Luke 18:7 And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off?

1. ______________ is inevitable and it will always challenge our _________.

2. Faithful suffering is expressed in ______________.

3. God is __________________ and will make all things __________________.

Scripture Readings
Genesis 32:22-30
2 Timothy 3:14-4:5
Luke 18:1-8

Take It With You!

Here we will offer thoughts and meditations on the message to help us as we contemplate and discuss and wrestle with what we are hearing.

2 Corinthians 12:7-9 To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.

[When facing agonizing struggle] it is appropriate, against one's own "conflicting thoughts [that] will accuse or perhaps excuse" (Rom. 2:15), against the verdict of one's own conscience, against calling into question the "very good" (Gen. 1:31) creation because of sickness, defamation, injustice, suffering, pain, and death, but in the bitterest moment even against the God who is contradictory and most horribly hidden, who acts "as if he does not care about you," that one flee to the God who not only cares about you but also speaks on your behalf and intervenes - to the Father who, thorough the Son in the Holy Spirit, provides the goodness and the righteousness of his creation beyond all doubt: that is the one who has overcome the agonizing struggle in its every form and continues to do so still, in that he creates the certainty of salvation (Rom. 8:26-39).
-Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther's Theology, p. 21