When you meet the challenges, as you cross the battlefields and brave the storms of life, you can either try to endure them on your own or you can let the tumult cause you to experience His care and protection and deliverance--and resultant newness. You can let the Lord's "left-handed compliments" become your steppingstones to greatness through increased dependence on Him so He can use life's challenges to break and then make you; or you can avoid the humbling, rough it alone, and come through maybe stronger, but not remade. The choice is yours.The Lord will always come to your aid when you cry out to Him in your need. He will always answer the cry of those who hunger and thirst for Him and His righteousness. It's at that time, when your heart and soul are crying out for forgiveness, for answers, for help, for strength--when your heart recognizes its incompleteness and the need to unite in passionate desire with your Creator to find fulfillment, that your new man is formed from the ashes and death of the former. At that time, your humility triumphs over your pride, and you have the victory.
ML 3448:206,207