How many ways can we suffer: Broken hearts, unhappy marriages, painful illnesses, divorces, depression or loneliness?
God walks arm in arm with us over the chasim, entering into our suffering. He did it all through His Son, Jesus Christ. The hinge of all history is the cross of Christ.
In the cross we have the clearest proof that God cares. He carries our sorrows close to His heart. He has been there because He was at the cross when His Son died. He is the God of all comfort.
By the cross we are assured that ultimately God will conquer all things, including suffering. We can believe in hope when there is none.
Revelation 21:4 And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.
Colossians 3:1,2 If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ siteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above not on things on the earth.
What is the resurrected life? It's a life that's victorious over the world. It's a life that identifies, idealizes, and imitates the life of Jesus Christ.
Living a victorious Christan life sets us apart from the world, not molded into its shape but rather transformed by a higher set of values and expectations.
The resurrected life is not to judge everybody, put down everybody or gossip about people's way of thinking and living so that we look good.
The victorious Christian life is a focused, determined, obedient, self-evaluating, and self-denying way of thinking and living.
The victorious Christian life will be in direct proportion to your love for God.
Matthew 6:10 Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven.
This verse is a request for Jesus to return to earth and rule and reign a thousand years in His Kingdom with perfect glory, peace and righteousness. What a day!
This is also a personal request. If you are saved, the Kingdom of God is in you. We must pray, "My kingdom go, and Thy Kingdom come." Jesus must have the key to every room in our lives. We must also pray that His Kingdom will spread to the unsaved.
"Thy will be done" is the prayer prayed in the will of God that receives the answer of God. The key is to be lost in His will.
Matthew 6:33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness; and these things shall be added unto you.
It doesn't matter if you've been saved thirty seconds, thirty minutes, thirty months or thirty years and more; God will carry you.
Psalm 55:22 Cast thy burden upon The Lord, and He shall sustain thee: He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved.
God through Jesus will carry your sin with it's guilt, shame, and condemnation. Lay it at His feet. He will carry your cares and anxieties and your uncertain future. He will carry you through your graying years and beyond.
In our weak and wounded condition, God loads us on His back and carries us.
Hebrews 13:5 . . . . I will never leave thee nor forwake thee.
"I didn't understand why in times when I needed you most, you should leave me."
The Lord replied, "My precious, precious child, during your times of trial and suffering, when you saw only one set of footprints, it was then that I carried you."
Footprints--Mary Stevenson
If you abide in Christ through daily prayer, Bible study, and meditating in His Word, you will find "spiritual fruit" producing in your life. You won't have to struggle to grow in The Lord.
2 Timothy 3:16,17 All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
Everything we believe and do should be based on the Word of God; not opinions, preferences, prejudices, feelings, experiences or what someone you admire believes.
The Word of God shows you what's wrong in your life and how to fix it.
Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
If you were to ask Satan what he thinks of you he may say you are a failure. Society may say you are a fool. You may think you are a fake. What does God think about you?
Titus 3:3 For we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lust and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another.
God could have written us off and allowed us to go to Hell, but He loved us and did somethig about it.
In spite of what we were and are, God chose to display His love for us through Jesus Christ.
If you need evidence that you are precious to The Lord, look no farther than Calvary and see Jesus dying on the cross for your sins.
He is saying, "I love you! You are special to me!"
John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.
There's so much that we don't know, but if we are a redeemed child of God, we can know our life is in His hands. We may not always feel it, but what we feel is not the test of what we know.
Romans 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God to them who are the called according to his purpose.
ALL THINGS: Every event of life for the child of God is either planned or permitted by God.
FOR GOOD: The "good" promised by God isn't always prosperity or happiness but spiritual rather than material--eternal rather than temporal.
Our immediate pleasures and comforts do not alter God's long-range plans.
TWO CONDITIONS: (1) "To them that love God"--true believers. (2) "To them who are the called according to His purpose"--those called to surrender to His purpose.
God's purpose is to conform us to the image of His Son (Romans 8:29).
