GOD THE BUILDER

 Dear friends,
        In Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis devotes his chapter “Counting the Cost” to explaining the troubles a Christian experiences. Among his many thoughts, he wrote, “We must not be surprised if we are in for a rough time.” He goes on to explain that when a person is following Christ, he feels that things should now go fairly smoothly in life. Thus, when troubles come along, he becomes disappointed and wonders why God is letting all this happen now.
        But, Lewis tells us, God is helping us become better people. He is moving us to a higher level, putting us in situations where we will have to be braver, more patient and more loving than we ever thought possible. It may seem unnecessary to us, but that’s because we don’t realize the tremendous thing God wants to make of our life.
        He uses an example: Imagine we are a living house that needs some fixing. We can understand we need some changes, so we can accept that God needs to come and rebuild things here and there. At first, we can understand why He is fixing our leaky plumbing, or repairing our roof, or replacing our drafty windows.
        But then God goes too far. He starts knocking walls out and it hurts! God's major repairs make so sense. Why is God doing it this way? He doesn’t need to knock us around like this!
        We don’t realize this is happening because God is building a different house from the one we've had and thought we’d like. He is adding another room, building a tower or making a courtyard. We were satisfied being a nice little cottage, but God is building us into a palace, and He intends to come and live in it Himself. But this is painful!
        Now, we surely can prevent God from doing this. People do it every day by just walking away from Him, denying Him, rationalizing that He doesn't exist. But If we choose to let Him rebuild us, then He will take the weakest and draftiest of us and build us into a fine, strong and house that will bless Him and others around us. The process may be long and painful at times, but this is what God wants for us – the best and nothing less. 
        This is why He told us through the Apostle Peter, “[You are] living stones, being built up as a spiritual house.” (2 Peter 2:5)

Have your walls been shaking lately?