Pearl Of Great Price

Why do we have to face the same trial over and over again? Why do we keep making the same stupid mistakes again and again? Why doesn’t the Lord remove the thorn in our flesh sooner? A weakness, an illness, a character flaw - these things work their way into our heart and soul and they hurt. And we pray and we ask for relief, and often we are comforted by the Spirit. The Lord fills us with His grace, covers us in peace and light and soothes our aching soul. But then we feel those pricks again from the same spiky thorn in our side, and we pray again, and again the Lord covers us with His peace and His light and His hope. And again. And again. Couldn’t the Lord just rip out the thing that is causing us so much pain? Why doesn’t He? When an oyster makes a pearl, it is because something small and irritating and potentially lethal has worked its way in. So the oyster coats the irritant in layer after layer of smooth, luminous coats of carbonite, both to soothe the irritation, to smooth out the spiky edges, and to prevent it from doing any lasting harm. The more and more layers that the pearl is covered in, the shinier it gets, because each layer shines back the light in its own special way. God does not alway remove the thorns from our side, because together He and we are engaged in a great work. We are crafting together a pearl of great price, and through patience and a great deal of faith on our part, and through layer after layer of soothing, luminous grace on His part, those sins that so easily beset us, the grief we can’t seem to get past, the despair that rears its ugly head over and over, the anger that erupts again and again, they will shine forth all the brighter and more beautiful. If it takes a thousand or a million or a billion layers of grace and peace and comfort, then so much the greater and more radiant will be our pearl in the end.