Trials and Gifts

This Sunday at church, the speaker chose to talk about trials based out of the book of James. I feel like this is a subject that should be tread upon lightly. I ,generally speaking, get frustrated and bitter when people talk about trials because I feel like they miss the heart of God. When people talk about trials, I usually begin to feel a bit of resentment creep into my heart because I feel as though it's assumed that when we don't have something that we've been asking for, or when something has been taken away from us, it's automatically a punishment from God.

Jesus chastised the disciples for doing this very thing in John 9. When a blind man passed by Jesus, the disciples as Jesus, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" The disciples assumed that God was admonishing this man or his parents so the man was blind. Jesus tells his followers that neither the man nor his parents did anything wrong, but that God was going to reveal his works through this man. The he made the man whole. That is the heart of God!

If we think of the analogy of a parent, a parent doesn't take the toy of a happily playing child. She delights in watching her child's joy and only intervenes if the child is at risk of hurting themselves or other around them.

God uses our life circumstances to teach us, of course, but he is not the author of evil, and the Bible says that every good and perfect gift comes from the Father.