adversity | Thoughts About God

Refined by Fire

Devotionals — Sat, 07 Dec 2024 09:03:28 +0000

“In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ,” 1 Peter 1:6-7

God is always at work in our lives. Even during seasons of adversity, He wants to accomplish something powerful and good. How should this knowledge affect our response? Today’s passage teaches us to choose to rejoice during difficult times. This doesn’t mean we have to be happy about the hardship itself. Instead, joy comes from drawing close to the Lord and believing steadfastly that through His redemptive power, He is growing and preparing us. If your usual response to trials is anxiety, anger, or depression, the idea of having joy in the midst of a negative situation might not seem logical. However, if you look beneath the surface, you will discover that this biblical directive makes sense for several reasons.

Often, our natural reaction to pain is to run in the opposite direction, and as fast as possible. However, God wants to teach us endurance–much like a long-distance runner builds up strength in training–so that we can fully benefit from what He is doing in our hearts. He uses trials as a refining fire to purify us like gold and bring us to greater spiritual maturity. As we realize that we are actually being made more complete through our adversities, we’ll begin to face challenging times with confidence that He always
has our best interest in mind.

While a worldly viewpoint sees hope and joy in the midst of dark times as naïve, a spiritual perspective discerns that we’re really progressing on a journey toward life at its fullest. We can be filled with supernatural joy, knowing that the Lord is making us into world-changing spiritual warriors.

By Dr. Charles Stanley
Used by Permission
https://www.intouch.org/

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Overcoming Adversity

Devotionals — Sat, 17 Aug 2024 08:01:03 +0000

“But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 2 Corinthians 12:9

The college was rattled! It started simply with three students wanting to organize a Bible club on campus. Anne and her two friends felt God calling them to do so.

Many people at the college opposed it. They said the group was trying to force religion on people. Teachers tried to intimidate them in class. Students wrote mean comments on Anne’s door.

The campus radio station even ridiculed them on the air.

But Anne and her friends would not be deterred. Feeling discouraged, however, they turned to God for strength. He says in the Bible that “[His] strength is made perfect in weakness.” Eventually, their Bible club became official.

Dear one, the persecution may become intense. When it does, pick up your prayer pace. God will give you strength to complete the task He’s called you to do.

By Vonette Bright
used by permission

Advancing Through Adversity

Devotionals — Sun, 05 May 2024 08:01:12 +0000

“In all their affliction He was^a]">]afflicted, And the Angel of His Presence saved them; In His love and in His pity He redeemed them; And He bore them and carried them All the days of old”. Isaiah 63:9

At medical checkups, children periodically need immunizations. Boys and girls may not understand that inoculations protect them; from their point of view, they are experiencing pain—while someone who loves them is allowing it! Such an experience affords a little insight into God’s dealings with His children. It answers one of the questions we often ask when painful things happen to us: Where is God?

The Bible tells us that “in all their affliction He was afflicted” (Isaiah 63.9). You may remember your earthly father restraining you so that the doctor could administer the injection. Perhaps you recall him commenting that the experience hurt him more than it did you. That is exactly what our heavenly Father is describing in this Bible passage. To a childish mind, it is an utterly incomprehensible concept, but when we have children of our own, we grasp it clearly. We then begin to understand what kind of a God we have. He Himself entered into all our agony, and He has tasted the last drop in our own cup of suffering.

Where is God? He is where the pain is. The book of Isaiah says,

“He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him” (Isaiah 53:5).

As you face hard times, look into the Savior’s tear-stained face—you won’t see anything but love. If we would follow Jesus, we must bear the fellowship of His suffering. We must go where He is, and the cross is one of the sweetest places to find Him.

By Dr. Charles Stanley
Used by Permission
https://www.intouch.org/

The Source of Our Adversity

Devotionals — Sat, 14 May 2022 08:03:55 +0000

We struggle to reconcile our suffering with God’s love for us and His power to prevent or stop it.

Read Isaiah 45:5-10

When we experience hardships, we usually wonder why God allows these painful situations to come our way. It just doesn’t seem to fit with His role as our loving heavenly Father. We struggle to reconcile our suffering with His love for us and His power to prevent or stop it. In order to understand what’s going on, we need to consider the possible sources of adversity.

A Fallen World: When sin entered the world, suffering came with it. God could have protected us from these harmful effects by making us like puppets who could not choose sin, but that would mean we’d also be unable to choose to love Him, because love must be voluntary.

Our Own Doing: Sometimes we get ourselves into trouble with our foolish or sinful choices. If the Lord stepped in and rescued us from every negative consequence, we’d never grow into mature believers.

Satanic Attack: The Devil is our enemy. To hinder anything the Lord wants to do in and through believers, Satan will never cease to harass us. His goal is to destroy our lives and our testimonies, thereby making us weak and useless for God’s purposes.

God’s Sovereignty: Ultimately, the Lord is in charge of all adversity that comes our way. To deny His involvement contradicts His power and sovereignty over creation.

For us to accept that God allows–or even sends–afflictions, we must see adversity from His perspective. Is your focus on the pain of your experience or on the Lord and His faithfulness? As believers, we’re assured that no adversity comes our way unless He can use it to achieve His good purposes.

By Dr. Charles Stanley
Used by Permission
https://www.intouch.org/

The Cry of the Hungry and Thirsty

Devotionals — Thu, 16 Dec 2021 09:01:19 +0000

What happens to us, as Christ seekers, when ill winds of adversity whip around us?

The cry of the heart….“We would see Jesus.” (John 12:21 KJV)

The cry of the hungry and thirsty…a cry that sometimes cannot be identified. Some nebulous something or other.

Yet, most of the time, those who cry out don’t even know they are searching, for, they (we) attempt to fill that void in our lives by pursuing all sorts of other things.

But what happens to us, as Christ seekers, when those ill winds of adversity whip around us? Many times, we fall apart.

Cries can be heard in the wilderness. We cry out in our hunger and thirst. We find no comfort, no peace.

And yet, sometimes, the Lord allures, persuades, and draws His people into wilderness valleys. Hosea said, “Therefore, behold, I will allure her, will bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfort to her. I will give her vineyards from there, and the Valley of Achor as a door of hope; she shall sing there.” (Hosea 2:14-15a NKJV)

The only word used in the Old Testament for wilderness is midbar. It doesn’t mean a sandy desert; it means a pasture (as an open field, where cattle are driven) and implies the meaning of a desert as a deserted place. It also means speech and comes from a word meaning to speak.

Wilderness is a lonely, uninhabited wasteland, yet, a place where God will draw you in order to speak to you. Where you are set apart from the madding crowd.

To a place filled with His presence.

A place where He will speak comfort to you.

In the Hosea verse, comfort (or comfortably) actually means heart and also means speak into a heart tenderly, friendly, and comfortably.

So there, in the midst of your heartache, your afflictions, your trials, He will speak tender comfort to your heart and bring forth vineyards from the Valley of Achor, meaning the valley of trouble.

Vineyards, as a fertile place, a place of growth in circumstances, a place to glean a harvest, this is where Jesus will meet you. And you will sing there, as Hosea said.

The Hebrew word for sing means ‘to heed, to pay attention, to respond, to begin to speak, specifically to sing, shout, testify, announce.

So that which causes affliction, as the valley of troubles, will be an entrance, a gateway to hope, as a cord of expectancy.

Oh, to see Jesus when we are in that lonely wasteland of hopelessness, to walk with Him there, to hear Him speak comfort to our discouraged soul, that we may pay attention to His voice. And there, we will find our vineyards, as sustenance, supply, and growth, in Him.

Our hope is renewed in Him. And we sing His praises, for that which had been a source of calamity has become a source of redemption and blessing.

A valley of trouble. A strange place to find vineyards, isn’t it? But it is God’s doing.

“This was the Lord’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. (Psalm 118:23 NKJV)

Yes, God knows your need while you’re in that wilderness experience. He knows how long you’re to stay there and just what you need while you’re there. Mainly, you need Him.

And Jesus is there to walk you through the wilderness and to bring you out of it.

The cry of the hungry and thirsty? Yes…

“We would see Jesus.” (John 12:21 KJV)

By Lynn Mosher
Used by Permission

Adversity

Devotionals — Wed, 29 Sep 2021 08:01:11 +0000

Someone once described suffering as God’s fertilizer for spiritual growth.

“If you falter in a time of trouble, how small is your strength.” – Proverbs 24:10

Either we are in adversity, just getting over it or about to go into it, or perhaps, all three at once. Living in this world is not easy and trouble comes with it. The issue is not whether we will experience it, but how we will respond to it.

There are a number of reasons why you or I will experience adversity during our lifetimes. Some segments of the church today have been wrongly taught that adversity is a sign that God has removed His blessing. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Scriptures clearly teach us that trials are a part of a walk with God. No man or woman who has achieved much in the kingdom has been spared some form of trial or adversity. God gives specific reasons for some of our trials. Other times the purpose is to identify with the cross of Christ. We must view adversity as God does–as a means to conform us to the image of His Son. Making us more Christ like is the ultimate goal of all of our experiences with God.

Adversity is God’s workbench where He conforms us to His image. Someone once described suffering as God’s fertilizer for spiritual growth. No matter what God does in our lives, we know that nothing happens without His foreknowledge and His planning. Sometimes we fall into the trap of thinking that God is not aware of our circumstances.

Certain calamities simply cannot be explained adequately to allow rational defense of the events. These are better left unresolved until we come before God and He can quiet our hearts.

Suffering and adversity are parts of our heritage as sons and daughters of God. They come with the territory as parts of God’s refining process for every believer. Consider every major character in the Bible, and you will see that their lives had adversity. God never said we would not suffer as Christians.

Throughout Scripture God encourages us not to put too much emphasis on the here-and-now life, but to emphasize our future life in heaven. Whatever trials we will encounter here will not compare to the glory He will reveal when we get to heaven. Earth is a mere watering hole on the way to eternity. Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him (James 1:12).

So keep looking up, no matter how bumpy your road of life gets. Things could get worse and probably will, but for those saved by Christ, eternal glory is just around the bend.

By John Grant
Used by Permission

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The post Adversity appeared first on Thoughts About God.

adversity | Thoughts About God

Refined by Fire

Overcoming Adversity

FURTHER READING

Advancing Through Adversity

FURTHER READING

The Source of Our Adversity

We struggle to reconcile our suffering with God’s love for us and His power to prevent or stop it.

Further Reading

The Cry of the Hungry and Thirsty

What happens to us, as Christ seekers, when ill winds of adversity whip around us?

Further Reading

Adversity

Someone once described suffering as God’s fertilizer for spiritual growth.

Further Reading

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