I gritted my teeth, tears streaming from my eyes as I waited for another contraction to pass.
I looked into my husband’s eyes and whispered jerkily, “I don’t think I can do this anymore.”
He chuckled a little nervously, then patted my arm. “You’re doing great,” he replied instead of responding to my statement.
Just then a cheery nurse popped into the room.
“Let’s see how much you’ve progressed,” she said. After a minute or two, she smiled, and said, “Eight centimeters! You’re doing a wonderful job! It won’t be too much longer now.” She made a few notations to my chart and left the room.
I looked up at the ceiling, almost writhing on the bed from another contraction, and wondered how much longer my suffering would last.
If she had said, “Only one more hour dear,” or, “Twenty more contractions and your baby will be born,” I could have managed the pain.
Not this. Not this seemingly endless wait. It was unbearable. I didn’t have the option to fast-forward the pain. There was no prearranged signal at which the baby magically appeared in my arms. No, I’d walked this road five times before and I knew the only way out was through the fire.
Even birthing five children previously, this was a new level of suffering. I like to walk during labor because it gives my mind a level of focus. Down the hallway, past the nurse’s desk, stop and breathe through another contraction, and repeat. But my sixth birth was difficult. They needed her heartbeat on the monitor, yet she continually moved away from it. After repositioning my monitor fifteen times, the nurse asked me to remain very still so they could receive a good read and make sure that the baby was still tolerating labor well.
Then the waiting. I watched the hands on the clock circle again, breathing in rhythm with each tick, tears leaking into my pillow as the contractions intensified. How much more suffering could I stand? How much longer would I have to wait? An hour? Two?
I once spent three hours in a darkened movie theater watching the final installment of “The Lord of the Rings” without even a bathroom break. Time that passed in a blink of an eye.
Now, every minute was a groan. Seconds passed in slow motion with only waves of pain to mark the time. Dizzy one moment, vomiting the next, I couldn’t focus on the clock anymore. Vaguely, I realized the nurses were quickly repositioning the bed for the birth. I shut my eyes as the world became one giant tunnel of pain when suddenly, a wriggling, warm body was laid on my chest.
“Here’s your baby!” The nurse enthused.
I opened my eyes to the most beautiful face I’d ever seen.
Eyes wide, she looked up at me, squinting at the bright lights, before curling into my chest with a tiny whimper.
Euphoric, I brushed her tiny fingers with a feather-light touch, marveled over her petite toes, and gently stroked her button nose.
The white-hot fire of pain had ended, and yet here in my hands was something so precious, that I would have suffered all over again, just for her.
Suffering is something that we as Christians hesitate over. Some people call suffering the devil’s work. Others call it the punishment of God for our sins. But is there a third choice on the menu? Can suffering ever be a call that God places on our lives for our good and for His glory?
1 Peter 5:10-11 says, “But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.”
Perfect. The Greek verb used here is “katartizw” and it means, “to complete thoroughly, repair, adjust, fit, frame, mend, join together, prepare, and restore.” (Strong’s Concordance G2675)
Did you know that God can use suffering to adjust us? Our journey of suffering can prepare us, and complete us into a carefully restored version of ourselves through God’s grace.
My children watched a PBS show recently called, “When the Bowl Breaks”. The synopsis of the show involved taking a broken pottery bowl, and repairing it using a process called ‘Kintsugi’. This art form was developed in Japan and uses gold or another precious metal to mend the cracks and broken pieces. This both showcases the scars, and increases the value of the item. I also learned that the Kintsugi process can take up to a month to complete because of the various meticulous steps, as well as the essential time it takes to dry the pottery.
I think the word “perfect” used here is exemplified by this process. God restores us to wholeness using the perfecting work of suffering as the gold that joins us together. Yet this process takes time, and under His careful hands, we emerge as a testimony of God’s glory being worked out in our lives.
The word ‘establish’ means, “to set fast, to turn resolutely in a certain direction, to confirm, to make stable, to render constant, to place firmly”.(Strong’s Concordance G4741)
Has suffering ever turned your face resolutely to the Lord? Has the suffering you experienced ever shaken your faith down to bedrock until you stood before the Lord face to face and said like Job, “I came into this world with nothing, and I shall certainly leave with nothing. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away. I will still bless the Name of the Lord. (Job 1).
The places of suffering in my life are places of deep emotional and physical pain, yet when I look back on them, I realize that those times of pain have put my feet firmly on Jesus. These are the places where everything else has fallen away, and yet Jesus is still there, holding me steadfastly. The times of blessing when I can joyfully yell, “God is so, so good and so faithful!” are fueled by the dark and cold valleys of suffering when I’ve reached bottom, and whispered through raw and wrenching agony, “God, you are so, so good, and You are faithful. I trust You even though I can’t see.”
The word ‘strengthen’ means “to make strong, to strengthen one’s soul”. (Strong’s Concordance G4599)
Suffering doesn’t always mean we come out gloriously and physically perfect. The word used here is qualified by describing strength of soul, not just strength of body. God doesn’t always use the most outwardly beautiful. Just look at King Saul in 1 Samuel 9:1-2,
“There was a man of Benjamin whose name was Kish……..And he had a choice and handsome son whose name was Saul. There was not a more handsome person than he among the children of Israel. From his shoulders upwards he was taller than any of the people.”
Yet in 1 Samuel 15:11 God says this of Saul,
“I greatly regret that I have set up Saul as king, for he has turned back from following Me, and has not performed My commandments.”
Contrast Saul with David, the one God chose to succeed Saul on the throne of Israel. When chosen he was the youngest of eight sons, a sheepherder ridiculed by his own brother, and yet his soul was at maximum strength. He killed a lion, a bear, and a giant by trusting in the Lord’s strength and power. (1 Samuel 17 & 18) At one point, David’s wives, and the families of all his mighty men were captured by their enemies. Can you imagine the mental suffering he experienced when he came back from a foray only to discover his family missing? 1 Samuel 30:6 speaks to his emotions; “Now David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and his daughters. But David strengthened himself in the Lord His God.”
David’s strength, unlike Saul’s, came from the Lord. David’s experiences through countless areas of suffering had taught him that strength would be found in the Lord. This soul-strength had been refined in the fire of pain. It was the foundation he clung to when his whole world had disappeared with raiders, and his own men threatened to stone him.
This is the same kind of soul-strength that can be cultured in us when God leads us through a valley of suffering. As painful as it is in the moment, and even when we can’t see it, God is still working out good in our lives.
The last word, ‘settle’ means “to lay a basis for, to erect, or consolidate, to ground, to make stable, to lay the foundation.”(Strong’s Concordance #G2311)
Similar to the word “establish” that we looked at previously, this word is akin to the concrete foundation that is poured as the base and most stable layer for a new building. My husband told me that in the engineering world, a foundation layer is not considered stable until it has been curing for 3-7 days.
This nugget of information invites another layer of speculation about God’s timing. When we sit in the cauldron of suffering, we want the process to be finished quickly. “Just get me out of here!” we yell as the heat sears our tender skin. But like curing concrete is a process, settling can take time. Endeavoring to build on an unsettled foundation will cause cracking and damage to the first layer.
A hasty trip out of the suffering God is using to refine us will result in a broken foundational layer, and can even cause us to doubt God and His love for us. But sometimes God uses these hard places of life to heal us and make us whole. I love Psalm 138:8 because it’s both a declaration of faith, and a plea to the Lord to keep working in our lives. It says this: “The Lord will perfect that which concerns me; Your mercy, O Lord, endures forever; Do not forsake the works of Your hands.
When my second son was four years old, he pulled our heavy, wooden, fireplace mantel off its holder, and onto his hand. Glass shards from the pictures and candles I had placed above the fireplace came hurtling down with it and my son ended up with a broken hand and a severe cut several inches long across his palm.
We arrived at the emergency room and the nurses began wrapping him tightly in a sheet to hold him still while they plunged a huge needle into his broken hand, numbing it before sewing up the cut. I still remember his terrified little eyes staring at me as he screamed in horrible pain, wondering why I would allow these strangers to cause him such suffering.
I cried as I stood in the corner allowing the ER technicians access to my precious son.
Even though I knew that this was a necessary step towards true healing, my own heart was broken over the pain he was experiencing. He didn’t understand that this would allow him the full use of his hand in the long run. All he knew was the moment.
I see God’s heart in the same way. He isn’t rejoicing over our suffering, or even blindly unconscious of our hurt. No, I think He stands right beside us, tears running down His face as we fall face down on the floor, twisting in pain, because He knows that the suffering He so carefully allowed is working to perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle us.
In my own experience, walking through the fire with Jesus has given me a precious and unshakable truth. This truth is that God is trustworthy.
So many people go through life with the underlying assumption that God is untrustworthy and unreliable. When the hardships of life come, it seems to prove their theory that the Lord is painfully against them.
My sure foundation is based on who I KNOW God is. He is my Savior, my Helper, my Healer. The eternal author of my salvation, the One who holds me up when everyone else fails. My God is faithful, and full of mercy, even to the thousandth generation.
My God is the One who hears me whispering prayers for strength when I’m washing dishes. He’s the same God who heard me whisper, “I can’t do it without You,” when I saw a positive line on a test form for the fifth time.
He has been as tender as a Father, and as full of love as a mother holding her newborn infant for the first time.
He is God, MY God. This is why I say, “If You think I need suffering to make me more like You, then do what is in Your heart. I trust You. Just be with me, and hold me Jesus.”
I pray for you, my friends, that whether you are watching steam bubbling out of the water, whether you are in the cauldron of suffering, or whether you are finally holding the precious treasure gained on the other side, that you would allow our Faithful Father to perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever, Amen.
Take a moment:
Did you know that even Jesus suffered? Read over Hebrews 12:1-2 and Romans 8:18 and answer the following questions.
“Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2
“For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” Romans 8:18
- What was Jesus’ response to the suffering of the cross?
- In comparison, what is worth more, the sufferings of the present, or the glory that is coming because of it?
- Based on Jesus and His actions, what should our response to suffering and difficulty be in our race? What character trait should we exhibit as we are running the race?
- Endurance is a trait that is developed. Do you feel that you are developing endurance in your relationship with Jesus or is your foundation weak and wobbly?
- Who should be our guide and our example as a pattern for our lives?
- Sometime this week, dig into the chapter of Hebrews 12 and see what the Lord speaks from His word to you about suffering, and His great Love for you.
