TLIC FAMILY. DAY 206. JULY 25: COMFORT.

THINK TOGETHER

Have you been sad lately? What made you sad?

READ TOGETHER

Can you find 2 Corinthians in your Bible? 2 Corinthians is a letter all about sadness and suffering. We suffer whenever things don’t go the way we wanted, or when we lose something good. Paul suffered a lot. And because he went through so many hard things people started to think that Jesus wasn’t with Paul. They thought that God was against him because his life was so hard.

But that is the farthest thing from the truth. Listen to how Paul explains our sadness and suffering here at the beginning of 2 Corinthians:

2 Corinthians 1:3-5. ³ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, ⁴ who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. ⁵ For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.

Sadness and suffering are NEVER a sign that Jesus is not with us, or that God is against us. How do we know? Because Jesus suffered too. He was sad too. His life was hard too. And God was always with Jesus.

One of the most important things you can learn as you grow up is that life will be really hard sometimes. Have your parents gone through any really hard times? Did your grandparents? I’m sure they did.

And one of the most important things we can learn as a Christian is that our suffering and sadness can help us to know Jesus better and it can help us to help others too. No, we don’t try to suffer on purpose, but we also don’t spend our whole life trying to avoid suffering. And Jesus definitely doesn’t want us to avoid being sad. Being sad can be a very good thing because it can help us turn to Jesus for comfort. Jesus shares his sadness with us and he shares his comfort with us too. And that is how we know that we are never alone in this hard world.

Because of Jesus we are never alone in our sadness.

With Jesus we can be a good friend to others when they are sad.

DO SOMETHING TOGETHER

Watch Inside Out together, or just watch this scene. Talk about why sadness is so important. In the movie sadness brought Riley home to her parents to be comforted. In our lives sadness should bring us closer to Jesus and to each other.

PRAY TOGETHER

Jesus,

You were sad sometimes just like I am. Help me to always go to you when I am sad and help me to comfort others when they are sad.

Amen.

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