Suffering

Hello and welcome to Grace Outpost!  I am glad that you have joined me today.  I apologize to you faithful readers for my hiatus.  It has been longer then I expected, but I’m back!  So many of you know that my family has had a lot of death happen in a short period of time.  So what do we do when disaster strikes in our lives?  How do we move forward when the world seems to stop moving for us in our pain and in our crisis?  We cling to God.  Paul tells us that this is the secret to being content in times of plenty and times of famine (Philippians 4:12). 

Psalm 23 has often come to my mind over these past few months and the belief of David has been a comfort to me. 

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
     He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
     He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
    for his name's sake.
 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
    I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
    your rod and your staff,
    they comfort me.
 You prepare a table before me
    in the presence of my enemies;
you anoint my head with oil;
    my cup overflows.
 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
    all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord
    forever.

It is a very personal, there is no “we” or “they” references, only “I”, “me”, and “my”.  I have been holding it close to me as a blanket of comfort, the Lord is my shepherd and I believe that he will guide me through even the roughest of storms.  God gives me peace in my life, when I seek him, when I spend time with him, even if just for a few minutes he gives me rest from my problems. 

Suffering is something that we are all going to experience, there is no promise that we will not experience pain and in fact we are told that we will experience suffering for our belief in God.  We all know what it is like to get news that makes it feel as if the world stopped and suddenly our daily responsibilities and worries don’t matter.  That feeling as if your head is floating and your heart is pounding out of your chest.  Those moments can be our valley of the shadow of death in our lives.  Though we are crushed, we know that God is right by our side through it all.

I have watched as my sister-in-law and her husband have gone through one of the worst things a parent can go through, the loss of a child.  They are crushed and yet they have been able to celebrate his life and worship God in the midst of it.  Their pain is not gone, but God sees them through it and God has done many great things through my nephew’s life, more than most adults will ever do.  I watched my family, which is large, come together to celebrate the life of my grandmother as we laid her to rest next to my grandfather.  God is good, even in the midst of our personal tragedy.  Pain happens to all people, Christian or not, but as a Christian I have the assurance that this life is but a blink of the eye in comparison with eternity with God.  I know that God has promised a day when there will be no tears and no more pain, God himself comforts us. 

I have been leaning a lot also on my favorite verse Isaiah 41:10

fear not, for I am with you;
    be not dismayed, for I am your God;
I will strengthen you, I will help you,
    I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.


This verse has always served as an encouragement in my calling and battles the anxiety I experience from time to time.  But lately, I have seen this as a promise that God is walking right by me and it is hand that keeps me vertical and moving forward.  Do you know God like this?  Sometimes I think that we can only come to know God in these deep ways, by experiencing deep pain and grief that drives us into his arms.  Our faith is tested in our hours of crisis and we often have no forewarning that these moments are coming.  Many people have a casual or even acquaintance like relationship with God, I worry that in their hour of crisis, their faith will fail.  You will not run to someone you do not know.  You cannot rest in promises you have not heard and do not know.  I urge you to know what you believe, because I promise you that crisis is coming at you like a speeding train.

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