Want Your Life to Go Well? Stay Away from Jesus

I know that my posts are always so frickin' long, but since I don't write very often, please bare with me...
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Does it seem like you just can't "catch a break"? It often seems that way at our house. I will be the first to confess that God is good when things are going well. I am very very thankful to Him and take comfort and security in His sovereignty when what happens is what I want to happen in the way I want it to happen. However, how do you respond when all that seems to "happen" are such difficult things? I tend to get discouraged and question God's sovereignty. It is usually not a Christ-honoring, Christ-exalting response that I tend to give! It is hard to echo Job in saying Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil? (Job 2:10).

Be encouraged that the widely taught and accepted view of Job and his response to his suffering is incorrect. He did not recieve double everything that he lost as a reward because he had been through so much or that he "suffered well". He was a type of Christ that points to the reality that we suffer because we are righteous (in and because of Christ). He received double everything that he had lost to point to the ultimate reality that Jesus is coming back and will make all things right!!!!

Let me remind you that I don't understand God's ways and I don't like them most of the time, but I believe that Job grew through his suffering...suffering that he didn't bring on himself...suffering that was ultimately from the very hand of God.

It was through this suffering that Job not only gained a deeper understanding of who God is (and how lowly a creature he is in comparision), but he also gained a deeper understanding of God's great love for him. This deep love caused in him to love God in return and brought him closer to Yaweh.

Job is virtually the only man recorded in the Scriptures that got such a great material blessing after suffering while he was still here on the earth, but remember that Job didn't receive the same children that he lost. His life was still full of grief and pain.

I think this further points to how our Christ's Heaven is the ultimate freedom of suffering. It is only in getting rid of this old physical flesh and receiving a new, ressureccted body that is promised to us in 2 Corinthians 5:1-5 that we will experience that which we so long for...He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee (2 Cor 5:5).

Whatever suffering you are now in the midst of, God will do the very same thing to you. He will use it to show you who He is and His love for you. This growth in your faith (that will happen) will bring you to His side and will cause you to love and trust Him more deeply.

And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. (Philippians 1:6)

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Hebrews 4:14-16)

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. (Romans 8:28-29)

Be encouraged that Jesus has gone through all the shit you have...on your behalf...and He cares about you and what you are going through...even though He is soveriegn, has forseen it, and still let it happen. Let your shit and your not understanding that shit bring you to Christ's side...for that is where we want to be!

Here are a couple of quotes from Puritan Samuel Rutherford and a short video from Pastor John Piper (desiringGod.org) to encourage you in your sufferings and perhaps even your sin...yes, even when you sinfully respond to what God has ordained for you...He is still God...that same loving, faithful, sovereign, "will-never-be-angry-with-you-again-because-you-are-perfectly-accepted-in-Jesus" God who demands your life and your worship because he worthy, not an ego-maniac. He loves you:

-"You must learn to make evils your great good, and to spin out comforts, peace, joy, communion with Christ, out of your troubles, that are Christ's wooers to speak for you to himself."

-"I hope you are not ignorant, that if peace was left to you in Christ's testament, so the other half of the testament was a legacy of Christ's sufferings."

-"I bless the Lord, that all our troubles come through Christ's fingers, and that He casteth sugar amoung them: and casteth in some ounce weights of heaven and of the spirit of glory in our cup."

-"Lay your soul and your weights upon God: make Him your only, only best Beloved..."

-"The floods may swell and roar, but our ark shall swim above the waters; it cannot sink, because a Saviour is in it."

-"The weightiest end of the cross of Christ that is laid upon you, lieth upon your strong Saviour."



Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!

“For who has known the mind of the Lord,
or who has been his counselor?”
“Or who has given a gift to him
that he might be repaid?”

For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.
(Roman 11:33-36)

Be encouraged Christian, you are safe and secure in the Lord Jesus...He is our hope and our hope is sure!!