How Do We Deal With Suffering?

Hope Has a Name
How Do We Deal With Suffering?

I. Introduction

A. Romans 8:24-25 (NLT) ²⁴We were given this hope when we were saved. (If we already have something, we don’t need to hope for it. ²⁵But if we look forward to something we don’t yet have, we must wait patiently and confidently.)

1. If I already have something, then I don’t need to “” for it.

2. Optimism, which is a good quality, is a predisposition to expect things to turn out .

3. Hope is a virtue.

B. Psalm 42:11 (NLT) Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God! I will praise him again—my Savior and my God!

C. Hope transcends !

1. Romans 15:13 (NLT) I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.

D. “How do we deal with ?”

1. The ancient writers generally said that what you have to do is to count on !

2. Write out a “” list

3. In the ancient world, like ours today, suffering was easier if it could be with somebody else.

4. One of the things that the ancient writers taught was that if a person were to die for someone else, the person you die for has to be a person of great .

5. “”

6. The Greek word for “” is “nikao.”

E. Romans 5:3-5 (NLT) ³We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. ⁴And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. ⁵And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.

1. The reason the ancients didn’t believe in hope for human beings is because they didn’t believe in hope for the !

2. One day will be made right!

F. Romans 5:6-8 (NLT) ⁶When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. ⁷Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good. ⁸But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.

1. Hope doesn’t disappoint because chose to give His life and suffer and on a cross!

2. Jesus died—not just for virtuous people—and not just for worthy people—but Jesus died for sinful, messed up people, like and like .

G. The answer to human suffering is !

1. That’s why groan too! We groan for humanity! We groan for the completely broken world!

H. Romans 8:18, 22-23 (NLT) ¹⁸Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will reveal to us later. ²²For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. ²³And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us.

1. The Spirit of God Himself and intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express!

I. Romans 8:26-27 (NLT) ²⁶And 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. ²⁷And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will.

1. What we glory in is precisely willingness to !

J. Romans 8:35, 37-39 (NLT) ³⁵Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? ³⁷No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. ³⁸And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. ³⁹No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

1. We in our friend, !

2. It was like, “I’ve learned to let the get to me.”

K. We are not “conquerors.” We are conquerors!

1. We are more than “through Him who loved us!”

L. Our “hope” is that things will the way they are now!

1. A day is coming when death—and sin—and pain—and guilt—will be completely conquered!

M. Hold on to your friend, , because can separate you from Him!