Day 36: What do you see?

Read: James 1:2-4

“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

Understand:

1. What helps produce steadfastness in us?
2. What happens once steadfastness has its full effect?

Listen: I am an inspirational quote kind of person. They can be singled out already or I find them as I’m reading something and, for some reason, they seem to shout out at me to recognize that they are important. Often, I’m curious how others interpret something that I find inspirational. Did it have a similar affect to them or did it mean something totally different? Maybe, someone else wouldn’t find it inspirational at all. Anyway, I saw this inspirational quote today and could see such meaning in it and I thought I’d share it with you.

“You cannot go on ‘explaining away’ forever: you will find that you have explained explanation itself away. You cannot go on ‘seeing through’ things for ever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it.”
— C. S. Lewis

It is the last sentence that grabs my attention: “The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it.” When I consider seeing through something, I think of how we endure so many things in life that we’d rather not endure. Maybe it’s the death of a loved one or an illness. Maybe it’s just one stormy season in life that seems to go on for too long. Being able to see our way through a hard time can be tough. But, look at the last part of the sentence again. When we go through rough patches, we should be able to “see something through it.” What I mean is that we can experience positive growth from any event in our life. It might not seem like we could get something good out of bad as we are going through it, but C.S. Lewis is right. I believe the whole point is to take something away from our experiences that we can use to be better or make the world a better place. How many of us actually look at it this way though? Do we have a tendency to allow negativity to consume us to where we not only really struggle as we go through a tough time but, then, when it’s over, we dwell on the awful emotions it roused within us while it was happening and continue to let it wreak havoc within our mind?

As our scripture verse today tells us, we are going to experience trials in life but we have the choice of allowing them to refine us or destroy us. The verse actually says that the testing of our faith produces steadfastness so that, when it’s over, we will “be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.” This means that something good can come from everything we go through. Just remember what C.S. Lewis said, the whole point is “to see something through it.” Choose for that something to be something good.

Pray: Dear Heavenly Father, You have given us the ability to control our thoughts and to direct our minds toward goodness. Help us to overcome events in our lives that can lead to fear, anger, sadness, and negativity. Help us to see the goodness and learn something positive. In Jesus name we pray, amen.