SCRIPTURE:

Psalm 25:4-5 (NIV)
4 Show me your ways, Lord, teach me your paths. 5 Guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.

Isaiah 45:3 (NLT)
3 And I will give you treasures hidden in the darkness—secret riches. I will do this so you may know that I am the Lord, the God of Israel, the one who calls you by name.

DEVO:

Do you remember your favorite teacher growing up in school? I do. Her name was Mrs. Norton. She was my 7th grade and 8th grade English teacher. She knew I had a knack for writing. She took note of my love for literature. She saw something in me. She pushed me harder than any teacher had up to that point. But what made Mrs. Norton such a fantastic teacher is that rather than just lecturing us day in and day out, she used class time to lead us into discovery ourselves. She took us on intellectual journeys. She involved us in discussion. Because we were empowered to make these discoveries ourselves, the lessons she imparted to us have stuck with me.

In college, I majored in Communications and one of the old adages we learned was this: “If you inform them, they may hear it. If you illustrate it for them, they may understand it. If you involve them, they’ll remember it.” This adage represents the distinctive impact of three major teaching styles based on three major learning styles -- auditory, visual, and kinesthetic. Let me unpack these.

Auditory learners learn well by hearing information and holding it like a sponge. Very few people can learn significant amounts of information in this way. It’s possible, but not prevalent. Visual learners learn by seeing something illustrated or demonstrated. They like object lessons. More people learn in this fashion. And yet there is an even more retentive style of learning and thus a more effective way to teach, and that is kinesthetic -- involving your students on the discovery journey. This method takes a considerable amount of time and effort, but it’s extremely effective. It’s the difference between lecturing on surfing, showing someone a video of someone surfing and actually taking someone surfing. Do you see how the latter would prove to be more memorable?

Isaiah 30 refers to God as a Teacher. Personally, I believe that God isn’t just a teacher, but He (namely Jesus) is the greatest teacher that ever lived. Even secular scholars who study the life and teachings of Jesus concede that He was the most influential and effective teacher of all time. If He was that while He walked this earth, don’t you think He’d still be that in each of our lives today? And as we’ve already established, the greatest teachers don’t merely tell us or show us, they lead us to the truth. 

This is what God does as He walks us through our valley. He is inviting us to open up our hearts and eyes to new discoveries, deeper insights, and a more personal connection with Him.

I used to wonder why God doesn’t rescue us from our suffering as soon as we recognize the need for Him in the midst of it. I had a very primitive view of our valleys in life, believing that they were a result of a brief lapse in judgement or trust on our part and that God’s goal for us in our pain was to recognize that we’ve somehow strayed away, and we need to turn back to him. Naturally, I thought that once we turned back we would immediately find ourselves, poof! out of the valley. In fact, I’ve heard many sermons that espoused the idea that once we repent, God will rescue us from the mess we’ve created and we’ll once again find ourselves standing firmly on a rock living the blessed life.

What we’ve discovered on this journey so far, however, is that seasons of trial may have nothing to do with our righteousness or lack thereof. The fact that we’ve found ourselves in a valley gives no indication as to whether or not we caused it. There are many times God allows us to go through suffering not as punishment for something we’ve done wrong, but as preparation for a greater potential in our future. I’ve learned that valleys are absolutely places where God is inviting us into repentance, but unlike what I previously believed, each moment of concession doesn’t suddenly time-warp us out of our pain, it merely proves to be another step through the valley. These valleys, if we embrace them, can be classroom experiences where we learn a great deal about ourselves, about this world, and most importantly about God. 

What if the valley holds a key for life. What the valley by nature strips away is all the trivial of our lives and narrows our focus to what’s most important. What if the most important thing about this life is to know Jesus? What if God has allowed this trial in your life as a way to invite you to get to know Him better?

Wow, Davey! That’s quite an assertion to make. Maybe it is, but humor me for a second. Logically speaking, if God is who He says He is, then us getting to know Him better will only lead to one thing -- falling more in love with Him. His character doesn’t just invite us to love Him, it compels us to. And if we fell more in love with Him, wouldn’t we trust Him more fully? And if we trusted Him more fully, wouldn't we follow Him more closely? And that in turn would be our ticket to the most fulfilled life we could live -- whether we find ourselves in a valley or out of one. So perhaps the greatest thing that could happen to us is that rather than God just rescuing us out of a valley, He leads us straight through it so we have an opportunity to get to know Him more intimately.

I wonder if this is why the Psalmist uses all third person language (He is my shepherd, He restores, He leads me, etc) in the first three verses of Psalm 23. These verses seem to describe seasons that are going well, mountain-top experiences if you will. However, the personhood shifts to second person language (“You are with me”) at verse four. It’s as if the Psalmist is saying that when we’re on the mountaintops of life, when things are going well for us, we can know about God, but it’s only in the valleys that we can truly get to know God on an intimate level.

Rather than looking to God to get us out of the valley, what if we submitted ourselves to the classroom experience God intends to turn this valley into? What if this valley is preparation for the next great assignment and adventure God has for us? How might it change the way you approach your suffering?

This is why we can glean as much as we have thus far from the stories of Job and Joseph and David and Ruth and all the other prominent Old Testament characters. Because God didn’t just show up to them and solely tell them who He was (though He did that). And he didn’t settle for merely demonstrating His power to them (though He did that on occasion as well). God entered into their stories, invited them to trust Him, took them by the hand and led them through their valleys into their redemptive purpose. Why? So their life would be a message. So their experience could be a testimony. This is the way of our God. He consistently is working out your redemption story to play the role of a beacon of hope in someone else’s redemption story. He wants to draw out of you the stuff He’s putting in you so it can display the excellencies of His glory. When others see what God has brought you through, they’ll get encouraged, and they’ll be inspired to place their trust in Him as well. When someone hears the story of how God brought you through, their confidence in Him will be reignited. 

Part of living out a redemptive story is welcoming the ways God is using your story to redeem others as well. In fact, I believe that God’s redemption for our lives doesn’t necessarily occur when he restores everything back to us that we’ve lost in our trial. Although I do believe he is making a plan for that. His plan for our lives isn’t just consolation, as Timothy Keller writes in Walking with God Through Pain and Suffering, but it’s full restoration. 

However, there is an ingredient to the recipe of our redemptive narrative that involves us leaning into the seasons where God is revealing more to us by involving us in someone else’s healing journey. I mean, what’s more powerful? Simply hearing about God’s power to heal and redeem or us seeing it firsthand? Afterall, how can you know God as a Healer unless you need healing? How can you know God as a Provider unless you need provision? How can you know God as a Restorer unless you need restoring? It’s our lack that reveals the power and timeliness of our Savior.

I truly believe that your redemptive story begins when you lean into God’s process and you allow Him to turn your pain into something that helps others in their pain. It’s that kind of purpose that God is inviting each of us into.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND JOURNALING:

1. What are some of the lessons you’ve been learning through the valleys in your life? 

2. How has tragedy been an invitation to know God better? How have you gained new insight and perspective into who God is? 

3. How could you lean into God’s process in turning your pain into purpose? What would that look like practically?

PRAYER:

Lord, you are a Good Teacher. You know exactly the right paths you need to lead me down to show me Your love for me. Thank you for caring for me enough to instruct me in your ways. Give me a fresh insight into who You are and what You desire for my life. Give me the heart of a student as I tune in to Your truths.