Sorrow - Curse or Blessing?
“Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death” - 2 Cor 7:10
I’ve thought about this passage a number of times in past years, but when I thought about it today I saw how it pointed back to the fall.
Sorrow had no place in man before sin entered the world. Then the curse brought discomfort and inconvenience to life. The passage describes how sorrow can have two effects - it affects two sets of people in two different ways. To those outside of Christ the curse is a present judgement, denying man of the full life he seeks. It robs him of quality in his relationships. It robs him of his ambitions, his health, his youth. Ultimately it condemns his body to rot as his life is cut short. Sorrow bring death to man in life and utlimately it brings death to him in finality.
Those who are in Christ should understand that the curse is an act of blessing. This is because it brings to us a constant reminder of our limitations and our inability to properly manage the things in our sphere. It points us back to our need for God, and back to life by faith. Perhaps repentance would not be possible without the curse because we would be so puffed up with self-confidence that the need for God would not be given a thought. If this is true then the curse is blessing indeed. The curse brings, to those in Christ, “repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret”.