School of Suffering
True faith is not just about doing, but also about suffering and trusting in God's will.
Dr. Charles Parkhurst emphasizes the profound faith and spiritual success found in willingly accepting and enduring God's will, even in the midst of great suffering and challenges. He highlights that true empathy and the ability to help others come from experiencing affliction and suffering, just as Jesus did on the cross. The speaker encourages embracing afflictions as a means of deepening compassion and understanding, drawing parallels to how David's psalms and Paul's letters were enriched by their own sufferings. Ultimately, the message conveys that surrendering to God in times of hardship allows Him to shape and mold us for eternity, making us rare scholars in the school of suffering.
Text
"The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" (John 18:11).
This was a greater thing to say and do than to calm the seas or raise the dead. Prophets and apostles could work wondrous miracles, but they could not always do and suffer the will of God. To do and suffer God's will is still the highest form of faith, the most sublime Christian achievement. To have the bright aspirations of a young life forever blasted; to bear a daily burden never congenial and to see no relief; to be pinched by poverty when you only desire a competency for the good and comfort of loved ones; to be fettered by some incurable physical disability; to be stripped bare of loved ones until you stand alone to meet the shocks of life--to be able to say in such a school of discipline, "The cup which my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?'--this is faith at its highest and spiritual success at the crowning point. Great faith is exhibited not so much in ability to do as to suffer. --Dr. Charles Parkhurst
To have a sympathizing God we must have a suffering Saviour, and there is no true fellow-feeling with another save in the heart of him who has been afflicted like him.
We cannot do good to others save at a cost to ourselves, and our afflictions are the price we pay for our ability to sympathize. He who would be a helper, must first be a sufferer. He who would be a saviour must somewhere and somehow have been upon a cross; and we cannot have the highest happiness of life in succoring others without tasting the cup which Jesus drank, and submitting to the baptism wherewith He was baptized.
The most comforting of David's psalms were pressed out by suffering; and if Paul had not had his thorn in the flesh we had missed much of that tenderness which quivers in so many of his letters.
The present circumstance, which presses so hard against you (if surrendered to Christ), is the best shaped tool in the Father's hand to chisel you for eternity. Trust Him, then. Do not push away the instrument lest you lose its work."
"Strange and difficult indeed
We may find it,
But the blessing that we need
Is behind it."
The school of suffering graduates rare scholars.
Sermon Outline
- The Highest Form of Faith
- The Importance of a Suffering Saviour
- The Price of Sympathizing with Others
- The Value of Suffering in Our Lives
- Suffering can produce comforting and tender writings
- Suffering can shape us for eternity
Key Quotes
“The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?” — Charles E. Cowman
“He who would be a helper, must first be a sufferer.” — Charles E. Cowman
“The present circumstance, which presses so hard against you (if surrendered to Christ), is the best shaped tool in the Father's hand to chisel you for eternity.” — Charles E. Cowman
Application Points
- We must be willing to suffer for God's will in order to have true faith.
- Our afflictions can be a tool for shaping us for eternity if we trust in God.
- We must be willing to help others by first being willing to suffer ourselves.