We hear those two words a lot in this season of Lent. You can look them up in Webster’s or Wikipedia and get countless uses and meanings for them. Add to them such vernacular phrases like “on a trial basis,” “testing the waters,” “trial by fire,” and… I am left marveling at how those for whom English is NOT their native language ever figure it (us) out! The Lenten usages can wear us down. They can be depressing, even defeating. We might not even choose to adopt such disciplines, like swearing off…swearing, or sweets, or other sinful endeavors. It’s too hard; we never seem to measure up.

God can sometimes feel distant, as in we don’t feel Him at all. Trials and tests hit us, and even when we pray, the answers are not readily evident. In the one perfect prayer we all know by heart, we ask to not be led into temptation or, in the contemporary version, to be saved from the time of trial. Two schools of thought: 1) God allows, even orchestrates the testing; 2) things happen, but God promises to see us through. I have gotten into the custom of saying “if you are brought TO it, God will see you THROUGH it.” I go with the mindset that God is in the details of His creation, while stepping aside and allowing what happens in our lives to be of our free will. I also have the mindset that God does not give us strikes or gutter balls in bowling, or let our team win or come in first place.

God is confident in us. God does not promise us freedom from testing and trials, or an easier life just because we’re Christian. We can and will endure the valley of Lent, because we have assurance of Easter. Trials and testing are temporary; the unconditional love of God is eternal.

Pastor Art