It is easy to respond to pain with anger, bewilderment, bitterness, and general distrust that the Lord is not treating you fairly. But our God is a loving Father that is, as Charles Spurgeon said, “too good to be unkind and too wise to be mistaken.” It is especially important in suffering to remember that our faith must not be in our faith or in anything else but in God’s character and integrity. The Bible teaches us this lesson over and over again in propositional statements and in stories of men and women whom the Lord took deep into the waters of pain. What they could not see at the time of suffering was later to be revealed as God’s goodness.

The greatest means of spiritual growth will be the valleys of humiliation, hurt, and heartache. But you must tie your anchor of faith to this absolute, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me” (Psalms 23:4).

These are just seven biblical exhortations that will provide stimulus for growth. These absolutes will lead you on the pathway to maturity. The more we act as our Lord and reflect his personality, the more He is seen by an unbelieving world. To those whom God will give sight, they will see and be attracted to the winsome Christ in us.