“Which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me.”
As he writes these words, Paul is suffering because he is doing what God called him to do.
For many people this wouldn’t fit their picture of God. They think that life should be pleasant if I am living by faith. But to Paul, being blessed didn’t mean that life was great, it meant being in a place where God was using him; it meant bringing glory to God.
Paul knew God. Because of that, he knew that when he entrusted his life, his possessions, his future, his health to God, he could trust God even when things didn’t turn out the way he wanted, because he knew that “he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me.”
“That day”meant when God wraps up human history and brings this world to an end and through judgment rights the wrongs of this life and brings justice. In “that day” Paul would receive his rewards and he knew they’d be far greater than his losses in this life, no matter what they were, so long as he honoured God through them all.
Journal your response to what God’s saying to you today.
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