The fire

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The finest steel has to go through the hottest fire. (Richard M. Nixon)

My brothers and sisters, you will have many kinds of trouble. But this gives you a reason to be very happy. You know that when your faith is tested, you learn to be patient in suffering. If you let that patience work in you, the end result will be good. You will be mature and complete. You will be all that God wants you to be. (James 1:2-4)

While none of us actually wants to embrace the 'furnace' of trials and troubles of all kinds, it is actually how we realize the greatest growth in our faith and inner character. Be that what it may be, we don't usually run right into the face of trials and get all up in their grill, so to speak. We actually might just want to turn tail and run when we see them coming - especially when they are coming so rapid fire that we just don't seem to have any breathing room in between them. God's plan isn't to leave us devastated by allowing these trials - though they be harder than we might want to endure, they ALWAYS bring something we might not have ever known possible!

Faith increases in the midst of trials. Somehow, we know that we need to turn to God, to seek his help, to listen closer to his voice. We dig in deeper in our prayer life, seek answers from scripture, and even spend more time with others who also believe. Why? We know we are toast without his help! Could we imagine a world without trials or troubles? Yes, but we'd all be selfish little brats, looking out for ourselves, and too caught up in all the 'stuff' around us to notice we had left God's side! Ease presents some very real challenges, just as trials present their own set of challenges! Neither state is without issue - but only one draws us to the bosom of Christ!

Faith is tested - not tempted. There is a difference between tests or trials and temptation. Temptation comes into play when our own desires and lusts get brought into play within our lives, luring us to give into something we know better than to do. Trials and tests carry an element of 'stretching us' beyond where we have become comfortable. They actually show us we have more 'capacity' for things God is teaching us, even when we think we are at 'full capacity' right now. In temptation there is very little patience, but in testing or trials, it is all about developing that deeper level of patience that actually results in a deeper faith.

We might not like the 'fire' of trials, but we will reap more than we imagined possible when we endure them with grace, hope, and trust. Just sayin!

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