Our faith is the center of the target God aims at when He tests us, and if any gift escapes untested, it certainly will not be our faith.

There is nothing that pierces faith to its very marrow—to find whether or not it is the faith of those who are immortal—like shooting the arrow of the feeling of being deserted into it.

And only genuine faith will escape unharmed from the midst of the battle after having been stripped of its armor of earthly enjoyment and after having endured the circumstances coming against it that the powerful hand of God has allowed.

Faith must be tested, and the sense of feeling deserted is “the furnace heated seven times hotter than usual” (Daniel 3:19) into which it may be thrown.

Blessed is the person who endures such an ordeal! CHARLES H. SPURGEON

Paul said, “I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7), but his head was removed! They cut it off, but they could not touch his faith.

This great apostle to the Gentiles rejoiced in three things: he had “fought the good fight,” he had “finished the race,” and he had “kept the faith.”

So what was the value of everything else? The apostle Paul had won the race and gained the ultimate prize—he had won not only the admiration of those on earth today but also the admiration of heaven.

So why do we not live as if it pays to lose “all things . . . that [we] may gain Christ” (Philippians 3:8)?

Why are we not as loyal to the truth as Paul was? It is because our math is different—he counted in a different way than we do.

What we count as gain, he counted as loss.

If we desire to ultimately wear the same crown, we must have his faith and live it.

This is a promise given to you for the difficult places in which you may find yourself—a promise of safety and life even in the midst of tremendous pressure. And it is a promise that adjusts itself to fit the times as they continue to grow more difficult, as we approach the end of this age and the tribulation period.

What does it mean when it says that you will “escape with your life”? It means your life will be snatched from the jaws of the Enemy, as David snatched the lamb from the lion. It does not mean you will be spared the heat of the battle and confrontation with your foes, but it means “a table before [you] in the presence of [your] enemies” (Psalm 23:5), a shelter from the storm, a fortress amid the foe, and a life preserved in the face of continual pressure. It means comfort and hope from God, such as Paul received when he and his friends “were under great pressure, far beyond [their] ability to endure, so that [they] despaired even of life” (2 Corinthians 1:8). And it means the Lord’s divine help, such as when Paul’s “thorn in the flesh” (2 Corinthians 12:7 KJV) remained, but the power of Christ came to rest upon him, and he learned that God’s “grace is sufficient” (2 Corinthians 12:9).

May the Lord “wherever you go . . . let you escape with your life” and help you today to be victorious in your difficulties.

We often pray to be delivered from afflictions, and even trust God that we will be. But we do not pray for Him to make us what we should be while in the midst of the afflictions. Nor do we pray that we would be able to live within them, for however long they may last, in the complete awareness that we are held and sheltered by the Lord and can therefore continue within them without suffering any harm.

The Savior endured an especially difficult test in the wilderness while in the presence of Satan for forty days and nights, His human nature weakened by the need for food and rest. The three Hebrew young men were kept for a time in the flames of “the furnace heated seven times hotter than usual” (Daniel 3:19). In spite of being forced to endure the tyrant’s last method of torture, they remained calm and composed as they waited for their time of deliverance to come. And after surviving an entire night sitting among the lions, “when Daniel was lifted from the den, no wound was found on him, because he had trusted in his God” (Daniel 6:23).

They were able to endure in the presence of their enemies because they dwelt in the presence of their God.

The following story was related by Mrs. Charles H. Spurgeon, who suffered greatly with poor health for more than twenty-five years: “At the end of a dull and dreary day, I lay resting on my couch as the night grew darker. Although my room was bright and cozy, some of the darkness outside seemed to have entered my soul and obscured its spiritual vision. In vain I tried to see the sovereign hand that I knew held mine and that guided my fog-surrounded feet along a steep and slippery path of suffering.

“With a sorrowful heart I asked, ‘Why does the Lord deal with a child of His in this way? Why does He so often send such sharp and bitter pain to visit me? Why does He allow this lingering weakness to hinder the sweet service I long to render to His poor servants?’

“These impatient questions were quickly answered through a very strange language. Yet no interpreter was needed except the mindful whisper of my heart. For a while silence reigned in the little room, being broken only by the crackling of an oak log burning in the fireplace. Suddenly I heard a sweet, soft sound: a faint, yet clear, musical note, like the tender trill of a robin beneath my window.

“I asked aloud, ‘What can that be? Surely no bird can be singing outside at this time of year or night.’ But again came the faint, mournful notes, so sweet and melodious, yet mysterious enough to cause us to wonder. Then my friend exclaimed, ‘It’s coming from the log on the fire!’ The fire was unshackling the imprisoned music from deep within the old oak’s heart!

“Perhaps the oak had acquired this song during the days when all was well with him—when birds sang merrily on his branches, and while the soft sunlight streaked his tender leaves with gold. But he had grown old and hard since then. Ring after ring of knotty growth had sealed up his long-forgotten melody, until the fiery tongues of the flames consumed his callousness. The intense heat of the fire wrenched from him both a song and a sacrifice at once. Then I realized: when the fires of affliction draw songs of praise from us, we are indeed purified, and our God is glorified!

“Maybe some of us are like this old oak log: cold, hard, unfeeling, and never singing any melodious sounds. It is the fires burning around us that release notes of trust in God and bring cheerful compliance with His will. As I thought of this, the fire burned, and my soul found sweet comfort in the parable so strangely revealed before me.

“Yes, singing in the fire! God helping us, sometimes using the only way He can to get harmony from our hard and apathetic hearts. Then, let the furnace be ‘heated seven times hotter than usual’ [Daniel 3:19].”

O believer , what a glorious assur ance this verse is! What confi dence I have because “the way that I take”—this way of trials and tears, however winding, hidden, or tangled—“He knows”! When the “furnace [is] heated seven times hotter than usual” (Daniel 3:19), I can know He still lights my way. There is an almighty Guide who knows and directs my steps, whether they lead to the bitter water at the well of Marah or to the joy and refreshment of the oasis at Elim (Exodus 15:23, 27).

The way is dark to the Egyptian s yet has its own pillar of cloud and fire for God’ s Israel. The furnace may be hot, but not only can I trust the hand that lights the fire, I can also have the assurance the fire will not consume but only refine. And when the refining process is complete, not a moment too soon or too late, “I will come forth as gold” (Job 23:10).

When I feel God is the farthest away , He is often the nearest to me. “When my spirit grows faint within me, it is you who watch over my way” (Psalm 142:3). Do we know of another who shines brighter than the most radiant sunlight, who meets us in our room with the first wakin g light, who has an infinitely tender and compassionate watchfulness over us throughout our day , and who “knows the way that [we] take”?

The world, during a time of adversity , speaks of “providence” with a total lack of understanding. They dethrone God, who is the living, guiding Sovereign of the universe, to some inanimate, dead abstraction . What they call “providence” they see as occurrences of fate, reducing God from His position as our acting, powerful, and personal Jehovah.

The pain would be removed from many an agonizing trial if only I could see what Job saw during his time of severe affliction, when all earthly hope lay dashed at his feet. He saw nothing but the hand of God—God’ s hand behind the swords of the Sabeans who attacked his servant s and cattle, and behind the devastating lightning; God’ s hand giving wings to the mighty desert winds, which swept away his children; and God’ s hand in the dreadful silence of his shattered home.

Thus, seeing God in everything, Job could say, “The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised” (Job 1:21). Yet his faith reached its zenith when this once-powerful prince of the desert “sat among the ashes ” (Job 2:8) and still could say, “Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him” (Job 13:15). J. R. M ACDUFF