Father,
It’s Your promise.
Please strengthen our hearts by fixing our eyes on Jesus today. Help us cling to hope in Your always-good purposes for Your beloved in Christ, as we suffer.
For it can seem like there are no good purposes for our earthly suffering. But Your Word gives us many…and they point us to Jesus Himself, who willingly took on flesh…
like us
and became utterly dependent on You, perfectly obeying You as He suffered…
for us.
In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered.
And being made perfect,
he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him (Heb. 5:7-9 ESV).
O Thou bleeding love divine,
What are other loves to Thine?
Theirs a drop, and Thine a sea,
Ever full, and ever free!
(“Gadsby’s Hymns,” 170, p.d.)
Clinging to hope in my dependence on You, glorious and loving Father
Like Jesus, Who humbled Himself as He walked the earth, we rely on You when we suffer. We’re so in need of the bigger picture for our earthly lives, which always include suffering.
We need Your help and hope to get through the next hour…like Jesus.
“Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again” (Jn. 12:27-28 ESV).
What a doleful voice I hear!
What a garden-scene is there!
What a frightful, ghastly flood!
Jesus weltering in his blood!
Groaning on the ground He lies;
Seems a slaughtered sacrifice!
Tells me, with a feeble breath,
“Sorrowful, yea, unto death!”
Clinging to hope in Jesus’ taking our place on the cross
Oh, glorious Lord, remind us of Your unending love as we seek to follow You. For You intimately know how hard it is when suffering lingers. Carry us, lead us, in Your steadfast love for us. For, in this suffering filled with losses, we also are dying to our sin. The sin You already died for. In Your deep love for us.
What wondrous love is this, oh my soul…
Help us cling to our solid hope in what You’ve done for us on the cross. Help us to continually re-turn to You with our sins, embraced with Your comfort as we cling to Your redeeming, strengthening, transforming love and ongoing grace.
How His eyes astonished are!
Sure they witness conflict near!
On His face what sadness dwells!
Sure He feels a thousand hells.
O my Jesus, let me know
What has brought this heavy woe;
Swords are piercing through Thy heart;
Whence arose the torturing smart?
Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Mt. 16:24 ESV).
“Sinner, thou hast done the deed;
Thou hast made the Savior bleed!
Justice drew its sword
on Me!
Pierced My heart
to pass by thee!
Clinging to hope in our resurrection and eternal life!
There is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on that day, and not only to me, but to all those who have loved his appearing (2 Tim. 4:8 CSB).
“Now I take the deadly cup;
All its dregs am drinking up;
Read My anguish in My gore;
Look, and pierce My heart no more.”
that I may know him
and the power of his resurrection,
and may share his sufferings,
becoming like him in his death (Phil. 3:10 ESV).
[God] will sustain you
to the end,
guiltless
in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord (2 Cor. 1:8-9 ESV).
Hallelujah! This is all Your powerful and purposeful work within us, all the way until we live with You forever, faithful God!
Clinging to hope in Your sustaining purposes to know Jesus and become more like Jesus, guiltless at the end
By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples (Jn. 15:8 ESV).
The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control (Gal. 5:22-23 ESV).
If I loved my Lord before,
I would love him ten times more;
Drop into his sea outright,
Lose myself in Jesus quite.
Father, as we suffer, turn our eyes upon Jesus in Your great and glorious love story for us, “losing ourselves” in Your love for us in Jesus Christ. In all of our deep need, fix our eyes on the cross and the power of Your resurrection, for You are the One who gives us all hope. That hope? That purpose?
You will sustain us to the very end, helping us to become more like Jesus, our beloved Savior and Lord.
All for Your glory. It’s Your promise and purpose!
In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, amen.
Material adapted from Singing the Gospel to Job: Finding Hope in Suffering, Lauri A. Hogle, © 2022
This week’s playlist gift and other resources of Singing Christ’s Hope
Sister in Christ, this week’s playlist gift turns our eyes upon Jesus. For where else can we find any hope to endure this right now? We come to Him with our pain and sorrow and sing of who He is and what He’s done for us. We look forward, clinging to our sure hope in what He’s doing in us right now and in what is coming for all believers in Christ. Through varied songs, we love Him and abide in His love, as He helps us take up our cross and live in His transforming, powerful, ongoing grace as we suffer. Even as we sing!
I pray this will strengthen and sustain your heart for the next hour and the next, as our loving God carries us through earthly suffering…like Jesus.
If this might bless you, sign up here, and you will receive the playlist in your email, with prayer. If you are new to our ministry, see below for all resources.
