The crucible is for silver, and the furnace is for gold,
and the Lord tests hearts.
Times of testing come. They are not pleasant or enjoyable but are in fact always discomfortingly tense and sometimes even excruciatingly painful. We would avoid the pain if we could and indeed we try. In fact, in Buddhist tradition the elimination of suffering is one of the noblest virtues of a life well lived. But honestly, who has done it? And today's Lesson should make us ask who would wish to?
Paula D'Arcy says, "God comes to us disguised as our lives." In other words, pain, suffering, and the struggle of life are how God gets at us. These are how God tempers and purifies us.
When a metal is purified its base property is separated and extracted from the ore by intense heat. It is the same with us. Holiness is not possible without heat -- white, searing heat. This process of purification is never something we would chose for ourselves and is always something we doubt we can endure. But there we are; and we do endure.
God comes to us disguised as our lives. And sometimes the disguise is a fiery, fiery furnace. From the refiner's fire there really is no escape.
But what is left when the fire has done its work and we have been made is something even more precious than even gold or silver, something we call "soul".
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