Responding To Adversity

Even more important than understanding why God allows adversity into our lives, is our personal response to it. The life of Paul and his contemporaries in the faith serve as positive examples of proper Christian response to the pressures of life. Paul may have been often knocked down, but he was never knocked out of the Lord’s service. Remember he said, “But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened to me have fallen out rather to the futherance of the gospel.” The problems associated with Christian living in our day are just as real as the pressures faced by Christians in the first century. Our response to pressure is important in advancing the cause of Christ as well.

We sometimes seem to abdicate our responsibility and adopt the role of mere spiritual survivors. When asked about how we are coping we tend to use the old cliché and say, “As well as could be expected under the circumstances.” When all along we know we should, by God’s strength and power, be victorious in all circumstances.

Our proper and Godly response to pressure can turn problems into patience, vexation into victory and tragedy into triumph. The same pressure that can cause a destructive explosion can be harnessed to drive the wheels of progress. Pressure usually produces and the production can be good or bad. Both the Old and New Testaments give many examples of the right and wrong ways God’s people have responded to pressure as they were tested in the crucible of crisis. The mere mention of names such as Job, Jonah, Joseph, Elijah, David and Peter immediately conjures up images of proper and improper responses to the pressures of Christian living.

Someone has said, “A Christian is like a tea bag, he’s not worth much until he’s been through some hot water.” Spiritual hot water is inevitable in the Christian life. Problems, real and imagined, afflict us on every hand. It is tremendously important that as we pass through the trials of life we come out on the other side as a source of blessing to those who may be looking to us for help and encouragement. Our response to adversity may make a real difference in the life of someone else.

One of my most vivid and pleasant memories from my childhood involves working the bellows for my father and uncle, who were both trained by their father as blacksmiths. I would watch as they would heat farm tools in a fiery bed of charcoal, quickly withdraw them, beat them upon an anvil and then quench them in a barrel of water. The tools were then ready for the task of tilling the roughest and rockiest of fields. It sometime takes the pressure of God’s fiery furnace and blows upon the anvil of life to produce sharp and enduring tools for His use in the planting and cultivating of His spiritual harvest.

Why Adversity?

Why do God’s people have adversity? As David asked, "Why do the wicked seem to prosper at the expense of God’s people?" Why do terrible tragedies occur in the midst of times of great success and prosperity? Why do a multiplicity of calamities, as in the case of Job, seem to come one upon the heels of another?  

Adversity can be the deadliest source of discouragement or the greatest impetus for spiritual growth in the life of a believer. The difference depends upon and is determined by our understanding and response to the pressure involved. But just why might God allow adversity into the life of a child of God whom He loves?

Adversity may be God’s way of getting  our attention. If we focus our life on the world and its standards and priorities, we may invite and accentuate adversity. When we become absorbed in our own personal plans, projects, programs, ambitions, goals and friendships, God may patiently try to get our attention. When we leave God out of our life and our priorities and decisions, inevitably problems and pressures arise too large and complicated for us to solve. When we become too busy with our own selfish will, God may intervene to show us His way of real peace and joy and His schedule and priorities for our lives. 

Such adversity is good for us.  Adversity may be God’s way of reassuring us of His love. Real love must be tough. Tough love means to care enough to rebuke and correct. Physical and emotional pain serve a real purpose. God shows His love by sometimes painfully reinforcing the dangers in our life. When we finally recognize God’s loving hand of correction and turn to Him, our experience will have been beneficial and spiritually maturing.  Adversity may be God calling us to self-examination. One purpose of chastening is to achieve self-examination. This process begins with self-examination, conviction and confession of sin. But if in adversity we become embittered and engrossed in examining and blaming others, God cannot use this process to bless us. Self-examination should lead to repentance and restoration.

Adversity may be God’s way of conquering our pride. God’s grace is free, but there is one thing essential to receive it - humility. God may occasionally prick our balloon of pride through adversity in order to humble us under His mighty hand that He might lift us up to a place of fruitful service that
pleases Him..

Adversity may be God’s way of reminding us of our human weaknesses and frailties. God sometimes tests us and prepares us for challenges in the future.  When stretched, a rubber band breaks at its weakest point. A chain is no stronger than its weakest link. Only by placing pressure upon materials, can we detect certain flaws. When God works powerfully through our obvious weaknesses, both we and others are freed to give Him all the praise and glory!

Adversity may be God’s way of motivating us to cry out for His help. The intensity of a child’s cry will determine the urgency of a parent’s response. When God’s children cry out in true repentance and faith, God will always lovingly respond.  Ultimately it is not the nature or severity of adversity that really matters.  It is our response to it. Someone has well said that Christians are like steam engines, at their best when under pressure!