The Beauty in Suffering

This is the first blog I’ve written since going on my Sabbatical. I will attempt to do a post each week to update our friends on our time of seeking God for healing and refreshment.

To start our time of restoration, we decided to drive our pick-up truck to a cabin that has been graciously loaned to us by our dear friends Tri and Nancy Robinson. Tri is the Senior Pastor of the Boise, Idaho Vineyard and the cabin he and Nancy have built is near Cascade, Idaho in the isolation of the tall pine mountains. We felt that solitude would be an important starting place for my sabbatical and this cabin will definitely afford us some seclusion. Our little home away from home is powered by a generator and is off the grid in terms of TV, cell phone and internet connection.

Roi Lene and I left on our journey en-route to Idaho on Monday, June 6th. We chose to take the northern route on I-90, which took us through the Bad Lands in South Dakota. We took a little detour to see Mt. Rushmore and enjoyed the awesome beauty of that country.

Traveling through northern Wyoming placed us at the eastern entrance of Yellowstone National Park. Our original plan was to spend a day looking at the sights in Yellowstone but quickly realized that to take in the sights of a two million acre park was going to be impossible in one day. Actually, it would take months to take in the spectacular features of Yellowstone.

We communicated with the Robinsons that we would be arriving in Idaho a few days later than expected. We were not prepared to camp so we proceeded to purchase a blow-up mattress and two sleeping bags. For two nights we bedded down in the back of our pick-up truck. There we bunked beside three RV busses each worth about a half million dollars. If you can picture Roi Lene and I in our Chevy pick-up, zipping ourselves into our sleeping bags and watching episodes of Seinfeld and Little House on the Prairie on my Mac computer with string cheese, wheat thins and beef jerky as snacks for our evenings.

Both nights the temperatures fell to 25 degrees. Believe it or not, with the massive snowfall they have received in the northwest, some of the snowdrifts that remain on the ground in Yellowstone are well over six feet high. Needless to say, the nights were a bit chilly. I am blessed to have a wife that is up for adventure.

Of course, at age 59, I would have to get up in the middle of the night, winch myself out of the pick-up, put on my flip-flops and do all I could do to miss the piles of snow as I made my way to the public restroom facility about 100 years from our camp sight. I would always take my cell phone with me in case on the way to relieve my bladder I was mauled by a grizzly bear. I’m not sure what a cell phone would have done for me in that event.

The dawn would awaken us and the discomfort of the night would be swallowed up by the magnificence of gorgeous water falls, geysers, majestic snow capped mountains, buffalo, bear, elk and moose living their lives in the wild.

I can’t say that my back was all that excited to lie back down in the bed of our pick-up but the anticipation of the Grand Tetons, Devils Tower, Old Faithful and all the other sights that were in front of us made the discomfort worth it all.

The Bible tells us that suffering is that way for a follower of Jesus. Paul writes in Romans 8; “these momentary, light afflictions are not worthy to be compared with the glory that will be revealed in us”. He goes on to say in the same chapter that God is causing everything is working together for our good.

When we as followers of Jesus go through hard times, discomfort and pain, how much are we anticipating the “good” that is coming toward us? There is beauty in suffering. Are you living with dread or anticipation?