Amanda BethSharing the Truths Behind the TRUTH

Jun 13th Monday’s Guest Blog: Melissa Divelbiss

Made in the Shade

This year, my boys and I are planning to convert our underused sandbox into a raised vegetable or flower garden. I’ve been doing some research on what to plant and came across some interesting information about rhubarb.

According to several websites, rhubarb is a very winter hardy, drought resistant perennial. The quality of the crop depends on several factors. It will thrive in cooler temperatures and requires manure. Lots and lots of manure. But according to some farmers, the very best yields come from plants forced, indoors, in cool, dark environments. I found out that rhubarb grown for personal use might grow to about a foot in length, at most. But rhubarb cultivated in dark, damp spaces, like cellars, can reach two or three feet in height. It is this growing method that is favored by farms that grow it for commercial purposes.

So what’s the point? The point is that God seems to favor this method as well. Men like Joseph understood that. The favored son of Jacob had a bright future ahead. His God given dreams revealed he would be a great leader, even having authority over  his older brothers. But at times, his dreams must have seemed more like nightmares having been sold into slavery, accused of assaulting his employer’s wife, thrown into prison, and forgotten by the fellow inmate he had encouraged in that cell. (Genesis 37-47)

David was just a young shepherd boy when he was chosen by God to be the next king of Israel. But his days on the throne were preempted by many days of serving his half crazed predecessor. He too found himself in the darkest places, constantly on the run from Saul, reduced to hiding like an animal from this man obsessed with killing him.
(1 Samuel 16-2 Samuel 2)

Even for Christ Himself, it was 30 years before He was thrust into His divine spotlight. And though much of that time was filled with signs and miracles, it was also filled with loss of privacy, angry crowds, and eventually death.

2 Peter 1:3-7 says:

”…seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. Now for this reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love.”

God sized callings require a spiritual maturity that is often forged in dark, unseen places. Our trials and tests, like fertilizer, are often smelly, dirty things, but they shape our character to fit the mold of who God intends for us to be. They can produce results in our lives that not only benefit us but others as well. But most importantly, when committed into His hands, they become something beautiful and God honoring which is always the primary intent of anything assigned by God.

”For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (2Peter 1:8)

To the man or woman of God who finds themselves in a dark place today, be encouraged. God has not forgotten His plans for you.

”He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1:6)

Great deeds may be accomplished in the light. But it is great character, sown in the darkness, that guarantees a yield that is beneficial to many and glorifying to God. Bloom where you’re planted.

Melissa Divelbiss is married and the mother of two very busy boys, ages 6 and 11. She is a passionate follower of Jesus Christ and is the author of Filia Dei*, Daughter of God www.honeybeefiliadei.blogspot.com, a devotional blog started in the summer of 2010. Her “life verse” is John 10:10. 🙂

Note: Thank you, Melissa! What an encouraging message! Don’t despise our trials, rejoice that God is working something beautiful in us.