I’m sure you would join me in saying “I don’t want to suffer!” We all want to get to the proverbial pot at the end of the rainbow. My life verse is Jeremiah 29:11 – “For I know the plans I have for you, plans for welfare not for evil, plans of hope and a future.” God has promised to keep working on us so we can be conformed to the image of His Son. So why the suffering, then, we ask? God is the potter and we are the clay. We could also say, God is the sculptor and we are the hunk of granite that needs to be chiseled to reshape us, to mold us. In Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, he encourages us to not lose heart when going through trials that will no doubt come our way. Though painful, they are helping God renew us day by day. “What is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”