Food for thought

by chuckofish

Have you entered the storehouses…which I reserve for times of trouble? (Job 38:22-23)

“Our trials are great opportunities, but all too often we simply see them as large obstacles. If only we would recognize every difficult situation as something God has chosen to prove His love for us, each obstacle would then become a place of shelter and rest, and a demonstration to others of His inexpressible power. If we could look for the signs of His glorious handiwork, then every cloud would indeed become a rainbow, and every difficult mountain path would be one of ascension, transformation, and glorification.

“If we would look at our past, most of us would realize that the times we endured the greatest stress and felt that every path was blocked were the very times our heavenly Father chose to do the kindest things for us and bestow His richest blessings.

“God’s most beautiful jewels are often delivered in rough packages by very difficult people, but within the package we will find the very treasures of the King’s palace and the Bridegroom’s love.”

–A. B. Simpson (1844-1919) quoted in Streams in the Desert by L.B. Cowman

“Trust God’s Word and His power more than you trust your own feelings and experiences. Remember, your Rock is Christ, and it is the sea that ebbs and flows with the tides, not Him.”

–Samuel Rutherford (1600-61)

We hunger to be known and understood. We hunger to be loved. We hunger to be at peace inside our own skins. We hunger not just to be fed these things but, often without realizing it, we hunger to feed others these things because they too are starving for them. We hunger not just to be loved but to love, not just to be forgiven but to forgive, not just to be known and understood for all the good times and bad times that for better or worse have made us who we are, but to know and understand each other to the point of seeing that, in the last analysis, we all have the same good times and the same bad times, and that for that very reason there is no such thing in all the world as anyone who is really a stranger.

–Frederick Buechner, “The News of the Day”

The painting is by William Bradford, 1859