Hope Through Suffering
Remember, God’s strength is made perfect in your weakness. Most people create the illusion of strength by leaning heavily on their defense mechanisms, masks, and facades—patterns of inauthenticity that erode their sense of worth. Many of us delude ourselves with the pretense of self-sufficiency, but the toll on our health, wellbeing, and relationships is a reminder that none of us are islands and of our need for total dependence on God. When we find our identity in Christ, have our being in Him, lose our lives in His, is when we reveal our diamond-like nature hidden deep within.
Because of the hardness of the stone, a diamond was once thought to be impossible to cut. However, over time technology gave way to the discovery that precision cutting enhanced the diamond’s brilliance. The more a diamond is cut, the brighter it sparkles; and like a diamond, the more life cuts away at us, the brighter we sparkle. As a diamond is masterfully chiseled to display the prismatic beauty of radiating light, so it is with you; when life cuts you the deepest and problems strike you the hardest, this is when the Master Jeweler is cutting and chiseling away at the superfluous so that you will reflect His light all the more brilliantly. The current pressure you are experiencing will bring the best out of you. You may begin this journey flawed, but you will end up fabulous!
When you experience the fiery furnace of suffering and the overwhelming stress of problems—whether physical, financial, relational, or emotional—even as God is able to change a pebble into a pearl, a worm into a butterfly, an acorn into an oak tree, and a piece of coal into a diamond, in spite of pressure, heat, and other opposing forces, He is able to bring the beauty and brilliance out of you as you overcome the temptation to give into the pressure to remain as you are. Transformation is not easy. Yet, no matter the difficulty, God is able to bring you through any furnace of affliction or fiery trial. Indeed, all things will work together for your good until your true worth shines as brilliant as a masterfully cut diamond. And like every diamond, you will prevail as you embrace the prospering power inherent in every problem, crisis, and adversity.
Your problems don’t define you; they refine you. I want you to embrace the power to prosper concealed within every problem. It is from this vantage point that you will discover your innate brilliance in the most difficult of times. When you encounter a hard place, learn to tap into the divine genius God deposited within you. In the worst of circumstances, allow your inner diamond-like essence, nature, and character to shine. You were divinely designed with the creative power to make sense out of chaos, to innovate your way out of setbacks, to produce your way out of scarcity, to revolutionize your way out from under oppression—you were designed to overcome; for greater is He that is in you than any condition or circumstance. Even in the harshest of situations, there is nothing too hard for God. Press on in faith. Prevail.
