Passage: Philippians 3:10-14; Genesis 22; Isaiah 43:2

The Big Idea

Someday we’ll be in heaven, perfect, every tear wiped away. But not yet. Here we’re still hurt by the troubles of this world. Why, if we’re already forgiven and saved? So that we can know God. Suffering is a furnace, and the furnace doesn’t destroy the gold; it only removes the impurities. The gold in you is your faith. Paul wanted to know Christ in the fellowship of His sufferings, and he shows us how to walk through the fire: press on, lay hold, forget what’s behind, reach forward. Abraham walked that road to Mount Moriah and came to know God’s own heart.

Not Yet

A famous movie line says life is pain, and anyone who tells you differently is selling something. That’s not the whole truth. But it’s not entirely wrong either.

John says we are God’s children now, and what we will be hasn’t yet appeared; but we know that when He appears we’ll be like Him, because we’ll see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope purifies himself as He is pure (1 John 3:2-3).

Someday we’ll all be in heaven. We’ll be perfect. None of this world’s troubles will touch us. Every tear will be wiped away (Revelation 21:4).
But that’s not where we are today. We’re not perfect. We’re hurt, sometimes brutally, by the troubles of this world. We cry in brokenness, sorrow and regret.
Why?
We’re already forgiven and saved by faith. In Christ we’re already pure.
So why do we need to keep hurting?
To know God. To understand who He is and to trust what He says. It can’t happen any other way. It must be the furnace.

The Furnace

The furnace purifies gold.

The fire doesn’t destroy the gold, only the impurities. The dross rises to the top, and the goldsmith skims it off.
The gold in you is your faith (1 Peter 1:6-7).
We suffer in these evil days because there are parts of your heart and mine that don’t yet fully trust the Lord.
However much we think we trust Him, our souls are laid bare before Him, and He cares so much that He’ll go after every part of our hearts that isn’t yet gold.
He sees the golden masterpiece in His mind’s eye, and He knows how to get us there.
But we don’t like it. Who would? No one ever enjoyed the furnace.

So how do we get through it?

We have to value something more than our own happiness. We have to value knowing the Lord: our relationship with Him, submitting to His Word in humility and receiving His grace in faith.

Someone once asked C. S. Lewis why the righteous suffer. His reply, in effect: “Why not? They’re the only ones who can take it.”

Knowing Him (Philippians 3:10-14)

Paul wrote that he wanted to know Christ and the power of His resurrection, and to share in the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, so that somehow he might attain the resurrection from the dead. Not that he had already obtained it or was already perfect; but he pressed on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus had taken hold of him. He didn’t consider himself to have arrived. But one thing he did: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, he pressed on toward the goal for the prize of God’s upward call in Christ Jesus.

It’s not fun to be in the furnace. But fun isn’t the purpose of life, is it?

Paul shows us the real purpose of life:

To know God!
That’s why we can “take it.”
We have a deeper well to draw from.
We have a fuller life being poured into our souls daily by Jesus Christ: His resurrection life.
We’re learning who God really is, and what He gives to those who trust Him.

Look at how we come to know God this way:

“The fellowship of His sufferings.”

This is the way: in the furnace.
It’s how our trust, our faith, is purified, and faith is the only way to truly know Him.

“Being conformed to His death.”

Jesus’ death on the cross was the ultimate expression of trust in His Father.
He let suffering do its work in His life.
He drank the cup completely.
He’s the founder of our salvation, made perfect through suffering (Hebrews 2:10), who has shown us the way. He learned obedience through what He suffered (Hebrews 5:8), and so will we.

What Do We Do in the Fire?

So how do we get through this suffering, this “death” the Goldsmith of our souls allows? What’s our part?

Paul gives us the words in verses 12-14: press on, lay hold, forget, reach forward, press on.

This describes an active life.

We don’t just shut down in suffering.
We don’t run from it, numbing it with alcohol, drugs, entertainment or relationships.
We engage with God through our suffering.

Press on and lay hold

Search the Scriptures for God’s promises, resources and wisdom.
When you find them, lay hold of them: write them down, speak them to your friends, pray them into your heart. All of that sets your soul on the path of believing God’s promises and trusting His grace.
Press on through the pain. Press on seeking the Lord. Lay hold of Him by faith.

Forget

Leave behind the old life and the old self’s expectations.
You aren’t promised a comfortable life. That expectation has to die.
Forget what lies behind!
Peter says we’ve spent enough of our past time living for our own pleasures (1 Peter 4:3).
We engage with God by letting that old life go.

Reach forward

Keep walking with God.
Keep seeking Him.
Keep reaching out to Him.
Keep learning to depend on His resources.
Keep growing in grace!
We don’t just sit and wait in our trials. We seek the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, looking for every place where we can let go of self-dependence and trust Him and His Word more.

That’s how we come to know God in the furnace. We have a fellowship of suffering: intimacy and closeness with Him that only comes through the fire.

“When You Walk Through the Fire” (Isaiah 43:2)

God promised His people that when they passed through the waters, He would be with them; the rivers would not sweep over them. When they walked through fire, they would not be burned; the flame would not consume them.

God promises to be with His people in suffering, not that they’ll avoid it!
In fact, that’s the point of their suffering: to be closer to God, to know Him more, more deeply, more really. No more faking it with God.
I don’t know anyone who truly knows God who hasn’t been through suffering.

The fire God allows doesn’t destroy us. We’ll feel the heat, but we won’t be consumed.

Think of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego (Daniel 3):

They were thrown into the furnace.
It wasn’t their fault. They had trusted God.
They were thrown in anyway.
They weren’t burned. Only their ropes burned off.
And they had fellowship with a fourth Man in the fire, who looked like a son of the gods!
They came to know God better than anyone else in the world at that moment.
And they became a witness to the world.

Abraham’s Furnace (Genesis 22)

And who could forget Abraham? God took him on a journey of suffering that’s hard to imagine. But it was all so that Abraham could know God’s heart more deeply.

Many people don’t understand why God would ask Abraham to sacrifice his own son. What kind of God would do that? A God who deeply desires men and women who will walk with Him, a God who will take us through the furnace of His love so we can know Him purely.

We sing about the “Refiner’s fire,” but do we mean it? Abraham did. So God took him through it, and Abraham pressed on.

God told Abraham to take his son, his only son Isaac whom he loved, go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on a mountain God would show him.

Look closely:

“On one of the mountains I will show you.” God was saying, “I’m going with you. I’ll give you more details when you need them. I will never leave you or forsake you. I know this will be hard.”
“Your son.” The one who came from you. Your life and heart are poured into him. Your hope for the future.
“Your only son, Isaac.” Only son? What about Ishmael? God doesn’t recognize the efforts of the flesh as legitimate. This was all about promise. God had promised Isaac and kept that promise. He’d promised that Isaac would have children and be the heir. Now He gave a command that seemed to contradict the promise. That’s exactly when we need to trust the Promiser.
“Whom you love.” Abraham’s love for Isaac wasn’t wrong. It was deep and good, a fruit of God’s faithfulness in his life. So why would God ask him to give it up?
“Offer him there as a burnt offering.” A complete sacrifice. Nothing held back.

In the land of Moriah. That’s where Jerusalem would later stand. About a thousand years later Solomon would build the temple there (2 Chronicles 3:1). And about a thousand years after that, God’s own Son would be sacrificed as the Lamb of God on those same hills.

Early the next morning Abraham got up, saddled his donkey, took two servants and his son Isaac, cut the wood for the offering, and set out for the place God had told him about.

In Abraham’s heart, this was the crucifixion, the death of his son.
He had already decided to trust God and do what God said.
I imagine that with each stroke of the axe on the firewood, his resolve grew firmer. He was pressing on, reaching forward, forgetting what lay behind.
With each swing the enemy may have whispered, “You can’t sacrifice your son! Who will be your heir? Find another way! God has no right to ask this. How could a God of love…?”
And the Spirit of the Lord answered within him: “God promised me that Isaac will be my heir. I don’t know how this will work. But when has God ever left me? When has He ever led me astray? I will trust Him. He won’t fail me now. It’s never happened before, but I believe God could even raise Isaac from the dead!”

Hebrews says exactly that: by faith Abraham, when tested, offered up Isaac, his only son, the one through whom the promises would come; he reasoned that God was able even to raise him from the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive him back (Hebrews 11:17-19).

“And he arose and went.”

The battle was won in Abraham’s heart. He would do what God asked.
Just like Jesus in Gethsemane. While Peter, James and John slept, Jesus was “splitting the wood,” praying and surrendering His soul to His Father’s will.
The enemy came at Him, but His trust in and love for the Father led Him.
Then Jesus rose and said, “Let’s go,” and set His face toward the cross to be the perfect Lamb of God.

On the third day, Abraham looked up and saw the place far off.

On the third day Abraham would receive his son back, as if from the dead!

Abraham told the servants to stay with the donkey while he and the boy went ahead to worship, and then, he said, we will come back to you.

Full of faith, Abraham spoke confidently about what God would do.
And what he himself was going to do: worship.
That’s what sacrifice is. Worship is most meaningful when it costs us the most.
It’s not just singing a song. It’s laying down your life and will before the Father.
Jesus doesn’t just receive worship; He worshiped the Father with His whole life and death, more fully than we could ever dream.
How can I worship more deeply? Lay down your life and will for the glory of God.

Abraham put the wood on Isaac’s shoulders, carried the fire and the knife himself, and the two of them walked on together.

Together: in agreement.
Isaac was no small boy; he was strong enough to carry the wood up a mountain, while Abraham was well over a hundred years old. Isaac could have run.
Isaac was the obedient son, a picture of the glorious submission of the Son of God.
The father laid the wood on his son’s back; Jesus carried His own cross.
The father held the instruments of death. It pleased the LORD to crush His Son (Isaiah 53:10). No one else could bear the punishment for the world’s sin but the Father’s own Son.

Isaac said, “My father, here’s the fire and the wood, but where’s the lamb?” Abraham answered, “God will provide for Himself the lamb, my son.” And the two of them went on together.

They came to the place God had told him about. Abraham built the altar, arranged the wood, bound Isaac, and laid him on the altar, on the wood. Then he reached out and took the knife.

He was bound, just as Jesus was bound, not by His own sins, but by mine. His love for me held Him to that altar and would not let Him flee.
He was laid on the wood, as Jesus would be laid on the wood of the cross and pierced.
Abraham raised the knife, a picture of what God the Father would do two thousand years later.

And through all of it, Abraham came to know God’s heart: the deep pain of offering His own Son, the unexplainable love of giving His beloved Son for us.

That’s what the furnace gives us too: to know God. If that doesn’t stir something deep in you, ask Him to give you that desire. Jesus warned that many will come to Him on that day talking about all they did, and He’ll say, “I never knew you” (Matthew 7:22-23). What matters is knowing Him: intimacy, relationship, Jesus Himself.

My Furnace

I speak passionately about this because I’ve been through the fire too. I don’t say I’ve suffered more than anyone else, but I have suffered deeply.

Years ago, in my first marriage, I went through a long season of betrayal and heartbreak. In the middle of it, I had a long talk with Jesus. I sensed Him saying that I had a choice, but that if I stayed and walked through the fire with Him, I would come to know Him better. I chose to stay and keep loving, for as long as I could.

It was terrible. Night after night I prayed, read the Word, worshiped, and cried. Lots of crying. Eventually the marriage ended, and I was left broken, with my boys.

And yet I wasn’t alone. And I wasn’t weak. Walking with Jesus through that fire had made me strong. In the darkest, most painful moments, He was with me. That’s how I learned God’s heart. That’s how I learned to trust His promises. That’s how I learned faith. I could never have learned those lessons outside the furnace.

That was my furnace. Yours will be different. God knows what each of us needs.

After that season, the Lord brought times of refreshing, and a new marriage and family, a houseful of boys, serving the Lord together in faith and without shame. We know we’ll suffer again. But God will be with us, and it will be worth it to walk with Him through every fire until the day we see Him face to face and every tear is wiped away.

John says that when He appears we will be like Him, because we will see Him as He really is.

Is Anyone Suffering?

Is anyone here suffering right now?

Think of Elijah (1 Kings 19). Life was unfair. He was exhausted, discouraged, depressed, and he asked God to let him die.

(If you’re in that dark a place, please reach out right now: to a pastor, a trusted friend, or a crisis line such as 988 in the U.S. You are not alone, and there is help.)

Notice what God did for Elijah. He fled to the wilderness and hid. Then the angel of the Lord touched him. Not a lecture. Not an explanation. Just a touch.

Then the angel cooked him a meal. Elijah slept again. The angel touched him again and fed him again.

Touching and serving. Touching and serving.

Sometimes the most powerful blessing we can give a suffering brother or sister is simply being present. Skip the speech and give them a hug. Be a friend.

When I was suffering, the friends I valued most were the ones who just sat with me, made me a meal, or prayed for me simply, not necessarily the ones who were full of advice.

Let’s be that kind of church family.

Grace Takeaway

The furnace hurts, but it doesn’t destroy; it burns away what isn’t gold and leaves faith behind. Paul pressed on to know Christ in the fellowship of His sufferings. Abraham climbed Moriah and came to know the Father’s heart. The fourth Man walked in the fire with the three Hebrews. Whatever fire you’re walking through, you’re not alone, and it won’t consume you. Press on, lay hold of His promises, and let the furnace lead you deeper into knowing Him.

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Knowing God Through Suffering