Charles R. Swindoll Quotes

The most remarkable thing about suffering is that God can use it for our good.

It is not God's way that great blessings should descend without the sacrifice first of great sufferings. If the truth is to be spread to any wide extent among the people, how can we dream, how can we hope, that trial and trouble shall not accompany its going forth.

There will be days when you feel defeated, exhausted, and plain old beat-up by life's whiplash. People you love will disappoint you - and you will disappoint them. You'll probably struggle with some kind of mortal appetite. Some days it will feel as though the veil between Heaven and Earth is made of reinforced concrete.

I used to hurt so badly that I'd ask God why, what have I done to deserve any of this? I feel now He was preparing me for this, for the future. That's the way I see it.

A season of suffering is a small assignment when compared to the reward. Rather than begrudge your problem, explore it. Ponder it. And most of all, use it. Use it to the glory of God.

When life is good and we have no problems, we can almost let ourselves believe we have no need for God. But in my experience, sometimes the richest blessings come through pain and hard things.

As in nature, as in the arts, so in grace; it is rough treatment that gives souls as well as stones their lustre; the more the diamond is cut the brighter it sparkles; and in what seems hard dealing, their God has no end in view but to perfect His people's graces. Our Father, and and kindest of fathers, He afflicts not willingly; He sends tribulations, but hear St Paul tell their purpose, - "Tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope."

The dark moments of our life will last only so long as is necessary for God to accomplish His purpose in us.

If tribulation is a necessary element in redemption, we must anticipate that it will never cease till God sees the world to be either redeemed or no further redeemable.

True, God hates Alzheimer's, spinal cord injury, mental illness, autism, and the rest (these conditions are all symptoms of the Fall). Yet he permits these things to accomplish something far more precious in our lives: patience, endurance, compassion for others who hurt, and refined faith and trust in God, to name a few.

Calamity is a blessing when it brings one to God. --- Hadassah

Your pain has a purpose. Your problems, struggles, heartaches, and hassles cooperate toward one end-the glory of God.

God will use your mess for good. We see a perfect mess; God sees a perfect chance to train, test , and teach.

I believe the hard heartest, most cross grained and most unloving Christians in all the world are those who have not had much trouble in their life. And those that are the most sympathizing, loving and Christlike are generally those who have the most affliction. The worse thing that can happen to any of us is to have a path made too smooth. One of the greatest blessings the Lord ever gave us was a cross.

God's greatest blessings often come costumed as disasters. Any doubters need to do nothing more than ascend the hill of Calvary.

Bear the Cross cheerfully and it will bear you.

Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament; adversity is the blessing of the New.

Do you think that you shall enter the Garden of Bliss without such trials as came to those who passed before you?

Some people who suffer run away from God, and I know the tendency, but instead I just run to Him.

God will not permit any troubles to come upon us, unless He has a specific plan by which great blessing can come out of the difficulty.

It's easy to lose sight of God when life is sweet and easy, but there is something awesome about despair, and it is the closeness of God when we are at our weakest.

I do not believe that God has imposed suffering upon anyone to punish them or to teach them a lesson.

Extraordinary afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins, but sometimes the trial of extraordinary graces.

Pour not on the comforts you want, but upon the mercies you have. Look rather at God's ending in afflicting, than to the measure and degree of your affliction.

When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord's choicest wines.