Why We Need the Psalms of Lament
The Psalms help us express our pain to God, knowing that he hears our cries.
Articles on Trials and Suffering
284 results found
The Book of Job Is a Book of Joy
“Joy” is probably the last word most of us would use to describe the book of Job. What could be less joyful than the nightmare of Job’s suffering?
The Problem of Pain Is a Problem for Everyone
There are only a few ways to handle this issue, and all of them feel incomplete. So the question is this: Which incomplete answer will you embrace to help you with the problem of evil?
4 Traps to Avoid When You Suffer
How we respond to suffering shapes our experiences with suffering.
An Open Letter to Victims of Abuse
Justin S. Holcomb, Lindsey A. Holcomb
Disgrace is the opposite of grace. Grace is love that seeks you out even if you have nothing to give in return.
Help! It Feels Like God Is Far Away in My Suffering
Lament is the biblical language for people who feel like God is distant.
3 Doctrines That Sustain Us in Suffering
While we may not understand what God is doing, we can always trust who he is. We must never interpret God’s character by our circumstances.
How to Hope in God When Life Gets Hard
Simply knowing the end of the story gives us hope in our present circumstances.
Your Salvation Doesn’t Depend on Your Feelings
If our salvation depended upon our feelings, we should be lost one day and saved another, for they are as fickle as the weather.
Help! I Don’t Know If My Words Are Helping or Hurting
Cheryl Marshall, Caroline Newheiser
As you have conversations with those who are suffering, remember how the Lord’s healing words have strengthened and sustained you in your own times of trouble.
9 Notable Quotes from Coronavirus and Christ
The only firm foundation we have in an unpredictable world is the rock of Jesus Christ.
The Unresolved “Why” of Suffering
When tragedy strikes, almost everyone who believes in God, along with almost everyone who claims they don’t, asks the same question: Why does God allow suffering?
Hope in the Midst of Languishing
Spiritual growth in seasons of languishing is more about persevering through the struggle for belief than it is about arriving at a settled conclusion.
The Importance of Lament in the Midst of COVID-19
The more you know about lament, the more things really come alive to you in reading Jeremiah's lament. His lament is so relevant to the suffering that we’re going through right now.
How Suffering Can Be Our Teacher
There’s no way you’re ever going to learn endurance without having to keep on going through something hard that doesn’t go away.
No More Hiding behind the Past
The Bible has a lot to teach us when it comes to thinking about our pasts. Whatever your situation may be, it is no surprise to God. Our challenge is to not allow the past to control our walk with God in the present.
What the Church Today Needs to Hear from the Book of Revelation
This message to patiently endure persecution for Christ is a message our church needs today. And if where we are right now means we don’t need it today, maybe we will tomorrow.
Don’t Let Go of God’s Sovereignty over Your Worst
God did and does have something to do with your tragedy. I know this sounds like a cruel statement, but stay with me. There is hope in the end.
Podcast: The Day I Lost My 3-Year-Old Son (Cameron Cole)
Cameron Cole talks about losing his three-year-old son and how that tragedy and all the suffering it entailed has ultimately strengthened his hope in God.
Watch Out for Functional Atheism
In the midst of storms in your life, have you forgotten who Jesus is?
David Powlison’s Answer to the Question “Why Me?”
David Powlison (1949–2019) reminds us that God does not offer advice and perspective from afar; he steps into our suffering.
An Open Letter to the Christian Frontline Medical Worker
The work to which you’ve devoted your life can plunge you into your darkest hours, luring you into doubts about God’s love, perhaps even about his existence. Where is God in all this?
3 Important Truths Job’s Friends Neglected
In the context of the whole Bible, perhaps the deepest error and omission of Job’s friends is this: they have no place for innocent suffering.
How Suffering Crushes Our Unrealistic Expectations
Our expectation is that tomorrow will be just the same as today was, but this world is not operating the way that God intended for it to operate.
A Story of Grace in the Face of Infertility
Read the personal story of a couple who experienced infertility for a period long enough to know the pressures, anxieties, absences, and losses that so commonly define the experience.
A Word to Parents at Their Breaking Point
It can be helpful to manage your expectations of what normal life can and should be, and recognize that the season you’re in is intensely difficult in a particular way and that it won’t always be that way.
9 Notable Quotes from ‘Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy’
Lament gives us a language to express our grief and sorrow to God, while asking him to lead us to deeper trust.
Don't Miss What God Is Teaching You in Your Pain
God works through our weakness to bring glory to his name and make it absolutely clear that it's him who's at work.
How to Pray in Times of Trouble
When we cannot articulate our prayer requests to God, the Holy Spirit understands our groanings and translates them into intelligible prayers that God the Father can understand and will answer.
What Not to Say to a Grieving Person
Here are three things that grieving people wish no one would ever say to them again.