Deuteronomy 4:30-31
When you are in tribulation, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, you will return to the LORD your God and obey his voice, for the LORD your God is a merciful God; he will not fail you or destroy you or forget the covenant with your fathers which he swore to them.
When Israel first entered the Promised Land, they were given solemn promises and warnings: promises that if they obeyed the covenant with Moses they would be blessed and warnings that if they disobeyed, they would suffer for it. And sure enough, the promises and warnings were fulfilled in the history of Israel. But there was a curious imbalance between the promises and warnings. If blessings were received they were merely blessings. But if punishment took place it was not merely a curse. It was another sort of blessing (albeit a painful one) aimed at bringing Israel back to God. It began to look like, no matter how you sliced it, God wanted to bless Israel. It’s the same with us. Even our trials and tribulations are merely another way in which God sends us his goodness, even the terrible goodness of being conformed to the image of Christ Crucified. And such goodness means we are not abandoned or mocked in our moments of pain. We are closer than ever to him who loved us through the death of the Cross and on into the miracle of the Resurrection—-a miracle we shall share as certainly as the sun rises in the morning if we remain faithful to Christ Crucified.
