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irpat54
08-20-12, 02:48 PM
copied from my facebook page, from embrace Grace TV

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Embrace Grace TV


Several years ago I attended my son’s graduation from Marine Corps boot camp in Paris Island, South Carolina. Pride streamed down my face as I watched him march across the field. Confidence gained from achievement and respect born out of extreme trial drew his shoulders square and lifted his head high. He was better than before. The thirteen weeks had broken him and remade him. Just a few months earlier these eighteen year olds were playing video games on their parent’s couches while consuming unnatural quantities of Pepsi. Now, hardened by discipline and inspired by freedom, they stood at attention willing to defend a nation.
Boot camp is not easy but it is necessary in the transformation of character.
Job of the Old Testament went thru his own spiritual boot camp. An extended time of loss, heartache and illness broke Job. Sitting in the local ash heap, he scraped the puss from his oozing sores. He had lost his children, his wealth and now great boils were bursting with infection across the surface of his body. The Bible tells us what Job did not know. Satan had suggested that people only worship God because of the way he blesses them and if the blessings were removed they would in turn curse God and die. Job, a righteous man, was selected as the person who would be tested in regards to his real motive of worship. Satan was allowed to brutalize the life of Job for a season of time in attempt to coerce Job to blaspheme.
But God was doing more than making a point at Job’s expense. God wanted to bless Job with more. However, a deficit in Job’s character limited God’s ability to bless him. Think of our character as a cup and when the cup is full it’s full, that’s it. Regardless of the amount of water poured our cup will only hold so much. God wants to bless His children but their character limits the amount they can receive. By taking Job thru a spiritual boot camp, Job’s character was refined and his cup enlarged.
During his time of grief and loss, Job thought that God must hate him. On the contrary, God loved Job enough to break him, refine his character, and remake him into a better man. A brief verse at the end of the Book of Job gives us this insight, “The LORD blessed the latter part of Job’s life more than the first…”.
After his personal spiritual boot camp, Job was able to receive twice as many blessings from the Lord.
God desires to rain down blessings upon us, His children. He loves us enough to take us thru spiritual boot camp wherein our cup of character is enlarged. Understand, God will break us by shattering our sense of pride and independence. Then He will remake us into people of humility, faith and compassion. God will walk with us thru the fire and the flood and in the end by His grace He will transform us into the image His Son Jesus.