”The God of All Comfort”
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God of All Comfort.
Joy in Sorrow is possible. Joy and sorrow are compatible. This is the final piece I’m writing in a book whose entire volume is dedicated to conveying this concept. The fact is that we have the option to rejoice and choose and be strengthened by joy in the middle of the deepest sadness and darkest trials of this lifetime.
While these statements are true, it is also true that God does not leave us alone in our grief; He does not expect us to muscle our way through sorrow by ourselves. He Himself walks closely with us on the journey of loss and pain. He ministers to us through His presence, His Word, and His people. He is Comfort in hurt and heaviness.
“Comfort” according to my dear friend, Miriam, is both a noun and a verb. It is a thing and an action. It’s something we or others do and something we receive.
Comfort: Transitive verb:
: to give strength and hope to : CHEER
: to ease the grief or trouble of : CONSOLE
Comfort: Noun:
: strengthening aid
: consolation in time of trouble or worry : SOLACE
: a feeling of relief or encouragement
Four times in the book of John, Jesus stated that He would send the “Comforter,” or the Holy Ghost after His ascension to Heaven. The Greek word for “Comforter” is paráklētos (#3875) and it means, “summoned, called to one's side, especially called to one's aid;...a helper, succorer, aider, assistant.”
This is comfort defined in both modern and biblical terms. And I can say, I have experienced all aspects of these definitions: consolation, solace, stenthgh, relief, encouragement, and God coming to my side to aid and assist. God has met me again and again in tangible ways in moments of heartbreak. He has been a Comfort; He is the Comforter.
In 2017, one of my dearest friends, Maggie, and her husband, Matt, walked an incredible journey of loss. It was the greatest tragedy that I have personally witnessed in this life. While in labor, and just before delivery, they tragically lost their first baby, Hudson Ward Anderson. (Their story is both difficult and beautiful, and you can hear Maggie share in her own words in an interview on the Unedited Podcast–Episode 102.) This was an unimaginable loss and brought seemingly insurmountable pain in their lives. Hudson was big and handsome and we celebrated his brief life for 3 days in the hospital and then with a memorial service that I will never forget. While Hudson’s life was short, it was not without meaning and purpose, and we memorialized his life as if we’d known him always. We said “goodbye for now,” releasing white star balloons into the gray sky by his graveside. This was an unthinkable loss no one would want to experience and no one would want to witness.
Shortly after Hudson’s memorial service, there was a baby dedication at our church at which Hudson should’ve been dedicated. In her fresh, raw grief, Maggie could not watch the dedication and went to the lobby. She wept, and Matt, her parents, her brother, Reagan, and I wept with her. As this difficult scene unfolded, Reagan spoke words I will never forget: “We’ll never experience the comfort of God until there’s discomfort.”
These words could not be more true. It is in the pain of loss, grief, heartache, heartbreak, and tragedy that we learn God as a Comforter like we can learn nowhere else. Though Maggie and Matt have walked through excruciating, life-altering grief, they have experienced the comfort that comes only through discomfort and from God alone. Maggie has reiterated that, though her journey has been marked by such devastation, she has witnessed first-hand the comfort and goodness of God through it all. She has found a God whose solace, aid, and ministry meets us in the deepest, darkest places.
Psalm 34:18 tells us that God is “nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be contrite in spirit.” God comes close to those who are crushed and broken. He rushes in with comfort, assistance, and consolation.
Those who have walked the journey of pain with Jesus, like my friends Matt and Maggie, and so many others, know that in the most debilitating pain, He is near. He is not distant and austere. He is not callous and indifferent. He is tender with broken hearts. He gently holds broken hearts in nail-scarred hands. He is close and personal. He is the God of Comfort.
The Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthian church and laid out beautiful theology regarding comfort:
“Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ.” (2 Corinthians 1:3-6)
Paul shares a few points regarding comfort in this short passage that are worth noting:
God is “the God of all Comfort.” This title alone is a consolation and gives strength. God is the source of Comfort. Comfort flows from Him. Hebrews 4:15 tells us that Jesus can be “touched with the feelings of our infirmities” or weaknesses. He is approachable and empathetic because He knows what we experience in our humanity–whether it be loss, grief or some other form of suffering. Isaiah 53 says, “Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.” Jesus is personally acquainted with the heaviness of sorrow and hardship; He carried ours to the Cross. This makes Him a “merciful and faithful High Priest; the “God of all Comfort.”
God comforts us in all of our trouble. No matter what type of trouble we are facing, He comes to our side and wraps us in the comfort of His love. He surrounds us with the “Comforter” in any form of pain; in “all trouble.”
God trains us to be comforters when we experience His comfort. He comforts us and, in turn, we are able to pass on the comfort we’ve received to others who are in any type of trouble. There is compassion and empathy and tenderness of heart that is only possible because of the comfort we ourselves have received. We are touched by others' pain when we’ve known our own. We can extend comfort and be a comfort because of our own experience.
The more suffering we endure, the more “consolation” or comfort we receive. Paul says “as our suffering abounds, so does our consolation (or comfort) abound.” Suffering and comfort are in direct proportion to one another. The more suffering we endure, the more comfort we know.
God is a Comfort. He is the “Comforter.” Brother Terry Shock said, “The Holy Ghost is a comfort and a guide, because many times where it leads, comfort is needed.” Oftentimes on the journey to heaven, we are guided into treacherous, challenging stretches of road. We are seemingly led by God into “the Valley of the Shadow of death.” Tight and “narrow” is the way, and often we need comfort as we walk the pathway to heaven.
David wrote, “Yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.” His presence is with us giving comfort in the darkest shadows of the deepest valleys.
In seasons of loss, hardship, devastation, grief, and sorrow, we find Him near. He is close. As one old song says, “He’s as close as the mention of His name.” He is the Comforter, the parakletos, the One called to our side to aid and console. Reach for Him.
We must know the pain of discomfort in order to experience His comfort.
He’s the God of all Comfort.
“For the LORD shall comfort Zion: he will comfort all her waste places; and he will make her wilderness like Eden,and her desert like the garden of the LORD; joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody.” (Isaiah 51:3)
“I am filled with comfort, I am exceeding joyful in all our tribulation.”
2 Corinthians 7:4
You can listen to Maggie’s Interview on Loss and Greif here. What she shared in this episode has been an incredible blessing to many!
Thank you for joining me for this journey!
Go grab your Bible and your journal!
I look forward to the power of this habit in your life. This is Unedited.