Welcome back to the podcast. Today we are going deep, very deep. Of course, at the center of our faith, we celebrate the cross of Jesus Christ, His horrific suffering and His death by crucifixion. Christ bore our sins in His body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness by His wounds, you have been healed.

That's 1 Peter 2 verse 24. His death was designed. It was no accident. It was no fluke of history. It was no mere result of mob violence left unchecked. His death was intentional. It was divinely intended, intended from the very beginning of time. This is a somber and significant point to grasp from Acts chapter 4 verses 27 and 28.

This theological point matters when we look at the fallenness of this world, the brokenness of our lives. Specifically in this clip, you're going to hear a mention of a massive earthquake that hit Nepal in the spring of 2015. That earthquake hit the day before this sermon was preached. In that disaster, three and a half million people were left homeless and nearly 9,000 lost their lives.

Why? Why does such a world exist with such deep pain? Here's Pastor John. This world exists with its pain, with its sorrow, with its death to make a place for Jesus Christ, the Son of God, to suffer and die. If a world like this didn't exist, Jesus would have no place to suffer and die.

If there were no suffering, Jesus couldn't suffer. If there were no death, Jesus couldn't die. Put it another way, the reason there is terror is so that Christ could be terrorized. The reason there is trouble is so that Christ could be troubled. The reason there is pain is so that Christ could feel pain.

This world became what it is so that the Son of God could enter it and feel all of it. Therefore, you should never feel that God is somehow out there, distant, far away, toying with this creation. He made the horrors to enter the horrors. Romans 5:8, "God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Do you believe?

Let me say it again, "God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ, his Son, died for us." He showed his love through the death of his Son. He showed his love through the death of his Son. Do you believe that love could be shown another way?

That love could be shown another way. It couldn't, and he meant for it to be shown. Listen to these words from Acts chapter 4, "Truly in this city," this is being prayed by the saints after the death and resurrection of Jesus, "Truly in this city," Jerusalem, "there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, Herod, Pontius Pilate, the Gentiles, and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan predestined to take place." Do you hear what that says?

Herod, who mocked him, put a purple robe on him, scorned him. Pilate, who expediently washed his hands and said, "I'll find no fault in him, but my job's at stake, and so kill him, crucify him, put him through the worst tortures imaginable." The Gentiles, that's the soldiers, they were driving the nails, pushing the sword in the side.

"Crucify him, Jewish people, crucify him, crucify him." Those four things, this text says, I'll read it again, "Herod, Pontius Pilate, the Gentiles, and the peoples of Israel were gathered together to do whatever your plan and your hand had predestined to take place." Christ did not die by accident. Oh, just a fluke of history, just a turning of Roman affairs, just a mob violence.

This had been planned since before the foundation of the world. This is the climax of the reason for existence. The Son of God bearing all the suffering of the world in order to lift sin from all who would trust Him, bring them into everlasting reward and joy, exquisitely on a new heavens and a new earth, glorifying God for His wisdom and grace and love.

That's the reason this world exists the way it exists. In my church, I still affectionately call it my church. I've been the pastor for two years. I feel I love her. There were a thousand young women, there were about 5,000 folks, and a lot of young people like here, right?

And we grew up together, guys there for 33 years, and young people would come. And when you have a lot of young people together, they tend to fall in love and they get married and they have babies, and those babies die more than you would like. And some of them are born with profound disabilities, like Michael, thinking of Michael.

And you got moms, therefore, who've just lost their babies or have now, their whole lives changed because they will be caring for this child until they're dead. And I just want to bear witness to you young people. I would welcome you to come to this church and interview any of them, like Patty, who you can't interview because she died of breast cancer.

The first crisis was that Eric, her one-year-old, died in her arms. And I went to the hospital, she's sitting there holding Eric, he looks like he's made out of ivory, dead, sitting in his mother's arms. She just looks at me. And then I buried her about 15 years later, four kids, young kids, and she dies.

It was a horrible death, in fact. Patty was a rock. Patty believed every word of what I said. With her bald head and her cap, she made a video about 15 minutes, 13 minutes, we showed it at a service, telling the people to trust God before she died. So I'm inviting you, work through this.

If it sounds problematical, God could shake this city, not just Nepal. Half these buildings could go down at 10 a.m. on Monday morning and 100,000 people be dead. Do you have a vision of God that would be able to handle that? That's my question, which might be easier to handle than if one of your children died or if you had a child with a profound disability.

I am inviting you to embrace Jesus Christ as the one for whom, through whom, and to whom all things exist. And He came to share this suffering. He came to bear this pain. He came to taste every test and every temptation that we have known, take it to the cross, die in our place so that by faith alone we could have all our sins forgiven, have eternal life and have a destiny on a new heavens and a new earth where that curse will finally be lifted.

The sobering connection between the death of Christ and the suffering of the world and our display of treasuring Christ above all things. This was taken from John Piper's sermon, "The Pain of the World and the Purposes of God," preached on April 26, 2015, the day after the major earthquake that hit Nepal.

If you have remaining questions about this episode, that's understandable, certainly understandable. These are deep topics and it reminds me of a key theological point that Paul gives us in Romans 9.22 we should mix in here. And it just so happens to be the most asked about text in all of the Bible, in all of our listener emails, Romans 9.22.

I mentioned that this summer in APJ 1827. But Romans 9.22 comes to the forefront in three other important episodes that you might want to check out. If God is so happy, why did He create the non-elect? That's APJ 547. Don't miss that one, 547. Also how is God glorified in those who reject Him?

Another really important episode, that's APJ 1215. And see also why does God choose some and not others, that's APJ 1320. So if this episode today raises questions, you might want to press into Romans 9.22 and check out APJs 547, 1215, and 1320. While shifting topics now, do you have skills in your church?

Like you're a mechanic or a carpenter or a doctor or a lawyer or a photographer and you feel like other Christians around you are using your skills unwilling to pay for them? Well that's the topic of next time. I'm your host Tony Reiki. We are rejoined in studio with Pastor John on Friday for that.

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