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,
Your heavenly Father wants to use your “Why?” moments. He hasn’t forgotten or abandoned you or decided you’re not worthy of good things. He loves you deeply and even now works to redeem your most agonizing moments.
,
Meredith Houston
Carr
“Therefore
we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are
being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving
for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” - 2 Corinthians 4:16-17 (NIV)
Before I knew it, I fell into a
joy-stealing loop: Why, Lord, would You allow that painful struggle?
Why, Lord, will this difficult season not
end?
Why?!
Do you ever find yourself tripping over
past painful events?
Maybe a traumatic experience like divorce,
a sudden loss or a friend’s betrayal has left you in a jumbled mess.
Or maybe the “smaller” trials of life have
combined into one big ball of hurt bouncing around in your heart.
Whatever the reason, you might find
yourself hung up on the age-old question of “Why?”
It’s one of the earliest questions we learn
to ask, and it remains on our lips as difficult circumstances roll into our
lives.
Before long, enemy-fueled doubts begin
assaulting the space between our ears:
I wonder if God has forgotten about me.
Maybe He’s abandoned me altogether.
His good plans must be for someone else,
not me.
The morning I got stuck on that question,
God graciously stopped my negative spiral by reminding me of what some of our
spiritual giants endured.
There’s Joseph, who spent years in
servitude and prison after being sold into slavery by his brothers.
There’s David, who had to flee the palace
for his life and endure years on the run to escape the sword of King Saul.
And then there’s Paul, the writer of
today’s key verse. He suffered multiple beatings, imprisonments and an
intrusive “thorn in the flesh” that
God never removed (2
Corinthians 12:7, CSB).
Yet unlike my why-riddled prayer journals,
Paul wrote these extraordinary words:
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we
are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light
and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs
them all”
(2
Corinthians 4:16-17).
Paul’s perspective stuns me, for his trials
were anything but light and momentary!
And yet he held fast to God’s bigger vision
for his life. How could a man with plenty of “Why?” moments exhibit this kind
of faith?
The next verse
reveals Paul’s secret to steadfast trust: “So
we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen
is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:18, NIV).
Paul understood that God would weave the
“Why?” moments into something beautiful and far more valuable than the
temporary, earthly comfort we often crave.
In hindsight, we see this truth in action.
We watch Joseph ascend to power in Egypt and David take his anointed place as
King of Israel.
We see Paul’s perseverance result in many
of our treasured books of the New Testament.
And those confusing, painful “Why?” moments
they endured?
Each moment played a crucial role! For
without descending into a dungeon, Joseph could never have ascended to power.
Without the chaos of persecution, David
could never have worn the crown.
And without his tribulations, Paul could
never have spread the gospel throughout the new world.
Your heavenly Father wants to use your
“Why?” moments in the same way.
He hasn’t forgotten or abandoned you or
decided you’re not worthy of good things. He loves you deeply and even now
works to redeem your most agonizing moments.
We can walk in hope, knowing that God’s
strength renews us each day. And in His strength, we get to decide that our
“Why?”
moments will no longer keep us stuck or
steal our joy. In faith, we can place our pain into His capable hands – for we
serve a God who turns our misery into a masterpiece.
Dear heavenly Father, thank You for the unseen, eternal
work You’re doing in my life. Help me trust You with my heartache, knowing that
it’s only part of the story. Grant me the strength to persevere today. In
Jesus’ Name, Amen.
TRUTH
FOR TODAY
Psalm 34:18-19, “The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and
saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the
LORD delivers him out of them all.” (ESV)
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CONNECT
Connect with Meredith on her website, where you’ll find encouraging content and free downloads to inspire your faith! You can also follow her on Instagram.
Meredith Houston
Carr is
a writer and unrelenting dreamer. An attorney in her former life, she now
enjoys the never-dull stay-at-home mom life with her three energetic children.
Meredith is passionately devoted to writing words that encourage and infuse
women with hope — a hope that leads to the joy and strength needed to walk
through life’s hardships and into the abundant life promised by Jesus. After
several adventure-filled years on the West Coast, she and her husband now make
their home in Athens, Georgia. You can find her writing during naptime and in
between loads of laundry.
https://proverbs31.org/read/devotions/full-post/2021/04/13/trusting-god-with-our-why-moments
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