Devotional | Trenchantly Yours

Once upon a time, it was a common sermon illustration to say that bank tellers handle money so frequently they know when they are holding a counterfeit note. The obvious application was, of course, that the more acquainted you are with God’s truth, the easier it is to spot the enemy’s lies and distortions.

While everyone was clutching their pearls in the 1980s and predicting a cashless society, we are almost at that point some forty years on, and the application has suddenly widened. It is still true that familiarity with the real thing is a good defence against scams – especially familiarity with English grammar! Here we are in 2025 surrounded by a deluge of fakeness: fake ‘writing’, fake art, fake documents, fake news. It’s getting harder and harder to separate what’s real from what’s imagined, what’s original from what’s stolen or appropriated and adapted. I get irrationally annoyed whenever a Facebook ad offers to write a book on my behalf! And all those old police dramas, where the case is solved by single photo? Not any more. We put the ‘frenzy’ in ‘forensics’.

Aside from having a rant, I want us to think about the glut of airbrushed content out there, and contrast it with the art of God. We are His poiēma (poetry) and we do the work He’s set up for us, says Ephesians 2:10. We are artist and art, training and trainee and triumph and trophy all in one. It’s not a sprint but a marathon. While God can turn a life around overnight, that’s a direction, not the actual course itself. It takes a whole lifetime to be conformed to the image of Christ.

For we are His workmanship [His own master work, a work of art], created in Christ Jesus [reborn from above—spiritually transformed, renewed, ready to be used] for good works, which God prepared [for us] beforehand [taking paths which He set], so that we would walk in them [living the good life which He prearranged and made ready for us]. Ephesians 2:10 AMP

That’s why testimonies can be inspiring and disconcerting at the same time. We want to know God can change our trajectory, heal the past, and move us forward. And He does! But there is often a great amount of wrestling involved. And nobody seems to want to hear about the struggle itself. ‘Hush til you heal,’ they say. ‘Wait until you’re shiny, then tell us what the Lord has done for you.’ But the ending is only one piece of the episode.

I want to hear about how the Lord is WITH you in the battle. How He’s bringing people around you to lift you up and encourage you, or even merely to accompany you. How in bad circumstances, He’s engineering whatever tiny gems of good can be unearthed, and presenting them to you in the thick of it all. How His love is never withdrawn in the midst of shame and turmoil. How He never gives up.

This is why we’re given the book of Job. It’s more than a whinge. Job let it all hang out: how he did his best, how undeserved his troubles were, how perplexing it all was when looked at in a simplistic and ignorant mindset. As it happened, Job’s circumstances had nothing to do with his righteousness, self-righteousness, or sin. They were quite likely the fallout of Abraham’s story! Certainly none of Job’s three friends had any clue about what was going on in the courts of Heaven. All they had were clichés and formulae. They got increasingly shirty as evidence continued to refuse to fit into their paradigm. Yet Job knew … He knew who God was, and that He would show up eventually.

Like Job, we are allowed to tackle the hard issues of our lives, and we do the Body of Christ a disservice if we hide them away. Like Job, we may only have a thread of faith left. Like Job, we may find that when the Lord does show up for us, we have some repenting and forgiving to do, as well as some blessing to receive. And we don’t always know if the latter is contingent on the former.

In Jo Wanmer’s books, she tells of intense trials without glossing over the difficulty and doubting and doggedness involved. Though the Bud Be Bruised (a true story) deals with exploitation and its fallout. El Shaddai (fiction) tackles natural disaster compounded by man-made evil. Because Jo has had to deal with trauma, she doesn’t pull punches. She writes honestly. Her characters suffer and grouch and grow slowly. And that imparts a level of hope – because it’s no more airbrushed than our own lives are. We don’t always make the best choices, mean people aren’t transformed overnight, and bad things happen – even to Christians.

But Jo is also faithful to the type of preparation and intervention the Lord brings. There’s redemption that’s realistic, and we get to walk with the characters while it’s all coalescing. We get to glorify the Lord with them for His breathtaking forward planning and unfailing character. Because we know that in all things, He works for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28). It won’t happen overnight, as the old commercial says, but it will happen.

I love a good testimony, but it means so much more to me when it’s not a Sunday morning soundbite, but a journey I’ve been able to observe or read about. Because if God can only work with Victorious Christians or Beautiful People or Finished Works, then I’m done for. I need a God who’s in the trenches with me. So, pardon me if I stick my begrimed head up out of a pit now and then to yell, ‘Look who’s here!’ Or whimper, croak or whisper it. Faith wears many faces, and some of them are weary. All of them please God when turned toward Him.

What’s your favourite work depicting the companionship and vindication of God?