Can Life Trials benefit Your Life?

As I started this year, one of the first books in the bible I wanted to dive back into was the book of James. It’s a quick read but also filled with what I believe are some of the most important lessons for those entering this year with high hopes, dreams, and a vision for making it better than the last.

Spiritual maturity is a central theme of this book and is imperative to the life of any believer looking to grow and do all that God’s called you to do this year.

The scriptures I want to focus on today come from James 1:2-4, around our faith and enduring various life trials. I’m someone who hopes for great things from the Lord each day and year, but I would be foolish to think I’m going make it through this new year without some trials along the way.

James 1:2-4 says,

2 Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. 3 For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. 4 So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.

As James writes, I want you to consider, as you pause and reflect on these scriptures today, the question, “Can trials in my life also benefit me?”

I know it might sound for a moment that you cannot begin to believe that the trials you go through can benefit your life. I mean, you might be going through a trial right now that, in no way, shape, or form, can you see a benefit in. And if that’s you right now, I get it, I’ve been there too, even in this last year, but why would James write that when (not if) we go through various trials to consider it an opportunity for great joy?

If you continue to read on to verse 3 we find out that trails give us the ability to grow in our Christian character to produce things like endurance, patience, persaverance, and steadfastness. These Christlike qualities are developed through trials, as we begin to expand the way we look at them beyond just the negative or painful things they bring.

Trials test our faith to see if we’re going to depend on the Lord or depend on our own strength.

Your trials have great benefit, producing within you the Christian character that God wants to see fully developed. Verse 4 is not about being a perfect Christian without sin, but a spiritually mature one. We all start our lives as spiritual babies requiring spiritual milk. But we can’t stay there and must grow in our knowledge and understanding of the word of God so that we can become spiritually mature.

A spiritually mature Christian grows from the trials of life so they don’t just break them but also build them. I know you might be hearing this now, thinking many of your life trials have only broken you, but I want to encourage you to really look for the things that God produced within you during those tough times. For one, you’re here now, having come to the other side, and if you are still going through it, choose to see what the Lord can build within you as you move through this.

Like Pator Phillip Anthony Mitchell, one said, “I believe pain should pay you, and you would be a fool to go through pain without it paying you, and what it should pay you, it should pay you in is wisdom, knowledge, character growth. Don’t let it be a coffin that buries you.”

Again, those words may be harsh to hear, having been through some serious life challenges that were painful, but ultimately, you get to decide what this means for you going forward.

Will you choose not to sell the peace and joy that comes from your Heavenly Father, who walks right next to you through these seasons?

Read the rest at: https://open.substack.com/pub/litwithprayer/p/let-your-trials-build-you?r=5sajy&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true