Credit: nomorerace.wordpress.com

A wild question…

Can we idolize our trials?  Suffering… pain?  Can we look more to the storms of life, storms we’ve barely survived, to determine what we’re made of?

Suffering and trials can take our mind off our Creator.  They can replace what we believe with doubts, fears and enough anxiety for five people.  Trials can make us believe that life will never improve, our pain will never subside, our burdens will never be lifted.  We can carry our suffering like baggage, carting it from one life experience to the next, opening it at various times to remind ourselves of our “lot in life”.  It can kill our hope.  It can skew the lens through which we see the world.

Trials need to be put in their place: they are but a deeply challenging and effective tool to ‘bind us to our Creator’ (thank you Charles Spurgeon!).  Without them, many – if not all – of us would be led astray after the pleasures and cares of this world.

Hard to believe when we’re experiencing them, but God woos us in our deep pain, in our devastation, in our delayed hopes and dashed dreams.  He even woos us through the abuse and hatred we unjustly receive.  Still more He woos us when we are faced with the reality of who we truly are: a reality so hard to accept most run far away!

We must not look to these trials as our idol, the “god” in our life telling us simply to expect more of the same.  We must look beyond… to the Hand allowing these trials.  And we must praise Him.  He is showing me that praise is how we overcome trials.  It is not merely something to do ‘in the meantime’ while we nurse our wounds.  It is the key to victory 🙂

Suffering, you are not my master.  Jesus is.  Thank You Lord for showing us this, each & every child of Yours!!

I’ll leave you with wonderful words from my mentor Patti:

Dig a well, and dig a well of worship, praise, thanksgiving!!  That He will do what He says He will do!!