Better than an ain't-it-awful session

Early on Monday morning, my prayer partner and I had what I have come to think of as a consider-it-pure-joy session. How was that for an opening salvo? Yes, I do realise that it needs some explanation. It may help to recall that the blogs I posted on the 1^st and 8^th of March explored James’ command to “consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds” (1:2). Think of this, then, as episode three.

Having given the context, I will describe our Monday meeting. I guess it started out as an ain’t-it-awful session – certainly in my case anyway! When asked how things were going, I described a state of affairs that has discouraged Gail and I on and off for many years. The details are not important, but it is enough to say that the situation falls into the “trials of many kinds” category.

Have you ever noticed that ain’t-it-awful sessions in themselves are unproductive in the extreme? However, if they become stepping stones to something else, then they are not wasted. Fortunately, my prayer partner gave me time to express my feelings without trying to invalidate or minimise them.

But then we started to try and discern the hand of God in the trial. What else could we do? For the trial seemed tailor-made to aggravate the most deeply held false beliefs that Gail and I have. And maybe that is exactly what God designed the trial to do. After all, God is perfectly justified in His dissatisfaction with our false beliefs because they are the very things that prevent us from enjoying Him to the full, tempting us to run after stuff that will never truly satisfy us. God is jealous for our affections. He wants us to find fulfilment in Him alone, for then He is most glorified in our lives. And since our overarching purpose in life is to make God famous, we will feel the most joy when our lives are invested to that end.

As our thoughts and discussion progressed along these lines, I could feel a sense of gladness and excitement building up in my heart. Yes, Gail and I were enduring a trial. Yes, it was not over yet. But there was a PURPOSE behind the trial that would result in something good for us. Our loving God was dissatisfied with where we were and had something better in mind.

So my ain’t-it-awful session became a consider-it-pure-joy session, and boy has that made a difference to everything. I am beginning to see why James made it a command.

Cheers for now - Ian