July 6 Daily Devotional

Bible Reading

2 Corinthians 7:8–10

Devotional

The sorrow of the world leads to misery, suffering, and ultimately to death. These effects are all the foretaste of eternal death. When troubles come into your life, when matters become difficult for you, and when you are in a vale of tears full of difficulties and cares, then the questions for you must be: Where does this all bring me? Do these afflictions lead me away from God or do they lead me closer to Him?

When hardships come, godly sorrow gravitates toward God, but the sorrow of the world goes away from God. The sorrow of the world does not acknowledge that it is His striking and chastening hand that causes afflictions. Perhaps you have had much sorrow and misery. But if it has not brought you to God, then all these sufferings are foretastes of your eternal sorrow. When the final blow comes all unrepentant ones will be cast into the terrors of hell.

But you must remember that when troubles come into your life, it is not God’s intention to cast you into eternal damnation. God chastises to lead you to salvation. God brings afflictions to drive you to Him. In all these dealings, the Lord has one aim, and that is to lead you to Himself. Therefore do not harden yourself, but bow before the Lord. Psalm 95:7 says, “Today if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart.” Let the tears you shed, be shed before the Lord. Let not the words of Christ that we read in Matthew 23:37 be applicable to you: “How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!” That is where the sorrow of the world will ultimately bring you: to the “ye would not.”

Remember that godly sorrow is a sorrow to salvation. The Spirit of God does not convict you of your sins and misery to bring you into despair. The Spirit of God does not break you down to cast you away. When God’s Spirit removes your carnal happiness, He does so to lead you to true and lasting happiness in Christ. God breaks down in order to build up. God’s Spirit empties to fill. God’s dealings in your life are to make you poor in spirit in order to make you richly blessed in the Lord.

 

From The Everlasting Word by Frans Bakker, compiled and translated by Gerald R. Procee. Reformation Heritage Books and Free Reformed Publications, 2007. Used by permission. For further information, click here.