Redeemer Modesto Sermon Audio

Key Thought: If you know the gospel, going into the refiners fire (suffering) doesn’t turn you into ashes, it turns your faith into something more precious than pure gold. Have you noticed that everyone in this world suffers? Suffering is relative to each individual, but no one escapes it. I remember watching the Bill Gates documentary “Inside Bill’s Brain” and wondering if a billionaire suffers. Sure enough, you hear the story of his broken relationship with his partner Paul Allen that never got set right, even while Paul was dying of cancer. You can’t escape suffering, and Peter knows it – it is a constant theme mentioned over 15 times. But what Peter reveals is that suffering is a like a fire that either turns you into ashes or refines you into something more precious than gold. Like an athlete that sacrifices and suffers in training (the dietary restrictions, the muscle cramps, the time and energy), yet turns that suffering into a gold medal. Unlike the athlete, the suffering that the scatter