You'll Get Through This Part 12

job. My security is in

G.o.d's hands.

3. Max shares Christine Caine's story (pp. 15758) to demonstrate how G.o.d can use our darkness to spread light.

a. As you reflect on what you wrote on your chart, what "light" do you sense G.o.d may be inviting you to spread?

b. Responding to G.o.d's invitation doesn't require figuring everything out at once; it requires only taking the next step, however small it might be. What one simple step could you take within the next twenty-four hours to respond to G.o.d's invitation?

4. Chapter 1 sets up the message of the book by emphasizing this encouraging statement: "You'll get through this. It won't be painless. It won't be quick. But G.o.d will use this mess for good. In the meantime don't be foolish or naive. But don't despair either. With G.o.d's help you will get through this."

a. Briefly reflect on the personal journey you've taken as you read this book. Consider especially any ways in which you have experienced G.o.d's care for you (in comfort, encouragement, wisdom, provision, perseverance).

b. How is G.o.d's care for you helping you "get through this"?

c. Set aside time for quiet prayer. Express your grat.i.tude to G.o.d for all the ways he has demonstrated his care for you. Entrust your ongoing questions and struggles to him, and ask him for what you need right now. Allow a few moments of quiet, inviting G.o.d to speak his words of love to you in the silence. Close your time by praising G.o.d for who he is and for his sovereignty in your life.

Notes.

Chapter 1: You'll Get Through This.

1. Emphasis mine.

2. Spiros Zodhiates, ed., The Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible: Key Insights into G.o.d's Word, New American Standard Bible, rev. ed. (Chattanooga, TN: AMG, 2008), Genesis 50:20. See also "Greek/Hebrew Definitions," Bible Tools, Strong's #2803, chashab, www.bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Lexicon.show/ID/H2803/chashab.htm.

3. The same term is used in Genesis 13:4 ("he had . . . built an altar" [NIV]), Job 9:9 ("He made the Bear"), and Proverbs 8:26 ("he made the earth" [NIV]).

4. Zodhiates, The Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible, Genesis 50:20. See also Strong's Exhaustive Bible Concordance Online, #6213, www.biblestudytools.com/lexicons/hebrew/nas/asah.html.

5. Genesis 50:20 is from The Message.

6. Emphasis mine.

7. Joseph was probably seventeen when he was sold to the Midianites (Gen. 37:2). He was twenty-eight when the butler, who promised to help him get out of prison, was released (40:2123). Two years later, when Joseph was thirty, Joseph interpreted Pharaoh's dreams (41:1, 46). And Joseph was about thirty-nine when his brothers came to Egypt the second time (45:16), in the second year of the famine following the seven years of plenty.

Chapter 2: Down, Down, Down to Egypt.

1. "Every shepherd is an abomination to the Egyptians" (Gen. 46:34).

Chapter 3: Alone but Not All Alone.

1. JJ Jasper, personal conversations with the author. Used by permission.

2. Thomas Lye, "How Are We to Live by Faith on Divine Providence?" in Puritan Sermons 16591689 (Wheaton, IL: Richard Owen Roberts, Publisher, 1981), 1:378.

3. Emphasis mine.

4. Emphasis mine.

5. Edward Mote, "The Solid Rock," in Sacred Selections for the Church, comp. and ed. Ellis J. Crum (Kendallville, IN: Sacred Selections, 1960), 120.

6. Augustine, Saint Augustine: Sermons on the Liturgical Seasons, trans. Sister Mary Sarah Muldowney (New York: Fathers of the Church, 1959), 8586.

7. Emphasis mine.

Chapter 4: Stupid Won't Fix Stupid.

1. Genesis 39:5.

2. David M. Edwards, "Song Story; Take My Hand, Precious Lord: The Life of Thomas Dorsey," Worship Leader Magazine, March/April 2010, 6465. Copyright 2010 by Worship Leader Partnership. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

3. Ibid, 65.

4. Thomas A. Dorsey, "Take My Hand, Precious Lord" (Hialeah, FL: Warner-Tamerlane, 1938, renewed). All rights reserved. Used by permission.

5. Edwards, "Song Story," 65.

Chapter 5: Oh, So This Is Boot Camp!.

1. Howard Rutledge and Phyllis Rutledge with Mel White and Lyla White, In the Presence of Mine Enemies-19651973: A Prisoner of War (New York: Fleming H. Revell, 1975), 33, 35.

2. Emphasis mine.

3. Spiros Zodhiates, ed., The Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible: Key Insights into G.o.d's Word, New American Standard Bible, rev. ed. (Chattanooga, TN: AMG, 2008), #977, p. 1817. See also Strong's Concordance with Hebrew and Greek Lexicon, http://www.eliyah.com/cgi-bin/strongs.cgi?file=hebrewlexicon&isindex=977.

4. Emphasis mine.

5. Bob Benson, "See You at the House.": The Stories Bob Benson Used to Tell (Nashville: Generoux, 1986), 2023.

6. Rutledge and Rutledge, In the Presence, 39, 52.

Chapter 6: Wait While G.o.d Works.

1. Psalm 46:10.

Chapter 7: More Bounce Back Than Bozo.

1. Jay Kirk, "Burning Man," GQ.com, February 2012, www.gq.com/news-politics/newsmakers/201202/burning-man-sam-brown-jay-kirk-gq-february-2012, 10815; Sam Brown, personal conversation with the author. Used by permission.

Chapter 8: Is G.o.d Good When Life Isn't?.

1. Christyn Taylor, CaringBridge.org, August 22, 2010, created at http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/rebeccataylor1. Used by permission.

2. Joni Eareckson Tada, "G.o.d's Plan A," in Be Still, My Soul: Embracing G.o.d's Purpose and Provision in Suffering, ed. Nancy Guthrie (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2010), 3233, 34.

3. Donald G. Bloesch, The Struggle of Prayer (Colorado Springs, CO: Helmers and Howard, 1988), 33.

4. Taylor, CaringBridge.

Chapter 9: A Splash of Grat.i.tude with That Att.i.tude, Please.

1. Henry Ward Beecher, Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit: Selected from the Writings and Sayings of Henry Ward Beecher, comp. William Drysdale (New York: D. Appleton, 1887), 13.

2. Special thanks to Daniel for allowing me to share his story.

Chapter 10: Now, About Those Family Scandals and Scoundrels.

1. Genesis 37:2.

2. Genesis 43:30; 45:2, 14, 15; 46:29; 50:1, 17.

Chapter 11: Revenge Feels Good, but Then . . .

1. "Spite House," New York Architecture Images, nyc-architecture.com, http://nyc-architecture.com/GON/GON005.htm.

2. Strong's Exhaustive Bible Concordance Online, #5117, www .biblestudytools.com/lexicons/greek/nas/topos.html.