Refiner's fire

"Perhaps refining isn't about bringing out the best in you. Perhaps refining is truly about bringing out the worst - because only then is the Master able to scour the flaws and imperfections away and create a shiny, clean vessel."

President James E. Faust said, "Here then is a great truth. In the pain, the agony, and the heroic endeavors of life, we pass through a refiner’s fire, and the insignificant and the unimportant in our lives can melt away like dross and make our faith bright, intact, and strong. In this way the divine image can be mirrored from the soul. It is part of the purging toll exacted of some to become acquainted with God. In the agonies of life, we seem to listen better to the faint, godly whisperings of the Divine Shepherd."

He doesn't say, "In the picnics of life, we feel a hug and know that all is well and life will be full of easiness and butterflies," although it is true that the Lord's love is available even during trial and hardship. The purpose of life is to test us - to try our faith and our strength, to give us an opportunity to be heated to the breaking point so that the flaws are revealed, and then overcome them to become a clean and beautiful masterpiece.

"Our needed conversions are often achieved more readily by suffering and adversity than by comfort and tranquillity.... The Prophet Joseph was promised that “thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment; and then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high.” - Elder Dallin H. Oaks

The challenge, then, is to not shirk from the refiner's fire, to not hide from its cleansing influence, and to have faith that in the "agonies of life" the Master is truly creating a masterpiece.