Sufficient Grace

2 Corinthians 12:9a

Last week we looked at God strength made perfect through our weaknesses. This week we will focus on His grace. His grace that is sufficient.

We naturally want to live stress free lives where we never have to worry about bills, we and our family are happy and healthy, and we steadily rise in the company we love working for. However, we all know that troubles do come, sometimes when you least expect it. An unexpected car repair, downsizing at your company which leads to you losing your job, or learning that the lump on your back that you have been ignoring has turned out to be cancer. Pain is always possible in this life. It cannot be avoided. Why? Because sin entered the world when Adam sinned. Because God has chosen to allow pain.

We concluded last article by mentioning pain. Pain is serious, it is not something that can be brushed off. Pain is also inevitable in this life. God never promised us a pain free life. In fact, Jesus promised us pain (John 16:33; Luke 12:53). It is a painful reality.

The wonderful thing about God though is that He promises to be with us in our pain. Jesus told us to give Him our burdens (Matthew 11:29). God promises to never leave or forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). Peter, one of Jesus’ closest friends, wrote that we should cast our cares on Him because He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7).

This verse is another promise that He gives. God tells Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you.” This means that no matter what we go through, whatever pain we are called to endure, we will have a sufficient amount of grace to endure it.

Wouldn’t we prefer to have a pain free life? Well, if you read last week’s article you will see why this is not desirable. I am not saying that we should pray for difficulties or pain, but we should be constantly trying to grow, and to do so involves tribulations and pain.

I am not someone who has had to deal with tragic loss. I have had my fair share of pain, but nothing so horrific as a loved one passing away, so I feel unworthy to talk about the sufficient grace of God in such difficulties. However, there are two men that come to mind who did deal with this form of tragedy.

The first is Job. God Himself called Job a blameless and upright man (Job 1:8), and yet He allowed the devil to kill his children (Job 1:12; 18-19). Losing ten children in a single day may be more then anyone has ever lost in a day. It is a pain that I hope I never experience. Job’s reaction to this situation is to tear his clothes, fall down, and worship (Job 1:20). He recognized that God has His reasons, that his children were ultimately God’s, and that His grace was sufficient. Dealing with a tragedy of this magnitude and yet being obedient to God is only possible through God’s sufficient grace.

The second man I thought of is John Piper. When Piper was twenty-eight years old his mother died in a bus accident. It was an event that deeply hurt him, and yet, when speaking about pain, he said,

“every moment of your affliction is meaningful. It has meaning. It is doing something. Causing something. Bringing about something glorious. You can’t see this. The world can’t see this. They think, and you are tempted to think, this suffering is meaningless. It’s not doing anything good. I can’t see any good coming out of this. That’s what you feel if you focus on the seen.... Nothing in your pain is meaningless. It is all preparing. Working something. Producing something — a weight of glory, a special glory for you. Just for you because of that pain.”

So again we see that though pain can still cut us deeply, it all has a purpose. Job understood that God is in control and he can glorify Him because of Who He is, not because of what He gives. And John Piper understood that our pain and suffering has a purpose. It is not meaningless; it is being used by God for our benefit and for His glory.

No matter what we deal with in this life, God promises to always provide us with the grace we need to continue to obey Him and to find the meaning behind the pain. We may not ever fully grasp why He allows hardships (we find no evidence in Scripture that Job ever knew why he suffered so greatly), but we can trust Him. We can find Him in our darkest hours, and we can hope in Him. He will always give us what we need.

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