Chris' Christian Blog

Tests

"Tests" 

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In a lot of my blogs recently I have been discussing how the trials and hardships we face in life make us into what we are today. I'm going to expand on that a little more here, The New Testament writer's spoke a lot on the topic of hardship. Let's look at a few of those scriptures. The first one will be from James. He writes "My friends, consider yourselves fortunate when all kinds of trials come your way, for you know that when your faith succeeds in facing such trials, the result is the ability to endure," James 1: 2 - 3.

So James is teaching the same things I have repeatedly said in my personal blog, that trials are how we grow as human beings. Our physical growth may stop in our teens but psychological and spiritual growth never stop. We must always continue to plug forward with life. Life can get to be quite a handful at times. These are the times that make us wonder if God has abandoned us or possibly even begin to doubt that He even exists. However surviving these trials is a win-win situation for us because it builds our faith and it helps us see that we can survive these things.

We also read "Be glad about this, even though it may be necessary for you to be sad for awhile because of the many kinds of trials you suffer. Their purpose is to prove your faith is genuine. Even gold, which can be destroyed, is tested by fire, and so your faith, which is much more precious than gold, must also be tested so it may endure," 1 Peter 1: 6 - 7b.

Many of us ask ourselves why God would test us that way? God already knows everything so why put us through those kinds of tests? The answer is that while God is allowing us to be tested God Himself is not testing us. He's merely allowing it to happen so that we can grow. He also isn't doing it to be mean but to teach. He put Abraham to the test with Issac so that Abraham could see that he was fully committed to God. God already knows how we're going to respond in those situations. However we don't know how we're going to respond for sure. So He allows us to tested so the we know how we're going to respond in a given situation. I do not believe for one minute that Abraham led Issac off on a journey that took a matter of days, and didn't have some serious doubts about whether or not he could actually sacrifice his son. I know I certainly would have and I'm sure any other parent who loved their child would as well! So these tests are not for God's sake. God gets no pleasure at all out of our hardship. He merely allows it to take place, knowing that we will mature as a result.