Precious Things - Profit From Pressure
Unknown Author
Table of Contents
Precious Things
THE MOST PRECIOUS THINGS in the world are often the product of the most adverse circumstances. Take pearls and diamonds for instance. I have found pearls in the shell of on oyster. Scientists tell us that the pearl is the result of a speck of sand getting into the shell and irritating the fish so that it has to build a sort of protective covering around it. That in the end becomes the pearl. In the case of diamonds it is intense heat and terrific pressure that makes diamonds out of ordinary carbon. There are myriads of grains of sand and lots of pieces of carbon lying around that are never transmuted into precious stones. There is a parallel here of life. It is the finest characters that are produced in the white heat of suffering and the intense pressure of circumstances. Remember that, if you are being called upon to endure burdens that seem at times greater than you can bear It may be that God is preparing you by pressure and suffering to shine forth like a precious stone, a sparkling jewel for the King of kings.
The tendency of each of us is to think that our lot is much heavier than that of someone else. And that someone Is no doubt thinking the some thing. If we are Christians we know that God will never lay upon us burdens greater than we can bear, but will with them as with temptation always provide a way of escape or some blessed antidote or anodyne. Always He will temper the wind to the shorn lamb. It may, of course, be quite true that others have much less suffering and sorrow than we hove, but may that not be because God has entrusted us with something He could not trust them with. We must wait the end of the race before we appraise correctly what has been done in our lives. God has a plan and purpose for us, and the circumstances that so distress us may be part of the Divine machinery intended to produce the beautiful diamond that will in the end make us shine like the stars of the morning when the Lord makes up His jewels. Paul speaks of our sufferings here as being but for a moment, and In the perspective of eternity he is right. Even at the longest "life's little day" for all of us must soon be over, and the sufferings of today, no matter how Intense, will forever be forgotten In the glories of that great tomorrow soon to be revealed.
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