Trials Before Us

Coming out of the ashes on Ash Wednesday, this fact was not revealed to us. It was deliberately held and kept for this place, time and people.

This word has come expressly for all who have gone through the vestibule and who have made the conscious decision to follow on with Jesus and not turn back, with the first distasteful, hard or scary word; a word which does not suit our carnal inclinations.

This fact states that once a thing has been burnt to cinders or ashes, it cannot be returned to what it was before. In other words, if a chair has been burnt to pure ashes, the ashes cannot be made back into a chair.

On this second to last day, before we begin a new week, the first full week of Lent, we have been given full assurance that our dross and base desires have been burnt up. This means that such impurities as fear and unbelief, have no more place in our lives and the ashes to prove this true, cannot be turned again into doubts and unbelief.  As long as they have been burnt up by the Holy Ghost, as long as His Fire is doing His work in us, we are made free from all those inner and outer hindrances and barriers, to experience these trials as Jesus once did.  

For today and tomorrow, we shall follow Jesus in His Lenten Enlightening Trials as the Holy Spirit, going before Him, leads Him into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. The first thing that holds me is that the devil has walked the same path as Jesus, the path of the wilderness. We are with Jesus and because we are dead to sin, because the Holy Ghost has burnt away, purged away our impurities, we are free to face what lies ahead.  We are with Jesus as He faces His First Big Trial or Temptation.

Lord, grant me ears to hear Your voice,

So that in You I can rejoice,

Grant me faith’s eyes Your truth to see,

I joy to know You live in me.

Amen!

The First Big Trial given, is found in Matthew 4: 1 – 4 NKJV. Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread. Jesus answered, It is written: Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

Indeed, several tributaries of this one sea of trial, are embedded in these verses, however, we are given to face just three of them. I shall refer to them as Trial A, Trial B and Trial C. In meeting the devil face to face, listening to his words of temptation, we know that we are no longer our own but the Lord’s. We stick closer to Jesus, as we meet the clever deceiver squarely and defeat him convincingly and conqueringly, with our victorious Jesus.   

Trial A - The Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness.

This has been a quiet concern of mine and perhaps of yours also, as I could never settle with the fact that the Holy Spirit would take me from where I am, in a non-wilderness place and lead me into a desert or wilderness place. No wilderness is nice, easy, comfortable or inviting, to say the least. For me, it is a place where the wicked one, the evil one who comes to steal and kill, will lead you. The wilderness can be an extremely harsh and hard place of want - want of food, want of water, want of shelter - to suffer and even perish from want. Such places we would not just shun, but we would ask God to save us from them, the wilderness experiences.

Where are you personally? Thank God if you are in a desert place, a dry place, a barren place, a wilderness place because you know that no devil or mighty evil force has led you there. Rejoice that God the Holy Spirit is faithful and He has not just led you, but He is with you and in you. Overcome Trial A and be steadfast in who you are in Jesus.

Trial B - The Holy Spirit led Him to meet the devil and be tempted by him.

This gets even more challenging as far as my carnal mind and thinking will afford. It is one thing for the Holy Spirit to lead a believer into the wilderness, but to lead that person to be tempted by Satan, is quite another matter. I mean, if one is led into the wilderness to meet a John the Baptist, for example, all well and good, but I draw the line of God leading me to be tempted. Such talk and such thinking, many of us believers will readily cut down and not claim as of God, saying most vehemently that Satan is a liar and use our human strength to fight it, praying and pleading the blood of Jesus. Be not deceived, this is a real trial we face, but if we stick to Jesus we will never be deceived in our understanding.

Where are you personally? Thank God that your temptations never find you without Him, God the Holy Spirit. Be eternally grateful and deeply thankful in spirit and in truth that the Holy Spirit is in command, so that even when the tempter fires away at you, Holy Spirit is guiding, directing and ensuring that you do not yield. Rejoice that God the Holy Spirit is trustworthy and He is in full control. Overcome Trial B and be steadfast and strong in who you are in Jesus.

We continue this with quickened feet, tomorrow.