When it comes to our suffering, aren’t you glad God doesn’t leave us on our own – having to fend for ourselves? We may be down for the count sometimes, but God always, always gives us answers to sustain us, or gives us the instructions on how to be free (sometimes physically free, but always spiritually free!). Not only is the Bible saturated with human suffering; but God says things about it, and His relation to it. In God’s Word we see how suffering originated. God speaks about our broken world…
Let me speak about PURPOSE in suffering – God’s purpose. My experience has now become the authority in which I speak. The very thing in my life that I viewed as a major crisis, perhaps even a curse (Muscular Dystrophy), the very thing that made my life come to a screaming halt and threatened to consume me… at God’s command, became the very thing He used to build my streets of freedom. Got that? In simpler words, my physical captivity, my suffering… became my spiritual freedom.
I quoted two verses from the book of Job in my last post, (Seeing the Works of God in-our Suffering). James says that the book of Job is designed to show us the purpose of God in suffering, of how God is compassionate and merciful…
“Indeed we count them blessed who endure. You have heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord – that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.” James 5: 11
I said before that God’s Sovereignty sometimes can be a very scary thing. The simple truth is that God will permit things He hates in order to accomplish the things in which He wants. Yes, He will permit your broken heart – if that’s what it takes to save your soul, or to accomplish a great work in His grand scheme of things.
“In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, that we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of His glory.” Ephesians 1: 11-12
God wants to remove whatever is in our hearts that prevent us from our purpose. We all have – human witnesses to the faithfulness of God through ongoing illness. God has had his hand every step, they will tell you. Personally, I can face any problem because I know God is with me. Accepting is an act of faith.
Let me close today’s post with something greatly said by my online friend, Jeanine Van Wyk from her Facebook page ENABLE – Empowering people with disabilities…
“Eyeglasses or contact lenses do not change what you see; they change how you see it. Many times you must change how you see something before that thing is changed in your life. If how you see it doesn’t change, then IT will never change. It is not a matter of denying the reality of your situation but a matter of seeing beyond your situation. Don’t deny the reality of your situation. Deny the finality of your situation.”
Have a great day. More to come on this topic…