Trials and Tribulations

By: Joseph A. Nagy, Jr via revelation of the Holy Spirit CopyFree (F) under the terms of the OWL (Open Works License, http://owl.apotheon.com), version 0.9.1 or greater.

INTRODUCTION
I. Good morning, I would just like to thank the Elders for letting me come up here today to share with you a message God has laid on my heart. II. As I share with you, my only prayer is that I am used by God to relate to you my own personal testimony so you understand a little where I'm coming from and also relate to you the meat of the message that God has given me to share. III. My name is Alex Nagy, and while I'm not an Elder, a Deacon, a Pastor or Preacher, I am a child of God. He saved me a little over 2 1/2 years ago when I accepted His will over my own, when I accepted His Son as my Lord and Savior. Since then I've seen, done, heard, and listened to a lot of things and people. My life has been radically transformed. To be fair, my journey started long before that. I won't spend too much time on that only to visit upon my youth for a moment and then to a time about a year before I was bornagain, then moving on with the message. It is interesting how it takes adversity to get us to take notice of God. It was in adversity similar to what I am going through now where I first really questioned God. When I was 16 or so, I was diagnosed with stage 2 Synovial Sarcoma, a cancer of the glands that lubricate the joints, in my left elbow. The same arm that has now has a diagnosis of stage 3 Osteoblastic Osteosarcoma, which is basically a primary bone cancer originating from the cells that create new bone. I really didn't question God too hard, or even seek Him out in more than cursory prayer. I was Roman Catholic at the time and I figured I was covered and I had no need to worry, though I did later on start to question the church's teachings, and eventually my own faith. I successfully went into remission via treatment with radiation and chemotherapy and didn't give cancer a second thought. Fast forward almost 13 years. I'm living on my own in Knoxville, smoking pot, drinking alcohol, and basically doing whatever made me feel good. Around September of 2008, though, I was at the end of my rope. No girlfriend, out of work, and

about to be kicked out of my apartment. One night I decided to end it all, or at least try to. I found some old prescription bottles of mine that still had pills in them - a combination of sleeping pills and muscle relaxers - and took every last one of them. I then went over to a buddies house, smoked some pot with him, and waited until I could feel the effects of the meds to kick in before going home. I know a lot of you may think God doesn't make deals with anyone, but I'm convinced He made one with me. As I drifted off to sleep I prayed to Him. I told Him I knew what I was doing was wrong in His eyes but that I felt that He didn't care about me. That I wasn't important. That I wasn't worthy of being loved. I told Him that if He did love me and care, I would wake up in the morning and start going back to church and enter into a real relationship with Him, otherwise I won't. As you can see I woke up the next morning, having had the most relaxing night of sleep that I have ever had in my life. You better believe that following Sunday I got my butt into church (a local Catholic church, as that was all I knew) and started to make good on my end of the deal. Only, I wasn't finding any relationship at the Catholic church. It felt good for a while, but in the end it was just as empty as I had remembered it. I didn't despair, though. During this time I was also starting to receive treatment for a mental illness known as bipolar disorder, as I knew I needed help and that I couldn't do it on my own. I was still smoking pot and drinking alcohol, but not near like I used to. Eventually I did find a relationship with Christ. It took a while longer then I thought it would, but I continued seeking after it. I was going to do everything in my power to have a fulfilling relationship with God. I knew He was the only one I could ever trust in and hope on. I'm not sure how I knew, and even now - knowing that my faith came not of myself but as a gift from God - I'm not sure what was going on before I was saved to bring me where I am. I only know that God was most definitely in it. I stand before you today a man made new by God who has once already had the healing hand of God already touch me when He cured me of my bipolar disorder. I've had others tell me that such illnesses are incurable and try to explain to me - as if I'm some dummy - how mental illnesses work. I stand before all of them and before you to tell you otherwise. God is not just wrathful and vengeful and jealous, but loving, holy and above all, perfect. I stand before you healed of what others call incurable. I also stand before you saved and to tell you that with God, nothing is impossible and that without Him, nothing is possible.

IV. Now that you know a little bit more about me, I would like to use the remaining time that I have been given to share with you what I have to come understand about Trials and Tribulations. I pray that you all will also seek out God yourselves for an understanding, because there is no understanding except for His. (Transition: Let's pray.)

Body
1. Several months ago, I think it was around October or November of 2011, I felt lead to begin studying Job, not even suspecting what was in store for me. I was already familiar with Job, having done a Bible study over it with a Sister via email. I knew his story and that, if there was anyone who understood what it meant to go through trials and tribulations in the Bible outside of Christ, it was good ol' Job. I didn't know what God was trying to show me at the time but I dove in, reading the book 3 or 4 times, just trying to soak it all in and let God show me whatever it was that He was trying to show me. I didn't get it then, though. There was so much. Perhaps too much, and it filled my head with all sorts of ideas and what I like to call delusions of grandeur, you know, when you think you've got something down pat when you really don't? When I started going through Job for the 5th time, I started taking notes over what I thought God wanted to show me, but I kept ignoring the Spirit which was trying to show me something else related to Job but not found in the book of Job. Soon I became frustrated with my note-taking, feeling as if I were missing something, and I put it aside. I'm not so sure if I was trusting in God to show me the missing pieces or if I thought I'd just figure it out in my own time, but I just let my Bible sit there, as if expecting God to just hand-hold me through what should have been something so simple. Shortly thereafter I was helping Brother David with some stuff and spending some really quality time with him and that's when this whole journey, as far as I knew it, started for me with the cancer and my first broken bone. It still took me almost another month before I went back to seeking after God before I really understood things. As it stood, I thought I understood why God was getting me into Job. He was going to put me through something similar. I thought it was a test and that I had it all figured out (remember those delusions I told you about before, hehehe). I figured all my studies in Job up until that point had been preparing me for the road that lay ahead for me - and in a manner it was - but not as I thought it. As my wife and I prayed, as I prayed, as

the Elders of the Church lay their hands on me to pray for healing, but most of all as I let God lead my studies in Scripture, I learned something that my previous studies hadn't revealed to me. Not because I'm not a good studier in the academic, worldly sense, but because it was an academic study. God led me to Scriptures to be sure to prepare the way, but I stepped out of line from behind Him and tried working on my own. Never a good idea, but God still gets the Word in on time, let me tell you. 2. When I went back to earnestly seeking after Him, repenting of sin that still haunted me, and begging Him to show me what it was that I had been missing, that's when the flood gates opened. The first thing He showed me that really got my attention was something that from my first 4 readings of Job I missed. I'm not sure how I missed it, but I did. Job 19:25-27 (NKJV) For I know that my Redeemer lives, and He shall stand at last on the earth; and after my skin is destroyed, this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God, whom shall behold, and not another. How my heart years within me! 3. Job knew! He knew that he would see his Redeemer, knew that He lives (notice the present tense), and He yearned for being able to see Him. In all of Job's grief, in all of his anguish over what he has been going through, Job knew that his Redeemer lives! If Job had any doubts about himself, he never doubted God or charged Him with wrong. Yes, Job thought he knew better than God for keeping him alive through the anguish he was now feeling, but is misunderstanding God's intentions for allowing us to go through trials in life a sin? Job 42:6 "Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." 4. I believe that's all Job was repenting for, for believing he knew better than God. I think that's something each of us probably should be repenting for each and every day. Thinking we know better than the Almighty Creator of Heaven and Earth. Of course if we are diligently seeking after Him in prayer, in Scripture, and allowing ourselves to be truly lead by the Spirit, it shouldn't be an issue. Oh how I have sinned in this manner and I abhor my own self for thinking I knew better than the almighty why I am

going through this own trial in my life. Me, of all people. Having already suffered through cancer once, I thought I was done. I still believe to this day that God saved me then, not because of my own faith but because of the faith of all those who prayed for me. I had no right to the healing and saving power of God back then. I was in my own crisis of faith that lasted well into my twenties and early-early thirties. I thank God every day for having a friend like the ones who invited me to church, and I thank God everyday for finally getting through to me and saving me from an eternity separated from Him. Those of us who are truly called by His name are truly blessed. 5. That being said, why was I being taking through this trial again? Why was I having to deal with cancer? Well, as I said earlier, I was hindered by unresolved sin, I was hindered by thinking I knew better, I was hindered by allowing myself to be distracted by the unimportant junk of this world. Sectarianism. Politics. Conspiracy theories. I was allowing those things to become the gods of my life, thinking that I could give equal footing with the only One who matters. I think God allows us to go through various trials, some more seemingly severe than others, not only to get our attention, but to purify us in a manner that is not otherwise possible. Peter himself speaks of it in the following verse. 1 Peter 1:6-8 (NKJV) In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials , that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith - the salvation of your souls! 6. And Job knew it! He had it right in verses 25 through 27 of the 19th chapter of the book of the Bible bearing his name. HE KNEW! How come he knew? Because he was a man that continually sought after God and His will! God Himself claims this! Job 1:1 (NKJV) There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God and shunned evil.

Job 1:8 (NKJV) Then the LORD said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil?" Job 1:22 (NKJV) In all this Job did not sin nor charge God with wrong. Job 2:3 (NKJV) Then the LORD said to Satan, "Have you considered My servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil? And still he holds fast to his integrity, although you incited Me against him, to destroy him without cause." 7. I've read all those Scriptures for a reason, to show that Job remained faithful to God. Job still trusted in God to do right by Him because He knew God to be just. He knew God was faithful. He knew God didn't strike those He Himself called righteous. I sometimes wonder, though, if Job knew who Lucifer was as throughout all of the book of Job, no mention of Satan is ever found. I believe the message that Eliphaz was from a demon, just going by the description of how he felt when the things he relates to Job were related to him. Either way, Job was beginning to allow fear to rule over him and distract him. Job 3:25-26 (NKJV) For the thing I greatly feared has come upon me, and what I dreaded has happened to me. I am not at ease, nor am I quiet; I have no rest, for trouble comes. 8. I feel like Job and I are connected in a way. Job has allowed fear to rule him. He has allowed adversity to cause him to fret, to doubt. The only thing Job did wrong was thinking he could have done better than God and for not waiting for God to speak to him. He staid silent, not talking to anyone (including God) for 7 days and then spends the rest of his time complaining - bitterly - about what has befallen him. He's forgotten all that he had been blessed with, if Job has any sin from chapter 3 onward, it's that he thinks he could have done things better than God. In chapter 19 he declares that his redeemer lives and that he years to see him. Yet he continues to think he can do better than God (his sole sin in all this, I believe) and his so-called friends do nothing but accuse Job of doing wrong against God though God Himself says that Job

is upright and without sin, a righteous man with no contemporary equal. Job and I shared this sin of thinking we know better equally. We fretted about what was happening to us before we allowed God a chance to step in and lead us where He wants to take us, before we allow Him to show us what it is that we need to be shown. That's the only reason that real healing alludes us. That's the only reason why we have no peace in our adversity. We fail to seek after God. We fail to realize that what we are going through, big or small, is being used to purify us and bring us closer to Him. Instead we go in search of smiling preachers who promise roses and riches and the grandest things. We are promised a life of ease if only we say 10 Hail Mary's and ask some idol to take away our sins. We look to the self-help guru's. The Oprah Winfrey's and Joel Osteen's. We look to everyone but God. We ask for salvation from our troubles from everyone but He who has already made the ONE AND ONLY WAY. And what do we get for it? We get to feel good for a while, I guess. It seems to work for some people, but if it's the right way shouldn't it work for everyone? Christ does work for everyone. Job knew this. He knew. 9. Job knows he hasn't sinned by charing God with wrong, but by letting despair rule over him, his focus turns away from Jehovah-Jireh (LORD Provider) to himself and his own, temporary, problems. He lets his grief at losing family, wealth, and position let him forget that he was never in control of his life to begin with. It wasn't the rituals that made Job righteous, but his love of God Almighty and a desire to please Him and do His will instead of his own. He rightly understands that God does give, but not take away. God does let things He has given be taken away if we forget Him (see Israel through out the Old Testament in the many times God allows them to be taken away in slavery to places throughout the known world). God allowed all that happened to Job to not only grow Job's faith and understanding (as well as our own), but to also show Satan that a TRUE BELIEVER can be upright, sinless, and righteous (see 1 John) AND to show Satan that no matter what the he thinks, God is always - ALWAYS - in control. Look at how God speaks to limit Satan's power against Job. Job 1:12 (NKJV) And the LORD said to Satan, "Behold, all that he has is in your power; only do not lay a hand on his person."

10. Satan was powerless to affect Job directly. Even with all the scary might Satan THINKS he has, unless God wills it, it CANNOT be done. Nothing is impossible with God. Nothing is possible without God. Job knows that God is the beginning and the end of everything, but for a while Satan succeeds in shaking his faith and in getting Job to thinking he could do better than God and that is what God is really chastising Job for toward the end of the book. Job's despair causes him to curse the day he was born, believing the world would have been better without him and that he would have been better without the grief he now feels. God's chastisement is not about Job thinking he could create the world, but has to do with Job thinking that Job knows what's good for Job.

Conclusion
1. Job was shaken to his core and nearly fell completely apart. Only his rock-steady faith - a faith that wasn't even of his own inkling but a gift from God to begin with - that he would get his day with God and be vindicated to his so-called friends kept him going. I'm not certain it's sin to allow oneself to be shaken with grief. There are things that we encounter on a daily basis that no one else knows about that shake us each a little. Job lost his family and his livelihood. We get diagnosis' of cancer, or AIDS, or some other illness. We look up and ask why. Sometimes - those more willing to trust in God's wisdom and less in man's wisdom - quickly find a peace because they - like Job - know that their redeemer lives! He's alive! He has rose from the dead and is alive today! Others, though, are shaken to their core. Fear sets in. Then depression. We ask everyone else why, but why is the wrong question and everyone else is the wrong one to be asking. If you go back ahead to Job, in chapter 42, verse 6: "Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." 2. What did Job repent of? The only thing Job sinned in: Thinking he knew better than God. On the other hand, his so called friends were told thus: Job 42:7 (NKJV) And so it was, after the LORD had spoken these words to Job, that the LORD said to Eliphaz the Temanite, "My wrath is aroused against you and your two friends, for you have not spoken of Me what is right, as My servant Job has."

3. Even though Job was in grief, and spoke out of an incomplete understanding of God, God Himself says that Job always spoke right about God. God is our judge, our jury, our executioner (in a sense). He's the Creator and He is our Redeemer. Yes, we'll all probably ask "Why?" when some tragedy or another has befallen us. I'm on my way to being a two-time cancer survivor. I'm not sure what God has in mind for this but the only thing I need care about is two things: 1. Even though we cannot see the whole picture, God can and there is a plan for everything we go through. It may be hard, it may feel like it would have been better had we never been born. AND 2. TO GOD BE THE HONOR, THE PRAISE, AND THE GLORY, NOW AND FOREVER. 4. Those are the only two things which we need concern ourselves with. Don't be like Job and let grief roll over you and bring you low. Know that your Redeemer lives and that He cares. Stand on the Word and rest in Christ Jesus. Don't forget God, but remember His glory, His love, His perfection in all things. Don't look to others as your sole source of comfort. Don't look to some self-help guru who can't really help even him- or herself. It was, is, and always be in God's hands. You have been, are, and will always be in God's hands but He cannot do anything in our lives if we reject the very love He pours out on us.