When duty calls, you learn who you truly are. Not all duties are created equal, of course. Sometimes the Lord calls you to action in a way that feels like a threshing. Self-awareness lands like a power punch to the gut because your natural selfish drives are suddenly exposed. Your deepest dreams rise from the depths of your soul and see the light of day for perhaps the first time. Everything about your wretched heart is exposed as your tongue expresses what’s lain dormant until now. Your true character is realized. It is a threshing!
Sounds daunting, I know, but I’ve decided that all of this is a very good thing. It is an oil change for my heart, mind, and body. It’s a cleaning out of cobwebs and a knocking off of rough edges. It’s the Refiner’s fire. The Lord wastes nothing when growing His people. This season has brought a repositioning of my priorities. It has been an education for my future and a witness to anyone watching. And there is no end in sight.
This is where faith steps in, inspiring me to cling to truth. I trust my Father knows how long to turn up the heat. He knows the exact amount of pressure this lump of coal needs. And He allows the enemy the right amount of room in order for His own glory to triumph. I do not have to worry about any of this, for I have no say in it. I am not in charge. My job is to obey and honor my King, even when I am neck-deep in the mud. Yes, it is hard, but He never promised me easy. He did, however, promise not to leave me. He will never forsake me. These truths about His true character are my comfort and my stay. He reminds me that this refining season is evidence that I am His beloved. Just wow.
Are you in the fire?
Rejoice that He loves you that much.
Rest, knowing He is fully in charge.
Resolve to obey and honor Him no matter what.
When duty calls, you learn who you truly are. I know now more than ever that I am His.
It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. For the moment, all discipline seems not to be pleasant, but painful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterward it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness. (Hebrews 12:7–11)
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