God will never disappoint us… If deep in our hearts we suspect that God does not love us and cannot manage our affairs as well as we can, we certainly will not submit to His discipline. …To the unbeliever the fact of suffering only convinces him that God is not to be trusted, does not love us. To the believer, the opposite is true.

Are we so childish (I do not say childlike) as to think that a God who could scheme a Jesus-plan would lead poor pilgrims into situations they could not bear?

St. Augustine said, The very pleasures of human life men acquire by difficulties. There are times when the entire arrangement of our existence is disrupted and we long then for just one ordinary day - seeing our ordinary life as greatly desirable, even wonderful, in the light of the terrible disruption that has taken place. Difficulty opens our eyes to pleasures we had taken for granted.

Your trials and difficulties are a golden opportunity to illustrate your faith in God.

In the world you will have tribulation.

Trials are not meant to defeat you. They are meant to be defeated.

I have wondered why it is that our greatest triumphs spring from our greatest extremity and adversity. Perhaps it is because we are so resistant to change, we only move when our seat becomes too hot to occupy.

Though adversity is the fertile soil in which the human spirit best grows, we loathe it still. I do not see how it can be otherwise, for no rational being seeks out pain and misfortune. Still, I cannot help but wonder if it is not somehow wrong to enjoy the fruit but curse the tree.

I have learned a great truth of life. We do not succeed in spite of our challenges and difficulties, but rather, precisely because of them.

Father, if this problem, pain, sickness, or circumstance is needed to fulfill your purpose and glory in my life or in another's, please don't take it away." This

Find me one person who's doing something interesting in the world who hasn't felt the hot sting of a NO. Or a door slammed in the face. Or boos. Or a rejection letter. Or a tepid reception. Or bankruptcy. Or gotten fired.

God allows us to experience the low points of life in order to teach us lessons that we could learn in no other way.