Trials are good

2 Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3 because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. 4 Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 5 If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. 6 But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. 7 That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. 8 Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do. [James Chapter 1]

I still remember years ago, when I looked at the verses, they reassureed me and gave me hope that the trials of many kinds I'm facing are to produce perseverance from testing my faith. I remembered our condition were so bad that after I failed my exam and went back home, I have to help out with picking up palm fruits everyday(we help to collect those palm fruits on the ground and sold it to owner). I remembered those days are fruitful days.

Everyday, I squatted down at the oil palm plantation, picking up fruits while letting the work numbed my pain of failing the exam, failing my family, failing myself. The future was uncertain at first. In a way, I reflected alot myself inside the plantation. Sometimes we went separately to different places, so I was alone, in a quiet environment, and I make use of the solitude to talk to God, to repent. Sometimes it was scorching hot, I sweat so much. But I was satisfied. Especially when I accidentally discover a bunch of palm fruits, chilly red in colour, big and juciy, screaming at me, "Come pick me up!". Then sometimes when it was so hot, suddenly there's a breeze coming by just to cool me down. And I would say, "God, thank you."

God was so near then. And I'm so close to Him, unwilling to let go. I remembered when I found Him at the time, its the time I discover Abba the Father after 2 years becoming a believer. I spent days and nights, reading the Bible, reading Christian books. I woke up to worship, to prayer, to devotion. The first thing I asked in a day was, 'What does He want me to do today?' That's the time when I get the strongest calling of studying medical, but now that calling slowly faded away.

James was right. Trials of many kinds was good for me. Certainly.

But somehow, as time goes by, things are getting a little bit comfortable until I am having less and less prayer request. So I'm turning from a person in verse2-5 into that person in verse 6-8.

The God I once called Father becomes a total stranger to me. I couldn't hear His voice and I couldn't see His face. "Jesus, I love you, " I said, with my lips, but not my heart. Thousand of times, I repented, but then I fell back to idolatry, to the pleasure of world that ruined my relationship with God. The bridegroom that I once committed to, once promised to love forever, now I had committed an affair in front of Him.

I was like the prodigal Son. I wanted to decide on my own for my life. And then I realized that it doesn't work at all. Life becomes messed up when I take on control myself. And I started to miss the days that my condition was so bad that I had to rely on God. And I realized that they weren't bad at all, they were blessing. Because, the more comfortable I am, the further I am away from God.