April 14: Joy Through Tribulation.
Facing Trials Head-On.
Make me hear joy and gladness, that the bones You have broken may rejoice.--Psalm 51:8, NKJV
IT IS TRUE that God loves us, that He is working for our happiness, and that, if His law had always been obeyed, we should never have known suffering; and it is no less true that, in this world, as the result of sin, suffering, trouble, burdens, come to every life....
...This world is not a parade ground, but a battlefield. All are called to endure hardness, as good soldiers....
The true way of dealing with trial is not seeking to escape it, but by transforming it. This applies to all discipline, the earlier as well as the later. The neglect of the child's earliest training, and the consequent strengthening of wrong tendencies, makes his after education more difficult....Painful it must be to the lower nature, crossing, as it does, the natural desires and inclinations; but the pain may be lost sight of in a higher joy.--Education, 295.
Our sorrows do not spring out of the ground. God "doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men." Lamentations 3:33. When He permits trials and afflictions, it is "for our profit, that we might be partakers of His holiness." Hebrews 12:10. If received in faith, the trial that seems so bitter and hard to bear will prove a blessing. The cruel blow that blights the joys of earth will be the means of turning our eyes to heaven. How many there are who would never have known Jesus had not sorrow led them to seek comfort in Him!--Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing, 10.
O Lord, I will praise You;
Though You were angry with me,
Your anger is turned away, and You comfort me.
--Isaiah 12:1, NKJV
Facing Trials Head-On.
Make me hear joy and gladness, that the bones You have broken may rejoice.--Psalm 51:8, NKJV
IT IS TRUE that God loves us, that He is working for our happiness, and that, if His law had always been obeyed, we should never have known suffering; and it is no less true that, in this world, as the result of sin, suffering, trouble, burdens, come to every life....
...This world is not a parade ground, but a battlefield. All are called to endure hardness, as good soldiers....
The true way of dealing with trial is not seeking to escape it, but by transforming it. This applies to all discipline, the earlier as well as the later. The neglect of the child's earliest training, and the consequent strengthening of wrong tendencies, makes his after education more difficult....Painful it must be to the lower nature, crossing, as it does, the natural desires and inclinations; but the pain may be lost sight of in a higher joy.--Education, 295.
Our sorrows do not spring out of the ground. God "doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men." Lamentations 3:33. When He permits trials and afflictions, it is "for our profit, that we might be partakers of His holiness." Hebrews 12:10. If received in faith, the trial that seems so bitter and hard to bear will prove a blessing. The cruel blow that blights the joys of earth will be the means of turning our eyes to heaven. How many there are who would never have known Jesus had not sorrow led them to seek comfort in Him!--Thoughts From the Mount of Blessing, 10.
O Lord, I will praise You;
Though You were angry with me,
Your anger is turned away, and You comfort me.
--Isaiah 12:1, NKJV
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