This past Sunday, we spent time studying 2 Corinthians 1:3-5. As a congregation, we came to understand more (… hopefully) our God who is both compassionate and comforting. We also commissioned our Stephen Ministers and Leaders to provide care for those in need in our congregation.
With regard to our 2 Corinthians passage, it’s amazing to consider our God, coming alongside of us and suffering with us. At the same time, He also comes alongside of us and strengthens us. As we’re comforted, His heart is for us to go and comfort others with the comfort we ourselves have received. That was the outline of our passage and message.
Just to back-track a bit, I was most caught off guard (in a wondrous sense) by the Lamentations 3 passage, declaring that God’s compassions never fail. Amazing! While we lack compassion — due to our inability to relate, lack of time, lack of concern, need to insulate/protect ourselves, our forgetfulness, etc. — He can be fully, perfectly compassionate, wholly engaged, not limited, not holding back. His compassions are new every morning!
This passage reveals a very wrong and off-mark view that some of us (myself included) hold of God. In times of personal suffering, I often see God as being distant, disengaged, generally uninvolved. Perhaps, I’m too busy trying to survive and cope to notice whether or not God is near. But perhaps at a more deeper level, I’m still perceiving God as one who is too “sterile” and transcendent to be involved in the suffering of His people.
This past Sunday, we saw that the opposite is true. God is not far. God is near. 2 Cor. 1 tells us. The cross shows us.
