If you allow your enemy to steal your faith, he can destroy your life and ultimately kill your relationship with God.

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.

But God does give us responsibility, and it takes biblical faith to do those things in dependence on God.

When you reach out to God humbly, you'll find that He's already reaching out to you.

Extreme measures bring extreme results. If you want a normal life, do what normal people do. If you want to know God intimately, walk with Him daily, and please Him in every way, you're going to have to do what few do. Absolutely nothing.

To really know God, you have to wrestle through pain, struggle with honest doubts, and even live with unanswered questions. So while I won't promise you that God is your copilot or that the Bible says it and that settles it, I will promise you this: if you wrestle with him, seek him, cling to him, God will meet you in your pain.

I think God eventually changed my heart simply because I clung to my desire for Him, even though I wasn't sure how to follow through on that desire.

If we take a risk, we might not succeed, but if we avoid all risk, we guarantee we won't succeed, and we miss so much of what God wants us to learn.

God can change our circumstances, but sometimes He waits for us to show real desire for change as well as our faith in Him.

Choose today to let the peace of Christ rule in your heart and have an attitude of gratitude toward the Lord. Even if you have things that are upsetting you, take a step of faith and begin to thank God for His goodness in your life. Thank Him for working behind the scenes on your behalf. As you do, you will walk forward into the life of blessing He has in store for you!

I am still far from being what I want to be, but with God's help I shall succeed.

Do not be afraid. Do not be satisfied with mediocrity. Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.