Using Suffering

I talked with a pastor friend today and he is discouraged. I told him I understand, I was a pastor for 39 years. Mondays were not always good days for me. Sheep are not always faithful, and at times they act like goats. What I learned from the disappointments of life is that in all of them there is opportunity to draw closer to Jesus our Lord. He too had some down moments and that is why “He is touched with the feelings of our infirmities.” For example, when we feel the sting of the rejection of friends, we are feeling what He felt as He stumbled down the street with a cross on His back. Suffering serves us when it helps us draw near to our Lord. Knowing about Jesus and knowing Him are two different things. Don’t let your sorrows go to waste and rejoice that you have not been nailed to a cross. Jfs

Heb 2:9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.

Nothing is true because I say it is, and nothing is untrue because I say it is. We don't make truth, we only embrace it. Jesus said, "I am the way the truth and the life." It is the most important truth we will ever encounter. "Who was Jesus" deserves a personal inquiry. He is the truth who can change our lives. Truth in the person of Jesus Christ is our hope. jfs

Joh 14:3 "And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.
4 "And where I go you know, and the way you know."
5 Thomas said to Him, "Lord, we do not know where You are going, and how can we know the way?"
6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
(NKJV)

God is the answer!

To You, O LORD, I lift up my soul. O my God, I trust in You; Let me not be ashamed; Let not my enemies triumph over me. Indeed, let no one who waits on You be ashamed; Let those be ashamed who deal treacherously without cause. Show me Your ways, O LORD; Teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your truth and teach me, For You are the God of my salvation; On You I wait all the day. Psa. 25:1-5