Hello, Saints, and welcome to this episode of the Speak Life Today Podcast. I’m your host Felton Thompkins, Gospel Minister and Ambassador for Jesus Christ our Lord. On this episode of the Speak Life Today Podcast, I want to talk to you a little bit about “suffering.” Now, again this is not one of those topics that we deem to be glamorous or fun to discuss. And yet it is a necessary topic. Because you see saints of God we are all going to have to go through some hardships on the way to getting where our Heavenly Father wants us to be.
 
In this life, there are going to be some…trials and tribulation, conflict and contentions, sickness and death, idolatry and witchcraft, rejection and persecution, drunkenness and drug abuse, inordinate affection and fornication, marriage and divorce, children and the choices that they make, jobs and unemployment, money and lack, inadequate housing and homelessness. The list goes on and on… And all of which many of us as members of the human race have been acquainted with and/or have suffered.
The topic of suffering as a Christian is a vast one. It’s a topic that can be, and is to be discussed at great lengths. It’s definitely not a subject that can be completed or exhausted within an hour or two of bible study. And yet it is a topic that most of us as Christians don’t like to discuss or choose not to discuss. In this episode of the SLT Podcast, I’m going to do my best not to be long winded and I promise you that this will be one of my shorter episodes of the Speak Life Today Podcast. And my prayer is that what I have to share with you will help you to see and understand that God is in total control. There is nothing going on in our lives that our Father doesn’t know about, and nothing in our lives has caught him off guard. So please stick around and be encouraged.
Here is a question….
Is all of our suffering from God?  The answer is No. But God will and does allow suffering to take place in all of our lives.
Here’s another question…. Where does our suffering come from?
Sometimes we suffer because of the choices that we make, and other times we suffer because of the choices that others make around us. Be it family members, friends or strangers.
You may be asking… Is that the only place that suffering comes from? Wel,l the answer to that is also no as well.
The bible tells us that we as believers shall suffer persecution. In fact, it states it like this…Yea and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. 2nd Timothy 3:12.
Here is a statement that I read in a devotional one day as I was studying for this lesson. “changing your circumstances isn’t always possible, and it’s certainly not always obedient to God”. Quote by Haley Morgan.
1st Peter 5:10 puts it this way…But the God of all Grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you. Paul tells us in his letter to the church at Rome that being heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ that we suffer with him (Christ) that we may be also glorified together Romans 8:17.
You see saints most times we have such a narrow view as to what suffering looks like when it comes to living life as Christians. We have a tendency to forget that suffering comes in many shapes and sizes, so to speak.
For example:  We have a tendency to look at the conflict that we may experience with others as some strange thing happening to us brought on by Satan or some other source, other than God allowing the conflict to come forth as a teacher to show us ourselves, to purge us, and to show us if we are going to trust in him, or are we going to try and go it alone in our own strength and understanding.
 
I am learning more and