Be of Good Cheer!

John 16: 33

³³ “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace.

In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”

 

I spent the last two Sunday’s, preaching on suffering.

Honestly, I don’t believe the church spends a lot of time on the subject, frankly.

 

Do we in the church, have some entitlement believing that we should never go through hardships as we walk with Jesus?

I realize that this devotional might indeed, strike a nerve with some.

 

Jesus said that we should expect tribulation. TRIBULATION: unhappiness, pain, or suffering

Does that verse somehow get lost in the preceding and the following words Jesus speaks?

 

A.W. Tozier is quoted as saying...“It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until He has hurt him deeply.”

That quotation doesn’t seem to be following the American theology I’ve heard through the years.

 

Have we forgotten that they used to light on fire, people who spoke the name of Jesus publically?

Have you ceased to remember, that the main staple diet for the Roman lions, were followers of Jesus?

 

The best news of all, is that Jesus has overcome all this by enduring the cross.

He has already tasted some of the trouble we’ve had to endure...and then some!

 

Throughout history, what made the Gospel spread like wild fire, was the exact hardships that people had to go through.

God never wastes a moment, and He may be trying to do something powerful, through your personal tribulation.

 

Whatever you’re having to go through, let’s be sure to remember, to... “be of good cheer”...