Tried Like Silver
For you, O God, have tested us; you have tried us as silver is tried.
(Psalms 66:10) ESV
Gravity is the force by which creation is being purified. It lets us reconcile physics, chemistry and biology with scripture and the concepts of baptism, refinement and cleansing.
Here is how the words are often used:
- A word often used in the Bible for purify is sanctify or sanctification.
- A word used for the process of purification, or the refinement that applies to precious metals, is tried.
- When the process of purification is applied to people it’s referred to as cleansing.
Sanctification
Sanctify yourselves therefore, and be ye holy: for I am the LORD your God.
(Leviticus 20:7) KJV
In the Old Testament sanctification was a ceremonial ritual done in preparation for a religious observance. We have to be sanctified before we can enter the presence of the Lord.
And Joshua said unto the people, Sanctify yourselves: for to morrow the LORD will do wonders among you.
(Joshua 3:5) KJV
Refinement
The fining pot is for silver, and the furnace for gold: but the LORD trieth the hearts.
(Proverbs 17:3) KJV
The words tried and fining are used to describe purification. The Word of God is pure, and it’s the means by which we experience spiritual cleansing.
The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
(Psalm 12:6) KJV
Isaiah combines the concepts of being refined in a fire with the removal of pollution.
Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver; I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction. For mine own sake, even for mine own sake, will I do it: for how should my name be polluted? and I will not give my glory unto another.
(Isaiah 48:10-11) KJV
Cleansing
Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,
(Ephesians 5:25-26) KJV
The cleansing has been accomplished by the work that Christ did to create and cleanse the universe, through physics, chemistry and biology, which is pictured for us by his sacrificial death on the cross at Calvary, and by his resurrection. This is played out in our lives as we live our lives to honor the Lord.
That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:
(1 Peter 1:7) KJV
The Time of the End
And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white, even to the time of the end: because it is yet for a time appointed.
(Daniel 11:35) KJV
There will be a spiritual cleansing at the end of the age.
Many shall be purified, and made white, and tried; but the wicked shall do wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand.
(Daniel 12:10) KJV
This is the reason why Christians have been given the commission to reach out to the world. The accumulation of impurities is called the Earth, and because of the inherent instability of matter the core has melted and there’s a literal physical hell of burning fire inside it. Once the impurities have accumulated the mass will be discarded into outer darkness. Do you want to be discarded with it? It’s not personal. God isn’t being mean.
Read through the Bible in a year
| Reading plan | February 20 | |
| Linear | Deuteronomy 16-20 | |
| Chronological | Leviticus 22-23 |
Salvation
- Call upon the name of Jesus Christ,
- believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead,
- confess your sin.