God’s Test
Thirty-three words changed the world.
Have you ever been tested? Let's take it up a notch. Have you ever been tested where something foundational got put on the line — your character, your convictions, your beliefs? Now go one more level. Have you ever been tested where your life was on the line?
God tests us. We ask the question all day long: "Why does a loving God allow bad things to happen?" Sometimes other people make bad decisions and we feel the pain. Sometimes we make the bad decisions and we feel the weight of our own choices. And the devil never misses a chance to throw in temptation, accusation, doubt. But when God tests us? We call that unloving. I want to challenge that. God shows us his love precisely when he tests us.
God gave us freedom to think, say, and do what we want — every moment, every day. That's free will. That freedom is what lets us choose him as Lord and Savior. Or walk away and be our own champion instead. That's real love. The One who made us — every gift, talent, ability, quirk — lets us choose him, in the good and the bad. He lets us stand in the middle of everything the world offers and asks: will you still choose me?
Here's an example. When Kristin said "yes" to marrying me, I didn't ask her to prove her love by locking herself in a room with no contact from the outside world. I asked her to prove it by living every day in a world full of other options for her time, her energy, her love. Every day she chooses me over all of it — that tells me something. We've been married over 38 years. That's a lot of committed, expressed love.
When God tests us, it's hard. He allows challenges that shake our whole life, and we feel isolated. There's a lot happening under the surface — his will, what's actually best for us, how he chooses to express his love. Some of it we understand. Some of it we never will. His test reveals the tough-love question underneath it all: will you love God in any situation? When God feels the farthest away, will you still love him? Will you still honor him?
In Acts 9, Ananias faces the ultimate test. God tells him to go pray for Saul — later known as Paul. Saul is notorious. He's made it his mission to hunt down, imprison, and even kill the early Christians for sharing about Jesus. Then a supernatural encounter with Jesus leaves Saul blind and broken. God has a plan for this man. He needs someone to pray for Saul's sight to return — and to commission him for the work ahead.
Ananias is caught in the middle. If this prompting isn't from God, he's walking straight into the hands of a murderer. If it is from God, he's still walking into the presence of a killer, with nothing but a prayer as his defense. Ananias trusts God anyway. He goes. He prays:
"Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit." (Acts 9:15–17 ESV)
Thirty-three words. They changed the world that day — and they're still changing it. Saul was healed. Baptized. Filled with the Holy Spirit. That one obedient prayer launched one of the greatest leaders the Christian faith has ever known. Saul — now Paul — carried the gospel beyond the Jewish nation. He wrote thirteen books of the New Testament. Generations have grown in their faith because of what happened in that room.
Here's the question that won't let me go: what if Ananias had said no? What if he'd said, "The cost is too high. I won't do it"? We'll never know what God would have done instead. But we do know this — with his life on the line, Ananias passed the greatest test he'd ever face.
You have that same choice today. What do you do when God tells you to do something? What do you do when he doesn't meet your expectations? When you feel the farthest from God — in your hope, your understanding, your faith — do you step toward him, or do you step away?
Take the step today. When you do, you change your world.
