On this Easter Saturday, I attended the funeral of a friend's mother, during which she told a story about her mom helping them find caterpillars when they were young so that they could have the awesome experience of watching them go from caterpillar to cocoon to butterfly. It reminded me of another butterfly story I heard once, one that is well-suited to this season in which we move from suffering and death to rising to new life. It's possible that I may have posted it before, but if so, it's worth posting again. :-)
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| A Monarch (Danaus plexippus) eclosing from a chrysalis. It took about 15 minutes for the Monarch's wings to fully expand. (By Megan McCarty (Own work) [CC-BY-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons) |
What the boy didn't know was that it is the very process of struggling to break free from its cocoon that helps strengthen a butterfly's wings so it can later fly. By intervening and freeing it from its struggle, the boy had unintentionally doomed the butterfly to a life on the ground.
How easy it is to look at our and others' struggles and see only the pain and suffering. Often, though, those very struggles are the necessary means by which God works grace and blessing and virtue into our lives. Like the training that an athlete undergoes, or the struggles of a butterfly emerging from its cocoon, our sufferings serve a purpose. We may not see or understand the purpose when we're in the midst of the struggles, but we need to believe God's promise that they will indeed work for our good if we love and trust Him.
