the church of Christ
Romans16:16 "Greet one another with a holy kiss.  All the churches of Christ send greetings."

By Leon Barnes

            Listen to any person who has started an exercise regimen and they will talk about how you need to run or walk or whatever other exercise until you can feel the burn.  Supposedly, when you feel the burn in your muscles they are developing and using up the fat.  You are becoming stronger.

            Do you suppose that was the point of James saying to us "Count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience?"  Most of us want to quit running when we feel the burn.  It doesn't feel good.  But if you keep on running when the burn starts, you will grow through it.  When trials come into our lives, the greatest temptation is to stop.  We've tended to buy into the notion that if a thing is right for us it will come easy and everything will fall into place.
 

            It's strange that the whole idea that living for God will make your life easy ever came to be promoted or accepted.  It is an idea that comes straight from the devil.  He knows that if we accept the health and wealth theory of Christianity, then we will expect everything in our lives to go great.  When they don't go well, our faith will waver.
 

            I'm always concerned about material we study which seems to promote the idea of ease for the Christian.  Some seem to want us to believe that if I as a Christian ask God to do anything He is going to do it.  Yet Jesus prayed for the cup to pass and God answered "NO".  Paul prayed for the thorn in the flesh to be removed but God told him he was better off with it.  Timothy had an ongoing stomach problem that Paul encouraged him to take a little wine for.  Trophimus was left at Mellitus sick. 
 

            Even when Jesus described the life for God He said the way that is right is "Strait and narrow."  The word "Strait" means difficult.  The easy road is the one that is broad and the gate is wide.  The only problem is it leads to destruction.  God's point is you can slide your way into hell, but it will require effort to go to heaven.  James said, "Faith without works is dead." (James 2:24-26).

            Instead of the trials indicating God is not on our side and blessing us, they may well indicate the opposite.  In Hebrews 12 the writer talks about the training and discipline of the Lord.  "Whom the Lord loves He chastens as a son."  If we aren't ever chastened, He said we are like illegitimate children and not like sons.  He said that no discipline for the moment seems pleasant.  It is afterward that it yields the right kind of fruit in us.

            Even when David described the life for God as being a sheep and Him our shepherd, he had to walk through the valley of the shadow of death.  God was with him as He is with us.  His rod and staff comfort us.  But we still have to walk through the valleys.  Instead of complaining that our lives have some valleys, we need to thank God for His presence and keep walking.  You can make it through the valley.  One day we will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.