In all kinds of trial, count it all joy

One thing that many people do not seem to understand is that the deeper the trail the greater the potential to enter into the reality of the peace and joy promised to the Christian. It is in the deepest trials that the promises of the Bible are the most relevant and the most empowering. We are told for example “You will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee (Isaiah 26:3).” We are also promised joy. Here in this command from James we are commanded to rejoice (count it all joy) but joy is also part of the fruit of the Spirit. We are not just talking about a superficial happiness here. In the context of various trials (the very same phrase used in James) Peter speaks of a joy that is too great to be expressed in words. The various translations have it as joy unspeakable, glorious joy or joy so great it is inexpressible (1 Peter 1:6-8). But how are we to experience this, and why is it that the potential for these positive things increases with the difficulty of the trial?

Here is one of the many upside down principles of the Kingdom. When the trial is small we can simply suck it up, we can tell ourselves to get a life. The secular self help literature does this in spades. We are told not to sweat the small stuff, and that it is all small stuff. But it is not small stuff if you lose a child, or if you are abused, and to pretend that this is small stuff is to live outside of reality. Secular self help also tells us that life is a gentle teacher, but it many times it feels more like the school of hard knocks. In particular as the pain and/or difficulties of our circumstances grow, it becomes increasingly difficult if not impossible to rejoice. At this stage the advice given here can be completely incomprehensible. They will think you are mad if you suggest it.

But the person of faith knows that the increasing pain and difficulties bring us to a crossroads, to a choice. Will we choose to trust? Will we choose, in the words of Paul, to believe that somehow (we may not know how) God is actively at work for our good in the trial (Romans 8:28). Will we accept, in the words of Peter, that the testing of our faith is precious, and that it will produce praise honour and glory at the revelation of Christ?

In the midst of my own fiery trial, the Lord put a devotional book into my hand. The title is revealing. It is called “I can't, God can. I think I'll let him.” This is akin to the first couple of steps of any twelve step program. We start by admitting we are powerlessness to rejoice in our suffering, to admit that without His help we cannot do it. The point is that when we fully surrender and cooperate with Him, He makes up for what we cannot do. He even changes our desires (Philippians 2:12,13). It's about coming to the end of ourselves and then choosing to believe.

This is where the depth of the trial is helpful. When the trial gets deep enough, and goes on for long enough we come to the place where we start to understand that with us it is impossible. We start to see the inadequacy of the power of positive thinking alone to bring us out of the desolate pits into which we have fallen. We become desperate, desperate enough to fully surrender, to put our faith money where our mouth is. When we do we find that "underneath are the everlasting arms" (Deuteronomy 33:27). This builds our faith so that surrender in the next trial is not quite so difficult. So then it is the depth of our trials that increasingly bring us out of our denial and more and more fully into the embrace of God.

Nobody is saying this is easy, nor that it is instantaneous. We may not be there yet, the trials may not yet have gone deep enough or lasted long enough for us to fully surrender. We may still think we can do it without Him. We need help even here, and we need help as we choose to count it all joy in the midst of it all. Without Him it is impossible, but with Him all things are possible. It is a process, and the book of James tells us many of the Scriptural ingredients that we need to take note of, if we are going to keep moving forward to appropriate the promised fruit of our faith and obedience.