Monday, June 3, 2013

A Musing on James 1


 HOW did the photographer get such an amazing shot!?  

I was just on the phone with a friend whose son was just bit by a rabid dog.  They have gotten the proper medications for him, but they are going to have to play a waiting game for the next few weeks.  Through tears she said "I just have to believe that God is in this, because if I allow myself to think differently I will loose my mind"  If I were to describe to you the year her and her husband have gone through you would just shake your head in awe and amazement.  

Luis has a friend whose marriage is falling apart.  He became a Christian AFTER he got married and his wife isn't happy about it.  She kicked him out last week because he won't renounce Christ and go drinking with her.  Thats a rough day! 

Our car has died and we are trusting God for a new one.  (that isn't as bad as what our friends are going through, but if you have been there you know!)

Depression plagues some of us like a nasty cold.  Anxiety, Worry and fear keeps some of us awake at night.  

LIFE IS HARD!!!!!


James wrote the following to the persecuted church.

(I like the way The Message puts it)


Consider it a SHEER GIFT, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don’t try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way.  James 1:2-4

A sheer gift.....WHATEVER!  Raise your hand if you feel that phrase mocks your pain!  

Consider this for a moment....God's goal is that I become mature and complete not happy and comfortable.  If pain has to come to be a part of that process, then so be it.  If he has to put pressure on us in order that "our faith life is forced into the open" then so be it! 

How do I react under pressure?   Not well at times, I must admit! I don't think that God is expecting that we react with a super spiritual attitude...bleh!  Wouldn't you agree that true worship in born out of pain.  True worship that says 

"YOU ARE GOD NO MATTER WHAT!  In the middle of my pain, in the midst of my confusion and frustration I am going to worship because you 
are my hope and my strength!"  

I Peter 1:6-7  Pure gold put in the fire comes out of it proved pure; genuine faith put through this suffering comes outproved genuine. When Jesus wraps this all up, it’s your faith, not your gold, that God will have on display as evidence of his victory.

I leave you with this this poem written by Amy Carmichael.  She wrote this while bed ridden from a back injury.  She was a missionary in India. 

Hast Thou No Scar 
by Amy Carmichael
Hast thou no scar?
No hidden scar on foot, or side, or hand?
I hear thee sung as mighty in the land,
I hear them hail thy bright ascendant star,
Hast thou no scar?
Hast thou no wound?
Yet, I was wounded by the archers, spent.
Leaned me against the tree to die, and rent
By ravening beasts that compassed me, I swooned:
Hast thou no wound?
No wound? No scar?
Yet as the Master shall the servant be,
And pierced are the feet that follow Me;
But thine are whole. Can he have followed far
Who has no wound nor scar?

3 comments:

  1. Thanks so much for this post, really spoke dear to my heart. Keep them coming you are an inspiration to many!

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  2. Praise the Lord! We are all in this together right!? We need to hold one another up and be real!

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  3. I know I'm not the only one going through an extremely hard time.... like you said, life is hard--it's harder when I realize I have brought some of the pain on myself. But we just keep going, trusting that God is good.

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