Suffering Is Never for Nothing

by Elisabeth Elliot

And I’ve come to see that it’s through the deepest suffering that God has taught me the deepest lessons. And if we’ll trust Him for it, we can come through to the unshakable assurance that He’s in charge. He has a loving purpose. And He can transform something terrible into something wonderful. Suffering is never for nothing.

I’m convinced that there are a good many things in this life that we really can’t do anything about, but that God wants us to do something with.

Suffering is having what you don’t want or wanting what you don’t have.”

The deepest things that I have learned in my own life have come from the deepest suffering. And out of the deepest waters and the hottest fires have come the deepest things that I know about God.

There would be no intellectual satisfaction on this side of Heaven to that age-old question, why.

The very worst thing that ever happened in human history turns out to be the very best thing because it saved me.

suffering is an irreplaceable medium through which I learned an indispensable truth.

“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”

We would never ask the question why if we really believed that the whole of the universe was an accident and that you and I are completely at the mercy of chance.

That’s what Jesus was demonstrating. My life for yours.

We’re not adrift in chaos. We’re held in the everlasting arms.

You either believe God knows what He’s doing or you believe He doesn’t. You either believe He’s worth trusting or you say He’s not.

Whatever is in the cup that God is offering to me, whether it be pain and sorrow and suffering and grief along with the many more joys, I’m willing to take it because I trust Him. Because I know that what God wants for me is the very best. I will receive this thing in His name.

But when we’re talking about the gifts of God, we’re talking about gifts that come from One who knows exactly what we need even though it is not necessarily to our tastes and preferences.

And He gives us everything that is appropriate to the job that He wants us to do.

And so, understanding that, then we can say yes, Lord. I’ll take it. It would not have been my choice but knowing You love me, I will receive it and I understand that someday I’m ...

How to deal with suffering of any kind. Number one, I wrote, “Recognize it.” Number two, “Accept it.” Number three, “Offer it to God as a sacrifice.” And number four, “Offer yourself with it.”

The visible things are transitory. It is the invisible things that are really permanent.

But I do need to thank God that in the midst of that very situation the world was still in His hands. The One who keeps all those galaxies wheeling in space is the very hand that holds me. The hands that were wounded on the cross are the same hands that hold the seven stars.

I can realize that it is through that very thing which is so far from being the thing I would have chosen, that God wants to teach me His way of salvation.

It is in these very situations which are so painful—having what you don’t want, wanting with all your heart something that you don’t have—that thanksgiving can prepare the way for God to show us His Salvation.

Suffering and love are inextricably bound up together. And love invariably means sacrifice.

We know that the cross does not exempt us from suffering. In fact, the cross is a symbol of suffering. In fact, Jesus said you must take up your cross.

I

give Him my deaths and He gives me His life. My sorrows, He gives me joy. My losses, He gives me His gains. This is the great principle of the cross.