Dear Christian, if you’re suffering, facing affliction, or if your cross has recently been very hard to bear, don’t take it as a sign that God is angry with you, has stopped loving you, or has forgotten about you. By God’s grace, our suffering is productive (Rom 5:3-4). Our feelings are not a reliable guide in the Christian life; God’s gracious promises are. “Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust him for his grace!”
Sometimes life for the Christian is just plain hard. We’re not exempt from the effects of Adam’s sin, so we face debilitating illnesses, allergies that nearly cripple us, mental anguish that makes for dark days, and other people often are like thorns in our flesh. Sometimes we still wander and stumble into sin. Following Jesus doesn’t mean life will be painless and easy! I know a contemporary version of the hymn My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less says “When darkness seems to hide His face;” however, I think the original is more accurate: “When darkness veils His lovely face.” It reminds me of Cowper’s great hymn, God Moves in a Mysterious Way, which says,
“Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.”
This also makes me think of the criminal on the cross, who truly repented and made the good confession. He was loved by Christ, promised heaven, but his pain and torture didn’t immediately end. He still suffered terribly as a convicted criminal. Calvin comments well on this:
What is promised to the robber does not alleviate his present sufferings, nor make any abatement of his bodily punishment. This reminds us that we ought not to judge of the grace of God by the perception of the flesh; for it will often happen that those to whom God is reconciled are permitted by him to be severely afflicted. So then, if we are dreadfully tormented in body, we ought to be on our guard lest the severity of pain hinder us from tasting the goodness of God; but, on the contrary, all our afflictions ought to be mitigated and soothed by this single consolation, that as soon as God has received us into his favor, all the afflictions which we endure are aids to our salvation. This will cause our faith not only to rise victorious over all our distresses, but to enjoy calm repose amidst the endurance of sufferings. (John Calvin and William Pringle, Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists Matthew, Mark, and Luke, vol. 3 (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2010), 314.)
Dear Christian, if you’re suffering, facing affliction, or if your cross has recently been very hard to bear, don’t take it as a sign that God is angry with you, has stopped loving you, or has forgotten about you. By God’s grace, our suffering is productive (Rom 5:3-4). Our feelings are not a reliable guide in the Christian life; God’s gracious promises are. “Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust him for his grace!”
Rev. Shane Lems is a minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and serves as pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Hammond, Wis. This article appeared on his blog and is used with permission.
