If you read the previous reflection you will remember that one morning when we were missionaries on Vancouver's downtown eastside, I was mugged. It was early in the morning and I was on Main and Hastings – that most infamous intersection in this most infamous neighbourhood - and I was on the phone with my wife who was out of town at the time.
Someone came running up behind me, grabbed my briefcase and tore down Main Street. In the briefcase was my laptop and all the information for the summer school program I was running for the kids in the area; so, like anyone mugged in the depths of skid row, I…well, I chased the mugger.
I followed him down Main Street through Chinatown across busy streets and around the myriad of mazes that are Vancouver’s back alleys. Scaring rats, jumping over sleeping street folk, I pursued my assailant. When I was within reach of him… I fell right in front of a bus and though I escaped with my life, the mugger escaped with my briefcase, my laptop, and the program files for the kids.
It was when I was walking back, completely distraught and despondent, that I experienced a miracle: I encountered an angel, a messenger of God, in the back alleys of Vancouver’s storied downtown eastside. I can still remember vividly; he looked like a ‘dumpster diver;’ he prayed with me and he offered me these words of encouragement from Romans 5:3,4 “...but let us also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” Inside I sighed. I knew he was right. God gave me these words to encourage me. . God sent His messenger to prepare us for impending challenges ahead.
In the next months a number of tragedies and struggles would confront our family. We were to receive serious, vocal, practical and other opposition from the Enemy through even people very close to us. We had to consciously protect even our children from harm; the foe is relentless.
The Apostle Paul says here that we should rejoice in our suffering because - if indeed our suffering is for the gospel - it will produce perseverance and you know what perseverance is good for, right? It gives us the ability to get through more suffering and difficult times and you know why God gives us the ability to get through more suffering and difficult times? …Because we’ve got more suffering and difficult times to get through still. So as we rejoice in our perseverance through difficult times we can rejoice because we will be ready for the even more difficult times that lay ahead.
Romans 5: “...rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” And this hope will never disappoint us (v.5).
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