REFINED BY GOD’S FIRE

Suffering… this is the element in the lives of people that define them, change them, make some better, and corrupt others. It’s an amazing phenomenon to watch thriller and horror movies and find that the horrible monstrosity of a criminal grew into that from the beginnings of his own childhood rejection, neglect, and terror. Suffering- it drives some people to divorce, depression, and substance dependency. Nevertheless; through the word of God, we have a great a cloud of witnesses that testify of the power of God to help us endure and make sense of our suffering. “And the Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends. Indeed the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before.” As Christians, Jesus teaches us that throughout our lives we will suffer. I’ve shared some of the reasons why we suffer and why bad things happen to good people in article Refined by Fire: Purposes for Your Pain. I’ll just list them here because they cannot be overstated for the ones who are going through. At least a few of the reasons we suffer, and some of the outcomes of the suffering of those who truly love God are that we: Model Godliness for others to follow Bring glory to God by enduring it to the end Deepen our walk with, love for and devotion to God Mature in character and perfect our faith Share in Christ’s suffering just as we share in His inheritance In my life, when things really got bad for me to the point that I didn’t want to get out of the bed, I didn’t want to eat, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t work right, nor function in any other capacity correctly, I had to have some real answers. “God why am I doing what You told me to do and yet my whole life is falling apart?” Have you ever suffered to the place that you made yourself physically sick with anguish? Here are some tools that will get you through: Hope- You’ve got to have hope. You’ve got to be able to see past your pain to better days. Hope feeds your soul; you’re heart, and your faith. Adaptability- Just like we see with Job, at the times when every luxury, basic necessity, and human need seems to fail, you’ve got to let go of the memory of those things which you once had and find a new resting place. The idea is to end up in a resting place closer to God than you once were. If you’re being punished for something that you did wrong, the solution is easy, just repent and get it right with Jesus. But my God, it’s so hard to endure when you know you’re loving the unlovable, you know you’re paying your tithes, and you know that God’s direct promises that say He will provide if you do certain things are failing miserably! Your First Love- At the point that things are failing miserably when they once worked you’ve got to lay your faith in that place in Jesus that got you saved in the first place; simple love for Him and hate of your life without Him. Job’s suffering sent him back to the most elementary but foundational places of thinking. “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job 1:1 Job was such an awesome man! This is what he had determined at the beginning of his crisis. The first thing that you’ve got to determine when crisis strikes is your perspective, your position, and your strategy for winning the battle. You’ve got to bite down and resolve in your spirit that you’re not going to leave the Lord and you’re not going to sin against God, but you will just endure. Hope is the only thing that helped my wife and I get through trials that we’ve endured thus far. Our hope simply became to get closer to Him, to know Him, to mature as Christians. That’s it. I couldn’t make any more plans for my business, my ministry, or my social life. All I could do was seek Him and search for more of Him. It was at this time my devotion shot up, my spiritual discipline shot up, and God became the center of my daily activity. You will have to dig deep into prayer, deep into worship, deep into bible study, deep into devotion, and deep into the Spirit within you to endure the Job kind of trial. God and God alone wants to be your hope. You’ve just got to keep digging for Him. You’ve got to be adaptable to the changing times of life. There are ups and downs that the Lord allows us to endure which work to keep us close to Him. Also never forget your first love for God. As you grow in Christ, you will learn to use more gifts and tools to win battles but when everything else fails, take it back down to the beginning and you’ll make it through just fine.