Suffering as Development

Watch this lesson on YouTube, or listen to it here.

Access the slide deck here. 

1) Sometimes suffering happens in order to develop us into something better.

A)   Maybe the suffering was sent by God to develop us,

B) Or, even if not sent directly from God, God can still use that to accomplish this goal.

2) Developmental suffering examples.

A)   Lifting weights or running. You must be uncomfortable and hurt first to get stronger and faster.

1) One of my favorite sayings that I heard first in a mountain biking context: It never gets easier. You just get faster.

2) Suffering is like building moral muscles and endurance.

B) Baby sea turtles.

1) I was on vacation with my family in Florida when I was a kid. We were walking on the beach and there was a nest of baby sea turtles that were hatching. They all climbed out and started on their way to the ocean. There was a ranger present to make people behave. They were trying to help the turtles out of their nest, smoothing the sand on their way to the ocean and scaring away the seagulls that were eating them. The ranger explained that this journey for the baby turtles is necessary to give them what they are going to need to survive in the ocean.

2) Gemini:

(a)   This is how they know to get back to this same beach to lay their own eggs later.

(b)   “The crawl is a vital ‘warm-up’ for their bodies. It stimulates their muscles and lungs, preparing them for the ‘swimming frenzy’—a period of nearly continuous swimming for 24 to 48 hours to reach safer, deeper waters. Skipping this trek can leave them too weak to survive the ocean’s strong currents or escape initial predators in the surf.”

C) The Biosphere 2.

1) In 1991, in Oracle, Arizona, a 3.14-acre airtight glass structure was built to replicate Earth’s ecosystem and test the feasibility of long-term human life in space.

2) There are several reasons why it failed, but one is because all the trees fell over. There was no wind to test their trunks, so they grew fast and then collapsed under their own weight.  

3) Suffering is (or can be) developmental in the Bible.

A)   Rom. 5:3-5

1) Suffering produces endurance

2) Endurance produces character

3) Character produces hope

4) Hope does not put us to shame

5) ESVSB – “The people of God rejoice not only in future glory but in present trials and sufferings, not because trials are pleasant but because they produce a step-by-step transformation that makes believers more like Christ.”

B) 2 Cor. 1:8-9

C) 2 Cor. 12:7-10 – Not only does suffering actively produce good things, it has the potential to burn away bad things, like refining fire.

D)   Heb. 12:11

E) James 1:2-4

1) The testing of your faith produces steadfastness.

2) Let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

F) Phil. 3:8-11 – Suffering to be more like Jesus in every way (Acts 5:41).

G)   Deut. 8 – This is a good passage because several reasons that we have looked at (and some we haven’t) are all cited in the same passage.

1) v. 2 – God humbles his people through suffering.

2) v. 2 – God tests his people with suffering to know what is in their heart. (Next Sunday class)

(a)   The test is to know if they will obey him or not.

3) vv. 3-4 – God let his people suffer so they would learn to rely upon him. He provided for them every single day.

4) v. 5 – God disciplines his people like a father disciplines his children. (Learning through pain.)

(a)   v. 16 – “to do you good in the end”

5) vv. 7-19 – God knows what is coming for his people, so he is trying to teach them hard lessons NOW so they won’t fail in the future.

4) Discuss practical examples and life experiences.