All posts tagged: comfort

When all hell breaks loose: Lessons from Job

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It was a beautiful day. I imagine tempretures in the low 70s. The warm summer breeze graced his face as he stood in the front of his ocean view house, basking in the glory and favor of his God. In the distance he noticed a runner – than another. One by one, messengers approached him dropping to their knees as they delivered heart breaking accounts of a beautiful and festive day gone bad. Job stood there listening to each one of them as they unloaded tragedy after tragedy. But the account that knocked him off his feet and brought him face to the ground was the account of the last runner.  Your sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house, and behold, a great wind came across the wilderness and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young people, and they are dead, and I alone have escaped to tell you. Have you ever been hit with bad news? How did you handle it? How should you handle it? I confess there …

Comfort Foods

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Comfort, comfort, comfort! Who doesn’t like to be comforted? The problem is we often seek it in all the wrong places. For me, finding comfort in food is my drug of choice when I am seeking comfort in difficult times. For some, it might be alcohol,  drugs, or some kind of temporary fix to cause you to forget your pain. Still for others, it is an escape into a world of fantasy,  entertainment,  the adrenaline of a fast life or a lustful, soulful,  sexual experience. In any case, we usually, if not always come away more empty than we went in. But it’s time for you to see and taste of the “sweetest of love, where your heart becomes free and your shame is undone. “ We find those in the comfort that comes only from the Father of all comforts.  If you are tempted in any way today,  to go looking for comfort in all the wrong places,  know that you will never be satisfied.  But if you choose to look upon the face …

Rivers of Living Waters

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In May of 1989 my family and I woke up to the sound of mortar blasts, and rocket launchers in our back yard. It was a great spot for the government soldiers because of the cliff overlooking the other side of the city, where rebel soldiers occupied. When we left our home that day, we came across many displaced people who had been without food and water for many weeks. The fighting was intense and life as we knew it, came to a stop. We had no idea what life would look like the next few weeks with less food and no source of safe drinking water. By the time we hit the second week on the run, we began to realize how important water is. Vital organs began to shut down because of dehydration. Skin began to get clammy. Coherent thoughts began to vanish. As we struggle to find safe drinking water, our mouths became dry; our heads ached and our Knees became weak. Sadly, many others fell by the roadside for lack of water. …

ReThinking the way you grieve

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There is nothing that can replace the absence of someone dear to us, and one should not even attempt to do so. One must simply hold out and endure it. At first that sounds very hard, but at the same time it is also a great comfort. For to the extent the emptiness truly remains unfilled one remains connected to the other person through it. It is wrong to say that God fills the emptiness. God in no way fills it but much more leaves it precisely unfilled and thus helps us preserve — even in pain — the authentic relationship. Furthermore, the more beautiful and full the remembrances, the more difficult the separation. But gratitude transforms the torment of memory into silent joy. One bears what was lovely in the past not as a thorn but as a precious gift deep within, a hidden treasure of which one can always be certain. — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

How to rise above Discouragement

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Luke 7:11-17 Soon afterward, Jesus went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a large crowd went along with him. As he approached the town gate, a dead person was being carried out—the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. And a large crowd from the town was with her. When the Lord saw her, his heart went out to her and he said, “Don’t cry.” Then he went up and touched the bier they were carrying him on, and the bearers stood still. He said, “Young man, I say to you, get up!” The dead man sat up and began to talk, and Jesus gave him back to his mother. They were all filled with awe and praised God. “A great prophet has appeared among us,” they said. “God has come to help his people.” This news about Jesus spread throughout Judea and the surrounding country. This story is one of the saddest in the gospels. It describes the life of a single mother who had just lost her only …