reading and the passage on which our sermon is based is Romans chapter 8 verses 26 to 39. This is God's Word. Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness for we do not know what to pray for as we ought but the Spirit himself intercedes with us for us with groanings too deep for words and he who searches our hearts knows what is in the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son in order that he might be the firstborn among many firstborn among many brothers and those whom he predestined he also called and those whom he called he also justified and those whom he justified he also glorified. What then shall we say to these things if God is for us who can be against us? He who did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect as is God who justifies? Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died more than that who was raised who is at the right hand of God who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall interpret us from the love who shall separate us from the love of Christ shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword as it is written for your sake we are being killed all the day long we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. No in all of these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us for I am sure that neither death nor life nor angels nor rulers nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. May God add his blessing to this reading of his word. So Bill on vacation this week you're stuck with me delivering the sermon and I will confess it's inspired by one of my favorite sermons from Tim Keller so if you're a Tim Keller fan and it sounds repetitive I apologize for that but I'll try to to do my best and more or less so than that it's inspired by my favorite verse which was in which was embedded in the passage we just read and some of you know that like Ann Wadden I grew up in Sydney Nova Scotia and in Sydney they have public schools at least when I was a child for Roman Catholics and they have public schools for everybody else and my family attended Roman Catholic Church and we did not have Sunday school in church but we had religious education in school so every morning Monday to Friday 9 to 9 30 we had what we called catechism class and I must confess I don't remember what I was taught a lot of in catechism class and I'm not blaming the people I was a small child and it was along it was 48 years ago but then when I was 12 years old my family started attending Westminster Church in Sydney which is now Harbor Light our sister PCA Church there and I was introduced to Sunday school as a 12 year old and truth be told I probably don't remember a lot of what I was taught in Sunday school I remember some of the teachers who were wonderful but what I do remember are the memory verses that we did as part of Sunday school and I don't remember whether we had verses every week or every month and whether I was a good student all the time or not but two verses have stuck with me and one was Isaiah 53 sex all we like sheep have gone astray we have turned everyone to his own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all that's a good verse it's half the gospel almost in one verse and it's a wonderful word verse to remember if we're trying to share the gospel with somebody but the other one that I remember is my favorite verse I've never forgotten it I've never forgotten the reference and it has been my favorite verse to this day and we know that for those who love God all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose so why did this become my favorite verse I'm not even sure but as I think about it I think because it's a promise from God and that's why I entitled to the sermon that listen to the words it says we know it doesn't say we think it doesn't say we hope it says we know that all things all things it doesn't say most things or some things or 50% plus one and it says for good and that's what we all want is is goodness in our life so but unfortunately as a 12 year old I got the promise wrong I thought it meant I would have the best job but I would get the best girl that my team would always win the NBA championship that I would live a life with no hardship or grief or disappointment well I did get the best girl I think but none of that other stuff has worked out for me and unfortunately many non-christians who are exposed to this verse or maybe newer Christians who or people who have not studied their Bible enough or have just not spent enough time on it also get it wrong just like the younger version of myself did you might say well what's the problem with that it's from the Bible it's a positive message it should make us feel good about being a Christian and doesn't God what's best for us well there's a few problems with that and one is not everything in life goes well and maybe what I think is good for me is not what God thinks is good for me next Christians are not protected from the terrible tragedies that come in life if you want evidence of that just read our prayer list every week just talk to some of the people here who have lost family members just in the last year or two or three or we have people who come here who have left everything to come from another country because they were seeking a better life here and if you believe the verse as I did as a as a 12 year old what will you do when the tragedies of life inevitably come but most importantly I think how I got it wrong is this verse is a promise of something much more profound something deeper something richer something much more enjoying than whether my team wins the NBA championship next year or I get a good job it's about the joy we have as Christians as they adopted children of God so when we use the word joy too often I think we're just using it interchangeably with happiness if you look in the dictionary you'll find that being happy is a feeling of showing pleasure or contentment and then if you look up joy joy is defined as a feeling of great pleasure or happiness so clearly joy is something bigger than happiness but still that does I don't I think when Jesus talked about joy in John 17 I think he was talking about more than that but then I found this definition true joy is a limitless life-defining transformative reservoir waiting to be tapped into it requires utmost surrender like love it is a choice to be made this week as I was getting ready for this I received an email from the Keller Center and coincidentally there was an article in it about joy and happiness and they did talk about joy but they also talked about seven different types of happiness and so you can be happy when I'm laughing or when I'm celebrating with friends there's a euphoric happiness we get when we listen to great music or we're on a roller coaster or skydiving if that's your thing we can be happy when we have good fortune like my team wins the NBA championship or I get a new job we can be happy when we're flourishing when our career is progressing when our kids are doing well or our mortgage is getting paid off we can feel happy when we're content like sitting on a patio and with a cool evening breeze listening to the birds with our children playing in the background and we can be happy when we're feeling fullness like we're in touch with some deeper type of thing and all these things are wonderful and happiness is wonderful but they're all related to my circumstances that Tim Keller in the sermon that I used for inspiration in this says the Christian joy is a joy that we have despite our circumstance if we have true joy it is unrelenting it is always there and we're supposed to have joy in the in the chapter of John 17 that I read in Jesus high priestly prayer he's going to his father before he goes to the cross in prayer and in verse 6 he says he's praying for the people whom you gave me out of the world he's praying for us and at verse 13 he says but now I am coming to you and these things I speak in the world that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves Jesus wants us to have joy in him and in the previous chapter he is for chapter 17 he's telling his disciples that he will be taken away and Jesus tells them that there will be sorrow at losing him and the sorrow will turn to joy and no one will be able to take it from them but think about that he is telling this to men that he knows will suffer persecution and torture and alienation and poverty and death for him and he says nobody can take away the joy that I'm going to give them he is telling them I am giving them a joy that will stand up to all that there is that no one will be able to take away so as Christians do we have that type of joy is it as pervious as the joy that Jesus gave his disciples if we do not then why and what is it made of Romans 8 verse 18 Paul begins talking about the suffering that is in the world due to its fallen nature it was the case then when Paul wrote this book and it's certainly the case today I don't know about you but I find it pretty amazing that think about the world never at any time in the world if we had greater wealth greater personal freedom greater things to entertain us greater technology to do things for us greater mobility to travel and visit relatives but why then is there so many unhappy and unsatisfied people out there and it's because we live in a broken world it was broken in Paul's time and it's broken today so in the rest of the time that I have there's there's three things and Tim Keller says if you want to have that joy you need to understand and focus on these three three things our bad things turn out to good our good things can never be lost and the best things are yet yet to come so our bad things turn out to good so verse 28 once again it says and we know that for those who love God all things work together for good for those who are called according to us to his purpose this is not telling us that our circumstances will be good Christian circumstances are no better than anyone else's some believe just as 12 year old read it that if I love and follow God less things will bad things will happen to me this is not true in Romans 8 verse 35 Paul says who shall separate us from the love of Christ shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword think of those aren't just words that's just not a bad day that's proved that those are life-altering things and Paul is saying that the same things that happen to everybody else he's talking to Christians happen to us as Christians and this is not telling us the bad things are really good things that there are blessing in disguise we live in a fallen corrupted world and bad things do happen it's not telling us that a better circumstance is coming like if I do not get the job I want or I lose my job that that there's a better one waiting for me out there sometimes that's true and sometimes God provides a better job for us but sometimes he doesn't I remember Bill telling me a story about a church where he was pastor in Indiana and he said there was a young family there and that family had three children and one by one each of those children inherited the same genetic disease got sick and eventually passed away as you can imagine that family would have been broken and I think most of us cannot imagine what type of what type of loss that would have been that is just a tragic thing there's no good telling that family that don't worry God is working it for good in John 11 when Lazarus died it says at verse 33 Jesus was greatly troubled and in verse 35 Jesus wept he was angry at the death Jesus knew he could and would raise Lazarus but he was upset at death that is because of the world we live in God will give things good effect in the end but there are bad things out there Jesus came in this world because of pain and suffering to defeat pain and suffering and pain and suffering are bad things this is telling us that if you love God God will take all things even the bad things and make them good in totality we may not see the good this week or this year or in our lifetime but God will work them for good one small example that we should all be familiar with in acts seven is the story of Stevens trial and stoning and all through verse seven Stephen gives us wonderful testimony of the gospel revealed all through the Old Testament and what Jesus did by his work and in crucifixion that at the end of chapter 7 of acts Stephen is stoned for preaching the gospel and then the very next verse verse 1 of chapter 8 it says and there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem and they were scattered throughout all the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles this is the beginning of the church growth beyond Jerusalem people that were church followers at the time fled Jerusalem they didn't have a mission conference and say let's go plant a church and Philippi they fled for their lives because of the persecution of the of the church in Jerusalem and that is how the church began to grow all through Asia and Greece and Africa and eventually to Europe so what do we do with this well we know that when good things happen as a miracle of God's grace so we need to recognize that and we and be thankful for the normal state of the world is for things to fall apart and when things go good it's God's work and if we are mindful of this and take it seriously that God is working in all things then it should help us relieve some fair some fear and anxiety we know that God is sovereign we're not in a world totally open to chance God is at work even in the flip of a coin second it helps us to see God's purpose in our difficulties I don't know about you but I think most people here do not look forward to go into the dentist some of us tolerate it but some of us have great difficulty with going to the dentist either because they can't handle the needle the drilling gets to them or some people have had terrible pain through dental work or because of it but we have to go to the dentist but why do we go to the dentist we go because we know the dentist is working good he's he's relieving something he's fixing he or she is fixing something for us and that's the way God works at us when bad things are happening to us God is using that to to work for our good John Newton said everything is necessary that he sends nothing can be necessary that he withholds the only things that can really hurt us are our own foolishness pride selfishness hardness of hurt denial of our flaws and the belief that we don't need God they're the only things that can hurt us in the long run some of those things can feel good to us in the short term but in the long run they'll hurt us these bad things God brings in to cure us of the things those things that could to cure us of those things that are hurting us if we think our life has been ruined by some bad thing or something good than we wanted it should be easier to deal it with knowing that it's playing a role in God's plan by humbling us by molding us by building us by strengthening us and third it should give us a balanced view of suffering we should neither despair and suffering or embrace suffering as a virtue suffering is God working in our lives secondly our good things can never be lost verse 29 says for those whom he fore knew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers I think part of the problem that I had was a 12 year old as I took verse 28 all on its own I took the part about the good things but the very first word in verse 29 is for and that means verse 29 explains verse 28 verse 28 is that God will work all things together for good because those before knew before the beginning of the world he predestined to be conformed to his image of his son that Jesus might be the firstborn amongst many brothers that means that if we love God he will work all things in my life for good and how do I know that because before the beginning of creation he determined that we would be conformed to be like Jesus and members of a very large family with Jesus at the head verse 29 is telling us that God is not promising bitter circumstances he's promising a better life it is not a joy that is dependent on things like getting a right job it is this is the joy that he promised to his disciples Jesus did not suffer so that I will not suffer he suffered so that when I suffer I will become like him Paul also uses the word predestined predestined is one of those difficult words that the Bible uses and we use and it gives some people some difficulty and it might be hard to understand and I'm sure that our pastor bill or Don or any other pastor in our denomination could probably preach a six-month series to us on predestination but predestination in this case is not there to make it difficult or complicated predestination there is there to comfort us that means it's locked in it's guaranteed it's already done before the beginning of time God said it that he would work those difficult and bad things for good God has already determined before the beginning of the world that he will use our suffering to make us like Jesus verse 29 explains verse 28 in this way we live in a fallen world and there will be bad circumstances in life there will be suffering but before the beginning of the world God determined to use that suffering of life that we will encounter to transform us to be like Jesus to strip away those things that are separating us from him and not just to be transformed into his image not to be sort of like him but to be conformed to his image it doesn't mean that we resemble him but that our very inter essence is like Jesus just think about Jesus love his compassion his sensitivity his wisdom that is what God has in store for us and he also used the language of Jesus being the first amongst many brethren that's the family that we're in as Christians and Jesus is the first and Tim Keller tells the story we think of adoption as adopting small children but in these days the most typical type of adoption was when somebody was wealthy and owned in the state or whatever and they didn't have an heir they might pick a favorite servant and that servant would get adopted into their family so you think about that the servant is somebody that works for the master that doesn't have all that freedom and immediately upon being adopted that servant moves from a relationship of formality with the master to intimacy from unconditional love to unconditional love from poverty to wealth from dishonor to honor and that first tells us that we are all sons with Jesus as the head Hebrews chapter 2 verses 10 to 12 say for it was fitting that he for whom and by whom all things exist in bringing many sons to glory should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering for he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source that is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers saying I will tell you I will tell of your name to my brothers in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praises and bad circumstances cannot undo God's plan we cannot fail God is using bad circumstances to make us all brothers of Christ all of us male or female rich or poor regardless of creed and race finally the best is yet to come in a verse 30 he says and those whom he justified and those who we predestined he also called and those whom he called he also justified and those who we justified he also glorified once again more complicated words but I'm just going to talk about the last one glorified our bad things turn out for good and our good things can never be lost and the best is yet to come what is to come glory that means to have all our sin eradicated to sit in God's presence to be loved as Jesus is loved Paul says in verses 20 and 21 of chapter 8 and if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies and in verse 18 Paul says for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed in us Paul is talking about a time when the church was being persecuted by the Roman Empire and living in the Roman Empire was brutal for most people even if you're outside the church or other groups being persecuted and at first 35 he says who shall separate us from the love of Christ shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword all of those are existential life-altering things and Paul is saying that those things aren't even worth comparing to the glory that is promised to us so what will be revealed to us in glorification is that wonderful and the last point of that is he says he does not say will be glorified he says glorified it's already done so what will we do with all this if you're a Christian verse 12 verses 28 to 30 it's a wonderful promise from God God does not promise you better circumstances but promises you a better life it's not telling us that bad things are really good but tomorrow will be a better day it's not telling us that we should smile through the tragedies of life when you become a Christian this is yours you're welcomed into God's family to the highest honor you're a love like Jesus is loved you are honored like he is honored and remember that Jesus wants you to have joy in him and I don't believe that joy is a sweet syrupy thing that where we're singing kumbaya smiling when things are going terrible it's the knowledge and understanding that the Holy Spirit is working on in us to conform us to the very nature of Jesus this allows you to be gentle to be resilient to be thankful to be forgiven thank God every day for his grace and the good things he has given you and pray for the Holy Spirit to keep transforming you and understand that nothing on this earth or beyond can separate us from the love of God and if you've not yet become a Christian and put your faith in Jesus you might be sitting there saying I would love to have that type of joy that read was talking about but I'm not sure I believe it in heaven or that Jesus is the Son of God and in his sermon on this topic Tim Keller paraphrases C.S. Lewis when he says do not come to Christianity because it's comforting do not come because it's encouraging do not become because it's relevant do not come because it's exciting come because it's true if it's not true it cannot be comforting or encouraging or relevant or exciting the joy is based on your convictions about Christ and the gospel so if you do not believe today pray for the Holy Spirit to work your in your life pray for the Holy Spirit to give you that understanding the concepts of glory in heaven are not meant to trivialize our suffering our suffering on this earth is real but what else can deal with our hurt and our suffering in a meaningful way like the knowledge that we will be glorified let's pray dear Heavenly Father we just thank you for your presence with us here today and we thank you for this worship service and we pray that this time together has been meaningful that it's been glorifying and we just pray that as we go from this place you'll you'll fill us with your spirit that you'll fill us with a deep and wonderful understanding of you we pray all this in Jesus name amen please