John Cassian (ca. 360-435) was a world-travelling ascetic who thought a lot about suffering. And in his work, On the Death of the Saints (conference 6, chapter 11), he takes an aside to consider why God brings trials into our lives, both believers and unbelievers.1
Here’s my summary of Cassian’s reasons for suffering, along with a verse for each reason. He includes some of these verses and many others in the work I’m summarizing, which you can read online or in Accordance.
God uses suffering for probation.
And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. (Deut. 8:2 ESV)
God uses suffering to warn us.
When a scoffer is punished, the simple becomes wise; when a wise man is instructed, he gains knowledge. (Prov. 21:11 ESV)
God uses suffering for punishment and justice.
The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself. (Ezek. 18:20 ESV)
God uses suffering to reject us, which is “worse than all other punishments”
The bellows blow fiercely; the lead is consumed by the fire; in vain the refining goes on, for the wicked are not removed. Rejected silver they are called, for the LORD has rejected them. (Jer. 6:28-30 ESV)
God uses suffering to improve us.
We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope. (Rom. 5:3–4 ESV)
God uses suffering to prove his work in us.
You have been grieved by various trails, so that the tested genuine of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in the praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 1:7 ESV)
God uses suffering to manifest his glory.
“It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.” (John 9:3 ESV)
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For more thoughts on the trials of Christians in particular, read Joel Beeke’s exposition of Westminster Confession of Faith 17.3. ↩︎
What can a church do to prevent a shooting in their congregation?
Here are a four practical ideas drawn from Safe Schools Arizona: An Action Plan to Enhance the Safety of Arizona Schools and Communities. A plan David French calls,
perhaps the most intelligent policy response to school shootings (and, honestly, mass shootings more generally) that I’ve ever read.
Here are the ideas taken from the Ducey’s plan:
- Mental health first aid training
- Confidential, centralized reporting tip line
- [Procedures for handling tips] Ducey’s plan assumes these are already in place
- Lockdown training [and] clear procedures that differentiate between active shooter drills [and] fire drills
⍟ I love these lines in Michael Perry’s “O God Beyond All Praising”:
And whether our tomorrows be filled with good or ill, We’ll triumph through our sorrows and rise to bless you still.
If you want to memorize poetry, espcially rhyming poetry, consider finding a good hymnal.
⍟ Alan Jacobs (@ayjay) on Snakes and Ladders:
I have come to believe that this is what almost all of our culture is about now: working the refs.
When the other disciples told Thomas that they had seen Jesus, risen from the dead, Thomas didn’t believe them. Their testimony to the truth wasn’t good enough for him.
Was this diligent truth-seeking or something else? And can we rely on the testimony of others about Jesus?
Michael Kruger addresses that second question in his excellent post, Can We Believe God’s Word is True Because our Parents Told Us? I draw from this article to answer the first question in my sermon this morning on John 20:24–31.
The testimony concerning Jesus is trustworthy. I hope that you will believe it. Because as John says:
Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
- Shortcut: WorldCat Search
- Shortcut: WorldCat Markdown Link
Until recently, I used Amazon almost exclusively for sharing links to books. But you may have noticed that in the last month or so I’ve been linking to WorldCat instead. WorldCat still shows you where to find a book on Amazon but it also offers other options, including which nearby libraries have what you’re looking for. I got this idea from @craigmcclellan who shares music in a similar way.
And thanks to Craig and his @theclassnerd co-host Robby Burns, I also learned how to create Shortcuts on iOS. So now, when I want to share a book on my blog, here’s what I do.
- Look up a book on WorldCat through their website or through the WorldCat Search Shortcut, which will find your book on WorldCat after you scan its barcode.
- With the book’s WorldCat page open, I run WorldCat Markdown Link. This copies a pre-formatted markdown link for the page to my clipboard.
- Then, I paste the link.
If this looks useful to you, download the Shortcuts and try it for yourself. You can modify them to suit your needs.
At the moment, these Shortcuts work perfectly in Safari. In the future, I’d like to get the same results on other browsers. If you can figure out how to do that, I’d love to hear from you.
