Comfort or Character?

Yesterday as I was talking to someone, they said, “I don’t understand why God would allow this when He knows how I feel”. That makes me think of the saying, “God is more concerned with our character than He is our comfort”. That is not a very comforting statement, but it’s the truth. So often times we expect God to be easy, to make things easy for us and do things the way WE want it done. No harm, no foul and everyone’s happy, right? Um, no, think about the caterpillar transforming into a beautiful butterfly….what if it decided that going through the cocoon process was just too hard or not worth the sacrifice or doing away with selfishness? You see, it is during the cocoon process that the wings are strengthened and old cells are stripped away, cells that won’t benefit the butterfly. I am sure the process is not very comfortable and it would not have been the path the caterpillar would have chosen, but look at the outcome. It has wings to fly and beauty for us all to enjoy. Much like the caterpillar, we must go through a metamorphosis’ of sort so that when the process is over we can soar to higher levels and our beauty in the Lord can be seen by all to enjoy. So when we don’t trust the hand of God, we can trust the heart of God. Jeremiah 29:11 states, “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. He knows the beginning to the end….and we must trust that He knows what best for us ~ the who, when, how and the where.