In the four years that I was undiagnosed, I prayed my illness would be something I could die from. I know that sounds morbid but I had such faith that heaven with Christ was far better than this place that... well in the words of Paul, "to live is Christ and to die is gain". Better to go sooner rather than later. No more pain, no more tears, no more watching my friends enjoy the fullness of this life while I stay confined to my bed. My Abba Father would finally rescue me from this world and wipe away my tears.
Today, while I still have chronic physical pain, it is not completely debilitating. Today I feel the rod lashing into my heart and wish to trade it for the physical pain I once had. Today I am tempted to pray for cancer that would eat up my flesh and put me face to face with my Savior. Today I read this post from Ray Ortland and was comforted and corrected. The fullness of life is not health and opportunity to do stuff. The fullness of this life is to experience fellowship with Christ and take refuge in the shadow of His wings when I just can't take it anymore. The greater depths of sorrow give opportunity for even greater inexpressible joy. One day, should I persevere, I may look deep upon the bloodied face of the Lamb that was slain looking just like Him and say, "I believed You. You told me it was worth it and now I see it is true".
“Ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold trials.” 1 Peter 1:6, AV
"I was lying upon my couch during this last week, and my spirits were sunken so low that I could weep by the hour like a child, and yet I knew not what I wept for—but a very slight thing will move me to tears just now—and a kind friend was telling me of some poor old soul living near, who was suffering very great pain, and yet she was full of joy and rejoicing. I was so distressed by the hearing of that story, and felt so ashamed of myself, that I did not know what to do, wondering why I should be in such a state as this, while this poor woman, who had a terrible cancer and was in the most frightful agony, could nevertheless ‘rejoice with joy unspeakable, and full of glory.’ And in a moment this text flashed upon my mind, with its real meaning. I am sure it is its real meaning.
Read it over and over again, and you will see I am not wrong. ‘Though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness.’ It does not say, ‘Though now for a season ye are suffering pain, though now for a season you are poor,’ but ‘you are in heaviness.’ Your spirits are taken away from you; you are made to weep; you cannot bear your pain; you are brought to the very dust of death, and wish that you might die. Your faith itself seems as if it would fail you. That is the thing for which there is a ‘needs be.’ That is what my text declares, that there is an absolute ‘needs be’ that sometimes the Christian should not endure his sufferings with a gallant and a joyous heart; there is a ‘needs be’ that sometimes his spirits should sink within him and that he should become even as a little child smitten beneath the hand of God. Ah! beloved, we sometimes talk about the rod, but it is one thing to see the rod, and it is another thing to feel it. And many a time have we said within ourselves, ‘If I did not feel so low spirited as I now do, I should not mind this affliction.’ And what is that but saying, ‘If I did not feel the rod, I should not mind it?’ It is just how you feel that is, after all, the pith and marrow of your affliction. . . . I think this one idea has been enough to be food for me many a day; and there may be some child of God here to whom it may bring some slight portion of comfort.”
C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, 1950), IV:346-347.
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