Category: suffering

When God Promotes You

“Extraordinary afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins, but sometimes the trial of extraordinary graces.

Sanctified afflictions are spiritual promotions.”

 —Matthew Henry

“God’s way of answering the Christian’s prayer for more patience, experience, hope and love often is to put him into the furnace of affliction.”

 –Richard Cecil

“Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”

–Paul, 2 Cor. 12:10

Training Your Spirit

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“Through suffering, our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies.”

2 Corinthians 4:10, NLT

“Since he himself has gone through suffering and testing, he is able to help us when we are being tested.”

Hebrews 2:18

No book, no tutor will give us the education we need.  We must patiently go through seasons of difficulty and temptation before we can understand what our brother or sister is facing.  Furthermore, we must advance through different levels;  sickness, injury, loss and discouragement.  On top of this, we must be tutored in the language of affliction, till we speak it without an accent.

This is a ‘strange’ school.  We’re watched and observed very closely to see what we will do.  “Will he give $5 to the homeless man, or will he turn away like usual?” There are billions of these scenarios that we get placed in.  And often there are multiple layers of these ‘programs’ running simultaneously.

And yet we are always being evaluated in love.

It is very advantageous for you to pass this way, because it lets you speak the dialect of suffering, with its mixture of pain and joy.  Believers now have a common tongue which in we communicate.

When Lynn and I lost our daughter Elizabeth, it was a deep, dark valley.  But I came to see (understand) that in some obscure way now able to speak into the hearts of those who were lost in pain.  Death has a way of touching us deeply.

There are so many different classes in God’s ‘strange’ university.  You may be enrolled in Compassion 101, or Mercy 410.  Oh, and by the way there is a school counselor available to all students that request Him (the Holy Spirit).

Also, we will do remarkably better if we will befriend others who are also enrolled.  Worshipping and the Word are quite critical as we must keep our spirits clean and right.

“He suffered and endured every test and temptation, so that he can help us every time we pass through the ordeals of life.”

Hebrews 2:18, TPT

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Alterations (Bring it On!)

Naomi and Ruth, artist unknown

“So Naomi and Ruth went on until they came to the town of Bethlehem. When they entered Bethlehem, all the people became very excited. The women of the town said, “Is this really Naomi?”

“Naomi answered the people, “Don’t call me Naomi. Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very sad.”

“When I left, I had all I wanted, but now, the Lord has brought me home with nothing. Why should you call me Naomi when the Lord has spoken against me and the Almighty has given me so much trouble?”

Ruth 1:19-21

Naomi has traveled from Moab to her hometown of Bethlehem. People were pretty excited and her arrival must’ve brought out the crowds. It’s great for her  to be around happy people who were genuinely pleased to see her again.

But a new Naomi returns. She makes it clear that something has happened. She has been fundamentally changed by the Lord. She can no longer be called Naomi (“Pleasant”) but insists she is now “Mara”. Her reasoning is painfully clear, she grasps the reality of her condition. “I am now Mara (“Bitter”), that is my new name. It’s what I’ve become.”

“Call me by this new name, because the Almighty has acted “bitterly” against me. I am not the same person I was went I left here. I am different, when I left here I was prosperous, everything was going very well. But now, its different, and I come home with absolutely nothing. And it’s all because the LORD has hurt me deeply.”

I read Ruth the other day, and something intrigued me by her perception, and of her theology that recognized God’s handprints on her life. I believe she was a broken person, and therefore essentially changed. I believe she had a measure of peace in seeing the Lord was in control of her life. She was becoming aware. Ruth was now attuned to the deep purposes of God.

It wasn’t fate, karma, or destiny after all. It was God! 

With my many, many issues, I find a comfort in this. God has touched me, and I am not the same person I was five years ago. I know hard things, even bitter things, about myself and the world around me. I went out healthy and strong and have returned weak and empty. Bipolar disorder will do that. Pain will do that. God’s dealings will do this. He loves us far too much to allow us to go unchanged.

God is not malicious, but He is very thorough. And all that He does is for our good.            

There are distinct times when the Lord works to bring us to Christlikeness. That involves a refining and the smelting process. Crisis becomes the ‘new normal’. This is never “pleasant” and it’s almost always “bitter.” Naomi was finding this out first-hand, to the point of even changing her name.

“I have refined you, but not as silver is refined.
 Rather, I have refined you in the furnace of suffering.”

Isaiah 48:10

I’d like to encourage you to recognize (and announce) your weakness and your brokenness to the Lord in prayer. See God’s hand in your bitterness. You’ll be surprised at the release that will come to you. It shouldn’t engender anger, but surprisingly it can bring you healing and salvation. It helps to understand. Consider the following:

  • There often two sides of living–the life we’ve lived and the life we’re becoming.  Both are filled with grace and they’re as different as ‘night-and-day’
  • God is stealthily working good on our behalf, even when things are awful. He has full authority to do so.
  • He’s always (lovingly and passionately) trying us; probing to see if we draw closer to Him when we’re tested. He is patient when we fail our tests. Every test will be repeated until we overcome it
  • We can’t escape Jesus’ work in our lives. He is the Master Carpenter. He is building a cathedral!

“God  rescues us by Breaking us, by shattering our strength and wiping out our resistance.”

–A. W. Tozer

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A Benefit of Depression

Thanking God For Pain

by Terry Powell,

Even when emotional pain is not the direct result of sin, it pays dividends in the war against sin.

When I’m extremely depressed and prone to fits of weeping, my heart is obviously softer than usual. And it’s during such times that the Holy Spirit often convicts me of wrong thoughts or behavior patterns. Since I’m already in a dependent state due to depression. I pray more often, if only for relief. And anytime I’m in a “seeking God” mode, the Holy Spirit is more liable to engage in a purifying work within my heart. So in a sense, tears spawned by physiologically-induced depression can serve as a cleansing agent.

Depression also drives me to the Word of God for relief.

Memorization of promises, especially from the Psalms and Prophetic books, instills a disciplined study habit that carries over even when the depression is gone. I’m reminded of the hard truth in Psalm 119:71, that affliction of any sort can deepen my dependence on God’s Word: “It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I may learn Thy statutes.”

Paul’s words also illustrate the point I’m making. His burdensome experience wielded benefits for the spiritual realm. Referring to an affliction he encountered in Asia, he wrote: “We were burdened excessively, beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life; indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves in order that we should trust not in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:8-9).

Like Paul, pain inevitably draws me closer to the Lord. That’s why I can thank Him for the pain, as explained in the poem that follows.

THANK YOU FOR THE PAIN

 

Thank you for the broken heart;

it is softer than before.

Since the pain ripped it apart

it’s insensitive no more.

How can I salute the pain?

Now I am more prone to pray,

to yield to my Savior’s reign,

and to let Him have His way.

I’ve no choice but to depend

on the Lord’s sustaining grace.

And He’ll pay a dividend

for each tear upon my face.

For God accepts as sacrifice

a heart that’s broken in two.

He’s already paid the price

for all that I’m going through.

There is no way I would choose

the hurt, all the times I’ve cried.

Yet it’s a gift I won’t refuse,

for it cleanses me inside.

I’m driven to wield Your Sword;

to give the Spirit His due.

So thank you for the pain, Lord,

for it draws me close to you.

How has a despondent spirit, or another kind of affliction, facilitated a closer relationship with Christ?

your brother,

Terry

 

Terry teaches in the areas of Church Ministry and Ministry Leadership at Columbia International University in South Carolina. He has served as a Christian Education staff member for three  churches, and he’s a licensed preacher in the Presbyterian Church of America.  His current books in print are Serve Strong:  Biblical Encouragement to Sustain God’s Servants, and  Now That’s Good A Question!  How To Lead Quality Bible Discussions. Terry has been married for 46 years, and has two sons, a daughter-in-law, one grandson, and a dachshund.  His constant prayer is, “Lord, make me half the man my dog thinks I am!”

Check out his blog at https://penetratingthedarkness.com/. His ministry is focused on Christians experiencing clinical  depression and other mental issues.