Refined, Not Defined

My daily reading of the Word took me into Romans chapter eight....I've read it trillions of times, cherish it deeply, but I love the way the 'same ole' 'same ole' can reach out and emphasize a valuable newness.

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?----No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

FACT...trouble, trial, hardship, and difficulty will follow us all the days or our walk in Christ. (Sorry to borrow from the flow of Psalm 23... goodness and mercy will follows all the days of our life too!) But the walk of the believer is not defined by the outward difficulties and tribulations, even suffering. We fail one another when we attach labels of faith and perseverance on one another simply because a severe test has been completed with a passing grade....say an "A-" or "B." Paul tells the Romans that none of those outward sufferings have any separative affect upon the love of Christ we hold to.

Now, don't get me wrong: I am not saying trials and tribs don't have a purpose, because they do. However, their purpose is not to DEFINE, but to REFINE. The relationship we have with our trials, persecutions, sufferings, or times of nakedness (lack), according to James, strengthen our faith. Why? Because they teach us to rely even more on our relationship with Jesus. The trials, when approached and dealt with by faith, tend to separate us from the love of stuff, the love of comfort, the love of culture, the love of things that are really not worthy of afterthought. Thus, we are refined into a deeper walk by our struggles, if we let it happen that way.

No, we are not defined by troubles and trials. We are defined by the love of Christ that we are attached to by faith! Something extraordinary happens to the person who holds desperately to the love of Christ when the odds seem to stack up against him. Paul calls it being "more than conquerors!" In other words, you don't have to win the trial....the trial simply cannot detach you from the love you are holding to. It is almost an ambivalent brush-off of the difficulty, as if it were a bug that is irritatingly buzzing around your ear.

I wish I was to that place, but I confess I am not. Sometimes, the hardship seems huge and difficult, and it is! That is why the refining continues...so that I will know thoroughly what defines me and how big HE really is. How about YOU?
Pastor Jim