Oh, my dears, I am sorry for all Dutchmen now who do not know the power of God. For we will be beaten. But He will not.

One, the observable, external life, grew every day more horrible. The other, the life we lived with God, grew daily better, truth upon truth, glory upon glory.

The worst can happen, but the best remains.

AND SO THE shadow fell across us that winter afternoon in 1937, but it rested lightly. Nobody dreamed that this tiny cloud would grow until it blocked out the sky. And nobody dreamed that in this darkness each of us would be called to play a role: Father and Betsie and Mr. Kan and Willem—even the funny old Beje with its unmatching floor levels and ancient angles.

He stamped on his cigar stub in the ashtray beside the radio and with it, it seemed, the anger too, for his voice grew gentle again. "Oh, my dears, I am sorry for all Dutchmen now who do not know the power of God. For we will be beaten. But He will not.

But I am in prison, dear lady from Haarlem, a prison stronger than this one.

It was a fact. We knew it, we experienced it minute by minute—poor, hated, hungry. We are more than conquerors. Not "we shall be." We are! Life in Ravensbruck took place on two separate levels, mutually impossible. One, the observable, external life, grew every day more horrible. The other, the life we lived with God, grew daily better, truth upon truth, glory upon glory.

Failure is the tuition you pay for success.

My pastor used to say you're either coming out of a tough season, in the middle of a tough season, or heading into a tough season.

Will we trust that God is good even when life is not? Our response to pain and challenges determines so much about our future. If we decide to trust, we will grow in our faith, deepen in our intimacy with God, and be conformed to the image of Christ. But if we allow our hearts to drift, we'll wake up one day drowning in doubts, buried in burdens, and feeling far from the only one who can help us heal.

What if rather than avoiding brokenness we embraced it? Welcomed it? And even prayed for it? "God, break me.

A. W. Tozer, who said, "It is doubtful whether God can bless a man greatly until he has hurt him deeply.