Parker Craigo - 8/9/26

What if the hardest seasons of your life were actually preparing you for something greater? This message takes us on a journey through the Bible's use of the number 40 -- a number that appears again and again in stories of trial, testing, and transformation. From Noah floating on floodwaters with no end in sight, to Israel wandering for four decades just outside the promised land, to Jesus facing forty days of temptation in the wilderness, we see a pattern emerge: God does some of His most powerful work in the middle of the waiting.

We explore how faith functions like a muscle -- it only grows through resistance and pressure. The micro-tears of hardship, when surrendered to God, do not destroy us. They rebuild us stronger. Drawing on James 1:2-4 and 1 Peter 1:6-7, we are reminded that trials are not signs of God's absence but evidence of His refining work, purifying our faith the way fire purifies gold.

The question this message presses us to sit with is this: in the middle of our own season of 40, are we willing to trust not just in God, but to let God Himself become our trust, our strength, and our foundation?