May 22nd, 2019

Wednesday’s Word

Oh, Lord, take this pain away! Help them see their part in this problem. Please, please, Lord, work this out for my good and Your glory…
Thanks for joining us for Wednesday’s Word with Trench Classes United.
Any of these requests sound familiar to you? None of us like trials and troubles, nor do we like to sit in the painful seasons of life, physical and/or emotional. In fact, suffering is contradicted in our society today. We want the microwave solution for any type of pain, don’t we?
And yet, there is something to be said for “longsuffering.”
The book of Job is probably the most popular example of suffering, on every human level possible, and there are others, Joseph, David, to name a couple, and yet perhaps the greatest example of suffering is found in Christ Himself.
While I don’t claim to be much like Him, I will suggest that I strive to be more like Him, which means I must embody His attributes. See, we as Christians who believe in our hearts that He is Christ (my rescuer and deliverer) and confess with our mouths that He is Lord (ruler over my life) then we must believe that we serve the One who  came to this earth in the form of man, endured trauma, temptation, bereavement, torture, hunger, thirst, persecution, and rejection. What more is there?
So if I suffer for doing wrong, what good is that? Every bad choice has a price. But to suffer for doing good…well, that’s where the true heart of longsuffering is. Merriam Webster’s Dictionary defines longsuffering as patiently enduring lasting offense or hardship.
How in the world…why in the world…What are you telling me, Lord? What do you want me to share in the midst of one of the most painful seasons of my life? Help me learn how to suffer long in a way that pleases You, brings You glory and changes me to be more like You.
Join me next week as I begin a series called When Faith Meets Suffering, a series about longsuffering, the why, the how and the joy that’s in it…I will be learning these ways as I go and share them with you as they come to me.
In the meantime, hold fast to Him whose plan is not to hurt you but to lift you up, to prosper you…
Love,
Kim-Evinda