Why the Christian Should Count it All Joy
I start planning my garden in January.
I live in Michigan, so peppers need to be started from seed in the winter in order to have time to mature enough to produce fruit before the first fall frost. I’ve spent many a February afternoon sowing seeds in the warmth of my laundry room while the ground is covered in a blanket of snow outside.
By mid-spring, my plants are usually bursting from their Solo cups and ready to be put in the ground. But I can’t just plop them outside. After living mostly sheltered in a greenhouse or under lamps, they need to be methodically exposed to actual sunshine, wind, and the normal temperature fluctuations of a Midwest spring before being planted out permanently in the garden for the season. This process is called “hardening off”, and it’s essential to ensure my plants will reach maturity so they can produce fruit later in the season.
If I skip the hardening-off process, my small plants risk fatal scorching, shriveling up, or irreparable wind damage. I certainly won’t see the fruit I want.
Our spiritual life is much the same.
James exhorts us: “Consider it great joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you experience various trials, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing” (James 1:2-4, CSB).
I’m never keen on experiencing trials. However, in the same way, I would never put my tender plants in the ground without hardening them off, I also desire the Lord to produce the fruit of endurance in my life, that I might grow mature and complete, lacking nothing.
While the various trials we encounter may not feel good, God can certainly use them for good, such as producing fruit in our lives. Instead of funneling our energy to escape hardship, let us learn to thank the Lord for His work in us as we endure through them.
May we desire more than sheltered greenhouse living. May we desire the fruit of endurance, our maturity over comfort. Lord, give us the grace to take joy in our suffering because we know You are a faithful God who desires for us to be complete in You and lacking nothing. Amen.
Meet the Author
Mary Kate Brown
Mary Kate and her husband Brian are high-school sweethearts who left their lifelong home in the Chicago suburbs to build their homestead in rural Western Michigan. She's a homeschooling mama of four daughters and a homebody who enjoys making hot breakfasts, working in her garden, and frequenting the local farmers market. After overcoming health challenges due to autoimmunity, her passion is pursuing wholeness beyond her diagnosis. She encourages other mamas to do the same to shape the wellness of their families.
