God has woven some underlying themes into my 35 years of suffering from chronic illness and pain, much like themes in a sonata. As I read my prayer journals, one theme has been the ongoing need to believe the gospel…daily.
I see the subtle spiritual warfare and temptation of the enemy’s lies in my thoughts. Many suffering days, I’ve asked my Father, “Am I Your beloved daughter, in Christ?” I’d come in repentance and belief, but how could I suffer so much…if I were His child?
In a crisis of faith, pouring through Scripture in a cloud of fears and tears became my thirstiest need. Honestly, this surpassed the cascading symptoms and life disasters.
I daily need solid truths of the gospel to endure.
I wrote “Singing the Gospel to Job,” remembering my desperate need, from the crisis of faith that ongoing suffering brings. In Job’s case, Satan used his friends to attack him for what they pridefully assumed was unrepentant sin and weak faith.
It was “Job’s fault,” and he needed to “do something” to “earn God’s favor and blessing,” in order to stop the suffering.
It provoked Job’s crisis of faith.
Sound familiar?
Crisis of faith: Is it my weak faith causing this suffering?
When we’re suffering, thinking we must defend our spiritual standing to others (and ourselves) can be far worse than the suffering circumstance. It was for Job.
For most of the book of Job, his three friends:
- Sinfully thought they knew the mind of God, judging Job’s heart motives and faith.
- Wrongly assumed Job’s suffering was God’s reproof and discipline (Job 5:17).
- Implied Job wasn’t seeking God (Job 4:8).
What did God say to Eliphaz and his buddies?
What wreckage it brings, with heaped-on burden and shame, for it tempts our own sinful approval-seeking from others…such a crisis of faith!
If you’ve been told by people, even well-known teachers, that either
our easy and comfortable lives
or
suffering
are indications of our “amount of faith,” our own spiritual “strength,” or God’s “favor” toward us, please dive into what God actually says.
On this side of the cross, what is true?
Our faith may feel as tiny as a mustard seed, yet He tells us we can:
be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might” (Eph. 6:1, emphasis added).
Whose might?
Who is the source of our faith, from start to finish?
Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith (Heb. 12:2 ESV)!
How did faith in Christ arise, and how is it continuing in us?
My faith looks up to thee,
thou Lamb of Calvary,
Savior divine;
now hear me while I pray,
take all my guilt away,
O let me from this day
be wholly thine.
(“MY FAITH LOOKS UP TO THEE,” PALMER, R., 1830)
Is this suffering punishment for my sin?
My faith needs to be in my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, not trusting in my own “faith” or anything in…me.
Remember the gospel? Jesus literally took our place on the cross! Believers have already been saved from God’s just punishment and wrath for our sin…forever. It has nothing to do with the current “size” of our faith, amount of our “surrender,” “size” of our transgressions, or any of our own works. All gift, all a bursting of love, covenant love for those in Christ!
ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23 ESV, emphasis added).
If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us (1 Jn. 1:8 ESV).
BUT, glory to our Lord!!
Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God
through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Through him we have also obtained access by faith
into this grace
in which we stand,
and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God (Rom. 5:1-2 ESV, emphasis added).
We’ve already been reconciled to our heavenly Father, and only because He has justified us in Christ will we live with Him forever!
What glorious hope, favor, blessing, a bursting of ongoing love as we suffer.
As His Spirit makes us aware of our sin, we can receive our loving Father’s ongoing grace, remembering what He’s done for us, now and forever.
We look to Christ, crucified and victoriously risen in the war against sin and Satan, and ask Him to help us by His indwelling Spirit.
Over and over. Constantly.
Beloved in Christ, He will, because He is interceding for us in the crisis of faith, in our suffering, into our every need, a bursting of love!
Therefore,
since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight,
and sin which clings so closely,
and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us (Heb. 12:1 ESV).
HOW?
May thy rich grace impart
strength to my fainting heart,
my zeal inspire;
as thou hast died for me,
O may my love to thee
pure, warm, and changeless be,
a living fire.
Material adapted from Singing the Gospel to Job: Finding Hope in Suffering, Lauri A. Hogle, © 2022
A playlist of gospel-centered songs for the crisis of faith, bursting of love!
I have more to share about all this, His bursting of love from a recent time of discouragement, largely from what I see on social media. That’s coming next week! The crisis of faith in my suffering sisters in Christ is breaking my heart.
So, this week’s playlist gift is bursting of love! It’s for us to love and be loved by our risen and reigning Lord, to gratefully sing of who He is and what He’s done for us, “despising the shame” we often feel. We sing-pray for His help, His cleansing, His gracious and freeing gift to us as His beloved, sinners eternally saved by His grace through the faith He’s gifted to us.
If a bursting of love would help you in what feels like a crisis of faith as you suffer, I pray it will be His gospel gift to you also.
For other resources that might help as you suffer, praying they are encouraging:
A music therapy-inspired podcast (with Scriptures) to calm symptoms of chronic illness and pain
For Scripture devotionals, calming hymns, and encouragement from Lauri, click here for YouTube podcast.
Devotional Bible study prayer journals, available on Amazon. Click for details.
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