Planting times

     I'm reading a book by Warren Wiersbe right now and thought these practical lessons on suffering were really helpful.  So here they are:

     "1. God has not determined to make us comfortable, but He has determined to make us conformable.  He will put us into the furnace to remove the dross and to make us moldable in His hands.  But keep this in mind: when you are in the furnace, your Father keeps His eye on the clock and His hand on the thermostat.  He knows just how much we can take.
     2. The battles of life are not easy, but God has given us the equipment we need to succeed.  Each victory prepares us for the next assault.  The race of life is not easy, but as we accept each new challenge, we grow and can accomplish more.
     3.We need patience. The harvest doesn't come immediately.  God doesn't bury us; He plants us.  And He promises that our experience will produce a harvest.
     4. Times of travail can be times of birth.  Today's suffering can mean tomorrow's glory.  God is not accomplishing all His purposes today, nor is He explaining all His plans.  We do not need to give birth to Ben-Oni; we can give birth to a Benjamin. [oops--that is from earlier in Wiersbe's book.  I'll explain in a second.]
     5. The storms of life are frightening, but God can speak to us out of the whirlwind. Even the storms can fulfill His will.
     6. Yield to the pruning knife; it will make us more fruitful.  Accept the cup that the Father gives us.

     One quick explanation: when Jacob and his family were moving from Bethel, his beloved wife Rachel went into childbirth.  It was a terribly difficult labor. "As she breathed her last--for she was dying--she named her son Ben-Oni [son of my trouble].  But his father named him Benjamin [son of my right hand]." (Gen. 35:16-18)  Jacob gave his baby a new name that would remind him not of his mother's death and sorrow but of his father's love and joy in him.  As Wiersbe commented on this: "In our experiences of travail, we need to trust God and dare to believe that the results will be triumph and not sorrow, no matter how much we may hurt.  The tribe of Benjamin became a noble people in Israel and gave the nation her first king.  They also gave the world the apostle Paul."
     Isn't that just so like God?  He takes our suffering and redeems it and uses it for purposes far beyond what we could ever imagine.  He truly does bring good out of even the dregs of despair.  He give us compassion and strength.  He gives us the ability to minister to others in ways far deeper and truer than we'd ever have otherwise.  He gives us hope and gratitude and depth.  And when we look to Him and trust His plans and purposes, He enables us to grow and blossom--because He "doesn't bury us; He plants us. And He promises that our experience will produce a harvest."  How I love that!  Like the seed in the ground--planted, not buried, to produce the harvest of beauty in the future.
     So today, if you are suffering in anyway, might you remember God is not burying, He is planting... and preparing to produce a harvest.  Keep trusting.  He is working... even when we cannot see... like the silent seed, planted deep in the soil, waiting, waiting to burst forth in glory.
     Never forget: the tomb is empty.  And we follow a betrayed, suffered, tortured, crucified, planted in a tomb... and RISEN IN GLORY SAVIOR.   We can trust Him in our own hard planting times... 'cause the glory is coming.  To God be the glory.