To Encourage You

Romans 8:29 “For those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son”

I heard a recording of the late Elizabeth Elliott some years ago in which she was speaking about God’s transforming work in the lives of believers.  As an illustration, she was speaking about the great sculptor, Michelangelo.  One day this artist was asked how he had created such a masterpiece as the sculpture of “David.” In effect he said something like this: “Well, you just start with a block of marble and knock off everything that doesn’t look like David.”  Seems simple enough!  In any event, her point was that God has a lot of “knocking off” to do in each and every one of our lives as He works to conform us to the image of His perfect Son. And that’s exactly what He’s working to do. 

But then she spoke about how this happens.  It’s something I’ve been thinking about lately. Do you have any people in your life that really annoy you?  Are there people with whom you are quick to lose patience?  Are there friends, neighbors, or family members, maybe even people in your church, that are quick to get under your skin with their mannerisms and words?  Do they tend to bring out the worst in you?  Well, if so, we need to realize that nothing is by chance in a believer’s life.  God, in His sovereignty, has placed that person in your or my life for a reason.  And more likely than not, it’s one of God’s ways to expose un-Christlike attitudes that need work in our lives. As these people grate on us, it may just be God’s means of smoothing out the many rough edges in our lives that need chipped away or a touch of “sandpaper.” 

And then there are those circumstances in life that tempt us to unrighteous anger, impatience, anxiety or other attitudes and actions unbecoming to one who is to be conformed to the image of Christ.  God, in His wisdom, knows how to touch our lives in ways that expose us for who we really are, in contrast to the higher ways in which we tend to see ourselves.  It is just these things that, rather than rail against, we should thank God for. These tests are necessary for us. They are ways in which God works in our lives to “knock off” anything that doesn’t look like Jesus. And, to think of it, isn’t that what you and I really want? 

May God help us to see those things that come into our lives that we’d much rather do without as the necessary things that they are to conform us more and more into the image of His Son.  It’s a life-long process that begins the moment we put our faith in Christ as God sovereignly works in our lives using those everyday mundane things that are really anything but in the hands of our Master as He does His masterful work.