Christians are Being Prepared for Glory (1 Peter 1:6-7)

SPIRITUAL DIARY

                                                                                                            Date:  11-30-03

My Worship Time                  Focus:  Christians are being prepared for glory 

Bible Reading & Meditation             Reference:  1Peter 1:6, 7

            1.  Message of the verse:  “In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”  (NASB)  “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials.  These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed.”  (NIV)

            In these two verses Peter is talking about trials, the kind of trials that all of us as believers well go through.  These various trials that believers go through are “some of God’s tools and textbooks in the school of Christian experience.”  Peter shared several facts about trials.

1. Trials Meet Needs.  God can use trials to discipline the believer who has sinned.  Psalm 119:67 “Before I was afflicted I went astray: but now have I kept thy word.”  Trials can prepare us for spiritual growth or prevent us from sinning.”  (2Corthians 12:1-9)  Even though we do not always the need that these trials are meeting, the important thing is to trust the Lord through all trials we go through.
2. Trials are varied.  The word in the AV used is manifold, which means various colors or various sorts.  The same word is used in 4:10 to describe the grace of God.  “As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.”  Dr. Wiersbe commenting on this section says, “No matter what ‘color’ are day my be, God has grace sufficient to meet the need.”  We may gain victory in one kind of trial, but not in another trial right a way.  It is good to remember that God is the One who matches the trials with our needs.
3. Trials are not easy.  The believer knows the anguish of trials, when he goes through them.  Paul said that the believer should not grieve like the people of the world who have no hope, but when believers grieve they do so with the assurance by the Word of God that there loved one is in heaven.  However we still grieve, and we still hurts, and we should not deny that it is painful for if we do we are fooling ourselves and then it will take longer for God to bring about His healing.  We a person is saved by the Lord he must acknowledge that he is a sinner before he gets the cure and it is the same when we are going through a trial, we must acknowledge that we are in the trial and that it hurts, and then the Lord will come to our aid.
4. Trials are controlled by God.  “When God permits His children to go through the furnace, He keeps His eye on the clock and His hand on the thermostat.  If we rebel, He may have to reset the clock; but if we submit, He will not permit us to suffer one minute too long. The important thing is that we learn the lesson He wants to teach us and that we bring glory to Him alone.”  Peter makes this clear with the illustration of a goldsmith putting gold into the fire to remove the cheap impurities from it.  If he would leave it there too long then he would damage the gold, but if he takes it out at the right time the gold will be beautiful, “so our Lord keeps us in the furnace of suffering until we reflect the glory and beauty of Jesus Christ.

Romans 8:18, and 18 gives insight into the sufferings of the believers:  “17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.  18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.  This glory will not fully be revealed until Christ comes at the rapture of the Church. 

Trials are given to us to test the sincerity of our faith.  If you look at the parable that Jesus spoke about the “seed” that is planted in different you can get an idea about trials and testings.  Dr Wiersbe writes, “the person who abandons ‘his faith’ when the going gets tough is only proving that he really had no faith at all.

Job is an example to us all when he wrote, “But He knoweth the way that I take; when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.”  (Job 23:10)

As I have studied this passage and the related study material I have been using it has been convicting to me, it has been refreshing to me, and it has also been challenging to my soul.

My Steps of Faith Today:  To have a sensitive heart so that I will get hold of Christ that He may show me what He has gotten hold of me for, that I will remember to worship the Lord throughout the day.

Memory verse for the week:  Philippians 3:12b

            12b. …but I press on in order that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus.