The thought of my affliction and my homelessness is wormwood and gall! My soul continually thinks of it and is bowed down within me. But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of hte LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end;
There are so many times when life hands us pain and sorrow, affliction and grief. At these times it may be hard to understand what good our faith does for us. After all, believing in Jesus Christ doesn't take away the humiliation, the rejection, the disease (dis-ease), or the injuries that are so much a part of living in this world. This is why we cry out, just as the writer of Lamentations does; we cry out in our pain.
But believing in Jesus--which means knowing Jesus, having a relationship with Jesus, and acting out of this relationship with Jesus---does offer us a buoy in the middle of our storms. Because knowing and being known by Jesus means we are connected to others---others who will serve as our lighthouse and life preservers when the water gets too high. Because in God's realm, it is all about community.
In community, we work together to support our faith with "goodness, and goodness with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with endurance, and endurance with godliness, and godliness with mutual affection, and mutual affection with love." (2 Peter 1:6-7)
Being a Christian doesn't mean there is no suffering. Jesus suffered. Accepting God as our Master, declaring Jesus as our Lord and Savior, means there is redemption and restoration from the suffering. There is Resurrection. Praise be to God!
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