Glory in Place of Shame

Call to Prayer

Title: Glory in Place of Shame

By: Daniel Peter

Date: 12.08.2024

Instead of your shame, you will receive a double portion, and instead of disgrace, you will rejoice in your inheritance. And so you will inherit a double portion in your land, and everlasting joy will be yours.  Isaiah 61:7 NIV

Sometimes, it stops making sense. Why would a good God allow His children to suffer? Where was He when we called? Why did He speak only after the evil and not before to prevent it? And many more questions like this might have risen in our hearts.

The way God has been presented to us by His ministers many times is the reason we feel disappointed. We have been told that God does not allow what we may call evil to happen, but looking at the scriptures, we find that He does. He said of Himself, “I form the light and create darkness: I make peace and create evil: I the LORD do all these things” (Isaiah 45:7). And “… shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?…” (Amos 3:6 KJV). So the question should be, why does He allow what we call evil to happen?

Firstly, He allows such to draw us to Him. Sometimes, we trust in our ability or that of those around us. But in a time of trials, our own strength fails, and friends and family may not be able to help. Then we have no choice but to depend on God. In that state, we gain knowledge of God we wouldn’t have before the trials.
Secondly, He allows us to experience evil simply because He has chosen us for His glory. The trials of Joseph were because of the fact that God had chosen Him to be a vessel through which the old world would be preserved.

Again, after Jesus Christ asked God to glorify Him with the glory He had with Him from the beginning (John 17:5), the next thing God did was to send Him to the cross. Scripture says “… if indeed we share in His sufferings in order that we may also share in His glory” (Rom. 8:17 NIV). Your suffering is a sign that you have been chosen for glory.

The suffering God allows is only for a while (see 1 Peter 5:10), and in the place of the shame we experience, He gives glory; in the place of pain, He gives power. God calls that which we may call evil “good” because of what it does in us. Trust in Him; there’s an end to the trials (Proverbs 23:18).

Prayer Point:

Let’s thank God for His word today. Let’s ask Him to help us see Him in our situation and to thank Him for them.