"The Best Presence" December 2004 Newsletter
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Hope is My Anchor
Strength for your soul amid life's storms
Strength for your soul amid life's storms
© 2010 Dave and Merry Marinello, all rights reserved.
Hope is My Anchor
Strength for your soul amid life's storms December 2004
_________________________________________________________________
I thought I'd better untangle myself from the endless strings of lights long enough to send
this letter and wish all of you a (belated) Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas!
Many of you have asked how Dave is doing. It’s been a very rough summer and fall. He’s
again having trouble reading, concentrating, memory loss, and has much more pain,
dizziness, and fatigue than he had the previous year. We truly covet your prayers. Dave so
enjoyed being back at church last year—how he loves to teach!
It’s a mystery to me why God lets Dave’s illness continue. Yet even after these 4.5 long
years, I still believe that He will use this somehow to His glory. I try to make that my first
prayer.
I’ve been wrestling with one of the most difficult passages of scripture for someone going
through any kind of trial. Hebrews 12:7 says,
"Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons."
Discipline usually conjures up images of anger or disappointment or a sense of failure. It
is hard to separate these ideas, humanly speaking, from discipline. And yet, the people being
written to were not disobedient—they were suffering for sharing the Gospel! They above
all people would seem to least need "discipline."
I think when trials come, they force us to do some soul-searching. Is the trial God’s
judgement on us? Sometimes we discover a sin issue that needs dealt with. Many times we
come up with a list of our faults and blemishes, but nothing that seems to equal the value of
the trial. What, then, is God up to?
God’s discipline is meant as encouragement—it reaffirms our adoption as sons of God,
and heirs to His glory. Even Jesus endured such suffering—and His led to the shedding of
His blood for us. When we suffer, we are to look to Him, the first Son, who endured so
much at the hands of sinful men, that we might not "grow weary and lose heart."
But surely Christ didn’t endure "discipline?" we might ask. Yet Hebrews 2:10 says that
Jesus was made perfect through suffering. Jesus, who already knew no sin, was made
perfect because He now can sympathize with us in every way, having been through
suffering.
And Hebrews 5:8 says that Jesus "learned obedience" from what He suffered. That sounds
like apostasy at first glance. But one can’t be obedient even unto death, unless one actually
dies. Obedience is not just in the knowing, but in the doing. God’s discipline helps us learn
this obedience as Jesus did, and God promises incredible fruit as a result.
Hebrews 12 discloses that discipline produces an eventual harvest of righteousness and
peace for those trained by it. It allows us to share in God’s holiness. "And without holiness,
no one will see God." God is giving us an incredible gift; to be able to see Him. Dimly now,
but then, oh then we shall see Him as He is! We haven’t even begun to contemplate how
magnificent heaven will be, how completely fulfilling, how awesome and overwhelming to
be in the presence of God for eternity—what grace God pours out on us!
And our one job in all of this? To humbly submit to it. To endure hardship as discipline. To
put our crusty pride aside, and allow God to change us, mold us, make us anew—all for
our blessing. The alternative I suppose is to muddle through bitter and grumpy—which I
confess some days I do! I consider God’s grace abundant that He doesn’t forsake me even
then.
I pray you all have much to be thankful for; and if that is difficult, I pray that God will fill
you with conviction that He has what is truly good in store for you, even if it’s now hidden.
In Christ,
Merry Marinello
Strength for your soul amid life's storms December 2004
_________________________________________________________________
I thought I'd better untangle myself from the endless strings of lights long enough to send
this letter and wish all of you a (belated) Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas!
Many of you have asked how Dave is doing. It’s been a very rough summer and fall. He’s
again having trouble reading, concentrating, memory loss, and has much more pain,
dizziness, and fatigue than he had the previous year. We truly covet your prayers. Dave so
enjoyed being back at church last year—how he loves to teach!
It’s a mystery to me why God lets Dave’s illness continue. Yet even after these 4.5 long
years, I still believe that He will use this somehow to His glory. I try to make that my first
prayer.
I’ve been wrestling with one of the most difficult passages of scripture for someone going
through any kind of trial. Hebrews 12:7 says,
"Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons."
Discipline usually conjures up images of anger or disappointment or a sense of failure. It
is hard to separate these ideas, humanly speaking, from discipline. And yet, the people being
written to were not disobedient—they were suffering for sharing the Gospel! They above
all people would seem to least need "discipline."
I think when trials come, they force us to do some soul-searching. Is the trial God’s
judgement on us? Sometimes we discover a sin issue that needs dealt with. Many times we
come up with a list of our faults and blemishes, but nothing that seems to equal the value of
the trial. What, then, is God up to?
God’s discipline is meant as encouragement—it reaffirms our adoption as sons of God,
and heirs to His glory. Even Jesus endured such suffering—and His led to the shedding of
His blood for us. When we suffer, we are to look to Him, the first Son, who endured so
much at the hands of sinful men, that we might not "grow weary and lose heart."
But surely Christ didn’t endure "discipline?" we might ask. Yet Hebrews 2:10 says that
Jesus was made perfect through suffering. Jesus, who already knew no sin, was made
perfect because He now can sympathize with us in every way, having been through
suffering.
And Hebrews 5:8 says that Jesus "learned obedience" from what He suffered. That sounds
like apostasy at first glance. But one can’t be obedient even unto death, unless one actually
dies. Obedience is not just in the knowing, but in the doing. God’s discipline helps us learn
this obedience as Jesus did, and God promises incredible fruit as a result.
Hebrews 12 discloses that discipline produces an eventual harvest of righteousness and
peace for those trained by it. It allows us to share in God’s holiness. "And without holiness,
no one will see God." God is giving us an incredible gift; to be able to see Him. Dimly now,
but then, oh then we shall see Him as He is! We haven’t even begun to contemplate how
magnificent heaven will be, how completely fulfilling, how awesome and overwhelming to
be in the presence of God for eternity—what grace God pours out on us!
And our one job in all of this? To humbly submit to it. To endure hardship as discipline. To
put our crusty pride aside, and allow God to change us, mold us, make us anew—all for
our blessing. The alternative I suppose is to muddle through bitter and grumpy—which I
confess some days I do! I consider God’s grace abundant that He doesn’t forsake me even
then.
I pray you all have much to be thankful for; and if that is difficult, I pray that God will fill
you with conviction that He has what is truly good in store for you, even if it’s now hidden.
In Christ,
Merry Marinello
| The Best Presence by Merry Marinello |
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