How can I face my trials?

How can I

Face my trials?

A PERSONAL STORY

 Looking Deeper

 Looking Deeper How can I face my trials?

A PERSONAL STORY

“G

od, what’s going on?”

Ever asked that? It’s normally one of the first questions that we fire at God during those times when everything just gets too much.

Problems and worries have been piling up higher and higher. And then there’s that one thing that tips us over into: “God, don’t you realise I can’t handle all this stuff? What am I meant to do now?” It’s the “What’s going on?” moments that this booklet is all about—when we just can’t see a way out or a way forward. I went through this recently.

We were looking to move house (always a saga, no matter what the circumstances), my wife was heavily pregnant and quite ill, and we already had a toddler who was perfectly happy We can face staying in the home he’d any trial or always known, thank you very test, no matter much. Then our purchase fell through, the new baby’s how severe or arrival was imminent, it was surprising, with two weeks before Christmas and we were in real danger God-centred of either becoming homeless confidence, or losing a sale we’d already waited a year for. composure and “God, what are you doing? peace.

What do we do now?”

If that scenario sounds familiar—if you’ve ever wanted to know what you should do but God’s apparently got distracted—then here are a few things I learned about approaching and handling times of trials. We generally react to problems and issues with stress, panic and desperate questions. But it is my absolute belief that, as God’s children, we can face any trial or test, no matter how severe or surprising, with God-centred confidence, composure and peace. Rather than panicking about what we should do, we can be prepared in advance with God’s priorities and purposes.

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A biblical example

D

uring my own time of questioning an apparently silent God, I came across a story in Acts I’d never really paid much attention to. The book of Acts is known for being full of exciting stories.

There are shipwrecks, prison breaks, powerful sermons, incredible miracles . . . By comparison the one that got me thinking was a bit, well, boring. It’s all about church admin. An organisational problem comes up in the church, the apostles deal with it and, within seven verses, everyone moves on. It’s an ‘everyday’ story that’s easy to miss. But actually the ‘everydayness’, in a way, makes it even more relatable to us than the miraculous stories. It’s a story which could so easily have found the apostles having their own “God, what do we do now?” moment. Yet, crucially, they didn’t: In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of

A BIBLICAL EXAMPLE [3]

the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”

This proposal pleased the whole group. They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit; also Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. They presented these men to the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them.

So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith. —Acts 6:1-7 While it may not necessarily be the main point of the story as a whole, there are certainly things we can draw from it about how we should face trials. So what’s going on here, and how does it relate to us?

An overview of the situation: This took place in the early days of the church in Jerusalem (made up of the very first Christians after Jesus went back to heaven). Some historians believe it could even have happened within the first year of the church’s life. And the church was growing—fast. So it was an exciting time, with more and more people trusting Jesus and joining His family. But it was also a fragile time. Every problem was new for the apostles to navigate the church through. They were responsible for everything that was going on in the church, including handling and distributing the money (4:34-37) and food (6:2-3), as well as leading the spiritual growth of this community.

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On top of all this, they were dealing with intense persecution. As the church had grown, the opposition to it had become personally targeted and physically violent. The verses right before this story tell us that all twelve of the apostles were summoned before the Jewish religious authorities, threatened by them, told never to speak of Jesus again and then beaten before being released (Acts 5:40-42).

And then the apostles had to deal with a potentially volatile and church-altering complaint. Talk about having their hands full!

An overview of the problem: We’re told of two groups of Jews within the church: the “Hellenistic Jews” and the “Hebraic Jews” (v.1). In short, the Hebraic Jews (which included the apostles) were ‘local’ Jews, born and bred in Israel and fully integrated into the language, culture, traditions and history. The Hellenistic Jews, as the minority group, had links to the surrounding gentile/Greek regions. The Hellenistic Jews were often viewed as worldly by the Hebraic Jews and not as committed to Israel’s traditions.

Now the Hellenistic Jews were complaining against the Hebraic Jews that the widows in their community were being “overlooked in the daily distribution of food” by the church (v.1). It’s important to realise how much of a life or death issue this was. It wasn’t simply about some people getting more or less food at the church family lunches. Everyone in the first days of the church “shared everything they had” (4:32) so that “there was no needy person among them” (v.34). For some “needy”,

A BIBLICAL EXAMPLE [5]

cut-off people, like the widows, their only source of food and provision may have been this generosity of the church. So if some were being overlooked, it might have meant they were starting to starve.

Already we can see the dangerous potential in this serious complaint. If not handled well, the church could suddenly find itself split in two, dragged into warring factions or at the very least, pulling the apostles away from their mission of making Jesus known (1:8).

Even though the story is told with a matter-of-fact straightforwardness, the problem before the apostles was anything but clear cut. They were dealing with a sensitive administrative problem that could have been fixed or approached in a hundred different ways.

For example, they could have kept full responsibility for the food distribution and simply reorganised it.

Or they could even have ignored the complaint as divisive moaning that they weren’t going to tolerate.

So, in a tense, sensitive situation, when they already had plenty to deal with, what approach did the apostles take? Critically for this booklet, God doesn’t speak in this passage. Just like when we have a mountain of problems and stuff to deal with, and God doesn’t answer our questions. There is no record in this story of God telling the apostles what they should do to answer the complaint that comes up. How could they act with God-centred composure and confidence when God didn’t directly lead them? And what can we learn from them about how we can handle our own problems as they pile up or come out of the blue to knock us down?

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How did the apostles face their trial?

T

hey handled it together: This is a very simple but important thing to notice in the story. In verse 2 we’re told: “So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together”. When this complaint came up, the twelve apostles handled it together, not individually. We often have an I need to fix this instinct when problems come up. We feel the weight of our trials, we’re not sure what to do and so, fuelled by anxiety, we scrabble around trying to sort things out right away.

But we’re not ‘in this’ on our own. We have a church family to be part of and to share our burdens with (Galatians 6:2). We don’t need to handle problems and work out what to do on our own. I would even argue that we shouldn’t approach these things alone.

It might not be that we stand at the front of our churches and list out all our confusing issues and trials. But within our churches we will have friends, mentors, Bible study groups, etc. who we can share the weight of our worries and burdens with. Through their prayers, support and, no doubt, God-centred advice and similar experience, we may well find we can hear God’s direction and wisdom after all.

HOW DID THE APOSTLES FACE THEIR TRIAL? [7]

Even if it takes a long time for us to feel like we know what to do in our trials, with other Christians around us, times of testing need not be times of loneliness and hopelessness. They can actually be opportunities for getting to know our church families even better, building stronger ties of trust and love.

They approached it with faith: Perhaps the confidence and composure the apostles showed can be summed up as faith. But faith isn’t wishful thinking, magic or a positive mind-set. Faith isn’t a switch we can flick on because things have got tough.

Assured faith in God, that confidence in His character, love and provision during critical times, comes from a lifestyle of faith.

The key thing here is that the apostles didn’t wait until a trial came along to start asking God to speak to them and reveal His will. They were doing that anyway as a way of life. Their lifestyle of faith is described Times of throughout the first chapters of Acts (see, for example, Acts 1:14; testing need 2:44-47). And this daily reliance on not be times God was preparing them for the of loneliness tests ahead, giving them a better knowledge of God, His ways, His and priorities and His Word. hopelessness.

The peace and composure the apostles display in this story didn’t just happen. It came from a life of knowing God for themselves; a life that prepared them to face the [8] HOW CAN I FACE MY TRIALS?

unexpected and confusing. The apostles understood that trials are not the time to start asking God to speak, but a crucial time to put into action the things He has already been saying through His Word.

They imitated God: As far as we know, God didn’t say anything specific to the apostles in Acts 6. But He’d already been speaking to them every day leading up to this test. Because they knew Him, they could model their response and reaction on His character.

For example, the apostles understood the importance of their “ministry of the word” (v.2) from what Jesus told them before He ascended (1:8). Also, from reading Scriptures, they knew God’s attitude towards providing for the vulnerable, like widows (See Deuteronomy 14:29). So when the complaint of the Hellenistic Jews was brought to their attention, they already had a good starting point for knowing what God wanted of them.

What is particularly striking in this story is how they displayed the humility of Jesus. Jesus’ humility made Him put Himself, His glory, His honour and even His life to one side. His humility meant obeying the Father’s will and going to the cross in our place (See Matthew 26:39; Philippians 2:6-8).

For us, putting ourselves and our egos to one side means being willing to be redirected, corrected and changed by God. This kind of humility allowed the apostles to make the hard decision to step down from an essential part of the church’s mission: “We will turn this responsibility [distributing the food] over to

HOW DID THE APOSTLES FACE THEIR TRIAL? [9]

[seven people from within the church] and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word” (6:3-4).

This wasn’t about them or the way they might look. The apostles weren’t allowing any part of their identity to be defined by their different roles in the church—so being changed or moved on was something they were prepared for. What’s more, their motivation could easily have been twisted by onlookers: “Look, they’re admitting they weren’t doing a good job!” or, “Now it’s becoming too much like hard work, they’ve decided looking after widows is beneath them.”

Because they were humble enough to be moved and changed by God, despite what others might have thought, they could make a very wise decision that ultimately “pleased the whole group” (v.5). I think for us, this humility often results in our prayers changing.

During our lengthy house move and many health and baby issues, God moved me on from repeatedly asking “God, what’s going on? What do I do?”

Humility to simply saying “You’ve heard often results me. Now I will wait and trust you.” It wasn’t easy and it was in our prayers still a long road after that shift in changing. focus—but God reminded me that having humility means allowing Him to lead, not me. And sometimes that comes down to waiting to see what He will do, rather than rushing ahead and trying to fix things ourselves.

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They understood God’s priority: Living so closely with God in their day-to-day lives, the apostles understood that God wants us to be defined by our relationship with Him, no matter where we are or what we’re doing. That includes whether we are focused on teaching the Bible, as the apostles knew they needed to be; or whether we are more involved in giving practical care to others. Just take a look at the job description the apostles gave for the people they wanted to take on the food distribution: “known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom” (v.3). And we see it emphasised again when we’re told about Stephen, one of the men chosen, who was “full of faith and of the Holy Spirit” (v.5).

My paraphrase of full of faith, wisdom and the Holy Spirit is simply this: people who know and love their God. People who are growing closer to Him. People who are defined by Him. When we think of individuals we know, there’s often a ‘thing’ that comes to mind: “He’s mad about football” or “She’s all about singing”.

The people the apostles wanted to take on this role in the church were known to be “all about God”.

In terms of talking about what God’s will is for us or how we should handle different situations or tests, the answer is always: “be full of the Spirit”. Or, in other words, stay close to Him. That’s for every day, every problem and every circumstance. Be someone who is “all about God”. That is His priority. As the apostles drew close to Him, it became their priority too and influenced their decision making and outlook

HOW DID THE APOSTLES FACE THEIR TRIAL? [11]

in Acts 6. They wanted to hand the work on to likeminded people who loved God and wanted to know Him better. This is what God asks of all of us who want to be active in His kingdom and in His church.

The outcome: The result of this approach from the apostles was fantastic. Firstly, a well-balanced team was chosen to take on this work. We’re told that one of the men chosen was “Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism” (Acts 6:5). This means he was a gentile. Suddenly the practical work was being done by a diverse team that, together, would better know the diverse needs of all the different groups represented within the church!

Secondly, we’re told “the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly” (v.7). Rather than being distracted by a volatile admin issue, the apostles were freed up to keep making Jesus known. And rather than the church fragmenting and breaking down like any other human organisation, it maintained its unique unity, attracting even “priests” of the temple to give up their privileged positions and join this God-centred community (v.7).

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Facing our own trials

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hese four principles from Acts 6 are not the solution or absolute fix for all our problems and questions. They are not a formula for avoiding stress and always knowing what to do. They don’t mean our issues will always clear up within the equivalent of seven verses.

Watch and But they are things for us pray so that to think about as we reflect on how we face trials and our you will not fall daily life with God. Whilst into temptation. we will still get confused and anxious, our aim should The spirit is be to meet trials with some willing, but the preparation under our belts. flesh is weak.

It’s like exams; you may not know what the questions or Matthew 26:41 tasks will be—but you know there will be some. In life we don’t know exactly what we’re going to have to face, but we know for sure that we’ll have to face something.

Our preparation is about living out Jesus’ words to His disciples on the night He was arrested: “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The

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spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Matthew 26:41).

The key to navigating our trials lies in knowing who God is, which means spending time with Him and reading His Word. The apostles’ insight and action in Acts 6 wasn’t spur of the moment stuff. It came from a life of loving and knowing God for themselves.

When Jesus was teaching about handling our worries and stresses, He assured His disciples that God already knew their needs and questions. So he directed them to “seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things [our needs] will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33). The point is that we prefer to focus on the specifics. It’s not surprising.

When stuff comes up, we say “God, what should I do about . . .?” or “What’s the plan for . . .?” We focus on the specific problems and questions because they affect our lives right here, right now. But Jesus tells us Seek first his to change our perspective to seeking Him and His kingdom and his ways first. And, just like for righteousness, the apostles, handling the and all these specifics will come from knowing God well, not the things will be other way round. given to you Our house-moving/new baby/sickness season lasted as well. a long time. Even after the Matthew 6:33 baby was born, we still had to find a permanent place to [14] HOW CAN I FACE MY TRIALS?

live, whilst my wife (recovering from a C-section) then got flu. And this was after I’d said to God “I trust you.”

I still wanted clear answers to my specific questions, but, at the time, all God gave me was Jesus.

I was asked to preach on Luke 9:51-62 during those weeks. What struck me most from the passage was that Jesus “set His face for Jerusalem” (v.51 NKJV). I realised that Jesus, my God, set His face in determination to go and die for me on the cross. In effect, Jesus decided to set His face for me, not against me, to do all that was necessary to save me and make me His. It was then that I realised Jesus was enough. I didn’t need answers and specifics from God—I just needed to fix my eyes on Him and know Him for myself. In knowing that He had resolutely set His face for me, I could be confident, even in the uncertainty of my family’s trials, that He could be trusted to bring us through and show us what we needed to do in His timing.

Had we zoomed ahead on our own and made ‘quick-fix’ decisions, we would have missed out on the new church, school and witnessing opportunities He has since provided us with. Not all the issues have gone away, and my wife still battles with illness, but we are choosing a faith in God that is all about who He is, rather than what He does. We believe, even in our trials, that if we are focused on God, we’ll get to know Him better, grow closer as a family and be able to show His love and peace to the new people we are meeting—even when we don’t understand how things will work out.

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It is my absolute belief that the composure, peace, confidence and assurance of the apostles in Acts 6 are things all of us can experience. They weren’t just super-spiritual elites. They were men who simply knew their God and were growing, daily, in their confidence in Him. We have the same faith as them in the same God (Ephesians 4:5). We too can change our reaction to tough times from panic to peace.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

—Proverbs 3:5-6

This promise from Proverbs is not about God making our lives easy when we trust Him, rather than ourselves. It is a promise that “he will make [our] paths straight” (v.6). This means that as we draw closer to Him, we will know better His ways and His priorities.

We will have more idea about what we should be praying, how we should be waiting, when we should be taking action, etc. These things don’t necessarily always come from lightbulb moments, but from daily knowing God better and better. And even if our trials and confusion last a long time, so too can our peace and confidence in God as we look to Him first.

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