In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” –– 1 Peter 1:6-7 (ESV)
I’m eagerly waiting for this hard season to change. Summer’s relentless heat and drought is oppressive, making the months long. Nothing cheers my heart more than that first nip of fall air and the sight of colors beginning to turn. It’s no secret: fall is my favorite season. Yet even as summer fades, I admit I’m already dreading the return of heat. My joy for the new season dims, overshadowed by a sense of loss for what I had looked forward to. It’s frustrating.
Why can’t every season be a comfortable, fall-like kind of season?
I can’t escape the fact that life often changes in ways I wouldn’t choose or prefer.
I wonder how much of my life I have spent locked in the shadows of harsh seasons. How many beautiful moments have been shelved, and how much joy have I missed, simply because I have been hyper-focused on trying to survive the bad ones? In trials that grieve me, I just want the greener pastures. I want to hurry up and get to the other side of the pain. I want to learn and grow, but please don’t make the process long and painful!
If we’re honest, many of us would wish pain out of existence.
How can anything possibly grow in life’s fiery trials, especially something as fragile as faith? Pain often feels purposeless.
Yet God often uses freshly-turned soil to help us grow. Just as hardened soil transforms into something rich and nurturing, seasons of pain can cultivate vibrant faith within us.
Reflecting on this idea, I recall my time in the Colorado Mountains. Each summer, my family escapes the heat by traveling there. Several years ago, an infestation of pests began to wipe out many of the pine trees that decorated the beautiful mountainside. That fresh pine and green that adorned the slopes for miles became dead, brown sticks. During that sad season, park rangers painstakingly conducted controlled burns to kill disease and safely remove the dead trees. Had the dead trees been allowed to stand, an uncontrolled, disastrous fire would have been just a spark away. Knowing those fires were necessary didn’t make seeing the blackened slopes and smelling the smoke-tinged air less difficult. This wasn’t the kind of typical experience you would expect to have in the beautiful Colorado mountains. They didn’t look beautiful in the aftermath of the fire.
Though many slopes appeared as blackened wastelands, underneath, new life was already growing. These controlled burns allowed the forest to stay healthy and would help it thrive again.
Often, my life smells and looks a lot like these slopes.
Sometimes, I look in the mirror and barely recognize the person staring back at me. This person feels threadbare, certainly not thriving. I blink, struggling to see potential growth beneath all that is burned. Refining seasons do change me. In pain, it’s easy to forget God has control over them. But these hard seasons don’t have the best of me; through them God has the best for me.
What is best for me?
In God’s eyes, what’s best is a faith more precious than gold. A faith that is not just intact, but thriving in spite of the fire. God knows that what’s best for me is a life that rises from the ashes, emboldened to praise Him. A life that shines glory back up to Him. A life not afraid to bow low and give due honor to the God Most High.
What is best for me is a refined life, made ready to see Jesus more fully.
Not all change is bad. Change God orchestrates is beautiful and good.
Seasons do change, but there is a process we must walk through as God uses them to change us. God knows exactly which dead trees and thorny shrubs need to go. He knows if they are left unattended to, they are just a spark away from wreaking havoc in our lives. It is a tender, gracious mercy that in some seasons, God chooses to burn the dead away.
All this is God’s work, and though it is painful work, it is good work.
Hard seasons are worth celebrating, because God loves us too much to leave us unchanged.
Pictures courtesy of Pexels.com
