A Year of Blessing - August 7, 2010

Ever feel like someone is watching you? Not in the creepy way that Luke is right now (pretty cool pictures, though, eh?), but in a loving, caring kind of way. I love the 'stolen' glances from Pete. The ones when I look up and he's looking at me with a smile on his face and he mouths "I love you". It sends and thrill of love and adoration thru me!

I have found that God does that. I glance up and see a beautiful sky, and God mouths "I love you". I hear a song on the radio that encourages me to lift my eyes to Him and He mouths "I love you". I feel the comfort of a soft blanket when I'm cold and He mouths "I love you". But more recently, I feel the knife hot pain that shoots thru my leg and He mouths "I love you".

Stay with me now...that last one was a really hard lesson for me. But God provided an example in Pete. When the pain comes, he is quick to react with loving arms, words of love, and prayers of intercession for me. How can I not believe that the God who watched His Son die would not be watching me? Or my savior who felt not only the physical pain of the cross, but the sins of all people, not be watching? Or the Comforter within me not interceding?

All thru the New Testament there is a thread of grace woven in the suffering of Christ's followers:

Luke 24:25-27 (New International Version)
He said to them, "How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?" And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.

Acts 3:18
But this is how God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, saying that his Christ would suffer.

Romans 8:17-18
Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

2 Corinthians 1:5-7
For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.

Philippians 3:10-11
I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Hebrews 5:7-9
During the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him...

Romans 5:1-5
Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.

Suffering is not an option to check on the list of what you want out of life, it is a required standard. Any person alive will suffer. Christian or not. The difference followers of Christ have, is in the option to glorify God thru the pain and learn obedience and perseverance in Christ. Pain and suffering, coupled with joy and strength in God, creates a powerful weapon to destroy the fear and doubt satan throws our way. It is a slow process. One that is learned one day at a time, one hour at a time, and sometimes one minute at a time. But each time we include Christ in our suffering and catch the quiet voice of God saying "I love you" in the midst of it, the pain is transform into praise, the prince of darkness is obliterated by the light of glory, and we endure with Christ for the victory He proclaimed at His resurrection.

I don't like the pain. And more than once I have 'offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears'. But in hope I accept the comfort of my Christ, and thrill at the 'I love you' the Father sends me.