Trials

As I go through difficult times in my life, I find some comfort in thinking about Job and reading about him. Job was a righteous man and he had a strong faith and fear of God. Yes, there were few people who feared God like Job. A faith so strong that the enemy and prosecutor (Satan) wanted to test Job for it, because he thought that Job loved God because of all the good things God had blessed him with. Job was a very rich and powerful man, who were blessed with many children (seven sons and three daughters) and he had large herds of  animals an also many servants.

 Satan got permission from God to test Job's faith in God. However, he was not allowed to take Job´s life. No, he was not allowed to kill him. Satan made sure that Job lost everything. Yes, everything except Job´s fear of God and his strong faith in God and his wife, whom during this difficult trial, tried to talk him into abandon his faith in God. All his children and all his servants were killed. All cattle were either killed or deserted. It´s impossible to imagine how such a loss affects a human being. Only one who has been or is in the same or in a similar situation might have a possibility to understand. Job´s friends were sure that it was a punishment from God that struck him and they tried hard to make him confess his sins against God. They could not see another explanation to why Job were so hard punished if it wasn´t so that he had sinned against God. But we know from the Bible that Job was tested because of his strong faith in God. Job was really strong in his faith and his fear of God. Despite all these difficult trials, he did not sin and he didn´t speak bad against God.

Job was so desperate in his grief that he thought it would have been better if he had never been born and he prayed that the day he was born should be wiped out. He was also deeply disappointed with his friends, who he thought were no good in comforting, but at the end of the trials he prayed for his friends and God blessed him and he got back from the Lord twice from what Satan had stolen from him! When Job, after a long life had been blessed to see four generations of both children and grandchildren, and at his death he was old and full of days.

I use to think that today we know about the Atonement of God and therefore we can trust in the grace of God! Job, who lived during the time of the Old Testament, did not know that Jesus would really come and take every sin on himself so that anyone who believes in Him and confesses that He is the Lord will be saved. Job could only trust the prophecies about this. He had no access to "the key" as we have today, according to the New Testament!

Still today, there are many people who blame God for exposing us to difficult trials, or they believe that they themselves have sinned against God and see trials as God's punishment.

I believe that God in a loveful way can try us in order to strengthen us and to make us grow, not by "striking" us, but he can for example use other people and grind us (iron sharpeneth iron) and to cleanse us from all that isn´t pure and from things that don´t benefit us or pleases God. He can let us go trough fire to bring out the finest in us, as silver is tried! All for our own sake, but he never lay so heavy burdens on us that we can´t bear or handle them and He even carries us and helps us to bear our burdens. We are so very precious to Him!

In trials we go through in life, is it  important to keep our faith in God and dare to be still and trust that He is truly GOD!

The Peace and Blessings of Jesus Christ!