Devotionals for the Heart: Pure Gold

Refined as Pure Gold
A devotional by Patrick E. Craig

"And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass." 

~Revelation 21:21 (KJV)

A friend of mine who was a missionary once told me an interesting story. When he was in South Africa he visited a gold mine. There he was able to watch the process by which the miners extracted the gold from the ore that was dug from the earth.

First, they crushed the gold-bearing rock into manageable chunks. Then they put it into a huge caldron where they began to heat it. When the ore melted, the impurities floated to the top and they were scooped off. Then the operator turned up the heat and more impurities floated to the top—again to be scooped off. This occurred over and over until the process of purification was completed.

Once the operator was finished my friend asked him how pure the gold was. The answer: "99.9 percent pure." Steve asked another question. Is that the purest it can get?" The operator answered, "Yes. 99.9 percent pure is the purest gold we can ever get in this world."

My friend asked one last question. "If it was 100 percent pure what would it look like?" "Oh," the man said, "it wouldn't be yellow anymore. The yellow color is the impurities that are left in the gold. No, 100 percent pure gold would be perfectly clear, like glass."

There are two things that come to mind here. First of all, when we look at gold in this present life, it is the wonderful, gleaming yellow color that captures us. That's why we call it "Gold". It's that lustrous golden color that has caused men throughout history to do anything to possess it. If we stumbled upon a trove of gold that was clear like glass we would probably pass it by even if it were right before us. And doesn't that reveal us for what we are—natural born sinners who are drawn to the impurities of this life while we often walk right by those things that are true, honest, just, pure, lovely, or of a good report?

The second thing that comes to mind is our future. When this life is over and we stand before the Lord, He will finish the refining process, the fiery trials as it were, that he began on the day we said yes to him. And when He finishes, all the impurities will be gone and we will stand transparent before him, as transparent as the golden streets of heaven, purest gold and clear like glass.

"For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus." ~Philippians 1:6 (KJV)

~*~
Author Bio: 

Patrick E. Craig is a lifelong writer and musician who left a successful songwriting and performance career in the music industry to follow Christ in 1984. 

In 2011 he signed a three-book deal with Harvest House Publishers to publish his Apple Creek Dreams series. His current series is The Paradise Chronicles. The first book in the series, The Amish Heiress, a romantic suspense novel, was published by Patrick's company, P&J Publishing, in August of 2015 and remained on the Amazon Top 100 best sellers list in three categories for seven months.

The second book in the series, The Amish Princess, a historical romance novel, was released in December of 2016 and was on Amazon's Hot New Releases for over a month. Harlequin recently purchased the print rights for both books for their Walmart Amish series. Patrick also just released Cracking The Indie Egg—A Recipe For Publishing Your Own Book and it is available in most major digital bookstores.

Patrick and his wife Judy, make their home in Idaho. They have two married children and five grandchildren. Patrick is represented by the Steve Laube Agency.

~*~
Connect with Patrick:
Website - www.patrickecraig.com
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/PatrickECraig
Twitter - https://twitter.com/PatrickECraig
Amazon Author page - http://tinyurl.com/n6sfagg