5 Reasons for Hard Times (part 2)
In my last
post, I began a list of
five reasons for hardships. I mentioned the wrong ideology that our
relationship with God is a way to take the easy route in life. Some
televangelists and other pastors promise that faith is a definite ticket toward
financial success, physical blessings, and illness-free living.
This growing belief, most commonly known as the "prosperity gospel," is sweeping the nation.
This doesn't make it right.
In fact, being perfectly honest: the prosperity gospel is dead wrong. The prosperity gospel is idolatry with the word "Jesus" sprinkled in a few times. It is not the Gospel.
Anyway, since this topic could (and possibly will) turn into a whole blog post, I suppose I'll get back to the point.
We aren't promised a shower of physical blessings here on this earth. We are to live a life broken and spilled out for the sake of gaining Christ. However, we are promised spiritual prosperity, as well as the hope of Heaven. Therefore, for the sake of God's glory and our spiritual prosperity, God allows adversity. Adversity is an extension of God's loving kindness towards us.
That is what this three-part series is all about. God always allows adversity for His glory and our good (Romans 8:28).
#3: Hardship Produces Gratefulness
Imagine if the night sky was entirely white, with no speck of blackness in sight. All the many billions of stars would still exist, but would we see them? Would we appreciate the dusting of stars across the white expanse? No. Why not? We wouldn't see the light of the stars, because there is no darkness to compare it to. It's only in darkness that we truly appreciate the light.
This is true in all of life: we don't tend to thank God for our health until we're sick. We don't appreciate our job until it's gone. We don't even give our next breath a second thought until we realize the brevity and uncertainty of life. Unfortunately, we may not even appreciate our loved ones as we should until they're gone. It is in these moments that death shows us how to live.
This is how God utilizes contrast. How would we know the beauty of a rescue without peril? When it comes to salvation, how do we revel in our freedom while denying the fact that we were in chains? From the dimness of the night sky to the darkness of difficulty to the bleakness of our sin, God allows us to appreciate the stars, the good times, and undeserved grace.
#4: Suffering Beckons Us to the Cross
Think about when you were first saved. What drove you to that point? Likely, it was a need. An emptiness. A longing. A desire that refused to be quenched by the empty things of this world. A disaster. An overwhelming feeling of guilt.
Often, God uses suffering to draw us to Him. When we refuse to get on our knees, He allows hardship to send us there. It is in that vulnerable state that we see His glory. He has to get us out of the way in order to see Who He is. We're blocking the view of His glory, and that has to be taken care of.
Even as Christians, God often uses hard times to draw us to Him.
His love for His child doesn't stay within the grounds of what we want. He reaches beyond our comfort zone and refuses to be limited by us. If our life never left our comfort zone, we would become all too comfortable...all without Him.
Through hardship, we share in Christ's suffering (1 Peter4:13). Jesus can sympathize with any pain we go through (Hebrews 4:15), because He Himself went through far greater suffering than we can even ever imagine.
Jesus sympathizes with both our physical and emotional pain. Not only was He beaten, whipped, and nailed, but He was scorned, humiliated, rejected, isolated, and grossly discriminated against. He felt.
Jesus also sympathizes with our temptations (Matthew 4:1-11). After forty days of fasting in the desert, when Jesus' body was weakened, the devil toyed with His senses and dangled the carrot of pride in front of His Face. The very world (literally) was offered to Him, with the seemingly "small" price of a "little sin." Yet, Jesus denied sin. Every. Single. Time. In His thirty-three years of living on this earth, among sinners, through childhood, adolescence, and even during His suffering on the cross, He refused sin.
When we face trials, temptations, hardships, and pain, it is a reminder of what Jesus went through for us. He willingly went through suffering of all kinds for us. As we remember this, it draws us closer to our Savior.
Stay tuned for the third and final part of this series: Five Reasons for Hard Times.
This growing belief, most commonly known as the "prosperity gospel," is sweeping the nation.
This doesn't make it right.
In fact, being perfectly honest: the prosperity gospel is dead wrong. The prosperity gospel is idolatry with the word "Jesus" sprinkled in a few times. It is not the Gospel.
Anyway, since this topic could (and possibly will) turn into a whole blog post, I suppose I'll get back to the point.
We aren't promised a shower of physical blessings here on this earth. We are to live a life broken and spilled out for the sake of gaining Christ. However, we are promised spiritual prosperity, as well as the hope of Heaven. Therefore, for the sake of God's glory and our spiritual prosperity, God allows adversity. Adversity is an extension of God's loving kindness towards us.
That is what this three-part series is all about. God always allows adversity for His glory and our good (Romans 8:28).
#3: Hardship Produces Gratefulness
Imagine if the night sky was entirely white, with no speck of blackness in sight. All the many billions of stars would still exist, but would we see them? Would we appreciate the dusting of stars across the white expanse? No. Why not? We wouldn't see the light of the stars, because there is no darkness to compare it to. It's only in darkness that we truly appreciate the light.
This is true in all of life: we don't tend to thank God for our health until we're sick. We don't appreciate our job until it's gone. We don't even give our next breath a second thought until we realize the brevity and uncertainty of life. Unfortunately, we may not even appreciate our loved ones as we should until they're gone. It is in these moments that death shows us how to live.
This is how God utilizes contrast. How would we know the beauty of a rescue without peril? When it comes to salvation, how do we revel in our freedom while denying the fact that we were in chains? From the dimness of the night sky to the darkness of difficulty to the bleakness of our sin, God allows us to appreciate the stars, the good times, and undeserved grace.
#4: Suffering Beckons Us to the Cross
Think about when you were first saved. What drove you to that point? Likely, it was a need. An emptiness. A longing. A desire that refused to be quenched by the empty things of this world. A disaster. An overwhelming feeling of guilt.
Often, God uses suffering to draw us to Him. When we refuse to get on our knees, He allows hardship to send us there. It is in that vulnerable state that we see His glory. He has to get us out of the way in order to see Who He is. We're blocking the view of His glory, and that has to be taken care of.
Even as Christians, God often uses hard times to draw us to Him.
His love for His child doesn't stay within the grounds of what we want. He reaches beyond our comfort zone and refuses to be limited by us. If our life never left our comfort zone, we would become all too comfortable...all without Him.
Through hardship, we share in Christ's suffering (1 Peter4:13). Jesus can sympathize with any pain we go through (Hebrews 4:15), because He Himself went through far greater suffering than we can even ever imagine.
Jesus sympathizes with both our physical and emotional pain. Not only was He beaten, whipped, and nailed, but He was scorned, humiliated, rejected, isolated, and grossly discriminated against. He felt.
Jesus also sympathizes with our temptations (Matthew 4:1-11). After forty days of fasting in the desert, when Jesus' body was weakened, the devil toyed with His senses and dangled the carrot of pride in front of His Face. The very world (literally) was offered to Him, with the seemingly "small" price of a "little sin." Yet, Jesus denied sin. Every. Single. Time. In His thirty-three years of living on this earth, among sinners, through childhood, adolescence, and even during His suffering on the cross, He refused sin.
When we face trials, temptations, hardships, and pain, it is a reminder of what Jesus went through for us. He willingly went through suffering of all kinds for us. As we remember this, it draws us closer to our Savior.
Stay tuned for the third and final part of this series: Five Reasons for Hard Times.
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