A personal record

In so many ways, through so many people and so many different avenues God has encouraged me...encouraged me when I was feeling weak and tired....encouraged me when I felt I could not take another step...so many things I hope to write down. Surely there are some things I have already forgotten. God is too good! And His lovingkindess to His children is beyond complete comprehension and measure!!! Hopefully God will help me to remember the times of encouragement in the past, but for now I press on - to embrace His Word and every milestone along the way which builds me up, strengthens my faith, stirs up hope...to document and record all of the tangible ways by which God shows His mercy, love, and grace to me...all the while being assured deep down that my AWESOME GOD is also showing me these things, and working in ways I cannot begin to see or even imagine!



Morning, November 12 - SPURGEON (Again)

“The trial of your faith.”
— 1 Peter 1:7

Faith untried may be true faith, but it is sure to be little faith, and it is likely to remain dwarfish so long as it is without trials. Faith never prospers so well as when all things are against her: tempests are her trainers, and lightnings are her illuminators. When a calm reigns on the sea, spread the sails as you will, the ship moves not to its harbour; for on a slumbering ocean the keel sleeps too. Let the winds rush howling forth, and let the waters lift up themselves, then, though the vessel may rock, and her deck may be washed with waves, and her mast may creak under the pressure of the full and swelling sail, it is then that she makes headway towards her desired haven. No flowers wear so lovely a blue as those which grow at the foot of the frozen glacier; no stars gleam so brightly as those which glisten in the polar sky; no water tastes so sweet as that which springs amid the desert sand; and no faith is so precious as that which lives and triumphs in adversity. Tried faith brings experience. You could not have believed your own weakness had you not been compelled to pass through the rivers; and you would never have known God’s strength had you not been supported amid the water-floods. Faith increases in solidity, assurance, and intensity, the more it is exercised with tribulation. Faith is precious, and its trial is precious too.

Let not this, however, discourage those who are young in faith. You will have trials enough without seeking them: the full portion will be measured out to you in due season. Meanwhile, if you cannot yet claim the result of long experience, thank God for what grace you have; praise him for that degree of holy confidence whereunto you have attained: walk according to that rule, and you shall yet have more and more of the blessing of God, till your faith shall remove mountains and conquer impossibilities.