Refining

Just when it doesn’t feel like the furnace could get any hotter, He turns up the heat. And it’s okay, just as long as He never leaves me nor forsakes me. I confess I don’t always carry this same tune in the midst of my darkest minutes, when I’m swirling around in the middle of the flame. Sometimes I even need to be sent to time-out…permanently. This is when I know that He is doing a work in my heart. He is refining me. And though refining is never pleasant in the middle of the process, when the dross is slowly, painstakingly heaving its way upward to the surface, it’s something from which I never want to be exempt. I want to grow closer to my God in this life, and I know there is perhaps no better way than being forced into needing His closeness, longing for His cheek next to mine, for His fingers to wipe away my tears.

It’s a hard road, but if it means I will be more like Christ at the end of it, I hope to always want to be the first to traverse it.