Trouble is here to stay! And God, believe it or not, doesn’t mind you having trouble; but He doesn’t want you to have trouble handling the trouble. The most important skill in life that you can develop is How To Handle Trouble.

Are you having a good day? We basically evaluate our days as good or bad based on whether or not they were days of trouble. And most of us generally admit it was a bad day or a tough day depending on whether or not we had to face troubles. We think “no troubles” equals a good day. But isn’t it a pretty good day—in fact, even a wonderful day—when we had troubles, but we handled them? We took care of business anyhow. We won. We triumphed over all the troubles. In fact, we grew. We learned something. Your algebra teacher, like mine, probably gave you some tough equations to solve. Why? So you could handle a tougher algebraic equation the next day, and the next day, and the next.

Fourteen times the Scriptures refer to “the day of trouble.” For example, David called out to God with specific requests of protection when his enemies were threatening him. Job gave glory and praise to God in the worst of times and even exclaimed, “My redeemer lives” when in fact Job felt he was about to die.

How should you react when trouble comes? What does God expect from you when the end of your rope may be near? Well I have good news, and the answers are very clear in Scripture. God provides answers for us even when we doubt there is a way out.