“For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth” (Job 19:25).

When Abraham took his son Isaac to Mt. Moriah to be sacrificed, his testimony in the midst of the trial was “God will provide Himself a lamb for a burnt-offering” (Genesis 22:8), and after this faithful saying became sight, Abraham called the place “Jehovah-Jireh” or “Jehovah will see to it” (Genesis 22:14).

Trials are a constant reminder in our lives of sin’s temporary intrusion into God’s perfect universe, but at the same time, they are a consistent exercise that causes us to reaffirm, as Abraham did, and as Job did in our text verse, that God is in control, and though we suffer momentarily, “death is swallowed up in victory” (I Corinthians 15:54).

The trying of our faith “worketh patience” (James 1:3) and patience is cheerful waiting or hopeful endurance. “For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope. . . . But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it” (Romans 8:22–25).

“For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; While we look not at the things which are seen (our trials and circumstances), but at the things which are not seen” (II Corinthians 4:17,18). “Though now for a season if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: That the trial of your faith . . . might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ: Whom having not seen, ye love” (I Peter 1:6–8). CJH