020: Rejoice!!!

March 7, 2010
1 Peter 1:3-9

Today I attended my friend Nate’s Sunday school before going to my own home church. Nate and I had coffee on Friday and we were talking about our mutual appreciation for Mark Driscoll’s (Mars Hill Church, Seattle WA) no-nonsense teaching style. I was lamenting the fact that our town is 2 hours from Seattle and 1 ½ hours from the closest Mars Hill campus. Nate mentioned his church was going through the “Trial” series in one of the Sunday classes, and I’d be welcome to attend. I was like, “Are you SERIOUS!?! I’m SO there!”

I think I’ve heard this sermon before – I listened to a bit of the Trial series – but it was still impacting. I took notes. I’m sort of a note freak. My friend Zeph would call it one of my nerdy quirks.

Driscoll highlighted the fact that we ALL experience trials. I loved how he put it: “Everyone’s trial is important to them. It should be important to us. It is important to God.” How often do I take my focus off my own trials and struggles and disappointments and hurts enough to really focus on other people’s trials and let their weaknesses be important to me? I can be SO self focused!

So, as Driscoll pointed out, we EXPERIENCE trials, we FEEL grief over those trials, and we are commanded to RESPOND by rejoicing.

Huh? That sounds crazy, doesn’t it? What on earth do I possibly have to rejoice about when I feel and believe that my world is falling apart?

Well, nothing. But we do have something greater than this earth.

Driscoll pulled 10 reasons for rejoicing out of the text, and I thought they were important and should be shared:

1 – Rejoice in God’s MERCY
2 – Rejoice in the fact that, if you know Jesus, you have been born again
3 – Rejoice in the hope of a living, interceding savior
4 – Rejoice that we have an inheritance for something more than just this life
5 – Rejoice in the promise of heaven and the eternal presence of God
6 – Rejoice in God’s power and how He promises to never leave us
7 – Rejoice that our trials are short. They’re limited in years (80ish or so!)
8 – Rejoice in the fact that our faith is being refined to be more precious than any riches
9 – Rejoice that God loves me and I love Him. That’s why I come back to Him again and again
10 – Rejoice in the fact that we believe in Jesus, even without seeing Him. Because we will someday!

I’m clinging to these things to rejoice about tonight. I hope you can too.