When Bad News Comes, Make Sure ‘All Is Well With Your Soul’…
Word-Of-The-Day: ‘(19) Then they cried to the LORD in their trouble, and He saved them from their distress. (20) He sent out His word and healed them; He rescued them from the grave.’ (Psalm 107:19-20); ‘<Jesus said to His disciples,> “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”’ (John 16:33)
There always seems to be troubles in our paths, even in the lives of those who we see as model Christians. Pope Leo XIV earlier this week had part of one of his lungs removed due to a cancer nodule found within it, any many consider him the person who exemplifies Christianity (though that may be disputed by many who are not Catholic). If someone like Leo can gain a cancer diagnosis, any of us can as well.
Cancer is not the only ailment that can fall upon us. Some suffer from some heart-related disease, or back pain, or brain-related injuries or diseases that can cause us serious health issues. We can also suffer from other non-health-related maladies, including financial woes or losing our jobs or homes. Cars break down at the worst time, and then outside of our own lives the maladies our friends and family members can give us grief and sorrow.
This is not new to modern men and women; back in the days of Adam and Eve, after they fell to sin and were evicted from the Garden of Eden, they suffered from something not done upon them but upon their son Abel, who was killed. It was a bit of a compounded suffering as the murderer was their oldest son, Cain, whose punishment was to be exiled away from them into the land of Nod. They lost both of their only sons, at that time, in almost one instant. While they later had another son, Seth, their loss of their firstborn and second-born sons likely stayed with them throughout their nine-hundred-year lives.
The price of sin is suffering, even if it is not directly done by something we did or did not do. Due to sin, the Lord has placed an ‘expiration date’ on all things physical and mortal, and in many cases the components within each thing have a separate expiration date than the whole – just like in our cars. Joints often wear out long before our minds do, and they may have to be replaced or, worse, mitigated by the use of canes, walkers, or wheelchairs.
Some maladies are worse than others, and often it is not the physical ailments that cause us our deepest hurts, but those emotional ones from the pain others suffer, like our children. Job’s worst heartache wasn’t from his own physical afflictions or the loss of his great wealth, but was likely from the loss of his children. Psalm 107 was likely written by David, or someone close to him, in commemoration of the pains the people suffered in their wanderings, like the Israelites who wandered in the wilderness. Some of those who suffered were not following the Lord, others were devout.
But when they turned and pleaded with God, in their times of trouble, God was found to be with them. Jesus told His disciples in John 16 that they would have trouble, but through Him they would have peace and Joy. In both the Old and New Testament, God gave His people a refuge from the suffering through the Joy and contentment through the promise that He would make things right, if not immediately then in His perfect timing, and of course, the blessed assurance after death in Eternal life.
It is in this Hope we have in Him that can soothe our pain. God may not always correct the wrongs or the disasters that cause our pain, but in having our Hope and Faith in Him, He allows us to find the Joy and contentment where our happiness is void. The best non-Biblical example is Horatio Spafford. Mr. Spafford, like Job who was a wealthy farmer and rancher, was a wealthy lawyer from Chicago in the 1800’s, who was married to his wife Anna and had four daughters Annie, Maggie, Bessie, and Tanetta, and had a son who earlier passed away. Spafford was a devout Christian who was tied to the famous evangelist D.L. Moody, who also resided in Chicago.
In 1871, the Great Chicago Fire burned down most of the city, including Spafford’s extensive real-estate investments, and the Recession of 1873 struck down most of his remaining fortune. At this point, he decided he and his family would go to England as missionaries. He sent Anna and his four daughters ahead, placing them on the SS Ville du Havre, a French ocean-borne steamship, to make their way to England first, as he initially stayed behind to take care of some of the planning and reconstruction of his real-estate holdings.
During the trip over to England, somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean, the SS Ville du Havre sank after colliding with another vessel, and although Anna was rescued, their four daughters were trapped and went down with the ship and drowned, along with over two-hundred other people. Anna sent a telegram upon her arrival in England, stating ‘Saved alone…’. Mr. Spafford immediately sailed for England to be with his wife, and when he was told enroute that they were in the area the SS Ville du Havre sank, he wrote the famous hymn to capture both his grief and his Faith, All Is Well With My Soul.
Spafford was not in denial of his loss and the pain he felt, but instead through Faith was driven to praise God for His Faithfulness in being with him in his darkest and most depressing moment. Like Job, he did not turn away from God but turned toward Him, seeking His strength for such a moment. Not wanting to break any copyright laws (if there are any remaining) I won’t print out the hymn, but if you read the verses, you find four distinct truths Mr. Spafford realized.
The first is God is always with us, and always in control. He is walking with us, those who have accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior, every step we take, in the good times and the not-so-good times. In the chaos of life, God is always the same; steadfast, immovable and unchanging. Second, our Salvation is never in doubt. We are emotional people, and we can be sad and mad over loss, even being mad at God over tragedies that befall us, yet we have a loving, forgiving, and patient God who allows our emotions to play out and will console us in our times of anguish.
Third, we find peace through God’s strength and leadership. We are told to give Him our burdens, and He takes them upon Himself, and in Him we find refuge from the chaos. The last truth is God provides for us that our suffering is temporary and temporal, but His Glory is permanent and eternal. We often suffer loss, and sometimes great loss, but given enough time our grief fades as we find Joy, and sometimes happiness, in our future endeavors.
Like Job, Horatio and Anna Spafford rebounded from such great loss. They had three more children, son Horatio, and daughters Bertha and Grace. After son Horatio passed away at age four with scarlet fever, the Spaffords traveled to Jerusalem as part of a missionary commune, and adopted a son, Jacob during this period. Mr. Spafford died in Jerusalem from malaria later at the age of fifty-nine and was buried in the Mount Zion Cemetery in Jerusalem.
Like Job and the Spaffords, we are to face our troubles by facing God, turning toward Him and not turning away. We have many examples of people who give up in the midst of tragedy, but God’s people should never give up, but give in to God and His great love for us.
