The Olive May Fail

 “Though the fig tree 

may not blossom,

Nor fruit be on the vines;

Though the labor 

of the olive may fail,

And the fields yield no food;

Though the flock 

may be cut off from the fold,

And there be no herd 

in the stalls--

Yet I will rejoice in the LORD,

I will joy 

in the God of my salvation.

The LORD God 

is my strength;

He will make my feet 

like deer’s feet,

And He will make me walk 

on my high hills.”

A number of years ago, at the beginning of a one year time period that was one of our worst years — a time of severe and long-lasting pain for me that held no end in sight — a physically miserable, emotionally devastating year filled with tests and imaging and surgery and a long recovery, I went to a pastors’ wives retreat. At the retreat, the Lord gave me a song. I had not yet walked through what was coming. And I knew I would be walking through something. 

“The joy of the Lord 

will be my strength

I will not falter, 

I will not faint

He is my Shepherd, 

I am not afraid

The joy of the Lord 

is my strength

The joy of the Lord

The joy of the Lord

The joy of the Lord 

is my strength

The joy of the Lord 

will be my strength

He will uphold me 

all of my days

I am surrounded 

by mercy and grace

And the joy of the Lord 

is my strength

The joy of the Lord

The joy of the Lord

The joy of the Lord 

is my strength

The joy of the Lord 

will be my strength

And I will not waiver, 

walking by faith

He will be strong 

to deliver me safe

And the joy of the Lord 

is my strength

The joy of the Lord

The joy of the Lord

The joy of the Lord 

is my strength”

You can be suffering pain, uncertainty, lack of resources, loss of relationships, and so many other miseries AND still be surrounded by His mercy and grace. I did not know if I would physically survive that year. And some days I turned my face to the wall and just laid there, heart open in wordless pain to the Lord. I fretted that my children would be motherless, and my husband widowed. And then I trusted them to Him who loves them better than me. I sat in a chair much of that year. 

And the Lord sustained me. He delivered me. He walked the valley with me, and brought me out again. 

You might think I don’t like hearing that song anymore. But you’d be wrong. 

When I hear it, and when I sing it, I remember how the Lord helped me endure when I couldn’t endure. How He gave me courage and taught me to trust Him when my prayers felt like they fell to the floor. How it isn’t abundant circumstances that give us abundant life. 

The joy of the Lord is my strength.

The Overcoming Blood

I find myself pondering the life that's in the blood.
The life of sin, that infects and reproduces,
that multiplies and overwhelms,
and results in a life bled out.

There was a doctor laboring in a hopeless fight
to save his patients from a death that just kept conquering.
And he got infected with it, too.
And he knew the disease, and he isolated himself.
And by the grace of God, he overcame it.
He was raised up from that death bed,
and his face glows when he speaks.
And his wife's face looks full of joy and wonder.
And he's been asked to share his story with news channels,
and to speak to Congress,
and to talk to the President about how to conquer this death.

But more than that:
he keeps opening his veins for fellow human beings,
and donating his blood -- the overcoming blood.
It was something that a recovered patient had done for him,
while he lay dying of the incurable plague.

And I think on Jesus, dying of my sin,
and raised up full of Life,
and He opens Himself up to conquer my infection.
He offers His overcoming blood,
to fight my plague from the inside out,
so I can grow clean and whole.
The Life is in the Blood.

And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb, 
and because of the word of their testimony; 
and they loved not their life even unto death.  
~Revelation 12:11

Faith Begs God

And He spoke a parable to them to this end, 
that men ought always to pray, and not to faint; 
Saying, There was in a city a judge, 
who feared not God, neither regarded man. 
And there was a widow in that city; 
and she came to him, saying, Avenge me of my adversary. 
And he would not for a while: 
but afterward he said within himself, 
Though I fear not God, nor regard man; 
Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, 
lest by her continual coming she weary me. 
And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith. 
And will not God avenge His own elect, 
who cry day and night to Him, 
though He beareth long with them? 
I tell you that He will avenge them speedily. 
Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, 
will He find faith on the earth?
~Luke 18:1-8

In the version I read this morning, the widow's plea was,
"Give me justice in this dispute with my enemy!"
Give me justice.
Don't we long for it?
Jesus wants us to persist in asking God for it.
That was the point of His story.
Keep asking.
Keep coming.
Because justice has not yet been served
in this dispute with our enemy.
He continues his unjust ways,
and the world continues to suffer for it.

But God is just.
And He is the Judge.
And if an unjust judge would give justice for sheer annoyance,
surely our Father in heaven will deal justice
on behalf of the innocent suddenly.

When He comes, will there still be any here asking for justice?
Believing in His judgement?
Or will we have abandoned the pursuit
because we lost heart at all the injustice?

Jesus said, "Don't you think God will surely give justice to His chosen people
who cry out to Him day and night?
Will He keep putting them off?
I tell you, He will grant justice to them quickly."

There is no reason to cry out day and night for justice
if all is just and right.
And there is no reason to cry out day and night for justice
if there is no Judge.
Faith begs God for what it knows is right,
though what it sees is wrong.
Because faith knows He is just, and He will judge.

O Lord, give us justice in this dispute with our enemy.

The Weight of Myrrh

Gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
Among His gifts, the aromatic resin of a repeatedly wounded tree,
cut to bleed.
Medicine for bruises, for injuries and sprains.
All My bones are out of joint.

Bitter.
It means bitter.
Like Mara, who ate bitterness,
and cried her heart out, and had nothing.
The tree that is cut to bleed out its healing is full of thorns.
Thorns that cursed our existence.
By His stripes we are healed.

It looks like the one I stepped on when I was eleven,
that pierced my shoe, and entered my foot,
and threw me to the ground in tears and howls so loud
that a nearby construction worker came looking to see what was wrong,
and pulled it out, and carried me to his car,
and drove me to my house, and got my mother.

I wonder if His crown was myrrh.
The thorns that pierced Him,
were they healing thorns?
Was its scent familiar to Him?
Had it perfumed His childhood?

It is antiseptic.
Washes out infectious material.
Analgesic.
It relieves the pain of the wounds so treated.
You can drink it in wine.
This is My blood which is poured out for you.

It is good for the heart.
A related species is considered one of the best substances
for the treatment of circulatory problems,
nervous system disorders
and rheumatic complaints.

The Egyptians embalmed the dead with it.
The Jews burned it as incense in the temple.

At times historically more valuable than gold by weight.
More valuable than gold?
The wounded-tree medicine?
The incense of worship?
The annointing for the dead?
The wound-cleansing, heart-healing, pain-relieving,
prayer-rising perfume of death?
How do I value it?
How do I value Him?

All thy garments smell of myrrh, 
and aloes, and cassia, 
out of the ivory palaces, whereby they have made thee glad. 
~ Psalm 45:8 

Call me Mara.

She had worked all her life in service to her family.
She birthed those sons in pain and blood.
She packed up her home with her own hands,
and followed her husband out of the drought.
The famine.
Out of the homeland and its inheritance.
They left it all and moved away into Moab.
There in a land not her own, she fed them.
She clothed them.
She took care of them when they were sick.
And then her husband died,
and she had to lead alone.

She began to look forward in hope from all the leaving and the loss,
when her sons were old enough to marry.
She found them wives.
Moabite wives, yes.
That hadn't been her dream.
But these were nice enough girls.
One day soon, maybe the loneliness would fade.
There would be women to share the load with,
and sons who could protect them,
and make their living.
And babies.
Laughing grandbabies she could offer advice about raising,
and rock to sleep,
and pretend away the sadness with.
Maybe it wouldn't all be loss.

For ten years she hoped,
while her daughters-in-law did not conceive.
Every month at first, that hopeful excitement.
Is my grandbaby on the way?
Surely any day now...
But the day did not come.
And then her last living hopes died.

The sons she had birthed in pain and blood were gone.
Their father had led her here to this alien place.
She had no friends.
No sisters a few houses down.
And two barren daughters-in-law.
They probably blamed her.
Everything around her ended in disaster.
Everything she touched turned to dust.
But these women were past their fruitful prime,
and had a ten year record of infertility.
Who would marry them?

Her homeland had good crops again.
It came like a breeze in the market place.
Maybe she bought grain that had traveled the road from her home.
Working it into bread,
perhaps she thought about the fields her young husband had worked.
How they had built their dreams there,
and birthed their sons there,
and harvested life there.
It had been nothing but a harvest of misery for years.
She decided to go back.
She had nothing here to keep her.
Better to die among friends.
Better to cry over losses with friends.
They had known her husband,
and rejoiced over her sons' births.
They could sympathize with her.

She didn't want these poor daughters-in-law
to have the same fate she had suffered.
Bereft in a strange land.
They'd been good girls, but it was too much to ask.
Ruth, odd girl, chose the mourning.
She'd rather stay under the cloud.
It seemed like choosing a curse.
Even her words sounded like she was choosing death.

All those old friends still recognized her.
They were excited to have her home.
Ah, but they remembered her hopeful and pleasant.
They remembered her a landowner.
They remembered her a mother.
They remembered her a wife with a husband who loved her.
They remembered a woman with a future.
There was nothing for her now.
All her fruit lay rotting in Moab.

"Don't call me Naomi.
Call me Mara.
I had full hands when I left,
but the Lord has taken everything away from me.
The Lord afflicts me.
The Lord sent tragedy to me.
Call me Mara."
I've eaten bitterness, and I'm a disaster.

Aren't you glad it doesn't end there?
Because this woman with no hope
and no family
and no property
and nothing to live for
is cuddling her grandson in the last verses,
and her daughter-in-law is better than ten sons to her,
and the future she thought was cut off
is connected to the past by a different branch.
And she embraced it.

Nearer To Us

"And Gideon said unto him, 
Oh, my lord, if Jehovah is with us, why then has all this befallen us? 
...but now Jehovah hath cast us off...  
And Jehovah looked upon him, and said, 
Go in this thy might, and save Israel ...have not I sent thee?  
And he said unto him, 
Oh, Lord, wherewith shall I save Israel? 
behold, my family is the poorest in Manasseh, 
and I am the least in my father's house. 
And Jehovah said unto him, Surely I will be with thee..."

"But Jehovah had shut up her womb. 
And her rival provoked her sore, to make her fret, 
because Jehovah had shut up her womb. 
...When she went up to the house of Jehovah, so she provoked her; 
therefore she wept, and did not eat.
And she was in bitterness of soul, 
and prayed unto Jehovah, and wept sore.
...And Elkanah knew Hannah his wife; 
and Jehovah remembered her."

"...And the women said, Is this Naomi? 
And she said unto them, 
Call me not Naomi, call me Mara; 
for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me. 
I went out full, and Jehovah hath brought me home again empty; 
why call ye me Naomi, seeing Jehovah hath testified against me, 
and the Almighty hath afflicted me?
...And the women said unto Naomi, 
Blessed be Jehovah, who hath not left thee this day without a near kinsman; 
and let his name be famous in Israel. 
And he shall be unto thee a restorer of life, and a nourisher of thine old age, 
for thy daughter-in-law, who loveth thee, who is better to thee than seven sons, hath borne him. 
And Naomi took the child, and laid it in her bosom, and became nurse unto it. 
And the women her neighbors gave it a name, saying, 
There is a son born to Naomi; and they called his name Obed..."

"Jehovah has cast us off."
"Jehovah has closed my womb."
"Jehovah has brought me home empty, 
testified against me, 
and afflicted me."

They were all perplexed by the trouble upon them.
And they were all in His direct view.
Loved and cared for.
He had their good in mind, although they could all ask,
"If God is with us, why has all this befallen us?"

"You need not cry very loud;
He is nearer to us than we are aware of."
~Brother Lawrence, from The Practice of the Presence of God

Called?

In looking at patience, I came across another thought-rattler.
Read it through and think on it a little.
It may help with the ever-present 'WHY?!' that springs up in the face of suffering.

"For this is commendable, 
if because of conscience toward God  
one endures grief, suffering wrongfully. 
For what credit is it if, when you are beaten for your faults, 
you take it patiently? 
But when you do good and suffer, 
if you take it patiently, 
this is commendable before God. 
For to this you were called, 
because Christ also suffered for us, 
leaving us an example, 
that you should follow His steps... 
Who, when he was reviled, did not revile in return; 
when He suffered, He did not threaten,  
but committed Himself to Him who judges righteously."
~ 1 Peter 2:19-21

Maybe this passage sounds exactly right to your human brain and internal sense of justice.
But when I consider what it's saying, my brain shouts, "WHAT??!!"
Going back to why I began looking at these passages in the first place
(the Hebrews passage about leaving the elementary stuff and pressing on to maturity
-- hope, faith, and patience),
it stands out to me that it says, 'to this you were called'.
We were called to do good and suffer?
To follow His steps.

And in that, to commit ourselves to Him who judges righteously.
Because ultimately, that is hope.
That is faith. 
And that is patience.
Hope knows He is righteous,
and He judges righteously,
though I suffer.
Faith knows He sees me,
and He loves me,
though I suffer.
And patience waits for Him, grieving.
Patience stays under the load in hope and in faith.

Several of the words for patience indicate an expectant waiting.
A long-suffering, patient endurance.
Fortitude.
One of them came from two words: 'motion toward' and 'receive'.
'To admit, to allow'.
We naturally turn away from that which does not give us pleasure.
No admittance here.
Maturity walks through it.
Maturity leans into the contraction, breathes through the pain, lets it have its work.
And God commends it.

The First Entry

All my study books are packed, so I used e-Sword to look up 'patience' in their dictionary.
Not being as quick as some, I puzzled a little over the first entry.
I don't read Hebrew, and it is a Hebrew word.  
'Iyob' is how it was transliterated.
It means, 'hated, persecuted'.
And the helpful little side note said, '(like Job was opposed)'.
Hmm.
I never thought of patience that way.

After I read and copied and considered all eight Biblical words translated as 'patience',
(and their seven root words),
and moved on through twenty-one words translated as 'hope',
(and their several root words),
and looked at the two words translated as 'endurance',
I decided to begin again with entry one and see what verses used this 'hated, persecuted' word.

Job 1:1?
There was a man in the land of Uz, 
whose name was Job; 
and that man was perfect and upright, 
and one that feared God, and shunned evil. 

Huh?

So I looked up the next one. 
Job 1:5
And it was so, when the days of their feasting were ended, 
that Job sent and sanctified them, 
and rose early in the morning, 
and offered burnt-offerings according to the number of them all; 
for Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts. 
Thus did Job continually. 

I double checked my reference.
I looked it up in the KJV+
(which numbers each word by its Hebrew and Greek word definitions
according to the Strong's concordance -- a lovely reference for wanna-be scholars).

Wait.
What?
That's his name?
That's his name.

With Patience

It began here:

"Solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is,
those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern good and evil.
Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ,
let us go on to perfection,
not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works 
and faith toward God,
of the doctrine of baptisms,
of laying on of hands,
of resurrection of the dead,
and eternal judgment..."
~Hebrews 5:14-6:2

I read this.
And I thought about it. 
And I said to myself, "It is obvious in this passage what the foundational things are --
the elementary principles we are to move on from.
But does it indicate what we are to move on to?"
So I read further.
Until I arrived at verses 11 and 12:

"And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to
the full assurance of hope until the end,
that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who
through faith
and patience
inherit the promises."

A new thought.
Hope.
Faith. 
Patience.
There's something to learn here.
New connections of very old-to-me scriptures began to form in my mind.
I thought I'd better study a little more about patience.

"Now the ones on the rock are those who,
when they hear, receive the word with joy;
and these have no root,
who believe for awhile
and in time of temptation fall away.
Now the ones that fell among thorns are those who,
when they have heard,
go out and are choked with cares, riches, and pleasures of life,
and bring no fruit to maturity.
The ones that fell on the good ground are those who,
having heard the word with a noble and good heart,
keep it and bear fruit with patience."

How did I never notice that last bit before?
Fruitfulness is related to patience.
Maturity. Patience.

"Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord.
See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth,
waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain.
You also be patient.
Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand..."
~James 5:7,8

I'd like to say more on this subject, but it will have to wait.
Patiently.

It Was Necessary

"Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary
for the Christ to suffer
and to rise from the dead the third day,
and that repentance
and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations,
beginning at Jerusalem."

Without His suffering, all our repentance could never bring about remission of sins, because without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins. 

But because of His suffering, remission of sins is free to the repentant. 

Thank You, Jesus.

Tritisms

Tritism. That is a home-made word. A word for something I cringe at.

"Don't worry. Nothing's ever as bad as it seems."  
Um, sometimes things are even worse than they seem.
"God won't let anything bad happen."  
Can you explain the Holocaust using that philosophy?
"It's all good."  
No, it's not. Some things are evil through and through.  
God is good. And He loves us. But some things are just rotten.
I could add misquoted out-of-context scriptures to the list, but I don't want to give anyone the impression I don't love God's word.

I think sometimes we use trite little sayings as a way to say to hurting people: "Stop complaining, I don't want to think about your pain." I have seen people who are suffering try to do what the scripture says and get prayer, and be slapped with a tritism for it. So the pithy little phrase has effectively been used as an excuse not to pray for them, and to blame them for their pain, and to disobey the scripture that tells us to weep with those who weep.

The other day I read a bunch of 'advice' for the heartbroken, and was disgusted.

"Stop being a moron and realize that emotions can be controlled. Proceed to control emotions and never feel bad again for rest of life. Not that hard."

"Broken hearts, makes you learn to be stronger. Without pain, we won't know how strong we are today. However, its the person's choice to put themselves back together again. If the person doesn't then of course they won't learn..."

The heartbroken are morons?
People who are weak and emotionally out-of-control?
They've just got to get it together?
What miserable comfort.

We have really bad reactions to other people's distress outside of Christ.

The Bible says the Lord is near to the broken-hearted;
He heals the broken-hearted, and binds up their wounds.
Wound care is such a labor of love.
Deep festering wounds are a whole other subject than skinned knees.
They take gentleness and patience, and a tolerance for the disgusting.
They require care for the whole person.
They don't heal overnight: there are bandage changes.

Comfort Overflows

 A hundred times or more I've read it. But this morning, I noticed it.

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
the Father of compassion
and God of all comfort,
who comforts us..."

Another version says 'the Father of mercies'. But the Father of compassion. Do you recognize God in that title?

So often, when we are devastated, we let Satan define Him for us. Or we let pain define Him for us. We let other people's sins and failures define Him for us.

'He wasn't kind -- God is not kind.'
'He isn't fair -- God isn't fair.'
'I'm suffering -- God doesn't care.'

But He is the Father of compassion.

It goes on to say a few verses later: "For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows."

Bless the Lord,
the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
the Father of compassion,
the God of all comfort,
who also comforts us.

I don't understand all the whys. But I'm thankful for the comfort.

We Must Through

"Then Jews from Antioch and Iconium came there;
and having persuaded the  multitudes,
they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city,
supposing him to be dead.
However, when the disciples gathered around him,
he rose up and went into the city...
And when they had preached the gospel... and made many disciples,
they returned to Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch,
strengthening the souls of the disciples,
exhorting them to continue in the faith, and saying,
'We must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.'"
~Acts 14:19-22

And doesn't it ring true when it comes out of his mouth? It is a comfort and encouragement to be exhorted to perseverance by those who have suffered themselves. He went to the very hometown of those who had stoned him to encourage the ones who lived there to continue in faith, through tribulation.

I don't know about you, but I get no comfort from the exhortations of the comfortable. From the corrections of the well-fed. When my friends from the tropics complain of rain at the beach, I do not sympathize. The trite assurances of "everything's going to be alright" from people who buy new clothes every week never mean much to me. But I listen very carefully to those whose pains I am familiar with. When I have watched them suffer, and I have seen them bleed, and they tell me there is hope, it has weight with me.

A Bookmark in Affliction

I have been for some time slowly working my way through Edith Schaeffer's book Affliction. I bought it in 1995, I think: I started it in 2010. It is a book that sometimes leaves me weeping, and often leaves me nodding, and writing a prayer in the margin. The bookmark I have in it is a plain strip of card stock upon which I wrote, "In all our afflictions, He is afflicted."

That ministers to me so much. Fellowship with Jesus in suffering makes a temple out of a pit.

I read some time back about a study that showed that being touched by a loved one reduced pain in patients -- I think it even lowered their blood pressure. In the midst of wracking pain I remember the comfort I received from my husband's hand laid on me. When we suffer, learning to recognize the touch of His hand is one of the benefits of the experience. Unlike our medical caregivers, who have often not experienced whatever we are being treated for, our Great Physician is afflicted in all our afflictions. The difference between care administered by doctors and nurses who have suffered themselves, and those who have only read of suffering is huge. Our High Priest is touched with our weaknesses -- He suffers our hurts. And He lays His hand on us in them.

Crying

 This life is full of so much grief. There's nothing we can do to remove it from others. But we can cry with them. Let their griefs hurt us, too. Suffer with them.

My friend is crying today. More than one of them, actually. Anniversaries of loss, present losses heaped with them... so much to cry through. I look forward to heaven. To seeing my friends with joy filling their faces, to the touch of His hand as He wipes our faces dry, and to the end of loss. The end of death. The New Testament tells us to weep with those who weep, and rejoice with those who rejoice.

When my uncle died in July, I went to my parents' house and sat and cried all day with them. It doesn't remove any of the loss, but there is something in knowing we aren't alone in our misery. So many of my friends are on my heart today, and I'm crying, too.

Against Me

I read Genesis 42 this morning. It was famine. Jacob had lost his most beloved son years before. In sending ten of his others to Egypt for grain to keep the family from starving, Simeon was taken captive by a foreign power. And that same power demanded Benjamin, too. Jacob had no choices, and he expected no good thing.

"And Jacob their father said to them, 'You have bereaved me:
Joseph is no more, Simeon is no more, and you want to take Benjamin.
All these things are against me.
...My son shall not go down with you, for his brother is dead, and he is left alone.
If any calamity shall befall him along the way in which you go,
then you would bring down my gray hair with sorrow to the grave.'"
(Genesis 42:36)

Jacob was not able to see the end. But we get to. We get to see his heartbroken grief and fear. His "I can't take another thing! It'll kill me. I'll die if my sorrows increase." Two sons were dead, and the third would die, too. I read his grieving words, his fearful words, and I cried for him. But I've read the end before.

He said, "All these things are against me."

Were they? They looked like it. It had been years of miserable sorrow. Of Joseph, torn by a wild beast, of ten sons walking in fear and guilt, and of his last son, clung to as 'the one left alone' -- all he had left from Rachel, the woman he loved at first sight and worked fourteen years to get. But reality was, His Father had been working all these miserable things together for his good for all those years. Joseph's loss was his salvation. Simeon's loss dragged Benjamin down there. And Benjamin's loss brought all the rest to exactly the place where God wanted that family -- and to a reconciled, whole, fed condition.

What Jacob said was true. They had bereaved him. But remarkably, God untwisted their handiwork and saved Joseph, Jacob, the ten guilty brothers, Benjamin, and all their family in spite of it and through it. All these things were being worked together for Jacob's good all along. But they were also being worked together for the good of his guilty sons. To restore them all to each other.

Jacob said, "I'll be brought down in sorrow to the grave."

But God had plans for good for him, and not for evil. Plans to give him a future, and a hope. He was right on the edge of having food through the famine, Joseph and Joseph's children, Simeon and Benjamin all given into his hands. He was on the edge of joy, and he couldn't see past sorrow. And the very things he thought were against him, were working for his salvation.

For Your Good

A quote from the end of Foxe's Book of Martyrs comes to mind: "The Lord has been better to us than all our fears."
 
Being an extraordinarily fearful person naturally myself, this quote has often comforted me. Because looking back, it has been true. He does work all things together for your good. I don't know what that will look like, but I know it is true.
 
I've been reading Genesis again lately, making note of every instance of the Lord's guidance in each chapter (some direct instructions, some interrelational conflicts, some famines).
 
I've been thinking about Joseph, and how the Lord said He had sent him ahead of Jacob and the others to save them. All those many years of suffering without any hope in sight... and he was sent. You can't know yet how this trial will play out -- or what good will come of it, but if you are His child, He works all things together for your good who love Him and are called according to His purpose. And He is still preparing a place for you. There is a reward.
 
"Moreover He called for a famine in the land;
He destroyed all the provision of bread.
He sent a man before them -- Joseph -- who was sold as a slave.
They hurt his feet with fetters, he was laid in irons.
Until the time that his word came to pass, the word of the Lord tested him."
(Psalm 105:16-19)
 
"Many of the richest blessings which have come down to us from the past are the fruit of sorrow or pain."
(Streams in the Desert, September 19)
 
I was in hard labor with my oldest for 26 hours. My total labor was 65 hours. Three hours of pushing, one and a half of that with a vacuum extractor -- and no pain medication. I'll spare you the inventory of damages to myself. When he finally came out, my pale, blood-spattered husband said, "We're not doing this ever again."
 
With my baby in my arms, I said, "Why not? I feel like I could leap tall buildings in a single bound!"
 
Joseph named one of his sons 'forget,' because he said God had made him to forget his suffering in the land of his affliction. God knows how to reward the righteous. And His rewards are so rich that no amount of fetters and irons can dull them. No years in prison can be compared with the riches He has prepared for His own.
 
"I walked a mile with Pleasure,
She chattered all the way;
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.
 
I walked a mile with Sorrow,
And ne'er a word said she;
But, oh the things I learned from her
When Sorrow walked with me."
 
(Also from Streams)

Chosen Afflicted

'I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction' (Isaiah 48:10)

"We are chosen as an afflicted people, and not as a prosperous people, chosen not in the palace, but in the furnace. In the furnace, beauty is marred, fashion is destroyed, strength is melted, glory is consumed, and yet here eternal love reveals its secrets, and declares its choice... In times of severest trial God has made to us our calling and election plain, and we have made it sure: then have we chosen the Lord to be our God, and He has shown that we are assuredly His chosen."  (Spurgeon's Cheque Book of Faith, August 27th) 

"Many of us need no other argument than our own experiences to prove that suffering is indeed God's testing room of faith." 

"It is very easy for us to speak and theorize about faith, but God often casts us into crucibles to try our gold, and to separate it from the dross and alloy. Oh, happy are we if the hurricanes that ripple life's unquiet sea have the effect of making Jesus more precious. Better the storm with Christ than smooth waters without Him."

"What if God could not manage to ripen your life without suffering?" (Streams in the Desert, August 28th)

That We Are

"The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs -- heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ,  
if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time
are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us."
(Romans 8:16-18)

The Spirit bears witness with us that we are God's children and His heirs. Joint heirs with Christ when we suffer. When we suffer, the Spirit bears witness we are joined to Him in the past, the present, and the future. Suffering in a way marks us as fellowshippers with Him, and joint heirs of His glory, too. And the two aren't worthy to be compared, because the glory far outweighs the suffering.

We think we're left behind when we're suffering. We think we're forsaken in affliction. But the Holy Spirit is present with us, claiming our suffering as His own, even as He claims His glory for our future. Children of God. Marked as His heirs. It isn't, as we so often ask, "If I am a child of God, why am I suffering?" Our suffering marks us as joint heirs with Christ. Our Savior suffered what only men can suffer. And when we suffer, we ought to remember that just as He joined us in human suffering, we will join Him in glory.  Because He has united Himself to us in suffering, and we are united to Him in glory.

Like in any good marriage, our lot is joined for better and for worse, in sickness and in health, in poverty and in riches. But all the worst is now, and the best is yet to come. He came to us in our sickness, our poverty, our worst estate, and He united us to Himself. And we go with Him to His health, His riches, and His glory because He has united us to Himself.

Choosing Rather

The mystery of suffering confounds us. Conflicts our minds. As much as we say we do not believe prosperity doctrines, I think in each of our hearts we really do. Good Life = Good Stuff. Trusting the Lord = Overflowing Bank Accounts. We think God's love means sex and affection and happiness. God's love meant death for His Son for our sakes. And we act like He hasn't done enough to prove it to us.

I read Psalm 73 recently. That’s the one where Asaph starts out by telling you he had almost stumbled; his steps had nearly slipped because he saw the prosperity of the wicked. “They aren’t suffering pain when they die. They aren’t in trouble like us. We’re plagued, but it isn’t touching them. They have more than they need; they’re always at ease; their money grows.’ He concluded that serving the Lord had no reward, because he was suffering all day long, and being punished every morning. He said he tried to understand it, and it was too painful. “Until I went into the sanctuary of God; then I understood their end: they’re on slippery ground; they are brought to desolation.”

He says he was grieved and vexed, because he was so foolish and ignorant. “I am continually with You; You hold me by my right hand. You will guide me with Your counsel, and afterward receive me into glory. My flesh and my heart fail; but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”

“Those who are far from You perish…
but it is good for me to draw near to God;
I have put my trust in the Lord God.”

His suffering did not stop. That’s why he said, ‘my heart and my flesh fail.’ But he came to recognize that an entire lifetime of severe trials and suffering while being continually with the Lord, and being guided by His counsel and being afterward received into glory is preferable to the lives of the wicked who do not suffer, are not in trouble, and prosper.

“Moses by faith refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter,
choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God
than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a time,
esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt,
for he was looking to the reward…
for he endured as seeing Him who is invisible.
(Hebrews 11:24-26)

Him who is invisible. Jacob, at the time of his exile from his family said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not.” Why didn’t he know it? Because he was lonely. Because he was outcast. Because he couldn’t see Him. But He was there. We see riches and equate them with God's presence. In a sense, under affliction, we see Him less. The affliction is the very thing to endure as seeing the Invisible God. There is a fellowship with the very heart of God which is only available to us in our sufferings. We learn who He is. We learn to value what He values. We learn to long for His kingdom, to hope in His coming. We learn in a very small measure what it was for Him to choose to suffer affliction for our sakes. And we learn how to cry with others.

But whatever things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.
But no, rather, I also count all things to be loss
for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord,
for whose sake I have suffered the loss of all things,
and count them to be dung,
so that I may win Christ and be found in Him;
not having my own righteousness, which is of the Law,
but through the faith of Christ, the righteousness of God by faith,
that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection
and the fellowship of His sufferings,
being made conformable to His death;
if by any means I might attain to the resurrection of the dead.
(Philippians 3:7-11)

I don't think feelings of happiness are the automatic result of walking with the Lord. Those who hope in the Lord have often lived in unhappy situations, suffering poverty and misery. It comes down to whether we will sell our inheritance for a bowl full of porridge. We are offered our Father's whole estate. If we believe that, a few hunger pangs for a few hours are worth the pain. Esau was a man who valued a full belly now as more valuable than the blessing of God and the inheritance of his father. "Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated," said the Lord. A lot of people fault Jacob for his actions in life, but one thing about Jacob was that he valued God's gifts. He thought they were worth being exiled for -- without the inheritance he'd won from his brother.