Forty denotes a period of preparation for unique intervention or some other special action of the Lord; it is thus a time of grace. The test is refining on the one hand, but it can serve as a sort of validation on the other. The grace may serve to close one season and begin another. It is a time of change. The themes shape up thusly: patience, endurance, purification, repentance, grace, rebirth. These threads will form your own story
