Better Than Everনমুনা

REFINED

Okay, I’m going to go out on a limb and assume almost none of you have any hands-on experience refining metals. Maybe I’m wrong, but it’s a pretty ancient art done by a small group of specialized professionals…so, I think the odds are in my favor. But, just because you and I aren’t metallurgists (your vocab word for the day), that doesn’t mean we can’t learn a very important principle of how God works in our lives from the world of refining metals. 

Basically, when someone digs a gold nugget out of the ground, it’s not ready to be turned into jewelry yet. Sure, it’s gold, but it isn’t pure gold. It's basically a nugget of gold mixed with a bunch of other minerals and stuff. So, someone with the skills and equipment necessary has to heat up that gold nugget until it melts. Once it’s melted, all that other non-gold stuff rises to the surface. This skilled person then pulls out all the impurities and non-gold. Then, they can take that now pure melted gold, let it cool down and harden again, and now they’re dealing with something that is so much more valuable and useful. 

What on earth does that have to do with how God works in our lives? Well, in several places in the Bible, God uses this analogy: we are the gold; he is the refiner. We are valuable and beautiful in his eyes, but he knows we can be so much more. So, God uses the right amount of heat (trials in our lives) so that he can pull the impurities out of our lives. Our faith becomes stronger, more valuable, and more useful. So, while we’re in the middle of this process, it’s natural to beg God to make it stop…just turn off the heat! But, God knows exactly what he’s doing, and we will be so much better at the end of it if we’ll just lean in and let him do his work through the trials. 

Today, if your prayers have been mostly “God, please turn down the heat”…how can you change that mindset? Ask God to refine you. Ask him to make the most of this situation in your life. Ask God to help you become better than ever as a result of this trial.