Written by Pastor Jack Wellman– Harriet Beecher Stowe
Devotional: 6 Signs That Bad Times are About to End
Everybody goes through rough times. Nobody is immune to personal challenges. It happens to the very best of us. Unfortunately, this is cold comfort to most people. They know intellectually that bad times can happen to anybody, but when it happens to you, you feel that it won’t end. You feel defeated and discouraged, and it seems to drag on forever.
Well, if you’re in the pit of a particularly challenging time in your life, you can take comfort from Harriet Beecher Stowe’s words that the place and time of the tide turning turns on your ability to never give up. Just hang in there.
Here are six signs that the bad times are about to end. Keep an eye out for these signs because they signal a change in your circumstances.
Sign 1: You stop struggling
In many cases, personal challenges are like being stuck in quicksand: The more you move around, the faster you sink. In fact, one of the best things you can do when bad times strike is to stop fighting it.
Instead, remain calm and try to gain an understanding. You’d be surprised as to how effective this piece of advice is.
Many people are in exactly the kind of hold they’re in because they made things worse. They kept struggling instead of just moving on. They end up stuck because of their initial reaction and struggle. You might want to remain calm and focus on getting a better understanding of what’s happening before you act on your situation.
Sign 2: You stop denying
Another reason why many Christians find themselves in challenging situation is because they’re in denial. They keep thinking that the disaster is not happening to them. Many even blame other people and situations for their misfortune. But the longer you deny and the longer you lay blame on others, the longer you will stay challenged.
By quitting your denial and remaining calm and trusting Jesus, you put yourself in a better place to eventually resolving your challenge.
Sign 3: Your heart is clear
Challenges in of themselves can often be channels of blessing. In many cases, we need to go through trials because there are certain personal habits and personal ways of thinking that hold us back and keep us from reaching our full potential.
In fact, if you study the biography of many people that went on to achieve great things, they were only able to reach achieve those great goals when they were able to resolve certain things about their character. In many cases, a sure sign of your challenge ending is when your heart is clear regarding your challenge. Instead of feeling in denial, feeling bitter, or having a tough time forgiving people, your heart is clear and you are at peace.
Sign 4: Your focus is clear
As the old saying goes, where your focus goes, energy flows. You really cannot dig yourself out of a bad situation if you don’t have the right kind of energy and right kind of focus.
When the challenge first hit you, chances are your focus was fragmented. You were all over the place. Not surprising, you likely find yourself knee-deep in trouble, and you can’t seem to get out.
A sure sign those bad times are about to end is when you are focused on the solution because the more focused you are, the more energy you can invest into the proper action needed to dig you out of the hole.
Sign 5: Inner peace and calm
The main reason why many people remain challenged is because they’re not operating from a sense of inner peace and calm. They’re constantly blaming, they’re emotionally distraught, and they’re all over the place mentally and emotionally. The more unsettled you are, the longer you will struggle.
When you have this sense of inner peace and calm arising from your relationship and trusting Jesus Christ, the answers come to you more clearly. Moreover, you realize that in many cases, there’s really not much you can do about it and that sense of calm enables you to identify workable solutions and workable compromises that finally begin the slow transition out of your problems.
Sign 6: You accept
There are certain challenges that you really just can’t get out of. There are certain challenges that you cannot cure or you cannot fix. And in many cases, the only way to end that challenge is to completely accept it.
While miracles happen all the time, when you are faced with a these challenges, one of the most powerful things you can do is to accept it. That sense of acceptance brings forth inner peace and inner calm. Paired with trust, faith, and confidence in the Lord Jesus, this can enable you to achieve the state of mind that can lift all your challenges.
This doesn’t mean that the challenge is gone. All it means is that your frame of mind has changed and that at the end of the day is all that matters.
