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Keep watch and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak!

Matthew 26:41 (New Living Translation)

Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.

Matthew 26:41 (New International Version)

Stay alert; be in prayer so you don’t wander into temptation without even knowing you’re in danger. There is a part of you that is eager, ready for anything in God. But there’s another part that’s as lazy as an old dog sleeping by the fire.

Matthew 26:41 (The Message)

You’re blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That’s when you discover who you really are, and your place in God’s family.

Matthew 5:9 (The Message)

Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called sons of God.

Matthew 5:9 (New International Version)

God blesses those who work for peace,
for they will be called the children of God.

Matthew 5:9 (New Living Translation)

I have swept away your sins like a cloud.
I have scattered your offenses like the morning mist.
Oh, return to me,
for I have paid the price to set you free.

Isaiah 44:22 (New Living Translation)

I have swept away your offenses like a cloud,
your sins like the morning mist.
Return to me,
for I have redeemed you.

Isaiah 44:22 (New International Version)

I’ve wiped the slate of all your wrongdoings.
There’s nothing left of your sins.
Come back to me, come back.
I’ve redeemed you.

Isaiah 44:22 (The Message)

Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying.

Romans 12:12 (New Living Translation)

Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.

Romans 12:12 (New International Version)

Be alert servants of the Master, cheerfully expectant. Don’t quit in hard times; pray all the harder.

Romans 12:12 (The Message)

What about your struggles? Is there any chance, any possibility, that you have been selected to struggle for God’s glory? Have you “been granted for Christ’s sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake” (Philippians 1:29)?

Here is a clue. Do your prayers seem to be unanswered? What you request and what you receive aren’t matching up? Don’t think God is not listening. Indeed he is. He may have higher plans.

Here is another. Are people strengthened by your struggles? A friend of mine can answer yes. His cancer was consuming more than his body; it was eating away at his faith. Unanswered petitions perplexed him. Well-meaning Christians confused him. “If you have faith,” they said, “you will be healed.”

No healing came. Just more chemo, nausea, and questions. He assumed the fault was a small faith. I suggested another answer. “It’s not about you,” I told him. “Your hospital room is a showcase for your Maker. Your faith in the face of suffering cranks up the volume of God’s song.”

Oh, that you could have seen the relief on his face. To know that he hadn’t failed God and God hadn’t failed him—this made all the difference. Seeing his sickness in the scope of God’s sovereign plan gave his condition a sense of dignity. He accepted his cancer as an assignment from heaven: a missionary to the cancer ward.

A week later I saw him again. “I reflected God,” he said, smiling through a thin face, “to the nurse, the doctors, my friends. Who knows who needed to see God, but I did my best to make him seen.”

Bingo. His cancer paraded the power of Jesus down the Main Street of his world.

God will use whatever he wants to display his glory. Heavens and stars. History and nations. People and problems.

Rather than begrudge your problem, explore it. Ponder it. And most of all, use it. Use it to the glory of God.

Through your problems and mine, may God be seen.

by Max Lucado

So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up.

Galatians 6:9 (New Living Translation)

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

Galatians 6:9 (New International Version)

So let’s not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a good crop if we don’t give up, or quit.

Galatians 6:9 (The Message)

If you listen to constructive criticism,
you will be at home among the wise.

Proverbs 15:31 (New Living Translation)

He who listens to a life-giving rebuke
will be at home among the wise.

Proverbs 15:31 (New International Version)

Listen to good advice if you want to live well,
an honored guest among wise men and women.

Proverbs 15:31 (The Message)