James tells believers to “count it all joy” when they encounter trials. How can he say that to someone facing sickness, betrayal, persecution, or the death of a loved one? I do not understand him to be asking us to enjoy suffering or pretend that grief has disappeared. He gives a reason for joy, and we need to follow that explanation before using his command to advise someone who is hurting.
The question is how we understand a trial when pain is not the only thing we know about it. We also know that we belong to God, that He has not abandoned us, and that He uses tested faith to produce endurance and maturity. Those truths can sustain a believer who is still asking the Lord for relief.
Joy Does Not Deny the Pain
A command to rejoice can be badly mishandled. If someone has just suffered a terrible loss, telling him to look happier may add shame to his sorrow. He may conclude that admitting how much he hurts would disappoint God or expose him as a poor Christian. Scripture does not require that performance. A person can grieve deeply while continuing to trust the Lord.
To count a trial as joy is to consider it in light of what God says is true. James directs our attention to what the testing of faith produces, rather than telling us that the pain itself is pleasant. The believer may not know why this particular hardship was allowed or how long it will last. He can nevertheless trust that God remains faithful and can mature him through it.
I need to remember that when I bring this passage to someone else. If I quote a few words and hurry away before hearing what happened, I may have used Scripture to avoid the discomfort of caring for him. He may need someone to listen, pray with him, and remain beside him while he cries. We can explain God’s promises without demanding that he prove his faith by recovering his composure on our schedule.
Tested Faith Learns Endurance
James addresses believers as brothers and speaks of various trials. Pressure may come through persecution, loss, sickness, or circumstances we cannot put right ourselves. His wording assumes that hardship will come into the Christian life:
My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.
James 1:2-3
But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.
James 1:4
The reason for joy is that tested faith produces patience, meaning steadfast endurance here. A believer learns to continue trusting God when doing so no longer brings immediate comfort or approval. His faith may have been sincere before the trial, but now he must put that trust into practice under pressure. The study on faith considers more fully what it means to depend on God.
God already knows the believer’s heart. He does not need a test to discover whether faith is present, but the trial can expose to us what we have been depending on. I may discover that I trusted God to give me a particular outcome and scarcely considered trusting Him if the answer was different. Or I may learn how quickly I neglect prayer when I cannot see progress. As I continue to seek Him and obey His Word, He strengthens the faith that pressure has brought into view.
James tells us to let endurance finish its work, describing the result as “perfect and complete.” He is not promising sinless perfection in this life. He is describing a believer whose faith develops beyond the areas in which it has remained weak or unpracticed. Endurance requires continuing to trust and obey through difficulty, rather than treating hardship as sufficient reason to disregard what God has said. The study on sanctification, or growth in holiness, follows that development in the Christian life.
God’s work of maturing His people should not make us assume that every trial is punishment for a particular sin. In Hebrews 12, Paul explains that God disciplines His children, training them for holiness. That training can include correction, and we should confess wrongdoing when Scripture exposes it. But we have no right to assume that a suffering believer must have committed some hidden sin. Job’s friends made cruel accusations because they insisted on explaining his affliction that way. The study on Job examines how badly they misjudged him.
A trial can also bring temptation: the pressure may make resentment, dishonesty, or abandoning obedience seem attractive. James later makes clear that God does not tempt anyone to evil (James 1:13–15). God’s use of a trial to strengthen faith does not make Him the author of the sinful response. I can ask Him to search my heart without assuming that all my suffering is a reprimand or excusing a wrong choice because I am under pressure.
To remain faithful under that pressure, we need wisdom as well as determination. James follows his instruction about endurance with this invitation:
If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
James 1:5
God gives “without reproach.” He does not rebuke His children simply for needing the wisdom He invites them to request. I can admit that I do not know what to do and ask Him to help me understand His Word and act faithfully. That prayer acknowledges my dependence on Him.
The answer may involve confessing something I have defended, making a difficult but right decision, or continuing ordinary responsibilities while the larger problem remains unresolved. Counting a trial as joy does not require passive resignation. We ask God how to respond and then obey what He has made clear.
Tribulation Can Deepen Hope
Paul describes a related progression in Romans 5. He begins with justification by faith, meaning that God declares the believer righteous through faith in Jesus Christ. Believers already have peace with God and access into grace before Paul explains what tribulation produces:
We also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope.
Romans 5:3-4
Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Romans 5:5
Perseverance develops as the believer continues trusting God under pressure. That endurance produces tested character: faithfulness that has been put into practice, rather than merely claimed when life was comfortable. As we learn that God’s faithfulness does not depend on favorable circumstances, our hope in Him grows steadier.
Paul also names the Holy Spirit, given to believers, as the One through whom God’s love has been poured into our hearts. The believer has not been left to manufacture hope by willpower. God has brought him into peace with Himself and given him His Spirit. We may not be able to explain every reason for a particular trial, but Scripture gives us grounds to trust the God who loves us and is at work in us.
Notice that suffering does not purchase our standing before God. The person Paul describes already stands in grace. We cannot earn justification by enduring more pain than someone else, and a distressed believer should not be told to suffer more impressively before God will accept him. Growth through tribulation follows the acceptance we have in Christ; it does not supply what His redemption lacked.
Keep Christ and Eternal Glory in View
Hebrews 12 directs weary believers to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. He endured the cross with the joy set before Him in view. His joy was not delight in the cruelty inflicted on Him. He obeyed the Father, accomplished redemption, and looked beyond the suffering to the glory that followed:
Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Hebrews 12:2
Jesus bore the punishment for our sins in His innocent body. Wicked people mocked, beat, and crucified Him, and He willingly shed His blood and died. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Jesus. His saving work was complete before He rose bodily from the grave. Our endurance cannot add to His atonement, the work by which He dealt with sin.
Paul tells believers to consider Jesus so they do not become weary and discouraged. We belong to the Savior who suffered, rose, and is now seated at God’s right hand. He has not merely demanded perseverance from us while leaving us to save ourselves. Remembering His finished redemption gives us reason to continue trusting Him when present relief has not come.
In 2 Corinthians 4, Paul places his own affliction alongside the eternal glory God promises. He had endured crushing pressure, persecution, and repeated exposure to death. When he calls affliction “light” and says it lasts “but for a moment,” he is comparing it with what will last forever:
For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.
2 Corinthians 4:17
While we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
2 Corinthians 4:18
Paul was not a comfortable observer dismissing suffering he had never experienced. Nor was he saying that a Christian’s present burden must feel small. He was measuring temporary affliction against the far greater glory to come. What fills our attention today will not determine the final condition of those who belong to Christ.
I can therefore ask for relief without assuming that relief is the only good God can accomplish. He may deliver me from the difficulty, and I should pray honestly for His help. If it continues, His promise of eternal glory remains, and He can strengthen me to be faithful during the wait. We must not measure His faithfulness solely by how quickly the hardship ends.
Grief and Joy Can Share the Same Heart
Peter puts grief and rejoicing together when he writes to believers under pressure:
In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials.
1 Peter 1:6
That the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
1 Peter 1:7
These believers had been grieved by their trials, and Peter did not treat that sorrow as proof of unbelief. He explained that tested faith is more precious than gold, which will perish. Their faith would be found to praise, honor, and glory when Jesus Christ is revealed. The trial did not create faith out of nothing; it tested and refined the faith already present.
I can admit that a trial hurts and still trust that Christ is true. Tears do not cancel His promises, and the ability to remain outwardly cheerful is not the measure of faith. Someone may be grieving honestly while continuing to pray, receive help, and obey the Lord through a difficult day. We should recognize that dependence instead of insisting that joy must look the same in every person.
Jesus prepared His disciples for trouble on the night before His death. He offered them peace in Himself while plainly telling them what they would face:
These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.
John 16:33
His promise did not remove their coming trials. It gave them reason for courage because the world would not defeat Him or overturn His purpose. We can ask for His peace while acknowledging fear and sorrow, rather than pretending that neither one exists. Our confidence belongs in Him, including when we need help to keep trusting.
The Psalms give us many examples of believers bringing sorrow, fear, and hard questions to God. This is lament: honest grief expressed before Him. Turning to the Lord in distress is not the same as rejecting Him because we are distressed. We can ask why, plead for rescue, and confess how weak we feel while still depending on Him to hear us.
A church should make room for that honesty. If we silence lament, people may learn to conceal their pain rather than seek help. But if we never speak of God’s promises, we leave them without the hope Scripture supplies. We need to listen carefully and bring the truth patiently. A meal, a ride, a quiet visit, or reading a passage together can help someone carry a burden without turning every conversation into a lecture.
When the trial is my own, I can begin by telling God plainly what hurts and asking for wisdom. I do not need to dress the prayer in impressive language. Then I need to receive the help He gives through His Word and His people. The study on grief considers how believers can mourn without being left to carry their sorrow alone.
We are called to weep with those who weep, pray for one another, and help bear burdens. Where sin needs correction, we should restore the person gently and speak truth in love. Where the trouble has come through no wrongdoing of his own, we should not invent an accusation to explain it. God’s people can strengthen one another’s endurance through that ordinary, faithful care.
My Final Thoughts
I understand counting it all joy as considering a trial in light of God’s promised work, rather than treating pain as the whole truth about it. We can grieve, ask for relief, and seek help while trusting that the testing of faith produces endurance, through which God brings maturity and deepens our hope in Christ. The Savior who shed His blood and rose bodily has secured a future that present suffering cannot cancel. We do not have to pretend the trial is pleasant or claim to know everything God is doing. We can ask Him for wisdom and continue to trust and obey Him in the difficulty before us.
What does Scripture mean when it calls God holy? We also read about holy ground, holy vessels, and holy people, so the word cannot simply mean that someone is well behaved. I want to understand those uses in relation to the Lord Himself, then consider why belonging to Him calls for a change in how we live.
What Holy Means in Scripture
Being set apart is part of the meaning of holy, but separation by itself tells us very little. We need to know what has been set apart and to whom it belongs. A bowl reserved for the tabernacle was holy because God had claimed it for sacred service. It had no conscience or moral achievements. A day could likewise be set apart from ordinary work, and priestly garments were reserved for their appointed use.
The Hebrew adjective qadosh means holy or sacred. Its related noun qodesh can refer to holiness, something holy, or a holy place, depending on the passage. Scripture uses this vocabulary for God, His name and Spirit, and for people and things He sets apart. Those uses are related, but we should not assume that holiness means exactly the same thing when it describes a garment as when it describes the Lord.
No one made God holy. He did not pass from ordinary use into sacred use, and He never needed cleansing from sin. He is the uncreated Lord, distinct from everything He made, and His character is entirely righteous and pure. There is nothing false or corrupt in Him and no higher authority whose standards He must meet. When God calls something else holy, its relationship to Him gives it that standing.
In the New Testament, hagios is the Greek adjective commonly translated holy. Used of people as “holy ones,” it is also translated saints. That explains why believers can be called saints before they have reached maturity. God has made them His own in Christ, and they are now called to live accordingly.
A person, unlike a tabernacle vessel, makes moral choices. Being set apart to God therefore includes being called away from sin. A solemn manner or strict religious habits cannot establish that someone belongs to Him. I need to consider whose word governs my life, rather than assume that looking devout is the same as being holy.
The Holy One in Worship
Isaiah saw the Lord seated on His throne in the year King Uzziah died. Judah had lost a king who had reigned for many years, but the Lord still reigned. The train of His robe filled the temple, smoke filled the house, and the doorposts shook. The six-winged seraphim covered their faces and feet as they called to one another.
And one cried to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; The whole earth is full of His glory!”
Isaiah 6:3
The repeated cry gives tremendous emphasis to His holiness. Even these heavenly servants approached Him with profound reverence. Christians worship the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as the one holy God, and the threefold cry agrees with that fuller revelation. It does not, by itself, supply a complete explanation of the Trinity; we learn that from the wider Scriptures.
The seraphim were acknowledging God’s worth rather than supplying something He lacked. When I worship, I am responding to Someone who already deserves my love and reverence, whether or not I feel especially stirred at the time. That does not require an emotionally cold response, but it keeps my feelings from becoming the measure of His worth.
Israel also praised His holiness after a very different encounter with His power. In Exodus 15, they had just passed through the Red Sea, and the Lord had overthrown Pharaoh’s pursuing army. Moses and the people sang about the God who had delivered them.
“Who is like You, O LORD, among the gods? Who is like You, glorious in holiness, Fearful in praises, doing wonders?
Exodus 15:11
They were not granting idols the status of genuine rivals. Egypt’s gods had failed to save Egypt, while the Lord had kept His word and rescued His people. His works revealed that no one was like Him.
His mercy and judgment both belong to that holiness. God does not become less pure when He is patient with sinners, or cease to be good when He judges evil. Nothing in His character needs correction. The study on the holiness of God develops those truths more fully.
Holy Things, Places, and Boundaries
At the burning bush, Moses was commanded to change how he approached the place where God was making His presence known.
Then He said, “Do not draw near this place. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.”
Exodus 3:5
The ground had no moral character of its own. It was holy because God had made His presence known there and claimed it for His purpose. Removing his sandals was the response the Lord required of Moses.
The tabernacle later gave Israel a continuing, visible lesson in this distinction. Its Holy Place and Most Holy Place were not interchangeable rooms. Priestly garments, altar vessels, incense, and anointing oil had appointed uses. The sacrifices and Sabbath were governed by God’s commands too. What He claimed for Himself was not available for anyone to repurpose.
Priests served in the Holy Place, but the high priest entered the Most Holy Place behind the veil only on the Day of Atonement, bringing sacrificial blood as God had commanded. He was approaching the Lord who had chosen to dwell among Israel. These arrangements provided access through the priesthood and sacrifice while teaching people to regard Him as holy.
The sons of Kohath were warned not to touch the holy things they carried. Nadab and Abihu were judged for offering what God had not commanded. Both accounts belong to the worship God prescribed under the Mosaic covenant. They describe the Lord enforcing His instructions, not magic becoming unstable inside an object. Religious office did not free anyone from His directions.
Christians do not take up those Levitical assignments or repeat the Day of Atonement. Christ fulfilled what the old worship foreshadowed. The covenant arrangements have changed, while the Lord who claims His people remains holy.
Holiness Exposes Sin and Leads Us to Christ
Habakkuk appealed to God’s purity when he struggled with the announcement that Babylon would discipline Judah. He knew Judah deserved correction, but how could the Holy One use a nation so violent and treacherous?
You are of purer eyes than to behold evil, And cannot look on wickedness. Why do You look on those who deal treacherously, And hold Your tongue when the wicked devours A person more righteous than he?
Habakkuk 1:13
He was not saying that God could not see wickedness. The same verse asks why He looks upon those who act treacherously. Habakkuk knew the Lord saw their wickedness; he wanted to understand how using such a nation to judge Judah was consistent with God’s pure character. God’s use of Babylon did not mean He approved its cruelty.
Isaiah responded to the vision we considered earlier by confessing his uncleanness before the King. He recognized it in himself and in the people among whom he lived.
So I said: “Woe is me, for I am undone! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, The LORD of hosts.”
Isaiah 6:5
Then one of the seraphim took a live coal from the altar and touched Isaiah’s lips, the very place he had named in his confession.
And he touched my mouth with it, and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; Your iniquity is taken away, And your sin purged.”
Isaiah 6:7
Isaiah did not make himself clean enough to remain before God. Cleansing came from the Lord, with the altar directing our attention to sacrifice. The Holy One had exposed his sin and provided forgiveness.
I need to hear the confession as well as the comfort. Speech reveals more than a person’s public manners; it reveals the heart. I can look respectable and still need cleansing from what I say and desire. Sin is not merely an embarrassment God should help me forget. It opposes His character and rejects His right to govern my life.
The gospel answers that need without asking God to excuse rebellion or lower His standard. Jesus Christ is the eternal Son, who became fully man without ceasing to be fully God and lived without sin. Wicked men tortured Him and put Him to death, while He voluntarily gave Himself to be slain as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Through His shed blood and death, He completed that sacrifice before His burial and bodily resurrection. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Jesus. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit acted in unity to redeem us.
Peter connects our call to holy conduct with the price of our redemption. We were not redeemed by making ourselves presentable to God, but by Christ’s blood.
but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
1 Peter 1:19
Salvation is by grace through faith, so no degree of personal holiness can purchase it. Christ died for the whole world, and God’s offer is genuine for everyone, though people can resist and reject His grace. Everyone who repents and believes is forgiven, justified, and born again. To be justified is to be declared righteous through Christ, rather than accepted on the strength of our own record.
The believer becomes a new creation, indwelt and sealed by the Holy Spirit, and is eternally secure in Christ. That assurance gives no permission for lawlessness, and a Christian profession without new life does not establish genuine conversion. God sets the person He saves apart for Himself and teaches him to live as His own. The study on the gospel explains Christ’s saving work further.
God Calls a People His Own
God rescued Israel from Egypt before calling the nation to be a kingdom of priests at Sinai. He did not wait for the people to become holy enough to earn rescue. He brought them out and then told them what life as His covenant nation required.
And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel.”
Exodus 19:6
This was a national calling, not a declaration that every Israelite had personally been born again. Still, the order is plain: the Lord rescued them and claimed them for Himself. Leviticus brought that relationship into daily conduct. Chapter 11 applied the command to “be holy” to clean and unclean animals, while chapter 20 addressed separation from pagan worship and sexual immorality.
And you shall be holy to Me, for I the LORD am holy, and have separated you from the peoples, that you should be Mine.
Leviticus 20:26
Some commands marked Israel ceremonially under the Mosaic covenant; others expressed moral truths about conduct God approves or condemns. We should not lift Israel’s dietary rules out of that setting and impose them on the church. Nor can we dismiss His moral instruction simply because it also appears in the Old Testament. We need to read those commands in light of the covenant and the teaching Christ and His apostles gave us.
Peter applied the call to be holy to believers scattered across Asia Minor. They were living as pilgrims and facing hostility. He urged them to prepare their minds, live soberly, and set their hope on the grace to come when Christ is revealed.
but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, “Be holy, for I am holy.”
1 Peter 1:15-16
Peter points them to the character of the Father who called them. He does not tell them, “Be unusual so other people will notice you.” Their conduct should agree with their belonging to God, whether or not it gains anyone’s admiration.
Peter then uses language from Israel’s calling to describe the people God has made His own in Christ.
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;
1 Peter 2:9
Peter’s use of Exodus language does not mean the church has erased Israel or acquired every national and territorial promise given to her. God retains His future purpose for national Israel, while Jewish and Gentile believers now belong to one body in Christ.
These believers had been called out of darkness to proclaim God’s praises. Their identity did not come from social standing, ancestry, or confidence in their own morality. Proclaiming His praises includes making Him known to people who do not yet believe. Jesus lived apart from sin while going among sinners with truth and mercy. If I use holiness to justify contempt for people or withdrawal from everyone who needs the gospel, I am failing to follow His example.
Growing in Holiness Through the Spirit and the Word
Being called holy does not mean a believer has no growing left to do. God has made him His own, and he is called to learn obedience within that relationship.
Paul also commands the pursuit of holiness in Hebrews 12, where he discusses endurance and the Father’s discipline of His children. God corrects them for their good, so they may share His holiness. Paul urges weary believers to persevere and watch over one another, warning against bitterness and the godlessness illustrated by Esau.
Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord:
Hebrews 12:14
The Greek noun hagiasmos is translated sanctification or holiness. It concerns being set apart to God and the holiness of life associated with that calling. In 1 Thessalonians 4:3, Paul makes the application specific: God’s will for their sanctification includes abstaining from sexual immorality. The study on sanctification examines this growth more fully.
We should not soften the warning in Hebrews 12:14 into a suggestion. But neither does it establish a level of moral performance that earns entrance into heaven. We cannot see the Lord apart from the holiness He gives in Christ, and that new life calls for an active pursuit of what pleases Him. Believers may stumble and need correction; a settled contempt for holiness gives no evidence that someone has received new life.
In 2 Corinthians, Paul appeals to God’s promises to dwell among His people and receive them as their Father. The words “having these promises” explain why believers should respond with obedience.
Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.
2 Corinthians 7:1
They were not being told to clean themselves up until God reluctantly agreed to adopt them. He was calling them to act on the relationship and promises He had given. The reference to flesh and spirit also reaches beyond a respectable public appearance. God condemns drunkenness and sexual immorality, and He sees the pride, envy, or resentment we can conceal from other people.
Ephesians 2 gives the same order: we are saved by grace through faith, not works, and created in Christ for good works. Titus 2 says saving grace teaches us to deny ungodliness. Eternal security does not mean the Father overlooks His children’s sins. He disciplines them, and we receive conviction through the Spirit and correction through His Word. Christ has secured us, so we can face that correction without imagining each failure reverses the new birth.
We also need more than determination. The Holy Spirit is a divine Person who indwells believers, gives life, convicts, and teaches through Scripture. He is not a religious mood or an impersonal energy we generate. Paul calls us to depend on Him in our conduct.
I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.
Galatians 5:16
That dependence does not make us passive. We make real choices while receiving help we could not supply through willpower alone. The Spirit produces His fruit in those who belong to Christ, and His leading agrees with the Word He inspired.
On the night before His crucifixion, Jesus prayed for His disciples as men He was sending into a hostile world. He asked for their protection from evil and their sanctification through the Father’s truth.
Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.
John 17:17
The disciples needed God’s Word to shape their life and service in that world. We need it too. If I neglect Scripture, my appetites, fears, or the opinions I hear can begin governing my conscience instead. A tradition may feel right simply because I am used to it, while an indulgence may seem harmless because other people excuse it. The Spirit does not lead us into holiness by teaching us to disregard what God has said.
If I speak courteously at church and then deliberately mislead a customer, I cannot excuse the lie by pointing to my religious conduct. Nor does avoiding a public scandal excuse the resentment I keep rehearsing in private. Belonging to God concerns both what I do and what I am willing to entertain in my heart. He has authority over my finances, entertainment, family relationships, and sexual conduct.
Legalism substitutes human rules for God’s authority and can bind people’s consciences where He allows freedom. Lawlessness treats His grace as permission to ignore Him. Neither honors the relationship He has given us. I cannot prove holiness by imposing my preferences on someone else, and I cannot claim an inward devotion that excuses disobedience in my body.
Pride can even disguise itself as zeal for holiness. Harshness, boasting, and a refusal to receive correction do not reflect the Lord’s mercy and patience. His compassion never compromises truth, and faithfulness to truth does not require me to become contemptuous toward people. The study on the fear of the Lord considers how reverence and assurance lead us to obey.
My Final Thoughts
I want to take God’s holiness seriously enough to receive His correction, rather than use the word to make myself look devout. The Holy One has provided cleansing through Christ and made believers His own. We do not earn that relationship by achieving enough holiness, but belonging to Him changes what we are willing to excuse. I can draw near with confidence in Jesus and ask the Spirit to teach me obedience through His Word.
