Difficult times occur in our lives occur only because the Lord allows them to occur. And He allows them because each one serves a purpose in our lives.

Recently I was having trouble praying. My mind would either keep wandering, or I would get distracted or sleepy. And then one day an unsettling situation occurred. It saddened and shook me. But it also jolted me right out of the comfort I was settling into and right onto my knees. If anything, the situation helped me to start praying again. So I thank God for difficulties and trials. For strengthening me and pulling to close to Him, time after time.

The Passover

In the Old Testament the Lord repeatedly instructs the Israelites to observe the Passover. It's good to recall what we have been through in the past and how the Lord has brought us out of it. We tend to take for granted the Lord's mercy and become blase about what He has done in for us. So a reminder now and then is good.

Remembering our trials helps us:

1. to not forget the grace of God

2. to empathize with others and help them rather than judge them.

Deuteronomy 10:10 and 2 Peter 3:9 lend lucidity to each other.

Deuteronomy 10:10

“I myself stayed on the mountain, as at the first time, forty days and forty nights, and the Lord listened to me that time also. The Lord was unwilling to destroy you."

2 Peter 3:9

The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

The Israelites wandered around in their wilderness for forty years. They repeatedly sinned and turned away from the Lord

What could have happened was:

Israelites sin--be punished--die.

What the Lord wanted instead was:

Israelites sin--be disciplined/learn lessons--gain promise.

And the same applies for us. If we're wandering around in some kind of wilderness it's not because the Lord is slow in keeping His promises. But because He is unwilling to see us perish. The Lord making us wait is actually Him giving us a chance to change, grow in Him and be blessed.

No one really enjoys a difficult situation, be it anything. Being hard up on cash, humiliation, pressure at work, not being understood, a fight with a loved one. The Israelites didn't enjoy their time in the wilderness either. But the Lord leads us through the wilderness and allows us to remain there for a while. Unfortunately, we end up focusing on the wilderness and not Him. But only by focusing on Him can we allow ourselves to be taught the lessons He wants us to learn through trials. 

Deuteronomy 8:2-5 says:

2 You shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. 3 He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.4 Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years. 5 Thus you are to know in your heart that the Lord your God was disciplining you just as a man disciplines his son. 

The Lord allows trials in our lives because:

*Trials are meant to humble us.

*Trials show us what we really have in our hearts: the kind of people we really are.

*They test whether we keep the Lord's commands.

*They teach us to depend on the Lord.

*They are meant to bring glory to God.

*They are what the Lord uses to discipline us.

Ernest Hemingway once said: "Courage is grace under pressure."

Well, the Lord allows the pressure so that He can teach us the courage, extend to us His grace and be the strength to pull us through. He disciplines and moulds us only because He loves us enough to do so.