King Solomon wrote (Proverbs 17:3):
The crucible is for silver, and the furnace is for gold, and the LORD tests hearts.
One of the themes that has been repeating as I read through the Bible this year is the idea that God uses adversity to develop character in his people. It’s all through the Bible. From Adam and Eve in the beginning to Paul and the early church, stories of tests and trials show up all over the Bible. In Romans 5 Paul says something crazy. He’s just written about faith and grace and the hope of God’s glory for His people, then he turns the corner with this:
More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
We rejoice in our sufferings…I have to admit that I don’t often find myself rejoicing in suffering. Suffering stinks. It hurts. It’s painful. I try to avoid suffering. I don’t want to suffer; I want to escape the pain and hurt. I want an easy life.
But don’t we all look back on the hard times and think, “Man, I really got close to God through that tough time…? Isn’t it pretty clear when we take the backward glance that the suffering was good for us? And how many of us tend to drift away from desperation for God when things are going well?
The writer of Hebrews put it this way: Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness.
Seth Barnes (I love that man!) writes If you’re a young person whose mother was always following you around making sure that life was never too rough, I hate to break it to you, but I can almost guarantee that you are spiritually immature. Your mom did you no favor by protecting you from pain – you need pain to grow.
The crucible is for silver, and the furnace is for gold…both are instruments used for refining, able to withstand heat that melts the precious metals so that impurities can be skimmed off. God uses adversity to bring our impurities, our flaws, our sins to the surface so that they can be removed.
If you’re going through that rough patch of adversity, hang in there! Don’t give up, don’t run from the test. Draw close to God. He wants you to come to the end of yourself so that you can find strength from him. He wants to develop hope in you. Hope comes from character, and character from enduring through suffering. He is refining you, making you more like Jesus, pure and set apart for his use. I know it hurts; hold on for the hope.
I don’t want to miss anything that God has for me. If that means that I need to embrace suffering and discipline, then bring it on. I want to be tested by God so that I know what he wants to work on.
I have a feeling that the list is longer than I want it to be. Let the skimming commence. Does anybody have any fireproof undergarments that I can borrow?
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