Morning Coffee with Gomarus

I will conclude this series of posts looking at Our Response to Adversity:

What is our first priority in times of adversity?   Our first priority is to honor and glorify God by trusting Him . . .  We honor God by trusting Him, and acting accordingly, even when we don’t understand what He is doing or why He has allowed some adversity to occur.

In Proverbs we are told to Trust in the Lord . . . and not lean on our own understanding (Prov. 3:5).  I think we should see that trusting God is not a matter of my feeling but my will.  I never feel like trusting God when adversity strikes, but by His grace I can choose to do so even when I don’t feel like it.  (more…)

In this 3rd post of my little series, I look at the Cause and Purpose of Our Adversity:

We have said that in order to rightly deal with adversity we must (1) trust our sovereign, wise, and loving God, and (2) we must view our adversity with a biblical perspective.  As part of that perspective, we must remember that ultimately it is God who gives adversity.  You and I obviously do not seek out adversity just so we can develop a deeper relationship with God.  Rather God, through adversity, draws us into a deeper relationship with Him.  If we find ourselves seeking Him, it is because He is seeking us.

Is my affliction, or the affliction of a loved one outside of God’s will?  Let’s see: (more…)

Continuing my mini-series on dealing with adversity: 

I read another little book that deals with handling adversity in our Christian walk.  It’s a book by an old Scottish puritan, Thomas Boston (1676-1732), entitled The Crook in the Lot.  Now, though it might sound like it by the title, this is not a book about a used car salesman.  In fact, this would be an appropriate title for my little series on dealing with adversity — The Crook in the Lot.

By the word lot, Boston is of course referring to one’s portion in life — as for example when we sing “Whatever my lot thou hast taught me to say it is well, it is well, with my soul.”  And by the word crook, he is referring to the adversity in one’s lot or life.  He goes to Ecclesiastes for the theme verse for his book:

Consider the work of God, for who is able to straighten what He has made crooked. (Eccl. 7:13) 

This is not unlike the last portion of our verse in Lamentations from my last post, where we read  “He has made my paths crooked,” (Lam. 3:9).  (more…)

Adversity, trials, tribulations . . .  these are things which we as individuals must expect, especially as Christians — for God is in the process of sanctifying us, maturing us, teaching us, and conforming us to the image of His Son.  Nevertheless, adversity is something we also have trouble with.  We don’t understand why it happens to us, we don’t know how God could allow these things, we doubt His love and wisdom when He does, . . . we want Him to deliver us from our trials immediately, . . . and we despair when he doesn’t.

Now I don’t profess any particular wisdom in dealing with adversity.  I’m certainly not qualified by virtue of trials I’ve endured. Yet, how we deal with the adversities in our Christian walk is a very real issue — and the subject of a short series here at my blog. (more…)