The Reflection of Jesus, the Glory of God, in You

Trials purify, purge, and refine us, so people can see more of Jesus’ character in us.

Compensation is not what we customarily fit to the salvation of God, but it is compensation that God fits to us in the production of our suffering; the Lord is giving us something back for the trials that life brings to our doorstep.

This compensation is the reflection of Jesus – the shining glory of God – in and about our character – as we are refined.

What does this shining glory of God – the reflection of Jesus – look like? It is every other glory apart from the world; or it is a glory totally unknown and unknowable to the world.

What the world cannot conceptualise or understand is the prevalence of God’s glory in and through us; a thing discerned only by the believer or the person close to belief. It is a thing spiritually discerned.

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There is a divine connection between trial and glory; the refining trials of life and the glory of God. One is the antecedent and the other is the compensation for having gone to ground and for having journeyed humbly with God, despite the injustice.

We cannot be blessed of God unless we have first been found unjustly treated by the world. And, being that everyone is unjustly treated by the world, everyone qualifies for the blessing of God. But, there is one further, distinguishing qualifier, a little one, but nonetheless critically important; to respond with humility to let God be God – to surrender our reaction and agree to be refined, which is faith.

Glorious is the faith of the ancients, in and about you, when you allow God to grace you with the compensation of the ancients.

These issues of faith are surmounting the very apex the world can throw at us. Respond the right way and there is the finish of glory all over you! Think on it – nothing can defeat you even though it seems this very trial is tormenting you. The trial does not have the final say; and the only ‘final say’ that matters is that of the Lord your God.

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Enormous engagements with stress, in the process of journeying humbly with God, enrol us to the gorgeous reality of the compensation of growth for the trials we have endured.

Trials purify, purge, and refine us, so people can see more of Jesus’ character in us.

© 2014 S. J. Wickham.