A Hope for the Hardships
For ages, people have often struggled with the idea of God’s goodness in a world filled with pain. Since God Himself is good, then every grain of sand, every bit of energy, and every person was designed for Him and His glory. However, when suffering enters our lives, we find it hard to see God’s goodness in all things.
Jacob (left), Becky (middle), Joseph (right) celebrating their graduation from the Resident program.
Just two years ago, if you were to ask Jacob where pain and suffering fit into God’s goodness, his answer would have been layered with anger, sadness, and fear. Jacob, like most of us, experienced pain and suffering in his life. However, instead of leaning on Christ, he chose to process his pain alone.
Jacob grew up in a good Christian home, with a happy family. However, there was much more to his story than meets the eye. At home, Jacob his from his family the bullying he endured at school. At school he hid his mother’s struggles with alcohol and his own harmful patterns that arose from his home life.
All throughout his life, Jacob believed in Christ. But from a young age, his view of God was skewed. The kids that would bully him at school called themselves Christians. He only went to church because his parents did. “I saw God as an emotionless judge that wanted no part in my life, my pain, or even with me—only to deliver punishment.”
In middle school, Jacob lost both his grandmother and uncle to cancer within one year. The pain from their deaths and the emotional and physical abuse from his classmates led him to a point of needing to find relief from his pain. Where most Christians would find relief in Christ, Jacob chose a different path. Jacob lived a life steeped in pornography and sexual addiction as a way to numb his constant pain. Through the continual masking of his pain, he grew increasingly more lonely and angry despite being surrounded by people he cared about.
“...we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit...”
Later in high school, Jacob’s mom decided to seek help for her alcohol dependency and returned a renewed woman. Seeing his mom freed from alcohol inspired Jacob. Unfortunately, he was not ready to find the same healing for himself. Soon, Jacob once again found himself in overwhelming darkness when a rocky relationship ended and a close friend passed away in a car accident.
One night, Jacob lay on the floor of his garage, steeped in despair. He was ready to take his life, wanting nothing more than for his pain to be over. “Why is life so painful, why is everything being taken from me?” he asked.
When he couldn’t bring himself to end his life, he heard the Lord for the first time. Rather than the cutting words of a cold judge, Jacob heard a soft, “I’m not finished with you. I am with you.”
He paused.
Jacob replied, “I’ll give you a shot. Show me you’re the loving God you say you are.”
Over the next few months Jacob continued to hear from God through the people in his life. With loving guidance from others, Jacob understood that he needed help dealing with his anger and addictions. Jacob made the decision to get help and in January 2018 he arrived at His Mansion.
Jacob and his mom spending time together while on vacation.
“Coming to His Mansion, I was a man full of rage. But no matter what I did or said they loved me anyway.” Slowly, Jacob realized that if a small Christ-centered community in New Hampshire could love him unconditionally, imagine how much more could the Lord he’d grown up hearing about. As he continued in the program, Jacob began to fully understand his identity in Christ. He learned that he was no longer a mistake, or an outcast, but a chosen son of God, one that was designed, created, and placed in the exact moment in time that God intended.
For years Jacob never understood how God could be good, yet allow painful things to happen to him. But the Lord continued working on Jacob’s heart, showing him that his pain was meant for something more than himself.
“The Lord was always with me,” acknowledges Jacob. “He allowed the painful stuff to happen so that I would not only be drawn close to Him, but to sit with others in their pain.” After his graduation in 2019, Jacob returned as a Servant Leader, continuing to help others through the difficult process of recovery.
Jacob’s struggles were used to draw him closer to God and ultimately draw him closer to others, that they might find the same healing that he experienced.