Daily Encouragement: Day 266

Adapted from: Handbook to Spiritual Growth

PERSPECTIVE ON THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF LIFE

Without a growing sense of desperation, we will not maintain our focus on God. The Lord lovingly uses trials and adversities in a variety of creative ways in our lives, and part of the purpose of our suffering is to drive us to dependence on Him alone. As God’s children, our pain causes us to ask, to seek, and to knock (Matthew 7:7–8), and in His time, God responds by revealing more of Himself to us. This personal knowledge increases our faith and our capacity to trust His character and His promises.

As we renew our minds with a growing biblical perspective on the experiences and circumstances of life, we come to see that this life is a time of sowing the seeds of eternity rather than multiplying ephemeral treasures on earth. Such a perspective reduces our anxieties, increases our contentment, and strengthens our trust and hope.