The Crook In The Lot: God’s Sovereignty and Wisdom Displayed In Our Afflictions by Puritan Thomas Boston.
The following 46-minute podcast is on Christian affliction via a book by Puritan Thomas Boston. Since it is a podcast, Pastor Hines interacts with some followers in the process of speaking about the book.
He read Boston’s words about Ecclesiastes 7 regarding afflictions, to address the manner in which believers and unbelievers deal with affliction.
Early on in his discussion, he shared some afflictions from his own life surrounding one of his children, as he alternatively read from Ecclesiastes 7 and Boston’s book.
In the initial 10-15 minutes, I saw that I have not been viewing a couple of long-term afflictions properly and have been dishonoring God and His providence to me.
Boston’s words are very meaningful for interpreting affliction properly, such that you might honor God as you go through it.
This message is part 1 of 4; depending on how much you want or need to know about affliction, I highly recommend it to readers, as we all undergo affliction from God’s hand to conform us to the image of His Son.
If you have been under severe or long-term affliction, then it is easy to be distracted, angry, bitter…, and to forget God’s purposes to conform you to the image of His Son; it is easy to get lost in the pain and upheaval afflictions bring into our lives.
Believers dishonor God when they reject His Providences.
I recommend listening to the initial 22 minutes before you quit on it if you have been under any long-term afflictions. I just finished listening to the entire message and was strengthened by it.
The YouTube link, to Christian Sermons and Audio Books, is to a playlist of 168 sermons on suffering. Pastor Hines 4-part series is at the beginning of the list. You could explore the list for other ministers / titles that call to you .
I highly recommend subscribing to Christian Sermons and Audio Books, YouTube site, if not for this site, I would not have known about many wonderful preachers.
SERMON HIGHLIGHTS of initial 23 minutes of this 46-minute podcast [bracketed statements, emboldening and underscoring are mine]:
- Initial 3 minutes 40 seconds are about how he was introduced to the book by a friend from seminary when his daughter was being treated for scoliosis
- Thomas Boston’s book is about Ecclesiastes 7:13; Hines read that verse and some other verses from ch 7 as he explained the relevance of this book to a believer’s suffering / affliction
- The crooks in our lives are from God
- The book explains that and helps believers interpret affliction such that they might quiet their hearts under it, as it is from God’s hand
- We tend to look at the affliction and with that focus forget to consider God’s possible reasons for giving us that in His providence to us
- Our focus on the affliction causes us impatience, anger… such things dishonor God because they are equivalent to rejecting His all-wise counsel to us
- Faith looks at God and trusts that He is sovereign and has His reasons for that affliction in our life – which is part of being conformed to the image of His Son
- Only the light of the Word represents affliction properly; enabling one to discern His hand [and the outward parts of His design for us]
- When the eye of faith perceives the above and considers it, one is enabled to quiet his inner turbulent emotions during trying outward circumstances
- With this view, Solomon advances several paradoxes in chapter 7, such as: the day of one’s death is better than the day of his birth (for those who by faith are honoring God)
- That is, in attending a funeral, one of faith takes such things to heart (that and other paradoxes briefly explained in terms of the danger these represent to the believer’s soul)
- A point made via his explanations is that we tend to surrender to God’s providences when humbled and oppose them in our pride
- If we become angry when looking at the lot of others, then we are likely comparing ourselves and interpreting our situation as ‘unfair’
- Verses such as the following are rejecting God’s providence
- Ecclesiastes 7:10 Say not, “Why were the former days better than these?” For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.
- Hines had some interactions with people watching podcast
- Suffering has very different purposes in scripture for believers and unbelievers
- The above considerations do not take the edge off pain, but do calm inner turmoil
- Ecc 7:11 Wisdom is good with an inheritance, an advantage to those who see the sun.
- Remedy: to wisely see the hand of God in everything you find bearing down upon you
- Ecc 7:13 Consider the work of God: who can make straight what he has made crooked?
- Consider the work of God, specifically in the crooked, rough, disagreeable parts of your lot and the crosses you find in it
- You likely see the cross in your lot very well, turning it over and over in your mind; but if you want to have inward quietness, then look upward to heaven and see the working of God in it; it is His doing
- The alternative is to be so fretful that you lose control in some way
- Difficult marital issues, health issues, wayward children issues… do the above in trust, or go crazy with worry
- All of us have 3-4 crooks that are from God, crooks that we really want changed
- It is ok to wrestle with God in prayer, but if that crook is removed, then another will come in its place
- [His words here made me think of a saying I heard my mother utter many times, “There’s always something to take the joy out of living.” According to the above, that is true if one focuses on the affliction, cross…as though it is unfair… and does not trust that God has right reasons to have it in your life.]
- Since it is true that one cannot remove any cross that God has given him, if your cross is not removed via prayer, then by trust and abiding in His word there is a way to deal with it by accepting it as from our loving God
- Therefore, the proper means of dealing with the crooks in your lot is seeing them as being from God and as not removable by you; trusting that our all-wise God has reasons for these crooks is part of enabling you to remain under them
- Hines talked briefly about the late Pastor James Boyce, his dying young from pancreatic cancer, shortly after it was diagnosed
- God is glorified when His children walk through the suffering
- We do not suffer any suffering that is without purpose
- God will not give you any more suffering than is required specifically for you
- The three parts of the book stated: 1. Every crook in your lot is God’s making; 2. What God sees fit to mar in your lot, you will not be able to mend; 3, contemplation of the crook in your lot, as the work of God, is the proper means to help you walk rightly under it
- When you understand that God measures out the trials of His children [steps 1-3] then you will be able to walk rightly
- What a testimony so many godly people have been through unbelievable heartache, physical trials, pain… to maintain a sense of the joy because of God’s promises
- [I was reminded of the following story at this point in Hines presentation: Horatio Gates Spafford was a prominent American lawyer and Presbyterian church elder. He is best known for penning the Christian hymn It Is Well With My Soul following a family tragedy in which his four daughters died aboard the S.S. Ville du Havre on a transatlantic voyage]
- Link to Wikipedia article on Spafford: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horatio_Spafford
- Hines enumerated numerous eternal benefits of trusting in God and then began considering chapter 2
YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQOyP-WHbgM&list=PLD6E647B538A71620
The following link is to Pastor Hines sermons at Sermon Audio, he has over 1300 sermons there: many series on Bible books and on works of the church, including such things as the Canons of Dort, Confessions of faith.
The link is to the 4-part series: https://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=108201951347795
The following links accompanied the YouTube video:
Contentment & the Crook in the Lot (Part 1 of 4) – Pastor Patrick Hines Podcast
▶️Reformed Presbyterian Pulpit Supplemental (Pastor Hines’ YouTube Channel):
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClW5…
▶️Bridwell Heights Presbyterian Church http://www.bridwellheightschurch.org/
▶️Pastor Patrick Hines (PLAYLIST): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list…