“The grave danger to sufferers is not admission of weakness but delusions of strength. . . . . if you tell yourself and other that you are strong, then you won’t seek and they won’t offer the enabling and strengthening grace that every sufferer needs.”- Paul David Tripp
Paul David Tripp concludes Chapter 13 of Suffering with ways four through seven to admit your need and open the door to God’s warehouse of provision.
4. Admit your weakness. Pastor Tripp observes that publicly faking what’s not privately true fails to honor God’s reputation. Rather than clinging to delusions of strength, let God use your travail to expose weaknesses of heart you didn’t know existed. And, God doesn’t do that to shame you. Instead, He wants to create in you a desire for His transforming grace.
So when you suffer, you view weakness either as an enemy or an opportunity.
5. Confess your blindness. In our sinful world, pockets of blindness exist in all of us. As a result, we exhibit inaccuracies of belief, subtle but wrong desires, wrong attitudes, susceptibilities to temptation, struggles with God, and evidences of hopelessness. However, others see what you don’t. Thus, they can speak into issues in your life as God’s agents of rescue and transformation.
6. Seek wise counsel. Amidst the despondency of suffering and the tumultuous emotions involved, it’s dangerous to make important life decisions. Therefore, when you’re suffering, you need to surround yourself with wise and godly counselors. Wise sufferers welcome and enjoy the harvest of good fruit godly counsel produces.
7. Remember that your suffering doesn’t belong to you. As 2 Corinthians 1:3-9 tells us, our sufferings belong to the Lord. In turn, the Lord uses the hard and difficult things in your life to produce good things in the lives of others. The comfort of community = a two-way street.
With your toolbox of gospel skills, you stand ready and equipped as God’s agent of comfort to your fellow sufferers. There’s blessing when you take your eyes off yourself and place them on others.
Today’s question: What grave danger do you see in delusions of strength? Please share.
Tomorrow’s blog: “Suffering – the intersection of pain + blessing”
