It's time of a test of learning patience.

[瑤翰 김요한]

  Jacob's life is just like the book of James.

After crossing the book of Hebrews, it connects to James, then Peter, and John.

By the way, John is love. Likewise, the Bible continues to progress backwards.

Jacob lived a life in which one state of being changed into another.

The book of James begins by saying, “James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, salute the twelve tribes scattered about” (James 1:1).

The 12 tribes are God's chosen people, implying that they are a tribe given God's guidance, God's responsibility, and God's promise.

In other words, it means the sons of Jacob.

The 12 tribes are the collective name for Judah and Israel with the kingship.

"James, a servant of God the Lord Jesus Christ to the twelve scattered tribes" refers to the whole invisible kingdom of God scattered throughout the world.

Since “the 12 tribes scattered” or “diaspora” has an article, it is a word spoken to ‘one community within it’, that is, to the whole of the church, the kingdom of God and the body of Christ.

Even in Hebrews, there are people who were cut off (Hebrews 2, 6, 10).

And then the 12 tribes come out.

The Bible cannot be broken. There are only 12 tribes.

The important thing for the 12 tribes, or all Israel, to go to Revelation is that we know through the Bible that we are included in it.

To the 12 tribes like this, "My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials" (James 1:2).

It means to regard trials as blessings and turn them into joy.

In the Sermon on the Mount, it says, “If you persecute, rejoice, for the reward in heaven is great” (Matthew 5:10-12).

The ability to regard trials as joy is the spiritual state of conquest and dominion.

When the book of Hebrews is fulfilled, it reaches such a level.

Just as Israel crossed the Red Sea from Egypt, took out Egypt's servile nature during their 40-year life in the wilderness, and then crossed the Jordan River and entered Canaan, it is to us as well.

There is a long journey of faith like the wilderness that changes the lifestyle of the world.

There is a long period in which we find ourselves transferred into Christ and walk silently to the throne of the Lord according to the teachings and guidance of the Spirit of Truth.

To meet various tests means to be surrounded by various types of tests in all directions.

It is like being trapped in a dry well. It's painful.

It is a word that turns into joy when we encounter a situation like this, but we are really struggling.

But if you ask why he asks you to rejoice, the answer is, "You know that the testing of your faith produces endurance" (James 1:3).

It means that if you cross the book of Hebrews and reach the level of becoming a reader of the book of James, you will know that the test of faith produces endurance.

The testing of faith is like a certificate of acceptance that you receive after passing through a test or trial.

Faith comes from the Word.

The difference between those who have fallen into temptation and those who have passed the test of faith is whether or not they have faith by the Word.

"Because you know how to produce patience" The word to achieve patience is not to suppress and endure, but to lie on your face before God and wait.

It is an attitude that continues unwaveringly without bowing to the trials that surround it.

Ah! Do I really have this belief? It's a very painful journey.

However, the labor of giving birth to a pregnant  woman, just as joy is a reserved pain,  Israe is a chosen in Christ,, and God's promise is being fulfilled for Israe , although the test of reality is painful, 

Like watching a video, it is like a drama of salvation where you see the results that have already been decided by the promise.

That's why he says, "Let patience be perfected, so that you may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing" (James 1:4).

The word to make patience perfect means to let that patience do the whole thing.

Patience comes from faith and becomes a being in me.

It is about to become a personality. Like Jacob's change after crossing the Jabbok River.

Patience (Hipomone) means to live below.

By keeping the commandments to become one with Jesus Christ in the Spirit of truth, we abide in the Lord and remain in a spiritual state where the Father and the Son are together (John 14:23)

This is the life journey of Christians on this earth.

It is patience to become a life that lives according to the work of Christ in us.

"You may be perfect and entire" is the creation ministry that fulfills the image of God.

This is the process of becoming an heir who receives all of God.

Therefore, we must be able to handle God's plan of creation and its blueprint, which said, "Let them have dominion" (Genesis 1:26).

Just as the late Samsung Chairman Lee Byung-cheol passed on Samsung to Lee Kun-hee, the third of his sons.

‘In order to be wanting nothing’ means a person who lacks nothing in any case.

If you say, 'That person is great, but his will is weak', you shouldn't come out like this.

If I rearrange today's Word,  trials of many kinds are achieve the test of faith, and patience is the work and study that makes it perfect.

Through this process, you become fully equipped and perfect heirs of God.

Therefore, when trials come, he tells us to turn them into joy.

The target is 'my brothers'.

They are not Jacob's 12 fleshly sons, but strangers who have Christ as their head in Christ and become members of his body and are scattered throughout the world.

Therefore, these are the words spoken to the spiritual Israel in Christ.

Written by Ptr. Yohan Kim.

Translated by  Nancy Chung

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