How to deal with difficulties
I don’t know if you know this, but late January-early February has been known to be the most depressing time of the year. Think about it, holidays are over, bills come flowing in, the dark gloomy days set into our memories and it seems like a month of just gray times. The rain makes it nearly impossible to enjoy the outdoors and the temperamentof most people seems fairly too difficult to swallow. Even our families and closest of friends seem more distant and their fuses seem shorter. How do you handle this time of year? maybe life is even more difficult for some of you and for others, life seems to be fairly easy at this particular point in time. But one thing I know about life, is this, life can and will be difficult, and if we are never ready to face the hardships of life, and we are never ready to understand that God is in control, we will ultimately become a slave to this season, we will become full of despair and the weight of life, it will be so unbearable that just another ounce will crush us under its weight.
I feel that I have had lots of opportunities to experience both the joys and sorrows of life. I have had the opportunity to witness children, teens, young adults, adults and the elderly deal with the difficulties and trials life throws at us. So I would like to give some perspective and hopefully some insight on how to deal with this season, if you are currently in it, or seasons that will come. We understand that James tells the early church to “Count it all Joy, when you go through trials of various kinds” That when life gets tough, because it will, we are to count it as joy. Why? He follows it up with “the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And to let steadfastness have its full effect (some translate it as perseverance or longsuffering) so that you may be perfect ad complete (niv uses mature) lacking in nothing.
James 1:2-4
2 Count it all joy, my brothers,[b] when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
We are expected to go through trials, we are expected to count is as joy and understand that it will produce maturity to help us grow. It is God’s purpose and plan. Look at King David, he loses his son, and another son tries to kill him and overthrow him and this son ends up dying and he is sorrowful and broken. He understands pain. This is David’s response to Absalom’s death 2 Samuel 18:33
33 Then the king was deeply moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept. And as he went, he said thus: “O my son Absalom—my son, my son Absalom—if only I had died in your place! O Absalom my son, my son!”
And look at Jacob, the patriarch, the man who wrestled with God himself, when he thinks his son Joseph has been killed by a wild beast. Genesis 37:33
33 And he recognized it and said, “It is my son’s tunic. A wild beast has devoured him. Without doubt Joseph is torn to pieces.” 34 Then Jacob tore his clothes, put sackcloth on his waist, and mourned for his son many days. 35 And all his sons and all his daughters arose to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted, and he said, “For I shall go down into the grave to my son in mourning.” Thus his father wept for him.
Life is tough, but the purpose of what I want to tell you is this, our hope is not in the things of this world, yet our hope is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Seek God: The most important aspect in times of difficulty is to be able to seek and rely on God. Our hope is found in Christ Jesus our Lord. The fact of the matter is, if you do not have Jesus as Lord, and try to find security for hope in any other category of life, you will never find true hope. People will let you down, money will let you down, your body will let you down, even your spouse is not able to bear a burden that only God can bear. You, yourself will let you down. Think about it, all your ambitions, all your desires, all your enjoyment in life is temporary and the end result is this, life with out Jesus is hopeless. Only God can bear the weight that you carry and only Christ Jesus is strong enough to handle your burdens. Paul tells the church of Philippi.
Philippians 4:6 esv
Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
He tells them that the anxiety in life should not allow you to be beaten down. That we are to be thankful and pray in EVERYTHING. That we understand that we are unable to handle these things ourselves
We are to take our burdens in life and lay them at the feet of Jesus. Jesus says in Matthew 11:28
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.
Only Jesus can give us rest. You are not strong enough, your friends and family are not strong enough. Substances like drugs and alcohol are not ever going to be able to bear your burdens, only Jesus can, because Jesus is God and Jesus is our Lord. Billy Graham says this
“For the believer there is hope beyond the grave, because Jesus Christ has opened the door to heaven for us by His death and resurrection.” -Billy Graham
We have a hope not in the things that can be seen but in the unseen. We have hope in relationship with our Father through Jesus Christ, not because of what we have done but because of what God has done.
Seek Community—we are to bear each others burdens. We are to rely on one another. We are to seek community from other believers. The mission of the Church is two fold-1 to spread the Gospel and 2-to edify the Church. We need relationships. We are relational being that are made in the image of a relational God. Since before time, the trinity has always been. God the Father-God the Son and God the Holy Spirit have always been in perfect community with one another. We take on these things as well.
-This past season of my life I have struggles with many doubts. Am I a good teacher, am I a good father, should I look at going into another career field that I feel I am built more for? I dealt with the anxiety of school, of being relational with my youth, my flock. Am I being a good Shepheard to the flock God has placed me to watch over. Am I keeping their best interest? Am I able to bear the burden of my Greek classes? Lots of anxiety and lots of doubts. Luckily, I had the support of other believers, of my youth, my family, my friends…and these people would encourage me, and lift me up and pray for me. They were willing to take my burden and love me. Pastor’s Eldie and Hong were able to cover for me so I could go to my children’s concert at school. On my own, I would have failed. On my own I would have been crushed, but these people, these fellow believers, these family members that are part of the family of God were able to support me and help me through a difficult time. My wife was able to speak words of encouragement and hope, my friends did the same. We are to be reliant on each other. We are not made for independency, yet we are made for dependency from both God and from His Church. Facebook/ Instagram/ snapchat/ videogames/ isolation will never be able to hug you, hold you and tell you they love you. It requires relationship. Paul urges for Timothy to come quickly in 2 Timothy 4. Why? Because he is facing death and needs to see and be with the one he calls his spiritual son. He asks for Timothy to bring Mark as well, he wants to be surrounded in his final hours by those he loves. We also have an obligation to walk with those who need us and to be available for those who need us as well.
Imagine this—you are going through a tough time, you seek your friends but they are too busy, you feel overwhelmed and burdened. You just need to talk with someone. You have prayed and poured out to God but you still feel down. Maybe life hit you so hard that you can’t get up. You are so overwhelmed but you have no one to go to. What a horrible situation. Now on the other hand, lets flip it. Its not you that is going through this, its your friend or the person you see every week at church and they are going through this, what can you do? You can be there for them, you can listen to them, you can love them and encourage them. We need to love the way that Christ has loved. Paul tells us that without love he is nothing. That even if he speaks with the most eloquent of tongues, it’s of no good. Even the world know the need for relationships, even the world understand that need to have friends, shouldn’t we know and show that better than them? I know the it’s difficult at times, but it is necessary.
On days that I do judo, I always hit up my friend Travis. I Facebook messenger him and I’m like “yo, Travis, you doing judo today?” and he says “yeah brah, lets do it”. And if I don’t go, he usually says, “nah I’m not planning to go alone today”. WE understand the need for relationship. It’s far better to have someone to do this with. There is a need for reliance on each other.
Lastly I feel that we need to understand that we need to find ways to look towards the positive things in life. This past week I had a 1stgrade student come into my class and he was upset. Not sure what the cause of it was, but he refused to pull himself together. I was on the verge of sitting him out because I couldn’t do anything with him, so I decided to try and have him wash his face off and come back. He told me he was trying but couldn’t get out of the “funk” he was in. I decided to let him stay and we started to play our game. Right away he snapped out of it and played like a 6 year old should. No worry of life, no feelings of being down he just played. Running around with a huge smile and just played. I think that when Jesus tells us to be like children, he doesn’t just mean innocence of a child and the ability to have faith like a child, but we also need to play like a child. Have a mindset of fun. Thursdays are one of my favorite days. The reason is because we have a extended lunch and my 11thgrade boys setup the volleyball net and we just play. And we play hard and when we are having fun, the stress and difficulties in life seem to melt away. I am not saying that this is the fix for everything, but God has created us both again as relational being and playing with others allows us to connect and remove some of the stressors from life. If we think about it, our thoughts are really what develop our life.
Paul writes
Philippians 4:8 English Standard Version (ESV)
8 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
We need to focus on the things of God. We need to find the joy in life and praise God for those joys and we need to do these things with other believers. I want to end with this…all these things are great, but if you don’t have a relationship with Jesus, they are useless. We must have Jesus as our foundation in order to enjoy these things, and in order to deal with the difficulties in life. My favorite verse is in Romans. Paul tells us of the hope we have in Jesus and that this life and that death and everything in between has no power over the love from our savior.
Romans 8:37-39
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[k]neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
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