Tag Archives: Glorious Suffering

Placed In The Dark

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Placed In The Dark

Sometimes, God will put me in the dark to show others in the dark The Way.

“Now if we are afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effective for enduring the same sufferings which we also suffer. Or if we are comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation.” —2 Corinthians 1:6

Those with a heart ready for heaven, who love God and are called according to His purposes, glory in their suffering, rejoicing to be counted worthy to suffer for His name.

“Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this matter.” —1 Peter 4:16

And for those, like me, who are not there yet, God uses all things, including that same suffering to get you there. Instruction in the Light and lessons in the dark facilitated by the Holy Spirit is how I’ve gotten this far.

“And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son…” —Romans 8:28-29

“Though He [Christ] was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him” ——Hebrews 5:8-9

“Why Lord?” is an excellent question, if I’m listening for His answer.

I have not already attained but I press.

#GloriousSuffering

Same Suffering Different Outcomes

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Same Suffering Different Outcomes

If I go to church,
If I pay my tithes,
If I do good things,
bad things will not happen to me.

That’s not true.

That’s witchcraft.

You can be perfectly in the will of God and suffer the same conditions created by original sin as everyone else:

need – 2 Corinthians 6:10, 2 Corinthians 12:10
hunger – Philippians 4:12,
sickness – Philippians 2:27, 1 Timothy 5:23
distress – 2 Corinthians 6:4
disaster – Acts 27, Romans 8:35
injustice – 2 Corinthians 6:5
crime – 2 Corinthians 11:26
violence – 2 Corinthians 6:5
torture – Hebrews 11:37

death – John 19:10

The difference is, for those who belong to God and are in His will, our suffering —our grappling with the various manifestations of death caused by original sin, produces life.

So then death is working in us, but life in you.
—2 Corinthians 4:12

#GloriousSuffering

“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us.

We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed— always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.

For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.

So then death is working in us, but life in you.”
—2 Corinthians 4:7-‬12

“But in all things we commend ourselves as ministers of God: in much patience, in tribulations, in needs, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in fastings; by purity, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Spirit, by sincere love, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold we live; as chastened, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things.”
—2 Corinthians 6:4-‬10

Glorious Suffering

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Glorious Suffering

God is teaching me about suffering.

The message given to me was:

We can do more than know about God.
We can know God.
We can be with God, now.

Now, the Word burning on my heart is:

We can make God known.

As I pressed into this, and dug to unearth the marvelous treasure of this revelation, the first means of making God known that the Spirit began to tutor me in was suffering.

It has been put on my heart to dispel several prevalent yet errant notions about suffering.

One being that because I may be suffering, that something must be wrong, that I’ve done something wrong or that I must not be in the perfect will of God.

But “living right” or “being in the will of God” does not give us a pass on suffering.

Bad things have happened and will happen to even God’s most faithful elect.

In that sin has entered the world it made it so that everyone will suffer, even the best man, the perfect man, Jesus, was not excepted.

We do not have a choice whether we will suffer, but we can choose who our suffering will serve.

It may very well be that you are suffering not because you’re not in the will of God, but precisely because you are, and He has entrusted to you the honor and privilege of making Him known through the ministry of your suffering.

Consider Job.

Not only do I hope to share how to survive these inevitable seasons of suffering, but to thrive in the midst of them, by God’s grace being plump grapes in the desert —a fig tree producing in incompatible seasons, giving life and bearing fruit abundantly for the saving of souls to the glory of His name.

In the coming days and weeks, I hope to unpack that and share what God reveals about how to suffer in a series called Glorious Suffering.

#GloriousSuffering