Suffering Isn’t Always a Malfunction | Mornings with Mico

Yo, yo, what's going on with you, man? I wanna kick this off with a question. What if your suffering isn't the result of a disconnect between you and God, but rather it's actually evidence, it's actually, it joins you, it connects you to the Savior who actually suffered first. My name is Meeko, and that's the thought I wanna speak from today. I received a letter from one of y'all this week, which really kind of I've been using lately as inspiration for these devotionals. And today, I'm talking through, it's a letter, I'm speaking from a letter that I received, and the guy was just writing about hardship, a guy out of Florida. He was writing about hardship and just years of it, not in theory, but actually just giving details of just ongoing years of hardship. And the thing that stood out to me was when he was writing this letter, he had, it was his posture in it. I would've expected him to be like, God, what is all of this about? Where did you go? You've abandoned me, you rejected me, things like that. But instead of asking like, why was he suffering? It's like he looked at the cross and asked a different question.

If Jesus went through all that pain and turmoil, words cannot even explain what he endured for us. Who are we not to go through anything? That wasn't what I was expecting after reading like a big chunk of his letter and just seeing like what all he had endured. I wasn't expecting that turn right there, which really just kind of like stopped me in my tracks, stuff like that, I'm really having to sit with that because this is just evidence of just like the Holy Spirit massaging your heart in like the thick of your mess, your frustrations, whatever. It's something that I really had to sit with. Here's a man who had every reason to feel abandoned, to feel rejected. Jesus on a cross said, Lord, why have you forsaken me? But instead he's reframing his suffering as fellowship, not evidence that God left him, but rather it's like a place where he met the Savior, where he's meeting the Savior, where he's meeting Jesus, he's meeting Yeshua in this space, in this place of suffering. It is in a place where he's kicking up dust, it's a place where he's recognizing. And then just embracing the Holy Spirit in this space. And I was reminded of a verse in scripture, first Peter chapter four, verse 12 and 13 says, dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you

as though something strange were happening to you, but rejoice in as much as you participate in the suffering of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. And reading this, it's like, there's been many a times where like, I'll be dealing with something and I'll say a thing and then later read scripture and see the words that came out of my mouth were actually aligned with scripture. And I just wanna let you know, that is the Holy Spirit. Whenever you say that, whenever you, whenever those situations happen with you, I'm letting you know, that's the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit reminds us of Jesus's words. It reminds us of scripture, reminds us of that in those moments, even if we're not conscious that we're being reminded in that moment and we're just speaking how we feel, but then later finds out that it aligns with the scripture. Don't just count that as coincidence or like, oh, that's crazy. Like, listen, 10 times out of 10, give God the glory for it. I promise you, give God the glory for it. But I think just, I digress. Somewhere, I think along the way, many of us, we kind of picked up this quiet assumption that like, if I'm suffering, that something has gone wrong between me and God, that God is upset with me or that God has left me

or God doesn't hear my prayers, things like that. And Peter just says the opposite in his passage here. He says, don't be surprised, right? He said, as though something strange were happening. Don't be surprised. He's telling you, like, almost expect that suffering isn't always a malfunction in the life of your faith walk. Sometimes it's participation. I'm gonna let that breathe. That's, let that sink in. Like, let that penetrate your heart. Suffering isn't always a malfunction in your faith walk. Sometimes it's actually participation. We follow a savior whose role. ran through pain, and he never promised that I would detour around it. He set the example of what this walk looks like. We have to come to terms with the fact that we are going to experience some sort of suffering. The Bible talks about long suffering. That's just a part of this walk. I can recall some years ago when I was just frustrated with how life was going, and I was talking to God, and I'm just like, man, why does life have to look like this right now? This is one of those times. I may have shared this with you before, but this is one of those times where the Holy Spirit wasn't soft and cuddly with me. I felt like he just gave me very direct and clear, kind of like cutting, you know what I'm saying? But in the best kind of way, it was a verse, Galatians 2.20, and it just talks about how when we accept Christ, we die, and now Christ lives through us, that it's no longer us that lives, but it's Christ that lives through us, where it's like, Demico, you've accepted my salvation, and now I live through you, and this is what life looks like. I'm going to need you to get on board, right? That's what I heard the Holy Spirit speaking to me. I don't know exactly. I don't want to project that onto you and make you feel lesser in or trying to, I don't know, downplay whatever your suffering may be, because that's not what this is either, right? Even in light of this verse here in Peter, this doesn't

make suffering good. This doesn't make suffering feel good. It doesn't mean that we excuse some of the things that we may have happened, or some of the things that you may have endured. I mean, you may have dealt with manipulative parents, may have had to suffer through abuse as a child, or even as an adult, or whatever the case. I'm not, please hear me, I am not excusing that. That's not what I'm saying. I'm not saying, I'm not pretending like the pain doesn't hurt. What I'm saying is that in Jesus, that suffering doesn't have to be meaningless. There's a difference. There's a difference between a pain that isolates you and then one that actually joins you, joins you to Christ. And a cross is what makes that kind of pain, that kind of redemption in the pain, that kind of story possible. Who are we to go through anything isn't like resignation. It's dignity. It's a man refusing to let his hardship convince him that he's been abandoned by God, that he's been forgotten about, that he's been rejected, that God doesn't hear his prayers. He knows exactly how much his Savior endured for him. That's what I read in this man's letter. That's what I see. I see a man who's embracing what God has done. He's embracing the suffering that Jesus endured for us, for him, for you. And every day may not be perfect. Every day may not be peachy, but he's choosing to embrace this walk and whatever comes with it and lean into God in the valleys as well as the peaks. Whatever you're walking through, you are not walking somewhere Jesus hasn't been. Please know that. I'm gonna leave you with this question. Has your suffering been isolating you from God or could it become the place where you meet him? Could your suffering be the place where God is wanting to meet you? Ultimately, it's your decision how you experience it. We don't always get to choose what we experience in life, but the way we go through it, that's our choice. And he's not promising us a life free of suffering. He is saying that I'll be with you in it. And there's something that he can do in you through it. And he wants to meet you there. I just want to leave y'all with that today. I'm gonna pray for us. Lord, your word tells us that long suffering is a part of this journey. Lord, while we suffer, I don't fully know every time while we suffer what it is you're doing, Lord. But I pray that we be a people, that we seek you for understanding no matter what it looks like, that we choose to fix our eyes on you. Let you Lord over our emotions, Lord over our thoughts, Lord over our perspective, as you grace us through every season. Thank you. We love you.

Amen. Amen.