God’s purpose and suffering

Does God allow everything that happens in your life? And, if so, does He really have a purpose behind each event, something unique which, perhaps, you cannot see, yet conforms to His plan? This appeals to us. Who doesn’t want to prosper and to sustain no harm? But in promises such as these, we often see what we want to envision, not focusing on how God brings all of this about. We get laid off when we think we will be with that company until retirement. Our plans are put on hold when the doctor says, “I think you should know that you are faced with an uphill battle with cancer.”

Then your heart cries out, “Hey, God, I thought You said everything would be great if I just followed Your Son!”

While we live in an evil world, evil does not triumph because it is greater than God, so God uses the abrasive events and people that annoy us to soften us and cause us to become more compassionate and become more like Jesus Christ.

When difficulties come, it isn’t a reflection of God’s weakness, His inability to control your life, or His disinterest. He’s there in times of suffering, in times of pain, in times of grief.

A. W. Tozer said, “To will the will of God is to do more than give unprotesting consent to it; it is rather to choose God’s will with positive determination. As the work of God advances, the Christian finds himself free to choose whatever he will and he gladly chooses the will of God as his highest conceivable good.”

God’s purpose for your life also includes times of walking by faith because faith is living and acting in the belief that God is good and He will honor His word no matter how you feel.

Used with permission from Guidelines International Ministries. To learn more about Guidelines and the ministry, send an e-mail to [email protected]. You may also visit www.guidelines.org.