Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

—James 1:2-4

I woke up this morning to a loud thunder crash and the sound of rain pelting our roof. This adrenaline-rush-inducing start to the new day led me down two paths of thought simultaneously.

An Empty Cup and a Blank Page

First was the rather uncomfortable knowledge that it was Monday morning and I had nothing written for today’s post. I didn’t even have a topic. Normally, I write these devotions on Sunday night and schedule them to go out Monday morning. I get my topics from what God has taught me that week, most often during church on Sunday morning, but I’d been traveling home after a writer’s conference and hadn’t even had the chance to stream a service.

I was feeling empty and trying to overflow from that. And on top of that, it seemed like God was being silent. In a normal week, I can feel God teaching me, showing me things He wants me to know like He’s shining a spotlight on certain truths as I encounter them, and nudging me either to investigate more or humbly recognize that it’s pointing to something I need to work on in my own life. But not so this week. It felt like I was on my own with no idea what direction to go.

Seeing Rain Differently

The other train of thought was about rain. We often think of rain as something negative. We don’t like the gray skies. We don’t want to get wet as we run to our cars. It’s inconvenient, and in high enough quantities, it can be dangerous.

Rain is also a tangible reminder of the Fall. In the Garden of Eden, there was no need for rain, and all the plants’ needs were taken care of through numerous springs that bubbled up from the ground.

And even so, rain is necessary to our lives. Without rain, all the plants around us that we depend on so much would die. We wouldn’t be able to grow food efficiently, and eventually it would get rather hard to breathe without plants to produce more oxygen. We also can’t forget how rain often brings us relief by cooling down a hot summer day.

It reminds me of Romans 8:28. Even a thing that is so often associated with unpleasantness is working toward our good, an idea that’s echoed in today’s verses.

Finding Purpose in Suffering

I don’t have to tell you that trials and suffering are not fun things to go through, which is why it seems so strange that we’re supposed to have joy when we experience them. But I think there’s something beautiful here that we’re missing.

There are dozens—maybe hundreds—of examples of how struggles are necessary for people to thrive. We can’t build muscle unless we encounter enough struggle to literally tear the existing muscle. We learn most effectively through struggle and making mistakes. We have the opportunity to grow socially when we struggle because it gives us the opportunity to rely on others, which leads to stronger friendships.

Going through challenging times and making it to the other side builds resilience. We learn that we’re capable of overcoming challenges. Dealing with our own struggles helps us build empathy for others with similar struggles. Meeting a challenge we don’t know how to overcome leads us to become more resourceful.

God has wired this world in such a way that our struggle is not in vain.

He Works Even in the Silence

The rain, the times when God seems silent, the I-don’t-know-how-I’ll-get-through days are not in vain. Our bad days are not for nothing. And that is so beautiful to me.

We have all, at one point or another, rejected God and His rightful authority in our lives—an authority that He has always used to our benefit rather than His. He has been faithful, and we have not. Right there, as soon as we are the unfaithful ones, we give up any right to be cared for, provided for, loved. But God, in His grace and kindness and love for us, knowing what we would do, still decided to design us for redemption.

Not just the ultimate redemption toward which Christ is working, but a daily, sometimes moment-by-moment redemption in which God brings beauty out of pain and struggle.

What a good God we serve, and what a joy it is to be His!