Trials Transform Us
2 Chronicles 33:12. Now when he was in affliction, he implored the LORD his God, and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers.
Manasseh was just twelve years old when he began to reign over Judah, he didn't follow the steps of his father Hezekiah, he did evil in the sight of God, worshiped idols and performed sorcery, he even made the people of Judah and the inhabitant of Jerusalem to do more evil than the nations God had destroyed before them.
Some people would never come to the Lord at all, and would have been lost forever, if it were not for ‘problems’. For many years, King Manasseh lived as a filthy vicious idol worshipper.
The Lord sent prophets to warn him and his people, but they paid no attention. Things seemed to be going very well. Then, the Lord took a different approach. He prompted a foreign army to launch an invasion (2 Chro 33:10,11). At last, God got the king’s attention (vv. 12,13).
It is easy to ignore an occasional word of warning from a preacher, but it is not so easy to ignore hooks in your flesh, chains on your arms and legs, and bars on your cell. God used pain and prison to change Manasseh’s heart, when every other measure had failed, and still today, God sometimes uses similar strategies to bring people back to Him anyone who is derailing and ignores the message of peace (Psalm 119:67, 71, 75).
You may be experiencing problems, and be thinking your troubles mean that God doesn’t care for you. But often, pain is the way a loving God moves us to give up on ourselves and find life and joy in Him.
On many occasions when the children of Israel would sin against God, He will send them to slavery, not from a heart of wickedness but of love in other to bring back their senses and make them understand that He is the only true God.
The trials you are going through is to transform you from pride to humbleness, self-sufficiency to God's sufficiency, from immoralities to living righteously and from the gate of hell to your name being in the book of life.
If King Nebuchadnezzar had not gone exile to the animal kingdom, he wouldn't have realised the God of the Hebrews is the only true God.
Learn the hard lesson that God is teaching you. Because you have rejected His messages of peace, Let your troubles humble your knees in prayer. Put your faith in Jesus.
Ask God to forgive you, for Jesus’ sake. Restoration is the result, and happiness, the experience.
God bless you.
Prayer key:
1. Lord, thank you for the blessing of a new day today in Jesus Christ name.
2. Lord, forgive me for my stubbornness in Jesus Christ name.
3. Lord, help me to understand and know when you speak to me in Jesus Christ name.
4. Give me the grace to yield to your warning, teaching and correction in Jesus Christ name
5. Thank you Lord for answered prayers in Jesus Christ name.