It Has Been well said that there is no short cut from Jericho to Jerusalem. There is only one way that leads to the gates of Zion, where the immortal garland is to be won, and it is a hot and dusty way, a stiff and rugged climb fraught with peril for the unwary and the unsuspecting. And of course God has deliberately made it so, that by our reaction to the rigours and trials of the way the wheat might be sifted from the chaff, the sheep separated from the goats; for “The fining pot is for silver, and the furnace for gold: but the Lord trieth the hearts”. God trieth; He proves and He tests His servants, that through the difficulties of life in the Truth their faith might be richer and deeper.
We need to remember that a Christlike character is not a thing of easy attainment. It is not achieved by the slothful and the indolent; but it calls for endurance, for spiritual staying power, for this is the quality that alone can carry us through life’s grim years, through the disappointments and the sorrows, through the trials and temptations of the world. It is through these that God searches our hearts and tries our thoughts. It is through these that God seeks to establish the depth of our faith and the true quality of our love for Him. For these are the things that will steadily defeat the man of shallow faith; these are the things that will overcome the vain and the proud, and the hypocrite who pretends to be what he is not. Nothing but patient continuance in well-doing can survive the trials and the tribulations of the life in Christ.
Think how this is illustrated by the parable of the sower. “Some (seeds) fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth: and when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away” (Mt. 13:5,6). Jesus interprets this for us in verses 20,21. The heat of the sun that caused them to wither and die represents tribulation and persecution. Yet, if we might take the natural to illustrate the spiritual, it is the sun which, if a plant has root and depth of earth, causes that plant to grow and mature; it is the sun which ripens the fruit.
As with the natural, so with the spiritual. Tribulation and adversity, the difficulties and trials of the way, serve this double purpose of ripening and maturing the faith of those who have root in themselves, while at the same time exposing the limitations and the inadequacy of those who have set out on the road in an excess of ardour caused by a sudden burst of enthusiasm, but with no depth of earth, no root in themselves, no solid foundation on which to build.
The Scriptures abound with examples of men who lacked this all-important quality of endurance: men who put their hand to the plough and looked back; kings who went forth to war without counting the cost; men who began to build but were not able to finish. Think for instance of Demas, Paul’s companion. He is the perfect example of a seed that fell onto stony ground. Two quotations tell the sad story of his spiritual career. In his Epistle to Philemon Paul describes him as his fellowlabourer (v. 24). Evidently he had received the word with joy and was labouring patiently in the Master’s service. Yet many years later, in his Second Epistle to Timothy, Paul records the sad sequel: “Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world” (2 Tim. 4:10).
What went wrong? Perhaps Paul’s circumstances at that time give us the clue. He was imprisoned in a Roman dungeon awaiting his second appearance before Nero’s judgement seat. It was a period of intense persecution,and Paul knew that his pilgrimage was at an end, for he writes:”! am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand” (v. 6). To associate with Paul at this time was an extremely dangerous thing to do. “At my first answer no man stood with me”, says Paul (v. 16); and so Demas had forsaken him because the sun was up, and tribulations had arisen because of the Word. He was unable to bear the fiery trial of faith because he had no root in himself. He loved this present world. The Lord tried his heart, and his true quality became apparent. He chose present advantage rather than future glory.
In contrast we think of an illustration from the life of David at that time of his exile and suffering at the hand of Saul. Present advantage or future glory? this was the choice he had to make. Here was a man who had been promised the kingdom, and who in token thereof had been anointed by Samuel the prophet. Yet now he had found himself, not enjoying the comforts and the privileges of an heir apparent, but living the life of a vagabond and treated as a brigand. Driven from his home and family, with his life in constant jeopardy, he was hunted as though he were some wild animal. God was testing his faith. He was trying his heart, that David might come forth as gold. During all these grim years, with all their frustrations and disappointments, David must often have wrestled with doubt and perplexity as he pondered God’s promises to him and the outworking of that purpose in his life.
Nevertheless the true quality of the man is revealed by one incident during this period of exile, by his behaviour on that occasion when, as Saul lay sleeping, surrounded by his mighty men, David, accompanied by Abishai, penetrated into the midst of the camp. What an opportunity! Abishai saw it as God-given and would have smitten Saul with his own spear; but David restrained him, reminding him that no man could lift up his hand against the Lord’s anointed and remain guiltless. The Lord was trying his heart, proving his faith. If David had been a man of the world, filled with the natural man’s ambition for power and impatient to achieve riches and easy living, then he would have grasped this opportunity. He would have taken this short cut to comfort and security, and he would, of course, at the same time have revealed himself as quite unfitted to sit upon the throne of the Lord over Israel.
However, David was not prepared to take matters into his own hands. He exercised patience that enduring quality, that spiritual staying power and waited for God to fulfil His Word in His own time. The choice before him was to grasp present advantage or to wait for future glory, and he chose to rest in the Lord, knowing indeed that it is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord. God has promised us that He will make us kings and priests unto Him, but, like David, we too at this time have no crown and no kingdom. Here we have no continuing city, but we seek one to come, and our fitness to reign with Christ is determined now by the way in which we too conduct ourselves as God tries our hearts. The choice is still between present advantage or future glory.
The Lord trieth the hearts! Think now of Joseph, whom God had shown by dreams that he should be exalted above his brethren; Joseph, who had nevertheless been sold into Egypt by his brethren, wrongfully accused, cruelly mistreated, and then thrown into prison. How many years did Joseph endure in that Egyptian jail? We do not know exactly, but it was certainly more than two, and it might have been as many as ten. Of him the psalmist wrote in Psalm 105:17: “He sent a man before them, even Joseph, who was sold for a servant: whose feet they hurt with fetters: he was laid in iron: until the time that His word came: the word of the Lord tried him”. “The word of the Lord tried him”, for God had promised; and so, through the injustices which he suffered, through the terrible disappointments, through the grim years of imprisonment, God put him to the proof. He searched his heart that He might know it, and, like David, Joseph came forth as gold.
The Lord trieth the hearts. Consider also Hezekiah, on that occasion when the ambassadors of the king of Babylon came to visit him. 2 Chronicles 32:31 is most enlightening: “Howbeit in the business of the ambassadors of the princes of Babylon, who sent unto him to enquire of the wonder that was done in the land, God left him, to try him, that He might know all that was in his heart”. God left him. Was that how David felt when he dwelt as a vagabond? Was that how Joseph felt when he languished in that Egyptian prison? And yet it is an experience that must come to all men who walk in the way of Truth. There are times when they feel that indeed God has left them, when there appears to be no answer to their prayers. “Why standest Thou afar off, O Lord? why hidest Thou Thyself in times of trouble?” (Ps. 10:1).
The answer is there in the experience of Hezekiah. It is that He might try us, that He might know all that is in our hearts. Through the circumstances of life God will try us. He will give us countless opportunities to show the kind of people we really are. It is not an easy path that we tread, for it demands self-denial and self-sacrifice, steadfastness of spirit that will rise above and conquer all the difficulties of life. And if eternal life is really what we want most of all we shall cheerfully accept all life’s burdens, rejoicing in the knowledge that it is through much tribulation that we must enter the Kingdom of God.
The Solution