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Abounding Love: My Life with Chronic Illness

Knowledge that our God is a God of love is one of the most valuable gifts a person may receive on this earth. It is for the strength to comprehend this love that the apostle Paul prays for so earnestly in Ephesians 3:14-19.

When a believer knows that God is love, and that this love is for us, a wellspring of hope begins to burst in their soul. Such an eruption of hope and joy following a deeper understanding of the love of God is the experience of my own life. The assurance of God’s love for me is a blessing that vastly outweighs the joy present-day physical healing could ever bring.

So yes, my chronic illness causes me to experience unusual, horrible, detestable amounts of pain and suffering. Christ frees me to hate this suffering and invites me to join him in fighting against it. However, this unusual, horrible, detestable pain does not defeat the notion that God is love.

Rather, it emphasizes all the more that God is love—and this is reason for abounding joy.

Joyful, I write this in the midst of my pain and suffering today and I encourage you, brother or sister, to “rejoice!” (Phil. 4:4) with me, for our God loves us and he has overcome the world!