“Why have You afflicted Your servant?” (Numbers 11:11)

God causes or allows frequent troubles to try our faith. If our faith is saving faith, it will stand the test. “No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). The Greek word translated “bear it” means “stay under”. For the Christian, it means “stay under the Lordship of Christ”. That’s the victory…staying submitted to Christ while He leads you through the trial.

The same Greek word is translated “patience” when the Apostle James uses it: “Count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing” (James 1:2–4).

Any sinner (and demons) can have common faith (James 2:19), but saving faith always bears good fruit. Trials separates the counterfeit from the genuine. A faith which can say, when things look desperate, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him” (Job 13:15), is saving faith.

God is glorified when His graces are manifested in His people. When “tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope,” God is honored by these growing virtues ( Romans 5:3-4). There’s that word patience again. God is honored when you stay submitted to the Lordship of Christ in tribulations.

God gave you a new heart, the Holy Spirit to live inside you, and Christ as your Advocate in Heaven, to overcome every trial. “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:15–16).

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