I have shared about the butterfly, a few times before but this morning I felt the need to share it again. I say this because there is somebody who struggled yesterday, is struggling today and might be struggling tomorrow. Your struggle could be with weight loss, sickness, sustaining your marriage and your mind, finances, children, school, jobs, starting businesses, starting over and maybe it is spiritual. Whatever your struggle is, know it will not last but it is necessary. Sounds crazy, right? Of course it does but don’t stop reading because I need you to get this. A butterfly starts from an egg, it is then born as a baby caterpillar at which point all it does is eat in order to grow. Then the caterpillar goes through a metamorphosis stage in which it is enclosed in a hard shell called a chrysalis. Looking at the outside, you don’t tend to see any changes but that’s because the work is being done on the inside. Once the caterpillar has gone through the inward change, it has to now come out of its shell and this happens through struggling. See, when the butterfly struggles to get out of the shell, it is serving two purposes. One, it is shedding the old in order for the world to see its new body. And two, the struggle is pumping the necessary blood into the butterfly’s wings in order to strengthen them to fly. In other words, without the caterpillar’s struggle, we’d never see it as a butterfly.
Beloved, you’re struggling and sometimes it seems to be more than you can bear but there has to be a struggle. If you didn’t struggle, we would not be able to see the transformation you’ve been going through. Yes it’s hard but so is the shell of the caterpillar but this is because there is work being done inwardly. Sure, most people can’t see it, all they recognize is you still look the same but there’s something happening on the inside of you. And although it is hard and even hurtful, God created the hardness of your outer in order to ensure no one can mess it up before He’s done. Then when His work in you is complete, you’ll now begin to struggle to come out of your shell. This happens when you are taken from your comfortable place. When God sends you to help folk you know don’t like you. When you offer forgiveness and you weren’t the one who did anything wrong. When you show up to places you were once fearful to go. When you sit at tables you were once not invited to and you show up with your own chair. When you are no longer bound by fear. That is what struggling does. Struggling gives you the strength to fly. Not like butterflies but FLY … Face Life Yearning. This means you face life desiring, craving and hungering to get whatever God said you can have, even if that means struggling until you get it.
Lakisha, the Author 