Author Darlene J. Conard

“This is no longer your concern,” the Lord responded to my attempt to determine the closure concerning long-lasting circumstances. The good Lord knows me better than I know myself. This habit of quickly slipping on life’s backpack needed to end.

 God knows us inside out. Occasionally, I jest, thinking God is looking down on me, scratching His head, wondering how He will fix me. Many promises spoken by God quickly terminate that thought. “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” (Jeremiah 29:11 KJV)

“Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book, all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned when as yet there was none of them.” (Psalms 139:16 KJV) David acknowledged his imperfections, knowing God had known him before his birth. Our existence transferred from the mind of God from beginning to end. Such wisdom is impossible to fathom!

Philippians 1:6 says, “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ: (Philippians 1:6 KJV)

• Be confident
• Begun a good work
• In you
• Will be performed (completed)

God never fails to complete what He started. He does perform with excellence. God is changing us while He takes care of the prolonged circumstance(s).

My grandmother would say, “Darlene, think of it this way. You want the circumstance to change but God wants to change you.” While He is working, I’m pushing for results. I’ve learned a great deal of things. It hasn’t always been easy, most of the time it’s not. Eventually, a bold faith that lays dormant emerges from beneath the ashes. 

Whatever you are going through remember child of God He will turn your struggles into something beautiful!

The Butterfly Struggle
(The Man and The Butterfly Cocoon)

A Moral Story About Life and the Lessons of Struggle

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared. He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to squeeze its body through the tiny hole. Then it stopped as if it couldn’t go further.

So the man decided to help the butterfly. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bits of cocoon. The butterfly emerged easily but it had a swollen body and shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch it, expecting that any minute the wings would enlarge and expand enough to support the body, but neither happened! The butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around. It was never able to fly.

What the man in his kindness and haste did not understand: The restricting cocoon and the struggle required by the butterfly to get through the opening was a way of forcing the fluid from the body into the wings so that it would be ready for flight once that was achieved.

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our lives. Going through life with no obstacles would cripple us. We will not be as strong as we could have been, and we will never fly.

I have asked for strength… and life has provided me with hardships, to make me strong.

I have asked for wisdom… and life has provided me with problems to solve.

I have asked for prosperity… and life has provided me with a brain, and muscles to work.

I have asked for the capacity to fly… and life has provided me with obstacles to overcome.

I have asked for love… and life has provided me with people to help in their problems.

I have asked for favors… and life has provided me with potential.

I have received nothing of what I have been asking for… but I received everything that I needed!

Live your life without any fear, with the clear conscience that everything works for the best, engage yourself with all the hardships that come to you, and prove the fact that you can overcome them all. -Author unknown-

God has you in His enormous hands!

Thank you Tommy for the use of your beautiful photos. God bless you!

Butterfly- Black Swallowtail on Clover WV © Photographer Thomas Bailey

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