(The prophesy for my son)
I heard someone say, "The horror of real life cannot be surpassed by fiction. Monsters really do exist, and evil really does prey on innocence." I wanted to protest from my allegedly superior thinking, that faith surely protects one from such despair, that what you believe is what you will see realized, within the context of the truth. My blanket objection missed an important truth entirely, a gift from God, no less. The essential function of "testing" is crucial to the evaluation of our foundational assumptions. We must see ourselves clearly to judge ourselves accurately, and we must judge ourselves if we do not want God doing it for us. It is our time of opportunity, a hard scrabble in the dirt and the enduring of contempt and rejection, most often very painfully administered by a faithless and jaded society.
Here begins the gift. Bereft of strength to compel others, or even ourselves, we can begin the journey to understand.
Every last bit of our depths of despair, our harsh reality, is essential to our calling. In HIS hands, it is transformed into knowledge and understanding, the bedrock of His character upon which we stand. Grief must needs precede, must be allowed to create, the capacity for and the essence of joy! He's like that! His response to our humility is surpassing grace. His readily available compassion and mercy inspire us to great effort on His behalf. Such is His love, that He rewards our work for Him, with His peace, and our suffering FOR Him, with His joy and meaning. A gratifying gift indeed, to be used by Him, so that at His coming, we will be as greatly satisfied as He will be!
Our hope overcomes, is made our reality. He fashioned it from the very pain of our displacement, out of the flight of our freedom away from the contaminating inner circles of this world! If you are found to be unacceptable, are forced to conform or leave, then you have been prepared for the blessing of being His own possession. If you come to Him when He calls, He will never turn you out! He is worthy of all the turmoil and struggle to be of Him and His!
