We sat down and the praise group sang a few songs then the sermon and guess what, or I should say who, the sermon was based on? You guessed it Job. Probably the most tested and one of the people who suffered the most for God never wavering in his faith. The book of Job can almost make you not believe in a God who would allow things to happen like this but it can also help you to realize it isn't God who allows these things to happen, the suffering. We, the world, believe and blame God for the cause of all suffering and evil but why? All the bad that happens and the pastor listed off some really bad things in his sermon and then asked, "God has a reason for everything? REALLY? REALLY? He would want someones child to die? He would be happy in that? REALLY? I am sure you can add much of your own suffering here but try to ask yourself the question God would allow this? REALLY??
God desired a free response of love, so he created a world of suffering. Job 1:6 and Revelations 12:9
God could have created no suffering and no conflict but the devil and our own sinful nature changed that. Job 1:7 and Job 1:9-12. Before the problem of evil there was the problem of good. Job 1:11-12. Personally I wish the good could have stayed but it would have never worked. A perfect world. There is suffering in the world period. We cant run from it and much of it has no meaning at all. Job 2:1-8. I have a note I wrote next to this verse in my bible that says, God cannot be stirred up to do things against his will. Though it is not clear how everything that happens is part of his divine purpose. I know this is a struggle for many people, including myself, to know why things happen. I am a cut and dry person who believes there has to be an answer to everything. Truthfully when Rich tells me it will all make sense one day when we see Jesus I want to punch him in the face. My sinful side wants an answer now to all this unfairness, but when I step back and give it to God, listen to Rich, and stop trying to find all the answers it somehow gets easier to handle. The pain eases, the mind games ease, and I feel much more comfortable and free to enjoy the things I love to do. Faith can do that to a person if the person allows it to happen. There is no magic bullet. In the end the pastor read Romans 8:28 In all good things God works. Maybe not in our time but in his. We wait. We believe. We love him, ourselves, and others along the way.
Pastor said something I never thought about. We have to know and believe that God grieves more than we do over our pain and suffering. Ponder on that for a few minutes. Think of him as the Father. The Trinity as you do. You are his child so why wouldn't he suffer when we suffer. Wow that was a bam for me.
Love freely given must be freely reciprocated. God could have created no suffering, no conflict. The question I have with this is the point of suffering to bring us to him or if we already know him is it to bring us closer to him? Instead of blaming God I have learned to be okay with what I have been given. It isn't anyone's fault, it is life. It is in the cards so to speak. I use to be a person of the world trying to be what society told me I should be. Trying to be all to everyone, do everything, never say no, and then something changed. I became ill. It took a long time to become a person who lives in the world and doesn't allow the world to direct my life. I use to blame God and get mad. The human side likes to take over when we are suffering. I withdrew from most of the outside world because now I was different, still am. Looking back I think it was the anger and being mad that God would allow this even though I would never have admitted that back then. I asked why why why, all the time. Over the years I have learned to let it go and live in the moment knowing God loves me and there will be a reward for all this suffering. The pastor said this at the end of his sermon, the reward is in Jesus. I know! It is so much easier not fighting with the why's anymore. I feel like I have shed that person and put her on the shelf so to speak. I have become much happier in my own skin since I have accepted this life. A good one at that. I try not to think to much about not being able to be our in the world anymore and focus on other good parts of my life but I have written on this many times in my blog so I'll save you the repeat talk.
I know I have heard this sermon many times and each time I learn more. My bible is marked up with these verses and notes are written on the sides. I hear it over and over. I believe God led me to church yesterday because I needed to hear it again, for myself. I don't know about you and only you can answer that. I know there are people out there who do not believe, who am I to judge what I wrote here it is my true feeling and not up for argument. This is what gets me through my days, my faith. It may be something different for you and I respect that. I expect the same in my beliefs. We all need to do what is right for us and maybe just maybe the suffering and evil could ease up a little. Less arguing and disagreeing. Our world is in a mess right now no matter how you look at it. We can argue until hell freezes over but it is a fact. We are growing more and more apart instead of coming together as it should be. I don't understand it but in the end I do know one thing I will finally have my own peace and I hope you will too!
The pastor used a few of quotes yesterday from C.S. Lewis.
C.S. Lewis
“God created things which had free will. That means creatures which can go wrong or right. Some people think they can imagine a creature which was free but had no possibility of going wrong, but I can't. If a thing is free to be good it's also free to be bad. And free will is what has made evil possible. Why, then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. A world of automata -of creatures that worked like machines- would hardly be worth creating. The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water. And for that they've got to be free.
God Bless!
Dianne
God desired a free response of love, so he created a world of suffering. Job 1:6 and Revelations 12:9
God could have created no suffering and no conflict but the devil and our own sinful nature changed that. Job 1:7 and Job 1:9-12. Before the problem of evil there was the problem of good. Job 1:11-12. Personally I wish the good could have stayed but it would have never worked. A perfect world. There is suffering in the world period. We cant run from it and much of it has no meaning at all. Job 2:1-8. I have a note I wrote next to this verse in my bible that says, God cannot be stirred up to do things against his will. Though it is not clear how everything that happens is part of his divine purpose. I know this is a struggle for many people, including myself, to know why things happen. I am a cut and dry person who believes there has to be an answer to everything. Truthfully when Rich tells me it will all make sense one day when we see Jesus I want to punch him in the face. My sinful side wants an answer now to all this unfairness, but when I step back and give it to God, listen to Rich, and stop trying to find all the answers it somehow gets easier to handle. The pain eases, the mind games ease, and I feel much more comfortable and free to enjoy the things I love to do. Faith can do that to a person if the person allows it to happen. There is no magic bullet. In the end the pastor read Romans 8:28 In all good things God works. Maybe not in our time but in his. We wait. We believe. We love him, ourselves, and others along the way.
Pastor said something I never thought about. We have to know and believe that God grieves more than we do over our pain and suffering. Ponder on that for a few minutes. Think of him as the Father. The Trinity as you do. You are his child so why wouldn't he suffer when we suffer. Wow that was a bam for me.
Love freely given must be freely reciprocated. God could have created no suffering, no conflict. The question I have with this is the point of suffering to bring us to him or if we already know him is it to bring us closer to him? Instead of blaming God I have learned to be okay with what I have been given. It isn't anyone's fault, it is life. It is in the cards so to speak. I use to be a person of the world trying to be what society told me I should be. Trying to be all to everyone, do everything, never say no, and then something changed. I became ill. It took a long time to become a person who lives in the world and doesn't allow the world to direct my life. I use to blame God and get mad. The human side likes to take over when we are suffering. I withdrew from most of the outside world because now I was different, still am. Looking back I think it was the anger and being mad that God would allow this even though I would never have admitted that back then. I asked why why why, all the time. Over the years I have learned to let it go and live in the moment knowing God loves me and there will be a reward for all this suffering. The pastor said this at the end of his sermon, the reward is in Jesus. I know! It is so much easier not fighting with the why's anymore. I feel like I have shed that person and put her on the shelf so to speak. I have become much happier in my own skin since I have accepted this life. A good one at that. I try not to think to much about not being able to be our in the world anymore and focus on other good parts of my life but I have written on this many times in my blog so I'll save you the repeat talk.
I know I have heard this sermon many times and each time I learn more. My bible is marked up with these verses and notes are written on the sides. I hear it over and over. I believe God led me to church yesterday because I needed to hear it again, for myself. I don't know about you and only you can answer that. I know there are people out there who do not believe, who am I to judge what I wrote here it is my true feeling and not up for argument. This is what gets me through my days, my faith. It may be something different for you and I respect that. I expect the same in my beliefs. We all need to do what is right for us and maybe just maybe the suffering and evil could ease up a little. Less arguing and disagreeing. Our world is in a mess right now no matter how you look at it. We can argue until hell freezes over but it is a fact. We are growing more and more apart instead of coming together as it should be. I don't understand it but in the end I do know one thing I will finally have my own peace and I hope you will too!
The pastor used a few of quotes yesterday from C.S. Lewis.
C.S. Lewis“God created things which had free will. That means creatures which can go wrong or right. Some people think they can imagine a creature which was free but had no possibility of going wrong, but I can't. If a thing is free to be good it's also free to be bad. And free will is what has made evil possible. Why, then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. A world of automata -of creatures that worked like machines- would hardly be worth creating. The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water. And for that they've got to be free.
God Bless!
Dianne
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