Graduate Level Testing

I remember in grade school we took a spelling test every Friday. Some of those tests were easy. We had to spell words like sun, red, lid, fun, hop. Things got a little more difficult when the words contained multiple syllables and silent letters.

In high school we no longer took spelling tests. We started taking vocabulary tests. There were multiple choice tests, true false tests, and my all time favorite the essay questions tests.

One test stands out in my academic career. I took a two semester philosophy course. We discussed some heavy material. I often left class with my head swimming. Much of it I could barely understand. Some of it I grasped. At the end of the second semester I sat down to the simplest and most challenging final exam I ever took. The exam contained only one essay question. "Write down everything you learned in this class this year." That is the only time I took all the allotted time for my final exam.

Those tests pale in comparison to the tests Brenda and I have been given in the past several years. Rheumatoid arthritis. Diabetes. Failing eyes. Three eye surgeries. Three knee surgeries. A car wreck. Declining church attendance. A failed ministry. And others I care not to mention.

Graduate level testing. It is easy to write about faith when you are on top of the world and everything is going your way. It is easy to peach about faith when you have great testimonies to share as Brenda and I do.

It is much harder when everything you believe is put to the test. When your every prayer goes without seeing any changes. It is hard to preach when your faith and hope are shattered by another set of challenges that plunged you deeper beneath the surf when you were barely treading to keep your head above water.

Brenda and I are in graduate level testing. It has lasted a long time and only intensified no matter how, how much, or how long we have prayed. The few we confide in respond in one of two ways. Most do not have words for us. They often respond, "I don't know what to say." We are not looking for human wisdom. We desire the wisdom that comes from God. Others try offering cliches. That is something we do not want to do to others.

This testing is more than difficult. It more than challenging. Yet, it is by Divine design. Through it all we still trust Jehovah. . We still cling to Him. We still hope in His word. Brenda sent me three different scriptures where God spoke to her today. God's truth nourishes and reinvigorates

I keep preaching faith to help others. I keep writing faith to help others. We are in the battle like so many of you. We do not live in an ivory tower. We knows the agony of defeat and we know the joy of triumphs.

I know we are not alone. There are others going through own graduate level testings. Their faith is weakened. Everything in their world seems to go wrong and they wonder where God is and why He is silent nor does He intervene. When such people can barely catch a breath in between the crashing waves of never ending challenges. I still point to God and His enduring faithfulness.

If God can use Brenda and I to give people a little hope, to help them to keep believing, and to help them not lose heart and give up then I welcome these graduate level testings. Brenda and I do not just want to boast about our faith surrounded by success and financial security with no trials. We want to cling to God in the most difficult challenges before us. We want to boast in God in every season of life.

Here is a verse we surely set our feet. May you set your feet in the same place as well.

Isaiah 41:10 (ESV)
¹⁰  fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.