The air is turning from hot to warm, to soon to be gently cool. Seasons change. Some seasons are hard, some are easier than others. Do you have a favorite season? Winter, Spring, Summer, or Fall. (Do you remember a song like that?!) Thank you for this opportunity to join you for today’s Weekly encouragement! episode. I am grateful for this opportunity and our time together. This is one of the best challenging messages I’ve heard. I was encouraged by this word … You can do hard things. I receive this as a blessing and I want to share it with you. Hard things might sometimes get defined as impossible. That is such a lie! You will hear from deeply faithful people who have gone through deeply painful times in today’s Weekly encouragement! Hard times in their lives have become a strengthening in their soul and faith. No one wants to experience hard or difficult or painful times. I would not wish this upon anyone. Yet we live in a fallen world. We are not able to avoid pain in this life, but we can avoid becoming derailed by pain. I know people who have experienced tremendous pain, yet they haven’t become derailed by it. The grace of God is evident in their lives and how they navigate through hard things. One of the keys from today’s Weekly encouragement! is to be filled with the love of the Bible. The Word of God. I’m amazed at how this transforms a situation, a story. If we are filled with God’s word, negative thoughts and self talk are defeated. There’s no room for such defeat when we keep our focus on Christ. He transforms even our emotions. It sometimes (maybe all times, or always) takes resiliency and strength to fight negative emotions. That’s what today’s presenters have done to overcome the pain and defeat that tried to destroy them. The reward is so powerful. Please stand firm, resisting any tendency to become defeated over a situation or circumstance in your life. In one of the most painful places in life, today’s guest shares how intimacy with God breathed life into her when God spoke to her heart. “You don’t have to feel well to be powerful!” What a great revelation. I want to stand on this hope, as well. We can live with great purpose in any season. Oh! Do you remember the song quoted (sort of quoted) by me earlier? The next line says “all you have to do is call!”? Call upon God and make use of the tools He’s given. I believe this route will even help bring people together more powerfully. Though this lesson is about having more life and having it abundantly, there’s an amazing correlation to suffering. We develop tools in our life that can be used for incredible good when we go through very hard places. It’s called suffering in some unrefined places. Not a word we can use in everyday life. But it’s something that impacts each of us. Some more than others, I know. But I don’t have to consider it a negative reality. It can be so filled with purpose. I hope you experience this in any suffering you deal with. This is my prayer for you. Not that you have suffering, but that you have blessing in any suffering to the pulling down of strongholds in your life the deter you from God’s most lovely purpose in your life. Please remember I’m praying for you because I love you, in all these things.