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Would you curse God?
At some point in their life, I believe every Christian will face a trial or temptation that tests his or her faith to the point where that person considers leaving the faith altogether and even cursing God in anger over the difficult challenge to their faith.
The story of Job is a good illustration of this. It’s a book that has always fascinated me because, even though it’s the oldest book in the Bible, the questions Job and his “friends” discuss throughout the book are questions that we still ponder today; questions about God’s love and justice and why He allows suffering and heartache etc.
In the beginning of the story, Satan comes to God and tells Him that Job is only serving Him because God blesses him. In other words, that Job’s love for God is conditional love, which of course isn’t love at all. Satan isn’t merely making this accusation against Job; he’s making it against everyone who claims to love God. And, like Job, our claim of loving God unconditionally will be tested at some point in our journey.
After making this harsh accusation, Satan then proposes this wager; if God would allow him to take away all of Job’s blessings (Satan claims), Job “will surely curse You to Your face.” (Job 1:11)
For reasons we cannot fully understand, God accepts Satan’s wager and allows him to take away virtually everything Job possesses and loves. However, the result was not as Satan had predicted; the penniless and depressed Job announces, “I came naked from my mother’s womb, and I will be stripped of everything when I die. The LORD gave me everything I had, and the LORD has taken it away. Praise the name of the LORD!” (Job 1:21 NLT)
After hearing this declaration from Job, I imagine Satan with a puzzled look on his face; a look like the Grinch had on his face Christmas morning when he heard all the Who’s down in Whoville singing after he had stolen all of their Christmas gifts and decorations.
Satan isn’t one to give up easy; he then doubles-down on his bet with God by predicting; “A man will give up everything he has to save his life. But take away his health, and he will surely curse you to your face!” (Job 2:4-5 NLT)
Again God accepts Satan’s challenge and allows him to inflict Job with horrible pain and suffering. Satan is so desperate to win his bet with God that he recruits Job’s wife to relay a message to him; “His wife said to him, “Are you still trying to maintain your integrity? Curse God and die.” (Job 2:9 NLT)
Nice wife! Maybe she’s the reason they came up with the wedding vows, “For better or for worse and in sickness and health…”
As most people know, God won the bet with Satan; Job never cursed God or said anything against Him. The story ends with Job’s health being restored and his wealth and other blessings being greater than they were before. The lesson is this; whether it’s in this life or the next, “God blesses the people who patiently endure testing.” (James 1:12 NLT)
As I said, all those who claim to be followers of Christ, will eventually have their claim tested by trials, temptations and/or doctrines that are difficult to accept. It is the challenges to our faith that strengthens our faith.
Like Job, the crowd following Jesus had a difficult choice to make when their faith was tested by Jesus’ challenging teaching. The Bible says (after hearing Jesus’ words); “At this point many of his disciples turned away and deserted him. Then Jesus turned to the Twelve and asked, “Are you going to leave, too?” Simon Peter replied, “Lord, to whom would we go? You alone have the words that give eternal life. We believe them, and we know you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6:66-69 NLT)
If there is one advantage to my trying everything except Jesus before committing to follow Him, it’s that, like Peter, I know that Jesus alone has the words of life. And, like Job, even though I don’t know what’s going on “behind the scenes” and, like him, I too have many questions, but even in the midst of a difficult trial, I can still maintain a sense of joy, peace and hope. I’ve discovered that I can maintain this joy, peace and hope (to some degree) even in the emotional down times and the times of spiritual confusion by focusing on the following three simple truths;
- God is good (Mark 10:18)
- God is love (1 John 4:8)
- God has good plans for me (Jeremiah 29:11)
“Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” (James 1:2-4)
Why are you afraid?
“And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being covered with the waves; but Jesus Himself was asleep. And they came to Him and woke Him, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing!” He said to them, “Why are you afraid, you men of little faith?” (Matt 8:24-:26)
I suppose that even the most faith-filled Christian would experience some level of fear if they found themselves in a situation like the above. But I know that a doctor delivering news of a life-threatening diagnosis, a loss of a job and insensitive debt-collectors calling day-after-day, can instill that same kind of “Save us, Lord; we are perishing” fear.
Unfortunately, we don’t really know if we have genuine faith until that faith is tested. I believe this is the reason that Jesus allowed His disciples, and us, to go through so many of these nail-biting situations. Trials force us off of the proverbial fence. Tested faith is enduring and overcoming faith; it’s faith that can empathize with and encourage others who find themselves in the midst of a raging storm – those who are feeling as if Jesus is asleep in the boat.
“Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.” (James 1:2-3)
Faith (in Christ) is the opposite of and the antidote to fear. But like all antidotes it takes time to work and the quicker we start building faith, the more effective it will be. We build faith (overcome fear) by reading the Bible, through prayer and by surrounding ourselves with faith-filled people.
Faith is also preventive medicine. When faced with a life-altering situation, the person of great faith will experience little fear and the person of little faith will experience great fear. So, if you’re not going through a trial now, start building your faith because the Bible tells us we’ll all face trials.
“Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33 NLT)
It seems that Jesus attempted to strengthen the faith of His disciples before getting in that boat. That day, the disciples saw Jesus heal a leper, a paralyzed man, Peter’s sick mother-in-law and then, for a grand finale, just before stepping in the boat and sailing into the storm, “…they brought to (Jesus) many who were demon-possessed; and He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all who were ill.” (Matthew 8:16)
Obviously Jesus knew that His disciples would face this test of faith just as He knows when our trials are coming. It might seem like He’s asleep, but if we rely on Him to deliver us from the trial, we won’t wonder, “What kind of a man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?” like the men in that storm-tossed boat; we’ll be able to answer that question emphatically as those same men were able to do soon after this incident; “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (Matthew 16:16)
As I said above, everyone will eventually face something that they are powerless to handle in their own physical and/or emotional strength. This is the place where we discover how weak and fragile we are and how big and powerful God is.
“…we do not want you to be unaware, brethren, of our affliction…that we were burdened excessively, beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life; indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead…” (2 Corinthians 1:8-9)
Comparing Yourself to Others
I have learned to be careful about not comparing my life to those that are healthier and wealthier than me because I believe doing so can lead to hopelessness and depression.
I suppose it’s unrealistic, at least for me, not to compare our life to the lives of others, but I’ve discovered that I can choose who I compare myself with. Instead of comparing myself to people who are wealthy, healthy; people doing things like taking exotic vacations to places I’ve always wanted to visit etc, I compare my lot in life with the unhealthy, the persecuted and the poor.
Like all aspects of maintaining hope, this kind of selective comparison doesn’t come naturally for most of us not living in Third-world nations. For many years, even before I had ALS, I practiced this selective comparison by reading articles and watching documentaries about the poor and persecuted of the world and by following and supporting ministries and missionaries that worked to relieve their suffering.
Then, about 2 & ½ years ago, I became a missionary myself; an “Online Missionary” with an organization called Global Media Outreach. This is a great non-denominational Internet ministry that is able to reach people with the Gospel in areas that traditional missionaries cannot go; remote regions and nations like China and Iran where mission work is restricted or banned altogether. GMO has roughly 100 different Internet sites that can be accessed via computer and/or a cell phone. One or more of these sites will always be among the first listed when people Google words like Jesus, Christianity, religion or God etc. GMO has thousands of volunteers that communicate with millions of people every year. I’ve heard many heartbreaking stories from people that have emailed or texted me through GMO, many of which have become close friends of mine. The following are some of stories I’ve heard.
- Men and women in Africa dying from AIDS or other diseases.
- New Christians in the Middle-east living in fear of their Muslim family discovering they’ve converted (one 20 year-old man was living in hiding from his father).
- Abandoned or widowed mothers contemplating giving up their children because they cannot afford to feed them.
- People who are bound by long-term drug, alcohol or sexual addictions.
These are just a few examples of stories I hear regularly from people I communicate with through GMO. These are also the people I choose to compare my life to and by doing so I feel extremely blessed.
My oldest daughter and her husband recently took a mission trip to Uganda and they both told me it was a reality check for them. They saw what life was like for the vast majority of people on this earth; not knowing where their next meal would come from and living in fear that a drink of water or a bite from a mosquito might make them violently ill or even end their life. Lauren and James don’t have much, but, like Mary and I, they feel blessed because they’ve chosen to measure their life by the reality of Uganda instead of by the “American dream.”
I believe everyone, especially followers of Christ and Christians going through trials, should do volunteer work to help the less fortunate and to give us a realistic gauge to measure our life and current circumstances by and most of all to be obedient to Christ.
“I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me…Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.” (Mathew 25:35-40)
“Instead of comparing our lot with that of those who are more fortunate than we are, we should compare it with the lot of the great majority of our fellow men. It then appears that we are among the privileged.”
Helen Keller
Unshakable Hope 