The Greatest Tests of Faith...

Today I'm focused on God's tender and attentive care when it has come to difficult trials in my life. I remember the many small but incredibly meaningful things He's done through the years to bring me to this amazing place where I can both recognize and accept His help in stressful times. Remembering the many trials that have built faith slowly and steadily, reminds me of a woman's labor in childbirth. The pains become gradually more intense but because the body and mind have had a chance to adjust its bearable under normal circumstances. If, however, you were thrown directly into the last phase of labor, the fear, stress and pain would be unbearable! God does so many things in patterns - birth, death, building faith through trials to name a few. I've come to believe that these are not so very different from each other. Having given birth twice and having been at the bedside of now 4 very dear family members each in their turn at the end of their lives has provided clarity on the link between the labor of birth, the labor of death and faith building through trials. All three are painful in a productive way, they each follow definitive and predictable patterns under natural circumstances and are all bearable especially with God at your side. Birth and death both involve strikingly similar stages of labor which grow steadily more intense but with natural processes built in to make them bearable. The trials of our lives seem to follow this same pattern of growing intensity but with more faith being built through each one so that we become more able to handle the next trial. Recognizing that the Creator of the universe is focused on my relatively small life leaves me awe inspired, humbled and incredibly grateful.

As in many trials, laboring in childbirth or death requires intense support, comfort and gentle words of encouragement from loved ones. When a loved one is dying - in the last stage of life, you find yourself hoping that the end will not be long in coming. You pour your heart out to God with tears, asking Him to ease your loved one and allow them to have rest from the labor of dying. Though sadness comes with the death of a loved one, there is also relief when their final stage of labor is over and they are at rest. If you have been blessed to have cared for them through to the end then you have been cradled in God's hand and you know it without question. Your faith has been bolstered, you have seen His hand on your loved one. You have grieved slowly, in stages, leading to their final push to the end. You have done all that you could do to comfort and encourage them through their final trial. In birth, the labor ends with a new beginning for a little baby, ideally the father and mother hold her dreamily, maybe not quite grasping the reality of the long road ahead. Each stage of parenting will grow more intense, building on the last - another familiar pattern. So I'm reminded to follow God's instruction to take each day as it comes without worrying about tomorrow. God is preparing us for tomorrow, leave that in His hands. He will not allow us to fall into a final stage of labor without having prepared us for it. He will not allow us to suffer unbearable trials. He knows exactly what we can handle because He has been the One slowly and steadily building our faith, with great purpose, to handle each new trial that comes. He is building in us Godly character and faith each step of the way. Don't ever let seeds of doubt and fear take root lest you lose heart, God is intently focused on the suffering and trials of His children and gives us so many small and wonderful signs to let us know that He is caring for our many needs in such a way that we cannot even fully grasp.

What Happens After Death?: http://www.gnmagazine.org/booklets/AD/