You will not abandon me into enemy hands, but will set my feet in a free and open space. 10 Be gracious to me, Lord, for I am in distress; affliction is wearing down my eyes, my throat and my insides.11 My life is worn out by sorrow, and my years by sighing. My strength fails in my affliction; my bones are wearing down.12 To all my foes I am a thing of scorn and especially to my neighbors a horror to my friends. When they see me in public, they quickly shy away.13 I am forgotten, out of mind like the dead; I am like a worn-out tool.14 I hear the whispers of the crowd; terrors are all around me They conspire together against me; they plot to take my life. 15 But I trust in You, Lord; I say, “You are my God.”16 My destiny is in Your hands; rescue me from my enemies, from the hands of my pursuers. Psalm 31:9-16
These words from King David to God are spilled out of him with grief and sorrow. King David had a way of talking to God that was direct but reverent. He understood that God is a friend and He is also the royal King of the universe. David knew God in a way that touched God’s heart to the maximum. God called David a man after His own heart. That was a special title given to none other. God saw something in David that was attractive in the Spirit. Even though David murdered, committed adultery and basically raped Bathsheba, God looked past David’s sin and saw the pain and sorrow of his life. David’s pain and sorrow didn’t remove God’s judgment on David’s sin. David still dealt with severe consequences such as losing his baby with Bathsheba and losing his other son Absalom. There were great battles that David had to fight that looked impossible and caused him grief and sickness, but what put David aside from others was his relentless turning back to God. You see in David’s life there was much pain, but his pain ushered in progress with his relationship with God. Without David’s pain and agony, he would have never knew the need he had for God.
My friend, are you in pain? Are you in a physical, mental or spiritual agony? Is the testing of your faith pushing you to limits you never thought possible? If so, you are in the company of many a great soldier, many a great warrior and even in the company of a great king! For some reason, many of us have to walk through much sorrow and pain because it fits the plan of God for a particular season. If Jesus wasn’t immune to suffering, why would we be? Isaiah 53:10 says,”But the Lord was pleased to crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in His hand.”
That sounds pretty harsh but the truth is God was pleased not because Jesus suffered pain but because He saw and knew what the end result of Jesus’ pain would be. He knew that salvation would be ushered in for all humanity because of one Man’s agony. Just like Jesus, your suffering has a purpose. While we are in the time of pain and anguish, it’s difficult to figure out how you’ll make it to the next day, never mind seeing the end result. God knows this and He will see you through because He loves you. Our part in this temporary pain is to trust God ever so much. To literally trust Him with our life, our sanity, our eternity, our well being, our all. Not all storms are sent to destroy, I believe that the storm you are experiencing now was designed to clean away the pathway that you are meant to walk on. I know and understand this because I have and am now experiencing the very same storms.
Let me share with you what the Lord shared with me a few days ago. I was asking Him to remove certain mountains in my life and He responded to me very clearly. He said, “Michael, your are suppressing things that instead need to die.” I asked, “what does that mean?’ He said,”suppression is resistance while holding onto something that needs to be let go of. Rather than suppress things and hope for healing, die to those things so that they can no longer effect you. When you die to something, a process begins with the end result being death and it no longer has any hold on you, when you suppress something, you subconsciously are in battle with that thing all the time, and it wears you down.”
“I finally got it”, I said to myself. Now I understand when Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:31,” I affirm, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily.” We need to daily die to anything that wants to take us over. A dead person has no response to anything that tries to poke or prod it. Remember this is a daily process, not a one time decision. To die to something is part of the suffering that we endure while on this earth. Serving Jesus is a process of death. Death to self but life to Him who purchased us! Do not despise this short lived discipline. Embrace what is from God and fight against what is from Satan.
Be sure of this one thing, what you are facing now is not forever. There is hope in Jesus and He will get you through this. There is progress in your pain!
Pastor Michael Cannatello
Lazarusministry.com
