How Do You Respond to Adversity?

There’s something refined about a tea party, isn’t there? Perhaps we enjoy tea parties because they help us push pause in our crazy, schedule-driven lives. We wait for the water to boil, the tea bag to steep, and our stress dissipates as we sip from the teacup.

But think about it from the tea bag’s perspective . . . you’re immersed in boiling water making you a scalded, soggy mess, sapped of all your flavor till you have nothing left to give!

What is Your Hot Water Circumstance?

• Are you in hot water financially? There’s more month at the end of your money.
• Maybe you’re in hot water health-wise. You live with chronic pain that’s more than you can continue to bear.
• Perhaps your hot water is relational. A struggling marriage. A prodigal child. You’ve tried to fix the situation, but resolution seems out of reach.
• Your hot water might be grief. You’re living with the anguish of walking through life without the person who should still be walking with you.

People rarely choose to be in hot water circumstances. Our instinct is to run for the nearest exit. And since our heavenly Father loves His children, He doesn’t want us to suffer, right?

How to Endure

We live in a broken, sin-sick world. Trouble is part of this reality, whether we like it or not. But the apostle Paul says we can still succeed through Christ. The Bible tells us in 1 Cor. 13:7 (ESV):

“Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”

Rather than pretend suffering doesn’t happen, let’s equip ourselves to deal with it victoriously. To bear it, believe through it, hope, and endure. Still, enduring something doesn’t sound positive. But if that endurance is accomplished through love, belief, and hope, then we will be victorious.

So how do we live this out?

1. Rest in God’s love:

God does love His children. Still, the Bible tells us God doesn’t just love, He is love. And our circumstances will never change God’s nature.

2. Be the Body of Christ:

The apostle Paul reminds us that Christians are not called to suffer alone. We’re to help each other, bearing each other’s burdens (Gal. 6:2). This means we also have to be willing to ask for help. That’s hard for many of us. We’re more comfortable giving help than asking for it.

3. Believe God is accomplishing His sovereign, eternal will:

The Bible tells us suffering and affliction produce a glory that helps us maintain an eternal perspective (2 Cor. 4:17). It’s easy to focus only on the present when we’re hurting. But this life is temporary—it’s not all there is.

4. Share hope:

The comfort God gives us in our troubles is not meant only for us. The Bible tells us we’re to comfort others with the comfort we’ve received (2 Cor. 1:4). When we do that, we’re communicating hope to others and to ourselves.

5. Develop endurance through it:

The Bible tells us to count it as joy when we undergo trials. Not masochistic joy for the trial, but joy because we know the testing of our faith produces perseverance or endurance (James 1:2-4).

Trials will come, but what will we look like when we come out the other side of those trials?

The Carrot, Egg, and Tea Bag

Have the trials of life made you bitter or have they made you better? Consider the story of the carrot, the egg, and the tea bag:

A young woman told her mother how hard things were. She just wanted to give up.

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three small pots with water and placed a carrot in the first, an egg in the second, and a tea bag in the third. Then she boiled them.

After 20 minutes she placed the carrot and egg in a dish and ladled the tea into a bowl. Each object reacted differently to the same adversity. The carrot went in strong and hard, but came out of the boiling water limp and weak. The fragile egg with a liquid interior came out with its inside hardened. But when the tea bag came out of the boiling water it had changed the water.

“Which are you?” she asked her daughter. “When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond?”

Let’s ask ourselves the same question today. “Which am I?”

• Am I like the carrot, seemingly strong, but with trouble, I wilt and lose strength?
• Am I like the egg that starts soft, but hardens? Does my shell look the same, but on the inside am I bitter with a tough spirit and a hardened heart?
• Or am I like the tea bag that changed the hot water: changing the very situation that brings the pain? The tea bag releases its flavor in hot water. If you’re like a tea bag in adversity, by the grace of God and power of the Holy Spirit you influence the situation around you.

Adversity will come. But we have a choice as to how to respond. Being a “tea bag” does not come naturally, but the Holy Spirit gives us the strength to persevere through Christ.

When you face the hot water of adversity, be a tea bag!