When do I know if God is correcting me?

It's a question every believer faces eventually, and today it comes from a female listener named

Hunter.

This is so good.

Listen to this.

Quote.

Pastor John, thank you for your honest answer about the pandemic this year.

I'm thinking especially of your special episode titled, How Do We Make Sense of the

Coronavirus?

There you concluded that some instances of suffering, including weaknesses, illness,

and death represent direct judgments of God for our sin intended to discipline us and

to bring us to repentance and restoration.

I see this in passages like 1 Corinthians 11 verses 30 to 32, yet we also know from scripture

that God allows some suffering, not as a specific judgment or correction, but simply

to display His glory and build in us patient endurance.

I see this in passages like John 9.3 and 2 Corinthians 12 verses 8 to 9.

Now my question is this, when God brings suffering into our lives, how can we discern

if that suffering should be met with patients and endurance or with immediate life evaluation

and alteration?

Hmm.

Good question.

Yeah, it is.

...