A few of our pastors had the privilege to be treated to dinner by Paul Tripp this past week. Paul and his friend were in town teaching a quick class at Southern Seminary .
As dinner rolled on, we began talking about love and Paul mentioned Amos 4. We discussed how God tells the people all of the tribulations that He brought their way but they did not turn back to Him. The list includes holding back rain, smiting their crops with mildew and blight, sending plagues and even killing some of their young men with swords. If you read the chapter, these are not things that God allowed, but rather, these are things that God directly brought about from His own hand. We might ask ‘Why?”.
When we think about God’s love, do we consider that He is willing to do anything to give us what is best. Is God willing to break our legs, bring heartache, suffering, discontent, along with huge lists of other things in order for us to have what is best? The answer that we find in Scripture is a resounding “YES!” What would it profit for us to gain the whole world, all it’s riches and comforts and then lose our souls? What good would it do for us to become a child of God and then never grow past being a babe in Christ? How would this bring glory to God and how could this be best for us?
So what is best? Is happiness best? Is our comfort best? Is an easy life best? All of these things are not best. They actually fall so short of what is best that it would be like comparing the chance to live in a kingdom as a son of the King along with all it’s riches with having the chance to walk out alone into the dessert to die a long, slow, painful death. It’s a no-brainer right?
So why do we choose what we don’t really need? The problem is that we have short term vision. If we can look with eternal eyes, we can see that we would always trade the temporary in order to gain the eternal. As Paul writes, “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.” (Romans 8:18)
Are you looking at your trials as gifts today? Are you hoping to be released from their midst as quickly as possible? If we look at these questions with eternal eyes, we might answer these questions differently. Ask God to help you view the circumstances that surround your life today with eternal eyes.
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