I'm sure we have all seen weight lifters at work, or have friends who work out at the gym. Some are very body-obsessed and work hard to develop well defined, strong muscles. However, this process of developing strength actually involves the muscles repeatedly being broken down in order to grow stronger. At first the strain will cause the person to feel tired and weak, possibly in pain too, but over time they will grow stronger. It's the same with our faith – it too needs to be exercised in order to grow stronger and enable us to be closer to God and trust Him more.
The entire book of Hebrews is about faith – how to strengthen it and how it can help us endure the hard knocks in life. One of Gods goals for us is to learn to trust Him more. When we ask for more faith we are really asking for more trials, more exercise to enable our faith to grow stronger. We may be broken down during those trials, but the end result is a stronger person, with a larger faith.
Helping others may be the last thing we are thinking about when we are facing trials ourselves, but today's reading from Hebrews 13 gives us many examples of people we should be reaching out to, and things we should be doing in order to enable our faith to keep growing, and prevent that progress being destroyed.
Keep on loving one another as brothers and sisters. Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. Continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering. Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral. Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you." So we say with confidence "The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can mere mortals do to me?" Hebrews 13: 1-6
Our success at coming through our own trials is very important to God, so that then He can use us to pass on comfort and encouragement to those who need it. The more problems we face, the more we will be strengthened, and the more we will then have the joy of being able to help others when they are needing strengthening too. Some Christians are glad they have few problems, maybe even thinking they are fortunate for having a "quiet life". Others may feel they have had more than their "fair share" of problems. But ask yourself this – who has had the greatest opportunity to see their character grow stronger? And who has the most opportunity to help others by passing on the lessons they have learned through their sufferings, and supporting others with the strength they have gained?
Corinne Mason
Read the Bible in a year: Proverbs 27:23-28:6, Ezekiel 30:1-31:18, Hebrews 13:1-25
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