Tunneling through the rock

There is a mine for silver and a place where gold is refined. Iron is taken from the earth, and copper is smelted from ore... Job 28:1-11

Someone asked me once, "You were preaching the Gospel in Europe before you moved to Africa. Which place was easier?"

The same question a few years ago would have gotten a different answer from me. However I said, "I don't believe there are easier or harder places to preach the Gospel. I believe that a man of God seeks from God and from himself the appropriate tools to win souls - whatever the circumstances."

But I don't think she understood me. And in case you don't either, let me call on my old friend Job to help me explain - not about preaching the Gospel to Europeans or Africans but about why the level of difficulty to achieve something doesn't really matter.

Read carefully the above verses from Job 28 so you can understand what I'm about to say.

Job starts by asserting, "There is a mine for silver, and place where gold is refined." Gold and silver here represent what you want to achieve. Just as there are mines for silver and a place where gold can be found, what you want also exists and has ‘a place." Like undiscovered gold, it's waiting there to be found and claimed.

What you want exists. It's not a dream, and it's not impossible. There is a place where it lies. You can find it somewhere.

It's important that you believe this because I've seen too many good people returning from their journey with their heads hanging and confessing "It's too difficult, I can't make it" - only to see someone else come up behind them shouting, "I did it"

Like gold and silver, good things exist but obviously require effort and determination to be found.

Job said that the miner, who knows the value of gold, "puts an end to the darkness; he searches the farthest recesses for ore in the blackest darkness... he cuts a shaft... his hand assaults the flinty rock and lays bare the roots of the mountains. He tunnels through the rock... he searches the sources of the rivers and brings hidden things to light."

There ain't nothing stopping him!

So I say there is no such thing as easier or harder. There is only what you want and what you must do to get it. What is in between is only a temporary delay.

Instead of spending your time deciding which obstacle is easier and which obstacle is harder, spend it finding the solution to the problem and how you're going to get rid of it. In other words, instead of magnifying the problem, refine the solution.

Difficult and easy are in your hands. Or should I say, in your head?

Quote:

"There is no such thing as easier or harder. There is only what you want and what you must do to get it."

Bishop Renato Cardoso