Saturday, November 10, 2012

It's all about perspective



  So I wanted to write about something that I've been thinking about a lot for a while now. A friend recently posted an article about trials in life, and perspective... how something can look so bad, and can make us upset with God, rather than rejoicing that God is bigger than the problems and that all the trials we go through in this life can be used for good. 

  (Rom. 8:28a - "We know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God"  John 16:33 - "These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.")

  Someone commented on the post and talked about how with all the things they have to go through they would not glorify God for it.

 This really made me think... Job, when going through wayyyy more trials than any of us will ever have to face in life, said ( Job 1:21b ) "The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord." 

 Learning from Job, it doesn't seem to me like the bible talks about how "once you're a good strong Christian, you'll feel great in hard times" or "your heart won't hurt anymore in life"... but rather that "in life, there are always going to be hard times, but God is better and stronger."

 The main thing I've really thought about recently is perspective. You can see hard times in life and look at them as something horrible that God "should not have done to you" or, you can make a choice to trust God. Every example I've seen in the bible, where someone goes through trials, and comes out stronger, isn't, like I said earlier, because they're some super Christian, but because their perspective is that even when their heart is aching, they're choosing to trust in God and the promises He says in His Word. 

 Moving through trials in a positive way is not natural. It's a decision you have to make. The natural (human) thing to do is to get depressed, lose trust in God, and get angry. The biblical thing is to glorify God and trust Him, through the pain. I think the coolest thing is that... it's not unrealistic. The bible doesn't say, "Don't let painful things hurt." As we see from Job, he was clearly hurting, but it's making the choice to trust in God while hurting.

 This has been on my mind a lot, having recently gone through one of the hardest trials I've had to face so far in my life. Losing our child. It would be easy to have been mad at God, and to not have worshiped Him in the pain, but incredibly, through prayer and faith, He helped give me the strength to trust in Him and know He has the best for me, during the pain. To choose to worship God, even though I didn't understand why I had to go through this.

 Looking back, I already see how much God has taught me through this trial about real faith and trust... not just being happy with God when He makes your life great, but trusting in God when life is really bad, knowing He has overcome the world! I wish I could have learned this a different way, but God knew how to take a bad thing and teach me so much through that, that I might not have learned in a different way. 

 To end all of this off, I just want to encourage everyone to take a look at their perspective in hard times. Is your perspective self-centered, or God-centered. If it's self-centered, a great way to make is God-centered is to read the Word of God, which is FULL of God's incredible promises and statements that, if you truly understand them, can give you nothing but hope and encouragement in those hard times. 


 Remember... persecution from people... or from satan, is all going to happen... it's about how to look at and deal with it.

 (Matt 24:9 "Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of my name's sake.")

(John 16:33b "but take courage; I have overcome the world.")