Consolations that Cheer the Soul Pt 1: God's Foundational Goodness

As is customary, I will be starting this post by talking about how long it's been since my last blog entry.  It's been a long time.  But curiously, I'm once again in a similar situation as before: face to face with rejection and grappling with the messages it sends me.  Since my last post, I've been experiencing God's grace in my life like never before.  I mean that.  I literally have experienced his grace in ways I never knew existed.  Having reached resignation to the fact that I will never be able to rid myself of every evil motive, ill-will, misplaced emotion, etc has positioned my heart in the perfect place to be flooded by grace.  Namely, a posture of humility and a deepened understanding of my dependency on Christ.  All that to say, I'm starting to see the next test of faith my all-knowing Teacher is assigning me.  In his wisdom, he's leading me to open myself to vulnerability and pain as I allow myself to fall for a wonderful, sweet man of God.  The pain has already started and the risk I'm taking by not running away from this relationship is just becoming all too apparent.  However, I'm completely gripped by the confidence God has given me that this is going to be worth it.  I don't mean to say that I think I'm going to end up with him, I mean that no matter the outcome, I know it will be worth it and I've already begun to see why.

1.)  God's goal for my life is to know him, not to get married, have kids, and live in a big house with a white picket fence.  Don't get me wrong, the way he brings that about may very well be to give me all those things.  The distinction comes from understanding and viewing those good gifts of God as a means rather than an end in and of themselves.  I am here on this planet to know Christ and bear the fruit that flows from that transformational relationship.  Everything that happens in my life needs to be understood as a means of furthering that purpose, including marriage.

2.)  Ultimately, knowing Christ is the only thing that will be able to satisfy me fully for all eternity.  As God orders and ordains events in my life, I will inevitably feel the painful effects of the fall in my heart.  I will desire things other than God's will for my life and it will hurt when I don't receive them.  The comfort I can cling to in those situations is that my emotions will not always be a reflection of reality.  My felt needs will be different from my actual needs and God's wisdom and love is trustworthy enough to allow myself to be subjected to longing and heart break while I wait for what God deems best for my life.  As a matter of fact, I can trust that the pain itself is what's best for me at that moment.  The reason I can say this with such confidence is that being in right relationship with the Creator is what man was created for.  To come into deeper communion with God satisfies the deepest longing in the heart of every man (whether or not we know it) and fulfills the purpose for which we were made. We may not always feel satisfied in Christ, but it doesn't change the fact that he is the only thing that ever can satisfy us.

3.)  God's grace is sufficient for me, even when I think it's not.  As I've already mentioned, our emotions can sometimes mislead us.  Just because I feel at times, like some things are too painful to endure doesn't make it true.  There is a kind of rest that comes only from learning to depend on and trust God's promises more than our emotions and human understanding of a given situation.

I think what I'm getting at here is that opening myself up to pain as I abide in Christ and learn to walk in obedience to him is worth it because God is good.  Any and all consolation I receive flows from his goodness and is meant to ultimately lead me back to him in an ever-deepening, trust relationship based on his goodness.  In this way, God's character as an all-sufficient, perfect Savior is the foundation on which every other consolation we can glean from it is based.  As we seek to know the depths of the riches of his mercies, we can confidently face, not only rejection, but the all the other painful situations that result from living in a fallen world.  Why?

"For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us." Romans 8:18