Nuggets of knowledge: tests, trials and worries

Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.    He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
    for his name’s sake.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
    I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
    your rod and your staff,
    they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me
    in the presence of my enemies;
you anoint my head with oil;
    my cup overflows.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
    all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord
    forever.

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Blessed morning everyone and welcome to another installment of the nuggets of knowledge series here at metanoiameans.com.

Today we will be talking about tests, trials and worries. 

Tests, trials and worries…. We all both have and deal with these things on a daily basis and many of us suffer a great deal during them. Even more of us, still, though tend to think that God is punishing us or has forgotten about us when we are dealing with these incidences and sometimes whole seasons. I will be transparent with you all right now. My own life…. And current circumstances therein are what have inspired me to write this article. 

Over the past three months, I have been going on quite the faith journey. I was called by God to uproot myself like Abraham. I was called to abandon the life I had been living for 35 years, the town I grew up in, the family I knew, the friends I had, the career I was building, the future I wanted for myself…. I was called to abandon all of it and start over in a new land. I was called to abandon familiarity and comfort and to pick up uncertainty. This may sound scary to you who are reading this, it was certainly scary to me for a while. But through all of this, through all of this that I am going through right now I have learned many key and valuable faith lessons. 

Would I change even a single thing that occurred over these last three months? No, I wouldn’t. Every hardship, every instance of uncertainty, every moment of doubt, every second of demonic attack…. Every test of my faith…. I wouldn’t change a single one. Why? Because it is through these trials and tribulations that God molds us. These are the raging fires he uses to both purify and refine us, to burn away the impurities caked on by the world and form us into the beautiful and unbreakable diamonds, he created us to be.

Malachi 3:2-3 “2 But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. 3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the Lord.”

This… my  journey through the refiners fire is in fact, the reason why I have not been regularly posting here as of late. I have adopted somewhat of a nomadic lifestyle and currently spend a lot of time in quiet and solitude with God. It is through this journey that I have begun to seek him to a degree that I never have before. To be thankful for the small things that I used to take for granted. It is through this journey that I have learned to be compassionate for others. It is through this journey that my heart has changed. Changed from caring only for myself to caring for my lovely bride and the world at large even more than I do myself. My heart now aches for the struggles of others. I now spend more time in prayer daily than I ever have before.  My journey through the fire is not yet complete and I don’t think it will be until I meet Jesus face-to-face. I believe that I will be a work in progress until I pass from time into eternity, and I am excited to see what the fire will bring out of me.

I encourage all of you not to do what I’m doing, but instead to pray to the Lord and see how he will change you. Your journey through the fire of our great refiner may look very different from mine. in fact, that is most likely. Just remember that the changes come through fire and it will hurt. That pain means that something inside you is dying, something inside you is being removed, something inside you is being changed….burned away.  Lean on the Lord when it hurts….. lean on the Lord when you can’t take any anymore….. lean on the Lord no matter what goes on…. Trust his plans…. Trust his knowledge…. Trust his ways….. trust his love…. Trust his power….. trust him and all will end up as it is meant to be. You may not be where you thought you would be, or even where you thought you wanted to be but you will be both where and what the Lord meant for you to be.

I will leave you with this to think over…. Matthew 6:26

“Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?”

I’ll see ya when I see ya…

MB