March 01, 2020
Greetings and blessings to all of you. I have been thinking about the right way to respond to suffering? Why? Because when I see evil and the suffering of people around the world and in our nation, I want to make sense of it. When I hear others speak of abuse, desertion, and disease my heart is saddened. I will give them the verse “We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope.” (Romans 5:3-4) I will remind them of the verse, in I Peter 4:16 “yet if any man suffers as a Christian let him not be ashamed but let him glorify God on His behalf.” For most of us it takes what it takes BEFORE we recognize that we need to be obedient and allow God to mature us. And God does this by using trials or test that will cause us pain and suffering. Some of us will circumvent the P/S or the test by ignoring the commands of God. If God ask us to obey Him we say, “that won’t work for me.” Or we say, “that will not make me happy or we will say, “That will be too devastating. I cannot do that”. So, we decide to be disobedient just like Adam and Eve who disobeyed God and decided for themselves what is good and what is evil. We think we know better than God. When we decide to be disobedient and go our own way instead of taking the test that God has for us, I think of Prov. 12:15 “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes but a wise man listens to advice.” Being obedient will cost us our pride and our sense of independence. It will kill that spirit of self-centeredness and we have to admit our true weakness. Loss, hardship, sickness, chronic pain will happen to us but it will be used to test our commitment to Jesus Christ. Saints, we have to allow God to do His work in us (His way) so we can grow. The right way to respond to pain and suffering…look to God’s promise for comfort, pray all day every day, look for the reward, and begin sharing your time energy and money to others who are in a trial/test just like you. Saints, suffering is inevitable so learn to live each day holding hands with Jesus.
With the Love of Christ
First Lady Vivian C. Currie
Pastor ALC