​How to View Trials in Our Lives According to Scripture

   In this week’s biblical worldview post, we are tackling the topic of trials. Bad things happen to everyone. No one’s life is perfect. Since the fall of man, tragedies are, unfortunately, part of our everyday lives. But what is the purpose of trials and how
should we react to them?

Like everything else in life, God is in control. (“The heart of man plans his way,
but the Lord establishes his steps” Proverbs 16:9, ESV). The sooner we recognize that,
the better off we will be. We have to recognize, though, that God is in control of the
good and bad things that happen in our lives, but there is a lot of peace knowing that
nothing happens outside of God’s sovereign control. We don’t always know God’s
specific purpose for allowing certain situations to take place in our lives; we may never
know, but we can rest assured that God has a good plan (Roms. 8:28) and a purpose
for it all. God tells us in Isaiah 55:8-9, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither
are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the
earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” We
do not always have the capacity to understand what God is working out in our lives, but
we can trust that He knows what He is doing.
In 2 Corinthians 11:24-28, the apostle Paul talks about the trials that he endured
for being a disciple of Christ: “Five times I received...forty lashes less one. Three times I
was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a
day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from my own people, danger
from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from
false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst,
often without food, in cold and exposure. And, apart from other things, there is the daily
pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.”

In chapter 12, Paul talks about his “thorn in the flesh” that some scholars believe
to have been a problem with his eyesight. Nevertheless, Paul tells us what God told him
when he pleaded with God to remove the issue: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my
power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cors. 12:9). There is a lesson for us in God’s
response to Paul. God’s power is perfect in our weakness. When we are weak and feel
like we can’t go on because of the physical and mental anguish of our lives, God’s
power is perfect. He is still there. He is still with us. He still supplies. Our trials
strengthen our faith because they cause us to turn to Him. The apostle Paul said: “For
the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions,
and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cors. 12:10). He was strong
when he was weak because in his weakness, he learned to rely fully on God, and God
was supplying His strength.
​
I would urge you, dear brother or sister, if you are going through a difficult
season, as I am, rely on God to be your strength. I have never grown so close to God
as when I am going through trials and difficulties. He has never failed to be my strength.

                                     Our Purpose

       In last week’s blog post, I wrote about the biblical worldview metanarrative of creation, fall, and redemption and how we are created with a purpose on purpose by a
loving heavenly Father. I told you that our purpose, at least in part, is to have dominion over the earth. But our purpose is even greater than just having dominion over God’s creation, and that is the topic of this week’s post: Our Purpose from a Biblical Viewpoint.
Throughout the entire story of the Bible: creation, fall, and redemption, we can
see a thick thread of a theme that runs clearly through the storyline of Scripture. We see
it in the Old Testament, “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear (to fear,
reverence, honor, respect) God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty
of man” (Eccles. 12:13, ESV); “Let them give glory to the Lord, and declare his praise in
the coastlands” (Isa. 42:12). We also see the same theme throughout the New
Testament, “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God”
(1 Cor. 10:31); “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see
your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:16). (There
are so many other verses that are worth noting, but I am limited by time and space.)
However, do you see the thread? Our main purpose is to glorify God! The God Who
created us, loves us, and redeems us deserves glory, so we need to bring Him the glory
that He deserves. But how does someone glorify the God of the universe?
​
      To glorify God, you must be saved. You cannot glorify God if you are not serving
Him, and you cannot serve Him unless you belong to Him. “And without faith it is
impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he
exists and that he rewards those who seek him” (Heb. 11:6). To be saved you must
“…confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised
him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom. 10:9). There is a component of repentance
or the turning from one’s sins that exists in confessing and believing because there is a
change of heart that happens when we believe in what Christ has done for us. So,
salvation is the first step in glorifying God, but what else can we do to bring glory to
God?

     Glorifying God isn’t a one-time situation; it is a lifestyle. We should aim to glorify
God in everything we do. Looking back to the verse I noted earlier, 1 Corinthians 10:31,
we are supposed to do everything to the glory of God, even eating and drinking! This
means the way we get out of bed, speak to our spouses, the way we treat others, the
way we do our job, the way we take care of the blessings God gives us, even the
thoughts that we think. When we want to bring glory to God, bringing Him glory involves
EVERYTHING we do. It also involves all of who we are.

       In Romans 12:1-2 we are taught several things about glorifying God with all that
we are: “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your
bodies as a living sacrifice, holy acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do
not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by
testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and
perfect.” What does it mean “to present your bodies as a living sacrifice”? In the Old
Testament, when a sacrifice was offered, the priest would lay his hands on the head of
the animal to consecrate the sacrifice (to set it apart for use by God). We, however, are
supposed to be living sacrifices. This means our entire lives should be set apart to be
used by God. Our lives are no longer our own; they belong to God. In the matter of
“being transformed by the renewal of your mind,” we are supposed to have “the mind of
Christ” (1Cor. 2:16). The mind of Christ comes about by allowing the Holy Spirit to wash
our minds with God’s Word so that we think like Christ. In order to have the washing of
the Word (Eph. 5:26), we must be in God’s Word daily, reading and studying.

      I hope that you can see that our purpose here on earth, and one day in heaven,
is to bring God the glory that He deserves. We must do that with all that we are and all
that we do. You and I will fall short in our purpose sometimes, but the good news is that
there is forgiveness in Christ Jesus (Eph. 4:32), and God’s mercies are new every
morning (Lam. 3:22-23). Strive to allow the Holy Spirit to guide your life because He
never fails to glorify God.

​Every worldview has a metanarrative which just means every worldview whether secular or biblical has “an overarching story or storyline that gives context, meaning, and purpose to all of life” (gotquestions.org). The secular metanarrative begins with millions of years (evolution) and ends with nothingness because secularists believe that when we die, we simply cease to exist. That’s pretty hopeless! The biblical metanarrative begins and ends with purpose, intention, and the love of a Father. The biblical metanarrative can be described in three words: creation, fall, redemption.

Creation

In Genesis chapter 1 God intentionally creates the world and everything in it in
six literal 24-hour days. Nothing He creates is by accident or without purpose and
design. He provides everything needed for humans to flourish before putting humans on
the earth: light, water, land, vegetation, day and night, etc. Then He creates man and
woman. On day six God said, “Let us make man in our image after our likeness. And let
them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over
the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the
earth” (Gen. 1:26, ESV). God not only gives man a purpose: to have dominion over the
earth, but He also creates man in God’s own image. God doesn’t do that for any other
created beings, not even the angels!

Fall

God created boundaries for the first man and woman by giving them one
prohibition in the garden in which He placed them to live: “And the Lord God
commanded the man, saying, ‘You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the
tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat…” (Gen. 2:16-17a).
Unfortunately for them and us, they did not obey. The serpent, Satan, questioned God’s
Word, which he still does today; and Eve ate the fruit. Eve gave some to Adam, and he
ate too (Gen. 3:1-6). Because of their disobedience, sin entered the world, and with sin
came separation from God.

But this situation is not without Hope! In Genesis 3:15, we see the first mention
of a redemption plan that will bring us back into right relationship with God. “The Lord
God said to the serpent… ‘And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and
between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his
heel’” (NLT). Did you catch that? God has a plan where Satan will receive a death blow
(a strike on the head), and one of Eve’s offspring will receive a bruise on His foot. Who
is it that will receive an injury that will not ultimately result in death? That’s Jesus! Jesus’s death, which resulted in a resurrection, is what redeems us from sin. Even when sin
entered the world, God offered Hope!

Redemption

The separation from God that happened when sin entered the world has affected
everything in our lives. Relationships fall apart, we lie to keep ourselves out of trouble,
words are said in anger, hate and rage become commonplace, and the list goes on and
on. When the sin in our lives continues to compound itself daily, how can we ever face a
holy God? The answer is… we can’t. We are never good enough, never clean enough
to come to a holy God. How then can we be redeemed? We need Someone Who can
make us clean, Someone Who can pay for our sins so that we can be made right with
God. That Someone is Jesus.
The truth of God’s Word tells us that “…all have sinned and fall short of the glory
of God…” (Rom. 3:23, ESV), and the punishment for sin is death, “For the wages of sin
is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:23). We
are unable to save ourselves; there are not enough good works that we can do to make
ourselves righteous. Therefore, the sinless Son of God made Himself a sacrifice on our
behalf; He would die in our place: “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no
sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21). To be
saved, there is only one thing we must do and that is “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and
you will be saved…” (Acts 16:31). All we must do to be saved, redeemed by God, is by
faith, fully trust in Jesus alone as our Savior. One day God’s plan of redemption will be
complete and all of creation will be fully restored.
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Conclusion

The biblical metanarrative of creation, fall, and redemption gives “context,
meaning, and purpose” to our lives. It explains why the world and people are the way
they are. It explains why we need a Savior, and it offers Hope to us by showing us that
God has a plan and purpose for us. I pray that you will get into the Word of God this
week and read it for yourself. I particularly pray that you will think about salvation and
your need for a Savior and put your faith and trust right now in the only One Who has
ever given His life to save yours.