Let Me Suffer Well

So I've been listening to Mark Driscoll's recent podcast about prayer, which you can check out here, and he said three things that struck me as interestingly true.
One - When you come up again pain, difficulty, suffering, hardships...whatever you turn to is your functional savior. Food, drugs, alcohol, anger...those are functional saviors, but the best place to go is to God. HE is the complete Savior.
Two - Jesus did not pray for the "IF hardship comes moment" He prayed for the "WHEN hardship comes" moment. It will come. I should pray that God would get me through it, not out of it.
Three - I should not pray that dark, bleak moments be kept from me. Jesus, when He prayed in Gethsemane, prayed for deliverance from His future, but then went on to pray that God would let Him suffer well, let Him be betrayed well, let Him bleed well, let Him die well. If I am going to suffer I might as well not waste it, I should redeem it. I should pray that as I suffer through those moments, God would be honored and glorified as a result.

This week has been hard. We have been threatened with the loss of a family member. We are suffering. But our prayer has to be...let us suffer well. It brings peace knowing that whatever lies ahead, God will be glorified. We have determined that in our family heart.

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