Hammer or Nail

I recently read this, “Sometimes in life you’re the hammer sometimes you’re the nail.” It is a quote from Lance Armstrong after losing a leg of the Tour de France a few years ago.  I know as individuals go he might not be the best role model given his current situation but to be honest he is just a human being like the rest of us. He had a desire to be the best in his sport and was willing to do whatever it took to get there. How many of us have not done that very same thing in our own life. Like everything we experience there is always a lesson to be learned from it. I was reading in the book of Isaiah this morning and as we prepare to close out another year; that depending on what happened in your life, might mean it was great or it was the worst year yet. It seems very appropriate for the future and I hope it helps to prepare you for what tomorrow and the New Year brings.

7 The craftsman strengthens the goldsmith, and he who smooths with the hammer him who strikes the anvil, saying of the soldering, “It is good”; and they strengthen it with nails so that it cannot be moved.

Isaiah 41:7 (ESV)

As a craftsman prepares his work no matter what he builds it out of there is a certain amount of pressure that must be applied to make the correct changes to its form. The man who works with metals understands that the more times the metal is heated and folded and shaped the harder the metal becomes. I once worked in a draw room making steel cable into drill bits. It was an experience I will never forget.  I started with a roll of steel cable 5/8 of an inch in diameter and after several passes through a steel dye of a smaller size that same cable would measure ¼ of an inch in diameter. But it also became harder and less flexible.

Now how that applies to the passage of scripture is simple the things that we endure and experience in our lives are there to smooth out or shape us into whom we are and will become. It always amazed me to watch that cable change from one thickness to the next. Just as I am always amazed at what the trials we face as Christians; does to grow us to be more like Christ. No one enjoys the trials, but when we allow God; the craftsman of our beings, to sometimes use a hammer on us we become what He always intended for us to be. I pray that this coming year we learn to accept the shaping God brings into our lives so that we can be the individuals He created. The Christian life is a Journey I pray you take it in the New Year and I can promise you the paths will lead to unexpected blessings in your life and the lives of those around you. Have a Happy and Blessed New Year.