It has actually taken my illness, open heart surgery, trials and tribulations with family, to learn to trust Him. He has shown Himself faithful to me. I know all about fiery furnaces and crucibles and long dark nights of the soul. It’s not fun, but it’s for our own good in the long run.
I’ve been fortunate not to have suffered much physical pain but the pain of watching people you love die and suffer during that process or watching grandchildren have to suffer the consequences of their parents’ actions, etc., etc. is so much worse.
We humans tend to be so short-sighted.
Especially Americans.
Gratification, comfort, our way . . . yesterday . . . at bargain prices or free . . . me, me, me!
God is FIRST, FOREMOST, ALWAYS . . .
AND HE IS training rulers FOR ETERNITY.
One goal . . . that we might bear a greater weight of glory as we rule and reign with Christ.
. . . that the pains . . . the worst of this life . . . is
not worthy
to be compared to the glories of the next is still unfathomable . . . foundationally unfathomable to our finiteness.
The first shall be last and the last first . . . .
And Rick Joyner’s vision of the cloak of humility . . . much food for thought and growth, there.
IIRC he noted that if we let that cloak slip . . . we’ll be vulnerable to being picked off by the arrows of the enemy and out of the battle . . . in this dimension.