REPOST FROM OCTOBER 23, 2025

 REPOSTING FROM MY FACEBOOK PAGE DATED OCTOBER 23, 2025

Last Sunday the pastor at my home church preached from James 1: 1-5. He talked about how the trials we experience test our faith. The purpose of the trials is for our spiritual growth. When our faith is tested, we should pray, asking God for wisdom. 

James 1:2 Consider it a great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. 4 But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.5 Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives to all generously and without criticizing, and it will be given to him.

Later in James, chapter 1, we read that God is not the one who is tempting us. We are led astray by our own sinful desires.

James 1:12 A man who endures trials is blessed, because when he passes the test he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love Him. 13 No one undergoing a trial should say, “I am being tempted by God.” For God is not tempted by evil, and He Himself doesn’t tempt anyone. 14 But each person is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own evil desires. 15 Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is fully grown, it gives birth to death.

This Sunday I was visiting family and went to church with them. Their pastor preached from 1 Corinthians 10:13.

I Corinthians 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to humanity. God is faithful, and He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation He will also provide a way of escape so that you are able to bear it.

Having heard these two sermons on trials and temptations back-to-back made me think again about the importance of not taking scripture out of context, and studying the whole of scripture, not just selected passages. 

I have heard some people interpret the passage from 1 Corinthians 10:13 to say that God tempts us with evil. But look at what the verse actually says. “...He will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able…” James said that we should not think that God is tempting us. We know that God allowed Satan to attack Job, but it was not God who caused the terrible trials Job experienced. Through these trails, Job remained faithful to God. His faith was tested by his trials as James writes. Through Job’s trials, God was glorified, Job’s faith grew stronger, his unhelpful friends learned some valuable lessons, and we have an example of how to endure suffering. God blessed Job after he had been tested. James teaches us that trials are a test of our faith, but that we should be thankful for the trials we experience because our faith grows stronger, we become more conformed to God’s character as a result of what we learn about Him through the trials. James also teaches us that when we lack wisdom on how to endure through our trials, we should ask God. He will provide that wisdom. This is the same thought that Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 10:13. God will provide a way of escape. God will give us the wisdom to know how to escape that temptation. 

On the other hand, we also need to understand that disciplines those He loves. 

Hebrews 12:5 And you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons: My son, do not take the Lord’s discipline lightly or faint when you are reproved by Him, 6 for the Lord disciplines the one He loves and punishes every son He receives. 7 Endure suffering as discipline: God is dealing with you as sons. For what son is there that a father does not discipline? 8 But if you are without discipline—which all receive—then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we had natural fathers discipline us, and we respected them. Shouldn’t we submit even more to the Father of spirits and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time based on what seemed good to them, but He does it for our benefit, so that we can share His holiness. 11 No discipline seems enjoyable at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it yields the fruit of peace and righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

Whether we are enduring trials or experiencing discipline, we need to focus on God, allow Him to work in us, guide us with His wisdom, and remain faithful to Him. The questions in either situation we should ask is, “What is God teaching me through this? What change is He trying to make in me so that I reflect His character more clearly? How is He being glorified in what I am experiencing? What changes in my behavior and attitudes is He leading me to make?”

Hebrews 12:2 keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that lay before Him endured a cross and despised the shame and has sat down at the right hand of God’s throne.

Romans 8:29 For those He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brothers.

(All scripture references are from the Holman Christian Standard Bible.)