Suffering with Hope

Sunday 11:15pm
As I was reading tonight and reflecting on the message today I wanted to share this text in Romans 5.3-5.

“More than that, 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.” ESV

We as believers do experience suffering. But we suffer with great hope as “we wait patiently for full adoption as sons” (Romans 8.23).  This adoption is the end result of our great salvation.  This text actually calls us to rejoice in our sufferings.  One of the reasons we can rejoice is that we know there is purpose in suffering.  It is clear that suffering, here in this life, produces transformation in us.  Suffering brings about endurance, character and hope, making us more like Christ.