Redemptive Suffering

I just listened to the Feb 3rd sermon and I just think it is so cool that there is a name for what I was trying to describe in my post here:http://manymanyblessings.blogspot.com/2008/01/choose-pain.html and here:http://manymanyblessings.blogspot.com/2008/02/chosen-suffering-step-2.html

It just goes to show that you don't need some fancy, well-read theologian to tell you about God and the mysteries of how He works. He taught this to me, and I am quite often fairly unteachable!



The past week with G has been difficult at best. Just when we think he is coming around he will once again plummet into the abyss. Our therapist once suggested possible early onset bi-polar disorder. It seems to fit. He will have days, even weeks of being the G we know him to be - kind, affectionate, moderately obedient;-) but will then seemingly with no trigger or notice become this angry, irritable, defiant liitle tyrant. Every time it happens, even though it has happened consistently for years now, I become disheartened and completely discouraged. I get sad thinking about what the other three are exposed to - yelling, anger, destruction of property, and I get angry thinking how everything could be wonderful if he were just a normal kid. So, in light of my new revelations about suffering I have been asking the Lord what He would have me do in this situation. And the answer wasn't easy to hear. It was - ENDURE TO THE END. That's it. He didn't promise to fix it. He didn't whisper how it would be over soon. He didn't apologize for how hard it has been. He just said to endure. I think He wants me to truly start to practice this redemptive suffering thing! He wants me to keep loving G even when he is "unloveable" and ISN'T loving me back. He wants me to acknowledge that although being G's mother is going to be often heart breaking, that I was put in his life for a reason and if I can help his heart and mind to heal then it is worth it. It will be joyful! Even if I don't truly see the evidence of it in this life. So today I pray that God would help me to love in a selfless way that expects nothing in return. And I hope that one day G will feel the love that is indeed all around him.