Recently I was driving to work and the Christian song "Blessings" by Laura Story came on the radio. If you aren't familiar with the song, the chorus goes like this:

What if Your blessings come through raindrops?

What if Your healing comes through tears?

What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know you're near?

What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise?

I'd heard the song thousands of times. However, it never had any effect on me, and I had made up my mind that I was indifferent about the song and its lyrics. I was about to change the channel, but something inside of me told me to sit and listen. And this time, for some crazy reason, the song nearly brought me to tears. I sang along as I rounded the curve and adjusted my glasses. I was surprised. Never in my life had a song invoked such an emotional reaction in me. But considering I'm in a dry season right now, it kind of made sense.

What's a dry season, you may ask? The best way I can describe it is being in a period of life where you can't really control your circumstances and aren't particularly overjoyed with life at the current moment. It's not always a time of major trauma or tragedy; sometimes it's just when life is happening all around you and your mind struggles to comprehend and accept the situation. Personally, my dry season started as I approached summer and came home for break. It sounds weird, right? Isn't summer break supposed to be something that all the kids look forward to, count down the days til, and dream about? That's the way it always used to be for me, at least. But college really changed everything.

I knew that summer break meant not seeing some of the senior friends I'd made possibly ever again. I knew that it signaled the end of some class relationships I'd built over the semester. I knew it entailed saying goodbye to my roommates, my best friends, and boyfriend for three and a half months. And I knew it meant having to work all summer at a job I was doing just to save some money. And all those prospects really brought me down.

So here I am, on my third week of being home, in my second week of work. I miss my boyfriend. I miss my best friends. And oddly enough, I kind of miss campus. But I know I still have about three more months of being home working before I can get back to student life, which I now consider my norm.

Time has been weighing heavily on my heart recently. It's a funny thing, you know? I wish for it to go by so quickly but at the same time, it really scares me how fast it flies past me in retrospect. Learning how to be happy with my current situation--my "dry season"--and the reality of time is really, really hard. But that's okay because as Christians we aren't called to be happy all the time. God doesn't expect us to be overjoyed 24/7, 365 days a year. He knows we will have doubts. He knows we will have struggles, anxiety, fear and hardships. He simply asks us to be content.

Paul writes in Philippians 4:11-13, "I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every season, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all things through him who gives me strength."

I can do all things through Him who gives me strength.

If you grew up in church, that's probably a phrase you heard a lot--I know I did, at least. It didn't make a lot of sense as a kid, but now that I'm older and understand the context, it makes an overwhelming amount of sense.

Paul was persecuted, imprisoned, and hated by the nonbelievers. He endured so much suffering and hardships, and he wasn't secretive about it--he literally stated all the terrible things that had happened to him (2 Corinthians 11:23-29). Compared to that, I can't say I've faced the same trials, but I'm sure all those things took a toll on him mentally and emotionally. But instead of wallowing in his discomfort and asking "Why, God?", he chose to fix his eyes on the One he knew could relieve his pain and make everything worth it: Jesus. He knew that if he put his faith in Christ, he would be given the strength to endure anything and everything.

Imagine you're participating in a super difficult triathlon: your mind, body, and soul are exhausted. You know the finish line is somewhere in the distance but you feel as though you can't go on any longer; the pain is just too intense. What if someone were to reach out and give you an energy and strength drink to make it through? What if they not only did that, but also held your hand and ran the rest of the race with you by your side the entire time?

Paul realized that the only way he could learn to be content in life was to reach out and grab that drink, grab that hand. And if Paul was strong enough in his faith to do that while being flogged and starved in a cold, moldy jail cell thousands of years ago, shouldn't we do the same today as we live in comfort in a country that has freedom of religion?

Trust Jesus in your dry seasons and you will be blessed bountifully in times of plenty. Trusting Him is something I'm still learning to do, but every day gets a little easier, and I know it will for you, too.