When we are in the plateaus of life, we think we have it figured out. Life goes smoothly. We are following the well-worn tracks that others have taken.

But the reality is, we just haven’t run into anything yet. We haven’t come to the edge of a cliff that requires a faith walk to move forward. We haven’t been thrown into a pit like Joseph by those who we trusted. We haven’t been tempted, like Gideon, to rest on past successes, leading to the corruption and division of all those around us.

You don’t know who you actually are while you are on the plateau — the easy street. It is only when you come to a trial, a testing period, that you begin to learn who you really are, because it is only then that you must rely on something beyond yourself to get through what is too much for you to handle on your own.

It is in the trials, when we trust in God, that we learn to know for an absolute truth who He is and who He is to us.

And when we know who God is, we can know who we truly are — who we are and were always meant to be in Him.

We believe He is good so we believe there is good for us on the other side of this trial.

“I would have fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord, be of good courage, and He will strengthen your heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord.” – Psalm 27:13-14

We believe God is good and in his love for us, so we persevere and persist through.

It is this persistence and perseverance through the trials that God brings us to the high places.

“He makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he causes me to stand on high places.” — Psalms 18:33

We do what we can and take the next step, but there will be circumstances that are beyond us to handle. That is when we place the things we cannot do in God’s hands and trust Him to handle them. We persevere through.

That is faith: trust that commits.

“So take a new grip with your tired hands, stand firm on your shaky legs, and mark out a straight smooth path for your feet so that those who follow you, though weak and lame, will not fall and hurt themselves but become strong.”
– Hebrews 12:12-13

This reflection was first written in a prayer journal in a community prayer room and was inspired by the image and this quote on prayer from Oswald Chambers

“We hear it said that ‘Prayers changes things’; prayer not so much changes things as it changes the person who prays, and that person changes things. When I am born from above, the life of the Son of God is born in me, and I have to take time to nourish that life. The essential meaning of prayer is that it nourishes the life of the Son of God in me and enables Him to manifest Himself in my human flesh.” – Adapted from Biblical Ethics by Oswald Chambers