Encountering God

I want to preface this lesson with an important concept. There are some people who believe that you have to suffer in order to draw close to God. I personally don't believe that. Please don't misunderstand me, there will be times that you suffer, because Jesus said, "In the world you will have tribulation..." (John 16:33). But I don't believe that God wants us to suffer on an ongoing basis. Some people teach that God likes to make us miserable, because that is what makes us grow spiritually. I don't believe that and I don't teach that.

Two Myths About Suffering And Tribulation

Jesus did say we would have tribulation in this world. But look at what else He said in the same breath. He also said, "In Me you may have peace..." and "...be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."

Yes, there is tribulation. But in the midst of that tribulation, there is God helping us to overcome it, and giving us His victory. That is why we can encounter God in the midst of tribulation, trials and hardship.

We all get our turns in the "burning fiery furnace" of the "refiners fire." However, God does not abandon us when we are in the fire, and that is why we can encounter Him in the midst of our difficulty. And that is what I want to talk about in this lesson.

Before I do, I would like to address two hurtful misunderstandings about trials and suffering. The first is that we can only grow spiritually and develop our character through suffering and hardship, so God wants to give us lots of suffering and hardship. It is true that God can use suffering and hardship can develop our character, but that is not God's only tool for doing so. He can also grow us through intimacy, through devotions and bible study, through inner healing, through the conviction of the Holy Spirit and through may other things.

The second myth is that God uses hardship and suffering to force us to press into Him for His help. To paraphrase, He "hurts us" on purpose in order to make draw us close to Him. That is a lie of the devil and that goes against God's character. God is our good and loving Heavenly Father who wants to do good things for His children and doesn't want to hurt them. Jesus explains that in Matthew 7:7-11 and I encourage you to memorize that passage if you haven't already done so, because it will sustain you in the face of this myth.

Why Does God Permit Tribulation And Suffering?

The truth is that God doesn't usually give us difficulty or hardship just so we will be forced to run to Him for help. There are rare times when our rebellion and stubbornness may force Him to do that, but it is the exception, not His normal way of dealing with us. God is not a bully and He wants a love-relationship with us, not a fear-relationship. Likewise, God doesn't want us to be miserable. His plan for us is to that we live in His joy and victory. This is what He says in Jeremiah 29:11, "'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.'"

Yes, God has good plans for us, not hurtful ones. However, the reality is that God does allow us to encounter testing, trial and hardship. That raises the question: How can that be? If God's plan for us is for a hope and a future, then why is there hardship and suffering in our lives?

I believe the bible gives an answer to that question in 1 Peter 5:8, which says, "Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour." In short, we live in a war zone, and we have to deal with spiritual warfare on an ongoing basis. I wish that God would protect us from all of it, but He doesn't choose to do it that way.

We see this play out in Job's life. Job was an extremely godly man, and God was very pleased with him. Nonetheless, the Lord allowed the devil to bring all sorts of hardship and loss into Job's life for a season. Job's "trail" had absolutely nothing to do with anything that Job did wrong, and it was not caused by anything that he neglected to do. The bible tells us that Job was "blameless and upright, and one who feared God and shunned evil" (Job 1:1). Nonetheless, the devil singled him out and initiated an attack against him--and God permitted it. God allowed the devil to attack Job, but at the same time, He put boundaries on how much attack the devil was permitted to do: "And the Lord said to Satan, 'Behold, he is in your hand, but spare his life'" (Job 2:6).

Under the devil's attack, Job became absolutely miserable for a season. He suffered material loss so severe that he was thrust into instant poverty. At the same time, all of his children (who he loved dearly) died, and he had terrible grief to deal with. As if that were not enough, He also came down with a sickness so painful that he could not get physically comfortable and could not sleep at night. All of this caused Job to fall into a severe depression. He could not even turn to his support system for comfort, because his friends accused him of fault and played mind-games with him. Job suffered a lot, and he was completely and totally miserable. To make matters worse, he couldn't figure out why all this happened to him, because he hadn't done anything wrong to bring all of this suffering on himself. The devil attacked him, and it was a nasty attack. It wasn't fair, yet God allowed it to happen.

Job got so discouraged that he begged God to take his life; he wanted to die to end all of his suffering. But in the midst of all that hardship and difficulty, God never left Job. In fact, God gave Job an encounter with Him in chapters 38 to 42. Yes, in the midst of his suffering and difficulty, Job had an amazing encounter with God.

The next part of his story is very important--God did not leave Job in that place of suffering and misery for very long. God vindicated Job in front of his friends, and He restored Job to a place of prosperity, happiness and peace. The bible says that God gave job twice as much possessions and riches as he had before the attack. God also gave him a new family (the same number of sons and daughters that he had before, and each of them grew up to be beautiful and amazing people). Job 42:12 says, "The Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning."

God did allow Job to suffer for a season, and two important things came out of it. First, God met Job in that place of suffering, and He revealed His glory to him. Second, God did not leave Job in the place of suffering. Job did suffer for some number of months, but after that, God brought him into 140 years of blessings and prosperity. The book of Job ends like this: "After this Job lived one hundred and forty years, and saw his children and grandchildren for four generations. So Job died, old and full of days" (Job 40:16-17).

Likewise today, God does permit hardship, difficulty and suffering into our life at times, but that is not His main plan for us. We will not enjoy our times of difficulty and hardship, but we can have His peace as we walk through it. Jesus has made this available to us. John 14:27 says, "Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." We will have tribulation in this world (John 16:33) but we can experience God's peace and His presence as we go through it.

Finding God's Peace In The Midst Of The Storm

The bible makes many promises of God's protection and God's provision, which are intended to help us stay centered in His peace in the midst of hardship. Let's look at a couple of those verses.

First, let's look at God's provision:

Philippians 4:19

And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.

Matthew 6:28-24 (Jesus is speaking)

28 "So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; 29 and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

31 "Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble."

Now let's look at a couple of verses about God's promises of protection:

Psalm 34:7 The angel of the Lord encamps all around those who fear Him, and delivers them.

Psalm 91:3-7

3 Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler, and from the perilous pestilence. 4 He shall cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you shall take refuge; His truth shall be your shield and buckler.

5 You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, nor of the arrow that flies by day, 6 nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness, nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday. 7 A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; But it shall not come near you."

God has left us wonderful promises in His word that we can cling to during those times of adversity and hardship. He did that for a reason. He wants us to have "faith encounters" with God in the midst of "things going wrong."

That is right, one of the ways that we encounter God is by clinging to His promises and trusting His goodness in the midst of difficulty and trial. God wants us to believe that His word is true and that He will take care of us and deliver us. This is not necessarily a "fun" way to encounter God, but it is am important way because it is where we learn from personal experience that He is faithful and He will come through for us. It gives us the ability to deeply know and trust Him.

So how do we do that? How do we have a faith encounter with God in difficult or times?

One of the ways that we can encounter God in hardship is to remind ourselves of those promises over and over again. We might want to write out bible verses with promises pertinent to our situation and review them often. As we keep reminding ourselves of His promises and keep choosing to put our attention on the solution to our problems (e.g., God), His presence and His goodness starts becoming very real to us that way. And of course, when we are on the other side of the difficulty looking back, we will be able to see how God was at work in our circumstances, bringing His glory and His deliverance into them.

I have more to say about encountering God in hardship/difficulty, so we will talk more about this in our next lesson...