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Today has been a day of mixed and mottled emotions. I have found myself swinging from joy to trepidation about the future. I've struggled with resting in God's having control of the future, even the good stuff. I have gotten so used to expecting the other shoe to fall, and so often it has lately, that I'm now struggling with holding on to my joy when things are going in a more positive direction. I know that God is wanting me to rejoice and to not worry. I found comfort in the following quotes as I pondered the development of my own character. I hope that they encourage and inspire you. "PERFECT THROUGH SUFFERING" Heb. 2:10 Steel is iron plus fire. Soil is rock, plus heat or glacier crushing. Linen is flax plus the bath that cleans, the comb that separates, and the flail that pounds and the shuttle that weaves. Human character must have a plus attached to it. The world does not forget great characters. But great characters are not made of luxuries, they are made by suffering. I heard of a mother who brought into her home as a companion to her own son, a crippled boy who was also a hunchback. She had warned her boy to be very careful in his relations to him, and not to touch the sensitive part of his life but go on playing with him as if sh were an ordinary boy. She listened to her son as they were playing; and after a few minutes he said to his companion: "Do you know what you have got on your back?" The little hunchback was embarrassed and he hesitated a moment. The boy said: It is the box in which your wings are and someday God is going to cut it open and then you will fly away and be an angel." Someday, God is going to reveal the fact to every Christian, that the very principles they now rebel against have been the instruments which He used in perfecting their characters and molding them into perfection, polished stones for His great building yonder. Cortland Myers "Suffering is a wonderful fertilizer to the roots of character. The great object of this life is character. This is the only thing we can carry with us into eternity... To gain the most of it and the best of it is the object of probation." Austen Phelps probation: n. the testing or trial of a person's conduct, character, qualifications or the like. I hope that these words and an encouragement to you. They sure were to me. I'm encouraged and thankful to be reminded that our suffering is being used by God to make us perfect. I'm also encouraged to remember that suffering isn't caused by God, but used by God. The enemy is truly powerless in the presence of our all powerful and living God. Have a blessed evening.
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