What's So Good About Suffering - Part I

I've come to realize with increasing age and life experiences that God's definition of "good" and mine are drastically different. My "good" would never include adultery, abuse, divorce, sudden loss of a loved one or cancer, to name a few. Instead, my definition of "good" would include health, wealth and comfort.

Yet, Christ warned us in Mark 4:19,"but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the Word, making it unfruitful." The things we believe may be "good" for us, may actually make us ineffective for His Kingdom.

When we are uncomfortable, unhealthy and lack wealth we become less self-reliant. It teaches us to trust God. He loves dependent people. In hardship, we are more inclined to press up against Him. More likely to lean upon Him. It's a truth we learned in Sunday school, when we sang the song, 'Jesus Loves Me.' Remember the lyric, 'I am weak, but He is strong?'

In II Corinthians 1:8-9, Paul doesn't go into detail about their hardships in Asia, he does say that he felt they were going to die and realized they could do nothing to help themselves - they simply had to rely on God. Paul writes,'We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves, but on God, who raises the dead.'

In our suffering, we are placed in a position of weakness, dependence, surrender. In II Corinthians 12:9-10, Paul pleads to God, begging him to remove his 'thorn in the flesh,' three times. We don't know exactly what it was, but it was a chronic, debilitating problem that hindered him from working at times.

Jesus' response to Paul's pleading was this, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Then Paul responded, '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 weakness, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.'

Even though God did not remove Paul's physical affliction, he promised to demonstrate his power in Paul. He placed him in a position of reliance on God for his effectiveness rather than his own energy, effort or talent. This thorn kept Paul humble, reminding him of his constant need for Christ. This benefited others who knew Paul because they saw Christ's work in his life.

Joni Eareckson Tada wrote in her book, 'When God Weeps,' God always seems bigger to those who need Him the most. And suffering is the tool He uses to help us need Him more.

Admitting our weakness and dependence upon God, affirms God's strength and deepens our worship of Him. When we are weak, allowing God to fill us with his power, then we are stronger than we could ever be on our own.