When Challenges and Difficulties Become a Blessing

It’s been just more than a year since the pandemic, but somehow it feels much longer than that. Why? Why is it for others it feels so fast that they barely noticed that time passed by?

As we face everyday challenges and struggles, with things that seem so difficult and impossible to get through, a day feels like a month and a month feels like a year. But when we are in a holiday, when we take our time to rest and enjoy our freedom from all the loads of life, time flies!

Difficult to compare, to contrast and yet it is what it is. Individuals have their own way with how to deal with their daily living, but one thing for sure is that we can always plan what we want for tomorrow but God’s purpose will always stand. As Proverbs 19:21 says:  “Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the LORD’s purpose that prevails.”

As an individual who loves to travel, an outdoor person, a person who loves to communicate and be with people, this pandemic affects my day-to-day living. Such a big adjustment and a challenge to be able to function in this that they call the “new normal.”

Putting aside all the complains that are truly not needed, we are thankful that God has blessed and continually blesses us with many things, big and small. We are thankful for more quiet time to study His word, thankful for good health and peace, and thankful for having much more time to spend with the family that we appreciate more now than before. We also feel much closer to our families and friends abroad (through Zoom, Skype, and other means of social media) whom we haven’t communicated with for years. It is because we have more time now to spend with our families and friends because of travel restrictions. What we learned and hope to do in the future is to see that in difficulties and challenges there is always a blessing!

Menchie Bolk