Written by,
Robert Johnson
I’m learning so much about our relationship with God’s word. God like with Jesus will make us a target to satan to bring us closer to His will – There are several places in God’s word where He uses satan to press His children closer to the revelation of the gospel of redemption. “He made me a target to bring me closer to Him.” I didn’t understand at first, now I got it – The target is the word of God not man – Ut is not human affliction, it s the pain of carrying the cross/the word of God – Christ suffering was not by man, it was by the will of God – Everything He suffered came before His human birth thus it’s at the hand/the will of God. Isaiah 53:10 KJV
Just be still – The greater the conversation, the greater the enemy – Jesus was led in the wilderness to be tempered of the devil, Paul like Job received a sickness/Thorne because of the Revelation give Him. God ask satan to consider Him/Job – These men all shared one thing in common; they all learned obedience through the things they suffered. “He made me a target to bring me closer to Him.”
God Allows Trouble through faith trouble reduces the space between the believer and His word –
When ore is tested to prove it is gold or silver, the assayer puts a fire under it, pours acid on it, and then determines whether it is genuine.
Likewise, God puts faith to the test to prove it is genuine. When some hardship hits in your life, your faith will be put to the test. Will you trust God? Will you lean on Him rather than lean on your own understanding? Will you become sweeter or bitter? James said, “knowing that the testing of your faith….” God tests our faith that we might know it is genuine.
False Faith Walks Away
When Jesus began His ministry, He met a group of people who expressed a faith that proved to be false:
Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs [miracles] which He did. But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men, and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man. –John 2:23-25
Did He suspect them? He surely did. He knew their belief was not genuine because He “knew all men.” When a time of testing came for them, their faith proved false. Our Lord said to them later:
“But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who would betray Him. And He said, “Therefore I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.” From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more. -John 6:64-66
The ones who walked away couldn’t stand the test, so they left Him. Then our Lord turned to His own disciples and asked them, “Do you also want to go away?” Simon Peter, answering for them, replied, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). Their faith was genuine.
David’s faith was also tested. I imagine him as an old man reflecting back over his life. He remembered how God had led him. That’s when he wrote Psalm 23. Only a man who had been tested could write “the Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want” (Psalm 23:1). An inexperienced man who knew nothing about life could not have written that statement. But David could, because his life and his faith had been tested in the fires of adversity.
The Apostle Paul was also really tested. He was told from the beginning, when he was first called to follow the Lord, that he was going to be tested:
But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is a chosen vessel of Mine to bear My name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel. For I will show him how many things he must suffer for My name’s sake.” –Acts 9:15, 16
Paul’s faith was tested by the Lord. When he wrote to the Galatians he said:
From now on let no one trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. –Galatians 6:17
People of God, if your faith is genuine, God will test you to prove it. The church/organizations today is filled with shallow and superficial saints. Why? Their faith has never been tested. It must walk the streets of life in order to be real. Faith must be tested; if it’s not, then it is impossible to know for sure whether or not it is genuine.
In Closing, faith needs to be brought out of the ideal atmosphere and taken down to the streets where we live and move and have our being. God wants our faith to be tested in our lives. That is one of the reasons why He gives us an entrance exam of suffering or tragedy.
We love you with the love of God – stop looking for mans love and except all that God is –
The spiritual walk has a greater price, don’t war in the flesh – someone has too, but it doesn’t have to be you –
- God used satan to persuade Judas’s heart
- God used one of Satan’s messengers to afflicted Paul’s body
- God ask satan have you considered my servant Job? Satan states I can’t touch him unless you remove your covering
- God sent Christ into the wilderness to be temped of the devil!
We must stop giving the enemy and those that he uses when all glory belongs to God!
