Streams in the Desert

Devotional For

January 16

      Faith Grows Amid Storms
      
      "He hath acquainted himself with my beaten path. When he hath searched me out, I shall come out shining" (Job 23:10, free translation).
      
      Faith grows amid storms"--just four words, but oh, how full of import to the soul who has been in the storms!
      
      Faith is that God-given faculty which, when exercised, brings the unseen into plain view, and by which the impossible things are made possible. It deals with supernaturals.
      
      But it "grows amid storms"; that is, where there are disturbances in the spiritual atmosphere. Storms are caused by the conflicts of elements; and the storms of the spiritual world are conflicts with hostile elements.
      
      In such an atmosphere faith finds its most productive soil; in such an element it comes more quickly to full fruition.
      
      The staunchest tree is not found in the shelter of the forest, but out in the open where the winds from every quarter beat upon it, and bend and twist it until it becomes a giant in stature this is the tree which the mechanic wants his tools made of, and the wagon-maker seeks.
      
      So in the spiritual world, when you see a giant, remember the road you must travel to come up to his side is not along the sunny lane where wild flowers ever bloom; but a steep, rocky, narrow pathway where the blasts of hell will almost blow you off your feet; where the sharp rocks cut the flesh, where the projecting thorns scratch the brow, and the venomous beasts hiss on every side.
      
      It is a pathway of sorrow and joy, of suffering and healing balm, of tears and smiles, of trials and victories, of conflicts and triumphs, of hardships and perils and buffetings, of persecutions and misunderstandings, of troubles and distress; through all of which we are made more than conquerors through Him who loves us.
      
      "Amid storms." Right in the midst where it is fiercest. You may shrink back from the ordeal of a fierce storm of trial...but go in! God is there to meet you in the center of all your trials, and to whisper His secrets which will make you come forth with a shining face and an indomitable faith that all the demons of hell shall never afterwards cause to waver. --E. A. Kilbourne