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Joy in your place!

Monday morning this week, Sept. 25,  I woke up completely alert at 4:30 a.m. That doesn’t usually happen to me after such emotional services like the ones we had last Sunday.

 When I awoke that morning, the Lord spoke something to me that brought great joy to my spirit. I hope it will be a blessing to you and will enrich all of our lives today.

 The Lord gave me a picture of rough sandpaper and a chisel. The message with it related to God’s work in our lives to mold us and make us like Jesus. He said this to me, “Sometimes I have to use sand paper and sometimes a chisel. These are not pleasant experiences.”

 Immediately I understood what God was saying. I can attest that recently I have been going through things that have been like rough sand paper and chisels. Perhaps you are going through something rough in your life.

 Rough sandpaper and chisels are tools used by craftsmen to make things. Sometimes the defect in the wood is severe and the craftsman may use a chisel and/or rough sandpaper to remove it.

 Each of us sometimes have a defect in our character that needs to be removed. The Master Builder, Jesus, sometimes has to use rough trials (tools) to make us into a glorious piece of human artwork that is beautiful to behold. One thing you can be sure of, he will only use the rough sandpaper and chisels only when absolutely necessary. He has no pleasure in allowing affliction to enter our lives for no reason.

 I know Jesus has dealt with some major defects in my life. I am sure there are many more He will have to deal with in the future. I do not have a choice in what “tools” my Lord will use on me. But, I must trust Him to know what is best for my life.

 St. Paul taught his converts this in Acts 14:22 “…We must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.”  We know this but still do not enjoy it much less embrace it. Yet, that is what God wants us to do.

 St. James teaches us more on how to handle these kind of events in our life.

 ²My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; ³Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. ⁴But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing⁵If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. ⁶But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. ⁷For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. ⁸A double minded man is unstable in all his ways. ⁹Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: ¹⁰But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away. ¹¹For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways. ¹²Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.  (James 1:2-4)

 Can you have joy while the sandpaper and chisel are working? According to this scripture you can have joy in the midst of the trial if know the trial is a step toward becoming what Christ wants us to be,  “perfect and complete.” Verse four defines this “mark of perfection” or “completeness.” It is a state where you “want nothing.”

 “Wanting nothing” means that we are content and at peace with our life knowing that we are exactly where God wants us to be. (this same theme is taught by St. Paul in Philippians 4:11-13) In this state, we are not asking God to change anything He is doing because we know we are where He has placed us and there is a reason for the “sandpaper and chisel”. In fact we are to embrace the rough tools because we know God is working to make us into a glorious piece of art to display before the universe in the ages to come.(Eph. 2:4-7)

 Now that is perfection! That is where I want to be! Isn’t that where you want to be?

 How do we get there? James says we get there with patience The word translated patience here means cheerful (or hopeful) endurance. This is how God wants us to be during the trial  He wants us to be cheerful and endure the trial (sandpaper and chisel) until God has completed the work this trial (tool) can accomplish in our life.

 Now that we are in the trial and are embracing the work God is doing in us, we need to know how to conduct ourselves in the trial? James says we can ask God to give us wisdom and God will give it to us generously if we ask in faith, not wavering. The wisdom here is not how to get out of the trial. It is wisdom of how to conduct ourselves in the trial toward God and toward others. It is the wisdom to patiently wait to be delivered out of the trial in God’s time and in God’s way.

 Now we can only get this wisdom if we ask for it with faith that is unwavering.

 The faith St. James is speaking of here is not just having faith that God will give us wisdom. It is faith in Jesus as Lord of the trial we are in. It is faith that the trial is for a reason. It is faith that dictates that we do not want out of the trial but we want wisdom for responding to it so that we can reap the rewards God intends. This faith must be unwavering if it is to be rewarded with wisdom. We cannot go back and forth trusting God one day and trying to find a way we can manipulate ourselves out of the trial the next day.

 If we will embrace Jesus’ Lordship and the sandpaper and chisel He is using on us, we can cheerfully endure without trying to find our own way out. We can ask and receive wisdom on how to conduct ourselves in the trial and we can become the people God wants us to be. When God is ready, we will come out of the trial.

 Now this attitude is one that brings us the joy that St. James is talking about. With this attitude and faith we can do what St. Paul says in Philippians 4:4  “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice!”

 My prayer for you is this: “Jesus, You are Lord. I ask that you direct us into the destiny you have planned for us. I pray that all of us will accept Your Lordship in the current trials we are enduring and that we all will become grateful for what this trial is doing in our lives. Let us patiently look forward with joy to the outcome of the work you are doing in us. -AMEN