Bible Passage: “You are always righteous, Lord, when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?…’If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?’” (Jeremiah 12:1; Jeremiah 12:5 NIV)
Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 12:1-13
Suffering is not optional. Sometimes it seems the unavoidable norm.
Men tend to process suffering in one of two ways (admittedly, that is a dramatic oversimplification—you may find yourself outside these two stereotypical categorizations):
Denial or over-interpretation.
We either endure it with as much stoic detachment as we can muster, or we see suffering as a sign that something has gone wrong with God.
In today’s dramatic verses from Jeremiah 12, Jeremiah challenges God. In a way that is reminiscent of Job’s questioning, Jeremiah asks, challenges, and brings charges against God’s exercise of justice—the language in this passage is Hebrew legal language.
Jeremiah was “taking God to court” over the injustice Jeremiah saw all around him.
And God’s response challenges not only Jeremiah’s suffering but also our view of it altogether.
God does not rebuke Jeremiah for his challenge.
Rather, God asks a question that reshapes the issue.
If our current situation is too much for us, if the difficulties of life are wearing you out, how will we be able to face what is coming?
This is no scare tactic on God’s part. He is not simply putting Jeremiah in his place.
God is revealing that suffering is not an interruption of His plan. Suffering is an instrument of that plan.
God is not explaining the suffering. He is expanding Jeremiah’s ability to handle it.
This moment of honesty from Jeremiah offers us a way into new spaces with God. When suffering comes our way, we need not pretend that it does not exist or that somehow God has lost control.
We can rest in the knowledge that God is not indifferent to our suffering, but His aim may not be to minimize or alleviate it either.
He uses suffering to mold us, but we have to accept our position as clay in the Potter’s hands.
There is something else worth noting: as our view of suffering changes, honest complaint to God may be healthier than stoic and silent endurance.
God may not change what we are experiencing, but He will use it to shape us into vessels suited to His purpose.
Prayer: Lord, in my suffering, help me to see Your hands and to accept Your shaping in it. Amen.
Reflection: Is the difficulty you are in right now making you feel larger or smaller? How are you allowing God to shape you through it?
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