By Mark W. Christy, PhD
Kenneth Copeland Ministries asks and answers the following question: “Are you settling for less than God’s best in your life? If you are tolerating any type of physical ailment, anything less than financial abundance, or a struggling relationship, the answer is a resounding yes!”[i] This teaching, commonly propounding by those in the prosperity gospel movement (PGM), finds a ready audience in the self-absorbed, comfort-loving, worldly-focused, and materialistic multitudes who are looking for a religious solution that caters to their fleshly cravings but stops short of making any serious demands on their character, much less the Godly motive of love for Him and others (and not self) which should be undergirding their supposed Christian character. In this contemporary era where Christian kindness is understood as acceptance without so much as a harsh word, many would find themselves shocked to discover the less straight-forward condemnation of sinfulness portrayed in the biblical call to repentance. This perceived harshness is due to biblical message of God’s kindness being bound up with His gracious choice to delay His judgement against sin so as to allow sinner to be brought to repentance (Rom 2:3-4). Instead of this message, many so-called Christians in the PGM simply look forward to their best life now and fail to understand clear biblical teachings on God’s use of trials in the maturation of those who would be His people.
To prepare His followers for these coming trials, Jesus said, “He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal” (John 12:25).[ii] Expecting His disciples to join in His trials, Jesus announced, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me” (Luke 9:23). Invoking the awful imagery of the suffering involved in crucifixion, Jesus directs His followers to willfully choose such a difficult course, one which even Peter acknowledges to be unpleasant (1 Pet 1:6). Foreseeing such pain and knowing the sorrow that Peter would experience while being sifted by Satan, Jesus nevertheless authorized Satan’s attack and chose to offer a prayer on Peter’s behalf that his faith would not fail even while knowing that Peter would nonetheless still sinfully deny Christ a total of three times (Luke 22:31-34).
When examining Peter’s story, one may come to the conclusion that Peter’s suffering was directly connected to his sinful denial of Christ as opposed to his trial being a loving act of God whereby He matures His saint. Paul, however, speaks of suffering experienced even while maintaining a Christ-centered and morally pure life. While boldly ministering the gospel together with other faithful believers who were “in everything commending [them]selves as servants of God,” Paul and his contemporaries suffered “in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses, in beatings, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, [and] in hunger” (2 Cor 6:4-5). Despite the suffering and discomfort involved in such trials, James exhorts Christians to “[c]onsider it all joy…when [they] encounter various trials” (James 1:2). Such joy should increasingly become evident in the lives of believers as they experience the fruit of their faithful obedience and continued heartfelt submission to God in the midst of suffering. Over time, they will come to personally understand the eight revealed reasons for such testing, reasons which the Bible has already made clear.
The first reason for God-appointed trials is to test the strength of a believer’s faith. According to Peter, God’s trials prove the authenticity of believers’ faith when their faith survives despite the difficulty brought upon them (1 Peter 1:6-7). According to Daniel, his friends, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, stood resolutely before Nebuchadnezzar and boldly asserted their determination to their sole devotion to God and their refusal to bend their knees to idols even under threat of being thrown into a consuming fire (3:14-18). Their words were indeed strong given these words were directed toward the all-powerful (from a worldly perspective) King of Babylon; nevertheless, only the testing of fire would determine whether or not the words were combined with authentic faith. Proving the reality of their faith, these men stood by their words and faithfully faced the certain death that should have come from being thrown in the fire. Postponing their demise at that time by preserving them while in the fiery pit, God allowed them to live and gave them sure evidence that their faith was indeed real.
The second reason faith is tested is to keep us from becoming prideful. In 2 Corinthians 12:7, Paul writes, “Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me—to keep me from exalting myself!” Even though Paul maintained an exemplary Christian life according to Scripture, God was acutely aware of the constant danger of pride resurfacing in the life of His chosen instrument, and therefore, he sent a painful physical ailment to keep Paul humble.
The third reason for trials is to remove the Christian from worldly attachments. According to God Himself, Job, during his time, was the most righteous man on earth (1:13). So remarkable was the faith of Job that he held strong despite losing in short order his oxen, donkeys, sheep, servants, and his children (1:14-19). After all of this, his skin became covered with boils, his wife bid him to curse God, and his so-called friends offered him no solace in their counsel as the feelings of utter loneliness set in (2:7-13). In the face of such terrible suffering, Job’s faith was preserved as he ultimately received a commendation from God (42:8). From all of this, it would seem that Job had detached himself from worldly constraints, and yet the trials of God peered ever deeper into Job’s inner person. As these trials proceeded and the deafening silence of God set in, Job found himself journeying from pleas for understanding (7:20-21) to feelings of resentment and rebellion (23:2) and a desire to argue his case directly before God (23:3-7). This shaking of Job’s faith in the midst of horrific trials forced him to ponder his forced detachment from worldly things and offered an opportunity, once his trial had concluded, to gain the understanding he so desperately desired when his suffering persisted. That understanding in retrospect was the realization of the presence of God in the midst of his trials where it had seemed that God was absent (42:5).
The fourth reason that God tests his saints is to help them fix their eyes toward heaven and the hope that awaits them. In a lengthy discussion of his own personal trials, Jeremiah found all of his worldly hopes dashed to pieces to the extent that the only hope that remained was the one found solely to be with God (Lam 3). Through his ordeal, he was forced to abandon hope in himself, momentary delights, his comfort, his freedom, temporal release, his own ability, his character, and the good opinion of others (Lam 3:4-16). Like Job, Jeremiah discovered the presence of God while still within his moment of trial and rejoiced in the hope that only the presence of God could offer (Lam 3:31-33). While at first he struggled with a plethora of competing false hopes offered as substitutes by the world and especially enticing for those in affliction, Jeremiah learned that the only hope that will remain reliable is the hope that is from God.
The fifth reason for the trying of God’s people is to uncover the motive of love which has supplanted into their being by God Himself. As a young man, David found himself on the run from Saul and later reminisced, “The cords of death encompassed me, and the torrents of ungodliness terrified me. The cords of Sheol surrounded me; The snares of death confronted me” (Ps 18:4-5). Such desperation befell him even while he had been faithfully following God by humbly supporting Saul. Instead of crying foul and raging against God, David chose to seek the Lord, and his trial brought forth his deeply rooted motive of love for God (18:1-6). Upon reflection, he declared, “I love You, O Lord, my strength” (18:1).
David’s tried and tested love for God, one would think, should have continued to display itself in the same glowingly vibrant manner as David grew older. This, however, was not the case because David, like all people, struggled with sin and stumbled on occasion. As James asserts, “we all stumble in many ways” (3:2). For David, he fell into adultery with Bathsheba, and he even added to that terrible sin by murdering her husband by proxy. When confronted by Nathan the prophet, David first demonstrates his deeply rooted love for God by repenting (2 Sam 12:1-13). After humbling himself, God sent him through a trial whereby he would lose the child that had been born to Bathsheba (12:14-23). Upon learning about this child’s death, and to the surprise of his attendants, David discontinued his mourning process and instead went “into the house of the Lord and worshiped” (12:20). David’s behavior at the conclusion of the Lord’s painful discipline demonstrates that his love for God was still firmly set deep within his being, for only those who love the Lord can truly give glory unto Him: “Let all who seek You rejoice and be glad in You; Let those who love Your salvation say continually, “The Lord be magnified!” (Ps 40:16).
The sixth purpose for God’s testing is to help His chosen people prioritize His heavenly blessings instead of worldly comforts. For His saints, God wants them motivated and captivated by thoughts of Him, His Word, His Promises, His love, His concern, His strength, and His salvation. For this reason, the Psalmist announces, “For the righteous God tries the hearts and minds” (Ps 7:9). In the Scripture, Jonah was tried by God in such a way that his priorities were found to be incorrect. Despite God’s clear command that he should travel to Nineveh, Jonah chose to disobey and boarded a ship to Tarshish (Jonah 1:1-3). As the Lord’s prophet, one would think that Jonah would have taken the way of the Lord, but Jonah willfully chose the way of a fool (cf. Prov 12:15). In response to Jonah’s sinful misdeed, God had him swallowed by a whale for three days and three nights (Jonah 1:17). While imprisoned in the whale, Jonah repented, cried out to the Lord, and “remembered” Him (2:2-9). Casting aside his hyper-focus on his own people and his deeply rooted hatred for all of the atrocities committed by the Ninevites against them, Jonah learned to prioritize God’s will, His message, and His call to salvation.
The seventh reason for heavenly-commissioned trials is to develop the inward resilience of God’s people so that they may perform still greater deeds. Over the course of his ministry, Jeremiah repeatedly found himself being tested by God at the hands of the worldly Israelites who rejected him (7:27; 13:10; 17:23; 18:12; 19:15), beat and confined him in stocks (10:1-2), sentenced him to death (26:11), contradicted him (28; 43:1-2), imprisoned him (32:2), ignored him (36:23), starved him while leaving him abandoned in a cistern (38:6-10), and slandered him (43:2). At one point, Jeremiah broke down gave way to victim mindset where all of his attention became to devoted to his own plight. Among other things, he levied this charge against God, “Why has my pain been perpetual and my wound incurable, refusing to be healed? Will You indeed be to me like a deceptive stream with water that is unreliable?” (Jer 15:18). In the midst of his pity party and foolish proclamations, God called Jeremiah back to repentance and promised to strengthen Jeremiah against the machinations of His sinful and rebellious people:
“If you return, then I will restore you—Before Me you will stand; And if you extract the precious from the worthless, you will become My spokesman. They for their part may turn to you, but as for you, you must not turn to them. ‘Then I will make you to this people a fortified wall of bronze; And though they fight against you, they will not prevail over you; For I am with you to save you and deliver you’” (15:19-20).
The final reason for the apportioning of trials to God’s people is so they may in turn bless, comfort, and encourage others who are suffering themselves. When the devil requested the opportunity to sift Peter, Jesus allowed him to do so knowing Peter would find himself steeped in the shame of having denied his Lord in the moment of trial. His purpose, according to Luke, was that he would be able to “strengthen his brothers” after demonstrating that “his faith [would] not fail” even though for a short while he would be encumbered by sin (Luke 22:31-32). Like Peter though without sin, Jesus Himself underwent trials so that He might strengthen believers, “For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted” (Heb 2:18). Following Christ’s example and exhibiting a more mature faith than Peter when he was tempted to deny Christ before His resurrection, Paul serves as supreme example of how faithful Christians should remain steadfast in their trials. Remarking upon his many sufferings, Paul has this to say,
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ. But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; or if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is effective in the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer; and our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are sharers of our sufferings, so also you are sharers of our comfort” (2 Cor 1:3-7).
In conclusion, anyone who is called of God should fully expect to be sent through all many of trials. At times and especially at the beginning of one’s journey as a Christian, the likelihood of giving in to the devil’s trickery will be greater. Even so, the Christian who has been given the gift of faith, like Peter, can be assured that they will never be released from God’s loving hands. They will most assuredly find repentance and restoration. As they mature, they will gradually exhibit the steadfastness of Paul when under trial. Regardless of their performance in these most difficult of times, they will always come through victoriously with improved ability to serve the Lord and bless others.
[i]Kenneth Copeland Ministries, “60 Scriptures About Prosperity and Success,” available at: https://www.kcm.org/real-help/life-work/believe/60-scriptures-about-prosperity-and-success.
[ii]All Scripture references are taken from NASB1995.