The Lord Gave and the Lord Takes Away

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• Dr Desmond Ford
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Nov 9, 2014 3305

by Des Ford

Job 1:21

Sorrow, my friends, is normal and necessary. Christ sanctioned it when he wept and when he told the daughters of Jerusalem to weep. God has put the fountain of tears in every heart. We are meant to experience sorrow. It has indispensable uses and the worst thing that could happen to anybody in this world would be to have a pain free existence. The result would be a molly coddle.

In Old Testament times they said, “How can a person be godly when they suffer so?” In the New Testament times they say, “How can a person be God-like if they have never suffered?” The lesson of the Old Testament was material prosperity; the blessing of the New Testament is adversity.

Spurgeon was right when he said about troubles that if they don’t bruise they don’t benefit. Sayings like these are hard sayings but true sayings. To understand them is to find peace; to refuse them and to reject them is to always be under tension, always upset, always uncertain, always vulnerable.

The only person who is invulnerable is the one who believes that God is in control about everything…. the small, the medium, and the huge things. There is no peace apart from faith in the absolute sovereignty of God. It is our self-love that is the root of all our disturbance, whereas the opposite would be if we have such a love of God as can trust him and say, God is king, the Lord gave and the Lord takes away.”

– Des Ford. Rom 8:28-39 (from “My Servant Job″)