James 1:2-3 Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.
Verses like this always make my mind think hard. It is interesting to me that our brothers and sisters before us were joyful in trials. They had Kingdom eyes. They were able to think back on their life with Christ, in person, and know what they were gaining in a completely different way than we can understand. They walked with Jesus. They saw his love in action. They watched his pain on the cross. They touched his scars in His resurrection. Being in the presence of Jesus changed them. So are we just out of luck because we didn't live in that time? Absolutely not! We get the joy of being in the presence of the risen Christ at every moment. We don't have to wait for Him to show up at our dinner party or at our river side church meeting. We have Jesus with us at every moment. Our joy comes from knowing that while we are in the midst of the trial, we have Jesus Christ living in us walking through our trial with us. We live in Him, not just with Him. The apostles knew this too. They experienced incredible life after Jesus was resurrected. Not in a successful earthly way, but in a "Heaven is my home, so nothing here can touch me" kind of way. Go through the Refiner's fire with Jesus and you will find a nearness to God that you have never had before.
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