Trusting God to Take the Bad and Use it for Good
Good Morning Friends,
Life implies suffering. Life implies enjoyment. The problem is that we are not predisposed to understand the goodness and badness of them on our own. Some suffering is bad and some is good. Some enjoyment is good and some is bad. I have several Christian friends who have suffered the loss of a child and there is no good in the loss of a child. Yet there is a specific characteristic of their parents…all of them that is I am sure born out of their having been forged in the fire, the great pain and grief and suffering of the experience. My friends turned to God instead of turning away. Yet some people do turn away. It is a place with them that I cannot go, into this unmentionable agony. For if I was to go to this place I might try and cheer them up, and it would only minimize the loss. My sorrow is about their sorrow, so I pray that in their loneliness they would not be alone, in their affliction they would not be abandoned and in their suffering they would not be severed. As you ponder your own suffering, consider yourself one of God’s masterworks and consider the trouble He takes with you, in spite of the bad suffering and in light of the good suffering you experience as a sign not of less love but more. Know that the journey is about Trusting God to Take the Bad and Use it for Good.
Scripture: Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and through grace gave us eternal comfort and good hope, comfort your hearts and strengthen them in every good work and word.
2 Thessalonians 2:16-17 (NRSV)
Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you. Discipline yourselves; keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour. Resist him, steadfast in your faith, for you know that your brothers and sisters throughout the world are undergoing the same kinds of suffering. And after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, support, strengthen, and establish you.
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
1 Peter 5: 6-10 (NRSV)
Message: Honestly if we are going to survive the suffering I see in our communities of faith, the struggles we have as a nation, we need more than a temporary spiritual revival. For those who have suffered great loss and indeed for all of us, our hope is in the LORD who died so that we can draw nearer to God and have the comfort of His healing presence. Too often sin and suffering have been lumped together and so to say, ‘I am against” …though it makes initial sense… misses the point.
Evidence of authentic faith in Christ is the gift to spread the love in us for others, but especially for those who do not deserve it, for those who suffer, for those who are separated from God…even our enemies. For Christ suffered and in the suffering learned trusting-obedience. And in His act of obedience to God’s will, Jesus took on our sin, but not our purposeful suffering, because we too need to learn trusting-obedience to God… even at the price of pain. So how can I be against suffering if it brings me to a reality that God intends… that ultimate great good? Because God desires for me the reality of His love in my life and because He knows the way for me to experience it, I must withhold judgment. So if I remain teachable… desirous of being obedient, and not selfish or foolish enough to think ignoring God and the needs of others will bring anything but a harvest of pain, I might actually learn to trust God. Problems or challenges… It is a matter of perspective. To experience the workings of an abundant life as God intends for us sometimes requires suffering if only to help us learn to change our perspective to trust God.
Pray we remember the sufferings Jesus endured. Pray we learn to love like God, mature in the faith, joyously recognizing Him in the lives of the poor and sick and suffering, but also learn to be loved by God so that He abides in us through the suffering. Pray we believe that fear, pain, suffering, the sword, nothing can separate us from God because Jesus is, this very moment, interceding in our behalf, turning our sorrow into joy. Pray the suffering we do have is not in vain. Pray we realize that God is very good at taking the bad and turning it into something good.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 