Sovereignty and Suffering #reformed #bible #faith

Let me echo this in a way that God is comforting Joel in this day.

I want to comfort you, friends, who are suffering today. He has not abandoned you to darkness.

He did not depart from you yesterday in your trial. And he will not depart from you in your dreary night ahead.

God is there. God is protecting you. Though the armies may be raised around you, may the trials come.

Whatever it be, our God is there with you. And there's purpose in it.

There's a reason behind it. And it might just be that it's all for His glory.

It might be the ultimate purpose that's behind it. It's all for His glory. This is what you need to know.

That is to be faithful to Him, for He is faithful and true and has looked over you.

If you're challenged in this today and rationalizing your sufferings in the sovereignty of God, I beg you to look no further than the cross.

First Peter 2, 24 -25 says this, Who Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that having died to sin, we might live to righteousness.

By His wounds you were healed. For you were continually straying like a sheep.

But now you have returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls.

The same God, brothers and sisters, who tells Job to look at the stars, is the same

God who providentially cares for the trees. He is the same

God who became flesh and is the same God who was crucified upon the same tree that He caused to sprout.

The same God that can tell you where the goat will give birth is the same God who cares for you as a shepherd and overseer for your soul.

Have faith in Him today. Trust in Him. If you do, you are His sheep and you are in His sovereign hand.

Take confidence in the world with that. Take confidence in His word when you approach the world in that.

Be the wandering donkey who laughs at everything going around you because you know God is the one in control of it.

That you are in a kingdom that you are so undeserving of. The King came and died upon a tree for you and He rose again.

Let us pray. God, we thank You for what You have done.

Lord, You are sovereign. You do cause the trees to sprout. You do cause them to be sustained. Lord, You even cause it when the tree is cut down and You even cause it so that You would be crucified for our salvation.

You are worthy of worship today, Lord. So God, may we continue to do that in our fellowship.

May we go home glorifying and thinking and pondering on the ways that You have answered Job and the ways that that application of knowing that You are

God, that You are mighty, that You care, that You protect and that You provide in those ways that can encourage us in our hardships today.

Though there be many, there is none that are forgotten by You, God. You are good.

You are great. And we ask for Your will to be done today. And I ask this, we ask this in Your name, Jesus the