Immediately after his salutation, Paul launched
into offering praise to God whilst revealing several aspects of God. He is the
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies or compassion and the
God of all comfort. In saying that God is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Paul had put God the Father and Christ His Son as inseparably One. The God of
the Jews and the God of Christianity is one and the same. Only that the
centrality of God in Christianity is shifted to Christ Jesus, His Son.
Then, He is the Father of mercies and
comfort. Being the Father of mercies and comfort tells us two things about Him.
His mercies and comfort always go hand in hand. He mercies show His concern for
the plight of those who suffer, and His comfort would cause Him to do something
to alleviate those sufferings. Mercies describe God’s inner temperament or
nature while comfort describes the outward display of that inner disposition.
Paul carefully chose these words because they are appropriate and would aptly
convey God’s help in the trails Paul himself went through for the sake of the
Gospel. It is interesting to note that God is not only the Father of mercies
and comfort for us but He is also the Father of mercies and comfort in us. This
is one aspect of the image of God in us. These qualities of the Father in us
enable us to show mercies and comfort to others.
Notice the word mercies is put in the plural.
This is to show that God could customize His mercy according to our varied
needs. Being a personal God, He tailors His mercies accordingly and
specifically to meet our needs. As the God of all comfort, He will comfort us
in all our troubles. The adjective “all” covers troubles of every imaginable
area, regardless of size or dimension. Whether the need be spiritual,
mental-psychological, social-emotional, physical or domestic, economical or
financial, God can provide the comfort. However, the comfort He gives us are
not to be an end in itself. It is to be the means to an end. We are to comfort
others with the comfort demonstrated to us by God. We must see God’s ministry to us in this way.
He assist us in our needs to enable us to assist others in their needs.
Verse 5 tells us that while Christians are
not immune from suffering. Sharing the suffering of Christ would be part and
parcel of Christian life. The wonderful news is that Christ will also comfort
us abundantly through our sufferings. God will always match suffering with
comfort. The presence of the Holy Spirit will be ours in abundance through
Christ. Paul always viewed his life positively. He would not indulge in
self-pity when things did not happen as he desired. He saw affliction and distress
in the light of strengthening and ministering to others. He also viewed God’s
comfort to him as his training and equipping process to enable him to help
others.
Paul evidently had a very positive outlook of
life. This is seen in how positively he viewed people. He shared in verse 7 on
how firmly his hope for others is grounded.
By the trouble the Corinthians gave to him and the problems they had generated
in the church, Paul could have easily given up hope. But we hear it from his
lips – he never gave up on them. That’s because He believed in the God of all
mercies and comfort. He knew that this God would comfort everyone in any kind
of trouble and would certainly see them through.
Going through life challenges is God’s
equipping and training process. He takes us through the school of hard-knocks
to make us the instrument that would be yielded to him, and shaped to walk
others through their problems. The attitudes and response we bring to our
challenges in life will determine how long we will have to go through them. Let
us keep the end in view. Today’s experiences, no matter how difficult, will
equip us for tomorrow’s challenges.
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