Tested

             Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. (Psalm 139:23-24)

 

                My favorite psalm and what has become a beloved passage. It hasn’t always been. I remember hating it because being searched, tested, and known led to the unavoidable conclusion that I would be found guilty and wanting and therefore be a source of embarrassment to God at best and rejected by Him at worst. I’ve written about this before.

            Today, for a change of pace, let’s look at the word test. How does God test us?

By giving us what we want.

By not giving us what we want.

By giving us what we wanted to avoid.

By requiring that we give what we don’t want to give.

By giving what we wanted to someone else.

By demanding obedience.

By giving us options.

            Feel free to add to the list. The point is that sometimes we think God is not testing us because things are going the way we want, or that He is testing us because  they’re not – but the reverse may be the case. Our anxious thoughts may have to do with things going wrong or right.

            The offensive way in us may be pride, hatred, anger, belligerence, impatience, unkindness, evil, lack of faith, abusiveness, lack of self-control, self-indulgence, fear, being easily offended, disobedience, or any of several others.

            But here’s the big problem for us. We can’t see these things. If we could consistently see them, we’d do so much better. When we are tested, we discover them, and only then can we look to God for salvation from them.