Well good morning church. As Pastor Jim said my name is Andy Schultz. I serve Faith Church
as the executive administrator which basically means all the exciting ministry work that
people go into the field for. I don't do any of that. I just do all the other stuff. But
it's a pleasure, it's an honor to be here. I'm thankful for Pastor Jim, for the leaders
here at Munster Church and just allowing me to be here today. I'm so thankful to give
him a break and it is so good to be in the house of the Lord today. It is a somewhat
nice day. I almost said it was a beautiful day but I had to catch myself before I said
it. It's good. We need a little rain once in a while. But it is good to preach the Word
of God. So even though my job doesn't always bring me to the pulpit at Faith Church, I
really value preaching the Word of God. It is truly the rule of life that we can follow
to give us hope and hope for salvation. Amen, church.
A few weeks ago, my daughters actually, I have two girls. My family, we live here in
Munster. My wife Gina, my daughter is Kinley who is 11 and Emrin or Emmy who is 9. My daughters
were at their yearly pediatrician checkup recently. And the pediatrician comes into
the room and she sees Emmy, my 9-year-old. She says, oh, we remember Emmy. We remember
Emmy. Which is kind of a strange thing to say, right? When your kid comes in every single
year and when she has the flu and all that stuff. Why is she so memorable? Because when
she was 6 weeks old in 2015, she was at home, I remember my wife Gina, heard her cry in
like a weird way. Now to me, all crying from babies sounds exactly the same. Like, yeah,
it's crying. Let's just feed her. Let's figure out what she needs. But Gina is like, no,
there's something different about this cry. Something is wrong here. And I'm not sure
if I believed it at the time, but I'm like, you know what? I trust you. But she knew this
baby well enough after 6 weeks of life to say something is off here. So into the pediatrician
she went and the pediatrician said, you know what? Let's just as a precaution get her checked
out, send her over to community hospital. And she was in there for a couple days and
kind of walked out of there with not a lot of answers. Just we're not really sure what
this was, but it seemed like the crying had subsided a little bit. So they were comfortable
enough to send us home. But then just a couple of days later, it started up again. And it
seemed even worse this time. And 6 week old Emmy had a fever. Now any of you that work
in the medical field know that when a child of that age has a fever, that's an immediate
trip to the emergency room. And so back to community hospital we went and the doctors
seemed pretty concerned there. And so they asked us about doing a spinal tap on our 6
week old baby because their concern was that she had bacterial meningitis, an infection
of the brain and of the spine. And sure enough after that test it was true. She had group
B strep bacterial meningitis. And so it was a very dangerous situation for our 6 week
old daughter. And so they pumped her full of antibiotics for days and days. I believe
we spent, is it 10 days we spent in the hospital? Is that right? Yeah, I was looking at my wife
there. We spent 10 days total between the two trips in the hospital with baby Emmy.
And I remember very, very specifically a doctor saying to us, it's a good thing you brought
her in when you did. And I don't know if we were just naive. I don't know if we just weren't
ready to hear something like that or we thought we were immune to bad stuff at that age. What
does that mean? We're lucky that we brought her in. It was a good thing we brought her
in and the gravity of the situation started to really set in because in Emmy's crying,
she was suffering greatly. The pain from the brain and the spine must have been so incredibly
intense that it literally changed the way that she cried out. It changed her whole demeanor.
This is so intense I can't bear it. And it changed her voice in such a way that my wife
said something is not right. And we as parents in the hospital, we suffered. The big questions,
what's happening here? What is this all about? Why Lord? I mean, we thought we had this healthy
baby. This is stuff that they should figure out right away. Why did it six weeks after?
Why is this happening now? But it did. And there's good news to this story. There's a
happy ending to it that I keep looking back at my family because my nine-year-old daughter
is here and she's healthy and happy and amazing and artistic and sings and is full of life
and has a smile that is so big that it would change your day. Now, not all stories have
that kind of a happy ending, do they? Some just don't. They don't have the same sort
of fairy tale ending. So I've been reflecting a little bit this week on suffering because
I'm going to preach in a moment from Psalm 22 because that episode in my life seemed
hopeless and there have been others. I remember back in 2012, I lost my first job as an adult
was I used to teach middle school band and I lost that job. I lost that job because they
cut the district that I taught in the Lake Central District, they cut a bunch of money
from their budget and I was one of the 42 teachers that they let go that year. And that
job meant everything to me. It was my identity and I lost it. And I remember thinking, Lord,
why did you have me move to this area? I'm not even from Northwest Indiana. Why did you
have me come here to take this job and buy a house and start to have kids and a family
here just to take it all away? I remember it was, it was incredible suffering. We wrestled
with the future and financial uncertainty. I wrestled with my calling and my purpose
in life. Well, you're looking up here at me now and you see that things have changed,
that there was something providential in that, that losing that job started a chain of events
and here I am today, administrate which is likely where God wants me now. But it took
some suffering to get there. Gina and I both have suffered with medical conditions. You
know, we're 40 years old. I'm starting to learn that, that you can't really take a whole
lot for granted anymore. That there's new pains, new aches, new conditions, new, I go
to the doctor more than I've ever gone before. And some of you are saying it's nothing, dude.
You're only 40. Just wait. And you're right. And I don't want to be any part of that. I
don't, I get it. But yeah, I'm starting to, we're like, you know, we're just stepping
in to that phase of our lives, right? But there's suffering, there's, there's suffering
in this life. We've, as a family, we've endured broken relationships in our family or with
friends. We've endured financial uncertainty, not just from job loss, but just wondering,
Lord, what are you doing? How are you going to provide for this family? I don't know if
you know this, but education and ministry, the two jobs that I've had are not exactly
high paying fields. What are you doing, Lord? Why? Why would you call me to this stuff?
And I think that for some of you here today, suffering has hit you really hard. Maybe it's
in the past. It's a story that you tell around the table, or maybe suffering is hitting you
right now. And you're asking these questions. Why? Why Lord? Why have we endured loss as
a family? Why do I have to go to another funeral? Why do I have to go back for another appointment
because that medication didn't work and the next one didn't work and all that in this
order and here I am still in pain. Why Lord am I being called by creditors needing me
to pay bills that I don't have any money to pay? Why Lord do I have relationships in my
family that are broken, that don't seem to have any good happy ending attached to them
right now? Why? What plagues you? Tragic loss, illness for you, mental illness, struggles
for you or someone in your family. Maybe it's financial insecurity. You have likely suffered
at some point in your life. If you right now would not report that you're suffering, I
can almost guarantee you, you will suffer at some point, in some way in this life. So
here we are in the summer of Psalms. It's summer. It's happy time and we're deep in
the hole of lament in Psalm 22. Now we call this a lament because scholars have identified
it as a lament. A lament is essentially suffering and pointing it out to God. But it's beautiful
because it's from our word. It's from God's word. It's scripture. It guides us in these
incredibly dark moments and it reminds us that we're not alone in it. That others have
suffered historically, that others around you in this room are suffering now and guess
what? Others will suffer in the future. There's shared suffering here. Now Psalm 22 is credited
to David who was this great king of Israel. In fact, the people around Jesus in the first
century would have looked back and really thought that was the heyday for us. We want
to get back to that. Like when we had that great guy, David in charge. David was the
great king. You know David is in David versus Goliath. David is in the man after God's
own heart. David who is in the lineage of Jesus our Lord and Savior. That David suffered.
Now 30 to 40 percent of Psalms scholars would classify as laments, which is really interesting
because I think culture and sometimes even within the church, we can start to believe
lies about suffering. We can really start to believe that suffering is insignificant.
That suffering is just a speed bump. Getting in the way of real life. If I could just get
through this, then I'll be back on track. There's bad Christian teaching out there friends
that says that our suffering is taken away when we have more faith. That's a lie. And
then there's sort of a macho approach. Suffering, that's not real. You just got to have a good
mindset. Get yourself through it. You'll be fine. You're a wimp if you don't. Is that
real? Because God's word doesn't direct me and you're going to see that very clearly.
You're not alone in this and friends you are not hopeless. You are not hopeless. Read with
me here from, we're going to go through Psalm 22 now. We'll kind of step through it and
when we do, we're going to find, we're going to ask ourselves two questions. How do we
find God in suffering? And how did God find us in our suffering? And so this is kind of
my big takeaway. I like to summarize the whole thing into one sentence and I would say this.
We find God in suffering because God found us in Christ's suffering. So I'm going to
give you four ways we're going to find God in suffering and I think this is really important.
We're going to get it from the text. So here we go. Number one, cry out to God. Pretty
simply. As my daughter, Emmy, did, she literally cried out as a helpless six week old baby.
It changed who she was. Read this from Psalm 22 verses one and two. It says, my God, my
God, why have you abandoned me? Why are you so far from my deliverance and from my words
of groaning? My God, I cry by day, but you do not answer by night. Yet I have no rest.
Crying out to God. And by the way, if some of those words, my God, my God, why have you
forsaken me or abandoned me? By the way, depending on the translation, if those sound familiar,
it's because not only were they written here by David in Psalm 22, they were spoken by
Jesus on the cross, Matthew 27 verse 46, about three in the afternoon. Jesus cried out with
a loud voice. Eli, Eli, Lema, Sevaktani. That is my God, my God, why have you abandoned
me? Even Jesus cried out in his suffering. And even Jesus asked the big questions, even
though he knew the big answers, he still asked the big question of his father in his suffering.
So it's suffering is for David and suffering is for Jesus. Guess who else suffering is
for? You and me. That's right. So we cannot pretend suffering isn't real. And we can't
pretend it's not difficult. It is okay to ask big questions in your suffering. And using
my God here in the language of verse one is important because when we feel forsaken and
David is giving us this guide that we look to God, it's not feel forsaken, therefore
turn away from God. But rather it's I don't know what's happening. So I have only one
place to look. God, why have you forsaken me? That's what it feels like. But I know
you're my God. I know that you are. Do we sometimes turn away from God and use secular
wisdom for a much holier problem? Do we try to say things like, oh, you know, it's no
big deal. The universe must be really upset with me. You know, karma is getting me back.
I don't know if anyone here is saying that. But the world is saying that, right? Those
are things out there. I'm only suffering because of something else and some this and
chain of events and try to explain it away with some form of logic that doesn't really
actually line up with the God's word. But are we also caught in that? Do we sometimes
forget that we have a great God above who we just saying, right? You give and you take
away. We love the give part. Yeah, God, give me more. No, no, no, take it away. But our
God and his infinite wisdom has providence in his sovereignty. He overlooks his people
and he knows what is good for us. And we cry out to him looking for his guidance. We can't
just explain it away. We have to turn to him. So number one, cry to God. Number two, remember
God. It's important here. Psalm 22 verses three through five, it says, but you are holy
enthroned on the praises of Israel. Our ancestors trusted in you. They trusted and you rescued
them. They cried to you and were set free. They trusted in you and were not disgraced.
See, David's circumstances didn't overwhelm his knowledge of God's work of salvation because
historically in David knew this to the time he was able to look back as we talked about
from Exodus and through numbers and through Deuteronomy and then obviously into Joshua
and on that God's people suffered in many different ways. They suffered in slavery in
Egypt. They suffered in starvation and thirst in the wilderness. They suffered in battles.
They suffered due to their own sin. But the Lord and David knew this, the Lord offered
a way out in saving grace and David knows it. He knows it. He's relying upon it. He's
remembering what God has done. Do you rely on the history of God's people to be your
guiding light in suffering? Do we have this long game perspective of God's eternal faithfulness
that he has shown his people from the beginning of time until now? Or do we feel forsaken
and are short-sighted and forget about this God that has written the story of humanity?
David remembered God. Do we have stories of faith in our lives that we can point to that
guide us? Stories from previous generations that can guide you? Maybe points to the closeness
of God. Are there times when you remember God was close and you can reflect upon those
even when it seems dark? Do we have stories of the past? I can tell you right now, when
I was young, if my parents didn't suffer through financial hardship but then rely on the Lord
and then see the Lord do an amazing work, if I didn't have that story growing up as
a child, I don't know what I would think today when I was suffering financially. Because
I was able to look back at my own past and go, well God, you were faithful to that generation.
Will you be faithful to this one? So I have my own history that I can look upon. And we
have this great thousands of pages history right here in our hands to see God's faithfulness
that we can remember him as David did. And now those narratives, they can shape my understanding
of what God is doing. But the thing is the lament doesn't turn bright now. It doesn't
go, okay, well I remembered God that you did all these great things. And so awesome. End
of story because if you're following along your Bible, I've only read one to three or
five verses so far and there's 31 of them. So this takes a much darker turn. Look at
verse six. David starts to think like Job here. He says, but I am a worm and not a man.
Scorned by mankind and despised by people. Everyone who sees me mocks me. They sneer
and shake their heads. And then Jesus, we can parallel everything that David says here
to Jesus as well because Jesus who quoted Psalm 22 has very Psalm 22 like things happening
to him simultaneously. Matthew 27 verse 39 says those who passed by were yelling insults
at him, shaking their heads. David is mocked. It says in Psalm 22 verse eight, he relies
on the Lord. They said, let him save him. Let the Lord rescue him since he takes pleasure
in him. They're mocking him. And then Jesus is mocked in Matthew 27 verse 43. He trusts
in God. Let God rescue him now. If he takes pleasure in him, for he said, I am the son
of God. Some parallels here. David is mocked for his faith in his God. Jesus is mocked
for it too. And there's a good chance that you in this culture can be mocked for your
faith in God. What's good for David? Good for Jesus. It's good for us. To remember God
means to remember that suffering has been a part of the history of God's people. And
so has salvation for that suffering been a part of the story for David, for Jesus, for
you. David's just reiterating how bad the situation is though. Here I go back to Psalm
22 verse 12. Many bulls surround me. Strong ones of Bashan encircle me. They open their
mouths against me. Lions mauling and roaring. I am poured out like water and all my bones
are disjointed. My heart is like wax melting within me. Some interesting imagery there.
Is that really what David was experiencing? We don't really know. We don't tie this particular
Psalm to a particular event in David's life. Scholars haven't been able to make a specific
connection. We know that he suffered in a lot of different ways. But boy, I tell you
what, my heart is like wax. My bones are out of joint. I'm poured out like water. That
sounds a lot like Jesus. Because crucifixion for Jesus is incredibly cruel. And this imagery
that David uses sounds a lot like the cruelty of crucifixion. To be physically poured out.
To have hammers and nails driven through your arms to physically break you. Is there significance
in Jesus quoting the first part of Psalm 22 that we might look at the rest of Psalm 22
to understand the greater story of what's happening in his crucifixion and then ultimately
his resurrection? But it gets worse for David. Verse 15, he says, my strength is dried up
like baked clay. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. You put me into the dust of death.
For dogs have surrounded me. A gang of evildoers has closed in on me. They pierced my hands
and my feet. I can count all my bones. People look and stare at me. They divided my garments
among themselves and they cast lots for my clothing. And go to the crucifixion account.
Matthew 27 verse 35, after crucifying they divided his clothes by casting lots. It's
almost as if David's writing was looking forward to Jesus in suffering. Scholars believe
if Jesus quoting one verse of Psalm 22 was to point us to the whole thing then therefore
we can look at this whole Psalm and find ourselves in this suffering. How many of you have felt
like this? Dried up, lost, broken, hurt, no idea how you're going to get out of it. And
yet there's our Lord that we can remember. We don't get to just remember the Old Testament.
We get the whole New Testament reality to remember as well. We get the whole story of
the Christ. The resurrection included in that. New life. The Holy Spirit. We get a whole
new set of tools that David didn't have access to. To remind us to remember God. Now if you're
following along you may have noticed I skipped a couple of verses. I'm going to go back to
verse 9 now. It says it was you who brought me out of the womb making me secure at my
mother's breast. I was given over to you at birth. You have been my God from my mother's
womb. Don't be far from me because distress is near and there's no one to help. So we
are reminded here of a clue to keep going to God. To keep going. To be persistent. Keep
looking toward the Lord rather than giving up when suffering intensifies. This is a confession
that we are helpless to do anything for ourselves but rather to look to Jesus our great high
priest and the Holy Spirit to minister to us when things are helpless. Friends I want
to encourage you to pray and then when that doesn't work pray again. And when that doesn't
work pray again. And when and you get it. God is faithful in his timing. David didn't
say this is uncomfortable. End of Psalm. Keeps going back. Back. Back. Lord. Lord. Lord.
Verse 19. But you oh Lord don't be far away. My strength come quickly to help me. Rescue
my life from the sword. My only life from the power of these dogs. Save me from the
lion's mouth. From the horns of wild oxen. You have answered me or in the text there
you have rescued me from the horns of the wild oxen. So David chooses to live as if
the deliverance has already happened even as he waits for it to happen. He is so convinced
that God is going to do something great. He's so convinced that God is up to something.
That he is willing to declare victory in the waiting. He does so because he knows who his
God is. And so I want to invite you number four. And not just keep going to God but to
praise God. To praise God in the suffering which I know seems backwards and weird. But
praise him knowing he is faithful. Verse 22. I will proclaim your name to my brothers and
sisters. I will praise you in the assembly. Or it says congregation in another translation.
Look at this from Hebrews chapter two. Verse ten it says for in bringing many sons and
daughters to glory it was entirely appropriate that God for whom and through whom all things
exist should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For the one who
sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one father. That is why Jesus is not
ashamed to call them brothers and sisters saying I will proclaim your name to my brothers
and sisters. I will sing hymns to you in the congregation. Or I will sing praise. And another
allusion back to Psalm 22. And church know this we are with Christ in suffering. We are
with him in his suffering. We're worthy of suffering. Let me say that again. We are worthy
of suffering. Worthy of it. Because Christ deems us worthy enough to be with him in his
suffering. We are worthy of suffering. Jesus includes us with him and that is worthy of
praise. God takes care of his children in our times of suffering by allowing us to be
shaped by our suffering. It's a gift to endure to teach us perseverance to grow. We suffer
with confidence knowing that we are sharing with Jesus in it. And even more of a big deal
is this that God cares for his children so much that he allowed his son to suffer to
die to shed blood that you may walk out of here sinless. Removed right? It doesn't mean
we won't sinning in tomorrow. It just means that we can confess and be cleansed. Which
is the greatest news of all. That there is no physical suffering. There is no situational
suffering that will take that away from us. That we have a great healer through Christ
who wants to redeem this great story of redemption back to God the Father is done in and through
Christ in and through his suffering and you are given perseverance in and through your
suffering. We're part of a much greater story and when we suffer and try to fix it on our
own we are only seeking our own glory. But when our suffering drives us to him it is
a confession that our only way in life is freedom through Christ in the forgiveness
of our sins and a glimpse toward eternal life that we will share with Christ as well. We
share in suffering with Christ. We also get to share in resurrection. Romans chapter 6.
Therefore we were buried with him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was
raised from the dead by the glory of the Father so we too may walk in newness of life. For
if we have been united with him in the likeness of his death we will certainly also be in
the likeness of his resurrection. That is resurrection hope. Sharing in his resurrection
means that nothing that happens to our earthly bodies, nothing can affect our eternal freedom
in the forgiveness of sins and ultimately a new body in the new creation, the new heavens,
the new earth. Being resurrected with Christ means there is nothing in this world to fear.
It's easy to say but it's hard to live out but we have nothing to fear. But for that
confidence I want to praise God that he has given me life and breath but also purpose
and direction and hope. Hope in my suffering in this broken, very very broken place. Verse
23 of Psalm 22. We'll close out the Psalm here in the next couple chunks here. You will
fear the Lord. You who fear the Lord praise him. All you descendants of Jacob honor him.
All you descendants of Israel revere him for he has not despised or abhorred the torment
of the oppressed. He did not hide his face from him but listened when he cried to him
for help. I will give praise in the great assembly because of you. I will fulfill my
vows before those who fear you. The humble will eat and be satisfied. Those who seek
the Lord will praise him. May your hearts live forever. This is not trying to find a
silver lining in the suffering. It's a confession that we serve a God that is bigger than my
suffering. When we cry out, when we remember God and when we praise him in the face of
our suffering knowing God is eternal and our bodies are not then we are looking to him
and saying God you are everything including my suffering therefore I know where to go
with it. I praise you right now no matter where I am at. Verse 27. All the ends of the
earth will remember and turn to the Lord. All the families of the nations will bow down
before you for kingship belongs to the Lord. He rules the nations. All who prosper on earth
will eat and bow down and those who go down to the dust will kneel before him. Even the
one who cannot preserve his life. Their descendants will serve him. The next generation will be
told about the Lord. They will come and declare his righteousness to a people yet to be born.
They will declare what he has done. Do you have a story of suffering? Do you have a story
of God's faithfulness? I want to invite you to tell it so that the next generation will
hear it and know of our God. And don't spare any details. Don't whitewash a story and say
yeah it was kind of bad but we you know no live in it give the details say it was horrible.
I remember how we felt in that hospital room but God was with us. Even when we felt hopeless
even when we thought we had no chance God was with us. Spare no detail to the next generation
to let them know the faithfulness of God. So who are you talking about your suffering
with? Are you crying out to God in your suffering? Are you persistently praying and being drawn
to God in that suffering? That's what makes suffering so special is it draws us right
to him. And I remember very specifically being in that hospital room and someone came up
to my wife and said I can't believe you're so calm right now because man she was calm
in like this supernatural way that made no sense. But when someone says that to you I
can't believe you're so calm basically what they're saying is I can't believe that faith
thing that you do is real. Isn't that what they're really saying? I can't believe that's
a real thing that you actually believe that you're so calm right now. You're a baby. No
God is faithful. That preaches in a very hectic chaotic world to have the confidence and say
God is doing something. I may not get it. I may not understand it. I may not like it
but God is doing something and in that he is growing his people to continue to be more
and more like Jesus.