We might expect religion to...
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We might expect religion to make our life with God easier. That wasn't the religion of
Jesus, of Jacob, or the religion offered in the Bible. As life is a struggle, so our
relationship with God can be a struggle. For every person who zips through life with few
problems convinced God is the source of such ease, there's all the rest of us who struggle.
Yet, our struggle isn't senseless.
Jacob comes limping away from Peniel knowing something more about a God who cares enough to struggle with him. Harry Emerson Fosdick, great preacher and teacher for the early decades of the twentieth century, had a nervous breakdown in his seminary days that, as he said, scarred him. Out of that painful experience he wrote his little book, The Meaning of Prayer, that proved so important to others that it was reprinted continually in English and translated into eighteen languages. His suffering, like that of Jacob and Jesus, brought blessing to others.
Jacob comes limping away from Peniel knowing something more about a God who cares enough to struggle with him. Harry Emerson Fosdick, great preacher and teacher for the early decades of the twentieth century, had a nervous breakdown in his seminary days that, as he said, scarred him. Out of that painful experience he wrote his little book, The Meaning of Prayer, that proved so important to others that it was reprinted continually in English and translated into eighteen languages. His suffering, like that of Jacob and Jesus, brought blessing to others.
