2 Corinthians 4:16-18, “Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”
Not only does Paul beautifully encapsulate the reality of
life in general, he likewise differentiates between the life of the believer,
those who have surrendered their lives, and been born again in Christ, and the
life of the godless, who wither daily just as we do, but without the benefit of
the inward man being renewed day by day.
We are not the same. Yes, once we were like those of the
world, counting down the days hopelessly and without the blessed assurance of
eternity, but no longer. It’s not a reason for gloating, pomposity, or pride,
but rather a reason for heartfelt gratitude, thankfulness, and indebtedness. But
for the grace of God, we would be likewise desperate, hopeless, and adrift. But
by the grace of God, we would be living purposeless lives with no hope beyond
the handful of days we are given on the earth.
Because our perspective has shifted from the temporary to the
eternal, from the things that are seen to the things that are not seen, our
reactions to the trials, hardships, setbacks, and valleys of life are different
than those of the world.
Job’s outward man was perishing. There was no denying it, no
matter how one might hope otherwise. He went from a man in possession of his
faculties, of reasonable health, with no apparent issues, to one who was on the
threshold of death, covered in painful boils, caked with worms and festering
wounds. Although men could only see the outward appearance and pity him, God
saw what was taking place in the inward man, and the two side-by-side snapshots
of Job couldn’t be more different.
True enough, the outward man was perishing, but the inward
man was being renewed day by day. It’s easy to focus on the physical,
especially when we’re going through pain or suffering some malady, but the
question we must ask ourselves is how is this present trial benefiting my
spiritual man? How am I growing through this, learning to trust God despite it,
expanding my faith in it, and what will my spiritual man look like once this
momentary affliction passes?
Trust that God is doing something you can’t see, but doing it
nonetheless, and the final iteration will be a stronger you, forged in the
fires of trial and testing, purified and refined into the image of His Son
Jesus. By its very nature, the refining process cannot be painless. Although it
doesn’t necessarily have to be physical pain, whenever God begins to prune and
cut away the things not conducive to spiritual growth, there will be pain. Your
flesh will cry aloud, pitch a fit, protest, because it is being mortified, and
it doesn’t like it one bit.
The flesh never has a problem with you paying God lip
service. What the flesh has a problem with is a steadfast determination of
pursuing righteousness and growing in Christ. It knows that the more of Jesus
there is in you, the less sway it will have over you. When Jesus sits on the
throne of your heart, the flesh is weakened, muted, and unable to assert its
influence over your decisions. The more you grow your spiritual man, the easier
it becomes to resist the devil, deny the urges and impulses, and overcome the
temptations the enemy lays at your feet. It’s work, no, not works, but work.
It’s also effort, it’s being watchful and sober-minded in all things, it’s
striving to enter through the narrow gate so that the fullness of the
indwelling of Christ in you may be so complete that you’ll always be one step
ahead of the enemy, and intuit the snares that he sets before you.
The mouse might not know that the piece of cheese is baiting
a trap that will take its life, but we’re not mice; we are human beings with
the ability to reason and use logic, and you know that there’s no such thing as
free cheese, and whenever you see it offered up, you grow weary and cautious
understanding that it may look good, smell good, and taste good, yet is
nevertheless the means of your destruction.
Although he may have been up until Satan asked to sift him,
Job was not living his best life. If this present life is all there was, and
here was no eternity, if the only thing that mattered was how much we can
accumulate and how comfortable we could make the flesh, then we would rightly
conclude that Job got the short end of the stick even with all his uprightness
and blamelessness.
Had he grown despondent? Most assuredly, but even in such a
deplorable state, he held to his integrity because while his intellect could
not make sense of why these things were happening to him, his spiritual man
perceived that there was more to the story than he was given to understand.
The notion of blind faith is a misnomer at best. Faith grows and stretches and matures because it perceives that although it may not fully understand a given situation, it understands the nature and character of the One who is above all, the One who spoke the universe into being, and the One who has intimate knowledge of one’s joy, pain, hardships, and trials. We have faith in God and His sovereignty because we know Him, we know that He loves us, and we understand that there is a purpose for all things even though we may not be able to currently define the purpose itself.
With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea, Jr.
Posted on 4 March 2025 | 12:21 pm
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