Pray the Word with David Platt is a resource from radical.net.

Romans chapter 5, verses 3 through 5.

Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,

and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,

and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts

through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

What an other worldly picture of suffering.

Like I in no way want to take these verses lightly, like verse 3, we rejoice in our sufferings.

Like that does not mean when we go through suffering hurt

pain we just kind of put a smile on our face pretend the pain isn't real and try to gloss over it all

no that's not at all what the bible's talking about here or anywhere else.

All throughout Scripture, we see suffering men and women who are experiencing the effects of sin and hurt and pain in a fallen world, sometimes directly due to sin in their lives, sometimes not in a job-like way,

not directly due to sin in our lives. And yet we experience tragedy, we experience heartache,

we experience hurt, we experience pain. So how is it possible to have joy in that? And the Bible says

right before this, that by faith we've been justified before God. Now we have peace with him

and we rejoice in Him. We've been reconciled to God, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

We rejoice in the hope that one day we will be with Him.

So, in light of that, verse 3 says, not only that, we rejoice in our sufferings.

Why?

Because we know that suffering produces endurance. Endurance.

This is a picture we see all throughout the Bible. I think about Revelation chapter 1,

written to suffering brothers and sisters in the first century. And the Bible calls them in Revelation

...