The Mystery of Sorrowful Rejoicing

00:00:00.000 | We say God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. But how

00:00:11.360 | does that relate to suffering and the pain of this life? With the opening of

00:00:15.440 | the new 9/11 Museum in Manhattan, which opened back in May, we're once again

00:00:20.040 | reminded of the permanent pain of September 11th, 2001. So can the gospel

00:00:25.360 | really offer joy to us in the uncertain times of a post 9/11 world? This was the

00:00:30.880 | question at hand in 2005 on the fourth anniversary of 9/11, which happened to

00:00:35.240 | land on a Sunday. Pastor John took up this question in the pulpit at Bethlehem

00:00:39.320 | Baptist Church, and here's a clip of what he said. One of the truths that we

00:00:46.040 | embrace with trembling joy at Bethlehem is the truth of God's supremacy in all

00:00:53.680 | things. The mission of this church is we exist to spread a passion for the

00:01:01.320 | supremacy of God in all things for the joy of all peoples through Jesus Christ.

00:01:08.880 | And when we say that, we do not mean except in calamities, or except in war,

00:01:19.440 | or except when Al-Qaeda blows up a building or train, or except when cancer

00:01:28.840 | takes a mom or a child is born with profound disabilities. There are no

00:01:34.480 | except clauses in our mission statement. We did not formulate this mission

00:01:41.080 | statement in 1995 in a rosy world and then get surprised by the reality of

00:01:49.280 | suffering. Oops, we forgot. We didn't formulate this statement of mission for

00:01:58.160 | this church with our head in the sand as though we didn't know people in this

00:02:04.840 | church die and agonize with suffering. We have seen many people die in 25 years,

00:02:14.680 | some with sweet peacefulness and other in terrible suffering. We exist to spread

00:02:21.920 | a passion for the supremacy of God in all things, all things with a capital A,

00:02:27.320 | through Jesus Christ all the time, no exceptions. None of us who has lived a

00:02:36.880 | few decades, and I'm moving towards six, none of us who have lived a few decades

00:02:44.080 | has embraced this mission without trembling. None of us has lived this

00:02:51.760 | mission for any length of time without tears. We have said it dozens and dozens

00:02:59.200 | of times and we will say it till our last breath, that the joy we pursue and

00:03:07.960 | the joy we embrace in Jesus Christ is always in this world interwoven with

00:03:15.560 | sorrow. There is no unadulterated joy on planet Earth while history lasts. None for

00:03:29.840 | those who care about other people. The Bible describes the servants of the Lord

00:03:37.840 | like this, "We are sorrowful yet always rejoicing." 2nd Corinthians 6 10.

00:03:46.680 | Sorrowful yet always rejoicing. How in the world can that be? It can be because

00:03:56.960 | Christ is supreme over all things forever and suffering and death remain

00:04:04.480 | for a while. Therefore, life is not simple. There is pleasure and there is pain. There

00:04:16.400 | is sweetness and there is bitter suffering. There is joy and there is

00:04:21.560 | misery. There is life and health and there is pain and disease and death.

00:04:29.320 | Therefore, emotions are not simple. For those who love others and don't just

00:04:35.400 | care about maximizing their own comforts in a private little sphere, this

00:04:39.760 | complexity will always mean we rejoice with those who rejoice, we weep with

00:04:47.360 | those who weep, and we always know somebody rejoicing and we always know

00:04:52.240 | somebody weeping. Therefore, we will in love discover the mystery of sorrowful

00:04:58.840 | yet always rejoicing and rejoicing yet always sorrowful. If you haven't found

00:05:03.640 | that mystery, you haven't lived long yet, or you don't love people, or you're not a

00:05:07.440 | Christian. Sorrowful yet always rejoicing is the banner that flies over this

00:05:15.000 | church. That was an excerpt from the sermon "Where is God? The Supremacy of

00:05:21.960 | Christ in an Age of Terror," preached at Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis

00:05:25.920 | on September 11th, 2005. You can find the full sermon and hundreds of other

00:05:29.880 | sermons and thousands of other resources from John Piper all free of charge at

00:05:33.840 | DesiringGod.org. And for more on the sorrowful but always rejoicing theme, be

00:05:39.680 | sure to check out Ask Pastor John episode number 117. We titled it "The Joy

00:05:43.920 | of Calvinism and the Fight for Joy." It's worth your time and it's related to this

00:05:48.520 | episode. Well, should women become ministers? Of course. Pastor John will

00:05:54.920 | explain why tomorrow on the Ask Pastor John podcast. We'll see you then.

00:05:59.880 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

The Mystery of Sorrowful Rejoicing

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