We Must Believe God Loves Us In Spite of the Fact that He Does Not Make Our Lives Go Better – Part 3

11 Jul We Must Believe God Loves Us In Spite of the Fact that He Does Not Make Our Lives Go Better – Part 3

Blog Series

Moving from Checkers to Chess

Five Steps to Unleashing the Power of an Eternal Perspective

5.   There are many good and wonderful things that can only come about through struggle and trial and pain

In my own life, time has demonstrated that many of my struggles with God were rooted in ignorance, selfishness and pride. It is clear that if God had given me an easy life, I would have remained arrogant and self-entitled, absorbed with my own welfare over the welfare of others, pursuing the America Dream over the Kingdom of God.

We wish we could become more like Christ by eating chocolate while watching sunsets. But while that is not the case, sandwiched in between promise-laden Scriptures on the one hand and an unimaginably bright future in which those promises will be fulfilled on the other hand, the only thing God hasn’t done for us is make this life on earth easy for us.

But He intends to do so in the end in lavish, magnificent and deeply personal ways. Revelation talks of a time when “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain…” (Revelation 4:21)

Whatever loss we feel we have incurred in this life can be counterbalanced by the realization that God will use it for good if we let Him (Romans 8:28), and we can be disproportionately compensated for it in the next (Romans 8:18). This life is brief. The next life is endless. There is no ultimate loss. There is only delay.

When we are in the middle of difficult trials that make us wonder if God loves us, we must – by faith – get a grip:

• Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong. (1 Corinthians 16:13)
• Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might (Ephesians 6:10)
• Be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:1)

We must choose to trust the truth of Scripture rather than our notoriously unreliable emotions. 

God does love us, even when we don’t feel loved. Even when we are going through such hard times that we believe that, if we were God we would help us. We must accept that God’s ways are higher than our ways (Isaiah 55:8-9). We must trust Him over our own imperfect perceptions of reality.

• God is morally perfect. We are not. (1 John 1:5)
• God has ultimate knowledge and wisdom. We do not. (1 John 3:20)
• God is sovereign and can accomplish whatever He desires. We cannot. (Job 42:2)

When we step down from the throne of our life and abdicate it to Him… when we take Scripture at face value, when we trust God above self, we conclude that God does, in fact, love us, even in spite of all the trouble in our lives.

6.   In the end, the greatest gift is God Himself

Like coming into the presence of someone you love deeply on earth, only much more so, we will come into the presence of God, which will be infinitely more precious to us than any gift He could give us.

When I called my (now) wife, Margie, in high school and asked her to go to the prom with me, I was delirious with joy when she agreed.

On the fateful day, I washed and waxed my car to a blinding shine, put on my finest clothes, and went to pick her up. When she met me at the door in her dazzling white dress, smiling and perfectly made up… at that moment, I didn’t wish for another thing.

I did not wish I had made better grades that year. I did not wish I had scored more points in the last basketball game. I did not wish I had more money. I did not wish for another thing. I was completely happy in the moment with her… in her presence. I felt like the luckiest guy in the world.

And so it will be with God – yet infinitely more so – that we will be filled up and completely happy and satisfied in His presence. The thought that He did not,  from a temporal perspective, take better care of us on earth will become a non-issue.

As Timothy Keller has written, “On the day of the Lord – the day that God makes everything right, the day that everything sad becomes untrue – on that day the same thing will happen to your own hurts and sadness. You will find that the worst thing that ever happened to you will in the end only enhance your eternal delight. On that day all of it will be turned inside out and you will know joy beyond the walls of the world. The joy of your glory will be that much greater for every scar you bear.”

Conclusion

Even though we may be able to see the ultimate benefit of suffering, this is not to suggest that our suffering will ever be easy. No suffering is easy, or it wouldn’t be suffering.

In the providence of God, some Christians suffer more than others:

• • Joni Erikson Tada who has been a quadriplegic since young adulthood, who has survived cancer, is now living in chronic pain
  • Corrie ten Boom who witnessed the death of her father and sister, and who suffered terribly in a German concentration camp for helping Jews escape Germany, spent the last years of her life an invalid, unable to communicate with others as a result of a severe stroke
  • Countless nameless individuals today living in communist or Islamic countries endure unspeakable persecution because of their faith
  • Countless nameless individuals today live in unending, severe physical and or mental pain and turmoil

And even though most of us do not suffer on that level, nevertheless, sometimes individual suffering can rise to almost seemingly unbearable levels.

C.S. Lewis wrote, “What do people mean when they say, ‘I am not afraid of God because I know He is good?’ Have they never been to a dentist?” And, “We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be.”

Yet Joni, and Corrie, and countless other individuals – and even C. S. Lewis – give testimony to the goodness and grace of God, even in the midst of their trials… confirming that even in such extreme levels, trials can make us stronger, make us more capable of ministering to others, deepen our relationship with God, and increase our eternal reward.

So, by faith, we believe in the goodness of God, in spite of the fact that He does not make our lives easier, trusting in His sufficient grace, and waiting for that day when all will be well.

As we progress through our series on Moving from Checkers to Chess ~ 5 Steps to Unleashing the Power of an Eternal Perspective, having taken a good look at the concerns and issues we must come to grips with in Step 1. We must believe the unbelievable, we are now ready to look at Step 2. We must embrace the inconceivable. I look forward to seeing you next week.

Get a Moving from Checkers to Chess At-a-Glance-Overview: Click Here

As we have been studying these concepts for quite some time (including in some prior blog series), and I am excited to now be connecting all the “moving parts” from those posts and combining them into a “spiritual game plan” in this “Moving from Checkers to Chess ~ 5 Steps to Unleashing the Power of an Eternal Perspective” series.

For an overview of the game plan, so you can see at a glance where we begin and where we’re headed, I’ve created an overview/outline you can download for free: Click Here

For the full discussion of each of the steps, begin with the first post in this series, Moving from Checkers to Chess, and then continue with the following posts thereafter.

In case you’re new here, below are two resources I’ve created for additional help in your Christian discipleship journey:

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