July 2 Daily Devotional

Bible Reading

2 Corinthians 7:8–10

Devotional

Every sorrow knows its emptiness. If sorrow exists because of bereavement, there is a perceived empty place. You miss a dear relative you had to bury in the cold earth. If sorrow exists because of sickness, there will be a lack of health. Every sorrow has a perceived void. Godly sorrow is a sorrow whereby a person realizes he is without God; there is a void in his life; he is in need of God. There is emptiness in his life and he needs God to fill his heart. In the midst of the many other needs and cares the most urgent is that he is without God. What sorrow!

Job lost much. He lost his children, his possessions, and his health. Job sat upon the broken pieces of his shattered ambitions. He sat upon the ruins of his life. And in all this Job did not ask for his children, nor for his possessions, and also not for his health. In all this Job only asked for one thing: “Where is God my maker, who giveth songs in the night?” That was a godly sorrow.

Godly sorrow is to be in need of God. Waves and billows flood us with adversities. Yet, in the midst of all this trouble and grief, the poet of Psalm 42 asks only for one thing: “As the heart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God.”

The sorrow of the world is very general; it is focused upon this world and this present life. But godly sorrow is focused upon God. Give those who have a godly sorrow health when they are sick. Give them prosperity when they have adversity. Give them the entire world; give them all their heart desires. Give them even heaven, and with all this they would not be satisfied, because they desire God.

Godly sorrow is not a sorrow for heaven. It is not a sorrow because of fear that they must one day experience punishment because of sin. The emptiness in this sorrow does not need to be filled with the heaven of God. It needs to be filled with the God of heaven. When a man knows a godly sorrow he asks only for one thing and that is God. He does not ask for heaven; his soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When you have this godly sorrow, you need God not only in the hour of death; you need Him throughout your entire life. You cry out, “O God, I can no longer live without Thee.”

 

From The Everlasting Word by Frans Bakker, compiled and translated by Gerald R. Procee. Reformation Heritage Books and Free Reformed Publications, 2007. Used by permission. For further information, click here.