Trouble can be good for you - if it drives you to God through prayer.
E.M. Bounds, a prolific author of books on prayer in the 1800s, says that God allows trouble in our lives to shape us into the likeness of Christ. We need trouble.
Without trouble, we might easily believe we can manage everything on our own. Trouble makes us realize we need help.
In his book The Essentials of Prayer, Bounds writes:
"Trial is testing. It is that which proves us, tests us, and makes us stronger and better when we submit to the trial and work together with God in it."
Bounds says prayer "sees God's hand in trouble, and prays about it".
He suggests we should bow before God in the troubles we face and ask him what he will have us do.
"Prayer in the time of trouble brings comfort, help, hope, and blessings, which, while not removing the trouble, enable the saint [believer] the better to bear it and to submit to the will of God."
Bounds acknowledges that some troubles are of our own making. But, whatever the problems we face, we can find hope, direction, and comfort in prayer.
Sometimes, we will find - like Jacob's son Joseph in the Old Testament - that the troubles God allows have a completely unexpected result. In Joseph's case, he was sold into slavery and wound up becoming the Egyptian Pharaoh's right-hand man so that he could save his family, the future nation of Israel.
Bounds says: "God can and will lay his hand upon all such events in answer to prayer, and cause them to work for us 'a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory'."
He adds: "Prayer places us where God can bring to us the greatest good, spiritual and eternal. Prayer allows God to freely work with us and in us in the day of trouble."
Of course, much depends on our attitude to trouble. Do we accuse God of abandoning us? Or, do we seek him to find out how he is using trials to make us more like him?
The apostle Paul bore suffering with the confidence that it would never compare to the glory he would see when he met Jesus in heaven.
That's something for me to remember when I'm struggling with anxiety.
E.M. Bounds, a prolific author of books on prayer in the 1800s, says that God allows trouble in our lives to shape us into the likeness of Christ. We need trouble.
Without trouble, we might easily believe we can manage everything on our own. Trouble makes us realize we need help.
In his book The Essentials of Prayer, Bounds writes:
"Trial is testing. It is that which proves us, tests us, and makes us stronger and better when we submit to the trial and work together with God in it."
Bounds says prayer "sees God's hand in trouble, and prays about it".
He suggests we should bow before God in the troubles we face and ask him what he will have us do.
"Prayer in the time of trouble brings comfort, help, hope, and blessings, which, while not removing the trouble, enable the saint [believer] the better to bear it and to submit to the will of God."
Bounds acknowledges that some troubles are of our own making. But, whatever the problems we face, we can find hope, direction, and comfort in prayer.
Sometimes, we will find - like Jacob's son Joseph in the Old Testament - that the troubles God allows have a completely unexpected result. In Joseph's case, he was sold into slavery and wound up becoming the Egyptian Pharaoh's right-hand man so that he could save his family, the future nation of Israel.
Bounds says: "God can and will lay his hand upon all such events in answer to prayer, and cause them to work for us 'a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory'."
He adds: "Prayer places us where God can bring to us the greatest good, spiritual and eternal. Prayer allows God to freely work with us and in us in the day of trouble."
Of course, much depends on our attitude to trouble. Do we accuse God of abandoning us? Or, do we seek him to find out how he is using trials to make us more like him?
The apostle Paul bore suffering with the confidence that it would never compare to the glory he would see when he met Jesus in heaven.
That's something for me to remember when I'm struggling with anxiety.
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