When Times Are Tough

Posted on 12. Apr, 2009 by frank in life struggle

I’ve repeatedly shared with people the three ways I believe God communicates with us:

• Prayer and circumstance – God will give us impressions about things we pray for, and show us things during the course of a day through what is happening around us.
• The Bible – God will reveal things to us while reading the scriptures.
• People – God will use people to tell us things. Often things we don’t want to hear. However, sometimes we get a word of encouragement someone just when we need it.

That is exactly what happened to me recently. Sometimes we face challenges that seem so much bigger than we are. Things that we can’t imagine having the strength to conquer. During a recent challenge, I asked a friend to pray for me and they said, “lets pray Romans 15:13. That should be our prayer.” It says,

13May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

The thing I see in this verse is that we receive joy and peace AS we trust him… NOT before. Trusting God is so hard sometimes. Especially when it is something that we have not really shared with others. Something that we have held onto so tightly and attempt to control out of fear.

The exciting part is that when we do trust God, not only are we filled with joy and peace, we also are provided with something by the power of the Holy Spirit – HOPE. I don’t know about your situation but when times are tough for me, I need hope. What we find out in Romans 15 is that God knows that we need hope and he is willing to provide it.

In my situation God was using all three to communicate with me. I’m so thankful I was listening.