Psalm 12:6 says (in the new King James Version), “the words of the Lord are pure words like silver tried in a furnace of Earth purified seven times.”

This morning, I found myself reading Psalm chapter 12. I found myself just sitting pondering over this chapter where it talks about how treacherous man is and how everyone speaks idly with his neighbor.

That bothers me. It is not something that I want to be known for. It is not something that I want to be said about me.

Verse 2 says that we speak with flattering lips and a double heart; but next, in comparison to man’s treachery, we’re shown how constant GOD is, and how pure and trustworthy our Heavenly Father’s Word is.

Psalm 12:6 says that God’s word is like silver purified 7x. To be purified seven times means that one is tried and tested to the fullest sense of the limit, and that one is absolutely trustworthy.

This caused me to wonder what does the process of purifying silver look like. I became curious about what actually happens during this process of purifying silver. So I decided to watch a YouTube video about the purifying of silver.

It was a three-minute video, but in that video there was so much that was displayed, so much that happened prior to the receipt of a bar of pure silver from which our jewelry is made.

I watched this YouTube video on refining silver several times. I had to continually stop and rewind it just so that I could understand what I was looking at.

There are three steps or processes that take place before you get to the refined element of silver or gold.

Step One is the harvesting.
Step Two is the extracting.
Step Three is the refining.

Silver comes from a mineral called argentite. It is found in lead, zinc, gold, and copper ore deposits.

To understand what it takes to get silver from ore, I called the first process, in obtaining silver, harvesting.

In the harvesting process, there are at least eight steps which requires drilling, blowing up, testing, blending, crushing, breaking, crushing a second time, more breaking, crushing a third time, pulverizing, grinding, flushing, and an adding of acid to what was flushed which means burning, and a pressing all to get to a substance called Silver precipitate which looks like a black sledge which has to be scraped off of a filter and dried into a dust.

The black dust is 50% silver and 50% dross which means waste.

Now I’m not going to lie, the thought of that which I was looking at on YouTube made me want to cry, and here is why…

In the whole land,” declares the Lord, “two-thirds will be struck down and perish; yet one-third will be left in it.This third I will put into the fire; I will refine them like silver and test them like gold. They will call on my name and I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are my people,’ and they will say, ‘The Lord is our God.’” – Zechariah 13:8-9

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Zechariah13:8-9&version=NKJV

You see, in Zechariah it says that we will be refined as silver is refined, and I started panicking because of what I saw in this first step of harvesting.

Let me say it again, that process required drilling, blowing up, testing, blending, crushing, breaking, more crushing and breaking, more crushing and pulverizing, grinding, flushing, and adding something that burns;

and all I could think is “that hurts!”

Who could withstand under that type of pressure and pain?

I started tensing up. My neck started hurting, and my shoulder started hurting, and I was close to tears; and then the Holy Spirit reminded me that this is not the process that we were being taken through.

“For My name’s sake I will defer My anger, And for My praise I will restrain it from you, So that I do not cut you off.Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.For My own sake, for My own sake, I will do it; For how should My name be profaned? And I will not give My glory to another. – Isaiah 48:9-11

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah48:9-11&version=NKJV

The process that we are being taken through is called refining. This part is the harvesting.

During the watching of this first process, the harvesting of silver molecules – a part that I found myself watching over and over, it caused me to look again at what I had previously read in Psalm 11:4 – 7.

The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lord is on his heavenly throne. He observes everyone on earth; his eyes examine them.The Lord examines the righteous, but the wicked, those who love violence, he hates with a passion.On the wicked he will rain fiery coals and burning sulfur; a scorching wind will be their lot.For the Lord is righteous, he loves justice; the upright will see his face. – Psalm 11:4-7

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm11:4-7&version=NKJV

It’s funny how, as I think about this process of harvesting, I am made to think of the process that we go through as a people when we are brought out of the darkness of this world and transferred into the Kingdom of Light.

He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love,in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins. – Colossians 1:13-14

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Colossians1:13-14&version=NKJV

So let’s break this down:

In the mountains that are mined, where silver has been detected, holes are drilled so that Dynamite can be stuck into these holes to blow up and break off chunks of Argentite filled rock called ore.

The ore is now tested and blended in a primary crusher that breaks the big rock into smaller pieces, which then drops down through a grate into a secondary Crusher which breaks the Rocks into even smaller pieces.

So now these smaller pieces are dropped into this vibrating cone which crushes and pulverized the smaller pieces into even tinier pieces which go down this conveyor belt towards a ball mill which grinds these tiny pieces into a powder using steel balls that are of various sizes and weights that are inside this is a ball mill.

Water is then used to flush the powder out of the ball mill into this tank that continuously keeps the water moving. In the tank acid is poured into this moving water and the acid separates the various metals from one another. The water containing silver is then pumped into a filter and pressed.

As I consider all of that, I can’t help but to feel as if this describes what it’s like for all of us living in this world and the pressing, and the breaking, and the crushing that we all go through just trying to navigate life in this world. By the time that we get to the place of being mixed with water, and constantly stirred with water, and having the acid added to the water, it is at that point that we are beginning to hear God’s word and it’s slowly having an effect on us.

The water solution containing silver is next pumped into filtered presses. It is at that point that I kind of feel like this is when the word of God, which washes us, begins to sink into us and begins to take an effect and we start to have to make these decisions which requires us to choose.

Am I going to choose the world?
Or, am I going to choose God?

The more that we choose God , the more we are drawn out of this world as if fished. Until we are caught. This reminds me of those filtered presses which are treated with a zinc base chemical which attracts the silver molecule causing it to form a layer of silver precipitate on the filter. The silver precipitate now has to be dried in a oven at which point it becomes like a black dust.

The black dust is made up of 50% silver and 50% dross, also known as waste, but it’s not yet ready to be refined. The next step is called extraction where the silver is separated from the waste.

In the extraction process, after the silver precipitate has been dried in a gas furnace for a couple of hours, the dried precipitate, a black dust, is then put in the oven with some chemicals that has been added to keep the silver from burning off as its being melted down.

That liquid is then poured into a mold where the silver settles to the bottom and the dross settles at the top so that it can be scraped off the Silver and it cools off and solidifies really quick.

Now when I think of this process, the extraction process, I think of the separating work that happens once a person chooses Jesus Christ to be their Lord and Savior.

I think of the separating of the wheat from the tares (Matthew 13:24-30). I think of the separating of the sheep from the goats (Mathew 25:31-46). But what I think of the most is Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego being thrown into the fiery furnace.

Insert scripture Daniel chapter 3 verses 24 and 25.

So, now that we have chosen Jesus to be our Lord and Savior; now that we are reading God’s word, eating it up and trying to adjust our lives so that we would live according to God’s word, it is now that we meet the Refiner’s Fire.

When I saw this video I could not help but to think of what King Jesus did for us how he was crucified for us. He is the crucible that we are poured into.

In other words, we approached our Heavenly Father, in prayer, through Jesus Christ. We cannot do it apart from Jesus Christ. He is our crucible.

Therefore, He tells us to pick up our cross and walk.

We need to understand that when we do this we are simply following in His footsteps.

Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. – Matthew 16:24

http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew16:24&version=NKJV

I mean you really have to make sure that you are understanding this. We could not pay the price of the debt for our own it took Jesus Christ to do that for us.

So, Jesus Christ pay the price. He took that weight on himself. He bore that burden for us, and cleared us of it so that it is IN Jesus Christ that we are debt-free.

Apart from Jesus Christ we still got a debt to pay, but in Jesus Christ we are debt-free.

Amen

Tried as if by fire, proven to be told. I couldn’t end this without taking a look at the refining process for gold…

This has been the most interesting of all of the studies I have done.

I’ve heard so many hellfire teachings.

I’ve even had people tell me I was going to help because I was not a certain religion.

I’ve had trials that I have come thru that has only served to strengthen my faith.

I’m even at that place in my journey where I am asking to be refined and purified.

Each step in the process I can see in my life, and to see this in conjunction with the purifying and refining of silver is breathtaking.

Oh how HE loves us. ❤