John 8:1-11

An affliction is a crushing pressure that threatens to destroy us. Our health, peace of mind, or relationships could be in danger from the hardship. We know God will comfort us when we are sick. But, will He be there when we bring the affliction upon ourselves by our sin? This is a question many believers ask. But too often, they provide their own answer of no.

But, the Lord does not condemn us for sin—He has forgotten it. What remains are the consequences of our wrong actions. If we turn to God, He will soothe our soul and guide us safely through the painful fallout. Under His influence, pain is bearable and serves to make faith stronger.

Remember the woman dragged before Jesus by the Pharisees? She had been caught in adultery, which was a clear violation of the Law. The religious leaders were prepared to throw stones, but Jesus spoke to her with compassion. Although He in no way condoned her sin, He did recognize that she was already facing consequences for her unwise choices. He forgave her, saying, “Go, and sin no more” (John 8:11 KJV).

Nothing we do can separate us from the love of God. One way He expresses that love is through the promise of comfort when we hurt, even when the pain is self-inflicted. We can allow shame to chase us away from the Father’s loving arms… convinced He would not give encouragement to one who disobeyed. Or, we can believe Scripture when it tells us, He is “the Father of mercies and God of all comfort…”(2 Corinthians 1:3)

There was a lady named Ms. Johnson who was up in years and very wealthy. She was a very haughty and arrogant woman who was as prideful as they come. She had hired a young girl named Lucy to come and work for her around the house. Lucy came from a very poor family and didn't have much but she worked so hard for Ms. Johnson. Ms. Johnson treated Lucy like something you would scrape off of the bottom of your shoes, never offering a kind word to the girl. But Lucy prayed to God every night for Ms. Johnson's health and to soften her heart and give Lucy the strength to carry on. Well on day Lucy died. Ms. Johnson didn't think much more about her after that.

That was until she died and went to heaven. When she arrived she couldn't wait to see her mansion. She told St. Peter to take her straight to it because she had lived so nicely on earth that she couldn't imagine how grand this mansion would be. So they start walking on the main street of heaven and Ms. Johnson is amazed at all of the beautiful mansions she sees. The further they walked, the prettier and more elaborate they were. This excited Ms. Johnson. She saw off in the distance the grandest of them all and asked who it belonged to. St. Peter told her that belonged to Lucy. Now this really got Ms. Johnson going because she thought of how poor Lucy was on earth and she still got that mansion...well hers would have to be so much better!

Suddenly, St. Peter took a turn and they began walking on a dirt road and on each side of the road was little shacks. They got worse and worse as they went on. Finally, St. Peter turned to Ms. Johnson and said "Home sweet home." Ms. Johnson looked and saw the shabbiest little shack she had ever seen in her life! She was outraged and said "how in the world did I get stuck with such a little shack like this and that peasant girl Lucy got that beautiful mansion?"

St. Peter replied "Through her prayers, Lucy has been sending building materials up for years and years."

"Remember in the Bible God had to send a great storm, not too long after He had made this wonderful creation. Man forgot God and went away from Him. God sent the storm, and after He had cleansed the earth and got man's attention again, He gave a promise that He would never again destroy the world with a flood. He signed that promise with a rainbow!

The rainbow was God's signature to say to us, "Never again will I destroy you by a flood." But I think when He put that beautiful bow in the clouds, He must have said, "Oh how I love My people. I don't want them to go away from Me. I want them to fellowship with Me. I don't want to have them hurt." And I think that bow represents all the promises He would give that would help us in our hurts.

Let me tell you what rainbows are. Rainbows are caused by the sun's rays passing through drops of water, and rays returning again back towards the sun which causes the spectrum of color that we see. The interesting thing is your back must be to the sun to see the rainbow. Isn't that the way it is in our spiritual life? We often only see rainbows when our backs are to the sun and we don't see any sun at all."
-- Mrs. Beverly Hyles

God's beautiful rainbows are caused by the rays of the sun/Son passing through drops of water/tears and returning back towards the sun/Son and this must happen for us to see the beautiful spectrum of color in a bow in the sky. In storms with many tears please never stop looking for and expecting a rainbow from God...you opened your computer to one today!
-- Sharon Merhalski