Father, as we undertake, to do this now one more time today.

I pray again for strength and for your help and your guidance.

And I ask Lord again that as we focus now

in on the suffering of the preacher himself, that you would help men

who are senior pastors in this room right now charge with the obligation of preaching.

Not to grow weary in well-doing or to begrudge the lifelong seminary of suffering.

I'm drawn near now and minister to them, I pray, because some may be ready to quit right now.

And I pray that you'd give them renewed hope and strength

that it may be that what they're going through is not a sign to leave but a sign of hope.

I pray this in Jesus name, amen. So preaching and the suffering of the preacher.

So by way of summary, leading into where we're going, if the ultimate aim of preaching is the

glory of God through Jesus Christ.

And if God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him, and if

suffering threatens that satisfaction and must come to everyone. Then I conclude, and it's the aim of these messages, that

we should preach says to help our people say with the Psalmist the steadfast love of the Lord is better

than life and mean it, feel it. Or to say with Paul I count everything is lost for the surpassing value of knowing Christ

Jesus my Lord. We must preach with a passion to produce people whose satisfaction in God is so solid and

so deep and so unshakable that suffering and death that is losing everything on this earth

will not produce murmuring or complaining or cursing, but rather rest in the promise that in his presence his fullness of joy and at his

right hand are pleasures forever more. So how are we going to preach like that?

That's what I want to talk about in this and the next message. And a hundred things could

be said. Everything could be said.

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