I read this today in Streams in the Desert. I thought, perhaps, it might bless those of you who are going through deep, dark trials.

George Mueller: “The only way to know strong faith is to endure great trials. I have learned my faith by standing firm through severe testings.”

A. B. Simpson: “Dear Soul, you may scarcely realize the value of your present situation. If you are enduring great afflictions right now, you are at the source of the strongest faith. God will teach you during these dark hours to have the most powerful bond to His throne you could ever know, if you will only submit.”

“God’s greatest gifts come through great pain. Can we find anything of value in the spiritual or the natural realm that has come about without tremendous toil and tears? Has there ever been any great reform, any great discovery benefiting humankind, or any soul-awakening revival, without the diligence and the shedding of blood of those whose sufferings were actually the pangs of its birth? For the temple of God to be built, David had to bear intense afflictions. And for the gospel of grace to be extricated from the Jewish tradition, Paul’s life had to be one long agony.”