Butterflies

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly.  One day a

small opening appeared. He sat and watched

butterfly for several hours as it struggled

to force it's body through that little hole

Then it seemed to stop making any progress.

It appeared as if it had gotten as far it could

and it could go no further.

So the man decided to help the butterfly.

He took a pair of scissors and snipped off

the remaining bit of the cocoon.

The butterfly then emerged easily.

But it had a swollen body and small,

shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch the butterfly

because he expected that, at any moment,

the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to

support the body, which would contract.

Neither happened!  In fact, the butterfly

spent the rest of it's life crawling around

with a swollen body and shriveled wings.

It never was able to fly.

What the man, in his kindness and haste,

did not understand was that the restricting

cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly

to get through the tiny opening were God's way of

forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into it's

wings so that it would be ready for flight once

it achieved it's freedom from the cocoon.

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we

need in our lives.  If God allowed us to

go through our lives without any obstacles,

it would cripple us.

We would not be as strong as what we

could have been.

We could never fly!

             - author unknown