Suffering: A Divine Vocation
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What does the Bible say about a vocation to suffer?
I haven't seen any vocational schools that give a diploma in suffering, or a place where you can go and study how to die. And yet, if I understand what Scripture is teaching about the nature of suffering and about the nature of death, there are times in a person's life where the call of God upon that person Is to suffer.
Christians often talk about being called to a particular career or ministry. Maybe someone will say that they are called to the mission field of the pastorate. But does God call us to suffer? That's the question we'll be exploring today on renewing your mind. And I'm glad that you're joining us to study God's Word. Today's message is from RC Sproul's classic series Surprised by Suffering. You can receive the downloadable version of this series in the Ligner app and a digital study guide as well. Use the link in the show notes or call us at 800-435-4343 to make your donation and thank you for supporting this program. Here's RC with today's message. There's
a somewhat lesser known work of Herman Melville, the author of Moby Dick and Billy Bud and the host of South Sea adventure stories. One of his lesser known works, Melville makes this statement. He says Until we learn that That one grief outweighs a thousand joys. We will never understand what Christianity is trying to make us. Now when Melville makes that statement, I don't think that he's simply being morbid or pessimistic. But he is echoing a sentiment that we find in Scripture itself. For example, the wisdom literature of the Old Testament declares that it is better to go to the house of mourning. And to spend our time with fools. It's just one more case in point where we see how closely related the God of Scripture is to the reality of suffering and of pain.
And then the first segment together I mentioned this word vocation. And usually when we use this word vocation, we're referring to our career or to our life's work. Uh whenever I meet someone the first time I ask them what their name is and where they live, and then inevitably I'll say, What do you do? I'm inquiring about your vocation. We have vocational tests, we have vocational school. So this word is a very important part of our vocabulary. But its root meaning, its classical meaning, is taken from the Latin word that means to call. And the idea earlier on in our history, when we understood that God calls people into various tasks and various occupations, He doesn't just call people into the ordained ministry, to clergy, and so on, but He calls people to be physicians, He calls people to be involved in jurisprudence, He calls people into productive enterprises of business and so on.
That this idea of vocation has to do With the fact that we are confident that as the Lord of history and as the Lord of all of life, God places his call upon people. to perform certain tasks. But we don't usually think Of suffering Or of dying. as a vocation. I haven't seen any vocational schools that give a diploma in suffering or uh or a place where you can go and study how to die. And yet, if I understand what Scripture is teaching about the nature of suffering and about the nature of death, I think that it is safe for us to see that there are times in a person's life where the call of God upon that person may not be to banking or to being a doctor or to being a minister or whatever, but the call of God on the person's life for that person.
Portion of their life.
Is to suffer. Perhaps even to the eye. As I said earlier,
that may sound Far out to you and radical. So what I'd like to do in the rest of this segment is to show you something of the history of God's activity with people. By looking again at persons who Whom we know God called to suffer. Anytime we even talk about suffering, usually the first name that comes to mind from biblical history is the name of and I know this is gonna look funny up here underneath this word vocation, it's the name Job. Not job. Although there's a link between vocation and jobs. I'm talking about vocation and job. You know the story of Job, how that there's a drama that is unfolding in heaven where Satan reports to the divine architect of heaven and earth, and he says he's been going to and fro over all of the earth and examining the creation.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What does the Bible say about a vocation to suffer?
0:00–6:41
2
How does the Old Testament describe the call to suffering?
6:41–12:28
3
What can we learn from Job’s experience of divine suffering?
12:28–18:27
4
Why does Jesus use the story of the blind man to illustrate suffering?
18:27–22:39
5
How does Jesus’ prayer in Gethsemane reveal a divine vocation to suffering?
22:39–25:38
6
What does Peter’s reaction teach us about the cost of the Messiah’s calling?
25:38–25:54