Going Through Hard Times

"One of the reasons we go through hard times is so we can comfort other people who are going through hard times."

Not quite


 This one is almost true but just misses. It’s usually based on experience and the verse that says we are to comfort others with the comfort we have received.

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ. (2 Corinthians 1:3-5)

One person “rewrote” it in her mind to say, “We go through troubles so that we can comfort others with the comfort we have received.” That’s not what it says, that’s adding to the Word of God. This concept has prompted people to actually seek out hard times, to embrace hard times rather than overcome them when they do come and/or give others who are going through hard times a rather cold comfort—that hard times are good for you.

In addition, the context of this scripture is “sharing in the sufferings of Christ”—persecutions received for being obedient to Jesus’ teachings.

“God Makes Christians Sick” part 3

“God makes Christians sick in order to teach them something.”
This teaching/belief is often paired with one that says that God wants Christians to suffer. The confusion comes in when people so often read in the New Testament of the testing, character building and correction God brings about through our suffering. However, to equate this with sickness or everyday difficulties of life is to remove it from its context. The context of every New Testament reference to needed or “beneficial” suffering is that of suffering for Jesus’ name’s sake.

Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you stood your ground in a great contest in the face of suffering. Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated. You sympathized with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions. Hebrews 10:32-34

Read some accounts of Christian martyrs through the ages, of Christians imprisoned in the former Soviet Union and even today in China, to see the difference. (You can contact me for places to read these stories.)