I was listening to this one filmed conversation between two rather famous friends, and one gentleman who is a late-night comedian said something rather profound, "What punishments from God are not gifts."

At first, you might quibble with his wording. You might say that God is good and He only wants what is good for us. Yes, this is absolutely correct, but God's No's can be viewed as punishments from our perspectives. Conversely, these punishments can also be viewed as extraordinary gifts, depending on our heart's posture.

For example in my own life:

1. God has not yet seen fit to remove me from my current job. But, until He does I can bless the homeless with leftover desserts from my wife's work.

2. He has not removed my depression after I have prayed about it. But He has given me this brokenness so that I might help others along the way with their own mental health struggles due to my empathy.

3.  He has not given my wife and I children despite my prayers. So since we are still childless we can pray for our friends who have children, and I can serve occasionally in the nursery trying to impact little lives in a way that's open to me at present.

 I could go on. Each one of us has had our own share of no's courtesy of our Heavenly Father. Something hasn't happened. Someone hasn't changed. Some situations remain unbearable or unattainable. However, we can, as I've stated before, view these punishments/disappointments through another lens as gifts from God, if we so choose. 

Because the door God closes shut happens for a profound reason. 

Not just on a surface level reason like when we were growing up and our mom and dad denied one of our requests. No, something way more grandiose and epic than our imagination can conjure happens with every yes and every no we receive in our relationship with our Heavenly Father.

For God is in the majestic and mystical business of redeeming all of creation. 

So His no in our lives happens not for whimsical or capricious reasons. But because it lies outside the fool proof plan and prism of His redemption arc in not only our personal history but in the whole timeline of human history as well.

But that doesn't mean of course we should be autonomous, without grief and all our other emotions that come with the brutal ending of one season and the no's that come with it. Jesus, on the cross, cried out, "My God, My God. Why have you forsaken me?"

Here, Jesus was in the very grip of pure pain, despair, and heartache when He uttered these words. Yet, even in the midst of our suffering when our cup isn't taken away, as with Jesus, there will be victory. Since God will use our suffering to redeem our little corner of creation and with it touch the people with whom we come into contact, just like he did with Jesus on a theological and cosmological scale.

We just have to believe that all things will work together for good and that most assuredly means the no's we receive too.