I hear some Christians complain that God hasn’t blessed them even though they are praying and reading the Bible every day.  By blessing, they mean good health, financial success, job success, good relationships, and so forth.  However, when you read the entire Bible, it does not promise that your life is going to be easy if you will just do what God says.  In fact, there are numerous counter-examples.

What about Job?  He was righteous and yet God allowed Satan to virtually destroy his life.

What about Paul?  Are you more dedicated to God than Paul?  He was beaten, imprisoned, shipwrecked, and ultimately beheaded for his obedience to God.

Virtually all the Old Testament prophets were mocked and ridiculed, and many of them killed for following God’s lead.  Just read Jeremiah to see if he was living the easy life.

The truth is that God only guarantees that we will live with Him in paradise after this life.  This world is riddled with sin and evil, and God is not going to place a protective bubble around you for your whole life.  You will face hardship.

Now, if we are obedient to God in this life, then generally speaking, our lives will be better.  No doubt about that.  God keeps us from sin and sin will make our lives miserable.  So if you don’t sin, then you will generally avoid many of life’s pitfalls.  And many of us will be materially blessed, but not all of us.

There is not a direct correlation between your material blessings and your obedience to God.  I saw a TV special the other day about one high-ranking Nazi officer at Auschwitz who lived to a ripe old age before dying peacefully in the year 2000.

Good people sometimes suffer and bad people sometimes prosper.  That is not going to change until we are in heaven.

What we are called to do in this life is to trust God and obey Him in every situation.  That is the essence of loving God in this life.