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Conflict With A Purpose Intro and Ch 1: 90 Days of God’s Goodness by Randy Alcorn
Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Come close to me.” When they had done so, he said, “I am your brother Joseph, the it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping. But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance.
“So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt.… “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” —GENESIS 45:4–8; 50:20 After Job had prayed for his friends, the LORD made him prosperous again and gave him twice as much as he had before. All his brothers and sisters and the trouble the LORD had brought upon him.… The LORD blessed the latter part of Job’s life more than the first. —J OB 42:10–12
While most of my books are Now, if I were to write a novel about lives without conflict, where characters get everything they want, where life marches on comfortably and no one ever loses anything, nobody would read it. Who likes a boring story? In fact, my central characters always face great conflict, turmoil, uncertainty, and suffering. Some die. That it makes for a far better story is my main reason for doing this. (We enjoy in fiction much that we do not enjoy in life.) So who am I to say that God shouldn’t write such things into his story, including my part? just literature, we repeatedly see that protection from conflict produces soft, spoiled, and selfish people, while enduring conflict is more likely to produce someone strong, capable, and caring.
If, in an interview with a character from one of my novels, you were to ask whether he’d like to be written out of the story, he would answer no. Nonexistence appeals to no one. Now ask him if he would like to suffer less, and he’ll answer yes.
Conflict With A Purpose Intro and Ch 1: 90 Days of God’s Goodness by Randy Alcorn
Conflict With A Purpose Intro and Ch 1: 90 Days of God"s Goodness by Randy Alcorn
