Tough situations

My sister, Rachel Coyle, just wrote something after a horrible experience she went through that really touched me.  I feel is so true to life.  She said, "Sometimes we have to go through situations that test us and stretch us like a rubber band, just before it snaps.  Have you noticed that when a rubber band stretches that way, without breaking, it seems to grow a bit?  It gets more flexible, less stiff and rigid...may I say, set in its ways?  It seems to me that’s what happens to us.  God knows just how much pressure to put on us to cause us to grow without breaking. Through those situations, so long as we seek Him and His truth in the midst of it, we learn to relax a bit and trust God more.  It’s not fun to be stretched; it’s usually a little (or a lot) painful.  But the things we learn and the changes God brings about through the process couldn’t be accomplished any other way.  For that, we can learn to be thankful."  I hope whatever your struggle is, that you are using this time to trust God and to seek His purpose for your trials.  Rachel wrote a booklet on the subject of women struggling with an addiction to pornography.  Her booklet is listed on the side of my page, and you can catch a short interview with her here: http://biblicalcounselingcoalition.org/books/review/help-shes-struggling-with-pornography .  I think that what she said is so true, we can use our struggles to learn, change, and grow closer to God.  That right there makes the struggles we face worth it in the end.