pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: pain


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Honor, Glory

Reading: Romans 16: 25-27

Verse 27: “To the only wise God be the glory fever through Jesus Christ”.

We tend to go through life largely on cruise control.  Our daily routines are comfortable an established.  We are generally content with our lot in life and we live with a sense of joy and well-being.  Our jobs, our families our friends are satisfying.  Our place in God’s family feels good and we feel known by God and feel we know God.   Yes, there are trying moments and temporary frustrations, but for the most part, life is good.  It makes the Christmas season seem even better.

But once in a while, life takes a turn.  Then we find ourselves in uncomfortable or painful places.  An unexpected loss or a sudden change in life takes us for a loop.  Our routine, our joy, our contentment are disrupted.  We feel lost, insecure, alone.  Yet God remains present.  God is our constant.  We all know people dealing with loss or change.  It is important this time of the year to connect a little deeper, to be a little more aware, to remind them more often of your love and of God’s love for them.

Maybe this is you.  If so, know that God loves you and that your family and friends love you and want to be there for you.  If this is someone you know, remind them often.

Today’s passage from Paul is the closing reminder to the Roman church that God established them in the faith through the gospel or good news of Jesus Christ.  All Christians are established by this same good news.  Jesus Christ came and lived and died and was resurrected for us all, showing us how to live out God’s love here on earth and showing us the way to life eternal.  Hope and love all in one life.  This is our truth in Christ.  It is the path we joyfully and assuredly walk as children of the light.  May all we do bring honor to Him.  As Paul closes, so do I: “To the only wise God be the glory fever through Jesus Christ”.


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Restore

Reading: Psalm 80: 5-7 and 17-19

Verse Five: “You have fed them with the bread of tears”.

Psalm 80 is a song of lament.  As one reads the Psalm, you can feel the people’s pain and hurt seeping out of the words.  They are calling out to God and and feel as if God were not there.  In the opening line of our passage, the psalmist asks, “How long will your anger smolder against the prayers of your people”?  They are searching for God.  They long for God’s face to once again shine upon them.

Today our headlines are filled daily with stories of people who could use God’s face shining upon them.  And there are countless others who feel this way whose stories do not cross our TV screens or our Facebook feeds.  There is much hurt and brokenness in our world and even in some of our lives.  We continue today to ask where is God in the midst of the pain and suffering of our world.  We wonder why God would allow tings to be as they are for so many people.

On behalf of the people Israel, the psalmist laments to God: “You have fed them with the bread of tears”.  It is a sad image to have in our minds.  Instead of being filled with God’s love and compassion and healing, they are eating tears.  They long for God’s presence instead.  The psalmist goes on to ask, “Restore us, O God Almighty; make your face shine upon us, that we may be saved”.  The people long for God to look their way.

Many would voice this call today.  “Restore us, O God Almighty”.  You are powerful and can do anything.  You came down to earth and lived among us, healing many – physically, emotionally, spiritually.  You continue to be present both through the Holy Spirit and through us, your disciples.  So Lord, God Almighty, send us out, led by the power and presence of your Holy Spirit.  Send us out to bring healing and restoration to the broken people of our neighborhoods and communities.  Send us out to be your love and compassion to those who are eating tears.  Lead us and guide us to fill them with your bread of love and hope.  Send us out.  Amen.


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Victory

Reading: Revelation 7: 9-17

Verse 16: Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst.

Tonight is a “scary” night.  People of all ages dress up in fun costumes and go out to collect candy.  The reality is that the “trick” has largely left the “trick or treat” aspect of the night and it is largely about dressing up (which is fun) and collecting candy (which is yummy).  For the vast majority who will be going door to door, trunk to trunk, or table to table, Halloween is just a fun night.

Although the “darkness” of Halloween is largely gone, the world we live in still has plenty of darkness.  The world brings each person their share of hurt and pain in life.  It is part of the otherwise beautiful and loving world.  As Christians we can better face the forces of evil and the times of pain and suffering because we know the end of the story.  Today, in Revelation 7, we get a peak into the end of the story.  We see praise and worship around the throne.  We see those that have gone through the great tribulation – they have been redeemed and their robes are white as snow.  They join the elders and the angels in worshipping God and the Lamb.  It is a wonderful and beautiful image of the end of life as we know it here on earth.

Through the victory of Jesus Christ we know that “never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst”.  It will be a time of light and love as we dwell with God and the Lamb.  All will be amazing as we join the heavenly choir singing our praises to the Lord our God.  The Lamb will lead us by springs of living water and God will wipe away every tear.  This is the vision, the hope, the promise that we hold onto as we dwell in this time and place.  Thanks be to God for the victory won by Jesus Christ!


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Healing and Wholeness

Reading: Genesis 45: 1-15

Verse Four: I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt.

Joseph is at a good place in his life.  He has gone through some difficult experiences but has had a sense of God’s guidance and presence during his time in Egypt.  The old hurts and scars are a thing of the past.  And then his brothers suddenly appear before him, begging to buy food.  Oh how the tables have turned!  All that distant hurt and anger must have come rushing back for Joseph.  In the text we see that this is right where his brothers go – terrified in his presence because they too remember what all they did to him.

In life we experience hurts and offenses.  We all have been let go by an employer or have been dumped by one we love or have been cast aside for a cooler or better connected friend.  More often than not we absorb the hurt and over time it lessens and we come to a new place of peace and contentment as we allow God to heal and love us.  We see that God has continued to be at work in our lives, bringing us a new job or a new significant other or a new best friend.  And then our old boss comes looking for a job or the ex shows up with regrets over their choice or the old friend comes looking for your help.  Thanks feelings come rushing back and it is hard to be loving and caring and to act as Jesus calls us to act.

Joseph exclaims, “I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt”. It is not, ‘I am in charge now!’ or ‘Get out!’ or anything else harsh or negative.  It is love and mercy and reconciliation that Joseph offers.  He knows that God has been with him and will continue to be with him.  He chooses to let go of the past and to embrace a future with God leading and guiding.  When we are faced with the choice to love or to seek revenge, may we also find a way guided by God’s love, bringing healing and wholeness to what was broken.


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God Kept the Dark

Reading: Genesis 1: 1-30

Verse Two: … darkness was over the surface… the Spirit of God was hovering.

The creation narrative begins with the world being formless and empty.  There was darkness over the surface and “the Spirit of God was hovering”.  Sometimes we feel as if life were a bit formless or out of control and sometimes we feel a tad empty.  Life would not be the same if the world were void of these times.  God’s first act of creation is to form the light.  God chooses to separate light from dark instead of simply eliminating the darkness.

As Christians we often look at light as good and at dark as evil.  We reference Jesus as being light and we pursue “walking in the light” as a way to represent following Jesus.  We use the phrase “shine the light” to describe living out our faith as we seek to share our faith with others.  The implication here is that our ‘light’ drives away or at least exposes darkness.  And it does.  In the end, we know that light will triumph over the dark because only light can drive away darkness.  Darkness simply cannot drive away light.

Although we prefer to walk in the light, at times we​ do struggle with the dark.  On one level, sin and temptation are always near, lurking right around the edges as Satan is always at work.  On another level, life itself sometimes brings darkness.  In this sense, it is not necessarily evil.  It comes in a loss we experience or maybe it is caused by the actions of another person.  Sometimes we find ourselves in darkness as a result of our sins.  In any case, being here is uncomfortable and maybe painful.  We do not like being here.  But God kept the dark for a reason.  It is here, in the dark of the valleys, that we must trust and hold onto God the most.  It is here that we learn how much we need God.  It is often here that our faith grows the most.

We love the light.  This is our preference.  It is where we are called to live as here we reflect God’s love back out into the world.  The light is also our hope in times of darkness.  For God’s presence in both the light and the dark, we say thanks be to God.


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Suffering

Reading: 1 Peter 4:12-14 and 5:6-11

Verse Nine: Resist him [Satan], standing firm in the faith.

Suffering is the overarching theme in today’s passage.  Peter opens by reminding us that we may suffer for our faith.  He says, “do not be surprised” and encourages us to “rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ”.  To really suffer for our faith is foreign to us, isn’t it?  To rejoice because we are suffering for our faith seems even more foreign!  Yet over the course of our faith journey, most of us can look back and see times when holding fast to our faith led to some decisions and choices that had a ‘cost’ and came with some suffering.  Maybe it was a relationship that you had to let go or a work decision that kept your integrity but cost a promotion or a windfall in your bank account.  This is the type of suffering that most Christians we know suffer.  But the reality is that there is much pain and suffering just beyond the doors of our beautiful churches and just down the street from our nice neighborhoods.

Every community, big or small, has its share of suffering.  When Jesus said that we would always have the poor with us, He knew we would.  We find suffering clustered here and there.  In my town it is called “housing” and in all communities there is a similar neighborhood.  The housing conditions are poor, people go without heat and/or electricity for stretches, and food is sometimes scarce.  In larger communities there are also homeless shelters, safe houses, and halfway houses.  In big communities there are the “projects” and in some huge cities whole communities are built out of cardboard and scrap metal and there is no running water or electricity.  Go to this place in your community and you will see that there is pain and suffering, there is hurt, and there is a loss of hope.

Our call as Christians is clear: go.  Go!  Go and do what you can when you can.  Alone you and I cannot end the suffering…  But we can alleviate some and lessen some.  We can bring food and clothing and whatever else material is needed.  We can bring food and sometimes clean water.  We can fix a leaky roof, a broken window, or a creaky set of steps.  We can sit and hear someone’s story and offer some words of hope.  We can also work to address some of the root causes and systematic forces that cause the pain and suffering.  This can be through education, through voicing opposition to the systems that work against those in poverty, and through fighting things like prejudice and stereotyping and judging.  This day and every day may we “Resist him [Satan], standing firm in the faith”.  Evil comes in many forms.  Today may we resist all forms if evil and suffering as we seek to bring the hope and love of Christ to a world in need.


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Through the and In the

Reading: Psalm 23: 4-6

Verse 4: I will fear no evil, for you are with me.

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death” is a very familiar line in a very familiar Psalm.  This line contains several truths for all of us.  First, we will all, at points in our lives, walk through a time of loss.  The death may be of a friend or loved one, it may be of a marriage or a friendship, it may be of a job.  In the times of loss, we all feel a shadow hanging over us.  The grief, the pain, the unwanted change all feels like a shadow or dark cloud hanging over us.

Second, we do not walk alone as we pass through the valley.  Our God walks with us.  Because of His great love for us, God does not let us walk alone.  His presence and the people He leads into our lives during these valley experiences are what makes it possible to “walk through”.  Yes, we do spend time in the valley and, yes, we will return there from time to time, but we do not remain in the valley.  God fosters new life to spring up or to form in us as we walk through the valley and continue on our journey of faith.  This is the third truth.  God leads us up and out of the valley, back into new life.  When we look back, we can see how God was with us in our deepest need and how God led us through the valley.  Because of these reminders of God’s love and because of the experience with His closeness, we can join the psalmist in declaring, “I will fear no evil, for you are with me”.

The Psalm ends where it began – with God’s blessings and joy in our lives.  God prepares a table for us, God anoints us with the oil of His blessing, and through this our cup overflows.  Outside of the valleys we also live daily with the sense of God’s goodness and love surrounding us each moment of each day.  It is the same sense of comfort and presence, but it is experienced in the joy of life as well.  The Psalm ends with the hope we all profess: “… and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever”.  May it be so.  May it be so!


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God’s Power

Reading: 1 Corinthians 2: 1-16

Paul was well-educated and knew the Jewish faith inside out.  He could quote from the scriptures all day long.  He could probably recite all 623 codes found in the Law.  Paul was a man with great knowledge.  And he was very smart – he knew that the power to transform lives was held by God alone.  So Paul chose to proclaim faith, not religion.  Paul chose to share the words brought to him by the Spirit instead of relying on all the fancy religious terms and rules he knew so well.  Paul chose to speak from the heart and not the mind.

When we come to the sacred place of being able to share our faith with someone, they want to know the source of our joy, peace, and contentment.  They want to know how God has transformed us.  They want to know how accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior will change them forever.  There is no interest in knowing what committee we are on or where to sign up to be an usher.  The seeker simply wants to feel what we feel and to experience the power of Christ in their life.  They want to hear and feel from our hearts what it means to be in a relationship with Jesus.

Others will come to us in times of pain or brokenness.  They often do not know where else to turn.  They have exhausted their other options.  Some have a sense that only God can help.  It may be prompted by a sudden tragedy, by an unexpected job loss, a request for a divorce that comes out of nowhere.  Here too we must speak from the heart and must rely on the power of God to give us the words to say.  Like Paul, we must trust in God to lead and guide us and to help us “speak not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths”.  In situations that are truly beyond us and make us feel inadequate, we must call upon God and seek the power of God.  Then the words we speak will be the wisdom of God.

In all things we must rely on the Lord our God.  This is true of our words, our actions, our relationships.   May we ever seek God first, trusting fully in God’s power alone.


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Trust

Reading: Luke 21: 10-19

Today’s passage really lays out what is ahead one day and makes it clear that God will be present through it all.  The reading opens with a view of a grim future that evokes connections to Revelation.  We do not know when, but we do know that the world will be in rough shape with all the earthquakes, famine, violence, and so forth.

Then Jesus steps back and makes it personal.  Jesus speaks of a time of persecution and trial for the believers.  Believers will be persecuted and arrested and put on trial.  Why?  So we can witness to our faith.  It is interesting that we will not be rescued from the trial by our carefully thought-out arguments.  Jesus even says not to prepare any.  He says, “Trust”.  Do not worry – “I will give you words and wisdom”.  Do not rely on your own skills and knowledge and rhetoric, but only rely on your faith.  Just like the Holy Spirit filled Peter and John when they were on trial before the Sanhedrin, so too will the Holy Spirit fill each who trusts fully in Jesus.

This message of trusting in God holds true for all believers in all times.  We need to remember this because we know that in this life we will face times of trial.  There will be difficulties.  There simply will be.  Jesus encourages us in how we approach and walk through these times.  The first thing we must do is trust in God and not in ourselves.  Once we acknowledge our absolute need for God, then we fully open ourselves up to God’s presence to work in our lives.  In this way we will bear witness to our faith in a world that doubts and questions.  By trusting fully in God we demonstrate that God is absolutely in control.  By living out a peace that passes understanding we bear witness to God.

God is faithful and God is loving.  When we trust fully in God, we experience these things.  There will be pain and hurt in this life, but when we hold fast to our faith in God, we retain a hope greater than anything in life can defeat.  May we trust fully in God, knowing our eternity rests securely in God’s loving hands.


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Promise = Hope

Reading: Isaiah 65: 21-25

In the new kingdom, all will be blessed.  The works of the peoples’ hands will bring enjoyment.  The homes they build and the crops they plant will be enjoyed.  Nothing will be done in vain.  Even before their prayers are spoken, God will hear and answer them.  Life will be wonderful when the earth is renewed by God.  The renewing will affect all things.  Even the wolf and the lamb will lie down together!  There will be absolute peace and all will be blessed by God Almighty.  We long for the day!

The promise and hope in these words from Isaiah were just what the Israelites needed to hear.  Times were very bleak and it was an easy time to begin to lose faith in God.  Nothing in life seemed to be favoring the chosen people.  While the people knew their situation was the consequence of their sins, at some point we all say, “How long”?

We too have uttered this question to God.  Like the Israelites, we may have wandered from our faith and there is a consequence that we must endure for our choices.  Often we too get to the point of longing to return to ‘normal’ in our lives.  At other times in life, our time of suffering is not caused by us.  We can be adversely affected by another’s sin or choices.  We can also be affected by the circumstances of life – a diagnosis or sudden loss comes our way and we suffer and experience pain.  In all of these scenarios, we long to move past and to come to terms with our hurt or loss, but it can be so hard.

The promise of a new heaven and earth cannot remove the hurt or pain or suffering.  But it can give us a new sense of hope.  In this promise we can find hope and strength and comfort and maybe even a little healing.  One day all will be restored.  May we cling to this hope.  The promise is true!