God's Call

I know that I said I would begin posting about Advent today, but Steve sent me something tonight that I just wanted to share with you. It is a great post by Os HilmanI have never heard of him, but Steve is currently reading one of his books and thinks he has some really good thoughts. This post actually came from his website at http://www.crosswalk.com/devotionals/marketplace/

The Depth and Width of Your Calling
2 Corinthians 1:6
If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer.

"God must love you a lot! He doesn't allow someone to go through the kinds of adversity you have experienced unless He has a special calling on your life." Those were the words said to me by two different mentors at two different times within a three-year period. Later I would learn another related truth from a respected man of God-a man who lives in another country, a man whom God uses throughout the globe. "The depth and width of your faith experiences are directly proportional to your calling." What were these men of God saying?
They were describing a process of preparation that God takes each of His leaders through when He plans to use them in significant ways. A "faith experience" is an event or "spiritual marker" in your life about which you can say, "That is where I saw God personally move in my life." It is an unmistakable event in which God showed Himself personally to you. It was the burning bush for Moses; the crossing of the Red Sea or the Jordan River for the nation of Israel; Jacob's encounter with the angel. It was the feeding of the 5,000 for the disciples. It was the time when you saw God face to face in your life.
If God has plans of using you in the lives of many others, you can expect that He is going to allow certain faith experiences to come into your life in order to build a foundation that will be solid. That foundation is what you will be able to look back on to keep you faithful to Him in the times of testing. Each of us must have personal faith experiences in which we experience God personally so that we can move in faith to whatever He may call us. Do you need a personal faith experience right now in your life? Pray that God will reveal Himself to you. He delights in doing that."

I don't know anyone who wants to go through trials, so while I appreciate everything the author has said here and the thoughts it provoked I don't know how anyone would be bold enough to say "yes I need a personal faith experience right now in my life" and that would mean trials or suffering. Maybe the point is if we know ahead of time that God will always bless us through suffering and use it for His divine purposes, we will be better prepared to accept it when we do have to go through it because let's face it, none of us will live life without some kind of adversity. That is why we look so forward to heaven.