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Advent is a time of preparation for remembrance of when God became flesh and dwelt among us. The birth, life, death, and resurrection of our Lord Christ Jesus is the beginning of our story as Christians.
I have spent most of my adult life teaching the stories of the Bible. There are so many that have special meaning for me, but reading the stories of the Apostle Paul whom God chose to spread the Good News gives all of us hope in these times of such unrest and even assault on our Christian faith.
I would like to share an excerpt from Ralph Sockman’s book The Meaning of Suffering. Dr. Sockman was a renown Methodist minister. This is an interview with the Apostle Paul.
Question: Paul, What are some of the things which have happened to you?
Answer: Five times I have received forty lashes less one. Three times I have been beaten with rods; once I was stoned. Three times I have been shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been adrift at sea; and frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, from robbers, from my own people, and from Gentiles. In toil and hardship through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. (II Cor. 11:24-27).
Question: How much did these adversities hinder you?
Answer: I want you to know, brethren, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel. (Phil. 1:12). I have learned, in whatever state I am, to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound: in any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want. (Phil. 4:11-12).
Question: What is your secret to this?
Answer: We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us (Rom. 5:3-5).
Question: But do not disasters sometimes make you doubt Divine Love?
Answer: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ: Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?….No, in all these things we are more than conquerers through Him who loved us. (Rom. 8:35, 37).
Paul taught us that each one of us is a beloved child of God. We are never alone.
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