5 talks about the preparations for temple construction: 30,000 men cutting timbre, 80,000 quarry workers and stone carvers, 70,000 common laborers, 3,600 supervisors
• 1 Kings 6 gives the blueprint for the temple, three stories high, hardwood cyprus flooring throughout, every wall and ceiling paneled with elaborately carved cedar--overlaid with gold!, flooring in the inner sanctuary and main room overlaid with gold!, gold statues, doorposts, even doors--7 years to completion
• The Temple was stunning, impressive and a place for God's people to worship God. But once again, the seeds of the next "low point" are planted in the story: 1 Kings 6:38-7:1 The entire building was completed in every detail by midautumn, in the month of Bul, during the eleventh year of his reign. So it took seven years to build the Temple. NEXT VERSE: Solomon also built a palace for himself, and it took him thirteen years to complete the construction.
• The rest of 1 Kings 7 details the elaborate furnishings of the Temple, with huge quantities of bronze, silver and gold articles.
• Finally in 1 Kings 8, the Ark of the Lord which led Israel through the wilderness to the Promised Land is brought into the completed Temple and 8:10-11 tells us that "a thick cloud filled the Temple of the Lord. ¹¹ The priests could not continue their service because of the cloud, for the glorious presence of the Lord filled the Temple."
• THE PRESENCE of God among His people. The knowledge of the One True God, the reality of His Presence, the experience of relationship with Him...would all converge to make the PAIN all the greater when that presence was eventually severed...

Following Solomon's death, the cruelty of his son Rehoboam results in the nation of Israel being divided into two kingdoms governed by two kings: Israel to the North would ultimately be defeated by Assyria in 722 B.C.. Judah to the south would hold off Assyria, but ultimately be defeated and carried off to captivity in Babylon in 586 B.C. Time and again, the accounts of each King's actions in both Israel & Judah follow the pattern: "and he did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord..." with only an occasional good king every few generations.

• The disobedience, stubbornness, unfaithfulness culminate in God's final judgement on His people: allowing PAIN at the hands of Babylon to shape His people who were unwilling to be shaped in any other way.
• King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon besieged Jerusalem, cutting off all food and supplies for 2.5 years. The resulting severe famine finally brought the city to its knees. Solomon's descendant, King Zedekiah was captured and forced to watch his sons be slaughtered before having his eyes gouged out and being led away in chains to Babylon. Imagine yourself as an Israelite on that day. You are a part of the People of God. You have been raised hearing the stories of God's faithfulness and blessings to His people. The thick cloud of God's presence had filled Solomon's Temple generations ago. And on this day, the author of 2 Kings tells this story: 2 KINGS 25 ⁸ On August 14 of that year, which was the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar’s reign, Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guard and an official of the Babylonian king, arrived in Jerusalem. ⁹ He burned down the Temple of the Lord, the royal palace, and all the houses of Jerusalem. He destroyed all the important buildings in the city...

  ¹³ The Babylonians broke up the bronze pillars in front of the Lord’s Temple, the bronze water carts, and the great bronze basin called the Sea, and they carried all the bronze away to Babylon. ¹⁴ They also took all the ash buckets, shovels, lamp snuffers, dishes, and all the other bronze articles used for making sacrifices at the Temple. ¹⁵ Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guard, also took the incense burners and basins, and all the other articles made of pure gold or silver.

   ¹⁶ The weight of the bronze from the two pillars, the Sea, and the water carts was too great to be measured. These things had been made for the Lord’s Temple in the days of King Solomon.

Sources of Suffering:
My Sin: Israel suffered for their own sin.
Your Sin: The remnant of the faithful suffered together with the wicked.
Circumstances: Joplin tornado

Surviving & Thriving through pain:
God's Word: Psalm 119:105 "Your Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path."
God's Spirit: Rom. 8:26-27 "²⁶ And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words. ²⁷ And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers^[a] in harmony with God’s own will."
God's People: Gal. 6:2 "Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ."

In the midst of PAIN, the seeds of hope are already in the ground: 2 Kings 25:27-30. Don't despair. Yes, 70 years of captivity are coming. Pain has come and will remain for a time. But God has not forgotten or abandoned His people. His promises are still true. He is still faithful. He is still present.