When Life Hurts: Learning from Job's Wife #RTTBROS #Nightlight

"Should we accept from God only good and not adversity? In all this, Job did not sin in what he said." — Job 2:10

You know, I've always found it interesting that we remember Job for his patience, but we rarely talk about his wife. She's gotten a bad rap over the years, but I think I understand her pain. See, she didn't just lose her stuff, she lost her children. Every single one of them. Her world had collapsed, and in that moment of raw grief, she told her husband to curse God and die.

Now, Job's response is remarkable. He basically says, "Are we going to take the good from God's hand but refuse the difficult?" That's not resignation, that's perspective. Job understood something his wife had momentarily forgotten in her pain: God doesn't owe us an explanation for every hard thing that happens.

Here's what I've learned, and I'm too soon old and too late smart on this: when bad things happen to other people, we're pretty good at keeping perspective. Your friend's house gets broken into, and you comfort them by saying it's just stuff. A child breaks their favorite toy, and you remind them these things happen. Someone spills coffee on your friend, and you're quick to say it was just an accident.

But when it happens to us? Suddenly everything changes. That lost item becomes a tragedy. That broken toy feels like a personal attack. That spilled drink ruins our whole day. We take it personally because it is personal, it happened to us. And then we make ourselves miserable.

Job knew something we often forget: accepting only the good from God while rejecting the difficult isn't faith, it's entitlement. Real faith trusts God in the blessing and in the trial. It doesn't mean we won't hurt or grieve or struggle. Job's wife was hurting deeply, and God understands our pain. But somewhere in that pain, we have to choose whether we're going to trust God's character even when we can't trace His hand.

I think about Jesus, who suffered more than any of us ever will, and He did it voluntarily for our sake. When we're facing our own trials, remembering His suffering for us helps put things in perspective. He's not a distant God who doesn't understand pain. He entered into it fully.

And here's the truth: God has purposes in our suffering that we may never fully understand this side of heaven. Sometimes suffering produces patience, sometimes it produces compassion, sometimes it produces a deeper dependence on God. But always, always, God is working something eternal through our temporary pain.

So when life hurts, and it will, we have a choice. We can respond like Job's wife in her moment of grief, demanding God explain Himself. Or we can respond like Job, trusting that the same God who gives good gifts is still good when life gets hard.

Let's pray: Father, when life hurts and we don't understand, help us trust Your character even when we can't trace Your hand. Give us Job's perspective to accept both blessing and trial from Your sovereign hand. In Jesus' name, Amen.

#Faith #Suffering #Trust #ChristianLiving #DailyDevotion #BiblicalWisdom #SpiritualGrowth #RTTBROS #Nightlight

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Brite Hope #RTTBROS #Nightlight

A Matter of Heart #RTTBROS #Nightlight

"For though I be absent in the flesh, yet am I with you in the spirit, joying and beholding your order, and the stedfastness of your faith in Christ." — Colossians 2:5

You know, we live in a world where we expect instant everything. FaceTime someone across the planet, watch news unfold in real time, send a text and get annoyed if there's no response in thirty seconds. We've gotten spoiled.

But when Paul was writing his letters to the churches, it could take weeks, even months, for those words to reach their destination. Here's a story that drives this home: Andrew Jackson fought the Battle of New Orleans in January 1815, a victory that made him a national hero. The thing is, that battle was fought two full weeks after the peace treaty ending the War of 1812 had already been signed in Europe. The news just hadn't reached him yet.

But here's what gets me about Paul. Despite all those delays, despite never even visiting the church at Colosse, his heart was completely invested in those people. He's with them in spirit, rejoicing over their faith, praying for folks he's never met face to face.

That tells me something important. The depth of our love for people isn't measured by how close we are physically. It's a matter of the heart.

Paul says in Philippians, "For I have no man likeminded, who will naturally care for your state" (Philippians 2:20). He's talking about Timothy, a young man who genuinely cared about people from the heart.

What makes someone effective for God isn't their talent or their gifts. It's their heart. Do they genuinely care about people? I think about folks in my own life who've made the biggest difference. It wasn't the most talented or the most gifted. It was the ones who cared, who checked in, who prayed when I didn't even know I needed prayer.

That's what God is looking for. Not the most talented people, but people with hearts that care, hearts willing to be invested in others even when it costs something.

So who has God put on your heart lately? Don't ignore that. That might be the Holy Spirit prompting you to pray, to reach out, to care. We can be physically distant but spiritually close. And that kind of caring, that's what changes the world.

Let's pray: Father, give us hearts that genuinely care about people. Help us invest in lives because we want to. Make us people who naturally care for others. In Jesus' name, Amen.

#Faith #Love #ChristianLiving #DailyDevotion #Caring #BiblicalWisdom #SpiritualGrowth #RTTBROS #Nightlight

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https://linktr.ee/rttbros