A young college girl went to her father, a chef, and complained about how difficult life had become. She indicated that the struggles she was going through were threatening to destroy her. She wasn’t sure how she would make it.

Her father, without a word, lead her into the kitchen. He out three pots of water on to boil. In the first pot he placed carrots. In the second, he placed an egg. In the third, he put in coffee beans. After 20 minutes he removed the pots from the heat and removed the carrots. They were soft and pliable. He removed the egg, now hard-boiled. The third, he poured into a cup.

He asked his daughter to note what she saw from the experiment. She was able to note, as he pointed out, that the once strong, hard carrots were now soft and weak. The egg, once fragile and soft had been turned hard from the hot water. But the coffee beans had done something unique: they actually changed the water and turned into something good to drink.

God gives us struggles in life to refine us. You can allow those struggles to weaken you or harden you. But you can also allow God’s purpose, and not only to be improved by your struggles and hardships, but to also improve the environment around you!

Isaiah 48:10 shares how God refines us: “I have refined you, but not as silver is refined. Rather, I have refined you in the furnace of suffering.” Suffering is not always about punishment. It can be about improving us!