Reactions

 The way in which we react to trials says more about our level of spiritual maturity than any diploma, certificate, or accolade we might have collected along life’s journey. How you react, and the manner in which you meet life’s trials reveals how far you’ve come and how much further you must go in your spiritual growth.

Rich or poor, man or woman, well-known or obscure, no one is ever spared trials in this life. The way they appear varies, but be certain, everyone living, and anyone who’s ever lived, has experienced trials.

A trial doesn’t necessarily mean a loss, an illness, a tragedy, or a privation. Another word for trial is test, and although we readily associate the word trial with something catastrophic, a trial can be as simple as what you do when the cashier at the local grocer’s hands you more change than what you’re owed.

Are you honest and forthright? Do you hand her the twenty back? Or, knowing that at the end of the day, when she counts her drawer, and she’s short the Andrew Jackson, she has to cough it up from the minimum wage she earns, you pocket it anyway?

You’d be surprised how many self-professing Christians would pocket the money, knowing that it was ill-gotten and wrong to keep it. Sure, they’ll try to justify it by saying the Lord blessed them with the money or that it was the wealth of the wicked being laid up for the righteous, but how do you know the lady with the cat sweater that smelled like moth balls was wicked? It’s ghastly, to be sure, but Diamonds by Elizabeth Taylor doesn’t smell like tar or pitch.

And you’ve just lost another reader, chubby. I think Diamonds is a lovely fragrance! And that’s your right, but taste is subjective. In all good conscience, I can’t say something that makes my eyes water is something I want to smell for longer than a second or two.

We are constantly being tested, and James insists that we should count it all joy.

By their definition, trials and tests are not easy for the flesh, nor are they something we naturally react positively toward. Usually, your tests and trials will be focused on the one area in your life you’ve neglected to strengthen your defenses against. Before you say you are impregnable, everyone has something that’s their pressure point, their trigger, or their weakness.

Whether it’s bad drivers, flattery, lust, pride, avarice, or pumpkin spice lattes, there’s something you know you have to guard extra hard against, and usually, it is the thing you guard least against because your flesh does its best to keep you from doing so.

It becomes easier as you mature and you realize that your flesh and spiritual man are at constant war, and they will never reconcile and become friends. One will always be seeking to fell the other, and the one we show most deference to is the one that will usually win out. Your flesh can’t do much hanging on a cross, but few are willing to drive the nails in deep enough for it not to wriggle free from time to time.

Although there is something to be said about the adage that God doesn’t call the qualified, He qualifies the called, it is also true that He promotes the tested.

Luke 16:10, “He who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much; and he who is unjust in what is least is unjust also in much.”

How does God know? By testing us. If we are found faithful in the little things, He knows He can entrust us with greater things still. However, if we prove ourselves unfaithful in the little, we will remain where we are until we pass the test.

Wherever God has you currently, be faithful to it. There are no small callings, insignificant tasks, or irrelevant offices within the kingdom of God. Your duty is not to pursue an office or a calling; it is to pursue godliness with contentment, and when He has need of you somewhere, He will let you know at the appropriate time.

Getting ahead of God and pursuing something for which He knows we are not yet ready is a recipe for disaster and a whole lot of heartache. Spend enough time in ministry, and you’ll see it play out firsthand. When one is ill-equipped, immature, and unseasoned, yet barrel headfirst into things to which they were never called, ruination is inevitable.

Saddest of all is that people who pursue callings to which they were never called usually get bitter toward God for not validating their aspirations once they fail in their endeavors. Be content where God has you, and make sure that He walks with you every step of the way. Not ahead, not behind, but side by side, toward whatever plan He has in store for you.

Prophet to the nations has a nice ring to it, but if He never called you to that, it’s not something you should pursue for yourself. God rewards the obedience of His servants, not the size of the ministry He entrusted them with.

The faithful servant who preached to a homeless man on the street corner will receive the same reward as the one who preached to thousands in stadiums because they both walked in obedience and remained faithful to their calling.

There’s a difference between you wanting something and God wanting something for you. It’s not nuance, it’s not splitting hairs, it’s the difference between success and failure, between victory and defeat.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.