I'm curious what are some challenges in life you had to deal with and how God helped you overcome?
I was at church and my pastor said that his pastoral intern from many years ago died at age 53 from cancer. The patient found out in 3 weeks it was over. So sad.
50% of marriage end in divorce and I was so close to going there but held on.
This is a great question.
I guess I have different categories:
A. The hardest times centered around my divorce:
1. Coming home from what I thought was a normal day of work and school, and finding half the house gone.
2. Finding out he left for someone else.
3. Going to court and having him tell the judge and the court that he didn't know how to talk to me anymore. I felt thrown away.
I always say he took my soul with him when he left, and God has spent all these years helping me try to grow a new one. I know that isn't Biblically accurate, but boy, did it ever feel that way. But I have plenty of my own faults, and have told God a hundred thousand times I wish I could go back and change all the things I did wrong, too.
B. The times my parents have had medical emergencies that came out of nowhere and we didn't know if they'd make it.
C. The deaths of my beloved grandparents.
D. Finding out someone I'm close to is about to walk through an unknown and undeserved fire.
I know God is faithful and gets us through (and yes, the people involved are all Christians.) But it's one of those times when, even though you know the truth of all the passages saying that God will be with you, but that doesn't mean that you, the people involved, or the situation it surrounds will ever be the same.
The scariest part to me is the unknown; the second scariest part is learning how to adjust to what becomes a "new normal."
Thanks very much for the thought-provoking thread!