Hello, this is Ashley Chase welcoming you to the Mark Driscoll podcast.

For more content from my dad, Pastor Mark, senior pastor here at the Trinity Church in Scottsdale, Arizona,

visit real faith.com, where you'll find study guides to go along with each sermon series as he

preaches verse by verse through books of the Bible, daily devotions, free

e-books and more. Now grab your Bibles and get ready for today's sermon.

We continue our study in a book of the Bible called James.

If you've got a Bible, go to James chapter 5.

Next week will be the very last sermon, so we're nearing the end and James is Jesus kid little

brother grew up going to homeschool and sleeping in a bunk bed with his big brother

who happens to be our Lord and Savior. And so James is a blue-collar

guy and we like to call him the blue-collar scholar of the New Testament. He's super practical.

How do you take faith and not just have it live on pages in theory but live in life practically and daily in today's topic is how does faith work when you are suffering?

So how many of you are suffering? You can all raise your hands.

Oh, and if you're not suffering just give it a minute and if you're not suffering you love someone who is so you're suffering with them and

anything that doesn't prepare you for reality in life is not that helpful.

And the Bible is the most honest book that's ever written and it talks about the pain not that needs to activate so that we can endure it.

So it's that time of year.

We're coming to the end of 2021.

Thank you, Lord.

The best thing about 2021 is it ends.

That's the best thing about 2021.

And this is the time of the year that many of us are reflective and we look back on the year and ask okay what did I learn what did God do? How do I need to change and what does God intend for me next year?

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