Day 12/18 – The Value of Affliction

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Thoughts from the Diary of a Desperate Man by Walter Henrichsen
The Value of Affliction
Day Three Hundred Fifty-two

‘It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes.” Psalm 119:71

People more easily believe in God when afflicted than when well. Tribulation drives regenerate people to God. As a follower of Christ you can see this correlation discussed again and again in Scripture. Paul says that God brings tribulation to produce hope, and for this reason we should rejoice in times of affliction; tribulation conspires with God to develop in us a biblical hope. 449

The unbeliever also more easily manifests a belief in God during adversity than during times of prosperity. When things go well, he is apt to conclude that either God does not exist or if He does, He is irrelevant. When calamity strikes, however, he often blames God. You hear him say such things as, “You believe in a God who brings pain and affliction into our lives; I could never worship Him.” God becomes a convenient scapegoat, someone to blame when things don’t meet his expectations.

Tribulation probably affords you a better opportunity than anything else in life to evaluate your concept of God. You can easily conclude that He is good when things are going well, but to suffer and call Him good requires an understanding of God’s character that not all believer’s develop. When tribulation enters your life, spend less time trying to understand why and more time giving God thanks.450 View times when circumstances seem to indicate that God has abandoned you as an opportunity to affirm His goodness.

449 cf. Romans 5:1-4
450 cf. Philippians 4:6-7

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Obadiah 1 Revelation 9 (New King James Version)

Obadiah
The Coming Judgment on Edom
1 The vision of Obadiah.
Thus says the Lord God concerning Edom
(We have heard a report from the Lord,
And a messenger has been sent among the nations, saying,
“Arise, and let us rise up against her for battle”):
2
“Behold, I will make you small among the nations;
You shall be greatly despised.
3
The pride of your heart has deceived you,
You who dwell in the clefts of the rock,
Whose habitation is high;
You who say in your heart, ‘Who will bring me down to the ground?’
4
Though you ascend as high as the eagle,
And though you set your nest among the stars,
From there I will bring you down,” says the Lord.
5
“If thieves had come to you,
If robbers by night—
Oh, how you will be cut off!—
Would they not have stolen till they had enough?
If grape-gatherers had come to you,
Would they not have left some gleanings?
6
“Oh, how Esau shall be searched out!
How his hidden treasures shall be sought after!
7
All the men in your confederacy
Shall force you to the border;
The men at peace with you
Shall deceive you and prevail against you.
Those who eat your bread shall lay a [a]trap for you.
No[b] one is aware of it.
8
“Will I not in that day,” says the Lord,
“Even destroy the wise men from Edom,
And understanding from the mountains of Esau?
9
Then your mighty men, O Teman, shall be dismayed,
To the end that everyone from the mountains of Esau
May be cut off by slaughter.
Edom Mistreated His Brother
10
“For violence against your brother Jacob,
Shame shall cover you,
And you shall be cut off forever.
11
In the day that you stood on the other side—
In the day that strangers carried captive his forces,
When foreigners entered his gates
And cast lots for Jerusalem—
Even you were as one of them.
12
“But you should not have gazed[c] on the day of your brother
[d]In the day of his captivity;
Nor should you have rejoiced over the children of Judah
In the day of their destruction;
Nor should you have spoken proudly
In the day of distress.
13
You should not have entered the gate of My people
In the day of their calamity.
Indeed, you should not have [e]gazed on their affliction
In the day of their calamity,
Nor laid hands on their substance
In the day of their calamity.
14
You should not have stood at the crossroads
To cut off those among them who escaped;
Nor should you have [f]delivered up those among them who remained
In the day of distress.
15
“For the day of the Lord upon all the nations is near;
As you have done, it shall be done to you;
Your [g]reprisal shall return upon your own head.
16
For as you drank on My holy mountain,
So shall all the nations drink continually;
Yes, they shall drink, and swallow,
And they shall be as though they had never been.
Israel’s Final Triumph
17
“But on Mount Zion there shall be [h]deliverance,
And there shall be holiness;
The house of Jacob shall possess their possessions.
18
The house of Jacob shall be a fire,
And the house of Joseph a flame;
But the house of Esau shall be stubble;
They shall kindle them and devour them,
And no survivor shall remain of the house of Esau,”
For the Lord has spoken.
19
The [i]South shall possess the mountains of Esau,
And the Lowland shall possess Philistia.
They shall possess the fields of Ephraim
And the fields of Samaria.
Benjamin shall possess Gilead.
20
And the captives of this host of the children of Israel
Shall possess the land of the Canaanites
As far as Zarephath.
The captives of Jerusalem who are in Sepharad
Shall possess the cities of the [j]South.
21
Then saviors[k] shall come to Mount Zion
To judge the mountains of Esau,
And the kingdom shall be the Lord’s.
Footnotes:
• Obadiah 1:7 Or wound or plot
• Obadiah 1:7 Or There is no understanding in him
• Obadiah 1:12 Gloated over
• Obadiah 1:12 Lit. On the day he became a foreigner
• Obadiah 1:13 Gloated over
• Obadiah 1:14 Handed over to the enemy
• Obadiah 1:15 Or reward
• Obadiah 1:17 Or salvation
• Obadiah 1:19 Heb. Negev
• Obadiah 1:20 Heb. Negev
• Obadiah 1:21 deliverers

Revelation 9
Fifth Trumpet: The Locusts from the Bottomless Pit
9 Then the fifth angel sounded: And I saw a star fallen from heaven to the earth. To him was given the key to the [a]bottomless pit. 2 And he opened the bottomless pit, and smoke arose out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. So the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke of the pit. 3 Then out of the smoke locusts came upon the earth. And to them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. 4 They were commanded not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green thing, or any tree, but only those men who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads. 5 And [b]they were not given authority to kill them, but to torment them for five months. Their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it strikes a man. 6 In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will desire to die, and death will flee from them.
7 The shape of the locusts was like horses prepared for battle. On their heads were crowns of something like gold, and their faces were like the faces of men. 8 They had hair like women’s hair, and their teeth were like lions’ teeth. 9 And they had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the sound of chariots with many horses running into battle. 10 They had tails like scorpions, and there were stings in their tails. Their power was to hurt men five months. 11 And they had as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in Hebrew is [c]Abaddon, but in Greek he has the name [d]Apollyon.
12 One woe is past. Behold, still two more woes are coming after these things.
Sixth Trumpet: The Angels from the Euphrates
13 Then the sixth angel sounded: And I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, 14 saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, “Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates.” 15 So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour and day and month and year, were released to kill a third of mankind. 16 Now the number of the army of the horsemen was two hundred million; I heard the number of them. 17 And thus I saw the horses in the vision: those who sat on them had breastplates of fiery red, hyacinth blue, and sulfur yellow; and the heads of the horses were like the heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire, smoke, and brimstone. 18 By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed—by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which came out of their mouths. 19 For [e]their power is in their mouth and in their tails; for their tails are like serpents, having heads; and with them they do harm.
20 But the rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk. 21 And they did not repent of their murders or their [f]sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.
Footnotes:
• Revelation 9:1 Lit. shaft of the abyss
• Revelation 9:5 The locusts
• Revelation 9:11 Lit. Destruction
• Revelation 9:11 Lit. Destroyer
• Revelation 9:19 NU, M the power of the horses
• Revelation 9:21 NU, M drugs