By Curt Iles @curtiles
Thanks to guest blogger Curt Iles for a powerful life lesson.
In front of me are three objects: a hammer, a brick, and a flat piece of leather. They make for a wonderful lesson we all can learn from.
It’s amazing observing folks as they go through difficult times. Periods of trial, adversity, and sadness distill out what is really inside people. What’s revealed often surprises, as well as shocks, us.
The human spirit and corresponding attitudes are amazing to observe. It comes down to this:
Life will make you either hard or tough.
Let’s look now at our three objects: the hammer, the brick and the piece of leather.
Put the piece of leather and the brick on a sidewalk side by side. Now, take the hammer and hit each one of them hard several times. The brick will be broken into pieces by the hammer blows. The piece of leather may show the indents from the hammer, but it will not break or crack.
Here is why: The brick is hard, while the leather is tough.
In life, circumstances will make us either hard or tough. These circumstances are the hammer blows. It doesn’t matter whether the hammer blows are self-generated or due to chance or fate. They may be due to family circumstances, what we call rotten luck, a cancer diagnosis, a hurricane, or any trial. The hammer blows of life are limitless.
The hammer of life’s troubles hits all of us. No one is immune.
However, some people will only become tougher when the hammer falls. They take the blows, their lives even show the imprints of the hammer, but they are supple and flexible. They come out of this experience tougher and still standing.
Under the same circumstances others, like the brick, crack and crumble under the same blows. That is because like the brick, they have become hard. However, hardness does not ensure toughness.
In this new year, I encourage you to seek to be tough, but not hard. What will you do to be shaped during 2020?
Curt Iles
Curt Iles is a native of Louisiana’s Pineywoods region. He is the author of thirteen books and over 1200 blog posts at www.creekbank.net
His writing celebrates the history, culture, and people of western Louisiana.
Before becoming a full-time author, Iles worked as a teacher/coach, school administrator, youth camp manager, and missionary.
His life statement is to be a man God can use, be an encourager and be respected by those who know me best (my family).
He and his wife DeDe live in Alexandria, Louisiana.
Learn more at www.creekbank.net
Thanks again Curt
Comments 6
What a great lesson! The visual makes you see exactly the difference in becoming tough and becoming hard. The difference is seen in the reactions, the comments, the determination after the fact. So many crumble and give up, while the tough continue to fight, continue to push ahead and work hard to find their path.
Life has been hard. I recall from my childhood people making statements about certain individuals:he/she is hard, or he/ she is tough. It turned out to be true. No one could
approach the hard ones. Then there tough teachers. They expected students to study
well, and lacked leniency in their grading. Only satisfactory grades mattered. I did
well under such teachers.
God may seem hard at first, in His demands, His expectations, but what I suffer makes me
tough. I confess inconsistency in my application, but desire toughness. I want to shed any
hardness, and become toughened.
Thanks for your wise words.
Frances, I treasure your godly insights.
Sherry, I agree. Your response is beautifully written. For the last 3 years God has been hammering hard on me, but I think I’ve gotten to the point that I’m semi-pliable. 🙂
I have been both hard and tough, Curt. In both cases, circumstances are hard to endure. When I am tough, though, I find that God can use the blows of the hammer to shape me and mold me into the person He wants me to be. He can use me to minister to others. Being tough enriches my relationship with Him.