I haven't seen any vocational schools that give a diploma in suffering or a place where you can go and study how to die.

And yet, if I understand what Scripture is teaching about the nature of suffering and about the nature of death,

there are times in a person's life where the call of God upon that person is to suffer. God not only allows suffering in our life,

but as we look through the pages of the Bible, we see that he calls some of us to a life

of suffering, but not suffering for suffering's sake, but for

his glory. Hi, I'm Nathan W. Bingham, and thank you for joining me today for renewing your

mind. Those are hard words, so hard in fact that some have not only rejected that truth,

if rejected God himself. And that was one of the concerns Dr. Sprole

had when he recorded this series, surprised by suffering. He wanted people in the midst of their

suffering to know God's plan and his purpose. Dr. Sprawl was given the opportunity to record

this series at MD Anderson Cancer Center. And today, he brings

us great encouragement as he introduces us to people in the Bible who are called to a life

of suffering. There's a somewhat lesser-known work of Herman Melville, the author of Moby Dick and Billy Budd and a host of South Sea Adventure Stories,

one of his lesser-known works, Melville makes this statement. He says, until we learn that one grief outweighs a thousand joys, we will never understand

what Christianity is trying to make us.

Now, when Melville makes that statement, I don't think that he's simply being morbid

or pessimistic, but he is echoing

a sentiment that we find in Scripture itself. For example, the wisdom literature of the Old

Testament declares that it is better to go to the house of mourning and to spend our time

with fools.

It's just one more case in point where we see how closely related the God of Scripture is to the reality of suffering and of pain.

And then the first segment together, I mentioned this word vocation. And usually

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