Help for Ukraine

Ordinary people on both sides of this conflict are suffering significant hardship. I know there is suffering in many places around the world, but if you would like to help out in Ukraine, Slavic Gospel Association provides an easy and practical way to do it right now. https://www.sga.org/ukraineaid/ Urgent Need for Aid as up to …

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The Ministry of Listening

Sometimes the best help we can give is a sensitive heart and a listening ear. Let's remember to listen. Anton Chekhov understood a newly bereaved parent's compelling need to talk about their loss. Here are excerpts form his short story, Misery. "With a look of anxiety and suffering Iona's eyes stray restlessly among the crowds …

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A Bar of Steel Worth Five Dollars

A bar of steel worth five dollars, when wrought into horseshoes, is worth ten dollars. If made into needles, it is worth three hundred and fifty dollars. If made into into penknife blades, it is worth thirty-two thousand dollars. If made into into springs for watches it is worth two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. …

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The Ministry of Sorrow | Tim Challies

"We should not long to suffer, but we should be willing to. We should not desire loss, but we should consent to bow the head, to bow the heart, to bow the knee, and to be a blessing to God’s people in whatever sorrows God ordains for us. When we surrender ourselves to God, we …

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Depression and the Child of God

There is no getting around the fact that losing a loved one is a painful experience and a legitimate reason for being sad. Sometimes, (especially when we have been hurting for what seems like a very long time), we, or someone who cares about us, may wonder if we are OK. I am not a …

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Suffering: A Perspective

Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; and them which suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the body. Hebrews 13:3 One of the neat things about blogging on the internet is that people from around the world can read what I write. For someone, such as myself, who remembers when hand-held calculators were …

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Strength From the Sorrow – Streams in the Desert, March 11

"Weeping inconsolably beside a grave can never give back love’s banished treasure, nor can any blessing come out of such sadness. Sorrow makes deep scars; it writes its record ineffaceably on the heart which suffers. We really never get over our great griefs; we are never altogether the same after we have passed through them …

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That Woman

You may have met her. That woman. The one who has an incurable health problem and has only months to live. The one whose husband has run off and shamed her. The one with the wayward teen. The one whose child died. You may have met her, that woman who is living your worst nightmare. I …

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Job’s Wife

"God is good when things are going my way. God is good when things are not optimal. God is good when life is smooth and peaceful. God is good when calamity strikes. The fact that God allows painful things to happen does not change who He is." Then said his wife unto him, Dost thou …

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Revised Post: Accident or Appointment?

Did God Take Our Son, or Was it an Accident? “No, God does not do evil.  God is good.  But he does direct events here on earth and allows sinful man a lot of freedom to prove his utter hopelessness apart from the Almighty. And sometimes that gets pretty ugly.” Grieving, suffering mother, you could …

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No More Sorrow by Miss Mary Slessor

 This article recounts the sad scene of the funeral of an African child. Her thoughts on this cause her to meditate on Revelation Chapter 21, Verse 4: We have to start early for the services on Sabbath morning, as we go far over the hills, and it is stony land and hard to manage – …

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Why Does God Allow Suffering? – Interview with Helen Roseveare (video)

You are going through something terrible - your worst nightmare has come true.  Suppose, in the midst of it, God were to ask you: “Can you thank me for trusting you with this experience, even if I never tell you why?” How would you respond? Listen to Dr. Helen Roseveare (1925-2016) as she shares the …

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