Month: September 2017

Difficult times ask the question: what do you believe? They put our faith to the test.  They are the circumstances in which we cannot see anything good, and they ask if we still believe anyway in the goodness of God. When we say yes, we are declaring our faith, our confidence that even though we can’t see anything good, we still believe and trust God that His goodness is there. That God has more in this situation than what we can see.

This is the reason that James could tell believers to consider troubles an opportunity for great joy. Not because he thought they should be happy about troubles. That would just be putting on a mask and hiding how we really feel behind a whitewashed facade. No, he said troubles can be the route to joy because they grow our endurance, they strengthen our faith, they finish the work.

Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.  James 1:2-4

You won’t need anything.  Trials say we’re losing something. Temptation says we’re missing out on something.  Both suggest we have a need that isn’t being met.  In response, God says have endurance, steadfastness, patience – wait – because in the end, you will lack nothing.  Not the thing you thought you were losing.  Not the thing you thought you were missing out on.  It won’t be “You have everything except _________.”  No. You will lack nothing.  You will have everything you need.

Be thankful for trials because they produce endurance.  Faith says I don’t see it yet, but I know I will.  Endurance is what we need for the YET part.  It’s the growing season for our faith.  The longer the delay between the promise and its fulfillment, the greater need we have for endurance.  And the bigger and more fruitful our faith becomes in the meantime.

Think about it.  If I’m only running 10 meters, I don’t need much endurance, or even that much strength.  But as the distance from the start to the finish line increases, so does the amount of strength and endurance needed to reach the goal, the prize, the destination.  There’s a big difference between what’s needed to run 10 meters and the 42000+ meters of a marathon.

Let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us.  Hebrews 12:1

You know that this is a long race and you’re going to get tired.  Don’t give up.  What’s the point of running a race if you don’t run all the way to the finish line?  Over and over the Bible encourages us to keep going because God knows that we will get discouraged and want to give up.

Even youths grow tired and weary and young men stumble and fall, but those who wait on the Lord will find new strength.  They will fly high on wings like eagles.  They will run and not grow weary.  They will walk and not faint.  Isaiah 40:30-31

We can find new strength while waiting for God to deliver on His promises by considering the character of the One we are waiting on.  You see, we have a faithful and patient God who is also waiting.  He is patiently waiting for all of His beloved children to be saved, to be rescued, to be brought home.  That means He is also enduring. He endures our rejection, our rebellion, our sin, our mockery, our nails, our agony, our hell.  He puts up with all of it and He’s put up with it for a long time.  Why?  So that we might be saved.  Because He longs to be reunited with all of His children.  With you.  With me.

So we need endurance because of God’s incredible patience.  We have to put up with the trials and troubles of living under the effects of sin’s curse because God is patiently doing the same thing.  Because there are enslaved hearts that still need to be freed.  Because there are chains that still need to be broken. Because there are beloved children who have not yet been brought home.  And so we endure, we wait patiently, because we have brothers and sisters who have not yet been saved.

Patient endurance is really a picture of love.  Love that puts up with much.  Love that waits a long time.  Love that never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.  Love that will last forever.

Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, his love endures forever.  Psalm 118:1

I was recently talking with my friend about a tragedy her family experienced and she said I wish I could just get over it. I knew what she meant – she just wanted to stop crying every time she thought about the hurt. She just wanted the tears to stop welling up all the time.

But as I listened to her, I thought of how appropriate her sorrow is. What happened is terrible, heartbreaking. It isn’t the kind of thing you can just “get over”. We aren’t made that way because we are made in the image of God and His sorrow is immense. He wept at Lazarus’ tomb, and in the Garden of Gethsemane, and He still weeps from heaven over the suffering sin’s curse has caused His beloved children. So our heartache reflects some of the sorrow of God.

My grief is beyond healing; my heart is broken. I hurt with the hurt of my people. I am stunned and silent, mute with grief.  Jeremiah 8:18

Maybe you’ve known this kind of pain, a sorrow that clutches your heart and twists it beyond recognition. Beloved, you are not alone. If anything about God can be said to be broken, it is His heart.

Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “You are the body of Christ” (1 Corinthians 12:27). Our hands are His. Our feet are His. This means His hands are also ours – His nail-scarred hands. His feet are also ours – feet washed by tears and dried by love. If we are to be the body of the Man of Sorrows, we must accept that it comes with wounds. It was broken and poured out for us so that sin could be forgiven. So the curse could be broken. So one day He could wipe every tear from our eyes and eliminate the source of our pain forever (Revelation 21:4).

When our heart aches, we just want it to stop. And so in an effort to keep functioning, we sometimes resolve to harden our heart, resisting the hurt and the sorrow. But a stony heart cannot feel. A stony heart is a dead heart. Functionally that person can be said to be without a heart, heart-less.  It’s far more dangerous to have no heart, than to have a heart that hurts, that is broken.

God loves your broken heart, because the broken heart knows it needs Him. The broken heart is exactly the kind of material He can work with to make something more. Maybe the pieces can be like seeds, can grow into something more than they were. Whole and unbroken, a heart is only one seed. Broken, its potential is multiplied a thousand times over. God makes something better out of the brokenness. The flower is better than the seed. The bread is better than the wheat.

So go ahead and weep, wail and mourn. Let the tears fall. God has given you the privilege of sharing His heart, to give expression to His sorrow over this thing that has left you crushed. Turn to Him with the pieces. What we can be in Him is always something more than we could ever be on our own. But it’s only the broken who are eligible.