How to Move Through the Fires of Faith
Would you sing God’s praises after being sold into slavery by your brothers?
Would you continue to believe God’s promises while sitting in prison for something you didn’t do?
Would you maintain patience while waiting for God to move?
Faith Fires Refine Us
God created us to be perfect and whole while we lived with Him in the Garden of Eden. Worry-free. Pain-free. Struggle free. Then sin entered our lives. We broke. We struggle. We worry. We hurt.
After sin entered our lives, God created opportunities for us to be refined as we journey in our faith.
Refining Faith Into Steel
When I think of being refined, I think of the creation of steel. The iron that’s used to create steel is harvested from the earth. Then it’s refined into steel, one of the strongest metals on earth. So, how does that happen? The only way iron can become steel is through fire. The more fires iron goes through, the stronger the steel becomes. The hotter the fire, the stronger the steel becomes. Each fire is a necessary step in iron’s journey to become steel. To develop strength. To stand strong as more fires rage.
From Doubt to Freedom
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Fires of Faith
Our faith becomes stronger, like steel, every time we go through the fires of faith. Our fires are filled with struggles, hurts, doubts, feelings of unworthiness, worries that God has left us, impatience, and even fear.
There have been many fires in my own faith journey and looking back I can be filled with gratitude for each one. My faith has been refined through the fires. Grown stronger because I was never alone. God brought me through each one and into a life I never could have imagined for myself. So, how do we move through the fires of faith to become stronger on the other side?
Leaning Into the Struggle
The story I lean into when going through fires of faith is Joseph’s in the Old Testament. Joseph experienced fires in his life to help him become the person God created him to be. To help him become one of the most powerful men in Egypt. To help him become the person who would save the people of Israel from dying in a famine. To help him become the person God needed him to be for His plan to be successful.
Let’s focus on the 5 things we can pull from this story to help us move through the struggles.
Keep your focus on God’s promise
Joseph was given a dream by God. A dream he wholeheartedly believed in and knew would come true, even when his family told him it wouldn’t. Joseph never gave up. He had plenty to wallow over (slavery and prison) and be upset about in his lifetime. Anyone would have been supportive of him if he had thrown in the towel and just lived a normal life.
Instead, he chose to have faith that God would be with him and guide him through the good and bad times. That is a difficult way to live when you think about it. Trust. It’s a difficult concept to believe in. All of us have been hurt in this life. Even through Joseph’s hurts, he believed in God’s faithfulness and promise.
Know God is with you
The Lord was with Joseph, so he succeeded in everything he did as he served in the home of his Egyptian master. Genesis 39:2
Joseph wasn’t alone through the struggles he was facing. God stayed with him. God stayed in control. I know it can be difficult to not feel alone when going through the refining process. When the fires are burning hot all around you. When you’re afraid of what comes next. When you feel like you can’t handle one more thing.
Even with all of that - God is there. These two verses show God’s presence in Joseph’s worst of times. If He is there for Joseph, He is there for you too.
“But the Lord was with Joseph in the prison and showed him his faithful love. And the Lord made Joseph a favorite with the prison warden. Genesis 39:21”
Have faith in God’s plan
It would be disheartening knowing your own brothers sold you because they hated you. He could have let it get to him. He could have wallowed in it. He could have stuck his head in the sand and said, “God, why have You done this to me?!” Instead, he stood firm in who he was in God’s eyes and did his best every day no matter the situation he was in.
We never truly know where God’s plan is going to lead us. Through the valleys and up on the mountain tops. It’s all a part of refining our faith. Each step. Good or bad. Letting go and holding on. God had a purpose for your life before you ever had a plan. Sometimes your plans have to fail so God’s purpose can prevail.
Accept the situation when God moves you
There is a lot to be said for this amount of faith in everyday life. The big vision of the lives we are striving for can cloud our minds and keep us from moving forward.
Day by day, step by step Joseph became the most powerful slave under his master. He had a good thing going. Then God moved him. God didn’t move him in a pleasant direction either. I wouldn’t want to trade a house where I had a lot of control and influence for a prison cell. I’m sure it wasn’t on Joseph’s to-do list either.
God knew where he needed to be. Sometimes God doesn’t move us in the most pleasant of ways. He moves us because we need to be moved to keep on the path He has for us. Maybe we strayed or got stuck. Maybe it was just time to move on, so we could keep trusting God and His direction. Maybe we stop relying on God because we had it so good.
There isn’t a reason laid out for Joseph’s move from slavery into prison, but as we know Joseph probably wouldn’t have been summoned by Pharoah to interpret his dreams if Joseph hadn’t been in prison. The connections with Pharoah’s staff wouldn’t have happened.
Remain patient in the waiting
He didn’t know when his dream would come true. He believed it would someday, somehow.
Even after the connections with Pharaoh’s staff were made, it still took Joseph two years of waiting, trusting, and believing before he was brought before Pharoah. During that time, Joseph continued to take steps to become who God had created him to be.
He didn’t get discouraged by the time passing. He kept plugging away, one step at a time. Moving in the direction God told him to move.
Where Refining Takes Us
The refining process allowed Joseph to be the person God needed him to be so he could save his family from famine. So the dream God gave him could come true. The refining process isn’t always pleasant. It comes from pain. It comes from failure. It comes from being uncomfortable. But, without it, God can’t do miraculous things through us. Joseph saved an entire nation and more from dying. If his brothers hadn’t sold him. If he hadn’t gone to prison. If none of that would have happened, he wouldn’t have been in the position of authority to save anyone.
It is easy to look back and connect the painful dots in our lives to where we are now. It’s harder to let God direct our paths forward and have faith that He is in the process of connecting our dots towards the dreams He has given us. To take one small step at a time and know that as long as I am following God’s path, I will get where I am destined to go. Faith. Belief. Reminding myself of who God is. Reminding myself of who I am. Patience. Action. A combination that keeps us moving towards the person God created me to be.
Where do you currently see your faith being refined?
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The realization that God created each one of us with a purpose and gifts is miraculous. Spend time connecting with God, your Creator, to strengthen your faith.