The School of Hard Knocks
James 1:2-4 My brothers and sisters, you will have many kinds of trouble. But this gives you a reason to be very happy. You know that when your faith is tested, you learn to be patient in suffering. If you let that patience work in you, the end result will be good. You will be mature and complete. You will be all that God wants you to be.
What’s meant to happen, as we move from childhood into adulthood, is that we mature, grow up. And yet, some people never seem to actually grow up.
It’s just amazing as a parent, when you get to see your children grow up. And before you know it, this little two-year-old who was throwing a temper tantrum on the floor, becomes a twenty-two-year-old and then a thirty-two-year-old – and it’s an incredible thing to watch your child mature and grow up through that school of hard knocks.
And yet, you can be thirty-two, forty-two … seventy-two, and still throw temper tantrums; still behave as though you’re the centre of the universe; still act like a two-year-old.
They say that before you can be old and wise, you have to be young and stupid. Been there, done that. But old and stupid – now that’s not a pretty thing.
James 1:2-4 My brothers and sisters, you will have many kinds of trouble. But this gives you a reason to be very happy. You know that when your faith is tested, you learn to be patient in suffering. If you let that patience work in you, the end result will be good. You will be mature and complete. You will be all that God wants you to be.
If we’re honest, hey, we all still have some growing up to do. You do, and I do. And here, we discover that it’s in that school of hard knocks if we’ll let Him, that God will teach us the wisdom we need, to be mature and complete and lacking in nothing.
But what He needs from us, is our cooperation. What He needs from us, is our patience in learning the hard lessons, the hard way, right there, in the school of hard knocks.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
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