3D pictures can look really effective, fooling us into believing there is a hole in the pavement when there is not, but they remind us that reality is often more complex than we like to believe. Christianity is often presented as the solution to suffering, and there is truth in this, but to say there will never be any suffering in life once Christ is accepted is not the full story. God does help us; Psalm 18 reminds us that God rescues us and draws us out of situations which overwhelm us; He is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. (Ps 46:1) Psalm 34:47 and Psalm 37:39-40 all remind us of God’s deliverance and help, but there are times when suffering comes on us. Jesus reminded us that the world hated Him and will hate us; our very difference to the world means there is an inevitable reaction (see John 15:18-19).

Heb 2:10 reminds us that Jesus was made perfect through what he suffered. He experienced insults, opposition, rejection, betrayal and a tortuous death, but this reminds us that suffering helps us to be complete. (Heb 2:17-18) We grow and develop as we go through problems and suffering. Paul – who was used mightily by God to bring healing and deliverance to others – suffered (see 2 Cor 12:7-10).We do not know the form of his suffering (the ‘thorn in the flesh’) , but he was told by God that his weakness actually reflected God’s glory and the comfort he received from God, he was able to pass on to others. (2 Cor 1:3-5). Suffering equips us to help others.

Suffering produces perseverance in us, teaching us to push through. Suffering is designed to refine us and make us better (not bitter.) We are sustianed through hope (Rom 8:16-17).In any situation, God is able to deliver us from it, heal us from it or take us through it. Any suffering we experience is used by God for the best for us. We can trust God to help us, no matter what.

Envy is listed as one of the seven deadly sins and was certainly a major problem for Saul, as 1 Samuel 18 makes plain. Envy divides people. It destroys relationships, sows discord, and creates a spirit of bitterness and evil. It causes people to act and speak in toxic ways. James tells us, ‘For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.’ (James 3:16)

Envy often arises when we feel insecure and inferior, when we compare ourselves unfavourably to other people. The antidote to this is to recognise who we are in God and to learn godliness with contentment. Paul tells the Romans, ‘Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.’ (Rom 12:3) When we are sure that God loves us and accepts us no matter what, we can live freely, appreciating the differences and qualities of others without being threatened by them. Saul felt threatened by David’s military successes and was afraid of him. We see later on that David had great respect for Saul and did not return his animosity, sparing his life on more than one occasion. He lived without envy or jealousy, but Saul shows us how these emotions, if unchecked and never dealt with, will mushroom into far worse problems. Saul tried to kill David on numerous occasions and plotted so that others might kill him too. His life reflected the fruits of his ongoing disobedience to God, unchecked attitudes and wilful refusal to repent. Envy will always lead us into danger.

1 Samuel 18 shows us the importance of relationships and how these affect us in our everyday lives. We see two very different relationships in this chapter: the loyalty and selflessness of true friendship in how Jonathan (son of the king, Saul) deals with David, and the envy and jealousy of his father towards David which corrodes his relationship with his servant and leads him to attempt to kill him.

Friendship is a precious gift of God, and the friendship between Jonathan and David was very special. (1 Sam 18:1-5) Jonathan, far from being jealous of God’s anointing on David’s life and His decision to make David king after Saul, pledges his allegiance to David and gives him his robe, tunic, sword, bow and belt. His loyalty was to be tested over the next few years, but he remained faithful and true, giving us an example of how to love one’s neighbour as oneself (see Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 19:19; 22:39, Mark 12:31; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14; James 2:8).

Saul, on the other hand, shows us how envy and jealousy can grow from the least little comment, and how this can spill over into violent and irrational behaviour. The root cause of Saul’s growing antipathy to David lay in his fear and insecurity that God had left him and was now blessing David instead. He recognised God’s anointing on David and feared for his reign. Instead of coming to God in repentance for his sins, he projected all the blame onto David and tried to manipulate situations to get him killed. God’s hand on David meant that did not succeed, and so Saul’s fear and animosity grew.

The relationships outlined in this chapter were to take up years of David’s life and we see how important it is to choose God’s ways over our own. Relationships are at the heart of human life; they influence our attitudes and actions more than we perhaps realise. There is always the need for personal responsibility in our relationships; we need to choose God’s ways if we are to rest in His blessing and anointing.

Every day we talk to ourselves. We have an internal dialogue perfectly captured by J. R. R. Tolkin in his depiction of the character Gollum in ‘The Lord Of The Rings’. Originally known as Smeagol, he is a hobbie corrupted by the ring who is later known as Gollum, and he essentially chose a wrong, murderous path because of his desire for the ring. We are told he both loved and hated the ring as he loved and hated himself, and the author gives us insight into this dilemma by sharing his internal conversations which reflect this tension, a tension Paul describes as being the way of the flesh versus the way of the Spirit.

Talking to ourselves is something we do out loud as children, but the older we get, the more these conversations are internalised, rarely discussed and often even unnoticed consciously. Nonetheless, these conversations are powerful and often the source of internal conflict, creating dissonance within us as we wrestle with disquiet, anxiety, fear, envy and dread. We often try to suppress the internal voices that wage war on our minds, but the only real solution to these struggles is truth.

This is why the BIble tells us to speak words of truth out loud. It’s not enough to know truth; we have to declare it. Heb 13:6 says, So we say with confidence,“The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?”; Joel 3:10 says, ‘Let the weakling say,“I am strong!”’ Jesus, when faced with the devil’s temptations, quoted the word of God back to him. If we are to silence the voices of doubt, anxiety, fear and dread, we must do so with the truth of God’s word. Only by speaking truth can we hope to have victory over other conversations!

This evening in our series ‘The Miraculous & The Mundane’, we looked at Acts 10, where Cornelius and Peter both receive miraculous visions and dreams which lead to Cornelius and his household coming to a living faith in Jesus Christ. Not only does this show us how God works to bring people to faith, we see how Peter’s understanding of the gospel message is enlarged to include Gentiles as well as Jews.

It seems that God is prepared to go to extraordinary lengths to bring people to know Him – and this is tremendously reassuring to know. Cornelius, a devout and God-fearing man, directly sees an angel who tells him to send servants to find Peter. Peter, praying whilst waiting for food, sees a vision of a sheet from heaven filled with four-footed animals, reptiles and birds and is told to ‘kill and eat’ – a command which baffles him since, as a devout Jew, he has always followed God’s dietary laws. Peter does not really understand what this vision (which he sees three times) means, but whilst he is pondering this, Cornelius’s servants arrive. He realises that ‘I should not call anyone impure or unclean’ (Acts 10:28) and that ‘God does not show favouritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right.’ (Acts 10:34-35) Thus, a new chapter in evangelism begins as Peter realises the scope of the gospel is for all people, not just for Jews.

God is able to use ‘divine coincidences’ to grab our attention and to focus us on God. Often, the means of these coincidences may seem quite mundane or on the other hand might be difficult to understand, but if we are listening to the Spirit of God, He is more than able to nudge us in the right direction, bring the right people across our paths and use us to preach the gospel message of salvation. Dietrich Bonhoeffer once said, “We must be prepared to have God interrupt us.” God interrupting us could be the very definition of a miracle! Cornelius and Peter were both going about their ordinary lives when God interrupted them. The interruption was unusual, but resulted in a meeting which led to salvation. May God interrupt us and use us to bring the gospel message of salvation to a hungry and seeking world.