Is Your Vision Skewed?

I am convinced - according to 1 Peter 4:12-13 - that we look at the burdens of our life in entirely the wrong way. "Beloved do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you; but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ's sufferings that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy."

Look what Peter tells us -

• Don't think it strange ( or ask 'why me')
• Fiery trials WILL come ( heartache and pain are certain - what we do with them is another matter)
• You can rejoice - to the extent that you partake (share) Christ's suffering.

Christ's suffering? Now that was a fiery trial - mocked, beaten, betrayed, publicly shamed and humiliated, abandoned by friends and family - Do you feel far from God? How about knowing you would be eternally separated from Him.I don't think we can imagine the torments of hell Christ suffered for us.

So where does that put the trials in our life? Our heartaches are real - I don't mean to imply that we don't - or shouldn't - feel pain. Christ readily admitted His, crying out to His Father in the Garden of Gethsemane. We have that access, too (through Christ's own sacrifice for us, I might add).

But this pain, this earthly suffering, this daily trial we call life - I think we fail to see the purpose in it and that is what throws us off, skews our vision, if you will.

If we are to live like Christ, I first have to ask (myself!) - Where was His nice home, closet full of clothes, new car, steady income, three week vacation - all the 'comforts' which we North American Christians seek so desperately.

While we may agree that the daily pettiness sometimes becomes an imaginary mountain (the right perspective makes it disappear), what about the really tough things - divorce, abuse, death, betrayals, the evil we see in the world - It all brings pain and destruction at the hand of our enemy.

And perhaps that's our first mistake; we fail to realize we are in a war, not with flesh and blood, but with principalities and powers of darkness - with Satan himself.

Our distortion of our spiritual condition causes us to see people, and circumstances, even God himself, as our enemy, as the obstacle to that which we desire most - self love, power, control.

And that brings us back to the beginning - if we are to share Christ's suffering - the first thing we have to do is to die to selfish wants and desires, to shatter the blinders Satan has put on our eyes and see everything as God sees.

Just a little thing! That takes every moment, every breath, every drop of will power we have to put ourselves in our place - Seeing who we are without Christ and who we are in Christ is the key.

The real trials, or challenges, in my life are not the circumstances by which I am surrounded - it is my attitude toward them!

All for Him,

Missy