Days of Affliction God’s dealings on a to-be-manifested sons in this wise is always viewed and addressed in various ways. Some call it afflictions, some say it is trial, some address it as persecution, testing, adversity, or suffering. Some confused Christians simply call it “an attack”. Irrespective of the terminology, they are all situations that faces God’s children, and allowed by God to bring out the glory of his purpose in the person’s life. Remember he is imperfect control.
There are days and seasons of affliction and suffering. “In the day of prosperity be joyful, but in the day of adversity consider” (Eccl.7:14.) For everything under the sun, there is a season, and for every purpose, there is a time. Days of afflictions are never perpetual. This understanding alone should set someone free and preserve him from cursing God as Job’s wife wrongfully counselled. Days of prosperity are unavoidably preceded by days of adversities. The advent of adversity is an announcement that the day of abundance is also here. The Friday of crucifixion is an indication that the Sunday of resurrection is close. Behind every dark cloud is the silver lining. The hardest draught is to announce that a torrent and downpour will soon emerge.
The life of a to-be-manifested son is always stringed with chains of alternate seasons of test and testimonies. Without controversy, these tests are different depending on the next level of promotion God’s son is due for. David became known by facing Goliath, he became the king by facing Saul, and he became established by facing Absalom. Of a truth, many are the afflictions of the righteous but the Lord delivers him from them all It should be noted at this point that the whole essence of God’s dealings on his children is to make them a vessels unto honour, perfectly meet for his purpose. As such a lesson that is not learnt during a season of affliction will automatically come back. Learn the lessons, gain the victory, advance the step of becoming conformed to His image, and don’t abscond.
Suffering, The Believers’ Cross
Don’t be scared at this point, I simply want to let you know you cannot avoid it as long as you have the elements I am about to discuss.
It is an absurdity for a Christian not to expect suffering in whatever forms, since we are living in a world that hated our master. Expecting the world to love us is like expecting water and oil to mix. The life of Christ in any believer alone is a key reason why he must be persecuted and tested to prove the quality of what he or she claims to have.
“Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution”( 2 Tim 3:12).
It is compulsory unless you are not born again and showing forth the life you carry. Job’s godliness was the main attraction for his suffering. As a matter of fact, God himself initiated it by asking the Devil to see Job his righteous servants. God could have kept quiet and spared Job all the trouble, but how could he have receive glory over Job’s life, and also give Job an opportunity for doubling up. Oh, the depth and riches of God’s wisdom!
Suffering is a tool in God’s hand to fulfill his eternal purpose in his children. It pleases God to afflict Jesus to buy us eternal redemption, so it pleases him to make us in the furnace of affliction. Especially in the church of today the rate of God disciplining his people is high because of deviation from the truth that came by Jesus Christ. Many Jonah’s have lost their businesses due to disobedience to God’s call, while many Naomi are in Moab lamenting the death of husbands and sons because they ran out of the land of promise, seeking glory where none is (Ruth 1: 12). How then does the church expect to deliver such men and women from the so called “spirit of affliction”, definitely not by “casting out” or “binding”, but by leading them to repentance and obedience. Obedience is the key to every deliverance.
Anyone eagerly looking for manifestation as a son of God should expect affliction and persecutions. The Holy Ghost told Paul that bond and affliction await him in every city. The son of God is he whom the world is not worthy of. However not as of today when ministers are made worthy of the world and given accolade by the same world that is expected to hate us. They hate us because of the truth of God in us. Affliction and persecution always arise because of the word. Jesus admonishes in Mark 4:17 that no man should take offence in him because of this, in other words, don’t get offended and deny him, you are told ahead of time.
It is clearly evident that to avoid suffering as a Christian is to completely deny the person of Christ and your own personality. Our wrong orientation to it will simply breed a group of people with a knack for glory but not wanting to suffer, and a knack for reigning but not wanting to serve, and as such become spiritual armed robbers.
The Purpose In The Mind Of The Father The intention in the heart of the father as to the reason he permitted a situation in our lives is different from one persons to another. So God’s agenda for using suffering as a tool in His hand is a secret in his heart. The purpose achieved by an affliction in a man’s life is always different from what the same affliction will achieve in another person’s life. It is the same father, but different children with varying manifestation of the divine. “ And thou shall remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness to humble thee and to prove thee to know what was in thine heart whether thou wouldest keep his commandment or not”( Deut. 8:2).
The way of the Lord most times to us is always hard and unpleasant. Most things God does for us, initially is always seen as detrimental. However, to those that are patient with God, his doings later become appreciated. God’s decision to take the children of Israel through 40 years journey instead of 40 days journey seems stupid, but his purpose superseded what men see. God saw a people not prepared for war and could become a victim, he also saw a people unprepared to handle the good of the land of Canaan less they squanders it. In order to prepare them he needed to take them through the long journey, gave them the law, fed them with manna to prove them and so on. More than often, our short way out of problems is our shortest way to destruction. God always takes his time; he is never in a hurry.
God’s ways of handling us more than often are not ways we expect, for examples; his seeming delay has a divine purpose. At times he takes us through disappointments and defeats to help us discover ourselves. Other times he simply play hide and seek with us, he seems far away just to draw us into deeper seeking of him. Whenever his demand of a great sacrifice comes to give that which we love most, he is teaching us to let go of all to him. Even when we lose our loved ones to death, his eternal purpose is still not thwarted. Some other times he rains on us torrent of temptations and trials all to determine our spiritual capability or to test a recent truth we have just received. So innumerable are his ways that we only need to resign our lives into his hands knowing that we are in perfect hands.
In principle, he afflict as it achieves the following: -
(1) To Humble Us: - The height of God’s plan for us can only be maintained by our depth of humility or conformity to the truth. If he doesn’t prepare us for it, we shall crash under the weight of glory that is to be revealed in us. (2) To Prove Us: - Stress and affliction reveals our strength and ability to endure. If he cannot trust us to endure and not blow it up, we are limited in his eternal purpose. (3) To Know Our Hearts Intention: - The motive of a man’s heart is revealed under affliction.
The motive for some men serving God is revealed when financial stress shows up , or loved one died. Like Job’s wife most men will rather curse God and die. Some also run away from God after receiving a little blessing from him. To avoid this destructive act, God mostly places his beloved under a “fatherly” stress became of his special love for them.
to be continued........
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