“Rejoice”

In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith- of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire- may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. I Peter 1: 6-7

Verse Reflections:  Again, through this verse, God acknowledge the power that stress has over us.  We go through grief, we go through trials.  It is a given that we will have problems in life.  The older I get the more I realize that no one escapes the hard things that life throws at us.  You might look at a person or a family from the outside looking in and think their life is perfect but it is not.  Period.  We must acknowledge and accept that life is going to have trials.  Those trials will test our faith.  And yet, I have found that these trials will pull us closer to Christ if we allow them to. Once we realize our inability to control the situation, our helplessness, we also realize that we have to depend on Christ.  The trials “prove the genuineness of our faith.” Gold has to be heated to 2000^o to be refined and it had to be heated for five days in Biblical times. This prolonged exposure to heat separates out the impurities.  Likewise, we have to make choices when we go through difficult times.  We can choose to bond closer to God, the purer version of ourselves and separate from the impurities or we will run from the heat and the impurities will remain.  Are we going to push our way through with no help from God or others?  Are we going to isolate ourselves?  Are we going to resent or embrace?  Are we going to lean on God or fall on the ground exhausted?  Our tendency as food addicts is to reach for food to give us a temporary surge of happiness. And then, we proceed to create more stress by rebuking ourselves for the lack of willpower.  God is telling us here that we have to go through the trials to learn to lean on Him.  I have to depend on God to choose healthy foods.  I have to know that my faith is genuine and while I cannot make the right choices daily, God can.  I will praise, glory and honor Jesus Christ in this power.  So today, we are going to rejoice because we are making it through our trials.  We are not going to concentrate on the trials or the heat, we are going to focus on the success of yesterday and today.  We made it through the fire!! We are going to rejoice that we can face the heat, the trials and we are going to look for the power of Christ.

Prayer:  Father, I don’t want to suffer in order to prove the genuineness of my faith.  And yet, I know that my faith has grown stronger in the times I have suffered grief.  When my nephew at ten years old was diagnosed with stage four cancer, I had to depend on you.  When I emerged from a coma with a loss of short term memory, I had to depend on You.  When I lost my child, I was hopeless.  When any marriage goes through touch times we are tried.  When we depend on You to meet our bills because pay checks will not stretch far enough. And the list goes on.    Lord, we have all had so many trials.  My faith is genuine.   There is no doubt that You are my savior.  Father, save me now from my eating issues.  I trust You, I have faith and yet You know that I doubt myself so severely that I make bad choices.  Lord, daily I will be refined.  Lord, I know this is not the world of Your eternity so be with me as we emerge glowing from this refinement.  Allow me to praise, glory and honor You as You are revealed through our trials.  Remind us that anytime we make the right choices for You it may not be easy.  We must pause and choose to eat Your foods and not the “tempting” processed foods.  Lord bless us as we move forward.  We love You.