Trial by Fire

“Then the word of the Lord came to him: “Get up, go to Zarephath that belongs to Sidon and stay there. Look, I have commanded a woman who is a widow to provide for you there’” (1 Kings 17:8-9)

In the middle of a desert season, you might feel like the enemy is bearing down on you. Sometimes, in the midst of our most difficult seasons, we end up in the place where the enemy’s attack is most prevalent.

While Elijah is still in the desert, God calls him to go somewhere else. He tells him to go to Zarephath, which just so happens to be the hometown of Jezebel, the wife of Ahab, king of Israel. Jezebel hates Elijah’s God, and she does everything she can to spite those who believe in Him. Jezebel is someone who seems mad with rage against God, and because she’s the queen, she has both power and authority, yet God tells Elijah to go to her city.

Elijah is at the enemy’s back door. How often do we feel that when we are at our worst, the enemy seems so close? The places of obscurity and adversity are where we really learn to live out our faith.

It’s so easy to live our best lives when people applaud us and we’re surrounded by people who admire our faith. But what about when we’re in the center of the desert and our faith is being held to the fire? How faithful are we when no one is watching and it's just us and God out in the wilderness?

What does God do within us in the wilderness that He can’t do someplace else?

He puts a hope deep inside us, but this hope is only born out of struggle. It’s made from scratch—no pretenses, no cookie-cutter Christianity. This hope bears deep roots. It’s what makes up your character; it’s what shapes your heart. In the desert, the dry winds roll in and your roots get exposed, so they must be deep. This kind of hope is found only in destitute places. We don’t have a need for it in our golden seasons, but when we find ourselves in the wilderness, our faith gets tested, and God begins to grow a new hope in us that we never knew we needed.

It's a hope against the impossible odds. He grows your roots deeper in Him because one day when adversity comes, you need to be able to withstand it, and this kind of faith doesn’t just happen—it’s cultivated. It’s learned. Cookie-cutter Christianity doesn’t work here because your enemy is cut-throat, dangerous, and trying to take you out.

God’s going to call you to hard places in your life, and when you’re at hell’s back door, you need a faith that doesn’t kindly suggest for the enemy to take a step back. You need a faith that makes the demons run because you struggled in the desert with God and found out just how strong He is.

We don’t learn endurance by being cooped up and comfortable. We learn endurance when our faith is put through the fire.