James 1:3
3 Be assured that the testing of your faith [through experience] produces endurance [leading to spiritual maturity, and inner peace].
Instant coffee, instant tea, instant messaging, live video coverage, instant loans and so many other instant things, that’s the kind of world we live in today. We are so accustomed to getting what we want when we want it. Everybody seems to be in a hurry and thus no one is willing to wait. Patience has become like a torture in today’s generation.
James tells us that trials and the testing of our faith produces endurance and patience. Several weeks back together with a group of about 26 people, we had the opportunity to climb up Mount Sinai and one of the things the climb and descent teaches you is patience and endurance. It takes you about three and half hours to go up the mountain and about two and a half to come down. You take the climb one step at a time, there is no shortcut and you have to endure every step of the way.
Trials produce patience and endurance in your life as you look to God and wait for his timing. Imagine David being anointed by Samuel to be king and yet he had to wait for years before sitting on the throne and being recognized as king. Imagine him serving and honoring a king he knew God had rejected and he (David) was already anointed king. Talk about patience and endurance.
What about Joseph, after God speaks to him in a dream about his future, he ends up a slave and prisoner in a foreign land and it seems like his life is headed in the opposite direction of what God had showed him. His patience endurance and faith were tested to the core and he passed with flying colors.
Are you going through a trial? Remember yesterday we said count it joy and today we add, realize that the trial is building up patience and endurance in you as a believer. Hold your peace, do not complain, God has not forgotten you just the same way He did not forget Joseph when he was in the dungeons in prison. Grow in your patience and endurance as you learn to depend on God and wait for His timing because as we said, all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purposes. All things, inclusive of what you are facing currently.
