God’s Mysterious Gifts

God wants us to live healthy, wholesome lives, and the Word of the Lord provides tools and guidance on how to live those abundant lives. But we have also said that alongside God’s good purpose, His desire for us to be happy, prosperous, and healthy, we inhabit a reality in this world in which God’s desire must often contend with suffering and illness, with this fallen world in which we live; and that must also be acknowledged: there is a struggle between darkness and light, and we are like hostages in that cosmic struggle. And that is why there will also be suffering in life and all kinds of difficult situations, but, as the apostle Paul says, “Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors.” Amen?

And I have told you that my presentation on abundant life and healing, on emotional health and how to heal from our wounds, must acknowledge that dimension as well. I have presented to you what I have called a dynamic model, a model of struggle, because we Pentecostals often love to talk about victory, victory, victory, and we forget that there are also difficulties, suffering, and afflictions. Then everything is prosperity and good things, but when difficulties come, we often do not know what to do because we have not been prepared to deal with them. I prefer to see that in everything we are more than conquerors, and that everything sometimes includes difficulties and problems, and that we can even use them for great blessing.

And I want to focus on that. You know that we have discussed different subjects, such as the fact that God loves us and is with us; that our worth does not reside in the world or in external things, but in the inherent worth we possess as creatures of God; and many other subjects we have discussed, including the armor of faith that the Spirit gives us to help us fight when we face difficulties. And this morning I want to single out the subject of pain and suffering in order, once again, to strengthen this idea that amid life’s struggles and tribulations we can find victory and power, and can even grow more and more.

And that is why over the next two or three weeks I will be speaking about this subject: how to emerge victorious from life’s losses, from the absences we experience, from unanswered prayers, unrealized dreams, illnesses with which we must contend throughout our lives, pain that we have also seen our loved ones endure and that we suffer with them, and the afflictions that are normal in the fallen world in which we live.

Brothers and sisters, I have often said that part of healing in life, part of living healthy lives, is accepting, knowing, and expecting that suffering will come into our lives in many different ways. I believe that acknowledging this, adjusting to that fact, and accepting it as an inevitable part of the human condition while we are in this world is a source—or can be a source—of great emotional stability, because I believe that many of the distortions caused by pain arise because we think: I do not deserve this; or: if God were with me, that would not happen to me; or: I must be in sin, as many people sometimes say, because I am sick and a Christian is not supposed to be sick, so I must have done something wrong; or, as we have sometimes accused people: oh, you are not being healed because you have no faith. That is one of the most terrible things you can say to a person in crisis.

Do not say it or even suggest it, because what we do then is add pain and guilt to the pain they are already carrying. Sometimes, for example, when there is a loss, someone loses a loved one and is crying and sad, and we come along and tell them: No, Christians do not cry! Be strong and move on; or: it is time for you to get over that pain and pull yourself together.

Brother, walk the road with the person instead; love them, affirm them, feel their pain with them, comfort them with affirming words, and pray that the Lord will help them reach the place they need to reach. But do not add further burdens by filling their mind with guilt and making them feel worse.

Pain does not necessarily come to us because we have sinned or because we do not have enough faith. In fact, I have often said that pain may come because God loves us in a special way and wants to use certain pains to shape us and help us reach a higher level of life. Pain is an incredible ally in the pursuit of personal greatness.

Therefore, I believe that simply knowing that, as long as we are in this world, we will have to deal with some measure of negativity, loss, suffering, failure, emotional bondage, and difficulty helps us run the race of faith with a certain patience. Because if I think that God will somehow exempt me from pain because I am in the faith, then when pain inevitably comes, it will catch me by surprise and I will not be prepared.

It has helped me greatly to know that, quite simply, as long as I am in this world, I will face situations that I will have to confront. And what I must do when pain enters my life is gird up my loins, as it says, again, in Ephesians chapter 6: when the evil day comes, I put on the whole armor of God and say: Okay, now is the time to pray, fast, cry out, prepare myself well, and counteract what has come into my life; and to trust that at some point God will give me all the strength I need to emerge from it. And I will come forth shining like gold, as the Word of the Lord says; I will press on.

Pain can be a tremendous resource if we know how to deal with it. And that is why I will be working on this subject a little over the coming Sundays. But what I want to begin this—I decided to do something I do not usually do, and I am going to read part of my sermon because there is a—I am going to title this: The Mysterious Gifts of God, The Mysterious Gifts of God. Sometimes pain is a mysterious gift; it is a riddle that God gives us, and in the process of solving it, explaining it, and understanding it, we discover very beautiful things about God’s character and about ourselves as well.

And this is part of that book I have told you I am writing, which I have had to set aside for years. I have titled it Life by Design, and there is a section in it specifically about how to live a fruitful life, including pain as an ally and a gift from God, and how we can see wonderful things about God’s goodness and God’s good purpose in pain and suffering. We can often use life’s failures to grow and become more like Jesus Christ.

For the person committed to using all of life’s circumstances—failures, losses, and absences—for personal growth, there are no insurmountable barriers on the road to the summit, to personal greatness. Even failures, brothers and sisters, and adversity—even those obstacles that cannot be entirely overcome—can constitute raw material for success and personal fulfillment, and I would add: happiness.

Not long ago I read the extraordinary story of Steven Wilshere, an extraordinary figure who is very well known around the world and who has developed a truly exceptional artistic ability. Here is his interesting story, as told in an article from a London newspaper that I found some time ago.

This article says the following: “For most people, having a conversation is something very natural, but where others use words, Steven Wilshere uses images, paintings. Thirty-three-year-old Steven has autism, a brain disorder that limits social and communication skills and left him mute as a child. But that has not prevented this man, who has been called ‘the human camera,’ from achieving great success in his life. His incredible works of art, which include cityscapes of Manhattan and London, are all drawn to scale, including the precise number of floors and other structural features of those buildings, which he paints with great mastery.

Steven has developed his talent to such an extent that, after a 30-minute helicopter ride and a brief aerial tour over the city of Dubai, he is now drawing the city’s buildings from memory. The 4.5-meter-wide drawing”—we are talking about fourteen feet wide—“which will be completed by tomorrow, will have taken him only four days to execute and will be sold at auction to raise money for the Dubai Autism Center.” In fact, you can look up his drawing; it is on the internet. His name is Steven Wilshere; he is famous, and his paintings are very costly, very expensive.

“When Steven could not speak, he threw major tantrums because he was unable to make himself understood. However, his elementary school teacher in a London neighborhood saw him come alive when he was given pen and paper, and this encouraged her to help him try to express himself through art.

At the age of six, he amazed a family friend by drawing the facade of the Silfridges department store exactly, in a style far more advanced than would be expected of a child his age.

Drawing gave Steven the motivation to communicate with others and to live an independent life. In fact, it became such a powerful form of communication for him that it enabled him to learn to speak, according to his thirty-five-year-old sister Anette, who travels everywhere with him.” And I quote; his sister says: “We would take him to various distinctive buildings in the city of London and tell him: A is for the Albert Holme building, B is for Buckingham Palace, in order to help him learn language,” she adds. There you have him drawing the city of Dubai after traveling for 30 minutes, making a picture of the buildings of the city of Dubai, “in order to help him learn language,” she adds.

“Steven’s language skills have developed tremendously since then, but when we ask him how he feels when he draws, he simply tells us: I feel happy.

Steven Wilshere is what is known as an autistic savant, a person imprisoned within his own inner world but possessing a truly extraordinary and mysterious talent. Paradoxically, his ‘personal failure,’ in quotation marks, has endowed him with an incredible artistic gift that delights humanity and has led him to travel all over the world and gain international fame.

Steven was blessed to encounter people along the way who helped him overcome his limitations and discover the road to personal greatness.

I wonder: How many people like him might there be in the world, imprisoned within an apparent limitation or failure, unaware that their personal tragedy contains a mysterious coded gift from God?

Steven has not been healed, but he has turned his impairment into a wonderful instrument for personal success.”

That is why it is important, brothers and sisters, that when we speak about success, personal greatness, personal health, and happiness, we not undertake that exploration too quickly or too superficially without first looking from a suitable height at the varied terrain we must traverse. That vast expanse will include high mountains that will delight us with their panoramic view once we have climbed them, but it will also include valleys of the shadow of death, as the psalmist says—places of testing and disappointment where the road will become truly difficult and whose nights will be long and exhausting.

Paradoxically, many of us will not attain authentic success or authentic happiness in the biblical sense without first passing through failure and pain. In many cases, personal greatness will not be attained without first making great mistakes and failing spectacularly.

Wilston Churchill, one of the greatest statesmen in history, experienced a great many failures throughout his long and ultimately successful career. On one occasion he declared: “Success consists of going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.” Sometimes we see Wilston Churchill as the great hero of World War II who resisted Nazism and led English society to one of the highest points in its journey through history—the great English hero—but we do not remember all the serious failures he suffered before that, terrible disasters in his career that make it astonishing that he could reach that point in his life. And afterward as well, in the end, the English rejected him and elected someone else practically right after he had accomplished the great feat of resisting Nazism and inspiring the whole world to take up the battle against Hitler.

He knew what he was saying when he said that success lies in going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm. One of Wilston Churchill’s best-known sayings is: “Never, never, never give up.” That phrase, which came from him, is very well known because he knew what he was talking about.

No one attains success, sisters and brothers, or complete happiness without first experiencing some kind of crucifixion. No hero can retain and enjoy the territory conquered without first bearing the marks of a sinister wound or a shameful defeat. What is more, for some, God’s resounding no will be all they know on this side of existence with regard to some cherished dream. Many people will die without fulfilling the vision they cherished throughout their entire existence, and only in eternity will they know why they did not receive what they spent their whole lives longing for and pursuing; and yet it is possible that they are the most fortunate and the most approved by God.

Hebrews 11 tells us about the Bible’s great heroes of faith, in the famous chapter on faith. Many of these spiritual giants performed great feats and achieved great things during their journey on Earth. The writer of Hebrews speaks of this and says: “Through faith they conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched raging fires, escaped the edge of the sword, drew strength from weakness, became mighty in battle, and put foreign armies to flight”—and that is where the Pentecostals say, “Glory to God, amen, hallelujah!” and we get caught up in the blessing, don’t we?

But it says: “Others among those same extraordinary heroes, however, were not so fortunate.” We recall that the outcome of the efforts of other heroes of faith—which is what the Word teaches—was that their great faith fell far short of producing what they expected. The apostle says that they were tortured, refusing deliverance so that they might obtain a better resurrection. He says that others among those heroes of faith experienced mockery and flogging, and in addition to this, chains and imprisonment. He says that they were stoned, sawn in two, put to the test, killed by the sword; they went about covered in sheepskins and goatskins, poor, distressed, and mistreated.

I wonder whether that image agrees with this idea of easy prosperity that is preached in the Church nowadays, doesn’t it? If you have God’s blessing, you are going to have two Audis in the carport, three perfectly dressed little children, a top-of-the-line dog in the house, and a tremendous mansion, right? Those are the people of faith; those are the heroes of faith in this superficial age in which we live. And to me, it seems like a demonic lie that is very destructive to the sound health of God’s people.

So many of these men lived being stoned, sawn in two, put to the test, going here and there covered in sheepskins and goatskins, poor, distressed, and mistreated. It says: “The world was not worthy of them; they wandered through the mountains, the deserts, the caves, and the caverns of the earth”—great men of faith.

The writer of this epistle seems to suggest to us that, among all those titans of Scripture, the most accomplished and worthy of admiration are not necessarily those who got their way, those who achieved what they wanted, but paradoxically those who failed in the endeavor: the martyrs, those who experienced a permanent crucifixion. These, the writer suggests, would receive a more exalted reward on the day of resurrection. Perhaps without intending to, they exchanged temporary and imperfect achievement for a permanent and eternal triumph. God used their drama, their apparent failure here on Earth, to accomplish a purpose far more exalted than mere temporary, personal triumph.

These tragic heroes would have mysteriously joined their ultimate destiny, at that point in history when they suffered, to that of countless generations of believers who would come after them and suffer in a similar way. They had to postpone the pleasure of their coronation until a later time, the writer of Hebrews suggests, but they would receive their reward with interest at the end of time.

That may be why the writer adds: “And all these, though they received a good testimony through faith, did not receive what was promised.” Notice: they had all the faith in the world, but precisely because they had that faith, they did not receive what was promised. “God having provided something better for us, so that they should not be made perfect apart from us.” It is as though God said: You know what? I am going to reserve their coronation until other pilgrims in history have gone through their process, and in the end I will bring them all together. And He set them down to rest there for a while, and then in the future we will all receive that coronation.

God is very orderly in the way He goes about things. We want Him to do it now—for me, today, right now! But God is a God of order, and He says: No, I am going to wait. When we are there, we will hand out the crowns and the medals and the honors.

So this may happen to many of us as well. We may embark upon some vision or endeavor with great faith and enthusiasm, and we may fight legitimately, employing the authentic weapons and methods of the Kingdom of light. We may pursue a dream for many long years and, at the end of the day, day after day, fall short and not see it fulfilled. Perhaps here on Earth we will never attain what we longed for so deeply and pursued with such excellence, and only in eternity will we know why we were not granted the privilege of seeing the fulfillment of what we desired so greatly.

Yet it is possible that, in some way mysterious and unknown to us, our life fulfilled its true purpose and reached its consummation despite the apparent failure. Perhaps without realizing it, during our brief pilgrimage on Earth we powerfully blessed others or created the conditions necessary for the world to be impacted or blessed in subtle ways that only God will one day be able to reveal to us.

You do not know whom you have blessed. You do not know whether it was your child or your brother, or that disciple you taught in a discipleship class, or that person to whom you gave an offering on the street at a certain moment and, through that gesture of kindness, prevented from committing suicide or whatever it may have been. Perhaps you went through your life without knowing that you made a contribution that changed the history of the world, and one day up there in heaven, when you watch the video, you will realize that you did more than you thought you had done.

The life of Edward Kimball eloquently illustrates this principle. “Edward Kimball,” says a true account that I translated—all of this is true—“was concerned about one of his Sunday school students who worked in a shoe store in town.

One day Kimball visited him at the store, found the young man working in the back stocking the shelves, and led him to receive Christ right there. Dwight L. Moody—how many have heard of the famous evangelist? Dwight Moody, one of the most powerful men in the history of evangelism.

Dwight L. Moody eventually quit his job at the store. He was that young man, that young Sunday school student whom this humble Sunday school teacher led to know Jesus Christ—Dwight L. Moody. And that Dwight L. Moody eventually quit his job at the shoe store and became one of the greatest evangelists of all time.

Moody, whose international ministry led him to preach in the British Isles and in the Caribbean, once preached in a small chapel pastored by a young man with the impressive name of Frederick Brothertone Meyer. In his sermon, Moody recounted with evident emotion the story of his Sunday school teacher, who personally visited every student in his class and led them to Jesus Christ. This message transformed Pastor Meyer’s ministry, inspiring him to become an evangelist like Moody.

And after many years, Meyer came to North America. And while he was speaking in North Field,” which is a little north of here, of Boston, Massachusetts, “a young man heard Meyer say: If you are not willing to sacrifice everything for Christ, are you at least willing for God to make you willing? And that comment inspired J. Wilbert Chapman to answer God’s call on his life.

Chapman became one of the most effective evangelists of his day. And a volunteer named Billy Sunday”—another great and well-known evangelist here in the United States—“helped organize his crusades and learned to preach by watching Chapman,” who had been influenced by two or three others after Kimball had begun that chain of blessing.

“And Billy Sunday eventually took over Chapman’s ministry, becoming one of the most dynamic evangelists of this century”—of the last century, the twentieth century—“Billy Sunday’s ministry brought thousands of people to the feet of Jesus Christ.

Inspired by a Billy Sunday crusade in Charlotte, North Carolina, a group of Christians committed themselves to reaching their city for Christ. That group invited the evangelist Mordecai Ham to come and hold a series of evangelistic meetings in 1932. A lanky sixteen-year-old was sitting among the large crowd one night, captivated by the message preached by the gray-haired preacher. Every night, the preacher seemed to be shouting and pointing his finger exclusively at this young man.

Night after night, the young man came to the meetings, and finally he went forward to give his life to Christ. That teenager was Billy Graham. Billy Graham has communicated the Gospel to more people than any other person in history, and it all began with a Sunday school teacher named Kimball. Millions have been affected by his decision to go to a shoe store and share the Gospel with a single person. Millions will continue to feel his impact.”

Life is a web of indecipherable relationships. Everything that exists affects everything else in unpredictable and unknown ways. That is why we will never be able to determine precisely the true reach or triumph of our life here on Earth. All we can do is live faithfully according to the principles of the Kingdom of God and leave the final outcome to the Lord.

There is a movie called It’s a Wonderful Life—how many have seen it? If you have not, run and watch it afterward, and above all, save it for Christmas. It is a very beautiful movie. Here in the United States, watching it at Christmas is a tradition; it is a movie dearly loved by this nation. It is one of the most beloved films in all of American cinema.

It tells the story of George Bailey, a generous small-town character in the 1940s who has longed all his life to achieve financial success and travel all over the world. What he does not know, it says, is that ever since childhood, his nobility of character—George Bailey’s nobility—has blessed many lives and prevented great tragedies. But that fact has gone unnoticed; he has never realized how he has blessed the lives of the people around him, although many people in his town love this noble, gentle, and simple man.

George, the movie says, marries his one and only sweetheart, has four children, and embarks upon a completely ordinary, conventional, and unremarkable life—or at least that is how it seems. As a young man, George tries to enlist in the army but is rejected because of a defective ear, a condition he developed as a child while saving the life of his little brother, who was about to drown. He is forced to remain in his hometown and, against his will, take over the management of a small lending company founded by his father.

That seemingly insignificant business does an enormous amount of good in his small town and, above all, prevents Mr. Patter, a greedy and sinister businessman, from carrying out his plan to buy all the businesses in town and assume complete control of it.

George feels completely frustrated by the apparent insignificance of his life and, after a financial failure, decides to commit suicide so that his life insurance will pay the resulting debt. God sends an angel to Earth to stop him from committing suicide. The angel shows him how valuable his life has actually been and how greatly it has affected the town where he has lived all his life, and he grants George a privilege. That part with the angel appearing to him is very funny, very lovely. He grants him a privilege that, unfortunately, none of us has, which is to see what would have happened if he had never existed.

After this, George, aware of the profound meaning of his life, regains the joy of living”—and the entire movie is precisely the account of all the things that would have happened if George had not been alive and had not lived that humble life there in that completely anonymous little town.

“A film critic has written the following about this beautiful Frank Capra movie. He says: As in many of his films, though in none of them with such brilliance, Capra teaches us about true human values: that far from money, prestige, or power, what matters most is giving oneself to others, helping, understanding, and forgetting oneself.”

Interestingly, It’s a Wonderful Life, this movie we are discussing, fell into obscurity shortly after its public release and did not achieve commercial success. In fact, it was an apparent failure; it ended up losing $525,000 in those days. It earned nothing and instead lost more than half a million dollars in the 1940s—imagine that—in its first year.

"Only two decades later"—twenty years after it was produced—"when its exclusive rights expired, it began to be broadcast on television," especially during the Christmas season, "it managed to emerge from obscurity and attain the fame and popularity it so richly deserved." Interestingly, that same movie experienced that very kind of situation, didn’t it? An apparent failure that later turned into a great, great success and blessing.

Brothers and sisters, this fact reminds us once again that we must not make hasty judgments about the value of anything in this world, for, as the writer of Ecclesiastes says, "Time and chance happen to them all." Scientists point out that the almost imperceptible beating of a butterfly’s wings can alter the ultimate configuration of the universe; this is known in the world of physics as the "butterfly effect." A stone thrown into a lake unleashes waves at the atomic level that subtly affect the physical structure of the world.

Only God knows the true purpose for which we are brought into this world. Frankly, none of us can say with certainty whether our life has been a failure or a resounding success. I am sure that when we get to heaven, we will be greatly surprised. Some powerful people and movie stars will be left outside or will be at the end of the line, while many beggars, like Lazarus, will receive a princely welcome.

That is why, in my role as a spiritual counselor, I never presume that I can guarantee anyone that their requests will be answered affirmatively. Brother, every day I find it harder to say: yes, no, don’t worry, that job you are looking for—we declare it yours right now in the Name of the Lord, and tomorrow when you go, it is yours! Or that illness you have—oh! Don’t worry, in the Name of God it is canceled; go tomorrow and you... You do not know what on earth God has in mind for that person, honestly.

The more one knows the mysterious designs of God, the humbler one should become, and if one does not, it is because one is stubborn and insincere. God truly is mysterious. God’s gifts sometimes come in strange forms and in dark-colored packages. God does not use only little yellow and orange ribbons, you know? Sometimes there is a black velvet ribbon, but it too is beautiful—very, very beautiful—and of great value. Do not reject God’s gifts because they come in sinister-looking packages, heh, because God is sometimes very ironic in the way He blesses us. We have to be that profound, or at least draw a little closer to that inscrutable God whom we serve.

I cannot guarantee anyone that their requests will be answered affirmatively, and I say affirmatively because God always answers our requests; it is just that He often answers with a merciful, fatherly "no," knowing perfectly well that His refusal is the best answer to our simplistic longings for happiness and personal fulfillment. God is so complex and elusive, so unpredictable and mysterious in His marvelous interventions in our lives, that the best posture before His Sovereignty is what I call a humble, preemptive submission—a meek and unconditional acceptance of His unfathomable and loving Will.

That idea of preemptive submission means that, ultimately, each of us must. I say that when a person enters the Gospel, he must—or God expects you to—sign a blank sheet of paper, and at the bottom you write your name, approving whatever God may wish to write on that sheet. And you have heard me speak many times about the God who blesses us, prospers us, heals us, and opens doors for us. My life is a reflection of the Grace and mercy of God, the God who lifts us out of poverty, out of the ghetto, out of anonymity, and seats us in the places of princes. But in the same way, I can also tell you that I bear the marks of Christ in many parts of my body—the wounds, the failures, the defeats, the flaws—and God has been glorified in all of that.

And I believe that the pains and sufferings of life make us humbler, simpler, more loving, more patient, more dependent on God, less arrogant, and more compassionate toward others; they make us more like Christ. I have told you many times that God’s desire is not for us to be comfortable, but for us to be great and powerful and to reflect the Grace of Christ.

I would say that the only purpose God has in the world upon which we can depend is that every day we become more and more like His Son Jesus Christ. Of that you can be certain; you can take that to the bank: God will always do everything possible so that you come to reflect His beauty, His greatness, His might.

And therefore, let us understand that God is using everything we go through in life for marvelous purposes; we cannot. I recently told a sister—or a brother, I do not remember—look, what you are going through at this moment, if you photograph it right now and freeze it, then you will become depressed, because that picture is frozen now in the present moment, in this process. But you are not living a photograph; you are living a movie, and we do not know the ending of that movie.

Many times, we freeze the processes we are living through and say: oh, this is the moment, this is final, this is what... You do not know; perhaps tomorrow the sun will rise, the birds will begin to sing, the birds will begin to sing, the trees will come alive again, and spring will return. Never declare defeat at this moment, because you still do not know whether God—the final period of a process that will continue and will end in something great and beautiful. I can tell you that God’s end is always good; that I can assure you of. The processes may be difficult, but the ending is glorious, hallelujah.

And certainly, here on Earth we will never receive everything we want, everything we long for. This world, as I tell you, is a fallen world; I want to speak a little more about that. The apostle Paul says that creation groans as it waits for the day of its liberation. The planets themselves, the galaxies, the fish in the sea, and the trees groan in silent yet very powerful ways, knowing that they are not everything they should be, that they do not have all the colors they should have, and that they do not emit all the glorious sounds God intended them to emit when He created them in Eden; and they anxiously await the arrival of the day of their liberation.

Meanwhile, winter, spring, and autumn come; their leaves fall, then they put forth leaves again; the little birds migrate from north to south in winter and return in spring, awaiting the day of their liberation. We too must do the same.

When things grow cold, let us nestle in the Lord’s arms until the cold passes. Let us take refuge in prayer, in praise, and in the declaration of the good future God has for us; and one day the devil grows tired and leaves, and then he has to give way so that the blessing may come.

The Word says: "Having made it through the evil day, stand firm," hallelujah. Let me tell you something: God will never allow us to be tested beyond what we can bear. Rather, the Word says that along with the trial also comes the way out, the blessing. I know that the Lord will never allow me to be broken by the devil; He will always give me victory again and again. And regarding everything that happens in my life, the Word says, "All things work together for good for those who love God." Tell yourself that every day, three times a day, with every meal. If God loves you, something good will always come out of any situation you may go through.

Today I want you to leave encouraged. Do you understand why I speak about pain? To me, pain is liberating, glorious, beautiful, sublime. I do not say this to depress us—quite the opposite. It is to strengthen us and to know that God has provided an antidote to all suffering through Christ Jesus, and He provided it through the most sinister instrument of all: a cross, a first-century electric chair. In that way, God defeated the devil on the cross and canceled the record of decrees that was against us, says the apostle Paul.

God has already nailed it all to the cross. Do not allow the devil to accuse you with guilt or fear or a sense of abandonment. No, that is what he whispers in your ears, but you have to say: no, Christ is with me; Christ will bring me out of every trial and every difficulty, and in the end I will shine like gold that, after passing through the crucible, is purified and becomes much more valuable.

Bow your head with me right now, and let us give thanks to God. If you are going through some situation in your life, if you are going through some trial, if something has bitten you in your life or during these past few months, if you have grown tired of asking God for something you have longed and yearned for and have not received, then this morning I beg you to embrace God’s declaration that He has engraved you on the palm of His hands, that no one will be able to separate you from Him, that He will never forget you, and that His purposes for you are good. "For I know the purposes I have concerning you, thoughts of good and not of evil, to give you the end you hope for," says Jeremiah 29:11.

I declare the goodness of God over your life. If you are going through trials and difficulties, deprivation, and things you did not receive though you desired them so deeply, embrace your destiny in Christ Jesus. And I declare over you peace and joy, hope and blessing, gladness and a song in the midst of the storm, for the glory of the Name of Jesus. We thank You; thank You, Father.

Help me believe what I am saying. Help us absorb Your Truth: heaven and earth will pass away, but it will not pass away; Your purposes will never change; Your character will never change. Thank You because You love us in inconceivable ways, Lord, and we are precious to You. May Your people leave here assured of Your eternal and invincible love, Father, and of how precious they are in Your eyes. Thank You, Lord, in the Name of Jesus. And the people of God say: amen. God bless you, my brothers and sisters. Glory to the Lord. Let us declare that grace of God this morning, and leave here confident.