In the middle of the night I awakened with the phrase
“Suffer on Lord Jesus” repeatedly playing in my mind. I had been going through
some difficult things recently and I felt that the Lord was telling me to
literally lean on him through my suffering.
Unfortunately, we are not promised that we will never
suffer in this life. In fact John 16:33 says “ These things I have spoken unto you, that
in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of
good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
A lot of times we
feel like we go through things alone, and sometimes we may even push God aside
or blame God or question, doubt or feel like God is really far away, but the desire and heart of Jesus is for us to
come to Him as a relief from our suffering.
"Come to Me,
all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke
upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will
find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light"
To take Christ’s yoke means to submit to Him. In order to find the
rest Jesus is talking about, we have
to turn from whatever we are presently depending on to completely depending upon Him. When we are yoked with
Jesus, He bears the load for us.
Psalm 91:4: He shall cover
thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall
be thy shield and buckler.
We must
keep our eyes focused on Him, and the truth of His word.
Psalm 55:22 Cast your burdens on the LORD and he will
sustain you; he will never let the righteous be shaken.
If we will fully
submit and yield our lives to him, he will always be there beside us pulling
the weight for us. The only time the load becomes seemingly too much to bear is
when we take our eyes off of Him and try to handle the load ourselves.
Many of us have responded to Him as our Savior,
but we have not fully submitted to Him as our Lord. When He seeks to slip the
yoke around our necks to join Him, we resist, refusing to listen and truly
submit to His Word and acknowledge His authority.
God wants
us to trust in His gentleness and goodness.
Suffering is not enjoyable for anyone, but no one is exempt
from it. Every single person goes through trials. But, In suffering we come to
hope more fully in God and put less confidence in the things of the world. That
is his will for us. And through our suffering we will benefit from a deeper
relationship with Him as we learn to lean on Him alone. It’s in those times
that our relationship with Him becomes less formal and artificial and more personal,
real, intimate, and deep.
I can honestly say that as I reached my breaking point, my
suffering became the beginning of the most beautiful relationship with Jesus. I
read a quote that I really liked that says. “Something very beautiful happens
to people when their worlds fallen apart: a humility, a nobility, a higher
intelligence emerges at just the point when our knees hit the floor.”
If it wasn’t for my suffering, I would never have the
beautiful fellowship that I have with the Lord today.
Its only in a battle that true strength and courage of a
believer is revealed. Faith is not faith until it has been tested. But those
who draw near to God in times of trial will find that they cannot leave his
presence without receiving his strength.
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