Gold ore crushed
3 Be assured and understand that the trial and proving of your faith bring out endurance and steadfastness and patience.
4 But let endurance and steadfastness and patience have full play and do a thorough work, so that you may be [people] perfectly and fully developed [with no defects], lacking in nothing. James 1:3-4
So after I calmed down from the shock of being told I was going to lose my job, I did begin to pray to the Lord. I applied for another job and two weeks later I started as a Branch Manager for a Home Health Agency. It paid more money but the office was in a bad neighborhood and it was a dull and dingy workplace. The workers were sullen. Five months later I got fired! Yes, me who never gets fired got fired. But several weeks before I got fired, an interesting thing had happened while I was walking down a corridor of St.ElizabethHospital on my way to a meeting. I heard the Lord speak to my heart. “Emergency Room Nurse Practitioner”. “Boy”, I thought to myself “I would never do a job like that! Too much stress, besides I don’t like emergencies”. I kept on walking.
There is a purpose to our trials. The proving of our faith brings out fruit!
Endurance – the ability to do something difficult for a long time
Steadfastness – being firmly fixed, unmovable
Patience – the ability to accept trouble or suffering without getting angry or upset.
This fruit makes us more like the character of Jesus. Think of the last week of Jesus’ life. He needed all three of these qualities to go through all that He did for our sake. If he did not have these characteristics he could have said “No way! I am not going through that!” But He did go through it for us.
Our problem as Americans is that we are used to having things fast. Fast burgers, instant messaging, fast computers, shopping online – so no waiting. We do not like to wait. We want our trials our way and over fast! Unfortunately, in order to grow in patience, endurance and steadfastness we often have to wait, sometimes for a long time.
Somebody told me that in the Middle East they are great at waiting patiently – sometimes as long as eight hours in a line. Try doing that to one of us! Yeah.
So we need to be patient when we are in a trial and let the Lord do what needs to be done in our lives.
Jesus is Lord!
