One day a man found a cocoon of a butterfly.   Soon a small opening appeared.  He sat & watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to squeeze its body through the tiny hole.  Then it stopped, as if it couldn’t go any further.

The man decided to help the butterfly so he took a pair of scissors & snipped of the remaining bits of the cocoon. The butterfly emerged quite easily but it had a swollen body and shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch it, expecting that at any minute the wings would enlarge & expand enough to support the whole body, neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling.  It was NEVER able to fly.

The man in his kindness and haste did not understand:  The restricting cocoon and the struggle required by the butterfly to get through the opening was a way of forcing the fluid from the body into the wings.  By doing this the butterfly would be ready for flight!

You may have heard this story told over and over; but it’s good to hear it yet again! Character, patience, long-suffering; all the fruits of the Spirit are born out of challenge and adversity. Without those struggles, we wouldn’t grow or tap into our potential.

Certainly, a life without struggles sounds wonderful but we would not be “the best version of ourselves” without those struggles.

Today, you might be facing some real struggles and challenges. Let them make you strong!  Grow into a butterfly and FLY!!!

Galatians 5:22 says,

But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness.”