Your Measure of Faith
Welcome to Joni and Friends. Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada.
When it comes to dealing with suffering, it sure helps to at least understand or grasp a few positive things God might be doing in the midst of it all. It helps to know that, well my perseverance in this wheelchair encourages someone in a wheelchair. I mean it really helps me keep enduring, right? And it helps to know that my smile is backing up my witness, my testimony. When you know that you are suffering for something, it eases the pain. But what happens when it seems you are suffering for nothing? When you cannot for all your life see the benefits? When there doesn’t seem to be a reason for all the pain?
I thought about this when I recently received an email from Marjorie. She wrote, “Joni, I have been housebound for several years with Parkinson’s disease. I cannot get out of bed anymore. Can you help me understand God’s purposes?” I started to write back, asking if she would consider a ministry of prayer from her bed, but then I read Marjorie’s P.S; she said: “I already use my time to pray, but still, it’s hard.” This dear woman is simply trying to understand, or at least, see the “good” resulting from her many problems.
But truth is sometimes we can’t. Sometimes we cannot always understand the good that results from our heartaches. We may see some good; perhaps we’re a bit more patient since arthritis has slowed us down, or more sympathetic to single parents since our marriage collapsed. But often – not always – but often, the good that we are able to tally in this life does not seem to outweigh the bad that we are experiencing. The truth is the lost innocence of Eden opened huge floodgates of sorrow, soaking this world with sadness, far deeper, beyond telling. It will take heaven to dry it all up, to provide the total picture that will ease our hearts forever.
Oh, friend, sometimes only heaven will reveal the complete and clear picture of how Marjorie’s faint-hearted prayers shook the destinies of nations and countless people on her prayer list. Only eternity will show how many people came to Christ because of her faint and most feeble prayers. Until then, it is the glory of God to conceal a matter, as it says in Proverbs Chapter 25, verse 2. And it’s the glory of God that Marjorie trusts Him in her Parkinson’s.
Great faith believes in God even when He plays His hand close to the vest, never showing all His cards. God has His reasons for doing so. He wants to increase your “measure of faith” as it says in Romans Chapter 12. Can you hold on to that truth the next time your hardships seem to outweigh any potential benefit? John Piper once said that every day, in every life circumstance, God is doing a thousand things and we might only see three of them. He does this whenever He conceals a matter, and you trust Him in it! God is always doing something; and that’s why Marjorie can rest her confidence in her Lord. Why, her perseverance may be teaching millions of unseen heavenly beings that yes, God’s grace really is that sustaining. Hey, if you’d like to understand a few more benefits, a few more insights as to how God can use suffering to bless you, then stop by joniradio.org today and ask for your copy of “God’s Hand in Hardship”. And should the Spirit nudge you today, thank you for praying for Marjorie. Oh, and one more thing—when we serve the needy we also please God. And it’s why I want you to go over to my radio page today at joniandfriends.org and ask for our Joni and Friends Newsletter. It’s filled with opportunities for you to serve people with disabilities in the name of Jesus.
© Joni and Friends
