Food, Water and Word
2 Corinthians 1:3 Blessed [gratefully praised and adored] be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort,
4 who comforts and encourages us in every trouble so that we will be able to comfort and encourage those who are in any kind of trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
5 For just as Christ’s sufferings are ours in abundance [as they overflow to His followers], so also our comfort [our reassurance, our encouragement, our consolation] is abundant through Christ [it is truly more than enough to endure what we must]. source
Here’s the thinking train: The Father loves us as much as He loves JESUS and He let JESUS suffer.
He loves us, we have to know He will allow us to suffer too; I am confident though we will never be allowed to suffer to the extent that JESUS did, nor could we. All our suffering has a purpose – to save us from ourselves and perhaps help those we love or even needy strangers to see JESUS for themselves. All that JESUS suffered had a purpose – again, it was us; to save us from hell – eternal death.
BUT. The Father also comforted JESUS and He comforts us. Read our verses again.
If you recall Matthew 4, you know JESUS was so comforted that angels actually came and physically attended Him.
He had been forty days in the wilderness where satan tried with everything he had and still failed to distract Him, discourage Him, dissuade Him or in any wise defeat Him. The Father allowed that!
BUT when the work was done. Comfort came! The angels came and ministered to Him. I am imagining they came with food and water and Word from the Father.
Comfort comes in proportion to the suffering.
