Job 6:8 “Oh that I might have my request, and that God would fulfill my hope, that it would please God to crush me, that he would let loose his hand and cut me off! This would be my comfort; I would even exult in pain unsparing, for I have not denied the words of the Holy One. What is my strength, that I should wait? And what is my end, that I should be patient? Is my strength the strength of stones, or is my flesh bronze? Have I any help in me, when resource is driven from me?
Numbers 11:14-15 I am not able to carry all this people alone; the burden is too heavy for me. If you will treat me like this, kill me at once, if I find favor in your sight, that I may not see my wretchedness.”
1 Kings 19:4 But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers.”
Jonah 4:3 Therefore now, O LORD, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.”
Psalms 32:4 For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.
Isaiah 48:10-13 Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tried you in the furnace of affliction. For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it, for how should my name be profaned? My glory I will not give to another. “Listen to me, O Jacob, and Israel, whom I called! I am he; I am the first, and I am the last. My hand laid the foundation of the earth, and my right hand spread out the heavens; when I call to them, they stand forth together.
Affliction has a way of wearing us down to a place so void of hope that we seek God to just put us out of our misery. It is not as though we are the only ones who have felt this way or have been afflicted. The truth is many before us and many after us will experience affliction, this place where we are so over-burdened that our searching for God is hard if not almost impossible.
In the plans and purposes of God, we are allowed to experience and walk through affliction. It can be to draw us out of sinful path or to draw us into a much deeper and closer walk with Him. The path of affliction strips away the glossy veneer of this world’s false promises and our dependence on them. It takes away the lure it has and exposes it for what it is. Affliction will peel away the skin covering every nerve of our being and leave us wanting nothing this world has to offer.
When all is stripped away it is when we no longer hang on to the temporary things of this world and look only to Jesus Christ. It is in Him that we find comfort to our hearts deep in our souls. It is unpleasant but so glorious to have been afflicted and stripped of that which pulls us away from Jesus Christ. Only those who have experienced this type of affliction can tell of its blessed effect in and on their lives.
I can tell you that affliction without having Jesus Christ in your life leaves you with no hope but can lead you to Hope in Him. Affliction with Jesus Christ will increase your hope and take you on deeper paths of worship, honor, and glory for Him. Refined in the Furnace of Affliction.
