I gave that man the best illustration of this that I had ever heard. One of my uncles once asked me, while we were in the mountains, which tree would be stronger, the one on the top of the mountain or the one in the valley. It turns out that the one on the mountain top is stronger than the one in the valley. The tree on the mountain top is accustomed to the strong winds that have threatened to topple it its whole life, that's why its roots go deep so that it can endure the winds. But the tree in the valley is sheltered from the strong winds most of the time and its roots have no need to go deep, leaving it vulnerable and more likely to fall in a storm. The Christian life is much the same as those trees. God often allows us to go through difficult trials so that our faith will be strengthened for the road ahead. Our family knows this from personal experience. On June 23rd, 2001, our third child, Rebekak, was born, but to our shock, she was born with a life-threatening heart problem. Despite of our prayers and all the effort of the doctors, Rebekah died after living only ten days. But rather than destroying our faith, when we resisted the temptation to be angry at God, this trial strengthened our faith. God gave us the kind of faith that we needed to follow Him through the challenges that He has put in our path since. We could not have stepped out on faith and followed God to two different states away from our home in Georgia, if our faith had not been strengthened first. We also could not have experienced the great victories that God has won through our lives without having our faith strengthened. James must have also experienced this because he declared, "My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing" (James 1:2-4, NKJV).
When I was telling all of this to that man, another thought struck me about why God would allow His faithful followers to suffer like Job did. A big part of it could have been that God allowed Job to go through those things so that his story could encourage the millions that would later read about it in Scripture. You never know how God can use your suffering for the good of others. I have also learned this by experience. About a month after Rebekah died, I was preaching at a Christian rehabilitation center for alcohol and drug addicts. I had not planned on saying anything about my daughter that night, because the pain was still too great, but in the middle of my sermon, I found myself telling her story. I told about the challenge that it was to our faith, I acknowledged the great temptation that we fought, and I described how God had brought us through it and was still bringing us through it. Several of the men decided to put their faith and lives in the hands of Jesus that night. One of them came to me afterwards and said that he had also lost a child. He had been angry with God for years over it and had turned to alcohol and drugs to try and soothe the pain. But that night he confessed that he had been wrong and he said that it was all because of Rebekah's story and how we responded to her death. Do you see the point? Because of our family's great suffering and our right perspective on it, another person will be in Heaven that might not have been otherwise! There have been others since this man and I'm sure that there will be more.
I say again that you never know how God can use your suffering for the good of others, but don't forget that it is also for your good as well. The Apostle Paul said it best: "And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose" (Romans 8:28, NKJV). Paul also said, "For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal" (2 Corinthians 4:17-18, NKJV). We were never promised to be spared all trouble in this world, but we were promised that it would serve a good purpose and that we would be rewarded for faithfully enduring it. So Christians, let's have the right perspective on suffering, an eternal perspective rather than a temporary one.
