Encouragement

1 Peter 1:6-7 (New International Version, ©2011)
6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials.
7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed.

I've been reading up on encouragement recently, and note that the operative part of that is the word 'courage' - something that I blogged on recently. It’s so easy to get disheartened, discouraged: particularly when things are going awry, friends let you down. We're told in such circumstances to rejoice - not about the bad things that are happening, but because God can use it for good, work through you.

He gives you endurance. Keep on believing; hang in there, persevere!

What doesn't kill us makes us stronger - Friedrich Nietzsche