God entrusts me with trials as a gift. If I respond to the trials in faith and holiness, I can have joy in the fact that I am storing up rewards in heaven. If I respond to the trials with fear or complaining, I miss the opportunity for reward. On opening day, Heather came down with mono, which lasted a year, and soon I began suffering from debilitating migraines. Later, Heather needed a serious tumor removed, and we had a demon possessed worker and patients one even attacked Heather.
Crazy stuff. But I am a little slow. It took another missionary and a Zulu pastor to point out that we may be facing spiritual warfare. For some reason, we Westerners are often slow to consider spiritual warfare at least I was. He can only do what God allows remember Job. God may allow Satan to harm me or even kill me , but it always has a purpose and it is always for my eternal good. Satan wants to discourage us so that we give up. Keep your eyes on God. If you are getting bombarded with trials, take heart, it may be because Satan is not happy with your life and ministry!
Start with the heart. Even though this is listed last, I always start with examining my heart. God often uses trials or sicknesses to get our attention and reveal sin.
As a loving Father, he wants to restore us to fellowship with him. Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting! How can we endure with joy in trials? How can we find peace? Changed perspective. Peter walked on water during the storm because his eyes were on the King. When his eyes focused on the storm he sank. The storms and trials of life may rage, but perspective changes everything. You will miss out on being used by God.
Are trials hard? But I would never trade any of my trials because of what God did through them. God entrusts us with trials because he is using us for his glory. He is at work in us, through us and around us. Take courage. He is working. In times of trial, it is important to dedicate yourself to prayer. Become an ABWE prayer partner! Most recently prior, Kyle, his wife Heather, and their children he served in Tanzania.
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Give Contact My Account Locations. Search this site. Article Missionary Life. We assume that by serving God in ministry, we are entitled to ease.
But we forget that God shapes his servants through trials. Trials prepare me for service even little trials. Trials sanctify me. Trials make me depend on God. How can we prepare ourselves to face difficult challenges? While Jesus was asleep a furious storm came up and almost sunk the boat. Often we are just like those disciples who did not have a clue what to do when they found themselves in this trial.
Fortunately, the Lord was there to come to their aid. Yet, afterward he reprimanded them for their lack of faith. They had not yet learned to rely on God as their source. The Apostle Peter reminds us no be surprised when trials, tests and tribulations come into our lives. You see, we have an adversary who wants to hinder our spiritual growth.
And he wants to keep us from reaching the destiny that God has in mind for us. It turns out that what happens inside us is more important that what happens to us. Remember that statement and let it let it take root in your spirit. That is the truth that the Apostle Paul wanted believers to in Corinth to understand when he wrote in 2 Corinthians For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
What happens to us is not as important as how we respond to the events that take place in our lives. It is by responding in the proper ways that we are able to progress toward our dreams. God gives each of us dreams to strive for. Yet for a number of you those dreams has not yet been accomplished.
You have encountered many obstacles and setbacks and now your dream seems distance and unreachable. Those are the obstacles that we see. But Paul reminds us not to pay attention to those things we can see because they are temporary; they are subject to change. Rather we are to fix our eyes on the end result, on the dream that God has given us. Such was the attitude of Joseph. In Genesis 37 we read about Joseph and his brothers.
His brothers were jealous of Joseph and did not think much of his dreams. They conspired against Joseph and he ended up a slave in Egypt. Oh, things were not going well for Joseph. Yes, that is how it looked in the natural. But Joseph did not let his troubles dictate his response. Rather, he stayed faithful to God who was his source and he did not forget the dream that God gave him because Joseph understood that what happens to us is not as important as how we respond to the events that take place in our lives.
He kept his eyes on what was still unseen. And look what happened. Those obstacles and setback were enough to hold back the dream that God wanted accomplish through Joseph. One day he was just a prisoner, called upon to interpret a dream for the king of Egypt and in an instant he was elevated to the position of Prime Minister.
Let us apply this to your life: Have tests, trails, challenges and difficulties kept your dream from becoming a reality? If we are doing our part, that is being patient and remaining faithful to the vision God has given us, then the Lord will continue working, often behind the scenes.
It was the patience and faithfulness that Joseph demonstrated that helped to bring him to the place where God could fulfill his dream. The same has been true for my life. When I was just 20 years old I understood that the Lord was calling me to be a missionary; yet I experienced difficulties and setback as I sought to follow his assignment for my life.
Back in I graduated from a Baptist seminary in Kansas City, Missouri and I moved to a little town in the state of Ohio to pastor a little mission church. The church has not doing very well, and after I had been there a few months almost no one was coming so those in charge closed the mission down.
I then moved to the city of Dayton, Ohio and continued looking for a church where I could work and gain the necessary experience I would need to quality to serve on the mission field. Yet I was repeatedly turned downed. So finally in I returned to my home state of Georgia and went back to school to study computer science. After graduating in I worked in the computer field for the next nine years.
To me the dream of serving God on the mission field seem to be dead; I had been paying too much attention to the things that I could see. But God was at work behind the scenes. He was using that period in my life to prepare me for future he was planning. It was in the late 90s that the proper time arrived for my dream to be accomplished. At that time the Lord begin leading me to making preparations to move to another country. I sold off many of my possessions and left my occupation as a computer programmer and move to Central America.
It was there in the little country of Belize where I found opportunities to share the gospel, teach the word of God and begin fulfilling the dream that God had place in my heart. So do not let the dreams that God has placed in your heart slip away. For all of us the Lord has a destiny and a destination. Though trials, test and tribulations will come into our lives, Christ reminds us in John that he has overcome the world.
Plus, we have been raised with Christ, the anointed one, to a new life and the Father has equipped us with his word and placed his Spirit inside of us. Thus, as we continue on the path to our destiny that God has for us we must not forget that that test and trials serve not to weaken us, but to make us stronger. They enhance us the same way a goldsmith refines precious metals. The Bible speaks about God refining us just like gold and silver.
And Peter tells us in 1 Peter Wherein you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been put to grief in various trials, that the proof of your faith, which is more precious than gold that perishes even though it is tested by fire, may be found to result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
The purpose of refining metals like gold and silver is to remove their impurities. We too have impurities in our motives and desires, in our speech, in our way of doing things. But the Lord can free us from those impurities as we learn to apply his word in our lives.
And that is the choice we have to make whenever we encounter trials. But that no has to be the case for our lives. Determine that whatever event or issue you are facing is a test or trial.
First, we have to recognize that what we are experiencing is a trial or test. Often we think that we are able to handle whatever situations that arise in our lives according to our own strength and wisdom. It is too bad that we do not have a little device that would warn us that we are experiencing a trial and that we should not proceed without first connecting to the resources that the Lord has made available to us.
When we fail to recognize that we are dealing with a test or trail we will be likely to make bad decisions the will make matter worse. For us to respond correctly and appropriately to all the difficulties we may face we should recognize that test and trails are coming into our lives all the time and in all form and sizes. They could be dramatic or subtle, short or long lasting, slightly irritating or completely devastating. Resolve that the outcome of this test or trial will be for your good.
So if we can correctly perceive when we are experiencing a test or a trial then we will not be caught off guard; we will be in a position to employ all the resource that God has provided for us to deal with our challenges.
Which then brings us to the second principle, that when we encounter a test or a trial, we start should rejoicing. We should rejoice not because of what is happening to us, but for what overcoming this challenge will do for us. It will cause us to grow spiritually, physically and mentally and become stronger. God want us to become more like Christ.
The Apostles James tells us in James , Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. James is telling us to do what does not come normally or easily. Our flesh does not want to rejoice. To overcome any trial, test of tribulation we have to walk by faith and not by sight because God is our source. When we start rejoicing in the mist of our trial we unleash unseen spiritual forces in our behalf.
Do you remember the story of King Jehoshaphat in 2 Chronicles 20? A vast army was on its way to Jerusalem. So Jehoshaphat gathered the people together to pray for deliverance.
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