Rejoice In The Suffering, take two.

 I wrote this back in March, published it to my blogger site in April, and nearly forgot about it since.  I was in the middle of my own “sufferings” and was watching quite a bit of it around me.  I had no clue that the “sufferings” were nowhere near done coming.  To be totally honest, since writing this, I haven’t been very good at the “rejoice” part of the command in the title.

There’s quite a few things recently that have brought me back to this post.  Too much to type right now, maybe some other time in another blog post.  For now, hopefully this will serve as the beginning of me getting back into writing.

The following is a reformatted, and somewhat edited, version of a previous post of mine so that it can hopefully be read easier from a mobile device.  I figure it fits perfectly with the atmosphere around Thanksgiving 2020.

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Romans 5:1-5

“1 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,

 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,

5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” 

Vs 1 - “...we have peace with God...“ 

Based off of a footnote at the bottom of my bible, some manuscripts say “let us” instead of “we”.  This tells me that it is a choice and this peace with God is not necessarily something that just naturally happens.  I know there are times I don’t naturally have peace with God.

Vs 2 - “...we rejoice in the hope of the Glory of God.”

Another footnote at the bottom of the page in my bible says some manuscripts say “let us boast...”.  This is another choice, this time to boast!  Boast can be described as: an act of talking with excessive pride and satisfaction.  So if we combine these two realizations, we come to the conclusion that we are called to choose to talk with excessive pride and satisfaction in the hope of the Glory of God!

Vs 3 - “Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings...”

Not only should we choose peace with God.  Not only do we receive His grace through faith.  Not only should we choose to boast in the hope of the Glory of God, but we should choose to rejoice in our sufferings.  Paul, the writer of this passage, knew all about sufferings.  Before his conversion, he was handing out sufferings left and right to Christians.  Acts 8:1-4 speaks of the persecutions that Saul handed out.  After conversion, Saul became Paul.  The sufferings he then experienced as a christian are laid out in 2 Corinthians 11:23-28. The dude knew sufferings.  And he calls us to rejoice in them.

I have too many happening around me right now to even list.  I lived through too many in 2020 to even list.  Co-workers, family members, church family... This year has proven to be a very, VERY challenging one for a lot of people.

But here’s what I love.  Nearly every time a struggle is mentioned in the Bible, there’s a promise that God will work all things to the good of those that love Him and are called according to His purpose!  The suffering is not the end of the story.  

I heard something recently that I believe is important to mention here.  We have no promise that this life will be easy.  We have no promise for good health, for abundant wealth, or for worldly reasons for happiness.  But we are promised one thing:

Belief in Jesus Christ means a hope in our eternal future.  This is the only promise that I have found.  Our joy should be in Him and in our eternal future.  Suffering, even to the point of death, is not the end of the story.

But how do we know that suffering isn’t the end of the story?

... back to Romans 5 ... 

Vs 3-4 - Suffering -> endurance -> character -> hope

• Endurance - Finishing a race strong.  Not giving up til the end.  Even when everything hurts and all you feel like doing is giving up, muscle memory kicks in and you finish your race no matter how hard.
• Character - The mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual.  When we have endurance through a hard time, we become mentally stronger.  We see that we can do this.  That God can do this.  God can use us for this!  Whatever your “this” is, it is absolutely NOT unattainable.  This stronger mental state and attitude towards your calling will likely bring a higher confidence in yourself and in God for whatever He has you working on.  It most certainly has for me!
• Hope - This is calling back to verse 2.  The hope of the Glory of God.  I have to believe this hope is referring to our hope we receive when we accept Christ.  The hope of an eternal life with God instead of hell.  The hope of being accepted by the Almighty as a new creation, thanks to Jesus.  The best hope anyone could ask for.

Vs 5 - “...and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”

Verse 5 rounds it off so beautifully.  This hope does not put us to shame.  Whatever you’re shameful of, whatever failures you’re holding on to, whatever failures you’re afraid you’ll have; give them to God.  Because this hope does not put us to shame.

John 16:33

“I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace.  In the world you will have tribulation.  But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

The suffering is not the end of the story. 

 

Spend Time With The Word

I have one key point I want to get across.

GET. IN. THE. WORD.

In my life, I see an obvious drastic difference in the days that I start my day with reading the Bible vs the days that I get out of bed too late and have to hurry off to work.  Starting the day with the Word is so important!  And I’m horrible at it.  If anything, this blog post in particular is just me getting my thoughts out as a reminder for myself later.  In fact, I think I’ve used all of these blogs in that way at one point or another.  Kind of like a devotion that I’m writing for myself, all the reminders that I know I need help with, and encouraging everyone online to read along.  haha!

Hebrews 4 words it so perfectly.  Starting in verse 12: 

For the word of God is living and active,...

I have two thoughts on this.  First of all, so many people see the Bible as a history book instead of a handbook.  That is WRONG! It is living and active!  And this verse goes on to explain how awesome it is, but before we go there, I want to pose an idea.

John 1:1-5

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.  All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

So here’s my thought.  We talk about the Bible as the Word of God.  John 1 is clearly talking about Jesus as the Word of God.  What if - and this may seem crazy - we should quit trying to compartmentalize God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and the Bible as different things.  What if we accepted that God is bigger than our brains could imagine?  What if the Word is Jesus and us spending time in the Word is spending time with Jesus?  This thing is so much more than ink printed on a page!!

To be clear, I am NOT saying Jesus wasn’t fully man and fully God.  I believe everything written in my Bible happened.  But I believe when we read our Bibles, something extremely challenging to wrap our minds around happens.  Our inner spirit is spending time with the Holy Spirit.  If the Word is Jesus and Jesus is the Word then when I’m spending time in the Word (Bible) I’m spending time with the Word (Jesus)!

These kinds of things are easier to talk about in person.  I’d really like to know if that made sense to you (the reader) or if I’m just rambling something crazy and you’re already tuned out and about to close this webpage.

Either way, I’ll continue in Hebrews 4

(12) For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.  And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

I don’t know about y’all, but that doesn’t sound to me like it’s merely describing a book in which we get history lessons about something that happened in the past. THE WORD OF GOD IS ALIVE AND ACTIVE! This is describing Jesus.  It has to be.  There’s so much good stuff worth diving into in that passage, but I have to move on in order to get the point across without turning this blogpost into a whole book.  Now verse 14 on through the rest of the chapter...

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.  For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

Here it comes.  The final verse with my main point I want to highlight today, verse 16.

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Y’all ready?  Don’t miss this.

Get in the Word BEFORE you need it.  Not during.  Not after.  Draw near NOW so that when a time of need comes, you already are receiving mercy and grace to help you through!

In relationships with people, time spent with that person, so long as they are a decent person, begins to build trust in that person.  The more time you spend with someone, the more you know about them, the more you trust them.

How much more is that true about spending time with Jesus!  Spending time reading the Bible is spending time with Jesus! And if you trust Him BEFORE a hardship comes, how much easier would that challenging season of life be! Don’t wait until you’re in the storm to learn to trust Jesus.  Do it now.  Build that faith now, so when the hardship comes and everything feels like it’s failing, you already have a firm belief that no matter what, you serve a great high priest!

Rejoice In The Suffering

I actually wrote this about a month and a half ago for a small group session I was leading at church.  This message had been on my heart for months before, and when I was invited to lead the prayer time for the worship team, AV team, pastor, and church leaders before first service one Sunday, I knew this was the message.  And I knew I didn’t want to lead it.

“Rejoicing in the suffering” is something I’ve had to learn a lot about first hand, lately.  As someone who hates crying in general, let alone in front of people, I REALLY didn’t want this to be the topic.  But I wasn’t given a specific topic by the scheduler, and this was exactly what I knew the Lord wanted me to share.

Who knew it would apply so heavily a couple months later to many more people than just myself.

So I can be lazy and not rework the whole thing, I’m going to leave it mostly in note form.  I’m sure the same message will get across, haha!
(If it begins to look weird on your phone, turn your phone sideways.)

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March 8, 2020 Sunday morning pre service study:

Romans 5:1-5

“1 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,

4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,

5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”

‭‭Romans‬ ‭5:1-5‬ ‭ESV‬‬

• Vs 1 - “...we have peace with God...” 
• Based off of a footnote at the bottom of my Bible, some manuscripts say “let us” instead of “we”.  This tells me that it is a choice and this peace with God is not necessarily something that just naturally happens.  I know there are times I don’t naturally have peace with God.
• Vs 2 - “...we rejoice in the hope of the Glory of God.” 
• Another footnote at the bottom of the page in my Bible says that some manuscripts say “let us boast...”. This is another choice, this time to boast!
• Boast can be described as: an act of talking with excessive pride and satisfaction.
• We are called to choose to talk with excessive pride and satisfaction in the hope of the Glory of God!
• Vs 3 - “Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings,...”
• Not only should we choose peace with God, not only do we receive His grace through faith, not only should we choose to boast in the hope of the Glory of God, but we should choose to rejoice in our sufferings.
• Paul knew all about sufferings.  Before his conversion, he was handing out “sufferings” left and right to Christians.
• Acts 8:1-4 “And Saul approved of his execution. And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison. Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word.”
• Vs 1 - this execution Saul approved of was Steven, a Christian deacon in Jerusalem and the first Christian martyr.  That’s big.
• Vs 2-3 - major persecution!
• Vs 4 - Sneak peak at where I’m headed...  these people had been dragged from their homes and churches and scattered throughout.  Imagine the absolute fear and chaos that was experienced while being dragged; either from your home or place of worship, not knowing what the future held, or even where you were going.  And yet they used this unwanted scattering as a chance to share the Good News.  I think the kids these days would say “that’s heat”.
• Upon conversion, Paul then experienced many sufferings of his own.
• 2 Corinthians 11:23-28 “Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.”
• This dude knew sufferings, through and through!  And he says we should rejoice in them.
• There are a few examples of sufferings currently active around me.
• A recent young widow, who shows up to church and praises every Sunday.  Really, truly praises.
• My dad - burying two siblings on the same day, and through tears and an incredibly shaky voice still inviting people to Christ.
• My wife’s deployment and the multiple levels of struggles that that brings.
• Leading youth worship without the main singer had been a STRUGGLE before a couple amazing singers and worship leaders stepped in and started helping me.
• But here’s what I love.  Nearly every time a struggle is mentioned in the Bible, there’s a promise that God will work all things to the good of those that love Him and are called according to his purpose! 
• The suffering is not the end of the story.
• The suffering is not the end of the story.
• The suffering is not the end of the story.

But how do we know that suffering isn’t the end of the story?

- Back to Romans 5 -

• Vs 3-4 - Suffering -> endurance -> character -> hope
• Endurance - Finishing a race strong.  Not giving up til the very end.  Even when everything hurts and all you feel like doing is giving up, muscle memory kicks in and you finish your race no matter how hard.
• Character - The mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual.
• When we have endurance through a hard time, we become mentally stronger.  We see that we can do this.  That God can do this.  God can use us for this!  Whatever your “this” is, it is absolutely NOT unattainable.  This stronger mental state and attitude towards your calling will likely bring a higher confidence in yourself and in God for whatever He has you working on.  It most certainly has for me!
• Hope - This is calling back to verse 2.  The hope of the Glory of God.  I have to believe this hope is referring to our hope we receive when we accept Christ.  The hope of an eternal life with God instead of in hell.  The hope of being accepted by the Almighty as a new creation, thanks to Jesus.  The best hope anyone could ask for.
• Vs 5 - rounds it off so beautifully.  This hope does not put us to shame.  Whatever you’re shameful of, whatever failures you’re holding on to, whatever failures you’re afraid you’ll have; give them to God.  Because this hope does not put us to shame.

John 16:33 “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world."

The suffering is not the end of the story.

Nothing Like I’d Planned

Music has always just been a hobby of mine, and not really much more. I have always loved music. I would break out the guitars at a party, or around a campfire, or if I was bored and nothing good was on TV. But with it only being a pastime, and my last few years being insanely busy, guitar is not something I had been picking up much. Until February of 2019.

In February of last year, me and my beautiful wife took over leading worship for the youth. Originally, the deal I made was that I would play acoustic guitar if she sang. I didn’t believe I was a singer. Sometimes I still don’t. But God has bigger plans and a bigger purpose for me than I could ever dream. Now my usual Wednesday’s involve playing bass and leading at least one worship song vocally. And I love it!

~

I met Chloe in September of 2017. I had been traveling a lot for work, and had sworn off relationships. They were never successful, always ended in heartbreak, and seemed like a waste of time. I wanted a wife, but I was done trying to find one. I had plans to just keep working and keep being single, until September of 2017.

As soon as we started hanging out, she was all I could think about. We always have so much fun together! I had found a super cool chick that I was super attracted to. Half a year after asking Chloe out, I was asking her to marry me. Another 8 months and we were at the altar together. To this day (1 year 3 months and 6 days later) I’m still head over heals in love with that girl.

~

I graduated high school in 2013.  In high school, the shop was my favorite place to be. I never took shop class, but the engineering class got to spend quite a bit of time in the shop. My senior year, I took two engineering classes and was the engineering TA (teacher’s pet... I mean assistant). If I wasn’t in the gym I was in the shop. I had all these great plans to be an engineer, since I thought engineering class was what I loved so much. Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy engineering. But I liked the shop better. I just didn’t know that until the summer of 2015.

Summer of 2015 I had an engineering internship. Getting to see how things were designed and engineered was really awesome! I enjoyed the work, just hated feeling trapped at a desk. When I found myself jealous of the maintenance guy, I knew I was in the wrong profession. I had worked construction through summer and winter breaks, and decided it was time to pursue that on a more full time scale. 

~

Five years ago I woulda told you my future was going to be engineering somewhere way far away from Maury county. Three years ago I woulda told you I was just going to stay single for a good long while, and probably keep traveling for work. A year and a few months ago I would have NEVER guessed that I would soon be leading worship for youth every Wednesday night.

All three of these areas of my life are great big long stories, but for the sake of keeping this blog shortish (I’ve already failed at that. Ha!), I’ll just say this: life is not at all what I would’ve expected. I never would’ve thought I would be playing bass and singing in front of people. I never would’ve thought I would be living - and working construction - in Columbia. And I NEVER would’ve thought I would be home while my wife was deployed in the military. 

Proverbs 19:21 “Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand.”

My plans didn’t work out at all. But my life is so much better now than I could have ever imagined!!! Leading worship has been such a fun and fulfilling way to do ministry! I love working construction. Staying active and getting my hands dirty really is fun for me. And I absolutely LOVE my wife! This long distance thing we’ve been forced into is only temporary. I wouldn’t trade her for the world. 

Jeremiah 29:11 “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.”

Things may not work out how you had anticipated or hoped. Dropping out of college and moving back in with my parents felt like a HUGE failure in the moment. But looking back, it was all just part of my story to get me to where I am today. The Lord has not forgotten you and will not forsake you. This life has been nothing like I’d planned; and so, so much better.