I think a lot of Christians believe that they have to be joyful and positive all of the time and never discuss or admit to the hard things in life. In fact, there are entire churches dedicated to never talking about sin, Satan or hell for fear of offender their parishioners; all the while forgetting that Jesus talked more about these things than anyone in the bible.

Peter says that we are tested by fire and fire is hot. Fire is uncomfortable. Fire makes you want to scream and cry out in pain, not plaster a smile on your face and tell everyone you’re doing great.

I think sometimes as believers in Jesus we feel pressure to "sell" our faith to those around us and in doing so we feel that we need to make it look appealing. Like selling someone a used car we highlight all of the good parts of our faith and hide the struggle and sin like a busted radiator or a muffler tied up with a coat hanger so you don’t know that it drags on the ground.

The truth is however that sometimes, a lot of times actually, my radiator is busted and my muffler is dragging and sending off sparks in every direction.

We live in a broken world filled with broken people, most of whom don’t believe that they are broken. We sin every day against each other and God and as a consequence we are on fire. So how can we pretend to not feel the flames?

There's a song that I love and one of the lines goes "You never said it would be easy, you only said I'd never go alone.” This song reminds me that the Lord doesn't promise we won’t suffer or that we'll be blessed with money, fame and happiness, but he does promise that he will never leave us or forsake us.

I have a very strong desire lately to be real and not hide what’s in my heart (hence this blog) and if I’m going to do that I have to admit that there is a lot of pain and hurt in my life and there will be until I am in heaven with my savior. Jesus doesn't promise us a life without disease or pain, but if you have put your faith in Him he does promise eternal life in heaven with Him and that is what I look forward to.