I will come forth as gold through my suffering



No one in this world wishes to suffer. suffering is considered a negative thing because it makes us to feel rejected, abandoned and bitterness fills our hearts as we suffer. But if we look deeper, we can see that suffering has a power to transform and bring brighter days in our lives.

The Bible declares that "many are the afflictions of the righteous" (Psalms 34:19). Job was a God's fearing and righteous person. But despise all his holiness he had to go through suffering. But at times we wonder how does God permit suffering to come to someone who is living righteously within the will of God? 
Well here is the answer: God did not create suffering. It originally entered the world through man’s sin (Genesis 3). But God can take that which is intended for evil and use it for good to accomplish His purposes. 

 Suffering is sometimes compared to a natural storm. When we suffer, we experience a storm spiritually speaking. This storm may affect us spiritually, mentally, physically, materially, or emotionally. We suffer for many reasons: circumstances of life, people around us, our sins, Satan's attack, the work of God. 

 When we suffer innocently and not because of our own sin, we should maintain a proper attitude towards suffering. The real test of our spirituality is how we respond in the day of distress. The Bible says "If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small. (Proverbs 24:10) Suffering has in itself some positive benefits.

 - When we suffer, we learn not to trust our own self (2 Corinthians 1:8-9)

 - Suffering results in all that is unstable being shaken out of our life. We cease to depend on people, programs, or material things because these all fail in your time of need (Hebrews 12:26-27)

 - It is through affliction that we move beyond the calling as a child of God to become chosen of God. Affliction according to the will of God refines us for His use just as metals are refined in a furnace in the natural world. (Isaiah 48:10)

 - We learn obedience through suffering (Hebrews 5:8)

 - Suffering makes us to know God intimately (Philippians 3:10) Some of us know God only second handedly. When we are experiencing the blessings of life, God is often a luxury instead of a necessity. But when we have a real need, God becomes a necessity. Job came to know God more intimately through suffering. Before he suffered, Job knew God through theology. Afterwards, he knew Him by experience.

 So Job understood that his suffering had a purpose to help him to press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me . He knew that after the suffering he will become pure like gold

 Conclusion: 

 2 Corinthians 4:17-18 

For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal

…. and we will come out as pure as gold.

Stay blessed!!
Fleury


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