Joyful Ruins

Anyone else read verses like Isaiah 43:2 [When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned up] and laugh or cry (because you feel like the fire is burning you up)?

I don’t think I ever read that verse and really believed it.

In the midst of suffering I read that verse and say, “Yeah right, I am being burned left and right by this fire right now”.

And I have been burned and so have you. Suffering seasons, in whatever form, have moments of such intense heat, we may even cry out for death. We feel like it cannot be worse than this, and we wonder how God is protecting us from the fire or the waters. We feel burned up and swept over.

Then, step by step, tear by tear, prayer by prayer, we make it past that place of despair.

It might last a while, and it may return repeatedly as you walk through the fire, but we hold onto something for dear life: God, hope, the next step, people, nature, anything that gets us through and suddenly the heat is less intense.

But this moment is not the miracle spoken of in that verse. One day, as the fire molds us, as God uses it to forge in us a special strength, we will feel like the fire can no longer touch us.

This is not to say that the fire won’t continue to heat up or try and harm us. And the fire is still real and very much alive, but, that something in us will no longer feel the heart or the fear of the fire’s damage in the same way. It truly won’t burn us up.

That sounds abstract, I know, so let me apply it to my own experience.

I have been sick. My health taken away from me over night and there is still a lot of unknown about the what and why of it all.

In the beginning, I felt overwhelmed by the fear of sickness. The fear of my life stolen away from me. There were moments I did not want to keep going, when the fire felt so hot, I cried out in despair. Somehow those moments passed and I kept going, even if I had days where waking up was even hard.

Sickness stayed. The fire stayed. It was not removed, but my response, my feelings towards the illness, I changed in the fire.

They could not touch me in the same way. The anxieties, possibilities, the endless journey… these flames could not touch my heart.

Why?

Honestly, I do not know. I believe a work is done in someone’s heart as they stand in the fire. God helps them no longer fear the fire itself because He stands with them and protects them from it.

And when I say protect, I don’t mean that the fire is suddenly gone or you never feel its effects. You may still be sick, sad, hurt. You may not be well again, but our hearts, our minds, our peace, our souls are protected. The fire does not scare or worry us because we have been carried through it by God.

He may not deliver you from the fire, but He will deliver you in it.

P.S. If you are not experiencing this yet, be patient dear one, God will use the fire to forge in you are strength that comes from Him alone.