Hard times don’t mean you’ve failed. They mean He’s forging something deeper, real strength that doesn’t break when life does.
Loneliness amplifies everything. A problem shared might be a problem halved, but a burden carried alone feels exponentially heavier. It convinces you that your particular struggle is a unique flaw, a sign you've taken a wrong turn everyone else avoided.
You look around and see smiling faces on social media, capable colleagues, and families that seem—from the outside, at least—to have it all figured out. And a voice in our head whispers, "See? They aren't struggling. Their yoke is easy. Their path is smooth. What's wrong with you?
It's a lie. An ancient, tired lie.
I'm reminded of the prophet Elijah. After one of the most monumental public victories of his life, he collapses under the threat of a single queen. He runs for his life, sits down under a solitary juniper tree, and in 1 Kings 19:4, he asks God to let him die. "It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am not better than my fathers."
Read that again. I am not better than my fathers.
That's the sound of a man feeling utterly, completely alone. He believes his struggle is a sign of his failure. He's comparing his behind-the-scenes to everyone else's highlight reel. Even the great ones feel it. The profound loneliness that makes the hardship so much harder to bear.
Believe me when I say you are not the only one feeling this way. Your feeling of isolation is the first thing the struggle lies to you about. But it is a shared human experience. A fellowship of the weary. We're just all hiding it, thinking we're the only ones.
Where Did This Burden Even Come From?
So we feel alone. And we feel the weight. But why does it have to be so… heavy? Couldn't we learn our lessons in the sunshine? Couldn't strength be built with lighter weights?
We ask this because we misunderstand the purpose of the weight of our hardship. We think it's a punishment, a barrier, a sign of His absence.
What if it's an invitation?
Let me remind you that the yoke is a farming tool. It's not meant to crush the animal. It's meant to direct its immense power, to focus its strength toward a purpose—to plow a field or pull a cart. Without the yoke, the strength is wasted, dissipated in a frantic run in no particular direction.
Jesus, in Matthew 11:28-30, speaking to a crowd of people who knew exactly what a yoke was, said something that must have made their jaws drop: "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."
Take my yoke upon you.
He doesn't say He will snap His fingers and make the plowing disappear. He doesn't promise a life without a field to till. Rather, He offers a different way to carry it. He offers to get into the yoke with you. To pull alongside you. The weight of the cart doesn't change. But your experience of the weight is transformed because you are no longer pulling it alone.
The heaviness you feel in your hard times is the friction of your strength meeting an immovable object. It's the strain of trying to pull the cart by yourself. The yoke feels heavy because you're fighting it. You're trying to go your own way, to pull your own load, to prove your own strength.
Strength isn't born from the absence of the load. It's forged in the faithful pulling of it, alongside Him.
What This Strength Actually Feels Like
We have this idea that spiritual strength looks like a superhero—chest puffed out, chin held high, effortlessly leaping over tall buildings in a single bound.
I don't think that's it.
I think the strength He forges in the hard times feels less like power and more like peace. Less like certainty and more like resilience. It's not a muscle you flex; it's a root system that goes deep.
Think of it as a tree planted by the rivers of water. Its strength isn't its intimidating posture. Its strength is its hidden, relentless reach for nourishment. When the drought comes, and it will, that tree doesn't wither because its strength was built in the quiet, unseen, daily practice of sinking roots.
This is the promise in Psalm 1. That tree "bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper."
Notice that? In his season. Not all the time. The strength is the resilience to not wither while you wait for your season. The strength to be faithful on the unremarkable days, to pull the yoke in the ordinary fields, trusting that the roots are still drinking, even when you can't feel it.
This kind of strength feels like:
- A slower reaction time to panic. What would have sent you into a tailspin last year now makes you take a deep breath. You've seen trouble before. You know it doesn't have the final word.
- A deeper compassion for others. Your own struggle has sanded down your sharp edges of judgment. You hear someone's story and think, "I get it," instead of, "Why don't they just…"
- A quieter mind. The roaring stadium of anxiety hasn't vanished, but you've found a way to turn down the volume. You know which voices to listen to and which to ignore.
- A surer footing. It's not that the ground beneath you is suddenly rock solid. You've learned how to find your balance on the shifting sand. You know where to place your feet.
This is the real strength. It's not flashy. It won't always get you applause. But it is unshakable. Because it was earned, it was forged. It was pulled into existence through the faithful, plodding, often weary work of bearing the load.
The Alchemy of Affliction
Here is the sacred mystery. The great alchemy He performs in the human soul.
He doesn't just help us survive the hard thing. He transmutes it. He takes the base metal of our pain, our fear, our failure, and our longing, and—if we let Him—He turns it into the gold of wisdom.
The very thing you are praying for Him to remove might be the exact instrument He is using to remake you.
The apostle Paul understood this alchemy intimately. He pleaded three times for a "thorn in the flesh" to be taken from him. The answer he received wasn't the one he wanted, but it was the one he needed. 2 Corinthians 12:9 says, "And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness."
My strength is made perfect in weakness.
Not in spite of it, but because of it. In it. The weakness itself becomes the canvas upon which His strength is most brilliantly displayed.
Your weakness—that thing you hate, that thing you try to hide, that failure that keeps you up at night—is not a barrier to His use of you. It is the prerequisite for it. It is the empty space that His strength can fill. It is the cracked jar that lets the light shine through.
The hard time doesn't just make you stronger. It makes you you. A more authentic, more compassionate, more resilient, and more grounded version of you. The you that is not easily shaken. The you that knows, deep in your bones, where your strength really comes from.
The Next Time the Clock Reads 2:17 AM
So the next time you find yourself awake in the silent, heavy hours… the next time you taste that familiar fear… the next time you feel the weight of the yoke on your shoulders…
Remember.
You are not alone. You are in a fellowship of the weary, a club that includes prophets and kings.
I need you to consider the yoke not as a punishment, but as an invitation to pull alongside Him, to learn a new rhythm for your strength.
And the strength being forged in you right now, in the fire of this difficulty, won't look like arrogance. It will look like peace. It will feel like roots. It will sound like a quiet confidence that whispers, even on the hardest day: I am being remade.
The burden is real. But so is the promise.
His grace is sufficient. It is enough. For this. For you. Right now.
And that is a strength no easy path could ever provide.
Photo Credit: ©Getty Images/AscentXmedia
