He Giveth More Grace / Annie J. Flint
He giveth more grace when the burdens grow greater,
He sendeth more strength when the labors increase;
To added affliction He addeth His mercy,
To multiplied trials, His multiplied peace.
When we have exhausted our store of endurance,
When our strength has failed ere the day is half done,
When we reach the end of our hoarded resources
Our Father’s full giving is only begun.
His love has no limit, His grace has no measure,
His power has no boundary known unto men;
For out of His infinite riches in Jesus
He giveth, and giveth, and giveth again.
I read 2 Corinthians 1:1-11 for my quiet time with the Lord this morning:
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
To the church of God in Corinth, together with all the saints throughout Achaia:
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The God of All Comfort
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.
We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us, as you help us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many.
My Understanding: In this life we will face many hardships, testings of our faith, trials, tribulations, temptations, sadness, difficulties, and relationship problems, etc. The book of James, in the New Testament of the Holy Bible, chapter 1, states that we should consider it all joy whenever we face trials of many kinds, because the testing of our faith develops perseverance. “Perseverance must finish its work” in us so that we may “be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” The book of Romans, chapter 5, states something similar when it says that we should rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that “suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.” And, in the book of 1 Peter, chapter 1, we learn this principle: “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.”
So, based on these passages, when we face difficulties in this life, we should remember to:
• Rejoice! Consider the difficulties all joy; greatly rejoice!
• Understand the purpose of our trials – to develop within us godly character
• Persevere in the trial and allow God to do his work of transformation in our hearts
Then, in 2 Corinthians 1, we learn even more of why we face difficulties and trials and how we are to respond to these times of testing in our lives. The first thing we learn is that God the Father is the God of all compassion and comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles. So, when we are going through hardships of any kind, first of all we should turn to our Lord and allow him to bring comfort to our hearts. Yet, we must understand that, at times, his comfort may bring with it some difficult words for us to hear or even extended difficulties, because he knows what we really need. Just like a shepherd uses a rod and a staff with his sheep to protect, to prod straying sheep, to encourage the sheep back into the fold, to correct and to guide them (see Psalm 23), Jesus is our shepherd who will also use a rod and a staff to comfort us, though we may not recognize it as his comfort at the time he inflicts the pain upon us. Yet, this is often the way in which he chooses to bring comfort. Yet, he also carries us, takes us in his arms, and he gives us many, many words and messages of affection, love, care and concern for us, too, for which I am most thankful.
Another reason we go through hardships and difficulties in this life, is so that we can be compassionate with those going through similar sufferings and we can bring to them much needed words of comfort, as God has often comforted us in our times of need. God comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort those in trouble with the comfort we ourselves received from God. If this is true in all respects of how Jesus, as our Good Shepherd, comforts us with his rod and his staff, then we must realize that the way in which we are to comfort others is not always with a hug or a pat on the back, but the ways in which we are to comfort others are the same ways in which God comforts us, his sheep, and that sometimes that might involve a prodding, a strong encouragement, and/or a word of correction, though hopefully the Lord presents us with many opportunities to give hugs and words that bring the kind of comfort that we normally think of when we use that term, too.
Lastly, we learn that the reason we go through such times of suffering is that we are sharing in the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings, becoming like him in his death (see Philippians 3:10). Paul said that all their sufferings were not only so that they could be compassionate and could comfort others with the comfort they received from God, but that they might not rely on themselves but on God. When things are going well in our lives, it is easy to become complacent about our relationship with the Lord, to become self-sufficient, and to become lazy about our spiritual walk and witness for the Lord. So, sometimes God allows us to go through difficult circumstances in our lives to humble us, to remind us of who God is and what he did for us in dying on the cross for our sins, and to get us to place our dependency in him for all things in our lives instead of relying upon our own resources. Yet, in all this suffering, God is with those who are his, and he will deliver us, not necessarily from the circumstances themselves, but he will provide a way out from under the weight of the suffering when we place our complete trust in him.
In Summary
We will face difficulties in this life. That is a given! We should consider it all joy, and we should rejoice when we go through various trials. We should search out the scriptures to learn God’s purposes always in the adverse situations in our lives, and we should yield to God’s divine will for our lives and should be willing to have him teach us what he wants us to learn through the troubles we face. We ought to persevere and not give up on our faith or yield to the circumstances themselves, but we ought to find out what the Lord’s will is for us in our struggles, and then we ought to allow God to change us and to transform our hearts through what we are experiencing. We should accept God’s comfort, which frequently will bring with it his rod and his staff to strongly encourage us, to prod us back into the fold, to correct wrong thinking or behavior, and to lead and guide us in the way he wants us to go. And, then, when we have gone through the circumstances, we have accepted God’s rod and staff to comfort us through them, and we have learned what we needed to learn, we can then comfort others in the same way God comforted us in all our troubles.
The following is a song the Lord gave me last month. It is a prayer to him that I prayed back to him when I was going through a difficult trial, which was testing my faith. As soon as I sat down to write out my understanding of this passage of scripture, the Lord placed this song in my mind and heart again. I pray he will use this song to encourage your hearts with the same comfort I received from him through it when I was struggling to know and to understand his will, and to know best how to obey his will for my life in a given situation.
When in The Stillness / An Original Work / September 26, 2011
When in the stillness
Of this moment,
Speak to me, Lord,
I humbly pray.
Be my desire,
Set me on fire,
Teach me to love always.
Help me to walk in
Fellowship with You,
Listening to You;
Sit at Your feet.
Whisper Your words to me,
Oh, how gently,
Guiding me in Your truth.
While we are waiting
For Your blessing,
Lord, in our hearts
Be King today.
Help us to live for
You ev’ry moment,
List’ning to what You say.
May we not stray from
Your word within us,
Help us obey You,
Lord, in all things,
Walking each moment,
Lord, in Your presence,
Our off’rings to You bring.
Help us to love You,
Lord, our master;
Be an example
Of Your love,
Helping the hurting,
Lift up the fallen,
Showing them Your great love.
Teach them to love You,
Follow You always,
Bearing their cross and
Turning from sin;
Walking in daily
Fellowship with You,
Making You Lord and King.
Song lyrics @ Public Domain
Audio, song lyrics and sheet music at:
https://sites.google.com/site/psalmshymnssongs2/home/songs/when-in-the-stillness
Song on video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKHKzBTMigw
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