When you face trouble, loss, disability, and pain, how does the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ meet you and comfort you? How does grace and goodness find you, touch you, work with you, and walk with you through deep waters?
When I was struggling through a season of darkness, one friend offered her cottage for me to rest. Another friend gave me some books to read. One of those books was, God’s Grace in your Suffering. I wanted to use this time of rest to listen to God’s heartbeat to get to know him better. It was supposed to be a slow intentional time of reflective restoration. Powlison’s book made it hard for me to go slow. His book was easy to read, warm and full of Biblical gems that I wanted more of as quickly as possible.
The purpose of his book was to anchor my “experience more deeply in God’s goodness.” “Suffering,’ he writes, ''reveals the genuineness of faith in Christ. And suffering produces genuine faith.” Yes!! I want genuine faith in Christ. Powlison does not glamourize suffering as something we want to endure but in his comforting way does encourage the reader that our suffering is not missed by God and he is near while he draws us closer to him to make us stronger.
Powlison’s book is written to be a personal workshop which makes it such a practical tool. He begins with inviting the reader to get personal and name their specific difficulty, to write it on the pages and read the book through that lens. He writes, “Your Redeemer invites you to consider any life-troubling situation, whether large or small, and then make it personal. None of us suffers in general.” Taking the time to intentionally be thoughtful about our afflictions and be led through questions helps the reader to pause and reflect well.
Powlison is an experienced counsellor and the format of the book feels like you’re sitting with a dear uncle as he uses God’s Word to work through the hymn, “How Firm a Foundation” to point us to Christ. He uses teaching, story and questions to guide and comfort the reader through showing us God’s grace and goodness. The stories are oftentimes very personal, from his own life, demonstrating very closely how God used his suffering to strengthen his faith. He also finishes each chapter with a section he titled, “Making it Personal for You”. Those are opportunities for the reader to search their heart and see more of God in their story in a very tangible way.
This book creates a space to ask the questions, “Why me? Why this? Why now? Why?”. He invites the reader into lament, into conversation with the Lord. Yet, he does not leave us there but offers hope in our despair. “...he steps into your significant suffering. He will see you through and work with you the whole way. He will carry you even in the most difficult situations.” As this reality sinks in, he invites the reader to move from “Why me?” to “Why you?” to finally, “Why not me?”. God’s Grace in your Suffering is personal and practical and points the sufferer to Christ on every page. If you are in a hard season or if you’re walking with someone who is, I highly recommend you read this book. You will want to sing, “How Firm a Foundation” every day!
Questions to Consider:
What hardship are you facing?
How can you honestly wrestle your way toward trusting God?
What songs are you singing in your suffering?
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