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When Suffering Feels Too Great

by | Jul 25, 2020 | Bible Study, Gospel, Grace, Hope, The Year of Restoration

The last few months have been some of the most trying times I think this country has endured in decades. Unspeakable pain and heartache has flooded into countless lives and hardly anyone has escaped the devastation.

As I read my Bible this morning this passage stuck out to me:

“We were crushed and overwhelmed beyond our ability to endure, and we thought we would never live through it. In fact, we expected to die. But as a result, we stopped relying on ourselves and learned to rely only on God, who raises the dead. And he did rescue us from mortal danger, and he will rescue us again. We have placed our confidence in him, and he will continue to rescue us.”
— 2 Corinthians 1:8–10

There is no easy answer for suffering. It can be excruciating and it can feel unbearable. We read in Roman 8:28 that all things work together for good. That can be hard to understand when we can’t possible see any “good” from the suffering.

But what if the good is simply that fact that sometimes the suffering is so great, so unbearable, that we honestly can’t handle it, and therefore we must depend on God to sustain us?

What if the blessing in the midst of suffering is that it forces us on our knees far more often than if life had been a little less complicated?

This passage this morning is where my hopes lies. I pray it feeds your soul, too. ?

~Em

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About the Author

Emily Elizabeth Anderson is a Christian blogger and rising activist for people who have experienced abuse within a Christian environment.

After growing up in a fundamentalist cult for 23 years and experiencing childhood domestic violence, Emily began her journey to recovery in 2015 and eventually found Jesus to be her ultimate healer. She soon turned her passion for writing into a blog and her story has since been featured on several media outlets including NPR.

She married her best friend, Joshua, in 2020 and together they are passionate about educating on the realities of trauma survival and recovery, as well as supporting survivors they meet through their online community.

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