“Love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful” (Luke 6:35-36, my italics).

“As they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto (Jesus), Master, behold, the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away. And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God.

“These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God” (Revelation 14:4–5).

My wife and I were having dinner with a family friend, a woman we’ve known a long time. Suddenly, in the middle of our meal, our friend began to voice the kinds of thoughts I’ve been hearing from Christians all over the country. She said to us:

Christians all over the world have a sense we’re living in the final days. The mounting crises, the growing fears, the signs of great shaking — all these things are evident, even to secular commentators. Now, for every follower of Jesus, the question of the hour is this: “Will my faith endure what is coming?”

“Christ…a son over his own house; whose house we are, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end. Wherefore as the Holy Ghost said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness: when your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years….

“[Jesus] said Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren.

“And he said unto him, Lord, I am ready to go with thee, both into prison, and to death. And he said, I tell thee, Peter, the cock shall not crow this day, before that thou shalt thrice deny that thou knowest me” (Luke 22:31–34).

All of us know what afflictions are. They’re those times of trouble and stress that keep us up at night. They can be so painful and debilitating that we lose sleep because of the anguish and anxiety.

Yet, as painful as afflictions are, God uses them to achieve his purposes in our lives. David writes, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous” (Psalm 34:19). Moreover, Scripture makes clear God can use afflictions to heal sinners as well as saints.

“Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord; awake, as in the ancient days, in the generations of old. Art thou not it that hath cut Rahab, and wounded the dragon?… Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which has drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of his fury; thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling, and wrung them out….