“So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you must endure many trials for a little while. These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. You love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him now, you trust him; and you rejoice with a glorious, inexpressible joy. The reward for trusting him will be the salvation of your souls.”
1 Peter 1:6-9 NLT
I’ve had similar experiences, people mostly reject Christ and often times don’t end up talking to me anymore because I represented him accurately. The thing I struggle with is after the fact that happens, it usually messes with me because those people I thought of close friends or people I trusted in the past and I end up going against the mere things I represent. This is a place I need to grow in more of representing Christ accurately across all plains of life. I need to truth God no matter if I’m being ridiculed or not or if my life goes to chaos or not. I need to understand that I have peace and grace through Christ. In a other translation Peter says “rejoice” people may take that as a positive feeling, but Peter quickly acknowledges that his readers may be grieved or distressed by various trials in the present moment. So we may take this as rejoice can be both positive e and negative, but it is less a feeling that more about faith. It is less about maintaining some perfect emotional state and more about a declaration.
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