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by
Laura Story
Their stories aren’t in the Bible because these characters are heroes. Their stories are in the Bible because God is the hero of their stories. Think about it. Who was the hero: Noah or the Supreme Being who saved Noah from the floodwaters? Was Daniel the hero, or was it the Great I Am who saved him from the lions? Was Abraham the hero, or was it Abba Father who made him the father of nations?
If she hadn’t been willing to tell her story, God is sovereign, and he would have found another way or used another person. But it certainly would have been a tragic loss to the Samarian woman. She was a part of the blessing. She had been redeemed and now had the privilege of helping Jesus redeem her community. Imagine all that she could have missed out on had she not told her story! Could the same be true for us?
Could failing to tell our story mean we miss out on the blessing of being used by God?
It’s an ongoing, messy story without a happy ending, but God has used her story to draw others to him.
What trial is God bringing into your life for the purpose of equipping you to do his work? What trials are you going through right now that God is using to equip you for future ministry?
Could God be using your trials to better equip you for his work?
In February 2011, we released “Blessings” as the single, and the album followed in May, debuting at No. 2 on the Billboard Christian Albums chart. A few weeks later, in June, “Blessings” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Christian Songs chart and stayed there for four weeks.
I learned that God could, and would, provide for my deepest longings. It just might look different.
occasionally God allows a dream to die so that we can see his power greatly displayed.
God doesn’t owe me an explanation.
“I had a love-hate relationship with ‘Blessings’ when it came out. On one hand, it validated the suffering I was going through and spoke of a future with a hope. On the other hand, it was a daily reminder that I had to accept, even embrace, the deepest pain I’d ever experienced.”
“There is a breathtaking beauty found in suffering that you can’t know until you risk looking for Jesus in the midst of it. That beauty is so moving, you gasp in awe of the Creator who gives us beauty for our ashes.”
“God is worth the wait. He is good. He is kind. He is faithful, and he is with you in the middle of whatever you are going through.”
If your story is unfinished, broken, or messy like mine, if you feel as though God doesn’t answer your prayers, then perhaps it’s because he has something better for you.
It’s a hard truth to hear that our circumstances might not change and God might not fix the broken things in our lives. But I know personally that even when our situation doesn’t change for the better, we can change for the better.
Disabilities don’t cause relationships to fall apart; it’s how our sin manifests itself in that disability setting.
Why wouldn’t he design the trials in your life specifically for you? To reach you? To teach you? And to draw you closer to God?
God has so intricately designed us to be in relationship with him that if we try to do life on our own, we can’t. It’s impossible without him. No wonder people say it’s the hardest thing they’ve ever done, that life is too much for them, and they can’t do it anymore. The truth is we can’t. But he can.
Joy doesn’t come from our circumstances; it comes from our God. And since God is with us during our trials, it is possible to have joy even in our trials.
it’s a lie that comfort, satisfaction, and joy come from an answer to “Why is this happening to me?”
Maybe you thought God didn’t hear you. But perhaps God heard you and his answer was the same as his answer to Paul. He left your brokenness right where it was.
But when God chooses not to, we can still give him glory, and we can still boast of his strength in our weakness, and we can still find joy in his presence.
Our lives were different than we expected them to be, but that didn’t mean they weren’t exactly what God had planned for us.
