The Gift of Suffering:

How do you know when Jesus wants to tell you something? For me, I start noticing things that are not ordinary in my world. Recently, I had a day of knowing something was up as I continuously saw flashes of movement all around me for a solid day or two, nothing I could make out I just knew there was a lot of activity in the spirit realm. Even in my dullness to perceive the Lord wanting to talk to me, every time I closed my eyes I would see a color, in the last year the Lord speakes to me a lot through color. Knowing the redemptive gifts of seven are tied to a specific color, green kept coming to me. The redemptive gifts are given to each of us and provide such a rich culture for our journey with the Lord. The seven colors of the rainbow are tied to the seven spirits, and green represents exhorter. That portion of my spirit seems to interact on my behalf as I pursue my relationship with the Lord. So I began talking to extorter and the Lord. I am writing from my experience, this work on the redemptive gifts is scriptural and we all have one portion of the seven that seems to be most influential in our lives. I encourage you to explore the redemptive gifts for your own walk with the Lord. We know from our study of Revelation that Jesus is all seven.

Common of exhorters is that God allows rejection and alienation in order to force us into a position of the greatest and deepest strength, which is to know the Lord, His word and to truly live from principles. For me I have known rejection to the core, and isolation has been my life. When I thought it couldn’t get worse it did. When I couldn’t bare any more rejection nor isolation I received more with betrayal after betrayal. I quit asking the Lord, I absolutely could not fight anymore. I began counting the years left, knowing my impact for the kingdom would be minuscule. I knew because of what I had suffered people treated me as less than because I had been rejected seemingly by the Lord himself. I came to realize that Jesus was rejected as I was and in that place of rejection I could truly know what it felt like to be totally alone. In those moments of being totally alone, knowing no other relationship is with you then you know the preciousness of the walk with God. I came to know Jesus that day, the beauty of allowing me to suffer as He did and does on the cross was such an all encompassing gift. Because with it comes this strength of reliance on every word that proceeds from the mouth of our Father. I asked the Father some twenty plus years ago to know His son, and this is how He answered that prayer.

As now my mind, body and soul carry the scars of rejection and the years of mental abuse, I seek restoration, and restoration somewhat is coming just from being out of those places of confinement. Also, the balm of healing comes from one whom spirit to spirit is pouring out love. But I will walk into eternity with scars just as Jesus incarnate carries the scars of His sacrifice for me. What a gift those scars are! With them are the gift of discernment and a knowing of the preciousness of the word of God. This is now my greatest and deepest strength. When the King smiles there is favor that brings life like a gentle rain. Provers 16;15