By Gimena Alarcón
“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds,
James 1: 2-3, English Standard Version
for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.”
Over and over again the word of God commands us to rejoice in the great salvation that has been granted to us by grace, to obey, to persevere and to endure affliction, and trials.
“Count it all joy” How is it possible to be joyful in the midst of trials? Could it be that pain does not hurt for the Christian? Are we free from fear, and fatigue? Is the gospel an insurance against calamity?
Will we insist on denying the pain and hope to recover all that was lost like Job and hope to be excluded from all human vicissitudes?
We want God to miraculously free us from the fiery furnace and from the lions as he did with Daniel and we do not want to die stoned like Stephen. It is natural to try to flee from pain, but it is impossible that it does not reach us.
From our birth, as human creatures we are the most helpless of all, we depend on the care of our parents to survive, we are limited by space and time and mortally affected by sin.
We live in a time when technology has made life easier in such a way that it creates the false illusion of control of our lives and the circumstances that surround us, we have acquired the habit of obtaining everything instantly: the digital communication (which is not always true communication), realities that we can see from anywhere in the world, but are not always real, enhanced images, the world at home through a screen.
We see other people’s lives that seem perfect, and we madly rush to reach comfort and acceptance… maybe that is why God chose in his wisdom the time of Jesus’ birth during the time of the Roman Empire, when people still traveled on foot, without drinking water, electricity, and telephones, without the means of communication of today – that have us mortally distracted from the true reality -, without the comforts that we enjoy today.
Jesus Christ walked in our dusty roads then, he did not have here on earth the luxuries of the kings of that time, luxuries that are less than what we enjoy today.
The greatest joy for the human of today is to have everything now and with the least effort, it is the dream and the idol of total comfort, being the center of the world, just as Satan wanted to be, displacing God and occupying the throne.
Our greatest joy as Christians should be knowing God more, being closer to Jesus Christ, being more grateful for having been freed from the dominion of sin, enjoying his word and trusting in his already fulfilled and announced promises that are in the process of being fulfilled. It is appreciating each and every one of the small or great things that manifest to us his power and his greatness and his condescension in having approached us, enjoying his grace poured into our lives daily.
We are commanded to have our eyes fixed on Jesus Christ, to be like Him… it is impossible, we are too distracted, our minds are invaded with wholesale nonsense, we need his Spirit; Affliction is the means that God uses to wake us up again and again, to help us understand that we are only limited, fallible, useless, weak, foolish humans.
How many times do we struggle with our pride and self-reliance, and when we believe we have succeeded in this task, do we steal the glory from God and take pride in being less proud and self-reliant?
The psalmist says to God “I was brutish and ignorant; I was like a beast toward you.” (Psalm 73:22); the same are we, who dare to envy the powerful and rich unbelievers, loved and accepted by society; we dare to envy those who get all they want, when all they want is to sin. We long to rest in the swamp of total comfort as if that were the end of our lives, to ignore God peacefully, to know his word and to live as if he did not exist.
For the first time in history we live in the conditions we have at this time, in which we were all forced to abandon the race in its tracks, step on the ground, admit the fragility of life and recognize that the future is uncertain (it was always like that, but we intentionally ignore it, confident in ourselves and the technology).
Reckon with great joy that God in his mercy has wanted to wake us up and hinder our comfortable and wide path to damnation; hypocrisy becomes evident in the face of imminent death, in the face of affliction, illness, frustration, fear, pain… it is time to return to God, it is time to rethink our human goals, and recognize his sovereignty, it is time to recognize our lukewarmness, to abandon the wide road, and time to set our eyes on Jesus: the author and finisher of faith.
Brothers, if we cannot rejoice in the midst of trials, it is because we love more everything that is taken from us, and if we love more everything that is taken from us, it is that we are not loving our God as we should… idolatry? I am not saying that we do not cry and suffer for the current circumstances… we will cry and cry out to the God who hears us and we will be raised to continue serving him, we will bear the fruits of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, meekness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23); because He will complete His work in us and He is doing it through trials, difficult circumstances such as sickness, death, separation, scarcity, loneliness, injustice, persecution and afflictions of all kinds.
Thank God for the trials, for what he gives us and what he does not give us, in his perfect love and wisdom. The loving gardener is wisely pruning us today so that we bear abundant fruit for his glory.
The trials are not necessarily a punishment, the punishment was received by Jesus Christ on a cross, we are free from condemnation, we can be joyful, our salvation does not depend on our correct performance as Christians, the perfect work of our salvation has been completed.
How will we manage to cope with the circumstances that overwhelm us without fainting or going crazy? In our own strength it is impossible, we need his grace daily. For maturity there are no shortcuts, for maturity time is required, and it is by walking on the path step by step that we are being transformed day by day, and each day is a new opportunity to repent and seek to do His will as it is written in his word, we are not alone, is the same Spirit who helps us and leads so we can make ours these words of the prophet:
“Though the fig tree should not blossom,
Habakkuk 3:17-18, English Standard Version
nor fruit be on the vines,
the produce of the olive fail
and the fields yield no food,
the flock be cut off from the fold
and there be no herd in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord;
I will take joy in the God of my salvation.”
Amen.
