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When Fire Makes Things Grow
Trivia time! What natural disaster is the most destructive to a forest? Chances are that the first thing that comes to mind is a forest fire. After all, fire is pure destruction to plants. What possib... -
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We should neither court suffering nor complain about it. Instead, we should see it as one of the means God chooses to employ in order to make us increasingly useful to our Master. -
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All sorrows can be borne if you put them into a story. -
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Faith does not grow in spite of suffering, but through suffering, when hope learns to contradict reality. -
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Suffering is Walking in Jesus' Path
Amy Carmichael was a passionate missionary to India. She gave her life for the sake of those who had suffered the consequences of an unyielding caste system. She also had her suffering, due to physica... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide, Revelation 1:4-8
Ancient Lens What can we learn from the historical context? A Letter to Real People In the understanding of, and preaching on, any section of the Revelation of John , it is critical to know that t... -
series
Psalm 22 | Feeling Forsaken by God
Ancient lens What’s the historical context? A Structured Complaint The Psalmist organizes his complaint against God in three sections. The first two sections dramatize the complaint (vv. 1-11 and... -
lectionary
Second Sunday of Easter, Revelation 1:4-8
Preaching Commentary Ancient Lens What can we learn from the historical context? A Letter to Real People In the understanding of, and preaching on, any section of the Revelation of John , it is ... -
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God uses chronic pain and weakness, along with other afflictions, as his chisel for sculpting our lives. -
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I am certain that I never did grow in grace one half so much anywhere as I have upon the bed of pain,” -
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So pain endures for a time. Its role is to purge us, to make us to know ourselves, and it drives us to the Lord to plead for mercy. -
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Turning off the Warning System
In his book “Where Is God When It Hurts?”, author Philip Yancey shares an unfortunate, yet central dynamic related to how Americans respond to pain: we do everything possible to avoid it. That means p... -
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The Shape of Your Pain
What is the shape of your pain? Is your pain a gaping wound? Is it stuffed into the back corner of a closet, or is it neatly categorized and filed away with annotations that no one but you understand?... -
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Two Kind of Books on Pain
Books on the problem of pain divide neatly into two groupings. The older ones, by people like Aquinas, Bunyan, Donne, Luther, Calvin, and Augustine, ungrudgingly accept pain and suffering as God’s use... -
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Suffering is a dreadful teacher but often the beginning of the best in us. Suffering and creativity arc often interdependent. Pain produces a terrible tension released in our creative response. Suffer... -
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An essential part of the teachings and directives of the great religious and philosophical thinkers the world over has been on the meaning of pain and suffering. -
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If you do not transform your pain, you will surely transmit it. -
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Until leaders have suffered, and have learned to steward their pain, they don’t really have much to offer. -
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Healing From the Inside Out
The bad news was that a friend’s leg was severed in a gruesome automobile accident. The good news was that it was surgically reattached. A few months later she asked if I wanted to see her scar. I swa... -
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A Christian Approach to Suffering
In the summer of 2012, I knelt over the frail shell of a child, my son, strapped to all manner of medical monitoring equipment. His body failing, his frame thinning, the medical staff at Arkansas Chil... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide, Hebrews 2:10-18
Will the Real Jesus, Please Stand Up? Quite a few years have passed since I sat through a systematic theology class and had the professor pitch a variety of difficult to hit balls at us regarding the... -
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Suffering & the Primary Objective
In the United States and most other highly developed and industrialized nations that have been exporters of Christ’s gospel, it is generally accepted that the avoidance of suffering is a respected pri... -
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Agony into Glory
They say of some temporal suffering, “No future bliss can make up for it,” not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. -
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Living with Pain in a World Governed by Technique
Living in a society governed by technique conditions us to believe that in every way life is easier than it ever has been. Technique is the use of rational methods to maximize efficiency, and we... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide, Psalm 22 (Guide B)
Ancient lens What’s the historical context? A Structured Complaint The Psalmist organizes his complaint against God in three sections. The first two sections dramatize the complaint (vv. 1-11 and... -
scripture guide
Scripture Guide, 1 Peter 4:12-14, 5:6-11
IDENTITY AND SUFFERING The key to understanding today’s readings lies in the first half of 1 Peter. Two themes dominate Peter’s encouragement to these early Christians: identity and suffering. Knowi... -
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Drawing From the Infinite Well of Joy
In Jonathan Kozol’s book, Amazing Grace , he tells of the struggles and sufferings of people in a community in the Bronx, New York. He is amazed at the courage and resilience he found there. He then ... -
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I wept when I was borne, and every day shewes why. -
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[Every culture has provided an] explanation of human events that bestows meaning upon the experiences of suffering and evil. -
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We were promised sufferings. They were part of the program. We were even told, 'Blessed are they that mourn,' and I accept it. I've got nothing that I hadn't bargained for. Of course i...
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