I think if we're really honest with ourselves we'll admit that we only think of the attributes of God in terms of the abstract. We affirm the reality & nature of their existence but don't really see how they touch the sphere of our ordinary lives. That is why our prayers are so often characterized by anxiety worry or grief. We strain our voices tighten our eyes and clutch our hands together in the earnest hope that we will actually be heard, that God is really listening to us and cares about our needs. We believe that if we pray a certain way with a certain sincerity he will answer our prayers and if we don't then he simply will not. For while we believe that God is who he says he is in scripture and even sing songs in church in accordance with that belief, too often our lives fall short in practice of the reality we have professed. That's because it is so much easier to profess a thing than it is to actually live it out in practice.
While it would be so much easier if we could all just instantaneously understand and accept the plan and purposes of God in our current fallen state, that is not how we work as human beings. In order to really understand something & accept it we have to also experience something in relation to it in the sphere of our ordinary lives. That is not to say that our subjective experiences should be the sole validation of reality or can substitute for the instruction of Gods revelation in scripture, only that the Creator of the universe has given us certain human faculties which He has chosen in His wisdom to work in and through for our benefit and the benefit of others. And I think I am just now beginning to understanding that.
I think I am beginning to understand that God uses our individual trials & suffering to affirm to us in daily experience what He has revealed to us about Himself in Scripture through the revelation of His Son. I think I'm beginning to see that these unthinkable difficulties exist to ground our hearts & minds in the reality that God is exactly who He says He is in His word, that Christ did not speak or work in vain, that He is in fact the Son of God in power, that the Apostles were in fact led by the Spirit of God, that the salvation we now experience today in the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the continuing work of God in redemption for everyone who believes, and all of this in spite of what I perceive.
I think I am beginning to understand that God uses our individual trials & suffering to affirm to us in daily experience what He has revealed to us about Himself in Scripture through the revelation of His Son. I think I'm beginning to see that these unthinkable difficulties exist to ground our hearts & minds in the reality that God is exactly who He says He is in His word, that Christ did not speak or work in vain, that He is in fact the Son of God in power, that the Apostles were in fact led by the Spirit of God, that the salvation we now experience today in the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the continuing work of God in redemption for everyone who believes, and all of this in spite of what I perceive.
I think I am beginning to understand perhaps for the first time in my life, that these individual trials like the one that has so unexpectedly beset my family of late, which is daily taking the life of the woman I love before my very eyes, is in fact so much more than just the natural consequences of the fall (although it is certainly that too). It is much more than just the natural deterioration of my wife's body or the natural effects of entropy over time. It is much more than anything I could ever think or imagine. It is in spite of all other appearances a divine confrontation between my wife, myself our family and our friends and the One who made us and subjected us to the weakness of this planet for his own transcendent purposes. It is a divine opportunity to grow in our perception of and dependence on the goodness wisdom & mercy of our God, an opportunity to mature in the way we worship Him & trust His leading, not to mention the way we treat other people.
And while I know that this recent revelation will not necessarily ease the pain or suffering of watching my precious wife deteriorate in her health or make the trial go away altogether, I know that it is the reality none the less and a beautiful one at that. For above all else this trial and with it the revelation of its special purpose carries with it the divine opportunity to fellowship with the Son of God in His own earthly suffering and glory here on earth, to deepen my perception of reality and the One who created it. And that in and of itself is a glorious thing. For as there is no suffering in eternity either in heaven or in the newly restored future planet earth this is the only place that we may worship and fellowship in it. This is the only place we may deepen through it. That is why I have chosen to share it with you my dear friend whoever you are that would read this, so that you too might benefit from it and so prosper and deepen in your own trials and difficulties as faithful patient pilgrims.
