Mission 52:Week 2 - Removing the Dross

I was preparing to read my Bible for this weeks study.  My eyes feel on this verse.

Remove the dross from the silver, and out comes the material for the silversmith.  Proverbs 25:4

My immediate thoughts were that in order for God to use us in our marriage or our marriage itself, we have to give Him something to work with first.  In order to give Him something to work with we must "remove the dross".  Last week me made lists of of the good things we love about our spouse so that we could concentrate on the good.  I mentioned that we would not worry about the "bad" or the things we wish would could change about our spouse.  We will address this later.

This week, we are going to concentrate on praying for God to remove the "dross". 

Dross - the scum formed, usually by oxidation; an impurity, usually an oxide on molten metal.  Impurities removed from molten metal.

 An impurity...

I have thought and prayed over this for a few days now and at first I wasn't going to go into a deep lesson.  I wanted the lesson to be something you studied on and then I felt the need to go deeper anyway.  God is giving me the words.

I have had many friends go through hard times in their marriage, some are still struggling and some got out.  I have friends who have the marriage of their dreams.  In each of these marriages and even my own, I must step back and look at myself first.  I need to start with the part of my marriage that I know more deeply, me.  I had to take a hard look at my heart and I realized that there are many things that I need to work on removing so that God can use me to strengthen my marriage.  A marriage has to be strong to last and I want it to be the strongest God can make it.

When we think about impurities in ourselves.  We may not think of the impurities as evil or sinister but they are.  The impurities that we have not removed are only tools for the devil to use at his discretion.  This being said, as you pray about your impurities, when God reveals them, remove them. 

Then I think about the other definition of dross.  The scum formed on metal.  This was the hardest for me to wrap my brain around.  It's easy to talk about removing the impurities but it's harder to imagine that the tarnish is also the dross that needs to be removed.  It seems that even though we remove the impurities and give God something to work with.  He can mold us into a beautiful piece of work but our environment and the things we expose ourselves to, only tarnish His masterpiece.  Not only do we have to remove the impurities, we have to keep polishing our marriage and ourselves when ever the  beauty and shine are gone.  We have to get back to the polishing and removing and maybe even let God rework things we though were good enough so that we come out perfect.

Silversmith

There was a group of women in a Bible Study on the book of Malachi. As they were studying chapter three, they came across verse three, which says: "He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver. "This verse puzzled the women and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God.
One of the women offered to find out the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible Study. That week, this woman called up a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work.

She didn't mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver. As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities.

The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot then she thought again about the verse, that "He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver." She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.
The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, how do you know when the silver is fully refined? He smiled at her and answered, "Oh, that's easy - when I see my image in it."

Thank you A Treasure Garden for the story.

I think the part we should not miss in this story, is the part about the silver being in the fire.  Are you going through a "fire"?

Do a little research on what it means to remove the dross.  Come back if you will and tell me what it meant to you. 

I know I will be praying this week about how God needs to reveal the dross in my life and my marriage so that it can be removed.  I pray that whatever fire my friends may be going through in their marriage, that they know God is with them.  I pray that we all remember that when we are going through a fire, then there are impurities that we need to remove so that God can see His image in us.

I found an article on CBN's website that talks about removing the dross from the work place and while our home is not anything like our work place, the theology still applies in many ways. 

I seriously, would love to hear how God works in your life based on this weeks study.  I honestly, can't wait to see what He reveals in mine as well.

~this hit home on so many levels this week, with Bean being in the hospital, our Faith and our marriage should be challenged, but it's not. It's stronger than ever. I know that God is working through me right now, he is showing me his imagine - so I can continue to fight for our little one.