Trials and Tribulations

This is just so perfect and important I had to add it here for us.

“Look upon mine affliction and my pain; and forgive all my sins.”
— Psalm 25:18

It is well for us when prayers about our sorrows are linked with pleas concerning our sins—when, being under God’s hand, we are not wholly taken up with our pain, but remember our offences against God. It is well, also, to take both sorrow and sin to the same place. It was to God that David carried his sorrow: it was to God that David confessed his sin. Observe, then, we must take our sorrows to God. Even your little sorrows you may roll upon God, for he counteth the hairs of your head; and your great sorrows you may commit to him, for he holdeth the ocean in the hollow of his hand. Go to him, whatever your present trouble may be, and you shall find him able and willing to relieve you. But we must take our sins to God too. We must carry them to the cross, that the blood may fall upon them, to purge away their guilt, and to destroy their defiling power.

The special lesson of the text is this:—that we are to go to the Lord with sorrows and with sins in the right spirit. Note that all David asks concerning his sorrow is, “Look upon mine affliction and my pain;” but the next petition is vastly more express, definite, decided, plain—“Forgive all my sins.” Many sufferers would have put it, “Remove my affliction and my pain, and look at my sins.” But David does not say so; he cries, “Lord, as for my affliction and my pain, I will not dictate to thy wisdom. Lord, look at them, I will leave them to thee, I should be glad to have my pain removed, but do as thou wilt; but as for my sins, Lord, I know what I want with them; I must have them forgiven; I cannot endure to lie under their curse for a moment.” A Christian counts sorrow lighter in the scale than sin; he can bear that his troubles should continue, but he cannot support the burden of his transgressions.

Spurgeon, C. H. (2006). Morning and evening : Daily readings (Complete and unabridged; New modern edition.) (April 11 PM). Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers.

Too often today, especially with the pervasive influence of the word of faith/prosperity gospel, people have a tendency to think that God must heal all our physical illnesses and pains; That He couldn't possibly allow them to continue.  However that's simply not true and not supportable by scripture.  Yes, He does heal, but not always unless you count the healing that will occur on the day of our death or rapture.  Then we will all be healed completely and never have pain or illness again.  Until then however, sickness and pain are part of the curse from the original sin and are something we simply must bear with.

I'm not saying we shouldn't ask for healing, but we certainly shouldn't demand it, nor should we feel "let down" if or when He doesn't heal us.  His ways are not our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts.  We can't begin to understand Him entirely --it would be like an ant thinking it could understand a human!  We know Him, yes, but we can't hope to attain to His total knowledge and wisdom.  What we can know for sure though is that He does love us and He does want what is best for us.

Most of you know that I have lived with chronic pain for 10 years now due to an accident.  God has not healed me.  He told me He wasn't going to.  He didn't say He "never" would, but simply that "now" isn't the time.  Those of you who know me, know how much He has blessed me because of this pain too.  Yes, it's a trial--a severe one, but I honestly wouldn't give it up if it meant having to give up what He's given me because of it and that's the closeness I have with Him.

We all have choices.  My mom used to say that our choice was always to laugh or to cry so why not laugh.  That made sense to me and I've tried to live by that.  However she wasn't a believer so didn't know the Lord.  Now I know our choice goes beyond that. 

Our choice is to live our lives knowing that we are beloved by God and that He is doing what is best for us, no matter what our lives may "look like" to other or even ourselves; or we can live our lives constantly fighting and struggling against our circumstances trying to prove to ourselves, others and even God that we somehow deserve to have better; actually trying to prove we deserve to be loved.  What a shame when the truth is we are already loved!  Or perhaps trying to force God to prove to us that He is in fact God and can heal us.  God doesn't need to prove Himself to us though.  When we do that, it's called testing the Lord and we are told often enough in His word that we are not to do that!

This is what Paul was talking about when He said:

Philippians 4:11-13 I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.

He obviously was in great need many times.  He was beaten, starved, tortured at times, imprisoned, sick and in pain, etc. but he also had many "good times" when he had plenty and was healthy.

What Paul says here also has a bearing on what we're talking about:

2 Corinthians 12:8-10 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Again we see that Paul did ask for healing, and again we see that God's answer was "no".  Not because He didn't love Paul, not because He wanted Paul to be miserable or unhappy, but because He knew that this was necessary.  So we see from this that Paul didn't continue to badger the Lord or "claim" His healing.  Instead, in fact, he did the opposite!  He said "now I'll boast about my weaknesses!"  Paul didn't need God to prove He was God, nor did He need to prove he was worthy of God's love and healing.  Instead Paul, like David, simply trusted the Lord to do what was best and accepted His decision.

That then is what we need to do as well when we have trials of any kind.  Yes, take them to the Lord!  But don't insist that He do things our way or the way that we think He should.  Listen for His answer and accept it; remembering that He knows better then we do.

Like David too we also need to remember to examine ourselves for sin and when we find it, to take that to the Lord as well, asking His forgiveness and knowing that He will always forgive us because He loves us.

Philippians 4:19 And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.

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