Afflicted

Back in the summer, I was in my bed doubled over in pain from what I  
now have found out was a mass pushing against my large intestine.

I asked the Lord in refference to a word He spoke to me; Lord you said  
You would make me a mighty man because of my love for Your creation;  
is this the way a mighty man is made? (in the bed of affliction)
He said the pathway of affliction leads to the precipice of victorious  
life.

Then the scripture came into my mind in Psalms 119:71
It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn Your  
ways.

Which led me to search out that verse, which then led me also to  
Psalms 119:67 which states:
Before I was afflicted I went astray: but now I have kept Thy word.

In other words it could read, before I was afflicted I did what ever I  
wanted to do without regaurd for Gods will for my life.

Which upon further meditation of this thought I remembered the verse  
that says in Hebrews 12:11
Now no chastening for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous:  
nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness  
unto them that has been exercised by it.

The question then arises in my mind, is chastisment and affliction one  
and the same?

In the first letter from Paul to the church that was in Corinth in the  
fifth chapter there he makes refference to a man that has taken his  
fathers wife.

After which he says that you should deliver such a one to Satan for  
the destruction of his flesh, that his spirit man may be saved in the  
day of the Lord.

Later in the very same letter he states in the eleventh chapter in  
refference to the Lords supper about examining ourselves that we don’t  
eat or drink unworthily, for this cause many are weak and sickly among  
us, and sleep before their time.

The main point of that thought is found in the thirty first verse that  
states:
For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged.
But when you are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, (WHY) that we  
should not be judged with the world.

So I would say in conclusion that if we are born again into the family  
of God and we find ourselves in a place that our flesh is being  
destroyed, (such as that happened to me this past summer) remember:
For whom the Lord loves He chastens and scourges every son who He  
recieves.
Hebrews 12:6

Is every affliction a chastisement?
I think not, yet we need to examine ourselves and judge our ownselves  
daily with fear and trembling.
Remember also that the demons believe, yet they tremble.
For the just are scarcely saved.

So my brothers and sisters in the great and woundedful body of Christ  
may all of our eyes be opened and our ears likewise be opened to the  
truths of the Spirit of God found in His Manual that we may all grow  
in the fulness and likeness of Him, that we will ultimately bring  
glory to Him because of Christ in us.

Peace to you.

Sent from our iPod
Frank & Vicki Thompson

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